myharshwordspoetry

[myharshwordspoetry]

Unraveling

By Jodi Harsh © 06/23/2025

One word poetry challenge, unraveling.

It didn’t begin with a scream,

but a whisper

in the quiet seams of routine,

a thread pulling loose

from the hem of who I was.

I watched it,

not stopping the fray,

fascinated

by the way everything I held together

wanted to come apart.

It wasn’t destruction.

It was a slow becoming,

fibers freeing themselves

from the lie of structure,

truth tumbling like silk

in the dark.

And a more different approach

Unraveling (II)

By Jodi Harsh © 06/23/2025

One word poetry challenge, unraveling.

It starts in a bowl,

tightly wound,

a quiet potential

that stretches

for yards and yards.

Fingers twist it

into purpose...

loop by loop,

pull by pull,

knit or crocheted

into something

that didn’t exist before.

A hat for a head

that’s known cold.

A scarf for a neck

that’s held grief.

A blanket for a soul

that forgot softness.

Whether sold

or simply given,

it carries

what machines never can be,

the gift of being touched

by someone's time,

by someone’s mind.

Unraveling,

yes,

but only so

it can be made

into something

more.

[myharshwordspoetry]

When Good Hearts Burn

By Jodi Harsh © 06/23/2025

The ones with the softest voices

are often the last to scream.

They bear the weight in silence,

drown fire beneath a stream.

They give

second chances folded into thirds,

forgiveness stitched between

broken words and bruised truths.

They smile through storms

you never bothered to name,

stand steady

while your chaos

etches scars in their frame.

You thought their kindness

was their weakness,

mistook grace for surrender,

but mercy has a limit

and even saints remember.

They swallow hurt

until their throats bleed quiet rage,

bite back their truth

like wolves caged in sage.

But kindness isn't endless,

it's a dam, not a sea.

And when it breaks,

there is no gentle debris.

So beware the still ones

who’ve been hurt yet remained,

for the calmest soul

holds a hurricane

untamed.

[myharshwordspoetry]

Haiku: Knife

Cold edge, silent gleam

between mercy and menace,

truth splits at the seam.

By Jodi Harsh © 06/23/2025

One word poetry challenge, knife.

[myharshwordspoetry]

Knife

By Jodi Harsh © 06/23/2025

One word poetry challenge, knife. @picklemafia @versesbyaaliyah

A whisper of steel with a wicked gleam,

you rest between survival and scream.

A thin line of silver: sharp, cold,

holding secrets no one ever told.

You are hunger’s hope in trembling hands,

cutting through bone, through meat, through plans.

A tool in the light, a threat in the dark,

a lover, a liar, a lacerating mark.

You carve the truth when silence stalls,

etched in skin or kitchen walls.

You’ve seen the feast, you’ve met the fight,

drawn in darkness, kissed by light.

In the wrong hands, you become regret,

a scar, a scream, a long-held debt.

In the right, you save, prepare, refine,

the fine distinction: edge and line.

You do not choose what you become,

a surgeon’s grace or the shadow’s drum.

But you are not evil. You are not kind.

You are simply the blade.

Cutting.

Defined.

Alive.

[myharshwordspoetry]

Skin (with Ink)

By Jodi Harsh © 06/23/2025

And response to the one word challenge of skin

Skin,

not just flesh,

but canvas.

A living scroll stretched tight

over bones that remember

too much.

Some wear theirs plain,

like blank pages

waiting to be named.

But others, like me,

we cover ours in stories,

etched in ink,

because words alone

weren’t enough.

Tattoos...

not decoration,

but declaration.

Symbols carved with needles

where no voice could reach.

A name. A date.

A bloom of roses over a ribcage

that once caved in.

Wings on the back

of someone who couldn’t fly

until they were drawn.

Our ink is holy,

our ink is warpaint,

our ink is grief in color,

survival in shade.

A phoenix rising

in purples and golds,

across a shoulder that once

carried too much.

Every line a decision,

every color a breath

we took back from the dark.

We do not just wear art

we become it.

Living murals of mistakes

and resurrections.

