poetryfest

Read Poem: HOW SHE MOVES ME by Terry Smith

I tried to explain my feelings
but how do you explain a sunrise
to a blind man
or the call of a whip-poor-will
to someone who’s ears
refuse sound
that when I hold you
I feel as if I have regained
something I had lost
long ago
that one smile from you
washes away even the worst of days
your every breath
is like music
& your very existence in my life
is nothing short of a miracle

Read Poem by Noel Hartem

The house is silent with dread

No one speaks but your screams are heard

I see your soul I know your soul

Blackness has colored your burnt edges

A light born bright refused to glow

Who threw the first stone to open such a wound

No elixir can cure the lesions you pick and protect

Neap tides have eroded your empty hearts wall

Tracing scars beneath thin skin with a smile

Disdain oozes at compassion and kindness

The corner of your eyes display your beloved hate

Tears of others used as a whetstone tool

Sharpened tongue precisely placed

As you looked away I deadlocked the door

The house is silent…….I said no more

Noel Hartem
http://www.noelliesplace.com

Read Poem: CONFLICTED BY NIKI BELL

I took the road less traveled by and sang my song…
“Take Me Home, Take Me Home”
Crescendos in the trees
They would call out my name
Protecting me
Gasping for air
In total shock
Unbelievable to the naked eye
“Take Me Home, Take Me Home”
I tapped into my crown
And tried to go within
Once again…
It wasn’t working
Please, “Take Me Home, Take Me Home”
I screamed in my head
This high pitched whining
The song haunted me
I could not fall asleep
Over thirty years of nightmares
Life NOT passing me by
Oh no, Oh no!
“Take Me Home, Take Me Home”
Crescendos bellowing in the wind
Sounds like murder
They said.
“Take Me Home, Take Me Home”
Even though the river stands tall
Mighty and strong
I will drown in it
“Take Me Home, Take Me Home”
Please, take me home
As I try to let go,
Nothing seems to go my way
As I clear out my voice,
my heart, my aching pains,
More just flood my memories,
“Take Me Home, Take Me Home”
I struggle to go within
Relax, it is okay
Nothing will console me
Oh, I can not breathe
As they enter my bedroom
And tell me…
All of them
STOP.
All the men
Past, and present.
All the men from a hopeless future.
Say to me, ‘STOP”.
My inner voice need no validation
Always thinking for herself.
From within comes this message,
Stop torturing yourself
You cannot come back
To destiny lost
You cannot come back to healed pain
You must move on
Let the rain be your sun
The moon stand on tiptoe
As you walk in light
Ask yourself for forgiveness
Live for today
“Take Me Home, Take Me Home”

I was born into a world of sexual violence
We coin it as sexual trafficking these days
The trauma in which I have had to overcome
In this lifetime
There is no rhyme or reason for such sanity (no that is not a typo)
My saving grace is knowing that I have, with my story,
Helped another… woman… another child…
To be free and begin their journey
As I walk through the valley of death
I am acutely aware of my own re-victimization of myself
I am fond of my survival skills
I seek no praise
I stopped hazing myself with fire, with hate
I began to scream a new kind of love
I shed a new shell
I take my power back every moment of the day
Regardless of poverty
Loneliness, or a lack of
I stand alone
A warrior of my own
A savior of my own story
A goddess of life, Diosa de Vida
A woman deserving
A human being bleeding
“Take Me Home, Take Me Home”
Goes back to that hole,
To that time
And there is no reason or rhyme
For such sanity.
Therefore, I will not go.
As I walk through the valley of death
I demand to be free
“Let Freedom Ring”
“Let Freedom Ring”
You will not “Take Me Home, Take Me Home”
I have never been whole
Only…

CONFLICTED.
Copyright © 2018 Niki Bell

Read Poem: Grandma and Alzheimer’s by Missy Sue Singhaus

Alzheimer’s is not a pretty site,

It has no age that it affects

It can affect the young and old.

It takes a caring old lady into someone you don’t know.

As time passes things get worse and the sweet old lady is no longer there.

She is gone, she is someone you don’t know, and no longer is caring

But a stranger, empty soul, empty eyes looking at you

No longer can communicate their needs

Back to childhood without a voice

Their needs are strange and hard to understand

As time goes on they forget to how to walk,

Their communication is gone,

They cry in frustration

They cry out in pain

They know they are a stranger

And that you’re a stranger to them

Things can never be the same

Things have changed

Looking into her eyes now they look at peace

The pain, sorrow and the fight has end

They join loved ones before

You are left to wonder

When can I see them again

The whole them, not a stranger

The person you knew

The one you call a second Mommy

The one that stood there and stood for you

No more an empty soul but the woman you once knew

A younger version of the old lady you once knew

A younger you that your grandma once knew

Someday both of us back together again

We have made ourselves whole once again.

