Author: poetryfest

They were all dead
Bodies found

It happened within
A blink of an eye

Lots of people, I must say

The journalists
Were busy blathering to the microphone
The police force
Would not arrive until daybreak
The relatives
Bawled like babies
The crowds
Enjoyed the showbiz

What they did not know was that
He was still there
In the people
In the riot
Staring dead-eyed
At the bloodstained dress

How did I know, after all?
Am I dead? Possibly yes.

You make a habit of loving things that are
out of reach. You choose neither tower
nor sun. Candlewax & goose feather
wings grow cracked and cold
in pitch black November night.
Your husband is a crack
dealer. Your lover
has a
wife.

You’re stranded in frozen prairies. Demeter asks
you to join her where mountains meet the sea.
Granville Island—salted caramel fudge—boba tea.
Snow burns your feet. Pomegranate seeds
get stuck in your teeth.
Mercury is in retrograde.
The stars make
you ache.

you wrote songs to our love. I was your golden one,
a muse, an angel. I floated down from heaven,
landed tip-toed, en pointe atop my marble pedestal.

I still remember
the rough edges of your voice,
the soul of it beaming through,
cinnamon simmering alto, smooth
for all its ridges.

you penned novels of this love. within their pages,
we lived a different life, far off in the distant future,
the place where I live now, without you.

maybe we lived in
a new york city brownstone,
a european villa, an island
paradise, though paradise was wherever
we found ourselves
together.

you breathed poetry for our love. each token was
a metaphor, each stolen moment a verse, each love
letter a dreamy ode to our shakespearean tragedy.

I have burned so many things—
I burned the letters.
it didn’t feel right
to throw them in the trash.
the strange ritualism of it,
the legacy of destruction
of the generations
we do our part in compounding.

in another universe, you are still writing me songs.
I am still writing you poetry. maybe you have a better
relationship with your parents. maybe we’ve both
given up drinking. or maybe I’ve forgiven myself,
forgiven you.
our midnight sighs could make me dizzy, still giddy
with the resplendence of the shiny & new.
we do not lie to each other anymore.

the songs would still be for me
instead of about me.
the stories still ours,
not spun & stretched
for the ears of a stranger.
instead,

the only one still writing the stupid poetry is me.

I was living hell,
not a metaphor, or a dream,
No this was real,
the kind that brands your bones,
a building caught on fire with no emergency exit.

Stuck in rooms that never felt like mine,
stained walls, ceilings too low,
air so thick, it filled up my lungs,
drowned me from the inside out,
shoved its fingers down my throat
until I was throwing up rage.

Sinking into corners,
pushing against walls,
always breaking things—
myself, mostly.

I wanted to claw my way out of my own skin,
crawl out,
but there was nowhere to go.

So, I smashed things,
just to watch my hands bleed.
Stuffed my mouth with pills,
chased them with liquor.

I broke people,
wore them down,
spent years running,
slamming doors.
I fought with anyone,
anywhere.

I wanted love, I did,
but love tasted like rust in my mouth,
so I bit down until I bled.
I burned bridges,
pushed people so hard they never turned back.
I ruined hands that tried to hold me,
made them regret ever reaching out.

I hated everything,
everyone.
the smell of fresh air made me sick,
the sight of people smiling—
made me want to tear my face off.

I hated Christmas lights, birthday candles,
holidays were just reminders,
I had survived another year
when I wasn’t supposed to.

I chased destruction like a maniac,
I ruined everything good,
just to see what was left underneath.

Nothing was left.
Just anger,
panic that I could never outrun.

Prisoner of my own thoughts,
fighting battles that never ended.
I was running from everything,
and running toward nothing.

I could feel the rot in my bones,
but I couldn’t stop.
I didn’t know how.

In the quiet moments—
when the fight paused,
when I stood still
and realized I wasn’t winning.
I wasn’t even fighting.
I was just falling apart,
piece by piece.
But I didn’t know how to stop.
I didn’t know how to put it back together.

So I let it burn.
I let everything burn.
Because that’s what I was made for,
to destroy,
to break,
to let everything collapse
until there was nothing left but the ashes.

And even then,
even as everything crumbled,
I didn’t know how to let go.
I just stood there,
waiting for something to end me

Your body etherized becomes
planet
compliant celestial natural
resource
abundant with fields of terminator seed
dreams
enriched with all the forever plastic plastic can
buy
fortified head to heel with drivable online able
sprawl
fulfilled with residue of faster food and mood
fixers
quenched from banks overflowing with glacier
thaw
illuminated by billions of headlamps fueling bull
markets
elated AI declares man wins man versus nature
war
gratified robot labor can drone bombs and deliver
babies
rejuvenated from cosmetics extracted from carboned
reefs.
Alarm beeps and sirens evaporate the anesthetic
buzz
consciousness shoots up, cells cold sweat subdued
regret
pain invades lethargic arteries and soberly
bones
make a stand and emit a deforested shadow’s
plea
for what on earth she has not in stores for us up
roots
the weeds of greed and vines of me so we
see
selfless creeks, tend genuine community gardens
then
kiss to death the brute nature that manufactured
this us.

Routine was you.
Sleeping,
I coddled in the blankets you slept in
I saw you in my dreams.
Eating,
I consumed the things you loved
I took satisfaction in being fed.
Showering,
I soaked in the smells you took after
I treated my body to the clothes you gave
me.

Routine was once you.
Now that you are gone,
I am met with uncalled for reminders
and seek pieces of you,
through friends and motions of everyday.

