mo.men.tous

therapy through poetry

[luthienne]

Reginald Dwayne Betts, from Felon; “Night”

[Text ID: Listen, who hasn't waited for something / to happen? I know folks died waiting. I know / hurt is a wandering song. / I was lost in my fear.]

[its-the-kiwi-deactivated2026020]

there’s no greater love than that between a father that did not want the pet, and the pet.

[momentous000]

I saw a glimpse of her soul in the smudged cursive letters she used to drop into my locker. Paragraphs of damned longing, flirting to the extreme, cheesy platitudes, artifacts of our young fling. 

Who even was she? I saw through her lies. In fact, I only knew her through her lies. Facades on top on facades, walls on top of walls, steel gates of jokes and meaningless conversations to fill the time we had while we napped. 

Silence lined with silent songs of sorrows, highlighting the lack of soul, a soliloquy stuck in my head, pestering her, dreading the continued silence. My mind was made up: this wasn’t it. She was another love that hit my universe, breaking the circle, winning my attention, a co-dependent tragedy. 

Oh, we are so young and naive. Seeking attention, self-validation, feigning a connection for only a warm body to occupy our bed. To occupy our minds, tricking us into thinking we’ve made a connection. 

You don’t spark joy. You don’t make me feel alive. You are so uncomfortable with silence, you rather fill it with meaningless chatter, annoying me out of the room. 

[archbudzar]

follow my art on Instagram

[veralernt]

studying without the struggle to feel good enough. studying with interest and people to talk to when you don’t understand something. people who get lost in those topics with you over a drink or dinner in the evening, in a cozy bar after a day full of productive hours. walks and bycicle rides in the nights and in the early mornings because you spent the night in some shady apartment or club. motivation because you’re all in this together. happiness because it’s worth it. because you’re not alone.

[latibule-e-deactivated20231012]

— Miguel Hernández, from Selected Poems “Hunger is the Most Important Thing.”

[momentous000]

intertwined

there is a thread 

that travels

beneath my ribs

and

around your lungs

intertwining 

our hearts

together

regardless of

place

time 

and

circumstance

you have a 

fragment 

of my heart

so 

when we are apart

you will never be alone

this cord

pulls each of us

together

and

apart

lax

and

taut

it stretches

and 

tangles

but 

never 

breaks

[momentous000]

I am overflowing

your voice is a song

a warm

sweet

sound

that embraces

and kisses

the tips of my ears

[momentous000]

cannibalism

I crave your lips, your voice, your hair

I have been starved to the bone

waiting for you

I hunger for the warmth

of the incandescent fever

radiating from your bountiful body

I hunger for your laugh

I hunt for your smile

I want to eat your skin 

and taste your tongue

I am empty

hollow and wasting

yearning for a glance

a glimpse

any crumb to subdue the ache

this elixir of courage

does not nourish me 

nor quench the thirst

hungry and impatient

I hunt for you

stalking the beat of your heart

under the cover of dusk

[momentous000]

figure drawing

I’ve been watching the movement of your lips

I’ve been learning the way that you talk

the cadence of your thoughts

the timbre of your voice

By now I should be versed in the  

language of your eyes

the furrow of your brow

the slight smirk on your lips

so 

it is unnerving 

to have to guess 

what is going on

behind your eyes

inside your mind

I can feel the force of your stare

the weight of your thoughts

the gravity of love

[momentous000]

fragments

I give myself away in fragments

pieces of myself splintered, broken, seperated 

from the whole truth

these shards reflect light

creating a kaleidoscope of 

chaos and beauty

the good, the ugly

shuffled moments of my life

sparkling and blinding

strangers come and go

I warn them of the broken glass

these sharp shards have cut fragile hands

but sometimes

a passing stranger notices the kaleidoscope 

she crouches down to pick up the pieces

fascinated by the colors of chaos and beauty

the good

the ugly

bits and pieces of the truth

shattered and bloody

sometimes, 

a stranger is brave enough

patient enough

stubborn enough

to put the pieces back together

unsatisfied with the incomplete patterns of the kaleidoscope

with bloody fingers

she molds the shattered glass together 

arranging the fragments

of chaos and beauty

to form a precious image

of authenticity 

of the whole

blinding

truth

[chairules9]

Midpoints and Singularity

I used to see

The middle point

As closest to breaking,

And therefore the weakest,

Devalued.

But lately, I’ve noticed

Light, sound, and color

Traveling through and because

Of this point,

Blending harmoniously,

Strikingly,

In watercolor waves:

Nebulas

Bloom

Endlessly.

Within your being,

The universe’s core

Diffuses and spreads

Courageously,

And when cosmic echoes hit,

I break apart

Over and over

Without any walls

To cover and obstruct,

Soul laid bare

And painted with

Your fingers.

