Author: poetryfest

Submit your Poetry to the Festival. Three Options: 1) To post. 2) To have performed by an actor 3) To be made into a film.

Read Poem: I’M NOT JUDGING YOU, by CONSTANCE VAN NIEKERK

I passed by you again
Standing at the same corner
Your legs shining in the dark
As cars passed you by
You gazed hopefully at each passing car
Probably even praying
That you get lucky tonight
What drives you to these streets
Only you know
In these winter nights
Clad as always in your short black tights
You brave the cold
Without any rhythm
You skip to the blaring melody
From your phone
With your red lips you mimic the song
What tales are you hiding behind
That make-up on your face
Only you know
I don’t know your story
Neither have I walked in your shoes
You might find this hard to believe
But, I don’t judge you
I too have my own demons to fight
Clutching my Holy Book every Tuesday night
Just like the prodigal son
I’m just trying to find my way back
Don’t misunderstand me
I don’t condone your lifestyle
Neither am I judging you
Who am I but
Another soul wandering far from home

Read Poem: LOVE, by James Stordy

Let my lips serenade your body
and place my hands gently on your curves
Let my eyes deeply embrace yours
and let my voice whisper softly in your ear
let the fires burn intensely
and the candles illuminate you
let the night turn into day
and watch the stars disappear
until tomorrow
and i let me serenade you all again

Read Poem: Floydian Slip, by Preethy Nair

When the umbilical became a discord
I opened my eyes to this world
Everything was about me
Everyone was around me.
Mother, do you think the world is better than your womb?

That indelible age in school
Faded into solitude
Hurtful words were spoken with laughter
Bullying was a sign of power
Mother, do you think I can erase those scars?

Love, i was told, is finding a soulmate
Sensing what i need, without having to ask
Pure acceptance of all my flaws
And of all my secrets
Mother, do you think one other person is everything in my life?

Success was defined seeing myself ahead of my peers
Putting on a mask of acceptance
Concealing my true self
I raced for appreciation, money and titles.
Mother, do you think there is a finish line in this race?

I wanted to be a writer, they said there were too many writers
I wanted to be a nomad, they said i should settle down
I wanted to be careless, they forced me a mortgage
I wanted to be free, I was caged by the fear of missing out
Mother, do you think i can escape the jails of materialism ?

Hush now baby, hush, baby, don’t you cry
Don’t cry over your past for it has gone
Love yourself and know that you are enough
It matters not that you are the tortoise in the race
May you never be perfect for life is not perfect

Hush now baby, hush, baby, don’t you cry
For you already are a writer, writing your own life!

Read Poem: SYNESTHESIA, by Josimar Morán

I see you
in the cold that curtails my soul
and breaks through the side
of my numbed hope
uselessly waiting for you
in the acrid winter of loneliness
where you left me clinging to your oblivion.

I called you
and your silence has the taste of goodbye
impotent, black, moribund
who escaped from your wounding eyes
that cloudy instant
that I took your hand to hold you
while you got lost
in the feverish scent of nostalgia.

I Caress your memory
and a rare melody emerges
that I had never seen,
is the sound of one “I love you”

that was tattooed in the blood
with the indelible promise
of waiting you forever
in the golden and timid breeze
of a blessed autumn
that inspirits the fire of your return
with scraps of tears
that my hands have woven for you.

The night is sad
and caresses my wound with her lips
that smell like deceit,
’cause knowing that you’re not coming
still brings me your scent
and draw your figure
with the saddest colors of the sky.
Color of an star in your eyes,
full moon smell in your mouth,
heat of heaven on your skin
and in the distance a hidden bright star
screaming your name with light beams
that mimics
the crystalline and crazy laughter
of your hands ruffling my skin
at the dance with my verses
that were falling swift
at the mere sound of your look.

You’re not, you have never been or will be
here with me;
but your essence repeats in my ear
with the force of a volcano
about to eclipse the flight
of a drop of rain in the summer.

You have a white “parfum”
as reveries freshly cut
and a rare voice of repressed sadness,
I know, yes I know,
I have also drunk the sweet poison
of Pride,
intoxicating, hallucinating;
but leaves a hangover of solitudes
impossible to remain silent
because their footprints reflect
the melodious voice of happiness.

Every word has your taste,
empty as the distance between your skin
and my hands,
black
as the anguish of not seeing your kisses,
alone
as my left hand trying
to inhale the scent of your memory
and sad
as the voice of your lost sight
in the distance of forgetfulness
that never comes
because it is hidden behind the silhouette
of the ghost
dozing on the infinite horizon
of the warm desire
that was born the unlucky day
that I closed my eyes to not feel
the cold kiss of your goodbye
being lost in the senselessness of my destiny…

Read Poem: She is there, by Laraine Batis-Gelpi

Arms stretched high, sun-tanned & freckled skin, a crown of coils – all warmth & life..
Arms stretched high, face to the sky
bright shining eyes – deep inside
She is there.