Two souls young again

No more troubles of this World

But eternity to spend together

No more Alzheimer’s and no more pain

Those that were are put to rest

A New beginning for eternity

Dedicated to my grandma Alberta Delbert

Read Poem: In Time by Alex Clay

Thy lonely voice and somber tone
Of melancholy words ‘ere spoken
To linger here and left alone
Amongst dreams thy thoughts have broken
Whilst sitting still enduring all
The fathoms of thine emptiness
Mine own demise in time befall
My mourning without recompense
Thy earthly form to sever thee
From this final mortal coil
To dance afar and wander free
Left behind this lonely toil
Many a year shall pass my time
And giveth small reminder
The longest mountain I must climb
To light thy flame much brighter
Thou art asleep to wake not soon
By thine own hands’ destruction
Yet still in death as bright as moon
The mortician’s reproduction
Embalmed in flame I set abroad
Thine ashes tossed asunder
A chosen place the esplanade
The birth of nature’s wonder
Now rest my love and wander not
The shoreline still with water
Rest in peace and not forgot
Mother, wife, and daughter.

Dedicated to Kaitlyn Marie
1993-2016

Read Poetry: Lessons Learned by Leah Reeve

To all those I’ve loved before

Thank you for the memories and so much more

For all the kisses and all the lies

Which taught me things I cannot deny

For every promise that was broken

For every word left unspoken

I’ve learned to share my love with only those who deserve it

No longer willingly giving my heart away

To anyone who would come my way

I’d love too fast and fall too hard

Giving my all and dropping my guard

To all those I’ve loved before

Thank you for the lessons I couldn’t ignore

***
Categories: Love, hurt, fear, rhyme

Read Poem: Land of my Heart by Lynne Zotalis

This sky is tres spectaculaire
as I lie on the slate stone courtyard
astral planing
amongst lucent clouds revealing a canvas,
contrails accentuating
gossamer wisps,
vapor haze
fusing white with azure gray,
innuendo of coral.

Ahhh….
my breath makes the sound of longing,
stay forever, cradle me within the tranquility of your spell,
entrancing me till I blush crimson.

Fuse me
with the vision I can witness
only this once, this singular twilight.
My eyes reflect the waning sunlight, still with
soul penetrating rays, warming from inside out
these somnolent bones—
a surreal gift this clement evening, springtime
in the land of my heart.

Read Poem: Winter Afternoon by Carlo Danese

Parking on side streets, so impatient for spring the way your first girl shivered
until the heat came up, gas was cheap so you left it running
soon the windows fogged and you could pretend
that no one walking by saw you, but
people know your car anyway, so

You drive clear out of town, that farm you worked
last summer had a shed, good half mile
from the main house, you remember
it was clean, they kept it so clean, the wife
once proudly explained; ‘In case of guests’ pointing

At a rough cabinet high up on the wall, away
from the dirt floor littered with corncobs, leaves, scraps
from some fence that got in a tractors way, inside
piled high with moving blankets; her uncle drove a rig for twenty years
and the worn out army green one they sent him home in.

The sun finally fallen behind the last ridge sprays weak light, splayed hands
saying ‘Take me’ to the winter night, you ease the shift down third to second, back
up then down again pumping the clutch so the tires caress the frozen dirt, ‘How much further?’
she wonders and you nod to the distance then in case she took the brevity for impatience, smile
reaching across where her sweet hand weaves an unlit cigarette.

‘We’re here!’ nosing hard against a rut, ass end angled up so her door slams into a drift, the shed
a soft shape, barely darker than the growing night; ‘I can’t see’ she whispers, snaking
your arm through the glove box you explain ‘Flashlight somewhere’, flicking it on
she giggles ‘Oh my hero!’ then coat falling away circles your face, sighing
‘Kiss me here’ and blushes quivering under her open blouse you find

Heaven, her bra crumpled pastel on the floor mat, incongruity
part of the romance and tasting the place you dream of can’t stop
till she pulls away, ‘We should go inside’ you’re holding the flashlight still lit so
she covers your hand ‘I can see now, I can see good’ stepping inside
you fall together mouths everywhere you hush ‘Wait’ reaching up

To the hand made cabinet fling the door open then blankets tumble down
you lay them in a fat pile and grabbing the fuzzy green army one wrap her all creamy
in it’s softness you can’t believe how perfect the world is; she struggles
with your belt, fingernails shock at first but learning quickly
she knows just how to guide you, it’s rough

But soon you both find the rhythm you already knew, finally
laugh when she screams ‘oh baby!’ for the first time then somewhere
snow crunches under boots, a lantern clanks, hinges squealing swing
yellow blaze, a single blast then endless echoes no more laughs just red; gushing
where her face was the farmer in the doorway standing proud, blue haze

Clouds his grin; ‘Always knew you been messing with my wife’ no sooner
do the words fall out his mouth like rocks from a dump truck but his eyes, traveling
the eternal silence of a beautiful young woman finally inform his brain, ‘God forgive me!’
begging to be accused but you’re still holding her as if looking for a missing part, dip two fingers
in your forsaken mouth and run them along the surface of what she was, your hand

Lumbers, winged monster over a burning lake.

