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do men even love anymore?
coming from a woman who gave it all—
who still couldn’t fathom what is at the heart of men.

she had the love,
was it difficult to appreciate?
the late-night paragraphs,
the never-ending patience of hers,
the letters,
the affection—
she loved him, even in her chaos.
she wanted to be loved too.

she had the doubt,
was it difficult to reassure?
the same repeated cycles
led to trust issues.
she betrayed her dignity
to love you.

she had the effort,
was it difficult to reciprocate?
she who gave it all
was content with the bare minimum.

she, despite all the things that hurt her,
couldn’t unlove one
who she once loved.

she waited,
until she couldn’t anymore.

To the men-
make em feel loved, without em begging.
-akshitha
to the men who read this, love her fiercely and don't make her beg for it.
ash 3d
quite a few severe misconceptions
hey! seriously, that's how you can summarize my life for me!
beyond the glitter, the actual bones of the beast
ugly, somehow disgusting, but they make me up, me.

i sometimes wonder, if i could be poetry
perhaps? – actually we'll scratch that.
i will be overlooked, as this usually is.
will you still write me?

no, i don't want you to write to me
or write on me – though i wouldn't mind
if i could carry it everywhere i'm ought to be.
but still –
write me. write about me.
all that i am, all that i could ever be.

there's multiple, many – oh god, a vast multitude
that i wish to talk about to any.
literally, whoever bothers to listen – and to see.
well, mainly to see, to not go over just once
and simply forget me.

i feel like – i might be a pathological liar
and a people pleaser.
but is it too wrong? wanting to be seen?
and not just as a trophy you can bag anytime,
or a passing moment, when life has you bored in its rhyme,
or even worse – someone just for the pleasure.

will you notice me?
heed to my voice and all that resides within me?
you know what. i think this was enough of 'me'.

the "almost" kind of hurts, you know.
it's always been just that.
at least for me, that's where my clock stops.
i hear about how you like me,
hear about how you want to try it out on me –
why is it always, "the almost of us"
with you & i and i & them?
why does it always have to end?
(even before it has began)

perhaps i indeed am that one tale,
kind of like the midnight rain.
they say they do cherish my existence –
but they never stay up, at least in most cases,
or bother to listen.

i can't focus, or give you my all –
i know that's a flaw at my side.
one that i wish i didn't have to follow like a rule,
settled in the hymns of my body and my life.

this, to the "almost of us" –
why do you always just... give up?
leaving me halfway,
like i'm not even worth the wait.
never did you want to know, maybe,
what really lies at the end of this race.
(will you regret, if i were to say, there weren't a lot of opponents for you to go against, per se?)

being wanted is what i've required –
to be asked for, to be known,
to be understood, not to be shown.
i hear about it in the books
and in the movies and different tales of the hues
of others’ vastly nerving stories –

how when someone likes you,
it lights up this part of you
that almost resembles the feeling of being desired – finally!

contrast is jarring though.
i see you, realize – wow, you see me too?
and yet almost always –
almost wanted, almost pursued, almost something.
and then a beautifully cherished, salty little nothing.

am i really not enough?
or did i do something wrong?
i did pay heed to your existence
even though i might have missed my own.

the unspoken loss –
one that i didn't require.

you know it hollowed me out a bit.
oh, who am i kidding –
it took all of me from me.
maybe you too liked the idea of me,
and not who’s real.
i know it is kinda messy.
at least that's how it's always been with me.

i have always had a habit
to press on those tiny little bruises –
so soft in nature, hurt a bit.
just always the right way, they hit.

i didn't even ask for you or them.
and yet –
the way you fumbled
and had me finding the sweet little nothings.

sigh, i guess i'll just admit
i want to be chosen.
there. the truth out for the world to see.
(i'll hide it to my death and never let you close to me)

i wish you'd pursued me with intention –
and not always the almost trying
only to give up before the trying even came close.
it left me crying, you know.

it's always – the spark that they leave.
never enough to light up a fire.
and then they find flaws within me.
why am i attacked, i wonder?

