Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
They're telling me,
don't drink you'll sink
but
I think it helps to
keep me afloat.

Not too much to
be out of touch with what's going on
or maybe another one to help me
to sleep.


I will wake
if God is willing
whatever my will.
there is always that self-destruct mode.
  Nov 2024 John Edward Smallshaw
Nemusa
No soft lullabies for this rage,
no bedtime tales for the scars.
Her rebellion, a waltz in combat boots,
spiked with grunge, venom, and a scream
that split the dawn like broken glass.
No lowering of voices—
it was them who whispered ******
while she carried the weight of silence,
their pills clutched in cold fists.

Madness was no surrender,
no white flag to psychiatrists
and their bottled truths.
She danced instead,
barefoot with demons that knew her name,
their laughter a dirge,
their touch as real as chains.

Words slithered into mirages—
truth, lies, all indistinct,
a love once pure now shadowed,
a muse now bound by sleepless nights
and post-traumatic hymns.
Our Lady of Sorrows bled for a flock
that prayed in her shadow,
kneeling in borrowed guilt.
But when she bled,
no one looked.

Plans drawn in whispered ink—
a razor’s edge,
a promise of release.
Love, a phantom now,
its face distorted with time,
matured, stretched thin by distance.
The scream of silence grew louder,
and demons conversed until the sun rose,
its light bruising the horizon.

She was no saint.
She forgave no trespasses.
But as the dawn burned anew,
there lingered a pulse,
a faint rhythm of hope—
love not redeemed,
but waiting,
coiled like a spring
for the next dance.
Really?
we spent it so freely
wasted it
really?

the reality is that it's time for time and as time runs out there is nowhere we can buy it,
and when we say that we're buying some time what does that mean?
it's just a pipe dream on a paper boat.

'there will be time' said Thomas, to finish off the conversation in some salon with friends and time to measure our responses until the final pulse.

But he says, why worry, take it easy, no need to hurry the words that will come anyway
on that other day when the clouds part we'll all start the journey again as we have done before.

the cat that has only nine lives picks at its claw as it watches the man who has so many more and spits on the box.
She was so thin
I told her that I'd seen more fat on a greasy chip and if she wasn't careful she'd slip through the cracks in the sidewalk,
we used to say things like that when we were young but try it these days and you'd get hung,
all change
I saw a teacher cry today

And I'm not quite sure how to feel

I sort of always viewed teachers as stone

Always there but never truly real
I have found that within my mind
there's a canyon of horizons and each one shows to me a difference of opinions and every opinion has its own opinion opening up onto new horizons.

I couldn't wish for more than this.
About this time which was that time then when I thought it was about time I made my move because I was in the groove, and then the needle stuck and *** me the record replayed the same melody over and over.

always
and the female cop in the car said pull over, I said no, it's a sweater, I bet her pulse quickened as I sped away,
and about this, I remained quiet until now

She still follows me how
is that possible?
Next page