#i love me some poetry

[fluffyydumplings]

ALICE

I sometimes feel like I’m in wonderland,

My borderline like a looking glass,

But unlike Alice,

I can’t seem to cross through,

For I’m already stuck at the other side,

I guess, I’m in borderland,

But, this isn’t Tokyo,

It’s simply my mind,

My consciousness,

My subconsciousness,

Whatever it be

Sometimes the mad hatter,

Sometimes the queen of hearts,

Yelling off with your head,

Screaming like that

Sometimes the Cheshire cat,

Sometimes the white rabbit

Grinning wide with teeth,

Running late like that

But most of all,

I guess,

I’m sometimes the eat me cookie,

That forgot to be baked

But then again why does it matter,

When I won’t realise I’m any of this,

But then again why does it matter,

When I won’t remember any of this

In my heart I’m just sitting on a field of grass,

Reading a book and having tea,

I guess,

All that is real,

All that happens,

Simply feels like something of dreams,

Something of nightmares,

Something in my head,

I guess,

I’m just like that

[inkskinned]

in internet posts it is easy to cut them out of your life. they are hurting you! they aren't listening to you!

they held your hair back. they lent you lipstick. they held your hand at the train station and got you home safe. they rounded on your bully, got loud, said get fucked, spitting-mad in your defense.

they also cut the hair off again. told you that you should really think twice before wearing something like that. took you for granted. took your insecurities and threw them in your face again.

you know logically it should be easy. all the internet advice comments always read it will feel better. like an equation - if a person is rotten, you just remove them. you pull the tooth that's hurting.

but it was never a big flare-up moment. you don't live in a sitcom. they never tried to take your boyfriend or steal from your apartment. they showed up to birthdays and they wrote songs about you and bring you water without you asking. once you found out they carry an emergency inhaler for you, even though you haven't had an asthma attack in years - just in case.

where is the line? people fuck up. sometimes they fuck up badly. sometimes people have raw personalities, like a powerline, and being around them is dangerous. addicting. sometimes they can't help themselves, but you know they're trying. sometimes they are just rough-around-the-edges. sometimes they don't even realize how they sounded when they said that. sometimes it's just - you've both loved each other for so long now, the way this thing hurts goes back to the root.

and that's the fucked up part. you have pushed your fingers against the sweetheart of memory. things these days are electric, tense, harrowing. they didn't used to be. there were a lot of good days in there. sometimes you want to just close your eyes and say can this be over yet? do we still need to be fighting?

doing that would give up any chance you get of getting an apology, but you don't always know that you need an apology, you love them. once they flaked on your birthday party. once they told you to get over it, people are always dying. they also let you crash on their couch for a week after the breakup, handfeeding you when you were so sad you couldn't eat. they are also judgmental about everything, occasionally react to banal statements with an attitude that is weird and fiery. they also love you like a lighthouse sometimes, so strong they cut the storm like lightning.

but the problem is that you might be storm. you might be the thing that needs breaking. what if you are two forces who are desperately, horribly drawn to each other, shaped by the other person's passions, and both good for each other and bad in equal measure.

what if you're both just people, and you're no saint neither.

just cut them off! swallowing the saltwater, you catch yourself in the mirror. you've been shaking more than usual. there's an ache in you that is oblique, loud, impossible to soothe. is this what it looks like? when life is "easier"?

your mouth will always have a hole, is the thing, if you remove the tooth.

[welcometogrouchland]

ANOTHER SKETCH DUMP! Featuring more of me playing with lineless art. Batman reborn era trio (dick, damian and steph) I miss you...when will you return from war. Also featuring Steph designs bc I've seen ppl dissatisfied w/ her current look, some good mom Talia, and Jason Todd poetry club. Duke is confused not that Jason would start a poetry club but that he'd have such mid poetry opinions. (ID in Alt)

[corvidcall]

None Of You Know What Haiku Are

I'm going to preface this by saying that i am not an expert in ANY form of poetry, just an enthusiast. Also, this post is... really long. Too long? Definitely too long. Whoops! I love poetry.

