Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
 
I cannot silence it.

Words simmer forth from void to
Bone to skin.

Seep through
Sludge
Gold flecked river bottom

Rising up
Steady and thick with spirit
With blood
All of your silenced selves

Lanced from the wounds of the
Midnight hour
You clutch your own skin
Hot and red
Strip away the heavy years that
Told you to be quiet.

Howl in agony,

Sing

Whistle the ghosts in through the Windows cracked just so
The crisp night air weaves like
Snakes of ice
Around your neck and now

You write

You write

You write.
 3d
irinia
it's difficult to grasp the glory of madness
red carpets are deceiving but they match red ties
monochrome minds cast the shadow of empires
over our gluten free days
no wonder we are so allergic to silence, to steps shaped by loss
a thinking without thinking destroys the becoming of words
a tired public is trapped in the structure of hope,
the show  must go on
let's see if money speak louder than guns
 6d
irinia
I couldn't dance with my eyes full of skin
Sometimes depth is synonym with pain
The ache of heart echoed the light of night
Luckily the moon was full of herself

Boats are roaming the shining, boats are sleeping in the port
Dreams are seafarers well contained in the electriciy of skin
Fishermen talk to me
I talk to you with invisible words
"Au revoir madame with beau chapeau"
Time is an artist in the randomness of breath

"C'est tres beau", says a little boy to me
We are smiling together at the sunset
It's the first time he sees it in the train, he confides in me
Innocent tears spin through my heart
Words cross boundaries when they feel what they see
 Aug 7
irinia
I share a narrow window with the seagulls
I don't know if for them air is a magic fluid
for me it is a canvas waiting to be filled
the coal of time is burning our breath
away
 Aug 6
irinia
a croissant tastes the same flying over the Alps
sweat is sweat no matter what tram you take, it's so humane
on a tshirt from Asia a capitalist mind has written "Hit me hard and soft"  
let's heat the hit
clouds are dreamed of beneath the trees  
a young man takes a photo of an old woman having breakfast sur la Cote d'Azur
yeah, something hits me hard,  a contrast so sharp
black and white infuse  the blueness of air
the blackness of misery,  the whiteness of glamour

I'd better guard  the sea not to throw her abyss into my mind
 Aug 5
irinia
I often forget my name
and do not always
finish my dreams
Every morning I give away
baked bread
in desolate streets
The world has been deserted
for an eternity
Instead of churches I build
a new heart
that has now walls

by Ionut Calota, translated by Lidia Vianu
 Jul 28
irinia
It feels like an unseen field.... a constant tension,  a rush of more tension, the acceleration of looking and seeing desire, the spiral of pulse, a void full of everything. as if I can sense with an imaginary skin some  thoughts screaming in your smile. they are blue riders on weightless nights, they roam the dunes of time. I think of you, hooked by a mystery that will never be solved
 Jul 26
Agnes de Lods
Another gray trip to a small town.
At the bus stop:
an abandoned bicycle,
trembling in the rain,
waiting for someone,
who never came.

The coughing crowd,
getting on and off,
headed for the unknown.
Actors carrying
heavy bags of ugly food.

Out of the corner
of an invisible eye
snatches of words
drifting into a wrinkled world—
not the first, vivid green,
but the tired lettuce,
expired bananas—
a symbol of unreachable luxury.

Casual dialogues about angels and demons,
atheists and spiritual needs.
Random people battered by reality
rolling out a red carpet for their thoughts,
spoken aloud in the indifferent air,
small talk about kicking life—
an existential fight to survive.

The game downloaded
by an unfair fate.
Something put him, her, them
on this wrong level,
an extreme mode
the deepest discomfort.

Unfair purpose of pain.
For many,
not being loved is an aching way,
for others,
the lack of bread.

