"frostbitten" poems
The city spearheads the futures we sincerely sold,
As it pluckers your pennies and your coins of gold.
I felt poor amid the auras of their fearsome metals,
Cowering in the clothes of our daily struggles.
I am destitute enough
To bleach out the interests of my cards,
To shatter your savings for a disabled future,
To rummage the stock markets for apertures.
Yet within you exhales tentacles of the color Yellow.
Yellow as in,
The scattered stars that scorch the injured sky,
The mellowing voices of neon artificial lights,
The apex of fire alight in frostbitten nights,
And the yolk of hope my cheers rely.
So while you chase the sun
with your copper-clad hands,
remember but this:
all that glitters is not gold,
It’s the color Yellow in these eyes I behold.
Aug 31, 2017
Aug 31, 2017 at 10:56 PM UTC
In a world of millions,
In a place of thousands,
You are one in a billion.
You say you are nothing much.
As simple as pen and paper.
As plain as the ice on those frostbitten days.
Though you don't seem to know...
Pen and paper, though they appear simple-
are something I have always adored.
You are something I have always adored.
And as for those frostbitten days...
Those days when my fingers go numb after the seconds outside.
Those days where my whole body is cold.
I cherish those days;
As I am grateful that I have a warm place to return.
I am grateful for you.
So my love.
The one with the deep brown eyes.
The eyes captivate me daily.
You may think you are plain and simple-
But you are so much more than what you see.
Nov 29, 2020
Nov 29, 2020 at 8:17 PM UTC
To girls who dream of being fairy princesses: turn your
balconies into paradise greenhouses, and every
night sing each of the Thumbelinas
to sleep. Frost's flowers crowd beneath my fingers, the
young moon peaking in. I dare not invite you again -
your mind exploded into a nebula last time you saw
so many lights. My tiny Thumbelinas have gotten
married, with Thumbelinas of their won. I kiss
their frostbitten flowers awake. I promised. Blue
fingertips have become a norm, a childhood
reminder of a wish for blue blood. It thaws
outside. Wee Thumbelinas weep. The ferns
unfurl. My lullabies make plants awaken, not from the
beauty, but of dying loyalty.
May 2, 2014
May 2, 2014 at 5:33 PM UTC
candlesticks caught up in your wristwatch grip bundled up burning chopsticks not frostbitten yet, flashlight to toes happy it still shows your glowing red interior
Nov 17, 2014
Nov 17, 2014 at 12:24 AM UTC
Smoke is filling my bones
The carcinogenic ghosts of an irish ancestory
At war with my german temper
Fueling the fire
To a heart that beats for belonging
Keeping me in step with the frostbitten sidewalks
Of a December morning
Lips moist from french vanilla cappuccino
And your chapstick
Smoke is filling my bones
I'm rolling through my own fingertips
Losing touch with my own reality
Wondering if my knuckles are white from clenched fists
Or the grip around your palm
Smoke is filling my bones
You don't smoke
Yet you fill your lungs with my exhale
Breathe me in
I'll house myself in your capillary beds
Where I'll tuck myself in for the night
Listening to what makes your heart tick
Dec 2, 2013
Dec 2, 2013 at 11:25 PM UTC
the first drop of water
not ice
from the sky
signals the season’s
change
new england
so pretty
looking angelic
drew me in
a venus fly trap
locked in a prism
snow reflecting
back to me
eerie thoughts
shrouded in black
no place for a runner
where I can escape them
locked in by the fireplace
tattered ashes
mockingly laugh
i flee and i run
minus eight reads the meter
frostbitten
returning
trapped with my thinking
blocked in on all sides
the icy walls
fold in on me
forced to see the reflection
looking back at me
go away brightness
banish your glow
i need the shadows
where hidden feelings
quietly cower
another storm coming
madness engulfs me
searching for pen
grasping at paper
salvation
words spilling out
parts of me
buried so skillfully
long ago
finally see light
just for a moment
the respite’s exquisite
then longing for springtime
oh god,
why can’t it rain?
