She demands my attention
Yet chooses not to disclose herself
And stays hidden

With such great ambiguity
She whisper words
That lingers infinitely
In the echoing vortex of my imagination

Am i to b intimidated by her existence
Or to embrace her whispering intuitions
The road it leads to, is far too less travelled
Is this insanity or a work of a miracle

She never leaves me idle
For her presence is forever felt
In between the crippled thoughts
Dancing in her own rhythm

You said you loved my poetry,
That it was beautiful.
That it moved and writhed like a woman’s body
Under the cage of her predator, flesh pressed hotly against cold steel.
Said you loved how the light flooded out of me,
But you never mentioned how it left me empty most of the time.
You said you loved the fine lines of the words I wrote.
I didn’t know you meant the fragility I always wore
Like a permanent cloak.
You said you loved the melodious rhymes,
But didn’t mention the heartbroken prose that I weave
Between the spaces and curves of my womanly bones,
Eventually turned ugly
And withered with time.  

You loved my poetry so much,
When we kissed, you stole the words out of my mouth,
The metaphors and similes and imagery.
Left me empty of diction as you ran away,
The colours chasing after you like trails of blood.
Left me empty of all that light you loved
And caressed with your darkness.
Caged in your darkness.
Left me weightless, meaningless, loveless
As you take it all for yourself.

I am so empty now,
I almost feel nothing for you.

I hope someone someday
Loves your poetry.

517

He parts Himself—like Leaves—
And then—He closes up—
Then stands upon the Bonnet
Of Any Buttercup—

And then He runs against
And oversets a Rose—
And then does Nothing—
Then away upon a Jib—He goes—

And dangles like a Mote
Suspended in the Noon—
Uncertain—to return Below—
Or settle in the Moon—

What come of Him—at Night—
The privilege to say
Be limited by Ignorance—
What come of Him—That Day—

The Frost—possess the World—
In Cabinets—be shown—
A Sepulchre of quaintest Floss—
An Abbey—a Cocoon—

She was fascinated,
hooked as if a fish out of water.
Whenever death
was splurged across the television
she’d sit upright,
the sofa would creak,
her eyes gorging all
like globs of kitchen roll.
Two per second.
She thought she’d solve them,
bust the case wide open
or some other cliché.
Reams of unresolved stories,
of women splayed
at American roadsides
with a missing molar
or red rings around the wrist.
There had to be an answer, she’d say.
Everything has answers
because everyone asks questions.
A human doesn’t go missing,
someone always sees, apparently.
She’d talk about dying
as if she welcomed it,
as if it was a real person
with bones and a voice.
One day she sliced her finger
and just let it bleed,
the thin line then the bloom
of crimson that wept
into the sink.
Two per second she’d remind me.
I scrambled in the drawer
for a plaster.

His love,
was something she wasn't used to.

She was always busy
carrying out her role on the movie set,
eyes shiny with flecks of gold,
natural dimples like sugar across her face
soft curls and velvety skin,

while life was vibrant on the outside,
it seemed to be dead within.

One day he strolled in,
she turned her head, caught his gaze, and beamed
his heart suddenly went patter--patter
my god... she's the one
he rushed back to his studio
and watched the paint strokes form her figure each time
seated beside the window, underneath the starry night sky,
so... this is what love feels like.

But when he handed her the rose
she pricked her fingers and bled,

when he embraced her with his warmth
she was as cold as icy jewelry,

when he gazed at her with longing
she continued to smile at the camera.

And so, he painted the last masterpiece
signed it with his love, and vanished

She thought:
*I'm cold within
and everything is colorless,
I laugh although I cry inside

I saw him come along
and I thought he might have been the one,
with the gold through his hair
the warmth in his smile,
the paint on his fingertips

but in the masterpieces painted,
he fell in love with
someone who doesn't exist
and thought it was me...

and I can only so much
pretend to be something that I'm not.

So now he's gone, gone to pursue someone
like the one in his painting
for a man, a painting of a woman
can never be enough....


well then, I guess I might as well
just be a painting.

i dream of the sea,
whispering like a wild cloud,
stretching the blue air.

The winds of change she often rode
A wild free spirt, through the galaxy she strolled

Out in the Milky Way, she liked dipping in her toes
See the silver ripples as outwardly they flow

That fiery auburn hair was always in a whirl
When on Saturn's rings she would go for a twirl

She would wash her soul clean, in Jupiter's waterfall
She always loved listening to that planets howling call

Sadly her heart froze solid in the blizzards of Neptune
She flung herself to the Dark Side of the Moon

Like fireflies in the dark, bring life to a child's jar
Silent shimmering tears, gave birth to kaleidoscope stars

Don't bother looking, gone but still close
Another wild free spirit, woven into the cosmos

©Pauline Russell

sometimes —
home isn't four walls;
it has eyes and heartbeats,
and pairs of arms to
welcome you gently.

sometimes —
home isn't just roof
over our heads;
it's the place where
we feel loved and
where we belong.

sometimes —
home isn't a place,
it's a feeling;
and we are
finally
home.

– billiondays

I linger at skin that clings
and hollow bones
that catch in the moonlight,
pausing at mirrors
that look more like
still-life paintings-
an empty gold vase
over here where my heart
used to reside,
a fresh green sprig
where there were once arms.

There is a sickness
sleeping in my hypothalamus,
heaving with every breath,
every step, every heartbeat.
I try to look at it
and it slips like sand
through my closed mind.

I smile, and it's not
my smile anymore.