Stay there, I am busy with these waves, this wind, this storm ..

Crown of coils blown round my face
Weary rowing,
my back to the bow- lurched & pitched as I struggle to row..
Seeing only the trail where I’ve been

The outposts of each challenge stretched behind me like a worn and tattered hair ribbon kept from childhood that I beseech myself to find a use for… lest I let it go

Turn to the bow now, turn to the bow!!
Change your direction, just for today give leave for me to row for you ..watch where we are going.

I am here
Arms stretched high, sun-tanned & freckled skin, a crown of coils – all warmth & life..
Arms stretched high, face to the sky
bright shining eyes – deep inside
I am here.”

@soulpoetree

Read Poem: # A season of You, by _Inkling Ink

Like a summer blaze,
You have inflamed,
The humming heart,
Like a soothing rain,
You have soaked into,
The thunderous soul,
Like a freezing winter,
You have shaken,
A burning fire,
In January sigh,
And when I have shed,
Tears of gold,
In an autumn sage,
Amid the new dawn of hope,
In the colour of spring,
I have already lived a season of you.

Read Poem: Drama, by Coco Kiju

Feelings, desires, emotions
We say it’s what drives us.
But we’re only looking for reasons
to justify the obvious.

We have long since been stone cold
feeding only our selfishness.
We play with whatever cards we hold.
Hit on target. Yet pretend to miss.

Working only for your own needs.
Kindness you show is a facade.
Writing only what they want to read.
Even god himself is a fraud.

But your truth is only your opinion.
We put our faith in karma.
No matter what, the show goes on.
So we carry on the drama.

Read Poem: Rattles and the Rust, by Kartik Prajapat

I endlessly search my flesh and bone
what undernourishment has it gone?

How come they speak of me being shy?
when my days actually passes high and dry.

Some ask me to hope while some to have desire,
struggling is my heart, it is set on fire.

The hands that nurtured me promptly degrades
and her blessings are left as the only trace.

Might be the rust she was bestowed
here I corrode against all her hopes.

This goes till then I was five
Alike the present full of strife.

She kept screaming ‘Help O’ help!’
I was alerted & going to yelp.

He throttled me in a fit of rage
”Damn it you bastard! You shall also die in a cage”

I moved forth and tried to stop,
but my hands were barred by him, from the top.

“Stop here for my pity sake”
he added – Let her char O’ bloody snake!

You are vigilant and letting her die
Applauds to you, bidding her goodbyes.

You went up in the flames, burning so high
O’ count me the reasons, Mumma! what & why?

“Keep blazing O’, dear son
You are my residue, the charcoal unburned.”

Arid feels my heart, the dry leaves crinkle
blow me up with you, I’m ready to mingle.

I switch off the lights, what is sleep?
where’s gone that lap, I used to weep?

Nights are drearier than ever before
I often search for me in my core.

Your wailing reverberates up to now
I turned 23, I still wonder when and how?

Every time I breathe in my soggy lungs
a rattle of your presence fills me with the spunk.

Here I stand as your only fraction,
inbuilt into dynamite give me some friction.

You made me invincible, the heat is on
If only you were here, what wasn’t that I own?

―Kartik Prajapat

Read Poem: Of times, Melisa Keelanna Griffith

Times and times again
Bypasses the distance of my mise
Kaleidscopes of precious moments
Brings to life the real In meh total scope
Forever inundated be meh fe totalic replace
Reminiscing on the remembrance meh faded face
Phased an thinking of the measure within these times
Calling to know whom I was before
Transitting on this mindscape
I redundant the child
Was ever me was ever free
Too, much is due to the pleasant lessons in my negated rear view
Passing times measured by distance as I count the miles on the mileage speed; upon meh back as I walk entrance into the future
I sound the full hands width purposed within the stockhold; the baggage of memories
Cremiced I place it upon the table of trust to know in this essence of lust what befolds the resistance to know
To gauge its measure and point it to the zenith my realizing that time and times again exist
For to peel away at this old age sin forever would my hope foretold the wisdom untold
And if ever it be to my reality I must know the measure of my sins
To brigade within the lush waters of force to carry on trodding this course
To my eye view pinpoint the realness in me is to know
So I talk within the vocal stories, the forlore within
In pleasant reminiscing ii foretold the vessel that
would carry me on to times and times again.