©2016janetaylor
May 17, 2016
May 17, 2016 at 11:59 AM UTC
What is this feeling in my veins?
Thawing my frostbitten heart, but not for your own gain...
After the long cold months of walking in pain
Your melting my lungs so I can breathe again
A word so short
Short and plain
So much potential
Associated with so much pain
You've awakened a part of me that I thought to be dead
Jump-started by the words you've put in my head
Can this be true?
Am I falling for you?
Only time can tell...
But I hope you'll catch me.
Love.
The fire that reawakens even the dead
Jan 13, 2013
Jan 13, 2013 at 5:24 PM UTC
I can feel the cold setting in.
Each morning is more bitter and frostbitten than the last.
The air and my thoughts are becoming stale, dry, and unpleasant.
The sun does not warm me anymore.
Like me it seems to have become weary.
The birds are gone.
All life seems to have abandoned this place.
Ice clings to my bedroom window, begging to expire in the warmth of a living room fire.
Smoke rises from the chimneys, covering this world in cold ashes and grey.
A life of color now painted banal and mundane.
I can feel the frozen air seeping in, slowly chilling me to my core.
With every passing night I grow colder and slower.
I have become eternally internally tired.
I end each dream embracing the boreal winds.
Ice evaporates into my thoughts.
I can feel the cold setting in.
Dec 25, 2014
Dec 25, 2014 at 12:42 AM UTC
Your arctic blue eyes
Light my heart on fire
Your cold flames of ice
Burn me
Yet I only feel a slight chill
As my heart erupts into electric blue flames
Your frost-bound lips brush against mine
And my frostbitten heart
Melts
But freezes again as they leave
And forms a shell as hard as stone
And as cold as ice
Yet you leave me
Cold and unprotected
The turquoise embers still smoldering
Maybe I should fight ice with ice
But your hypnotizing gaze
Pierces into my soul and ignites it once more
The world bows to my will and power
But do you?
I am invincible from everything
But from your soul of ice
Your cold flames
And your arctic blue eyes
Feb 4, 2018
Feb 4, 2018 at 3:43 AM UTC
I have a favor I must ask
of you, and only you:
I need your body back,
your flesh, your warmth.
Your arms wrapped around me,
holding me tight, pulling me in-
silently speaking the words
"you're mine,
I'm your's. We are safe."
because baby, I have
a confession to make
I wrote poems in your
skin that you don't know
I left there.
You see my dear,
I tucked my quiet rhymes
behind your ears for
times I knew you'd
need to hear my words
so soft and sweet,
My words: I love you
My words: I am here
My words: I am not going anywhere.
(Little did I know you would.)
•••
I hid similies and metaphors
in the nooks and crooks
of your elbows and knees
because poetry must be just as
good an oil as any for a
twenty-eight year old tin man right?
**** I don't know
but that's where they fit,
where they were meant to go.
•••
The first time our bodies connected,
our forces colliding just like
The Milky Way and Andromeda
will in four billion years-
my universe aligning with yours
as we lay in the grass
you and I both whispered:
"This is wrong."
For the first time on
that summer night I wrote
my words secretly into your skin.
My words: "How can something
wrong feel so right?"
•••
Baby, I'm looking for home and
I know you're looking for a heart
so here's mine-
written in words on your flesh
that you don't know are there.
Here's mine-
to fill your dark cavern
because no heart should be dark,
no heart a cavern.
Here's mine-
my throbbing, beating mess of a heart
filled with everyone I've ever loved
and there you are on top.
•••
Then came the days
without "I love you."
On those days,
with my fingertips frostbitten
and trying to text,
I wrote my words on scraps
of paper, turned them into airplanes,
and aimed in your direction
hoping that maybe,
just maybe,
their tips would pierce your skin
injecting the warmth I once received.