all i wanted was some real connection.
what of it when i scream
for all those who hear –
you have no right to drop bread crumbs
and leave me to clean them up.
i won't, as i never have.
but please, just once – notice me.
and don't treat me like an ant
like you did to others whom you've had.

everything's worth trying,
one way or the other.
everything's got a fruit waiting –
if you're willing to not just give up.

i ain't just shallow –
feel too deep.
trust me, this isn't something i've wanted.
yet you leave me with the same question,
as they always do –
why am i the one hurting,
when i didn't even ask for anything, or specifically you?

sometimes i'm afraid –
what if i'm being the particular "pick me"?
but i promise to never show vulnerabilities,
even though i speak a lot.

you might call me arrogant,
but all i've done is exist
and ask for something in return –
to cover all that i am,
all behind the makeup on the bruises of my existence.

too much, too cold, too confusing –
i ain't any of those.
but i wonder if i'm worth choosing.

some say i'm that poem
someone doesn't know they remembered
and made memories with until it's too late.

is it too petty of me
to give you such chances and options
again and again?

what's hard to digest though –
is here, the truth written in the blood of my pain,
and all the cuts that you've given me to aid.

they will forever look at me in a particular way –
and half of them who heed to me,
it'll be because they require the things
they need from the kind of me.

never has anyone asked me the questions
i wanted them to ask –
like things that shaped me,
or the ones i liked truly.

the ones i'd love, to be honest,
if it's with someone who stays.
i'd want to be with them throughout
and share those little eye contacts and loving stares.

i need depth.
want to be asked, not just seen.
maybe again, i'm asking for too much.
please forgive me.

i wore the sun for you –
yet you chose the rain.
the same rain i used to be,
but it was one during the day
and not the midnights like i usually erupted.

too much for you to handle.
i wish you'd accepted.
needed no spotlight – just some care.
someone to notice, someone to lend a shoulder.

yet left behind, almost always.
but what can i even say
when it's always been – "the almost of us."

i'll withdraw in silence,
just to be looked at the same way as any other.

might be complex, chaotic – miserly at times,
what if you indeed realize
i'm just barely anything, not even like any other?

is there any place anywhere
where i can fit –
where i belong the most?
perhaps not, perhaps the answer's a never
but i wish you'd loved and chosen me – at least once
just so for once i could feel something
other than just always being the ghost.
write me a book on myself, will you? understand, listen, see- and i'm all yours.
pretty low standards?
ash 4d
there’s something akin to nuts and bolts in my heart, i think.
sometimes i wonder if it’s made out of stone,
or if it’s a machine.

feelings are messy —
and even though the world gave them names,
i can’t match the descriptions,
so i just rename.

something within sometimes pinches too hard.
i’m left wincing,
rubbing at my chest
as if it’ll soothe my past.

i intend to move on — that, i do —
but i can’t put it into words,
can’t explain why i am just because.

"i wasn’t always like this" —
but this?
i don’t know which version of me i speak of.

i’m worried.
deathly worried, more so.
but i just want to keep existing,
’cause —

what if there’s someone out there
willing to oil up these corkscrews in my brain,
have it speak to my heart,
make it make me speak —
and spell it all out?

i intend to find a love.
a mate.
’cause if i was born with something that intends to hurt,
i can’t believe
i was born without someone
who intends to heal
and aid.
like the cinnamon girl by lana del rey
Cadmus 6d
Sharing my pain would heal me, i thought.
So I opened up
told them everything.
The sleepless nights, the buried fears, the truth.

And they listened.
But not to understand.

They turned my story into gossip.
My wounds into entertainment.
Some even laughed.

That’s when I learned
not everyone deserves your truth.
Some people don’t hold your pain.
They dance to it.
Some hearts are too shallow to hold deep wounds. Share carefully , not every ear deserves your truth.
Cadmus 6d
👺

In this grand  masquerade,
We call
The real world,

No mask,
costs more than

your own true face.