If you ask most English-speaking people (or haiku-bot) what a haiku is, they would probably say that it's a form of poetry that has 3 lines, with 5, and then 7, and then 5 syllables in them. That's certainly what I was taught in school when we did our scant poetry unit, but since... idk elementary school when I learned that, I've learned that that's actually a pretty inaccurate definition of haiku. And I think that inaccurate definition is a big part of why most people (myself included until relatively recently!) think that haiku are kind of... dumb? unimpressive? simple and boring? I mean, if you can just put any words with the right number of syllables into 3 lines, what makes it special?

Well, let me get into why the 5-7-5 understanding of haiku is wrong, and also what makes haiku so special (with examples)!

First of all, Japanese doesn't have syllables! There's a few different names for what phonetic units actually make up the language- In Japanese, they're called "On" (音), which translates to "sound", although English-language linguists often call it a "mora" (μ), which (quoting from Wikipedia here) "is a basic timing unit in the phonology of some spoken languages, equal to or shorter than a syllable." (x) "Oh" is one syllable, and also one mora, whereas "Oi" has one syllable, but two moras. "Ba" has one mora, "Baa" has two moras, etc. In English, we would say that a haiku is made up of three lines, with 5-7-5 syllables in them, 17 syllables total. In Japanese, that would be 17 sounds.

For an example of the difference, the word "haiku", in English, has 2 syllables (hai-ku), but in Japanese, はいく has 3 sounds (ha-i-ku). "Christmas" has 2 syllables, but in Japanese, "クリスマス" (ku-ri-su-ma-su) is 5 sounds! that's a while line on its own! Sometimes the syllables are the same as the sounds ("sushi" is two syllables, and すし is two sounds), but sometimes they're very different.

In addition, words in Japanese are frequently longer than their English equivalents. For example, the word "cuckoo" in Japanese is "ほととぎす" (hototogisu).

Now, I'm sure you're all very impressed at how I can use an English to Japanese dictionary (thank you, my mother is proud), but what does any of this matter? So two languages are different. How does that impact our understanding of haiku?

Well, if you think about the fact that Japanese words are frequently longer than English words, AND that Japanese counts sounds and not syllables, you can see how, "based purely on a 17-syllable counting method, a poet writing in English could easily slip in enough words for two haiku in Japanese” (quote from Grit, Grace, and Gold: Haiku Celebrating the Sports of Summer by Kit Pancoast Nagamura). If you're writing a poem using 17 English syllables, you are writing significantly more content than is in an authentic Japanese haiku.

(Also not all Japanese haiku are 17 sounds at all. It's really more of a guideline.)

Focusing on the 5-7-5 form leads to ignoring other strategies/common conventions of haiku, which personally, I think are more interesting! Two of the big ones are kigo, a season word, and kireji, a cutting word.

Kigo are words/phrases/images associated with a particular season, like snow for winter, or cherry blossoms for spring. In Japan, they actually publish reference books of kigo called saijiki, which is basically like a dictionary or almanac of kigo, describing the meaning, providing a list of related words, and some haiku that use that kigo. Using a a particular kigo both grounds the haiku in a particular time, but also alludes to other haiku that have used the same one.

Kireji is a thing that doesn't easily translate to English, but it's almost like a spoken piece of punctuation, separating the haiku into two parts/images that resonate with and add depth to each other. Some examples of kireji would be "ya", "keri", and "kana." Here's kireji in action in one of the most famous haiku:

古池や　蛙飛び込む　水の音 (Furu ike ya　kawazu tobikomu　mizu no oto) (The old pond — A frog jumps in The sound of the water.)

You can see the kireji at the end of the first line- 古池や literally translates to "old pond ya". The "ya" doesn't have linguistic meaning, but it denotes the separation between the two focuses of the haiku. First, we are picturing a pond. It's old, mature. The water is still. And then there's a frog! It's spring and he's fresh and new to the world! He jumps into the pond and goes "splash"! Wowie! When I say "cutting word", instead of say, a knife cutting, I like to imagine a film cut. The camera shows the pond, and then it cuts to the frog who jumps in.

