scribbling down vicious verses on
tissue napkins while seated at
the corner of a sidewalk cafe is
about as romantic, raw and
honest a p(o)et
-outside of the four corners of your bedpost-
can get
if you've got that person dreading over
drafts and dreams on end
-of you, for you-
consider yourself a new owner
it is now time to
tame this p(o)et's perverse mane
you've got your hands on
a fragile purebred
which can be very tricky for
first timers
she fell to the earth in a stream of shrapnel
and stardust in holy proportions; born
of silence and unfulfillment, tumulting
through that narrow area between
expectations and reality where
the pink glaze marred her romantic,
(blurry: a photograph held by careless hands;
a memory outdated and forgotten
and beautiful, once, before
the future fell in pace)
she landed with a deafening crack--
ribcage split and spilling secrets,
gasping for air beneath the surface of a pond
so stagnant that even the lilies withered away:
bubbles rose slowly (she began the process
of forgetting to breathe)
and she was not made for
our atmosphere; the air po
Whale Songs of the Pacific by Sora-Seraph, literature
Literature
Whale Songs of the Pacific
Listen, the girls swallowed by whales are the ones that grow up lucky.
Listen, no one will warn you about the little boys with the magpie eyes and the fists swinging splinters of glass. No one will warn you that their smiles are sweeter than their words are sweeter than their souls are sweeter than their intentions. No one will warn you of the sheer weight of the world.
Listen, sometimes girls are fragile. Sometimes girls are frothy. Sometimes girls let boys nuzzle "I love you"s into their necks and sometimes girls drink the wine of believing them.
Listen, sometimes the boys really are sweet, and little girls' tart puckered mouths can't ta
expired warnings by intricately-ordinary, literature
Literature
expired warnings
I hate to break it to you but we're all betting on the day when
your nightmares will swallow you whole and you won't
remember how to open your eyes. we forget your voice,
it broke and no one buried the pieces. we're giving you up:
secessions (your ribcage is a civil war, your heart is the victim.
there will be no memorial; there are only red flags)
obsessions pick your bones dry, vulture needs, vulgar
mortality argues at least you're not alive
at least you can't see us anymore, counting the knots
in your neck and catastrophes in your mouth. in
your summer cage you were a soggy butterfly bearing
a cumbersome cross. now, we leave yo
A Mouthful of Sand by GentlemanAnachronism, literature
Literature
A Mouthful of Sand
There's sand in his mouth.
He's not sure why there's sand in his mouth - hell, he's not sure of anything at the moment, beside the fact that he seems to be alive (and even that's up for debate) - but sand in his mouth there most definitely is, coating his teeth and tongue in a gritty metallic-tasting sludge that he realises, with an odd sort of detachment, tastes a good deal more like blood than it would probably be expected to.
So, he thinks, after a moment's hazy contemplation, there's blood in his mouth.
This puts a new spin on things.
For a start, the blood has to come from somewhere (unless it's someone else's, which makes the whole
Burn down the house
Because there is a wedding
A necessary weeding
Of two souls
United by salt
(and a hint of lime,
Which, you know,
Is regret)
Sour and dripping
Like wax from the sun
Creating silk puddles
Of straw,
So you know,
That yellow
is not her hair
but, in time,
it won't appear, even,
to be there.
Burn down the bridge
Because of a beheading
A mandatory seeding
Of life interrupted
Combined with grief
(and a hint of thyme,
Which, of course,
Burns)
Black and dusting
Flaked like the corn
Breaking your incense
In multiples,
With wings,
Swimmingly,
To the sky,
As in a book,
A god named Pepper
Is still her
+++
i am the wicked edge of ricochet,
the asphyxiation of dust
in a hummingbird's bones. skeleton,
i am silver, grass torn hollow
by a child's breath. corkscrewing,
my veins etch true reflections
on time's skin:
a cardigan crumpled
like a child. Blue
and torn in half.
---
In January, Elsa got new neighbors. She greeted them with apple cinnamon tea.
It gets so cold, here, they told her, shivering in overstuffed parkas. Snow had turned to mud in their front hallan unavoidable side-effect of moving in winter. Elsa nodded along to their complaints and observations, silently brewing the tea in their kitchen. They were young; they had big plans. Allison and Steve, newlyweds, just starting out. They sat on the cold floor together, sipping with chapped lips. The house filled with cinnamon.
In April, Allison knocked on Elsa's door.