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Zywa Feb 2024
People are laughing,

maybe about me, about --


something I didn't say?
Poem "Overal om hem heen zijn ze" ("All around him they are", 1982, Ed Leeflang)

Community for young people with an intellectual disability

Collection "On the fly"
Jellyfish Jan 2024
Every time I think I'm done with my walk
I take note of the street signs name.
I'm still not done talking with myself
Because I'm still on the street of Shame.

When I think about why I feel so badly
I can list my ideas for what's wrong with me
but when I reach the the house and open the door,
I remember how unheard I felt in my core.
Jeremy Betts Jan 2024
I'm not afraid of dying
I'm afraid of the shame from trying

©2024
Glenn Currier Jan 2024
Tonight after an isolating illness,
propelled beyond my darkness,
I walked into a universe of light
where stars are swallowed
into black holes
spreading their energy and light
into and beyond the shame or blight
dragged along by each
stumbling with the baggage of their histories,
then recovering
his balance.
I wish I could attach the image that partially inspired this poem. It is an image of a star or galaxy being swallowed by a black hole or at least that is what it looks like to me. The image: https://www.pexels.com/photo/red-and-orange-galaxy-illustration-41951/
Zywa Jan 2024
Shame is having fear

of something ordinary --


that is a secret.
Poems "Kijk 's naar dit meisje" and "Over de schaamte" ("Please, take a look at this girl" and "About shame", 1970, Gerrit Krol)

Collection "Known"
Jeremy Betts Dec 2023
My rough past, a lonely gravel path that directed me here
One riddled with loathing and fear from myself and every peer
It all pales in comparison to each and every fallen tear
Added to the unforgiving shame of having tried to check out that one year
It's this reign of pain that stops me in my tracks like headlights freezing a deer
It's clear I don't know how to steer and can not get out of first gear
My entire windshield is a rearview mirror, the next tragedy always closer than they appear
My over corrections and over reactions are too severe, they're starting to break down the veneer
Put in place to simulate normalcy and hide the real me but I'm a horrible engineer
The intentions were sincere but this cavalier attitude never allowed the good in me to adhere
I've given in to my dark passenger allowing it to commandeer the space between each ear
At the time I thought it'd be far messier if I tried too interfere with the puppeteer
So I grabbed a few memories as a souvenir and tried to disappear

©2023
Pax Dec 2023
I've killed that old flame
felt so ashame, I'm to blame
i left to pursue nothing
it kept me running
please, lend me something
a little bit of hope
for me live on and to cope

i wish i never killed you
left you there
    in the darkness's hue
i wanted to write something good i hope but it becomes depressing when you dive directly into the darkside on how you killed your own dream.
Alex Dec 2023
A white-hot rod of shame burns into my chest- I can feel it now, the charring of skin, the cracking of ribs. I smell the smoke before I can see it. I feel the rod before I can break it.
"No, that's not quite right...."
I know. I know it isn't. I knew it as I said it, it's not right. God, I ******* know. I thought it was wrong, I was going to say something else-
And there's the stench of burning. There is the familiar rib-crack. There will be a scar there by morning.
Scarlet McCall Dec 2023
I saw you standing by the door
as I swayed and rocked on the dance floor.
The music was familiar, I could follow
the rhythm, the melody;
it seemed to be the missing part of me--
my unspoken sorrow, and sexuality.

You seemed immature. I didn’t try to understand
what you were saying. Your offered hand,
I rejected.  
I thought you were adolescent, smirky
trying to shock, pretending to be *****.
It didn’t make me feel like being flirty.
In fact, you reminded me
of everything I despised.
I couldn’t see the pain in your eyes
or peel away the lies
to hear the truth that you were saying.

A few decades later, here we are.
I’ve now found myself hitched to your star.
Do I now understand who you are–
or did you change--
older, wiser, the pretense gone?

I”m so sorry to arrive at this party so late.
Forgive me–
I was blind,
I was deaf,
I needed someone to hate.
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