Read Poem: Supershero by Syd Stewart

We wild women ride railroads with combat boots strapped and laced tightly
protecting our sheep because our children
sleep with nightmares
We keep our emotions frozen from fiction
in his story books
We the daughters of Sheba
heirs to the throne
We imbibe intuition
We bear our burden on backs barren
Our gender specific
We are the Superwomen

The ladies to give birth to revolutions in boardrooms, break rooms, bodegas and brothels where some of us finance romance due to personal circumstance

We survive
They call us She short for Supershero

We build bridges that generations will cross
We crochet uniforms for matching armies
We pray, repeat mantras, chant namaste and
sing warrior lullabies
We connect with ancestors for answers
to questions that six year olds conceive
In Alabama, where blood colored soil echoes
the dreams of four little angels
We climb heights with deer and send out warnings of lightning and thunder
Rain cleanses our wounds and we get in formation positioned for battle again

We are alive
They call us She short for Supershero

Our memories are like elephants and our swords are like tusks
We travel In packs and use our words
when necessary
Our words pierce through flesh that is diseased
Some of us our doctors. Some midwives
Some serve as council. The rest of us wait
We stir up our gifts and barter with dignity
to gain honor
Wisdom is our passport for this sojourn
And we rub cocoa butter on scars
to mend broken bones

We strive
They call us She short for Supershero

We look until we find the red orange yellow sunset
We sleep until we are tired of being tired
We rise until we kiss the sky
Our mothers are silent because they cannot speak
It is our time and we must rely on the moon inside
The tide current. The tomatoes ripe.
The harvest ready
The virtuous woman in the mirror is BattleBorn
And manipulate physics to make the earth rotate with her cycle
The marrow of our elegant bones is where Solomon hid his riches
We the mothers of nature daughters of the dust
Our names are written by scribes and translated into hieroglyphics
We are Julie Dash, Neema Skye, Monique Coleman, Laquita Perkins, Ana Lou, Shab Bahadori,
Mata Hari, Zora Neale Hurston
Brenda Stewart, Ava Duvernay, Michelle Obama, Barbara Walters and Queen Esther
We don’t need Charlie to be angels

Only God

They call us She short for Supershero

We remember then we forget
we are welfare mothers with no man and five mouths to feed

We succeed

We are crackheads with habits
trading places with movie stars
We breed
We are aid to dependent children
We breathe
We are public in our quests to conquer the world
We are the United States of Women, chairmen of the board, senators and presidents
We are more than hashtags

We are free
They call us She short for Supershero

As we walk miles on the road less travelled
with shoes tight around our ankles
The footprints we make are indelibly recorded on the iPads of little girls who play hopscotch with
other little girls
Who Snapchat the lesson to little boys
Our names are documented in court dockets
Scribbled on prison walls in notebooks and typed in code by paralegals

We are eagles

We aid and abet, we rewrite the alphabet for kindergarten classes
We ride or die for the masses
We build homes for the hopeless
Our wombs are habitats for humanity
We make no excuses and apologize
only to ourselves

Our men call us blessed and they learn Lamaze Giving us pause for the cause
They purify our breast milk so we can breath

They call us she short for Supershero

So when u see us gleaning in the fields
Like Ruth shining humility like diamonds and topaz you won’t wonder how she snagged a Boaz
So respect the swag and call us by name
Only the unattainable can render us insane

We are more than hashtags because of the magnitude of society’s vice
But for now

#Metoo will suffice

Read Poem: LOVE by Via Suzette Salao

I can write you a poetry as each of our lives emerges and creates a new chapter,
Just like how the monotonous dark sky luminesces as it welcomes the dawn brought by a new day.
Ready to walk together as we perambulate through the woods and explore new horizons,
To go astray as we suffice the desires and the longings buried deep within our hearts.

I can write you a poetry as we contend through the battle of life,
As we crack complexities and trail different quests to obtain solutions.
Together we will amble as we conquer mountains of hardship,
To diminish the hunger of temporary things and attain interminable time with each other.

I can be your poetry, your escape and your safe haven,
Let me be your shelter to foster you from storms, enlighten and guide you from dilemmas.
I can be your poetry to protect you from anything that hinders you from bliss,
A poetry that stays, and will remain with you for an endless time.