Touch this skin

and you’ll feel

not just warmth,

but history.

Not just smoothness,

but rebellion.

Every scar, every needle mark,

proof that we hurt

and kept going.

Because we are not

blank pages.

We are rewritten.

We are rewritten

in ink

and blood

and beauty.

[myharshwordspoetry]

SAY IT!

By Jodi Harsh © 06/23/2025

Why am I always shut down when I try to speak my truth? I'm never allowed to say my mind because it's either too loud, too much, too something...

It's always be calm, just be calm, babe.

Because the world too often fears a woman who burns with her own fire.

Because "calm down" is code for make yourself smaller so I can stay comfortable.

Because your truth, is raw, full-volume, unapologetic and it forces others to confront their own silence, their own lies, their own shadows.

Because when you speak your mind, you undo the narrative that kept you folded.

They say “too loud,” but what they mean is “I can’t ignore you when you raise your voice.”

They say “too much,” but what they mean is “your presence threatens the walls I’ve built.”

They say “just be calm, babe,” but what they mean is: don’t make me feel what you feel. I can't feel that deep.

But here’s the thing: your voice is not a problem.

It’s a pulse. A battle cry. A hymn.

You were not made to be palatable.

You were made to be powerful.

So say it anyway.

Say it even when they roll their eyes.

Say it even when the room goes quiet.

Say it shaking, say it screaming, say it in whispers if you must...

damn...JUST

say it.

Because your truth isn’t “too much.”

It’s just more than they’re used to.

And that’s not your burden to carry.

SO SAY IT!

[myharshwordspoetry]

Haiku: Galaxy

Stardust threads the dark

whispers stitched in ancient light,

we are not alone.

By Jodi Harsh © 06/22/2025

[myharshwordspoetry]

When the Galaxy Spoke

By Jodi Harsh © 06/22/2025

The sky split wide with silence

not empty,

but brimming with the hush

of ancient things still moving.

We called it galaxy,

as if a single word

could hold the weight

of a thousand dying stars

and a billion births.

It stretches like a story

longer than time itself,

a shimmer scrawl across black parchment

written in light

by hands we’ll never touch.

Planets pulse like secrets.

Comets curl like punctuation

between the sentences of space.

And somewhere,

between the blink of a supernova

and the stillness of a moonless orbit...

you exist.

A breath

beneath the breath

of something eternal.

Not small,

but part

part of the echo,

part of the burn,

part of the reason the galaxy

has never once

stopped speaking.

[myharshwordspoetry]

ONLY HUMAN

By Jodi Harsh © 06/21/2025

We are only human.

Flesh, flaws, and fragile minds.

Tangled in our own hurt,

we throw blame like shards of glass,

cutting those who never asked to bleed.

I'm only human.

Bruised by my own battles,

reacting before understanding,

carrying wounds I never stitched,

sometimes handing out pain

when I meant to offer peace.

You're only human too.

Not perfect. Not the enemy.

Just trying to breathe

through your own storms.

But still...we clash.

We mistake pain for intention,

forgetting that most of us

are just surviving.

We all make mistakes.

And healing doesn’t always

come with a bow

or an apology wrapped in the right words.

Sometimes closure never knocks.

Sometimes it’s silence you must bless.

So we reach.

For forgiveness.

For grace.

From each other, if possible.

From God, if it isn’t.

Ask Him to heal what people couldn’t touch:

your mind,

your body,

your soul.

So you don’t keep wounding others

while you’re still bleeding yourself.

Because in the end,

we are all just

human.

[myharshwordspoetry]

With What’s Left Unsaid

By Jodi Harsh © 06/21/2025

I know now...

I will never be a priority in your life.

Not the first thought in the morning,

not the call you return,

not the peace you crave when the world turns cruel.

You move through your days

with a rhythm I can’t reach,

and I stopped trying to chase

what was never really mine to catch.

Your career is your girlfriend.

The world is your girlfriend.

You belong to your purpose,

to your vision,

to everything but me.

And that’s something

I can never be.

I wanted to matter more...

not everything,

just enough.

