Author: poetryfest

The left says its men’s fault
The right says its women’s fault.

Incomplete.

It is our fault.

And more specifically,
Yours.

You.
Reading this.

It’s your fault.

Here’s the truth:

Every man
Has the possibility of being a violent,
Abusive,
Raping,
Serial killer
Who will peel off your skin and wear it for a coat.

Every woman
Has the possibility of being a conniving,
Abusive,
Betraying,
Gold digger
Who will take you for all your worth and leave you in the dirt.

This is not a problem of men or women.
This a human problem.

What do both of you want,
Actually?

Do you even know it?
I’ll tell you,
Because most of you are too cowardly to say.

You want certainty.
You want a promise.
You want a guarantee.

Here’s the truth boys and girls,
The only people who offer guarantees
Are selling something.

Because in the real world,
There are no guarantees.

Everything you have,
Everything you will have,
Everything you could have-

All of it-
Can,
And will,
Be taken away.

You are going to die,
And lose everything.

But if you spend your entire life
Demanding that life give you things
That it will not,

When your last breath is drawn,
It will be with regret.

Imagine casting in The Truman Show. Unbeknownst to you, your Truman…“Who all actually knows?” Misspoken lies and glamorized illusions…Are characterized by distorted confusions. Unfolding truths, opened realms… Of seeing others on repeat. Such defeat overwhelmes. Temperament in roles … unknowingly holds.

Strenuous hours on unanchored actors…Produced spectators with a grin and hands that read “traitor”. Participating in unordained events… That doesn’t protect all in its covenant… Represents a weakened system, only ruling for consumption. Vamping energy…Like it’s nothing.

Flaunting to amplify propaganda…Through entangled projections. Anything it takes, to increase views rating.

Grand exposures are met with lane closures… Unintended malfunctions got trafficked in manipulative conjunctions.

Interconnecting… Sought interconnection. Which interconnected, the moment of clarity. Third eye insight. Vanity!!! The type that doesn’t just flow …Grows.

A dissector is not supposed to overreact once it is registered. Divine time is supposed to teach. Lessons from failed actions, when acting.

Unaware of deceptions deceit. Unturnable effects… Leaving a stain of regret. That smell must reeks!

When the scripted tasks…siphoned energy, that heightened senses …Which could determine, whose foe? Enemy…?

Look through, that is hoping to pamper from someone else’s consolidation… Focus on you. By any means necessary, dead the notion of moving ineffectively. Checker in… chess moves, that brings positive in revelation. An Indescribable interpretation… Disguised as the attempt to reclaim classification.

Signify a thrill…When the blindness prevented the reveal. Stagnation of forwardness, discredit the attempt of an emotional death. Deluding realness, will not disenfranchise trueness.

I wanted to thank you.
I wanted to thank you for all the fun we had
The walks we took, the restaurants we went to, the drives,
Fighting with you, playing with you,
Me running after you and you running after me.
Watching television with you.
Just sitting with you.
I wanted to thank you for all the delicious food you gave me,
My food, your food—anything that caught my eye–knowing that just a little bit wouldn’t hurt.
(I did love roast beef and barbecued chicken!)
I wanted to thank you for caring about me
Taking me to have my hair done and waiting for me
Taking me to the doctor and waiting for me
Taking me to the hospital and waiting for me.
Taking care of me until the very end.
Yes, I always knew you’d be there.
I’m sorry I couldn’t say all this to you before—but words don’t come easily to me.
I’m patiently waiting for you now, as I always did, knowing we’ll meet again.
Yes, I really, really was a lucky dog.
Sincerely, Momele, the Shih Tzu
(2010-2025)

the raven’s song ceased,
a tarrying silence.
a tickle of wind teased,
willows waving in remembrance.

freed in stale air
a rose petal drifted,
the dance to forbear
an atmosphere shifted.

a radiant wreath
the rays shone aglow
upon newly unsheathed
chiselled headstone.

‘une vie honorable
est une vie éternelle’,
etched in the marble,
fervent tears in farewell.

hyper paradise —
another season unearthed
today in headphones.

one leaf that is gone
now is the intramural ring
of the rising sun

harvesting the heart —
identity cannot split
the unfound flux.

a palm tree trunk
arched over classic stucco —
views within a park

unknown shadow —
its insect twitched in air
and through grass it went

sounds of steps behind —
bordering the path I sat
to ease my day

Will you meet me down in
the dingy part of town
near Dunsinane
and the Burnham Bar
where we’ll suck cold wine from Evenflo.

