ROMANCE Poem: Love eternally, by Eros Leingang

lost, lost, lost, lost
oh my dearest lost
every moment we spend together
amounts to nothing
if I cannot have you after passing,
at the end of the tale,
at the brink of extinction,

lost
never faithful to another
but our perfect unity
no higher power
no fate nor destiny
I chose you
I love you purposely
loved

who knew it was to be punished for
who decided it was a crime
to be passionate
to be dedicated
to love

hungry
more of you
you, oh perfect you
the only mistake being
the lack of more you
forever and always

protective
not overbearingly
but willingly
to be greedy is to want
to want exclusively

angry
not at me
but for me
the dread
the sorrow
evolved
into an emotion that which protects me

rebellious
fight, advocate, protect
anything
for me
god damn those whose actions affect us
yet damned for doing so

vicious
brutal and harsh
but the moment your eyes turn to me
soft, delicate, gentile
the harbinger of death to another
but would never lay a hand upon me

deceived
no, you have not
I am the one guilty of such
I’ve tricked you into loving me
loving someone so far below
never shallI compare to you
to perfection
the Moon to the sun
achilles to paris

betrayal
I’ve betrayed myself
my guard
my shield
though in the end
betraying me
led to loving you

lover
you should never be punished
you have never made such a sin
Dante, I will always love you

from your’s
Beatrice

ROMANCE Poem: A Broken Wine Glass and a Persian Rug, by David Atti

The parts of me I fear to reveal,
Are the parts I left in you.
When we met I was broken,
And didn’t know how to heal(fix me).
So when I stumbled into you,
Right in the middle of the room.
Looking all in control, and,
Having all the attention you deserve.
I finally knew
That I would be whole again.
So I hid beneath your soft touch,
Avoiding the inevitable of being trashed.
Little did I know, that those little pieces,
Would be the one to tear you apart.
Now I’m stuck with not only a broken me,
But a torn apart you.
On our way to the one place I feared most
Damnation!!
But if it’s with you,
Then it’s a better place to be
With our new whole.

ROMANCE Poem: Entanglement, by John Casey

Being infinitely close; the thought lingers.
You feel, and so I feel
the little things, the big things.
You sense me thinking.

I explore your joy from afar.
The silly joke you tell, laughing—it makes me laugh.
Bouncing excitedly and talking fast, you excite me.
I stick my finger in something tasty, and you taste it.

Our surface reflects what lies beneath.
At depth,
we revel together within
an irrelevance of distance.

When apart, we intertwine,
bound in a delicate, paradoxical dance.
No one fits to me like you, nor you to me.
We are never anything other than near.

ROMANCE Poem: I wake from a long dream that unsettles me, by Roxana Landivar

I throw myself into devouring the complete works of Peri Rosi,
the complete works of Bob Dylan,
Caetano Veloso
Idea Vilariño
Gal Costa
Frank O’Hara
Roy Sigüenza
I seek something that speaks of you
I show the evidence
each discarded book on the floor is a trophy
I whisper your name in the avenues
like a prayer that repeats
repeats, repeats
I dream of a world where I finally forgot you
each year, I am certain that it has passed
I stay alive for long stretches
until you arrive like a tornado
snatching everything away with a single word.

ROMANCE Poem: A Little More, by FN

A drop of alcohol and everything comes rushing to my head, the feeling that maybe you’re not quite
it. You’re the experience I am living for once and not my whole world.
A little more alcohol and I hyperventilate at the idea of you being in my same space.
A little more and it sounds bearable.
A little more and the bartender’s looking really hot. I feel your body against my skin but I feel your
blood running at a different speed.
A little more and I’m asleep in your car as the songs I imagined breaking up with you are playing. A
little more and I start arguing with you.
A little more and I realise how suffocating you are, your embrace doesn’t feel loving and caring but
forced and still.
My heart is racing at the idea of young and free and yours is as still as the mountains.
I want to run up the hill and scream my lungs out and you want to walk while looking at the flowers
on the side.
A little more and I won’t feel a thing anymore, numb at the idea of love, passion and everything fun
I strangle my body in the white wedding dress and walk down the aisle thinking maybe a little more
alcohol and I’ve lived the dream.
The audience is staring at me with widened eyes as if they knew I didn’t belong to the altar but I
belonged to the audience.
They can see the fraudulent alcohol running through my veins, making me someone I am not.
I am not meant to be loved and appreciated forever I am meant to be a wonderful couple years.
And I am not meant to be yours.