English doesn't really have a version of this, at least not one that's spoken, but in English language haiku, people will frequently use a dash or an ellipses to fill the same role.

Format aside, there are also some conventions of the actual content, too. They frequently focus on nature, and are generally use direct language without metaphor. They use concrete images without judgement or analysis, inviting the reader to step into their shoes and imagine how they'd feel in the situation. It's not about describing how you feel, so much as it's about describing what made you feel.

Now, let's put it all together, looking at a haiku written Yosa Buson around 1760 (translated by Harold G. Henderson)

The piercing chill I feel: my dead wife's comb, in our bedroom, under my heel

We've got our kigo with "the piercing chill." We read that, and we imagine it's probably winter. It's cold, and the kind of cold wind that cuts through you. There's our kireji- this translation uses a colon to differentiate our two images: the piercing chill, and the poet stepping on his dead wife's comb. There's no descriptions of what the poet is feeling, but you can imagine stepping into his shoes. You can imagine the pain he's experiencing in that moment on your own.

"But tumblr user corvidcall!" I hear you say, "All the examples you've used so far are Japanese haiku that have been translated! Are you implying that it's impossible for a good haiku to be written in English?" NO!!!!! I love English haiku! Here's a good example, which won first place in the 2000 Henderson haiku contest, sponsored by the Haiku Society of America:

meteor shower . . . a gentle wave wets our sandals

When you read this one, can you imagine being in the poet's place? Do you feel the surprise as the tide comes in? Do you feel the summer-ness of the moment? Haiku are about describing things with the senses, and how you take in the world around you. In a way, it's like the poet is only setting a scene, which you inhabit and fill with meaning based on your own experiences. You and I are imagining different beaches, different waves, different people that make up the "our" it mentioned.

"Do I HAVE to include all these things when I write haiku? If I include all these things, does that mean my haiku will be good?" I mean, I don't know. What colors make up a good painting? What scenes make up a good play? It's a creative medium, and nobody can really tell you you can't experiment with form. Certainly not me! But I think it's important to know what the conventions of the form are, so you can appreciate good examples of it, and so you can know what you're actually experimenting with. And I mean... I'm not the poetry cops. But if you're not interested in engaging with the actual conventions and limitations of the form, then why are you even using that form?

I'll leave you with one more English language haiku, which is probably my favorite haiku ever. It was written by Tom Bierovic, and won first place at the 2021 Haiku Society of America Haiku Awards

a year at most . . . we pretend to watch the hummingbirds

Sources: (x) (x) (x) (x) (x) (x)

Further reading:

Forms in English Haiku by Keiko Imaoka Haiku: A Whole Lot More Than 5-7-5 by Jack How to Write a Bad Haiku by KrisL Haiku Are Not a Joke: A Plea from a Poet Who Has Had It Up to Here by Sandra Simpson Haiku Checklist by Katherine Raine

[sageandscorpiongrass]

could you do a web about loving someone who doesn’t love you back

certainly!

I Wish That You Loved Me.

I Swear Somewhere This Works, Trista Mateer | For the Best, Gregory and the Hawk | Today Means Amen, Sierra DeMulder | from the unsent project | poem I wrote sitting across the table from you, Kevin Varrone | The Garden of Eden, Ernest Hemmingway | Cascando, Samuel Beckett | Hungry Thread of Nerves, Fatima Aamer Bilal | Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude, Ross Gay | @/haematiclove on twitter | Lullabies, Lang Leav | In a Dream You Saw a Way To Survive, Clementine von Radics | Don’t You Dare (Make Me Fall in Love With You), Kaden MacKay | Honeybee: Baggage, Trista Mateer | If This Were My Book The Ending Would Be So Different, Natalia Vela

[text transcription in alt text]