Will you meet me in that basement
under the piano factory
where the silence begins
and the bodies float
where we’ll create new words with our hands.

Will you meet me in that doorway
sealed up with brick
in the discount alley
on that souledout street
where we’ll look for deals in the dumpsters.

Will you meet me in that phone booth
at the end of electricity
on the All World Party Line
and tubular highway
where we’ll talk about greening and systems and cyber-touching.

Will you meet me with your candlesticks
in that lonesome graveyard
on the boulevard of tombs
among the spidery footpaths
where we’ll trace our names and place pebbles on our graves.

Oh my grungy one
with the dust in your hair
and patchouli on your neck
We’ll ride by dusk and discover hunger and
what it means
to starve.

Do not speak ill of the dead for they have left you songs, joyous in sound, praying on the wine of my body that carried them as they passed.
Do not speak ill of the dead for they know what you see, how you now perceive, a gift a lyre gives to the received deceased.
Do not speak ill of the dead for after me, constructed into me, my sublime unity, frequency resides:: this time music, your ascription of “after”.
Do not speak ill of the dead for the living they mock will tether to your being, this fates undoing of your good, marking you with the scent of unluck.
Do not speak ill of the dead, make it a prayer over poetry, this a paradox of the arts, how they speak of the dead.

We met in heat,
The kind only Haiti knows.
Heavy air,
Light touches,
A man who said I love you
Before I could decide if I believed him.
I waited.
He waited.
We slept next to each other,
Naked but untouched.
Somehow, that was the closest I ever felt to him.

We moved in.
A dog followed.
We made a life of
Mango trees and miscommunication.

He wanted a woman who
Gave orders to staff,
But I was raised
Washing my own plate.
I stumbled with the household
But loved him hard.

We made children.
Two boys born at home
In our love island.
One after another,
Like prayers that landed
Little feet.
Our love represented in them.

Then came Florida,
Poison in my babies,
Not knowing from where.
Stress that outgrew us.
Bills, nights with no sleep.
Another baby born at home.
This time in America.
No midwife could catch
What was unraveling between us.
The man who once whispered
You are mine and I love you
Spits in my direction now,
Calls me names I don’t recognize.

The man I thought would never hurt me.
You don’t destroy the ones you love.
His rage, his hate,
A fire I didn’t start
But still burn from.
I tried to douse it
With patience,
With apologies,
With silence.

But silence did not save me.
It only taught me how to
Disappear without leaving
The room.

I miss the man who
Held my door open,
Who held my hand while driving,
Touched my growing belly,
Ran his fingers through my hair.

I miss the man
Who made me feel chosen
Without needing to be perfect.
Who made plans with me.
Not just for a day, but for a life.
A garden.
A family.
A home.

Now I live in the ruins
Of what we dreamed,
Tiptoeing around broken pieces,
Because the sharpest ones
Are made out of words.

And still, after everything,
After the silence,
The shouting,
The ache that settles between us,
I want to find our way back.

Not as strangers,
Sharing blame.
Not as roommates
Passing off the children like
Time cards.
But as we once were.

Lovers.
Best friends.
A team built on touch and trust.

I want to return to the version of us
Who held hands with hope,
Made love quietly
Under mosquito nets,
And believed that softness
Could last forever.

I don’t want what we’ve become.
I want who we were
Before pain pulled us apart.

I want whole.
Not perfect.
Just whole together.

You breathed be mine—
and just like that, I was yours.
At your disposal, at your mercy—
to hold, to tame, to unravel.

My undoing as your conquest,
thread by thread, laced in silk and sin.
Tattoos of bruises you kissed on my wrists.
Cramps from my shakes made you come for more.

And just like the fire meant to burn,
we melted—locked in embrace.

Now that I’ve built my sanctuary under your warmth,
is it selfish to keep you quiet?
Call you mine?
Maybe too reckless and callow
to end up in shackles
by the right being too shallow—
to divide twin flames burning for another,
send one spiraling across dimensions,
and poison a haze over the other’s core.

Unbeknownst to all,
the greatest stories are rewritten—
because epic was always their destiny.