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Tiger Striped Jun 2020
i dreamed of you last night
you were someone else
who loved me
i awoke a ship at sea
drifting aimlessly,
far from the shore
ignorant of the time or date
so long has it been since i gave notice to
the sunrise
or clouds
or stars.
i long for the shore,
yet here i am
in the middle of the ocean
i know not where you are
i sail because i have no other choice
i dream because i must
Tiger Striped Feb 2020
i drank you up
like boiling water,
dribbling over
the corners of my mouth
you were everywhere at once,
heat spreading through
my every limb,
sparking my nerves
with your cheshire grin.
we did not know what love was
how could you teach me what you did not know?
how could you convince me
when you did not love your own mother
that you loved me?
you showed me what love was not:
love is not ownership
love is not adrenaline
love is not ***
i still don't know what love is.
Tiger Striped Feb 2020
the day after christmas i
took a walk in the woods at
dusk.
i felt a city of eyes
staring, none
of which i could see.
i walked among them,
an obstreperous visitor uninvited.
beneath the rustling wind in the trees,
i thought i heard the
pounding of drums.
perhaps it was the rhythm of nature.
it beckoned me to run,
so i
ran.
i ran not from death, but
toward life.
i did not plan to run,
but i
ran.
i ran until the end
of my path.
i watched the puffs of air
float languidly toward the
sky, and realized
this was not the end, simply
where the path stopped.
Tiger Striped Feb 2020
don't be the clock
who tries to run time
Tiger Striped Feb 2020
This is the story of smoke,
mirrors,
broken fourth walls,
and me.
I
used to play with fire and pretend
I was a goddess, like
I'd created it with my own
fingers.
I once set my carpet on fire
(that's not a metaphor),
and for one brilliant moment I
thought I might have
inadvertently burned down the house.
But I outgrew fire,
grew bored of ice,
and discovered the final frontier—
it was disappointingly tepid:
dull, a bit smoky
from ex-flames that scorched the carpet.
My once-raw lungs are now
jaded and fading.
What is left to grow tired of?
I don't care enough to find out.
Tiger Striped Feb 2020
a summer scent seeps into spring,
the bitter hint of our endings
the years, begun in swelling tides,
now ebbing toward the shores of time.
this summer heat is scathing now;
the sky found wanting of her clouds
and sun the sole tenant therein,
burns with echoes of what has been.

so long ago, she deigned to rise
from darkness to uncharted highs
and now, our greenest life is graced
by torrid waves shone from her face
once lush and verdant, now descend
the lifeless leaves to life's grand end
our feet will find, in passing by
remains of those who knew the sky

so autumn falls, apprising death
and beauty takes a ragged breath,
exhales a gust of frigid truth,
reminds us of expired youth,
then lies down in her crystal bed
as isolation takes her stead
our memories and warmth are lost
'neath blankets of life's lonely frost

we seldom see the craven sun
we crave that fire that kept us young
and full of life's bright, loving rage
but fateful wind has turned the page
it leaves a blank chapter for us,
to our ink-stained fingers entrusts
invention and a flash of time,
future ahead and past behind

where life began, we pick up now
and to the blessed spring endow
an offset to the bitterness
that once beset our eagerness
we suffered, learned, and now we fight
not nature; not the flow of time
but to preserve humanity
to safeguard that insanity
we named love, for we have found
it is all but by time bound.
Tiger Striped Feb 2020
i took piano lessons when i was
five, until i was eight.
we moved states and
i just stopped.
but then a few years ago,
i met you and i
wished i remembered how to play
because you put a song in the back of my mind
and it's been playing ever since,
without your knowledge
or my consent.
sometimes it calms me
or animates my dreams,
and on occasions it's given me
headaches.
but it reminds me every day
of what i could have had,
what i long to pursue
and how
i wish i could play your song.
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