[unfinishedrambles]

on devotion

two, sleeping at last / everything everywhere all at once (2022), dir. dan kwan & daniel scheinert / kill your darlings (2013), dir. john krokidas / the chapter closes, critical role / twitter: jenny slate / episode 4, fleabag (2019) / euripides, anne carson / make you feel my love, adele / h of h, anne carson / the judge, bojack horseman (2017) / coffee and cigarettes, sade andria zabala / the chaos of stars, kiersten white / wild geese, mary oliver / mary on a cross, ghost / the art of fuckery, our flag means death (2022) / @/gayassnatural / the seven husbands of evelyn hugo, taylor jenkins reid / i will, mitski

[rainbowsmagicandshit]

[pits-stops]

Supercut (2017) by Lorde - Part 3 / 4

Part 1

Part 2

Part 4

[sfsolstice]

exurb1a, from "Inventory" in Poems for the Lost Because I'm Lost Too

[guhmshuda]

Folks 😭 my boyfriend just sent me three poems by Ghalib that he wrote himself in Urdu and it’s just too cute to see him make an effort to communicate with me. He always finds new ways to communicate and convey his feelings and honestly I am just too lucky to have him. I don’t think I could have ever had someone who adores me the way he does he’s just perfect ❤️

[fluffyydumplings]

Lone… Ly

My heart is a lock engraved with a poet’s last words,

It beats, but the silver that runs deep in place of my veins,

It diminishes into a pile of ashes,

It beats, but the gold that runs deep in place of my arteries,

It scalds into a pellet of red

Angina tapping at the corner of my coronary artery that has gone far beyond shrivelled up,

Perhaps, that is the significance of the stigma of the nonsensical eyes that plaque my walls

I clench my fists, and reach for the door to neverland,

But my peacemaker, it brings me no peace

I can feel it, my body giving up on me,

Even though I would kneel on a bed of thorns for it to not,

I cross my legs and pretend I can saunter even as the chains marring my limbs never resign

The lock of my heart, it slowly crumbles

But it prevails,

It’s left a lonely shadow of what it was,

Perhaps my heart is an exact reflection of who I am

My heart is a not a lock,

It’s a store with a door with a lock,

It has grown chambers, atriums and ventricles over time,

While I am lost in the loop of time

It’s crazy,

For it craves to thrive and belong,

Yet it refuses to be see-through, or easy to walk to,

When you want to get through its lock,

You’d have to knock

But, it’s just a loop that goes two ways,

You’d never stay where you want to,

You’d never stay where you believe you belong

My heart,

It doesn't want to lay lifeless and lonely,

Yet everything it does leads to this forsaken fate

If you take ly out of lonely,

Lonely really is lonely

My heart,

It is lonely,

My heart,

It is as lonely as I am..

[inkskinned]

at some point it's just like. do they even fucking like the thing they're asking AI to make? "oh we'll just use AI for all the scripts" "we'll just use AI for art" "no worries AI can write this book" "oh, AI could easily design this"

like... it's so clear they've never stood in the middle of an art museum and felt like crying, looking at a piece that somehow cuts into your marrow even though the artist and you are separated by space and time. they've never looked at a poem - once, twice, three times - just because the words feel like a fired gun, something too-close, clanging behind your eyes. they've never gotten to the end of the movie and had to arrive, blinking, back into their body, laughing a little because they were holding their breath without realizing.

"oh AI can mimic style" "AI can mimic emotion" "AI can mimic you and your job is almost gone, kid."