•••
To the man I used to love,
You can keep your body
and all the words I wrote in
places I wanted you to look
and hoped you wouldn't miss.
Jun 29, 2013
Jun 29, 2013 at 4:38 PM UTC
I could let myself go.
I would be shot.
But it would be over.
Since I had lost my faith in god
I did not know where I would go
But I know I would not be in heaven
Good lord I know.
I cursed his name,
When I cried out in pain.
And even when faced with death
I tell myself that my god was to blame.
I could just stop running.
And a bullet would end my march.
My run. My trek.
My endless march.
This snowy march.
Frostbitten feet.
I knew they were blue.
But of pain I couldn’t speak.
I did not speak,
Because I could not feel.
I was numb to all that was real.
Or maybe it was just the cold.
A medical reason that i could not feel.
Or had my mind been made so numb,
So that I could continue on this fate I’ve won.
This fate of earned by following faith.
Faith in a god who alone is the very reason I am in this place.
The fact that I could no longer exist,
It fascinated me.
I could just stop running.
I would cease to be.
This thought enveloped me.
Shocked me.
Stuck to me like glue.
The idea of dying, itself, was nothing new.
It’s just never something,
I thought I would wish upon myself so soon.
I could just give up.
And end my pain.
But that would be so very vain.
Because, my father, he could not press on,
If he knew I would soon be gone.
And so for him,
I drag me feet,
Across this snow,
Through wind and sleet.
I’m almost completely numb,
But my father’s heart still beats.
He is the reason I stay alive.
Nov 24, 2011
Nov 24, 2011 at 1:23 AM UTC
I grab at your heart.
Then pulling away slowly,
I lick the blood from my frostbitten
fingertips
Jul 8, 2015
Jul 8, 2015 at 8:40 PM UTC
I am a glacier:
icy white and light blue,
the color of frostbitten lips in the winter.
You can only see the best of me,
because I hide most everything
beneath the surface.
Sep 1, 2014
Sep 1, 2014 at 1:33 PM UTC
Thick and quiet – the snowfall around us;
easy silence; we walk through the forest.
There’s no need for small talk or stories –
we have lived through them all, to be honest.
Cold is creeping inside and I shiver,
I’m a wreak as we stop by the river.
Chill is only a part of the worry –
deep inside, for you feelings I’ve buried.
Always kind, you have noticed me get cold;
of my palms you have taken a strong hold.
Your breath warms my shaking frostbitten hands
but it is my heart that hopelessly melts.
Here, in place, I stand totally frozen.
You are close, but I want to be closer.
Would you let my mouth steal, savour this breath,
my arms hold you right here, in an embrace?
Dec 17, 2020
Dec 17, 2020 at 5:28 PM UTC
Broken and barren.
This frostbitten air haunts my
Soul; I'm going mad.
And I'm not sure if it's the
Change in the weather
Or
The changing time,
Or
The change in me that
Is
So
Unsettling.
Dec 1, 2015
Dec 1, 2015 at 9:31 PM UTC
April came and with her hope
A little sunshine helps to cope
Her kiss sweetly soft caress
A heart frostbitten now be blessed
A simple smile of inward child
Takes the breath away
To calm the cold of bitterness
The Ides of March display
She comes to heed the mother’s call
Her air so fair and kind
April sings her early songs
Nature speaks her mind
Gypsy flowers peak their buds
Expose the coming season
Ducks and geese return at last
And life returns her reason
Apr 1, 2014
Apr 1, 2014 at 8:30 AM UTC
Life’s an upward struggle, and it makes it so much rougher
when the ladder you find yourself climbing is beset by lonely weather.
When every other rung is off doing other things,
the solitude and altitude bring to mind desolation
and the emptiness that brings.
No matter the genius emanating from ivory minds,
the smartest man among us often finds
that brilliance unfiltered clogs up the system,
when others must consume the lonely perfume
of conceits kept alone,
while the common thoughts stay collected
like so many sheep in a pen that’s separated
from self-same lonely thoughts,
that genius oft encounters,
left only amongst the happiness
that fills up life’s happy coffers.