The multiple truths
closed in one small drop
of a rainy day without a name.
 Jul 26
irinia
water shines like dreams that mystify their depth
in nights without moon by the sea the solitude of breath is even stronger
a savage sea feeds on the memory of light, but only the sand carries its age
its black heart rumbles a white rage
a watery path their dreams, they travelled by sea or the surface of time
they envisioned us perhaps
in the randomness of waves

the breaking edge of waves consumes me
wind, sand, water, light meet
in the love story of a time
surfing its waves
 Jul 19
badwords
They say we are free.
Free to bark, if no one listens.
Free to scribble, if no one prints.
Free to inhale, if it doesn’t cost too much.

This is not anthem.
This is not lament.
This is autopsy.

Let the ink blister the page
for those whose stories
were throttled before sunrise.
Let the silence rupture into
a thunderclap of what should have been...


Judas of the Womb

Her name was reduced to a whisper.
Her death, a technicality.

She died of sepsis? No!
She died of legislation
the sanctified paralysis of law.

Izabela.
Thirty years haunted by patriarchy.
Twenty-two weeks into a doomed gestation.
One human life overwritten
by a cluster of cells wrapped in legalese.

“They’ll wait until it dies,” she wrote,
"Or I will."
She did.

The state shrugged.
Three men in coats clutched
their degrees like shields.
Guilty, but not too guilty.
Penalized, but not inconvenienced.

And somewhere behind a mahogany desk,
a BBC editor ticked the
"Do Not Disturb Poland" box.
Because truth, like radiation,
is best contained to domestic fallout.


The Jester Beheaded by Branding

He made them laugh.
He made them uncomfortable.
Then he made them look at themselves.
That was the mistake.

He survived presidents.
But not the quarterly earnings report.

The axe did not fall.
It slid.

No cancellation. Just de-prioritization.
No outrage. Just polite press releases
and quiet exits.

The revolution will not be televised.
It was tested poorly with key demographics.


Soft Guillotines

Not fire.
Just foam padding and soft lighting.

No jail.
Just "violated community guidelines."

No riot gear.
Just Terms of Service.

They won’t stop you.
They’ll just stop broadcasting you.
They’ll hide you in the cellar of the algorithm,
behind un-skippable ads and SEO oblivion.

Your words are welcome—
as long as they sell soap.
Your outrage is valid—
if it fits in a drop-down menu.


The Global Echo

Warsaw, Manhattan, Manila, Paris.
Different names for the same soft boot.
The same velvet rope
around the neck
of the narrative.

They don’t ban the voices.
They dilute them.
Filter them.
Render them un-shareable,
un-searchable, un-fundable.

We live in a marketplace of ideas,
where truth competes
with cat videos and loses.


The Hollowing

When liberty must pass through a monetization filter,
it is not liberty.

When satire must first clear advertising compliance,
it is not satire.

When journalism fears its own clicks,
when editors redact themselves,
when profit margins call the morning meetings—
we are not in a democracy...

We are in a theme park of tolerated dissent.


The Sliver of Soil

But still—yes, still.

There are cracks in the concrete,
uncatalogued by surveillance,
unpolished by PR.

In those fractures, we gather.
Not to shout—but to build.
Not to trend—but to outlast.

We will forge our voices into chisels.
We will scratch our stories into steel.
We will be inconvenient.
Unprofitable.
Relentless.

So write what they won’t publish.
Speak what they won’t air.
Sing the verses
that sour their brand strategy.

And if we rise, not in hashtags,
But in habit—
not in virality, but in volume—
not in fury, but in fidelity—

then liberty may yet bloom.
Not fast.
Not free.
But truly ours.
 Jul 19
irinia
All we need is darkness
for the natural selection of light
I watch the past as a travel show
the necessity or adversity ignites language,
different shapes of games, we like the power plays
of circle
let me be sealed in a wave
I want to descend to the faith of sand
to the Cro-Magno vision of words
 Jul 19
irinia
silence swings over waters as if...
it rehearses its unseen so...
to fill  in the depth of blanks
a stratified time inhabits the landscape
orphic dreams morph into your flesh
the wind collates its courage and rage
like someone who falls into a self
my words bite the shape of a scream
the hunger of love descends language into crumble
the beauty of lungs full of air is misleasing
when I am waiting for silence to miscarry its void
Next page