... how do i explain to you - you can make AI that does a perfect job of imitating me. you could disseminate it through the entire world and make so much money, using my works and my ideas and my everything.

and i'd still keep writing.

i don't know there's a word for it. in high school, we become aware that the way we feel about our artform is a cliche - it's like breathing. over and over, artists all feel the same thing. "i write because i need to" and "my music is how i speak" and "i make art because it's either that or i stop existing." it is such a common experience, the violence and immediacy we mean behind it is like breathing to me - comes out like a useless understatement. it's a cliche because we all feel it, not because the experience isn't actually persistent. so many of us have this ... fluttering urgency behind our ribs.

i'm not doing it for the money. for a star on the ground in some city i've never visited. i am doing it because when i was seven i started taking notebooks with me on walks. i am doing it because in second grade i wrote a poem and stood up in front of my whole class to read it out while i shook with nerves. i am doing it because i spent high school scribbling all my feelings down. i am doing it for the 16 year old me and the 18 year old me and the today-me, how we can never put the pen down. you can take me down to a subatomic layer, eviscerate me - and never find the source of it; it is of me. when i was 19 i named this blog inkskinned because i was dramatic and lonely and it felt like the only thing that was actually permanently-true about me was that this is what is inside of me, that the words come up over everything, coat everything, bloom their little twilight arias into every nook and corner and alley

"we're gonna replace you". that is okay. you think that i am writing to fill a space. that someone said JOB OPENING: Writer Needed, and i wrote to answer. you think one raindrop replaces another, and i think they're both just falling. you think art has a place, that is simply arrives on walls when it is needed, that is only ever on demand, perfect, easily requested. you see "audience spending" and "marketability" and "multi-line merch opportunity"

and i see a kid drowning. i am writing to make her a boat. i am writing because what used to be a river raft has long become a fully-rigged ship. i am writing because you can fucking rip this out of my cold dead clammy hands and i will still come back as a ghost and i will still be penning poems about it.

it isn't even love. the word we use the most i think is "passion". devotion, obsession, necessity. my favorite little fact about the magic of artists - "abracadabra" means i create as i speak. we make because it sluices out of us. because we look down and our hands are somehow already busy. because it was the first thing we knew and it is our backbone and heartbreak and everything. because we have given up well-paying jobs and a "real life" and the approval of our parents. we create because - the cliche again. it's like breathing. we create because we must.

you create because you're greedy.

[fairydrowning]

"ولو خيروني لكررت حبك للمرة الثانية."

Translation:

"And if they made me choose, I'd choose to love you once more."

– Via "warag-3nb" on Tumblr

"و في قلبي مدينة كُل سُكانها أنتي."

Translation:

"And there is a city in my heart where you are its only population."

– Quote to owner

[cerise-on-top]

EEEE BACK AGAIN CUZ YOUR WRITING IS YUMMYYY

Valeria, Graves, König, and Soap (separately) who has a s/o who's into poetry?

like maybe they're a poet or a librarian or something.

bonus points for a silly little cozy aesthetic dressed s/o :33

MANY HUGSSSS

-☁️

(CLOUD ANON)

Hello again! Welcome back! I'm glad my silly writings are enjoyable to people! I wrote it so Reader is a librarian and writes poetry both, in most of these! I think I forgot for Soap! I hope these are good enough! Thank you very much for the request! ^^

Soap, Valeria, Graves, König with an S/O who likes Poetry

Soap: While he may have read some poetry throughout his life, but only because he was forced to at school, he doesn’t care for literature like that in the slightest. Sure, he can understand some metaphors and some messages a piece of writing might try to convey, but he won’t go out of his way to buy himself an anthology of William Blake. He doesn’t have the time to read, and he doesn’t really want to either, he’d much rather go outside and take a hike. However, once you come up to him with one of your poems in hand, he’s more than happy to sit down and read through it. The way the language flows, the way the words intertwine with each other and form something unmistakably beautiful, it has him in a chokehold after a while. He’ll always cheer you on, quietly, while writing and read everything that you put on paper. While he might not be the best at giving criticism, he can use his words to reassure you that your writing is, indeed, the bomb. If you ever release your works then you can be certain he’ll be the first to buy a copy of the book, maybe even several because he loves and supports you that much. He loves the cozy aesthetic you have. Beige cardigans with either matching trousers or skirts. If you’re roughly the same size then let him borrow one of your cardigans, he wants to feel for himself how warm and cozy they are. It’s not usually his style, but trying them on won’t kill him. He actually also kind of likes it when you send him pictures of you drinking tea or coffee with a book on the table. It’s, as mentioned, very cozy, very comforting. You’re living your best life, you’re happy and thriving, and that’s all that matters to him.

