December 2025

Winners

HerMake her your muse, / Let her live inside your thoughts, / A constant whisper

#1

141

When They're Little, When They're BigWhen they’re little, / they make your arms ache, / with the heft of them,

@Geof_Spavins73

#2

140

The Quietest ExitShe learned early that silence / was the safest room in the house – / a place with no doors to slam,

#3

137

Idle EnginesShe keeps asking what he does, / though his answers are recycled: / French bulldogs, paintball,

@William-A-Gibson30

#4

136

Garden, Late Afternoonyou bend to touch the jasmine. / I watch from the gate, / keeping distance like a promise.

#5

71

Other poems

Old soil, New rootsI carry old things / like pressed lilies. / They no longer bloom,

70

She Was in the Field Counting Stars~ / In the mist of late night solitude, / from a mislaid plateau,

@Carlo-C-Gomez17

60

Hangovers are for ChildrenI wake / with shadows / and cat hair

58

in a lightless roomhe stands facing / where the window use to be / remembering the warm sunshine

@guy-scutellaro27

57

still trying to unpackThe road softens when you travel light. / The miles traversed has a way of stripping down / Sweat and spirit

52

Drunk on EverythingTruth shows up, / walking through clover / thick enough to stain my cuffs.

@thomas-w-case44

51

Frost-script and SilenceThe cold settles in, quiet as a held breath. / Out back, the lake begins its slow work, / a skin forming where the wind once kept its path clear.

50

The Lexicon of IntimacyInfidelity (noun) \ ˌin-fə-ˈdel-ət-ē \ / Betrayal of a vow. Or whispered otherwise, the first time Coyote tasted the salt of my wrist, when lightning seemed to have waited to arrive. Grandmother would call it shadow-marriage, the reminder that paper rings and courthouse oaths cannot bind the spirit. It flowers soft and fragrant, sweet as mesquite after rain. / Myth (noun) \ ˈmith \

@Kiki-Dresden12

46

looklook, / dreams turn into frost flowers / here only

42

The CanvasHe paints bright yellow hues where my Indigo is home– / Never bothering to rinse his brush. / I know he thinks he's helping,

40

Ocean of AffectionWaves caress my feet, / ever so gently, / wind murmurs words of love

39

Maybe January yearns for clemencyMaybe I am guilty for the leftover / essays, checklists, and goodbyes. / Thence I flipped through the calendar

@EvelynYiningChen15

38

Liminal skiesThe sun rides high atop a silver wave / Each new view framed in a different hue / In the liminal sky

@sarita-aditya-verma9

37

The FlyIt's a slippery slope, / I hope you know. / Said the Solipsist

37

Subtitles Between Usit's a quiet misery / to know you only by smell, / by what lingers after you leave—

37

NicotineStained are teeth, and fingers yellow, / Softly whispered lies we keep. / Smoke unfurls in breath so mellow,

35

Raspberry"I miss my favourite bird", / I wrote, tired, in my little book. / Happy chirps of feathered friends,

@TheClumsyGardener34

34

Chasing DreamsI chase stars / not to hold them / but to feel the burn

34

Thoughts at a desk in the public libraryStiff yet bent, my spine, my legs / As I attempt to decompress; / I feel the rain in my bones

33

her name's not actually seleneyour beauty / isn't perfection / when you're weak

32

MomentaryCrunching snow under my feet, / I like this sound. / I bend reality,

@Agnes-de-Lodz18

32

january pathwayshoney-drawn sun / sinks in pulsing flames / sunlight sky-woven

@beth-fwoah-dream16

32

LimitlessOh just for a moment / let me climb out of my body / and feel the vastness of the crashing ocean waves.

31

Chemotherapythere is a crack in everything; / the burden of ballast, walking / barefoot on the surface of the sun;

@Carlo-C-Gomez8

31

My poemsI find it scary to write a poem, / because what if people don’t like it? / Or worse — what if they do,

27

complexitiesI drenched my sorrows neat, / on the veranda in this stifling heat, / while the rest of ‘Stralia’s dying, trying to fight bushfires, floods, and other catastrophes —

25

Ash and BonesAsh and bones, / lightning and fire — / I lie in a battlefield,

24

all the distancein this cocoon of silence / the wind is clear / thoughts lose their gravity

24

TimeOf all the Gods / Time is the most cruel / It feeds on

@PeterGerstenmaier9

23

If You KnewIf I could cry a river, I’m sure you would drown, / if I opened the door, you’d see a world upside down. / If you knew the place where I sit and I think,

23

Fall SongAnother year gone, leaving everywhere / its rich spiced residues: vines, leaves, / the uneaten fruits crumbling damply

23

Promise MePromise you'll always love me / as we sit with pastries and a cup of coffee before us; / say it after the bar holding up the awning of the cafe has fallen,

@ShayCaroline39

22

Eat & RunBirds at the feeder, / when twenty below, / come and leave quickly

21

My Lost HeavenIf they asked me about heaven. / I would draw your picture. / I was really smitten.

19

Water in the wellThink of sin / as the water / in the well

@South-by-Southwest23

19

My Happy PenThis must be my sad pen, / that’s all it wants to write / It’s sad because my lover,

18

Mary MaryI learned, this morning, that my Grandmère’s tiny, / designer tote is a ferriday bag. / Mary, Mary, are you worried?

18

extrovertwhen it’s quiet / my mind turns the lights off / in ever room i tried to lock

@sweettasabutton11

18

ended

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