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Mark Parker Sep 2020
My pen slithers in poetic taboo
For as it writhes, you’d think it frail
Sliding along the garden’s morning dew
Polished diamond-shine upon each scale

Writing the lines as though I rhyme in schemes
Reptilian only within my dreams
I have always had a slight fear of snakes, but I usually try to overcome the fear if I’m given the chance to pet one.
Lyn-Purcell Aug 2020

Swathed in blood-wet robes
Bat wings stirs her viper curls
Soul of vengeance burns


New day, new haiku!
Now that I have the Charites and the younger Charites out of the way, I wanted to focus on the Furies, who are among some of my favourite goddesses! The Furies are also known as the Erinnyes, and are known to be the goddesses of vengeance and each of the sisters punished different crimes. It is said that the Furies were born from the blood that was spilt when Kronos castrated his father, Uranus.

Tisiphone [aka Tilphousia] was known to punish criminals who commited homicide, patricide and fratricide. In the first line of the haiku, it is a reference to Virigl's Aeneid, where he described Tisiphone as being "clothed in a blood-wet dress." I changed it from dress to robe because in Ovid's Metamorphoses poem, she wore a red robe with a snake about her waist; which leads into line two. The Erinnyes have been depicited differently over the years but what stuck with me growing up was the image of them being like the gorgon sisters only; with bat like wings and snake-like hair.
And of course, the last line speaks of her role as a goddess of vengence.

Like her sister, she is a woman to be feared. A blood soaked beauty. It is quite fitting for her and her sisters to be servents of Hades and Persephone, punishing those criminals in Tartarus...

Anyway, thank you all for growing followers, I'm forever humbled and grateful for the support 🙏🌹💜
Here's the link for the growing collection:
https://hellopoetry.com/collection/132853/the-women-of-myth/
Be back tomorrow with another one!
Much love,
Lyn 💜
Balaguer Jul 2020
It was art
intuitively we aspire
destruction
I reminisce upon the reflection of your face
a garden of angles
Japanese cherry blossoms in their trees
your aura
was layers of white clouds
the sun was over it.
It was brighter as I looked.
I closed my eyes
to see
a bright star in the sky,
when I think about your face,
I melt
like birds looking for food
and find themselves inside
a snake's
mouth.
Serpents
Amanda Kay Burke Apr 2020
Everything fine fake
Just can't take Hollywood snakes
At the stars eyes ache
About celebrities
The pills help me forget about my past mistakes
It helps me forget about those snakes
The ones who I once embraced
The ones who treated me like a slave
I've obeyed them but in the end
It made me feel numb
So I got out of that place
But I still love them

I don't know what to do with myself anymore
My hearts in pain
It aches to be back inside that cage
I was loyal to those devils
but how they treated me was awful

The light they showed me was out of this world
it was beautiful and It blinded me from the lies
but it was eternal
I didn't feel like myself afterwards
I felt like I was one of them
Just another devil with a hand on the dagger

Those nights in the summer
I loved everything about it
I loved being a sinner
and the dark still lingers
but I can't look in the mirror

They've got my heart
and it will be in the dark
In this life
And the ones after.
Created by me on February 6th, 2020
Marri Mar 2020
I don’t want to pray about you.
Not because God and I are taking a break,
Not because I’m busy,
Not because I can’t close my eyes without blinking away tears.

But because I’m scared.
I admit it,
I’m scared.

I’m scared that God will take you from me,
I’m scared that he’ll smite me for loving you.

I’m scared that God will cast me out of your garden,
I’m scared that the snakes and I are tangled into each other.
(We’re unrecognizable. Who knows where slither starts and fingertips end.)

I’m terrified that God will tell me that you and I aren’t meant to be,
That we are abominations.
That this wasn’t a match made in heaven.

That we are slowly falling,
In love,
Back to earth,
With wings scorched black—

Please.
Don’t ask me to pray,
Or you just might catch me with my eyes wide open whispering sweet nothings to a God I’m fearful of.
Marco Feb 2020
snakes surrounding my trailer
kick down the door
break all windows
knock me to the floor
I know what they're here for

they want me
I know that they want me
they don't even hide it
black eyes, black hair, black stare
he doesn't even hide it

a punch to the guts
a cut on my cheek
kisses me with a fist
my eye as black as his
he knew he wouldn't miss

and they want me
I can feel they want me
he doesn't even hide it

whisper into the night
hissing like vipers
biting like vipers
poisoning my wine
running out my nose
poisoning my mind

they got me
they know that they got me
I don't even hide it
black eye, black hair, blank stare
he takes my hand
and leads me out.
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