Far far away
As though locked in a room
A doll in a cupboard
Is a girl called Alice
Alice the stripper

I myself at home looking for connection
Flick through cams
As though searching yellow pages

My attention caught
As though an anchor
Was around my heart
I stop on Alice

Fragile and vulnerable is what I see

I take her to
""Private chat""
And I tap my keyboard
As fast as hummingbirds wings
To make a connection

But it is no use
As clothes fall of her like broken slates
Of a discarded building  
Only to reveal half robot
Half dead human being

I type, "STOP STOP"

But she is lost in her routine
An act of ****** pleasure

"Please stop" ,I type

But her soul scattered
As though beaten away
By stampeding Rhino
For a while we just
Float together
In outer space

Where are you Alice
My heart bleeds

As though a spell had been broken
A nervous silence is ruptured
And like Apollo 13
As she types "hello"
Houston calling Houston
A relief breaths through
My whole being

I type,  " hello there"
And ask how are you  
I thank her for her **** routine
  
Then she in response springs back up
As though being controlled
By a remote
Held in my hands

"No No No need no need", I cry I type
" just talk just talk I don't want this"

My heart feeling her vulnerability
Reaches through the screen
seeking to cover like a blanket

Shortly after she covers herself
With a beautiful Royal Blue blanket
I type ," That colour looks beautiful on you
You must wear it when Mr Right
Invites you to a ball
And I tell her she would be stunning
And would shine in that blue  
And the lucky man would be the envy of the ball

A sparkle for the first time
Returns to her eyes

Even more beautiful now I feel

It was as though a harvest moon
Had found a gap through
Thick clouds on a very dark night
As her soul returned home
She began to blossom
Like a brave crocus flower
Pushing through the snow

My soul danced with pleasure
As the love in my heart
Spun around her with the joy
Of a long lost planet
Who had just found his sun

As time passed my need to leave
The conversation approached
I asked her to promise me
To always , Love yourself Always
And to know that you are
A treasure
And that you are special

Her eyes began to well up
As my heart swelled up
As a tear drop fell on her being
It was welcomed like the first
Drop of rain
After a long hard drought

After on my way to friends I pondered
Why is it
Like diamonds in coal
Are jewels so easy to find
In dark places
But become so rare
In the light of prosperity

And why so easily condemned
By world
Which stands on moral castles
Built by the power of
Their own pride and vanity
They have their reward on their tower
I feel Jesus would say

I think
If the love in my heart
Is that of our God
I know who
HE LOVES MOST

People tell me I overthink things
It has never been about mountains or molehills
I always see land big enough for shelter
I do not need reasons
This is what worries me

I am the best at sort of
I think I know
Then I know I know
Then I see you in public and you're laughing
And I can't tell if you're laughing at me
Or just laughing
I'm not laughing because I don't know what you're laughing about
So I smile
Not because I want to
But because I think you want me to
Hope that your giggle is the drawbridge to a conversation I've been dying to have
But you walk by
Barely nod your head and say hi
And suddenly I don't know anymore
But I think everyone else knows
I wonder if you know
And I sure hope not
I've been trying to tell you myself
So I turn back
I swear in my head this was easier
The words just a quick skip down the walkway away
But I stand here
Discussing with myself the things I know I could have done better
But definitely shouldn't have done better
Because the possibilities of better bring thoughts of the worst that I've never envisioned
So I sit down on the pavement
Each passerby shouts another reason why maybe next time won't be like this
But I most certainly will be like this

It shouldn't be this hard to climb mountains
To lose my breathe as I look out at the landscape
I just want to see you
Shout your name at the highest peak
And watch the echos vibrate off my chest
Hope that you shout back
This is what worries me most
What I need
Is the courage to say exactly what I intend
Believe I already own this certainty
Live within the in between

~~
In touch of you,
one day, thousands of dreams grew on me
after that you left me in halfway
then little by little I have almost forgotten my dreams
forgotten that dreamy highway where there we walked together

Today I'm walking alone,
so alone,
towards an unknown way,
where there I hear my wounded dreams
and my love calling me,
calling me as if they are in a trap
As if they are in a cage
where there I see a narrow way,
I never go through such a way,
very congested,
little bit hazy,
too shadow,
dark,
and a few footsteps that I have seen
where there my dreams calling,
my lost love calling,
calling too loudly

Again I feel my heart has overflowed
floating over my lost dreams,
flooding over my lost love