So it goes that lofty ideals become frostbitten
by snowcapped mountains of emptiness.
Others seek the heights together only during pleasant weather,
while those who trounce through snow-packed trails
must brave the climes alone tempted only by fate,
to descend to summits more frequent
than the peaks of accomplishment.
Gangrenous lips cannot utter
the chilled revelations of those left above too long.
So it is left to those below,
not inferior from the altitude,
just more likely acclimated to the difficult, dull journey
of those who spare pristine slopes
for the sullied, muddied slush on the tourist trails below.
Sep 21, 2012
Sep 21, 2012 at 2:49 AM UTC
Thou tangle the mortality
And seek the mourning of its course,
With an outrageous cloak that falls adrift
To have its custom afloat.
The decorations, thereof flatters this turmoil
That has its doubts and moments,
A longevity beheld upon the chores of the subject,
Never cognizes its everlasting trials,
For those of which handles the elation
Of successive falsification.
I know not of the clumsiness of hymns,
That sighs the mourning of a course,
The chaotic iteration of single pauses
And the faltering of a mere slope.
I know not of the turmoil
That bedecks the frostbitten clavicles,
Onto which no sigh wavers
A petition of no faze and any dome.
I know not of the cloak
That nestles around a haze;
Bringing confusion that betrays every vivid sense.
Let it be the matter, ‘tis a matter of time(!)
Would it morph itself around the mourning mould,
When it dries away with the mud?
Oct 7, 2018
Oct 7, 2018 at 6:17 PM UTC
Gray Owl hearkens
the dappled daybreak knell
echoing through
the wildwood forest stand;
rock doves and frosty stones abide,
where a marooned heart doth dwell,
disrobed by the longest night's frigid touch
Timber stand grips tight
red clay and bedrock of ages,
postured tall and strong
as eagle's spirit throne
Pine cones hide
in the low drifting clouds,
ripe acorns tumble down alone
unto a windblown
shallow earthen grave,
hillocked beneath
the sky-high canopy
Bones of branches,
furrowed bark from burled oak,
wood-grains of pith,
natural gnarled achings
peeled by the shivering
wind's breath
Paling autumn memories
grow dim as the receding sunlight,
recollections of ebbing Jasmine's
mellowing fragrant balm
waft aloft in a favorite fading fantasy,
the edge of winter metamorphosis
bears down with a prodigious weight
of a different kind of retreating light;
brindled Queen Anne's lace
hold sway across
the tawny frostbitten meadow
imbuing the poignantly
whetting breeze
The blink of an eye winks,
to catch sight of
an intimate glimpse,
an unspoken
solitude holds forth,
the mesmerizing coo of rock doves,
reverently mirroring
the sanctity of the forest wildwood
lingering amongst the frosty
ferns and stones
The harmony of tranquil silence wanders;
only the bowing resistance of the boughs
manifest the shapeless wind’s
whispered breathe
swirling above the labyrinth threshold;
therein lies an unfractured fault line
rooted deeply beneath
the earth’s crust
like the sonorous heart
of a sanctuary hearthstone
Hence there is symmetry
felt in silence that only whispers
in the deep toned consonant
of our own harbored sighs
a holy human blood link
born of heritage wilderness heartwood
beats keenly alive
written by: harlon rivers ... December 2017
Dec 22, 2017
Dec 22, 2017 at 6:21 PM UTC
It started out as a flame
Flickering
Dancing off a matchstick that was an idea.
It kindled an idea to help renew,
To regenerate what was once lost.
The fire grew
And with it
A passion that could not be extinguished.
The warmth was welcomed by her body
A body so cold
So helpless against the dangers of the world
And herself.
The fire gave power
And with the power there grew an inferno
Once ignited, could not be smothered.
The fire whispered
Through smoke and cinders;
It whispered
To encourage the distressing ideas that flowed through her.