Valeria: Unlike Soap, she has picked up books after school. The only poem she has read after school was the Divine Comedy by Alighieri since it sounded interesting to her at the time. She never finished it, though, having become far too busy with the military and, afterwards, the cartel. She doesn’t particularly miss reading either, though. Maybe sometimes, when she just wants to have a nice and quiet day, she might pick up a book she found just lying around, but that book could contain just about anything. While she might not always have the time to read your poetry, it will likely be sitting on her desk for a few days before she can read it, she will visit you at your library. It’s calm there, it’s quiet, and likely not a place anyone would suspect someone of her caliber to be. While she might not particularly be there for the books, you could read her some poetry every once in a while. Doesn’t have to be at the library either, you could just check out a book and read to her at home. She can appreciate something like that, you spending time with her, reading your favorite poem in a soft, almost mellow, voice. She gets to see you happy, after all, and that’s what she’s usually striving for. Even if that library isn’t doing too well, she’ll always make sure that it’s up and running because you love your job as much as you do. She, too, likes your aesthetic. It’s fairly neutral, it doesn’t stand out too much. While it might be a bit boring to her occasionally, since you likely would look just as lovely in something a bit more flashy, she won’t tell you to dress you any differently. In fact, she might instigate you a bit and egg you on by buying you expensive coffee beans or expensive hand made tea. The most aesthetically pleasing tea pots and cups will be yours, in this case you won’t even need to ask her.

Graves: Graves has not picked up many books after school either. The occasional book on business and history, yes, but nothing that was written lyrically. It never interested him, he had to analyze poems at school and that was the start of his disdain for poetry. He never did well with writing down what a specific metaphor might mean, so he never got any good grades on that. At first, he won’t be very happy to see you’ve brought him a poem, even if it was written by you, but he won’t complain, he’ll read it and give you honest criticism. He’s better with constructive criticism than Soap because he can still see the poem’s flaws while being nice and uplifting about it so you can do better next time. It likely won’t ignite a spark for poetry in him, but he has a soft spot for you, so he’ll read anything you want him to see. On the off-chance he has time to visit you, he will. While he might not be as quiet as Valeria, he tries, but he just really wants to converse with you. He doesn’t get to see you often, so it wouldn’t be too unlikely for him to waltz up to your library in his gear either. He tries not to scare the people, but it doesn’t always work. Tries to convince you to go home early with him so you can pay attention to him instead of burying your nose in some books. It doesn’t work, but hey, an attempt has been made. He really digs that entire cozy aesthetic. You look warm, you look soft, you look like you want and need a good hug from him. He’s a very touchy person in general, but that goes up by 100% since he likes the feeling of your cardigan, it’s made of wonderful fabric. If you’re more of a coffee drinker, like he is, then you can drink some coffee at a lovely cafe together, he knows plenty of nice and calm places. Tea, too, but you’ll be alone in that endeavor since he’s a coffee drinker first and a human second. Send him some cute pics of you, though, he’ll appreciate them after a mission and tell you how good you look.

