Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Robert McQuate Aug 2023
Proclaim to me a trade,
For every crumb of food in the land,
Every drop of wine,
Every glimmer of gold in the realm,
And still I wouldn't trade it for a singular moment of time.
Robert McQuate Aug 2023
Oh, carry me on the winds of a sleepless dream,
Where there's fields aplenty upon the fiddler's green,
Where the woman is kind and the man is fit and clean,
Borne there upon St. Albans' wing.

Drift me off upon a fiddlers tune,
To a place where the sky is such a brilliant blue,
Where hope is abounding like those dog-days in June,
Where magnolias sprout forth like passion renewed.

****** me forth upon the lover's blade,
A more precarious place no other man can claim,
Where hope and love balance upon a precarious edge,
So easy to tumble off into that dark and void-filled death.

To be in such a state,
forsaking sleep,
Carries me to this strangest of dream,
For without such abstention,
And lack of means,
My creativity floweth out into an endless stream.
"You are beautiful every day!" - I've seen such a phrase on your car key ring. Yes, it's true. You are beautiful every day.
ChinHooi Ng Jun 2023
Needless to say
my heart is sometimes a jungle
a wilderness
there are many little
monsters that stalk the landscape
sometimes they behave like a ginger fawn in the headlights
sometimes like a lone wolf with blue stripes
sometimes they wriggle like anthias fish
sometimes sleep like a serpent
i have no way to confine them
nor can i bear to
they too
need care and comfort
when they're hungry they need me to feed them
if i don't see them for days
have they forsaken
left me behind
i just have to ask
as if they never existed
i'm always so focused on the deities and gods
little monsters also need to be nourished by love
when they feel the warmth love thawed and molten
they become more innocuous, pure and lovelier
than humans or immortals
this brought me to a realization
so called monsters or savages is just
a lack of affection
and the harm caused by limitations
the harm which is invisible at the root
it stems from established prejudices, discrimination, contempt
which more often than not
they are unintentional oversights, misunderstandings and ignorance
why do i love so hard
maybe because there are still too many little monsters
in my digital world.
Best anime i've ever spent a significant amount of time observing has to be the Digimon Adventure franchise
Elise Jackson Jun 2023
i used to see my own grave in my sleep
now i see yours right next to it
i only see our names floating around each other
no dates
no corny phrases
whether which one of us went first is still fuzzy
i'm sure it was you
because i'd do anything to stay

i'm tired of asking nicely
all my life i've been asking for permission
or hoping i won't be caught
i've never been bothered with wanting more time
not until i met you

running around a slippery parking lot
frolicking in the rain like children
suddenly afraid of the fall
the potential collision of my brains across concrete

but at least your smiling face would've been the last thing i'd ever see
ChinHooi Ng May 2023
I never lack an audience
even if it's just one person
i have
the cranium of poetry
humbly poised to be placed high
nirvana in a verse
is not to be flaunted
just like the distant incident of snow
remains far and illusive
only the wind knows
the interstice between the heaven and the ocean
the interstices amidst the words
only time knows
i never lack an audience
even if all the readers
who have come from all bearings
have gone
well, i knew that sooner or later
they will leave too
i just hope that when they do
they don't forget it all like a hangover
that'd be a cinch
i never need an audience
time is always by my side
the one true
underwriter.
Erian Rose May 2023
Where Oceans Meet
We Last Were Home-bound
Anchored Forest
Redamansy
Etc!
Anyone interested in reading a few
of my chapbooks before they are released?

Message me and I'll send you the sign up form to be an alpha reader, beta reader, and/or arc reader of the books.
wes parham May 2023
Listen.
This is good stuff that you need to know,
I’ve been writing it all in my head for a while.  
Because ever since we went toe to toe,
There are things that I now have to reconcile.

I recall...
I recall a camel-hair trench coat, green knit gloves and unfamiliar but smiling people. It was 1988.
I remember papers wind-strewn in a high school parking lot, oil and grit smudging the corners of awful artwork and poetry.  (I hope I thanked you for the ride home after missing the bus on my first day at a new school).

It was good to have met you in those formative years.  It was nothing magical, we just became friends and I needed one more than I could have known.

I learned…
I learned that a friend will nod patiently to interminable tales of obsession and unrequited love.  (You poor *******.  I thank you for this, if I never did before.)
I learned that a friend will patiently read your hack teenage poetry, advising sparingly.
(Thanks for that, too.)
I learned that someone might potentially be able to crash only “my side of the car”.
            ( I’m grateful that this "nuclear option" was never invoked!)
I learned about music bands that would become  the soundtrack for the best years in my young life.
(I still listen to pretty much anything by xtc, over 25 years later.)
I learned that a cast iron skillet may very well shatter if dropped onto concrete.
I learned that the best cornbread is a simple recipe and that you must pre-heat the pan.
(My wife insists that I prepare it anytime we make chili.)
1989, our senior year of high school…  I remember an overnight bike tour I took of our hometown. On a whim, I stopped by your house at 1AM. Unable to knock, I opted instead to get your attention by tapping at the window when I noticed you were awake and playing a computer game. ( sorry for the scare… )
1991.  I remember sitting, spellbound, to see “A Tour of Heaven and Hell” at the Center for Puppetry Arts.
(The first inspiration in a longer journey that would later have me working with it’s creator on five new shows.)
In college, I remember “our little ant farm”, the apartments across from our rental house on Milburn Avenue in Athens.
I remember climbing onto the roof to lounge, take photos and, of course,  leap off.
(Thanks for a Pulitzer-worthy freeze frame  of my youth in flight)
For that matter, thanks for some great camping excursions, a cast-iron pan cooking potatoes and, what-  onion?  on the fire.

This is how I come to realize: The darkness cannot outshine the light, since life will always throw reminders my way that when we were young, you were important to me.  I can not discard, too easily, that which is already an indelible part of me.
This is for a friend.  We once parted ways on cold terms and this is me placing a pylon in time, a memorial and reminder that time is a continuum; that people are multi-faceted and ever-changing.

It speaks of very real and specific things that transpired between us, mundane bits of “rememborabilia” that I felt compelled to reflect on and then reflect back for them to read, which they have.

It is my heartfelt desire that love prevail over bitterness, that forgiveness prevail over shadow and pain.

The title misspelling is intentional and reflects my friend’s abysmal skill at spelling.  I received a note, for example, with that very spelling of “tragedy”.  This, with all respect and fondness for the friendship formed whenever we both would occupy it.
Next page