Bruised Orange: Favorites

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

Aches

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

Dean Eastmond

Aches

Have mercy on this body,
it is learning to bend and shape,
but creaks and occasionally splits,
releases sighs from spinal aches,
the vertebrae laying lifeless, loving you so,
whispering of lip marks but no teeth,
sunsets but no rises, a bed but no you.
These aches are old, I know,
these aches are tired, I'm sorry,
this skin is a poem and
I leave unedited drafts of myself
in every bed
that has ever held me,
ever fractured me with metaphor,
abandoned with a half-cocked heart.

Take my bullets out.
Have mercy.

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

Of Angels and Their Folded Wings

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

raen

Of Angels and Their Folded Wings

The angels, with their folded wings
walk on silent ground

They know not whether
to weep,
or wield their sighing harps.

It seems like hearts are stones,
or jewels would they be?

Precious gems, maybe.

Of different hues,
with scattered light.

Encrusted, unpolished
by time and tears,
by things spoken and not. ...

The angels, moving forward--
with their timid halos
and shorn heads-
their soles
touching sacred ground.

Disyembre, 2013

#angel #moving #pondering #thankfulness

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

Heroism

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

Emma Pickwick

Heroism

Too much ******,
I had to be your heroine,
But I knew I could never save you.

You were suppressed of all your emotions,
The real ones at least.
Telling me lies all the time,
I couldn't trust you anymore.

When you fall asleep with me, you don't keep me warm.
Just a skinny, little shell of a beautiful body
That I miss so much.

Track marks down your arms,
Like little bits of hell.
I feel them and kiss them while you sleep,
Because I love you, I love you so dearly.
I know one day morning I'll wake up and you won't be there.
A long, long battle you stopped fighting forever ago will finally be lost.
You took your last breath, and I wasn't awake for it,
I was dreaming too deeply that when I awoke, things would be different.

I couldn't be your ******, and I couldn't be your heroine either.

#love #lies #death #drugs #****** #heroine #boyfriend #hope #sleep #kisses

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

While Sleeping

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

Jack

While Sleeping

While sleeping

Why is it mornings, so far in the distance,
flowing from beyond tempered shorelines
on lone standing bridges ~
always seem to call in the midst of a dream

When sunrise illusions now erase sleep
on meadowlark borders dotted in dew drops
built in the confines of spring
with fall fast approaching ~ featuring shadows stretched of time

Long on the porch, weathered and beaming,
tapping the front door with marching band fingers
in trumpet blares and bass drum beats ~
yet quiet in the state of mind seen through blurry eyes

Still ~ a before smile, brought about the prior evening
forces dimples once again in my cheeks
igniting the darkness with three-ring spotlights,
streaked of circus beacons on popcorn ceilings

Reminding ~ the dream I have found actually lives in my daylight,
slipping around corners and window sill gaps,
finding me on the brink of now,
stumbling my way to where I long to be ~ awake

For my dream is you,

who I so desperately miss ~ while sleeping

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

Hope

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

bones

Hope

In the end
it pulls
free of
its chain
and settles
inside like
a flame
and my
only concern
is how
long will
it burn
before I
have chained
it again

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

silence..

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

bones

silence..

your words
give me flight
like a child dreaming,

but childhood
dreams have all
of a lifetime to land,

silence rushes at me
as sharp and
as deep as grief.

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

choke

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

Quinn

choke

when I smoke cigarettes
I curse them, not myself

I'm sober,
what excuse do I have?

other than the growing sense
that my sky is perpetually falling

my therapist says
I should try breathing

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

Untitled

Feb 2015 Bruised Orange

Mel Harcum

Untitled

There’s a certain disharmony in the way of things,
and how it turns humans into monsters. I saw a monster turn a girl
into a woman with her clothes on the floor,

and he carved ‘liar’ on her chapped lips. I reached out when
she stood before me, holding a razor in one hand and whiskey
in the other. She had dashed lines on her wrists

and shattered glass at her feet. I feel like screaming, but my gums bleed
from a mouth full of broken metal wire.
I cannot tell you the story that sits on my shoulders like a child,
too young to understand the weight of himself.

Now my eyelids have been peeled from my face and
I cannot look away from the girl when she comes home after school
and asks me for help with her homework
because the least I can do is solve a few math problems.

This poem contains a trigger warning for self-harm and ****, which I have tagged as well.

#alcohol #selfharm #ptsd #**** #sisterhood #trauma #triggerwarning