ROMANCE Poem: Beauty of Union, by Jagannath Biswal

The feeling wreathing you and me
Into the musical garland of our silence and sounds
Is the dew mirroring the morning sun
Of our relationship raining
Its golden green fragile kisses to the earth.

The feeling snarling our fingers and hands in its emotional tapestry
And dissolving our minds in its intricate delicacy
Is the fathomless ocean of our love
Silently swallowing the quickness into its quietitude
And throbbing the fragile throbs on the surface.

The feeling tying us together
In its delicate knots
Is the quest for the blissful beauty of union.

Dt: 18th October 2024

TRAGIC Poem: VOID OF DARKNESS, by Kassey Rohrscheib

In the depth of my shattered soul I am lost, alone and cold The voices whispering in my head, saying things I cannot hold

They tell me I am unworthy, unwanted, and used They whisper of endings, of life no longer pursued

I try to silence them, but they only grow louder with each passing day I feel myself falling deeper into the dark abyss of my brain, my pain, my shame I am drowning in the sea of despair, and there’s no lifeboat in sight

I reach out for help, for someone to hold me tight But nobody’s there, no helping hand in sight Just whispers in the dark, saying it’s all in my mind They tell me to keep quiet, to put on a smile

I wear a mask of happiness, to hide the hurt within I laugh and joke, to pretend that I am fine But deep inside I am shattered, broken beyond belief The weight of the world on my shoulders, I can scarcely breathe

I yearn for comfort, for a kind, gentle touch To be held and told that I am enough But the whispers still whisper, growing stronger each day They remind me that I am alone, in this darkness to stay

I try to drown out the voices with music and sound To distract myself from the painful, aching pound But they continue to whisper, like a never ending song

They speak of solitude, of emptiness and wrong

I feel like I’m fading, disappearing from sight The world becomes blurry, the colors all turn white The voices sing to me, telling me it’s just my fate That I was destined to be alone, in this world of hate

I yearn for comfort, for a kind, gentle touch To be held and told that I am enough But the whispers still whisper, growing stronger each day They remind me that I am alone, in this darkness to stay

I try to drown out the voices with music and sound To distract myself from the painful, aching pound But they continue to whisper, like a never ending song

They speak of solitude, of emptiness and wrong

I feel like I’m fading, disappearing from sight The world becomes blurry, the colors all turn white The voices sing to me, telling me it’s just my fate That I was destined to be alone, in this world of hate

And so, in the face of this endless night,

I give up the fight.

The voices win, the depression takes flight,

And I surrender to the endless night.

“Goodbye to all, hope you had your fun,

Watching me squirm, cry and break undone.

The world can keep on turning, without me in sight,

As I drown in this void, this endless night.”

TRAGIC Poem: 6.3.24 LLKS, by Katherine Pfeffer

I dragged myself up this
mountain the day we got the
email. A 7th grader
dead. And I prayed it
wasn’t you.

No one can hear
me on this hill. Could
anyone hear you when
you killed yourself? Can
you hear your teacher’s
sobs? Can you feel your
friends’ shock? Can you see
their hollow faces? Their
deadened eyes.

Would you have done it all the same?

The world is filled with
horrible things. Your
pain was such a horrible
thing. The bruises on your
arms bled into your
heart. You were a
good kid. You didn’t
deserve the agony, the
horrors you held in your
mind. The weight
of your thoughts. What
pushed you to
end it all?

At school,
they all dressed
in black for
you. Tomorrow they’ll
wear yellow. There was
a room of counselors. They
told us to talk about
memories of you.

You were so
excited to have a
little brother. You said
hi to me even
if I wasn’t with
my sister. You
shouted your friend’s
name from all the way
across the campus.

They all
miss you. The girls
cried all day. The boys
grieved as one. The internet
is flooded with
messages for you.

They posted a
picture drawn of you. Your
smile forever preserved in
pencil. Your arms
forever open to a
hug. They drew
angel wings on your
back. A halo
over your head.

The students brought
flowers for you. They made a
memorial in your honor. A
tribute was signed. Today’s
attendance was missing a
name. Their drawings
haunt the whiteboards. They
write ∞13 on their
stories. They draw
LLKS on their wrists. A
GoFundMe was
started. Someone donated
a thousand bucks. You were
worth infinitely more.

I prayed for
you that night. I
told god you deserve
whatever salvation he has
for you. That you deserve
the chance to be saved.

It’s not
pretty. The world didn’t care
how pretty you would look
in your grave.

One week and five
days later. You used to
love watching the
sunsets. They’ve never
glowed brighter.