I'm walking through that narrow way
little by little that sound has seemed strong,
little by little I have heard her voice to grow long
may be I am so close to my love,
so close to my dreams
my right hand moving,
moving through the dark
I try to break the shadow,
try to catch my dreams
I have become tired,
Try to take a little breath
and finally,
I break the shadow,
shatter the dark
and finding her within the dark
seeking my dreams within the shadow
but I can't see anything,

Yet the clock moving on--
still I'm uttering her name
and dreaming within my thousands of daydreams
where I had left one long spring--
~~
@Musfiq us shaleheen


---------------------------------
হাজারো স্বপ্ন ও একটি ভালবাসা
---------------------------------
তোমার স্পর্শে
একদিন যখন হাজারো স্বপ্ন
বুদবুদ করতো--  
তারপর মাঝ রাস্তায় রেখে
চলে গেলে তুমি--
আস্তে আস্তে
ভুলে যেতে থাকলাম সপ্ন গুলোকে,
ভুলে যেতে থাকলাম সেই স্বপ্নের রাজপথ
যে পথে হাটতাম আমরা -

আজ আমি একা
বড় একা-
এক অচেনা রাস্তায় হাটি,
যেখানে শুনতে পাই,
আমার আহত সপ্নেরা,
আমার হারানো ভালবাসা,
আমায় ডাকে-
শুনে যেন মনে হয়
তারা বড় অসহায়,  
মনে হই তারা বন্দী,
সেখানে একটা সরু রাস্তা দেখতে পাই
এমন রাস্তায় আগে কখনো যাই নাই
খুবিই দমবন্ধ করা-
খুবিই দুর্ভেদ্য-
ঘন ছায়া,
অন্ধকার,
ঔইখানে কিছু পদচিন্হ দেখি
সেখানে স্বপ্নরা ডাকে,
হারানো ভালবাসা ডাকে,
উচু স্বরে ডাকে-

আবার হৃদয় প্লাবিত হয়
যা ভাসছে হারানো সপ্নের উপর
প্লাবিত হচ্চে হারানো ভালোবাসের উপর

আমি সেই সংকীর্ণ রাস্তা দিয়া হাটি
আস্তে আস্তে শব্দগুলো স্পষ্ট হয়
আস্তে আস্তে  তার সুর সুনতে পাই
হইত আমি ভালবাসার খুবই কাছে
হইত সপ্নের খুবই কাছে
ডান হাত সরছে
চলছে আধারের মধ্যে দিয়ে
চেষ্টা করি ওই ছায়াকে দূর করতে
চেষ্টা করি স্বপ্নকে ধরতে
দারুন ক্লান্ত,
চেষ্টা করি একটু শ্বাস নিতে
এবং শেষে,
মুছে ফেলি ওই ছায়া
বন্ধ করি ওই আধার
খুজি ওই আধারে ভালোবাসা
খুজি সপ্নকে  ওই ছায়াতে
কিন্তু পাইনা খুঁজে কিছুই-

এখনো ঘড়ির কাটা ঘুরে
প্রতিনিয়ত তার নাম উচার্রণ করি  
সপ্নদেখি শত সহস্র দিবাস্বপ্নের মাঝে  
যেখানে আমি ফেলে এসেছি দীর্ঘ এক বসন্ত--
~~
@মুসফিক উস সালেহীন

T-Thronging poets are welcomed at the doorway
H-Hundreds do shuffle in by night and by day
E-Eliot York hath provided a platform for display

H-How fantastic it's been to stumble upon this space  
E-Every conceivable style of poetry is seen in the place
L-Love and all emotion put in front of a person's face
L- Lasting impressions left for our minds to e'er trace
O-Our world poetic fraternity gathering in an embrace

P-Prolific amounts of verse offered to the page
O-Over the years some hath been verily sage
E-Engaging with fellow poets on a large stage
T-Themes and philosophies begetting of gauge
R-Robust the giving which occurs at this silage
Y-Young and older writers inside a vast cage

S-So let us all put our pens in creative mode
I-Invest HP with the fruits of your brain's node
T-Thousands of readers will enjoy every code
E-Endless lines we can all scribe into a fine ode

in this absence of tomorrow
when only birds turn into flying
I frame the image of you
owning yourself
being here, being everywhere
inside, you
words of thunder you were carrying
breathing in your fingers

my voice passed through you
resting in unknown spaces
I didn't look back
since each day is a child
I make with your shadow

my true self is a blank paper
spring will bring me flowers
your image is so real
between pillars of silence
you keep painting yourself with naked air
under untouched skin