So this is what it’s like

To be held by you:

My soul on your fingers

Remembers the stars,

And I become new

Constantly, consciously

In our multiple, intersecting

Horizons,

The budding sun

Radiating outward.

[chairules9]

Fall’s chill has crept into my throat like a fuzzy-legged spider crawling into its den. I’m more than happy to share the warmth and weight of whatever it is I have to offer: the soggy, emotion-laden sentences collecting like dew on a web; the crocheted doilies of winter’s new snowflakes or the creeping numbness in my nimble fingers; the fullness of fall caught in my cable-knit sweater or the pumpkin-spiced lattes that leave rings around friends’ smiles. We are passing through an age, an era, a day at a time and landing like leaves on a mirror’s edge. As the leaves sink and disperse downstream, the threads of our narratives become ever more entangled in a beautiful mesh. Autumn’s voice flutters crisp as turning pages, melting like butter into my senses and evoking nostalgia and wonder. My fingers hold fast to the warm silk of a bookmark and I remember where my roots touch the earth. All that I am is being harvested, turned over, used up and made new. I’ve never felt so empty, alive, and deeply content in a silence produced by symphonic harmony. This feeling is the passion of a sunset so intimate and intense it dances on the tongue and fingertips, knowing and reflecting the fire from within. This autumn is a fleeting glimpse of an ancient, earthen song that is heard and felt in every throbbing heart beat, the warm potential of an empty mug slowly being filled by the Milky Way and passed around.

[chairules9]

The Dialogue Between River and Star

Being long-distance means

I’ve fallen in love

With your voice

Before

The pressure of your lips,

The small of your back,

Or even the way

Your body curves into mine.

Your sound has traveled

Down primitive depths,

And I

Want to feel

You

Pressed up against my

Everything.

Your voice responds,

Filling me past

Any semblance

Of spatial, temporal

orientation.

You

Have broken me,

And I

Am following,

Down,

Down,

The pieces of my

Consciousness,

Pinpricks of light

Carried in your

River’s sound.

Oh shattered star,

Adorn River’s bend,

Twisting and glowing,

Fireflies on the water,

Milky Way in our sound.

[momentous000]

The Louvre

let’s go to an art museum and recreate every painting

Let’s kiss like Gustav Klimt’s golden painting, wrapped in an embrace and cradling your face.

We can enshroud our faces with your scarf, finding each other’s lips through itchy wool and recreate René Magritte’s The Lovers. 

Or we can melt into each other, make it impossible to separate our faces, becoming a featureless blank outline of passion. Impossible to distinguish our individuality, our separate identities, much like in Edvard Munch’s The Kiss. 

[momentous000]

That’s it

In that moment I realized how he could have fallen in love with her. 

In the third grade, during recess, she offered to take him to the nurse’s office after he fell off the monkey bars and broke his arm. 

In high school, she stayed after school every Thursday to tutor him in algebra. 

It was in the way she spoke, the soft yet firm cadence of her thoughts. She always went out of her way to make everyone’s day a bit better, insisting on carrying our the smallest acts of kindness. Like posting a sticky note with a cheesy yet inspiring message on the girl’s bathroom mirror. Or her habit of picking up trash in the grimy hallways. 

The thing is, when you start to notice the traits that lead a person to fall in love with another, you keep searching for it. You become obsessed with uncovering that mysteries in everyone; catching a glimpse of their vulnerabilities and witnessing their inner truths. Taking notes on their mannerisms, their quirks, how people respond to them when they enter a room. It consumes you.

Inevitably, you become so focused on searching for the treasure in everyone, you forget to acknowledge your own riches. You transform into a walking mirror, reflecting them, hoping to embody their truths. Romanticization is a double-edged sword.

[momentous000]

heavy baggage

Like a fugitive on the run, I packed a weeks worth of worn out clothes and mismatched socks in a rickety old suitcase with broken zippers. It’s been about six months since I’ve last spoken to them, since I’ve left for college. I always feel a sense of heaviness whenever I pack for a trip back home. Not quite sadness nor excitement, it seems to be a sort of discomfort. A dissociated fugue of going through the motions of packing clothes, toiletries, nostalgia, and memories of my last interactions with them. The suspense of waiting is what I hate when I am traveling. The nausea from three hour car rides, the loneliness of sitting on the subway, the swirling thoughts in my brain that I’ve left to consider for another time catches up to me since all I’m doing is waiting, awaiting my arrival to a place I have severed ties to. Perhaps that heaviness is the nostalgia I wished I have forgotten. Or the burden of fading memories that seem so far away, so different from who I am now.