favorites - Hello Poetry

Jul 2016

CA Guilfoyle

Of all the colors
or incense of fragrance imbued
of lavender in fields, violet blue
or softer still the lilac florets all abloom
pale silk, sweet the honeysuckle dew
drips and drinks the yellow painted tanager
and flits afield the newly winged swallowtail
the thrum and dance of bees bright in floral symphonies
gathering, heavy laden in the bending breeze
of all the colors, this bird iridescently shimmering
blue into the disappearing trees
too soon another day to lose
of all the colors, a favorite
I can never choose.

Jul 2016

spysgrandson

a sad stretch on chromosome 11

blind from birth, she
could tell the difference
between the odor of chrysanthemums and tulips,
and remember her first whiff of both

she could identify
the scent of her brother
in a groping group
of sweaty brutes

she knew
her nose was her biographer
collecting memories, visions
her eyes could not

she studied biology
only to discover her compendium
of smells originated in a space infinitely
smaller than a fly's eye

a few molecules
devoted to identifying ham,
the rich smokey meat
of her first Easter

another clump to help her hold
the faint smell of perfume which lingered
in the room hours after
her mother passed

and who knew what atoms,
what cells, what curse of chemistry
forced her to recall, most of all, the sweet scent
of her newborn's hair,

the few seconds she held him,
after his heart stopped, and they took him
and placed him in a smooth, cold box, where sight,
sound and smell were locked forever

a part of chromosome 11 has been determined to be responsible for the development of much of our sense of smell

#loss #memory #scent

Jul 2016

Barton D Smock

transponder

who wants to share
they’ve seen
but the mask
of god

I admit, I confess

as a painter
of chameleons

the art of the bruise

is lost

Jul 2016

Denel Kessler

This World Is

a hollow
swinging gourd
the swallow
snatches sustenance
mid-flight

an orchard
cherries rotting
on a mossy lawn
fodder for the
grounded dove

two shells
unhinged
sand erodes truth
the pearl
is an iridescent lie

a fissure
lost river deep
timeless echo
ricochet
repeat

#world

Jul 2016

spysgrandson

midnight, on the ranch

the gray grasses sang sweet songs,
without even a breeze to move them
the coyote howls were marrow yellow,
crimson, as their sour colors sifted
into the night

lightning streaked my charcoal
sky, and I could taste it, a salted butter
that tickled the throat on the way down,
the sonic booms it hatched smelled of baked bread,
and I hungered for more

then a white owl spoke to me,
but I did not hear it call my name
no, not mine--though its hoots formed ice,
chunks which pummeled me, froze me
to the bone

most of you know the legend, usually attributed to Native Americans, of the owl calling your name being a portent of one's death

#fear #death #synesthesia

Jun 2016

unwritten

red

today my gums bled when i brushed my teeth,
and i thought of making some metaphor
about how efforts to attain purity
only result in more stains,
but no.
it was just blood.

to call a rose — or torn gums — by any other name
is to silence the initial sting,
but it still ends up hurting more in the end.
it always does.
lying always does.

and if all i have are my words,
what am i if my words are lies?

what am i if i cannot be honest?

a bad writer, perhaps.
but trying.
i am also trying.

there are some days when the blood looks
a little less like words on a page,
and simply a little more like red,
and i am hopeful.

yet still i know
that efforts to attain purity
only result in more stains,
and red is a ***** to clean out.

(a.m.)

written june 28, 2016. inspired by bleeding gums. hope you enjoy. xo

#poetry #life #blood #red #writing #metaphors

Jun 2016

wordvango

presbyopia

might we all have a touch
of glaucoma, selectively walled in
occluded by mental myopias
where there sight is
half a day of suns,
night is blindness, never twenty four seven corrected
or twenty four right? Twenty tween's
fear and reality?cataracts
always coloring it as black or white
no depthness not colored right?
When tears fall, and people
run into burning buildings,
when innocent stars are blacked out
might we just,
let them go?

Jun 2016

heather leather

indigo

he said his favorite color was blue because
that was the color of the sky and his mothers'
wedding ring which was the only thing that
survived the fire and he keeps the ring around his
heart so that whenever he is feeling down,
he can always remember the color blue

she said her favorite color was red because she liked
to light things on fire and she was the
heartbreak girl that burned everything she
touched and you can tell that's she's coming your way
because the first thing that you think of when you see
her is red

he wanted to disappear into the ocean, because he
was calming waves of serenity and peace but
she wanted to burn bright like the star she knew she
was born to be, and she did; she was the wild card,
the indigo of the world and she burned everything
she touched, everything she loved until one day all
that was left of her heart was a pile of ashes

he said his favorite color was indigo because that
was the color of her engament ring, the one that he
had bought her the day before she burned alive and he
wears it around his chest now so that whenever
he feels like a burning red, he had her in his heart
to keep him a steady indigo

(h.l.)

i like the color indigo

#love #life #fire #pain #death #blue #red #color #burn #indigo

Jun 2016

Ellen Joyce

For all seasons

You plant kisses like spring bulbs in the curve of my neck;
I meld into you -
sinew and bone flows into blood pulsating in every caught breath
as the tip of your nose grazes my ear;
I love you nips playfully at my lobe
turning me into you like a jewellery box doll -
that slow pirouette to the tune of you and me and us.
There lies waiting room silence and you wash I’ll dry in your eyes
causing me to shiver as your fingertips trace the curve of my hips
to the rhythm of your hand in mine, fingers interlinked.
You breathe me like Christmas morning and mumble my name in your sleep
and I watch longing to kiss the twitch in your lips when your dreams turn to dark.

#love #kiss #home #*** #lovers #intimacy #closeness