🎭
To be seen as you truly are is the bravest costume and the most unforgiving stage.
H 7d
I reached out to you yesterday.
You had just told me how you felt,
You said it felt difficult.
I felt it too.

Three weeks it had been.
The silence echoed.
I questioned myself, had I done something?
I waited and waited…

I asked to meet up again,
You didn’t respond.
The day before you sounded different,
Then I heard nothing but my own heartbeat.

I had been over the moon.
I thought you might like me.
Do you though?
How am I to know.

My friend saw us,
Were you asked about it, and it felt too much?
Or were you honest…
You just felt like you were gonna mess something up.
Written to process what happened
Cadmus May 19
Take off your clothes.
Slow.
Let them slip like secrets.
Let the silk confess.

Step forward.
Bare skin. Bare soul.
No perfume to distract me,
no colors to lie.

Drop the stories,
the stitched-up smiles,
the lace of excuses.

I want you raw,
**** under the light,
where nothing hides
and everything dares to be real.

You’re never more beautiful
than when you’re stripped
of all that isn’t you.

Take off your clothes.
Let me meet
THE NAKED TRUTH.
This poem uses sensual imagery to expose a deeper metaphor, how truth, like the human body, is most powerful when unadorned. It speaks to the beauty of vulnerability and the courage it takes to stand uncloaked in front of another.
Ali Hassan May 18
I was given a gift, a tender thing
A heart that knew the songs to sing.
So full of love, so soft, so true,
It held a cure the cold once knew.

It cost me more than I could pay,
Yet still, I chose to give that way.
To thrive, it needed hearts as kind,
With gentle hands and quiet minds.

I wandered far through souls and faces,
Through empty halls and crowded places,
To find a heart that dared to feel,
To break, not hide behind what’s real.

But all I found were sharpened minds,
With pride and reason intertwined.
They saw its cracks, they mocked its beat
Too soft to win, too quick to bleed.

Each time it met a colder flame,
It broke in ways I couldn’t name.
I tried to guard it, held it tight,
But it was born to lose that fight.

And then I saw, with aching eyes,
That I, too, judged it, cold and wise.
I weighed it not in love, but thought,
And killed the grace that can't be taught.

A gift too pure for minds so keen,
It dimmed where coldest thoughts had been
So in the dark, I dug a grave,
For all the love I couldn’t save.

And there it sleeps beneath my chest
A precious gift, laid down to rest.
Moonlace May 16
Her
Cutting through, dancing through
with petals rumbling beneath our feet,
we dip and twist, entwined by a whispering thread—
holding tight enough to turn you blue, but never red, my love.

I don’t know where it will strike—
but I know I’ll die with wrinkles around my lips,
comfort in my eyes,
knowing I made the greatest trade—
my life, for you, my light.

To have you hold me—
guide me when sight fades, catch me as my body fails,
your gaze speaking volumes beyond words,
holding me soft and fragile—
so precious no one else could ever recreate this, my dear.

Him
On crumbling petals, I dance with you,
making sure I don’t crumble beneath your weight,
so fragile—
I don’t want to hold you so tight it causes pain,
nor let the world’s hurt reach you, my angel.

Sealed—
my lips cannot speak the depth of your meaning,
so I plead for you to see in my eyes
all the words they cannot say, my flame.
If the blade falls after claiming a head,

Let it be mine—
I will take the strike,
shield you from every wound, my oath.
With a smile,
love burning in my eyes for you,
there’s nothing I wouldn’t do, my heart.

Though my lips may be silent—
for you my legs stand firm to walk beside you,
my arms grow strong to hold you close,
my eyes sharpen to find you if you stray, my light.

My heart burns—
a calm fire fueled by love,
the most painful moments made beautiful by you, my salvation.
You are my heaven on earth,
the cure to every pain,

The beat within my chest—
and so I beat,
always, for you, my love.

Together—
we guide each other through,
hoping the blade never falls—
not because we fear the end,
but because we want to hold and lead each other,
not out of need,
but out of love.
“Moonlace”
This poem was inspired by the cutting edge 2024 perfomance video by Vera jukka
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