Tag Archives: poem

Poetry

How to Have a Midlife Crisis When You Are 24 Years Old – Samantha Forsyth

pace back and forth in the kitchen, 

and when he comes home 

tell him that you are unhappy.

he will look hurt but not surprised. 

start to walk away as he says

something like “Things can get better” 

or “I can change”. and for this you will hate him.

say that you will take a walk 

and before he can catch up to you, add ‘alone’

when you get back, find him 

at the kitchen table 

with a glass of wine. sit across from him 

and tell him that you are pregnant. 

before a year, there are medical complications

there wont ever be anything conclusive only a rash of tests

the thought occurs to you 

that you are waiting for something to die.

have a child together and then bury it. 

tell him again that you’re unhappy,

and hate him more for silently 

putting a hand on your cold shoulder

there wont ever be anything conclusive only a rash of tests

start to find excuses not to be with him. 

sit alone at cafes and hope he is having an affair

but when a man offers to buy you coffee, 

let him. have the affair for your husband

wake up early to think about what would 

make you happy and brew

a warm cup of coffee, but not for him.          

don’t say anything when your husband starts 

to play piano or learns your favorite song. 

don’t look at him when he glances at you for approval.

let his fingers trip over the keys 

and let the notes be heavy and dry,

hope they are painful for him to play 

even though you know he will keep practicing.

there wont ever be anything conclusive only a rash of tests

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Poetry

How to Look for Shapes in the Sky – Iman Messado

1. Make sure your eyes are clear.
You can’t have any cobwebs on the sill,
your eyelashes must be brushed straight through.
Are your tear ducts clogged?
Go ahead and polish your irises
until they shine as brilliantly
as the sun does
when you forgot your sunglasses
on a particularly
hot spring-summer day.
2. Have you looked yet?
Don’t do it until you’re ready.
Now that your eyes can match the sun for
clarity and
luster,
you have to understand
the implications
of that.
You have to remember to
blink.
Just because you can
stare down the sun,
doesn’t mean you should.
You’ll work it out along the way –
just know that your head is made
of stone and that
the sky is a celestial ocean.
Fear drowning.
3. I don’t mean to scare you.
I also don’t mean to control you.
I’m only worried – you have so much potential –
I sound ridiculous but
you only have to look into the mirror to see what I mean.
Have you looked?
Do you like it?
What do mountains have on the shifting marshmallow peaks of a Cumulus?
What does grandmother’s feather bed have on
the interminable expanses of heavenly soft Stratus?
4. The shapes are supposed to be what
really matter.
You’re supposed to ignore all that
has and is and will be
in favor of
practicality and analysis and intellectuality.
Of course,
it makes sense,
it should be as it is.
It’s just unfortunate is all.
It’s just you have so much potential.
So make sure your eyes are clear.
Remember that your head is a stone.
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Poetry

“I think this is maybe gonna stick with me for a long time.” – Matt Gryzduk

You will forget the way the friction burn felt at four years old, forearm dragging along rug

You will remember it all at once when people change their Twitter bios to the same thing at once

You will forget her resting expression because you never knew her well enough

You will forget that you thought about death maybe too much in the past but now never

You will forget birthday cakes, you will forget stories told to you under fluorescent lights

You will forget rewriting your name into her mouth

You will forget that it comes and goes in waves

You will forget that you’re only the second to worst person in general

You will forget that you weren’t thinking but are now very conscious

You will forget her name

But you will remember the friction burn, graft it onto others and like you perhaps they will tell others about the scar it left.

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Flash Fiction

How to Play Hide and Seek Alone – Samantha Foresyth

How to play hide and seek alone

(On Violent Growing Pains)

 

I hope you find a place where you’re ready to open hearts and throats alike with reckless abandon. Unapologetically.

1- Come back to the ruthlessness because I’ll be here waiting for you. Gums bleeding and incisors ready, the doors will all be locked. Meanwhile you’re spitting back at me, growing past milk teeth and tenderness. Unfasten your jaw like you could turn yourself inside out and hide all of these terrible things down your throat.  It’ll be a mouth like mine you’ll outgrow.

2- You can’t tell where it’s hurting and won’t calm down. Won’t ever stop howling. Jaw open too far, too big when there’s nothing left to swallow. And you’re keeping corpses between your teeth. Pick out the splinters of bone without hesitation. Cough up blood that isn’t yours.

I’ve been waiting to be left behind without a look over your shoulder. Just been chewing off dead skin.

