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  Nov 2017 tricia jane
brooke
when you learned to blow
on hot tea, when you realized
good love wasn't an old wivestale
when your body suddenly became the
least of things to keep a man
and your ego just a badly kept
garden full of weeds and
borers
when you became nothing
dust and bitters, people began to
ask you how you saw yourself
and where humble and quiet
used to stand in you found
an empty ship, wineless drums
everything now seemed alarmingly
true, maybe you weren't more than
the sum--and how long had that been so?
how long had you been tolerable,
how long had beauty been your stand in
for a personality, how long had your hips
spelled your name, gyrating to the
songs you only wished you could sing--


I have only now started to laugh aloud
or walk knowing what's ahead and not
every inch of gravel beneath my feet,
deep breaths are my saving grace
i have traded anxiety for faith
i started dreaming again,
I opened my mouth and
not a single word came out
but i had left port
laden with
more.
(c) Brooke Otto 2017
  Nov 2017 tricia jane
eileen
I don't need any friends
I got them all in my head

I don't need a lover
She's six feet under

Tomorrow night
I'll visit a meteor shower

We have celestial dust
In our bones and flesh

Made from Earth and outer space

I don't need any friends
If the stars
Are willing to listen
  Nov 2017 tricia jane
Tsunami
Insignificant, unimportant, inconsequential
People would look past me
They couldn't see that I had potential
I yearned so badly to be counted in
But instead I was counted out
Which led me to start following trends
But I soon took another route
Distinctive, unique, idiosyncratic
that's what I am
with melanin infused skin
flourishing in black girl magic
I love being unique
I vibrate your soul when I speak
I have an aura so strong
it'll sweep you right off of your feet
I love being different
I'm one of a kind
The entire sun is wrapped around my soul
Through my eyes it shines
© Imani Tsunami
  Nov 2017 tricia jane
Pearson Bolt
i want my poems to have teeth.  
i want my words to cut,
to maim, to bleed.
with verses, i will raze
empires. with stanzas,
i will turn thrones to dust.
with nothing but a bit
of silver on my tongue,
i will take the life of god.

i’ll ply that same *****
like honey, taste the sweet
nothings dripping
between knocking knees.
quake and quiver for me,
let me slip, furtive
as nightshade
to sate your curiosity.

feel the weight of veracity
in these fingers patiently
transcribing forgotten melodies,
compressing ivory keys
to sing of all that was lost
and what was gained
from the process.
An ode to words given form.
  Nov 2017 tricia jane
Lydia
now when I think of love I want to puke,
the thought literally makes me sick to my stomach because I know now what it does to a person

how you lose yourself in someone else and then all of sudden you can't breathe anymore without them

I am promising myself to never be that stretched again,
to give myself a try for once, relying only on my intuition and will to power through life and relationships, never getting too blind to see things as they really are

I wanna know what it's like to be so good alone that the earth shatters when I take a step,
electricity radiates from my skin and my soul is so loud it shouts through my eyes
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