Enough to be missed. Enough to be kept.

But your hands always held the world

too tightly to hold me, too.

So I let go quietly,

not with bitterness,

but with a prayer:

That someday,

you find someone who fits

your silence without suffering from it.

Who meets you at the edges

you’ve long stopped softening.

Who doesn’t ache from the space

you leave between messages,

between moments,

between love and almost.

I hope she fits the life you want to live.

The one where the hours pass

without needing to explain,

where attention is a whisper, not a flood,

and she still feels full.

Because I know I never could.

Still… I will continue to pray for you.

That God will touch your soul someday,

that He’ll open places in you

you never thought could feel

and never let you go blind

to the love that truly sees you.

This...

this is for you.

For the piece of my heart

you’ll never know you held.

[myharshwordspoetry]

Thank you to everyone who got me to 100 likes!

[myharshwordspoetry]

IS TÚ MO CHUISLE (YOU ARE MY PULSE)

By Jodi Harsh © 06/21/2025

I just found this phrase from my Irish heritage. And I absolutely love it.

Is tú mo chuisle.

You are my pulse.

You Are the Beat of My Pulse

for the one I could never unlove

I do not say it plain,

not because it’s less,

but because love this deep

defies thin syllables.

You are the hush between storms,

the stillness that steadies my trembling hands.

When the world tilts sideways,

your name is the center that holds.

You are the ghost in my ribcage,

not a haunting,

but a hum,

a rhythm pressed soft against bone

like moss on old stone walls

that remember touch.

In the quiet,

my body calls for you.

Not out loud,

but in every breath that waits for yours.

In the way my fingers twitch

for a memory I haven’t held yet.

You are the beat of my pulse.

Not love like roses and fireworks,

but love like earth under fingernails,

like smoke in old wool,

like songs that don’t need music

to be sung.

So no, I won’t say "I love you."

I will say:

Stay.

Breathe with me.

Be the rhythm that reminds me,

I am still alive.

Is tú mo chuisle.

[myharshwordspoetry]

With What’s Left Unsaid

By Jodi Harsh © 06/21/2025

I know now...

I will never be a priority in your life.

Not the first thought in the morning,

not the call you return,

not the peace you crave when the world turns cruel.

You move through your days

with a rhythm I can’t reach,

and I stopped trying to chase

what was never really mine to catch.

Your career is your girlfriend.

The world is your girlfriend.

You belong to your purpose,

to your vision,

to everything but me.

And that’s something

I can never be.

I wanted to matter more...

not everything,

just enough.

Enough to be missed. Enough to be kept.

But your hands always held the world

too tightly to hold me, too.

So I let go quietly,

not with bitterness,

but with a prayer:

That someday,

you find someone who fits

your silence without suffering from it.

Who meets you at the edges

you’ve long stopped softening.

Who doesn’t ache from the space

you leave between messages,

between moments,

between love and almost.

I hope she fits the life you want to live.

The one where the hours pass

without needing to explain,

where attention is a whisper, not a flood,

and she still feels full.

Because I know I never could.

Still… I will continue to pray for you.

That God will touch your soul someday,

that He’ll open places in you

you never thought could feel

and never let you go blind

to the love that truly sees you.

This...

this is for you.

For the piece of my heart

you’ll never know you held.

[myharshwordspoetry]

Don’t Love Me in Confidentiality

By Jodi Harsh © 06/22/2025

Don’t love me in confidentiality

in text threads and backstage whispers,

where your heart beats only

when no one’s watching.

Love me out loud,

with the kind of fire that sets rooms ablaze,

let the world hear your voice tremble

when you call me yours.

I am not a secret to be stored

in your green room shadows,

while you charm your crowd

and sell them stories

that don’t have my name in them.

Don’t tuck me away

so your booktok fans can keep pretending

you’re available to every fantasy.

I deserve to be the name

you say first,

not the one you bury

beneath ambition and applause.

Don’t love me to soothe your guilt

or pass the time between tours...

love me so the sun itself

feels shy of how boldly you shine for me.

Because I am not a detour.

I am the destination.