She was frozen
Frostbitten to the bone without the fire
And so
To stay alive
She stayed close by the hearth.
When friends became concerned
They tried to call her back
But she was too attached to the blaze.
While the smoke tangled in her hair
And coursed through her veins
She drew in ever closer.
She huddled towards the light
That was leading her to her dangerous desires,
Cutting everything off
Except for the sea of flames.
She clung to her damaged thoughts
And kept the fire steady.
Going almost unnoticed
Her skin turned red and warm;
She was too happy to embrace the heat.
She understood she was too close,
Yet she rose from her perch
Roused by the incandescence
The feverish luminosity.
She
A mere mortal
Drew within reach of the alluring fire.
The flames licked her face
Her hands
Her hopelessly lost mind
As she dove in
Headfirst.
Everyone she had turned away watched
Unable to help.
She registered one single thought:
It's too hot.
But
It was too late.
She couldn't step away from the furnace;
For suddenly she was bound by ropes of her own doing
A funeral pyre just for her.
She was stuck within the depths
Of the scorching fire she had so arduously cared for.
She tried to call out
To those just outside the fireplace
Watching
Witnessing
But the fumes enveloped her
Stifling her pleas,
Her cries for help.
She couldn’t breathe
The embers burning her lungs as she inhaled,
Silencing her voice as she exhaled.
She flickered for a second more;
The life left her eyes.
She collapsed
Leaving ash and bone to intermingle into nothing.
What she had once mistakenly perceived
As an idea,
No larger than a matchstick,
Was something she could not control.
But no one could control a fire that destructive
Or
Deadly.
May 7, 2013
May 7, 2013 at 9:53 PM UTC
Winters weeping wonders,
Of emotions seeping ponders,
Pain so deep,
And hearts so worn,
Fruits we reap,
And souls forlorn,
Winters cold,
And winters gain,
A thought so bold,
A mind insane,
A Woman scorned,
Man and creature alike,
Be warned,
Winters sorrows,
And winters mourning,
Bitter cold frostbitten warning,
Abandoned hollows,
Frozen wants,
A need so strong,
Winters wait prolongs,
Winters storms,
And winter moan,
Frosted rages warmth,
Ever growing,
And so the depth,
Ever sowing,
And so the fruits once warm,
And ripe,
Now cold and bitter,
A rotten infested type,
A Woman scorned,
Be warned,
Man and creature alike…
Dec 7, 2012
Dec 7, 2012 at 6:19 AM UTC
The Cresent Moon Dancing With The Silhouette,
Of Old Silos,
In A Ballroom Of Winter Air,
Completed With Hanging Glow In The Dark Stars,
& Planets Suspended In Spaces Endless Corridor,
Human Life Scarce For The Hours Of Darkness,
Except For A Few Nocturnal Beings,
Mostly Adolescents Sipping Liquid Courage,
Drowning Their Pride With Hearty Venom,
The Creatures Of The Woods Roam Freely,
Scrambling Across Roads And Frostbitten Yards,
Awaiting The Frosty Tears Of The Heavens,
Coating The Land In A Winter White Blanket,
Drops Of Jupiter Perfectly Fall Into Place,
Upon Rich Green Eyes,
And Swim In An Eternity Of Spring,
And Kiss The Petals Of A Sturdy Rose,
The Golden Gates Of Beauty,
Open And Welcome,
In The Cold November Evening,
Mercury Glides Upon Smooth--Vanilla Skin,
Enternal Peace Just On The Tips Of Frigid Fingers,
Slipping Into The Grooves Of Skinny Extremities,
As Gardian Angels With Rustic Gold Halos,
Reach Into A Troubled Heart,
Take Me To The Light
Drops Of Jupiter Roll Down Rosy Cheeks,
Take Me With You
The Cresent Moon Glitters Off A Radiant Dress,
Come With Me Sydney
Bright Light Fills Two Worshiping Retinas,
I Will, I Will
Rays More Vivid Then The Rays Of The Sun Itself,
Then The Green Irises Open,
Sadly It Was Just A Dream,
But Drops Of Jupiter,
Still Lay On Her Pale Cold Cheeks,
And The Cresent Moon's Light Still Slips Through,
Light Resisting Blinds,
And The Trees Whisper A Secret,
Which Was Shared,
With Me
Information Injected,
From A Vile Of Destiny
Nov 16, 2012
Nov 16, 2012 at 10:21 PM UTC
*My heart
Feels like a frostbitten cave nobody should ever go in.
