#poeticstories

[threewordusername]

who can

stop me

from

spending

the rest of

my life

thinking about

what

could've been?

"past and future."

d.b.a

[melloncolliegalaxies]

[instruth]

DAYS OF DRAGONS SLAYING

Today I kneel, praying at the front pew

Recalling everything I’d thought I knew

Visiting places, events more than a few

Of joyful days in my childhood as I grew

Plain as the new grass, purer than dew

Innocent, flexible, as the evergreen yew

Naive, fearless of danger with a hew

Dreamed of fiery dragons that I slew

Down molten lava from a volcanic spew

With the friendlies that can only mew

Times transformed me from a shrew

To a genius fresh out from the stew

Sharply and cunningly as to the brew

Ate, swallowed anything I could chew

Dug to discover, into the deep sinew

To control and rule by the skill I drew

And turned men into a slaving crew

Build an empire day and night - phew!

High up, away into the heavens I flew

I puffed as the dragon, its breath I blew

Till I collapsed among everything I threw

To patch up pieces of soul with a neat sew

Picking up the ruins and starting life anew

As the day I was born, green horn as new

Searching to find myself, simply to renew

©Johnny J P Lee

19 June 2024

A Gogyoshiren Poem (25)

Photo Credit J. P. Lee

[robertjw4688]

I keep my door open

just a crack

so the supernova

can crawl in

from time to time

and kiss me

to dream

of everything I am.

Robert J. W.

[n-ehpamoi]

These aren't questions to be answered - they're a moment of feeling, captured poorly in what little words that I have left to give.

There's something irritating about someone responding to a poem, like I'm asking people who don't know me at all for advice.

[poetic-little-doll]

Make Believe

Let’s pretend that you’re never like this.

That self loathing and pity

Aren’t the only things riddling your mind

Come morning time.

That by nightfall you’re not a

Boiling pot of hatred and disgust for the day.

Let’s pretend that you don’t exist

Just for the negativity to eat away at you.

That somewhere along the way you don’t

Expect everything to go up in flames

And for people to leave you as fast as

The ash in the wind does.

I know it’s hard to pretend to such extremes,

To act like the world isn’t against you

And every action isn’t meant to break you.

But for one moment let’s just pretend,

That some day you can be whole again…

That some day you’ll find yourself again.

-S.Lilobell (We’re all just playing make believe anyway.)

[illbeyouranchor]

Are my words broken?

Did you not hear the severity of what I said?

Don't worry, it seems no one else has either

Like a dancer in front of a mirror

It's easy to only see yourself

When in movement

[areebianights]

LOVE:

A word I never really understood.

And yet, I see it as a hanging rope, dangling above my head—whether to pull me up from this ditch as an anchor or to throttle me, I can't decipher.

I don't know when love became synonymous with being curtailed, when being free became the opposite of being loved.

I look at my cuffed hands and the chain that passes between my arms, wondering how many times I've tried to strangle myself with it.

How many times have I nearly died of love?

I don't know when being loved became something too brutal to bear—was it when love held me between its teeth so as not to lose me, or was it when it began to weigh me down under its feet?

How many times have I died of their insecurities, even after being killed by my own?

How many times have I lost myself so that they couldn't lose me?

I don't know why the rope only looks like betrayal, distrust, denial and death.

And yet, sometimes in desperate moments, I try to cling to it for my life. In desperate moments I wish to be saved by something that almost killed me.

I hope, beyond all reason, that someday this rope called love will be the one pulling me up.

Some days, beyond all reason, I hold it tight and bleed from the effort, trying to climb up, only to realize that on the other side of the rope lies another pit—but that's an abyss.

But I still keep trying, bleeding from the effort.

I keep trying to make it make sense. I keep trying to prove myself wrong.

-Areeba

[ivynightshade]

fatima aamer bilal, from i mother it the absence of her, iii. i am not a person that can be loved for a very long time excerpt from moony moonless sky.

[heartofmuse]

Why do I miss you when I shouldn't? What have you done to my soul that I think of you like this? Have you enchanted me without me knowing? Was it your soulful eyes or perhaps that melancholic smile? I'm drawn to you and I can't explain it. Do you think of me too and that's what I am feeling?

e.v.e.

[creatingnikki]

another year is ending and I want you to know that it is okay if you:

have not healed from the things that happened/did not happen from six months ago. just because the year is ending it does not mean your grief is too.

don't have any "fun" NYE plans to ring in the new year. this life is yours to live across days and months and years, and you can celebrate days other than the ones heavily marketed and shoved down your throat to shroud you in severe FOMO.

have no resolutions or goals for 2024 laid out in elaborate lists or shared on social media or with your friends. you are braving through this life trying to do your best every day and hold the fort and so of course you know, deep down you know what is needed from you for you going forward and of course you are going to work in that direction. good luck love.

have not become a "better" version of yourself by any of the tangible or conventional measures. that kind of bettering is mostly to serve others, not yourself.

are not happy with yourself/your life as it is now. you're a work-in-progress, remember? and if you're progressing in a direction you do not like, then it's time to change the blueprints and the strategy.

take time off social media around this time to protect your mental health and whatever little joy you have managed to keep.

don't want to spend too much time reflecting on how this past year went and doing various forms of 2023-wrapped. again, it's your life. you can also revisit this year in memories and pictures and feelings whenever you'd like. it's not like you don't still visit 2012, 2017, and 2022, right?

feel disconnected from your friends, family, lover. I know this is "ideally" a time to be celebrated with your loved ones. but life is not ideal, is it? it's just life. and if right now you are not feeling the love, the joy, or just don't have the headspace or social energy to engage , that's alright.

are finding comfort in simpler things like a TV show from the 90s or that book you first read at sixteen or that slice of strawberry cake or a random post like this you come across.

don't feel hopeful, encouraged, or excited for 2024. given everything that's happened in the last couple of years, on the macro and micro level, it's only natural for you to feel weary as well as wary. when the good things happen, when the healing happens, when things begin working in your favour over time, you will automatically feel all those things. it's okay if until then you choose to be neutral.

[threewordusername]

please, darling;

let me rest

at least

for tonight,

so that i can

face your

absence

again

tomorrow.

"one more night."

d.b.a

i wonder, were the nights as long for you as they are for me?

[unmondefou]

let me be your coffee

for you won't find anything

tastier than me.

and I promise

to turn your wake up

into a beautiful

sleepless night.

--- h.harouche

[rosarysgarden]

fatima aamer bilal, excerpt from moony moonless sky’s ‘i am an observer, but not by choice.’

[text id: i have the everlasting tendency to ruin everything i love.]

[fatimaamerbilal]

fatima aamer bilal, from days where my whole world is my bed.

[text id: september arrives like a twisted knife, and i always welcome it with open arms.]

[n-ehpamoi]

The fence on which I'm sitting between existing and seeming to exist,

And, if you believe I'm real I've got a personality to sell you --

it feels real enough, I put a lot of work into it, a piece from him, there, a quirk from her, there -- You'll get a good time out of it, for a while, at least --

Pieces of me stolen, whole cloth, from the people I've loved --

What are you willing, to pay?