König: He sort of likes poetry, actually. While he hasn’t read enough to actually have a favorite, he likes the way it sounds when read, either out loud or in your head. While he, by no means, could ever write a poem himself, English or German, he does like to read some every once in a while. He has an anthology at home he never got around to finishing. It’s a calming hobby. However, he finds himself with a favorite poet once you show him your writing. He’s very supportive of you, asking you fairly often about your progress and how you’re doing, answering any and all questions you might have that might bring you some inspiration. Whenever he writes it’s somewhat dry, mostly because he’s used to writing reports these days and nothing else, so seeing your flowery, beautiful language makes him smile a bit. It makes him imagine the scenery very vividly, even if you don’t specify too much of your setting. He, too, will come visit you at work when he can, but he won’t make a ruckus. If he can talk to you, that’s fine, if he can help you sort some books, he’d love to, but if you just want to do your work in quiet, then he’ll grab himself a nice book and sit down quietly until you have time for him again. Might ask you some questions regarding some books, might ask you for some recommendations as well, but he respects your want for quiet. He also really likes your aesthetic, it’s such a contrast to what he’s used to. You don’t look like you’re fighting wars, you look as though you sit down at a park bench during late spring or early autumn to read some books, and he thinks that’s very nice. If you want to, then the two of you can sit together in silence while you’re reading some poetry and he’s reading the Schachnovelle. He’s more than happy to tell you about what he read or listen to you reading some of the poetry out loud as well. It’s nice, it’s calming. It’s so far away from what he normally does at his job, he could fall asleep to the comfort of it all. If you’re reading at home, he might put his head in your lap and just take a nap.

[apppleioi]

am i am i am i adam. adam who works to live. to stay alive. physically and mentally. who goes to school. who wants to be and is top of his class. who will do anything to do well in school. who is empowered by knowledge. who perseveres despite not being supported. everyone telling him to rest.

or am i. am i gansey who works to live. to stay alive. physically and mentally. who hates school. who does the minimum because he knows it’s hindering him. who is a scholar anyways. who is restless with knowledge but doesnt care for school. who only goes there cause he always has. cause he has to. cause it’s expected of him. cause he can’t rest.

am i noah? am i dead. am i dying?

[pettyprocrastination]

Reluctant Bride

Pairing: Ellaria Sand x Baratheon!Fem! Reader (background Oberyn Martell x baratheon!fem!reader)

warnings: description of war, derogatory description of women, forced marriage, oberyn talks lowly of the reader’s appearance and status because he’s angry he has to marry in the first place, Oberyn is a dick but he gets better, (this makes it sound worse than it is lol. Just lore building with angst and sapphic yearning lmao. 

Summary: Just months after the rebellion has ended, Ellaria Sand meets her lover’s betrothed.

word count: 1k 

_____

Ellaria was dressed in finer clothes than you on your own wedding day. 

Orange silk embroidered with golden serpents hugged her curves and fine jewels were weaved into her hair that your betrothed seemed content to twirl with his finger as he leaned in to whisper in her ear. 

You didn’t need to be told who she was. The beautiful woman by your husband’s side, you saw it plainly in his eyes. Love and devotion that could never be found in a marriage under the sept’s roof, but rather one made by affection and passion. 

Ellaria Sand was more of Oberyn’s wife than you ever thought you would be. 

But bless the poor woman’s heart, she was frightened. 

She didn’t want to come to his wedding at first. But Oberyn has all but begged her to, laying gentle kisses up her arm until he was mumbling his plea into the crook of her neck. 

“If I will be forced to wed against my will, the least you can allow me is the pleasure of having my true love by side when I am chained to another.” 

He always has a flair for dramatics, her sweet prince. 

But Ellaria felt it, as she entered Storm’s End by his side, the judgemental stares and hushed whispers when his hand did not release hers. She knew exactly what they thought of her without ever heaving to hear their voices grind against her ears. 

“He brought his whore?”

“To his own wedding, the gal!” 

“She’s a bastard too, I heard.” 

“That’s the dornish for you, debauched dogs, every single one of them.” 

But she would not flinch at their words, she knew she was a bastard since birth, Dorne may have welcomed it but the rest of Westeros had no issue reminding her and every other sand in the world of their place. She learned it well and wore it with pride. She was the lover of the Red Viper, a child of house Uller, the gossip of tittering lords and ladies did not frighten her. 

However, the Baratheons did. 

She would be a fool not to, truly. They were the ones that started the war, plunging the realm into a year of bloodshed and horror that their eldest son charged headfirst into without a second thought. 

Strong, dutiful, dangerous. 

As she entered Storm’s End, thunder echoing against its stone walls that made their grand home resemble a shadowed cave rather than a castle, she is reminded of their words. 

Ours is the fury. 

