the manuscript

my ink spills fire and blood
on an unbridled manuscript
that witnessed all my quiet deaths
as paper sliced through my skin

my tainted hands still find you here
in strokes of sticks, humps, and tails
this night-long poem speaks of sad
for the bolter that got away

and the years passed
like thumbnail images on a fading filmstrip
the sparks and tears and could-have-beens
no longer hurt my current pen

the albatross—
turned weightless
the black dog—
no longer seen

Image: Unsplash

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Day 17 of NaPoWriMo challenges us to write a poem that is inspired by a piece of music, and that shares its title with that piece of music. I wrote this one during the TTPD release week. Titles from its four bonus tracks are included.

Wish You Were Here

dusk rolled in silence
crimson sunset; parting birds—
i wish you were here

Image: Unsplash

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Day 7 of NaPoWriMo challenges us to write a poem that takes its inspiration from the idea of a postcard. Consistent with the abbreviated format of a postcard, the poem should be short, and should play with the idea of travel, distance, or sightseeing.

Death of a Siren

she no longer desires to allure
you may pass — return to the moor
there will be no melody from this deadly songstresses
her wounds have been dulled by the salt

somewhere Persephone laughs with Hades
for the maiden who drowns in the weakest of waves
the verdigris sea stretches across her sadness
as the day gives way to a lavender storm

feet bound on multiple pinions
eyes a panoply of kindness and rage
death unknown to clueless sailors
moans and songs shunned for years

Image: Favim

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Day 3 of NaPoWriMo challenges us to write a surreal prose poem.

i’m saving myself this time (2.0)

i am no longer your old plaything
that craves for love in the shape of canine teeth
i won’t allow any mortal blunder
from your heathen touch or your rabid kiss
i have emptied my marrows of your being
take away your godless sacrilege
i have shed my old skin and has risen
this broken shackle is my apotheosis

Image Source: Favim

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This is the expanded version of my earlier post, i’m saving myself this time. Due to the word count limit for Quadrille, I had to remove the last two lines.

i’m saving myself this time

i am no longer your old plaything
that craves for love in the shape of canine teeth
i won’t allow any mortal blunder
from your heathen touch or your rabid kiss
i have emptied my marrows of your being
take away your godless sacrilege

Image: Favim

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In response to dVerse’s Quadrille #195: Don’t touch that dial! hosted by WhimsyGizmo who asks us to pen a poem of exactly 44 words inspired by the word “touch”.

It’s been quite a while since I last joined writing prompts. This one’s inspired by a Quadrille I wrote in 2016 titled Filth . Back then, I created a submissive protagonist. Now, she finally finds her voice.

Head over here to join the prompt!

A wager with fate

one day she will get through these dystopian days
look at the mirror and see blue irises growing
from her painted bruise
she will take fortune out of misery—
make a wager with fate;
there’ll be no more sad mornings
or skeptical days

peace will propel this crepuscular creature
who no longer breathes
between alternate universes
and thousand ironies
this will be her renovation—
rebirth to the nth degree.

Image from Unsplash

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Written for MLMM’s Wordle #304. Picked 10 out of 12 words and came up with this little Monday motivation.

Click here to join the prompt!

The night has me by the neck

the night has me by the neck
its claws tightening around my throat
i ache
i heave
i choke

i am once again Calypso failing to tame the mighty hero
he laughs — smiles like i was never there
not even for seven seconds,
seven minutes
or seven years

is it madness to still think
that love is not lost?

the night has me by the neck
as tears befall the sorry sheets

Image from Unsplash

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In response to dVerse’s Poetics: Are you listening? hosted by Merril who asks us to incorporate at least two of the podcast titles below into a poem.

Articles of Interest: American Ivy
I Was Never There
Legacy of Speed
Not Lost
Pivot
Reveal: After Ayotzinapa
Rumble Strip
Serial
This American Life
Ghost in the Burbs

It’s been a while since I last joined the prompts here. Looking forward to fun reading and catching up. 😁

Click here to join the prompt!

Vignette: Make-believes

I want to ask you to leave. To desert this open field that I am in before the flowers grow and wilt. But I can’t. I choose not to. Because deep within the chambers of this heart, a part of me begs for you to stay.
I want to believe that ours is like the coffee – bittersweet. That we can laugh and scream at each other but we will always end up cuddling under the night sky. You, tracing the stars. I, smiling at the moon.
I want to believe that we can sing our differences away and find common ground in love. That we can dance, barefoot, amid the prickly grass. My head on your shoulder, your arms round my waist.

I want to believe. I want to. I want.

Tonight I Can Write (The Saddest Lines) by Pablo Neruda

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write, for example, ‘The night is starry and the stars are blue and shiver in the distance.’

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.

To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is starry and she is not with me.

This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

My sight tries to find her as though to bring her closer.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.

The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.

I no longer love her, that’s certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.

Another’s. She will be another’s. As she was before my kisses.
Her voice, her bright body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, that’s certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.

Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.

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Sharing this poem from Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, who died on this day in 1973. Neruda is known for writing pieces that are tender and melancholic, explicit and romantic, surreal and political. While there are controversies that surround this man, he is unquestionably one of the best literary gifts the world has ever had.