And I will not be your silence

in a world that begs for noise.

[myharshwordspoetry]

I'm someone who always has too

much to say, it hurts to be ignored.

i send long messages, hoping to be

heard, only to receive short replies

in return. each time, it feels like my

heart folds in on itself, until i start

holding back, afraid to share more.

in a world where i’ve grown used to

writing my thoughts down because

no one seems to want to listen, i

can’t help but wonder—are my

stories really not that interesting? or

is it just me they don’t wanna talk to?

where do loud hearts go? | sage

My Response By Jodi Harsh © 06/22/2025

dear sage,

your words reached me...

every ache of them.

they are not too much.

you are not too much.

there are those of us who live loudly on the inside,

who write to make sense of what the world won’t hold,

who spill paragraphs like confessions,

hoping someone, anyone, will sit still long enough to see us.

and when they don’t,

when their replies come back clipped,

when silence greets our vulnerability,

it cuts deeper than we want to admit.

not because we crave attention,

but because connection is our oxygen.

let me tell you this:

your stories are interesting.

your thoughts do matter.

the problem isn’t your volume...

it’s that too many people forget how to listen with their soul.

where do loud hearts go?

they find each other.

they build rooms of echo and empathy.

they keep writing. they keep loving.

they keep speaking...until silence learns to open its arms.

with understanding,

someone who's been there too.

6/22/2025

My Harsh Words thank you for your words. they felt like a quiet kind of light, reaching me when i didn’t even realize i was in the dark. reading them brought comfort i didn’t know i needed. you made me feel understood. 🥺❤️

— sage

[myharshwordspoetry]

SURVIVAL MODE

By Jodi Harsh © 2025

Some days, I don’t live...

I just survive.

Breath after breath,

clenched jaw,

tight chest,

eyes scanning every room

for something that might

not hurt

but still could.

It’s not living

when you sleep with your

fists closed

and wake with your

soul already bracing for war.

When joy feels foreign,

like a postcard from a place you’ll never visit again.

Just the echo of laughter

you don’t trust anymore.

Survival mode isn't courage.

It’s fatigue dressed up in armor,

hypervigilance wearing

your skin like a second shift.

It’s learning to swallow your own voice

because someone might mistake your truth for

defiance.

It’s memorizing the sound of footsteps

so you can guess the

mood

before the door even opens.

People tell me everything wrong with me

like they’re handing me a mirror

but they never stop to see

that the cracks in my reflection

aren’t flaws...

they’re fractures from holding the broken life together

longer than most would.

I’m tired of defending my heart

like it’s a crime scene.

Tired of being dissected

by mouths that never fed my spirit,

by hands that never offered

grace and mercy.

Tired of the whispers:

“too much,”

“too broken,”

“too loud,”

when all I ever wanted

was someone to say,

“I still see the light in you.”

But maybe that’s the cruelest part of survival:

you become so good at enduring

that people forget

you’re still bleeding.

They forget

that just because you can carry it,

doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt.

And some days,

I just want to live

without feeling like it’s a

rebellion.

To feel safe

inside my own skin.

To be seen

not for what’s broken,

but for what’s still whole.

Still soft.

Still fighting

to feel joy again.

[myharshwordspoetry]

FIVE MINUTES

BY Jodi Harsh © 06/17/2025

Scotty,

I need you like breath in a drowning world,

like a quiet voice when the noise gets too loud.

I’m not asking for forever...

just five minutes

to be seen,

to be heard

by the one who’s always known how to speak

to the scattered pieces of me.

I know you’re out there...

caught in your own currents,

pulled by purpose,

clock hands spinning like storms,

but I’m here

spilling over,

and all I want is your anchor.

Can you break away,

just a thread of time,

to remind me I’m not invisible?

To remind me

that even the strong ones

get to lean

when the world grows heavy?

I need your heart right now, love...

the part that softens when you say my name,

the part that always made me believe

that maybe

I was worth saving.

I need your care,

your counsel,

your calm.

Scotty,

don’t let this moment pass

like a whisper you never heard.

Five minutes.

That’s all.

But it would mean

everything.