It had been the third child, who greeted them. Dressed in all black and face somber, he looked well past his age, like a soldier returning from war rather than the young man just coming to age as he was.

“It’s a great honor to have you, my prince.”

But Stannis Baratheon had suffered a siege while his brother commanded from the battlefield, he had seen the war just the same. 

His eyes, dark and cutting like a hidden blade, fell onto Ellaria, for a moment she felt as if she had come to an execution, rather than a wedding. Stannis looked at her like an intrusion, before bowing his head. 

“My sister is eager to join our houses with this union. As are you, I am sure.” 

Oberyn’s agreeance was slick with mockery, teeth flashed in a grin that made the young man’s face go sour. 

“There is nothing I look forward to more.” 

He had yet to let go of Ellaria’s hand. 

The pair did not separate until they reached the sept, a grand building covered in tapestries of every dead saint and alive with hymns that speak of love and devotion. 

Two things seldom found between husband and wife. 

Oberyn walked to the altar alone, but his eyes caught hers  in the crowd and he smiled. Even from afar, she knew him well enough to catch the twitch of his thumb at his side. That despite his anger and dismissive arrogance he loves to wrap himself in like a silken robe, he was at a disadvantage. This was not his home and nor were these were not his people.  He was in the house of the family responsible for the death of his sister with no plan for vengeance, but a wedding he was forced into, just like his Elia.

Ellaria’s gaze is pulled from her lover as the grand door creaks open over the singing, where their king enters, face still laden with scars of the rebellion, of his conquest, escorting the bride by hand. 

Robert Baratheon was large in every way possible. His presence commanded respect. Even in his formal wear the bulk of his muscle was seen through as he walked. The hymns dulled to a soft hum at his entrance, head turning as his eyes cut into the crowd before they landed on Ellaria and she froze in her spot. 

For a moment, fear clenched her heart. 

Robert had unleashed a war upon the realm when Rhaegar took his betrothed, he plunged his siblings into starvation and rode against countless noble families that now bend the knee to him. He caved in the chest of the silver-haired dragon prince himself, severing the three headed dragon with his war hammer until there was nothing left of it’s legacy than two eggs, lost to the wind. 

And here she stood at his sister’s wedding, the proud lover of her betrothed. 

There’s a brief moment where she wondered if he was going to say something. Shout an order for her to be escorted out for being so bold to be at the union, but then a hand squeezed his and he pulled away from her gaze to yours. 

“Don’t.” Barely a whisper that only he could hear. No question nor plea, but an order. 

One the Usurper obeys without resistance. 

Ellaria had never seen you in person before. But Oberyn had painted a foul picture of you the moment your betrothal was confirmed to still be held after the rebellion. He spoke of your sneer and the way your lips puckered into a sour pout each time somebody spoke to you, your eyes were flat and empty of any emotion. 

“If it weren’t for her skirt I wouldn’t know which one I was marrying.” Oberyn jested as he lifted a goblet of wine to his lips. “Her or Stannis.” 

Ellaria watched you walk down the aisle to her lover, struck by your beauty. 

A hood sat atop your head that fell to embroidered lace covering your shoulders, her eyes found a stray curl that dangled by your face and wondered what it would feel like under her finger tips. Dark eyes flick over to her own if only for a second and she felt herself stopped once more, not with fear. 

But desire. 

You continued forward and she watched you walk down the aisle to the awaiting prince. 

A strong nose frames the soft line of your features, shoulders drawn back and head held high like a queen to be worshiped or a painting to be admired. 

You were regal. Looking more like a crowned ruler than the king by your side.

Your voice did not waver during your vows, she wondered if you were frightened. Any woman would be. To marry a man who loathed her family for a death you had no part in. 

But you didn’t let it show. Instead the promise to be a loyal wife echoed through the sept before you leaned forward and pressed your lips to Oberyn’s, who was just as stiff as you. 

As she watched the first kiss of an unwanted marriage, Ellaria’s chest filled with envy of her beloved prince.