I'm walking blinded in your language
wanting to coin my phrases
like "I can die without you"
or "I need you to love my shoulders"

this is all too strange
under the eyelids
this beauty
when birds descend into singing
when tigers turn into grass
when your eyes turn into silence
and I disappear into words

Throw me a line

I don't care if it rhymes

As long as it tickles
my posterior cingulated cortex

Spin me a vortex of spells

Yarn me a tale

Take me to heaven
or your own personal hell


Mesmerise me
with your poemetry.

My head hurts
It keeps throbbing
I feel tears building up behind my eyes
Waiting to rain down
Because of everything I've kept inside
The vision of them yelling at me
I never let it phase me on the outside
The thought of disappointing
Always crosses my mind
Banging my head on a white wall
Watching my body become bruised
Let me resemble the cosmos
Maybe if I had an expanding everlasting mind
I wouldn't be so caught up on the fact
I could never finish on time
If I were a unconscious entity
It wouldn't bother me
Please leave me alone
In my effort to become something other then me
I can't hold out much longer
An endless struggle against myself
It's all in my head the doctors tell me
But is it still when these thoughts manifest
Into actions that affect my reality
My head won't stop throbbing
How do I ask for help
When everything is wrong
I'm sorry I just wanted to be something else
Hot salty tears against my cheek
Another night spent battling my own mind
I just want to be like the galaxy

Please will
you pull
all my poems
apart
whichever way
you think
is best
I don't care
if you pull
at them gently
or hard
I just
want to be
undressed

Collapse into the arms of destiny
Let them carry you wherever the wind blows

Do not resist, be pliant
Like the reed that sways

Trust that you will be guided
To that which is in season to your soul

Love speaks with one voice
Sometimes through the parting of different lips

Know that the displacement and nostalgia you feel
is but a memory and a foretelling of Home

Relief comes with surrender
The leaf knows this secret
it yields in acquiescence.
Take a moment and contemplate
the life of a leaf ~

Surrender is not defeat,
it traverses land far and wide
and arrives gently to its destination

Surrender is not weakness,
know your strength.
Your essence can move mountains

Transcend into a fragrance that casts its spell into the night
unbeknownst to the beholder from whence it comes

In your surrender is beauty
that draws you closer to the ultimate Beauty
and culminates in the ultimate Love

Love him, love her, and let your love permeate
like the scent of two roses, together in bloom

♥

have you ever believed
in something so blindly
so genuinely
that the moment you realize
it isn't true, something inside you
changes forever?
i wanna tell you a story, see
seldom do i ever
go swimming in drinks
deep enough to drown in
but when i do
i speak in tongues
about things that none
of my memories
are allowed to talk about
like that christmas
at the isthmus
where my girlfriend
plucked a conch shell
whiter than gods teeth
out of the sand
held it to her ear
and stopped time
that day she was a shade of blue
the could've made the ocean sick
see, she loved to play jokes
when she held
the sea shell to her ear
she gasped, called my name
and said "i want you to hear this"
i said "yeah, right, everybody knows it's just the same old sea"
she replied "no. not this one. this one is special. listen. theres music in this one"
she handed me the shell
like a promise she couldn't keep
and i held it to my ear
with all the potential
of seeing shore
after being stranded
at sea for years
only to hear
a tired dirge of silence
spill from its emptiness
i guess she didn't know
how desperately
i wanted to hear it too
because ever since
something inside me snapped
now sand pours out
of every post card i open
i hear seagulls
in telephone static
sometimes i have dreams
where i bury my hands
in every beach
i've ever been on
and exhume this graveyard of noise
every time i try to sleep
i spit up fishhooks
and i guess i'm obsessed
but maybe
if i hold my ear
to enough vacant things
then i could have back
the time stolen from me
since it happened
maybe they would get it
if they knew what i wanted
when i blow out birthday candles
maybe they'll find me
face down in a wishing well
i watch eternal sunshine
of the spotless mind every day
pretending i can forget too
because this sea sickness
has followed me for years
because yesterday
i walked into a music shop
and all the pianos broke
but the only thing
i can think to say is
*do you know how bad
a memory has to be
that you fantasize
about forgetting it?