My soul
Feels exhausted, drained and spread really thin.
My mind
Feels like its fighting battles it can never win.*
I find my thoughts
Consumed with anger and despair,
Evil feelings who have created a lair –
A base of operations within my mind,
Staring at the world with a terrifying glare.
And yet, despite all this,
Nothing kills me more than being alone.
This need to experience humanity
Is not simply an act of vanity,
Or a call for attention,
But an attempt at reclaiming sanity.
We are the loneliest generation of all time;
Previous overlords used force to rule,
And whoever didn’t follow was lambasted,
Marked as a traitor and a base fool.
Now, force is merely a tool,
One in many of a lethal arsenal.
Social hierarchies are fake, sometimes downright farcical –
Now, we are divided and conquered.
Our communities have collided,
Our love for each other is drained and flustered.
We are armed with shields of prejudice,
Careening towards a perilous precipice
Of watching out only for ourselves,
With no room in our hearts for anyone else.
I just wish I could let go –
I wish I was an atom of boiling water,
About to break free and become steam,
I wish to taste of true freedom,
To at least get one, tiny gleam.
Yet,
I find myself weary, tired and trapped,
A torturous routine so well-travelled
That, at this point, I could say my brain has it mapped.
I close my eyes
And see visions of you I wish I could forget.
I wish I’d looked before I leapt,
Rather than live with this pain and regret.
I close my eyes, and see
Years of seeking somewhere I belong,
Brothers and sisters with whom I can stand strong.
Yet,
All I seem to find
Is people struggling with their daily grind,
Souls that are just as tired as mine, if not more.
*And so, I find myself
Dealing with this constant craving,
Ranting and raving,
Hoping that this frosty cave is still open to reclaiming,
Hoping that my soul is still worth saving,
And that my mind still finds this battlefield worth braving.*
Aug 12, 2018
Aug 12, 2018 at 4:06 AM UTC
Last December
I remember it clearly
The snow fell as I did
You watched me crumble
The wind threw me
You don't remember do you?
Your words frozen
You're a bad habit
I didn't know it.
Even now into the months of summer
I'm still thawing
I'm frostbitten
Jun 1, 2015
Jun 1, 2015 at 9:00 PM UTC
Are these tears of blundering laughter
or heckles of contempt
that spirit on these haggard few
to rhapsodise our era’s curtain calls?
They who brought us mounting debt and conscientiousness
which seems only to be healed in the appeasing fluorescence
of 24-hour supermarkets and the purgatory
of weekends spent at home?
Such stifling, nervous coughs
are head as responses of
today’s domestic questionnaires
Gung-ho reformative advances
and calls to “pull up our socks”
Mixed with the state-sponsored fortune-telling
Rationed out to boys languishing on the dole.
Which All falsely transpires,
intimidatingly revealed as being
About as appealing as vacuum cleaners for the soul
aimed at the resolutely bored to tears.
Despite our fears
the sun will come streaming again
through fresh fir trees
which decorate contemplative, sheltered lanes.
These last, frostbitten years
seek replacement with halcyon days
in order to suspend dogmatic disbelief.
Let’s not get ahead of ourselves:
Pessimism is ****
Even in the most roaring of times
we remained despondent and calculated.
Jul 16, 2012
Jul 16, 2012 at 12:12 PM UTC