And in spite,
Sleeping,
I deprive myself of rest,
to be reminded less.
I toss the covers to the other side,
which was once yours.
Brushing teeth,
I scrub the reminders of our last meal
together
I floss you out of my teeth.
Brushing my hair,
I let the bristles collect dust,
where your hair is still tangled.

Showering,
I rub my skin raw,
with uncented soap.
I want to throw on your shirt anyways,
but anger dresses me now.

And with eyes puffy and lips fiery
I drap it’s burs over my shoulders,
and pile your gifts in a corner of my room.

Routine is now me.
I must learn again to do it myself
To find happiness in the mundane
and care for myself rather than caring for
you.

I am no longer walking with you,
But walking beside you.
As inscrutable as it is,
I must embrace it.

mary jane- a response to lies by ana sage

my problem is that i smell my vanilla perfume and i think of me and of you and i think of
guns and white nectarines and then when i smell my vanilla perfume it starts to smell kind
of like weed
and my vanilla perfume starts to smell too much like you
and then i think of smoked salmon bagels and candy cereal and how you texted me at 4
in the morning
and i can just see your body crumpling over the hood of the car and impaled on your own
knife
when i said smoke i thought of what wildfires leave behind when they die out
but you thought of last night at 4 in the morning and 911 calls
my problem is that when i smell my vanilla perfume
i think of what you wrote on the decrepit wall above the baseball diamond and the chalk
smeared across my fingers when i reached out to touch it
i think of my fingers interlaced with yours and how your hands were always too cold and
how they shook
i can picture your funeral and how i would scream at your mother for being your mother
i would scream at everyone is the pews that this was your fault
and that your white chalk outline on the fresh tar was my fault
and that i ate white nectarines last night at 4 in the morning while my phone buzzed and i
knew it was you
and i didn’t pick up
because i knew it was you
and now when i smell my vanilla perfume
it smells extra sweet, like a rotting corpse.

If you asked my parents

“What was the worst year
Of your youngest daughter’s life?”

They might tell you age twenty.
Because that’s the year
A bottle of pills
Found their way
To the bottom
Of my stomach.

But that wasn’t
The worst
Of my experiences.

If you asked me
The same question
You’d get a more accurate response.
I’d tell you age seventeen.
The year I lost control
Of my body.
7 times in one night.
I’d tell you of how
To this day
I can still feel

Her hands
Running on my skin
Like knives.
Over and over
7 times
One after the other.

But in my house
We don’t feel trauma.
We hide it.
Bury it.
As far as it can go.

I learned that,
When at age ten
I asked my dad

“Can we tell the police?”

And he scorned

“Of course not.”

So, I tried.

Believe me, I tried.
With everything I had
I tried to be like them.
I carried shame and avoidance
With me
Like my own children.
For years.
Never letting them out of my sight.
I took them with me
Through assaults,
And broken beer bottles on the floor.
To the tops of mountains,
In oceans, and rivers,
And lakes.
To concerts, and schools, and work.
With friends, family, strangers.

But when I tried
To bury myself
As deep as my traumas
It didn’t work.
I couldn’t breathe.
For some reason,
I am not like them.
I cannot push the pain away.
Maybe it’s because
My senses tell me
I am still there.
How can I avoid
And shame these feelings away
When they refuse to leave my side.

I wish more than anything
To be like them.
To live in avoidance
Like bliss.
To use a substance
To escape yesterday.

But yesterday
Keeps coming
Faster than tomorrow.

I just can’t keep up.

For whatever reason,
I’m not like them

Puppy born without ears, unable to hear, deemed useless, death foreseen
Aegocerus saves the Laconian dog later becoming loyal Cadmean
Since, each others side remaining, puppy becomes dog with his man of many years
Living lowly, ignoble, performing favors for fellow man
Labors not always well-meaning or moral, questing without question, integrity kept
through ignorance

Crusades rarely lacking consequence, they wronged the electric witch
Lady luck had left their hands, the fates places would switch
Zeus renowned for seeking revenge, sends after them his Castorian
Dionysus acknowledging they had no fault, tells Cadmean his destiny is to never be
caught

Laelaps, canine made of lightning and obedience
Born in Pleonos from the wolf made of stars, Zues’ sunless child made only to serve
The glowing golden hound made to hunt any being, destined to catch its prey
His eyes, infinite voids of indifference, and his teeth a hundred blades of zinc

The Castorian could be seen from a million miles away, its aureated skin glowing in
the saddened sun
No matter how good the hound was at hunting, his glittering body incapable of
keeping hidden
120 years the man and dog spent, traveling, keeping distance
Years were catching up, enclosing the space, safety was so fleeting

Hidden in wood and undergrowth, they lie in the loam
Enfeeblement of age has entrapped them in the earth
His Laconian lies in agony, refusal to die destroying him
Aegocerus’ only friend suffering from his loyalty, man faces amicicide
Now sobbing, screaming, overwhelming grief, no longer caring for concealment

Laelaps mere moments away, running full force, identifying direction of sound
His last stand, Aegocerus accepts suicide seconds before being devoured
Predestiny never fulfilled, beast becomes flowing river, runs till end of times
Zues turns deceased companions to constellations, for Laelaps failed to kill
Cadmean the Laconian, prevailing over the Castorian only through deat

She loved the sun, he didn’t. He worked the graveyard shifts, she worked the morning.
She lit up the room, he was misunderstood as gloom. He had few friends, her friends’
faces were a blur. She was always moving, he stood still. He enjoyed the natures’
beauty; she wanted the next fad. She had her head in the heavens and stars, his sight
narrow. He crooked as they came, she was a star. She was fuschia pinks, he was berry
blues. He was night and she was day. But they both died in that car crash.