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Poetry

Seasons – Harika Kottakota

You stand in the wheat plains gazing heavenward
Palm rested on the side of a chestnut foal
Cumulus drifted slowly, soft heels dug into clods
Shoots brushed cranberry cheeks, crickets whispered
Their secret melody under the settling dusk
Gold waves to rickety barn, sides infested with ivy
Dismantled windmill blades sprinkled in dew drops,
Seedlings of those scary thunder nights,
Lay glistening like a second sun on muddy sky
Faded fence skewed like an ice skater’s blade
Scraping joyously on frozen lakes under Moon lamps
Waking to Mother’s oven and Grace’s doll house
Father rapt in daily news of some faraway place
Hopping over creaky floorboards, storing static
Against wool carpets and zapping Grandma’s knitting
Vision wrinkling in warm shades like mangoes, oranges
Frisbees dropped, under hammocks or crude tents
Saving scrapbooks from attic cobwebs–pasts, before pasts
Taping our precious scribbles religiously until our
White ceilings converted to memorial mosaics
Dragonflies and Vs of geese enchanted our daydreams
Off to some Everest or Yosemite where adventure lurks
Leather-bound journals lined tables clasping memories
And reminders to future selves to always hold dear
Your heart’s home: acres of beginnings, middles, and ends
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Poetry

Oh, Mother Nature – Karlee Sanders

the sky cries for you, my dear. when you’re sad, so are the clouds.

the sun shines for your effervescent smile.
flowers lift their heads as you walk by.
you’re one with nature, it’s like they look up to you.
or maybe it is you.
controlling them in ways that are impossible to understand.
not with your mind, but your heart.
yes, oh yes.
I can see it in your eyes.
such beauty could only be created by the most darling thing of all,
you.
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Poetry

Human Nature – Ivy Juniper Manchester

“Even the mighty succumb to human nature.
There is no beating the beating of our hearts,
No defeating the monsters we bred,
The demons we define as thoughts,
The poisonous lies dipped in honey
Which we so arrogantly accept as honesty.
We cannot overcome that which makes us strong,
Simply because we believe it makes us weak.
There is no denying emotion that we feel so fervently,
Simply because we fear its strength.
We cannot run from ourselves,
And we cannot be brave if we fear ourselves.
Despite the notion that we are invincible,
We cannot defeat ourselves.”

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Prose, Prosetry

Aerial Views – Matt Grydzuk

And so you were skipping stones across ponds

“Every time I walk past a balcony I think of throwing my phone over it.”

Same, but I think of throwing myself over

For just a split second, then realize it’d be too up-front

Too gaudy, and then it sort of fizzles out


And so you were skipping stones across rivers

Playing records backwards to get the real meaning

“I think maybe I should leave,” you said

But I could never understand how someone could fit

That much sadness in such a small thing


And so you were skipping stones across canals

“They’re all just intersecting lines,” you said

We’re all just intersecting lines

You followed up with

I think that maybe people don’t know you

As well as they should have


And so you were skipping stones across lakes

Hands tied behind your back, you were writhing

“I don’t want to be here!” You said, taken out of context

Were placed anywhere else

You didn’t know how to address matters outside of literal meaning

So you just stopped talking

So you just stopped addressing the bleach stains


And so you were skipping stones across deltas

Frozen over for a long while, now thawed, you turned to me and said

“I think this is where depression stops and starts”

And so I am standing at the edge of the balcony

For the first time thinking of throwing something else over

Thinking, “Maybe”

“Just maybe, one can make a monologue out of anything.”


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Prose

Looking for Lost Words – Elena Barrera-Waters

I think there’s a reason I’ve always loved mornings when no one is awake yet, or sentences that take up half a page, or sitting cross-legged in the dark of my room at one in the morning. There’s something significant to me that comes from being entirely taken away from the world, in the literal sense and also the figurative. I read a book recently that quoted Henry David Thoreau, “Not till we are lost, in other words, not till we are lost from the world, do we begin to find ourselves, and realize where we are in the infinite extent of our relations”, who was able to speak everything I think about in words more elegant, more reflective, more well put together than mine could ever be. And that itself was able to take me away from the world, just a little snippet of words mushed together that were able to make mine feel insignificant, but in just the right kind of motivational way. I write when I’m alone, and that’s always been for a reason. That’s when I see most clearly, that’s when everything blocking my mind suddenly is able to poof into dust that will not return until I am finished. Of course, it’s not just writing, it’s an endless number of things that I do better on my own, no matter how much I sometimes wish and hope and dream of the day I could do everything in the presence of people, and do it well. I can’t yet, though. And that’s ok. It only takes Henry David Thoreau to convince me that, yes, my desire to be taken away and separated from so many of life’s busy tasks is just a part of life, and eventually it will be these little lost moments that help me to discover those words I’ve been hoping to write all along. 

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