fern gully

[syphoning-gasoline]

I hang my head out the window

Chin to the sky

And god in my wounds

Everything flows through me

My heart, she can't compete

With another winter

[noeliogallagh3r]

[littlegirlinvisible]

SORRY, BABY  2025 — dir. Eva Victor

[mindful-poems]

[hangsawoman]

hunter’s moon - eating the bear, mary oliver

[a-ramblinrose]

“I wanted the past to go away, I wanted to leave it, like another country; I wanted my life to close, and open like a hinge, like a wing, like the part of the song where it falls down over the rocks: an explosion, a discovery; I wanted to hurry into the work of my life; I wanted to know, whoever I was, I was alive for a little while.”

― Mary Oliver, from 'Dogfish'

[havingapoemwithyou]

Dinosaur by Richard Siken

[soulmaking]

[jackdawwit]

My Papa’s Waltz // Theodore Roethke

[biblioklept]

"Rite of Passage" -- Sharon Olds

“Rite of Passage” — Sharon Olds

“Rite of Passage” by Sharon Olds As the guests arrive at our son’s party they gather in the living room— short men, men in first grade with smooth jaws and chins. Hands in pockets, they stand around jostling, jockeying for place, small fights breaking out and calming. One says to another How old are you? —Six. —I’m seven. —So? They eye each other, seeing themselves tiny in the other’s pupils.…

View On WordPress

[redlipstickresurrected]

SilllDa (Korean-Japanese, b. Japan, based South Korea) - Untitled, Digital Art

[a-ramblinrose]

Don’t call this world adorable, or useful, that’s not it. It’s frisky, and a theater for more than fair winds. The eyelash of lightning is neither good nor evil. The struck tree burns like a pillar of gold.

But the blue rain sinks, straight to the white feet of the trees whose mouths open. Doesn’t the wind, turning in circles, invent the dance? Haven’t the flowers moved, slowly, across Asia, then Europe, until at last, now, they shine in your own yard?

Don’t call this world an explanation, or even an education.

When the Sufi poet whirled, was he looking outward, to the mountains so solidly there in a white-capped ring, or was he looking

to the center of everything: the seed, the egg, the idea that was also there, beautiful as a thumb curved and touching the finger, tenderly, little love-ring,

as he whirled, oh jug of breath, in the garden of dust?

― Mary Oliver, 'Where Does the Dance Begin, Where Does It End?'

[missedstations]

“Monologue for an Onion” - Suji Kwock Kim

I don’t mean to make you cry. I mean nothing, but this has not kept you From peeling away my body, layer by layer, The tears clouding your eyes as the table fills With husks, cut flesh, all the debris of pursuit. Poor deluded human: you seek my heart. Hunt all you want. Beneath each skin of mine Lies another skin: I am pure onion–pure union Of outside and in, surface and secret core. Look at you, chopping and weeping. Idiot. Is this the way you go through life, your mind A stopless knife, driven by your fantasy of truth, Of lasting union–slashing away skin after skin From things, ruin and tears your only signs Of progress? Enough is enough. You must not grieve that the world is glimpsed Through veils. How else can it be seen? How will you rip away the veil of the eye, the veil That you are, you who want to grasp the heart Of things, hungry to know where meaning Lies. Taste what you hold in your hands: onion-juice, Yellow peels, my stinging shreds. You are the one In pieces. Whatever you meant to love, in meaning to You changed yourself: you are not who you are, Your soul cut moment to moment by a blade Of fresh desire, the ground sown with abandoned skins. And at your inmost circle, what? A core that is Not one. Poor fool, you are divided at the heart, Lost in its maze of chambers, blood, and love, A heart that will one day beat you to death.                        

[typewriter-worries]

Monologue for an Onion, Suji Kwock Kim

Notebooks: “Ah, Mon Cahier, čoute”, Marian Engel

The Carrying, Ada Limón

Crush, Richard Siken

[mvaljean525]

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal, There where the vines cling crimson on the wall, And in the twilight wait for what will come. The leaves will whisper there of her, and some, Like flying words, will strike you as they fall; But go, and if you listen she will call. Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal— Luke Havergal.

No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies To rift the fiery night that’s in your eyes; But there, where western glooms are gathering, The dark will end the dark, if anything: God slays Himself with every leaf that flies, And hell is more than half of paradise. No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies— In eastern skies.

Out of a grave I come to tell you this, Out of a grave I come to quench the kiss That flames upon your forehead with a glow That blinds you to the way that you must go. Yes, there is yet one way to where she is, Bitter, but one that faith may never miss. Out of a grave I come to tell you this— To tell you this.

There is the western gate, Luke Havergal, There are the crimson leaves upon the wall. Go, for the winds are tearing them away,— Nor think to riddle the dead words they say, Nor any more to feel them as they fall; But go, and if you trust her she will call. There is the western gate, Luke Havergal— Luke Havergal.

—-

Luke Havergal

Edwin Arlington Robinson  1869-1935

—-

Graphic - John Atkinson Grimshaw  1836-1893

[infiniterichesinalittleroom]

For My Daughter

Looking into my daughter's eyes I read Beneath the innocence of morning flesh Concealed, hintings of death she does not heed. Coldest of winds have blown this hair, and mesh Of seaweed snarled these miniatures of hands; The night's slow poison, tolerant and bland, Has moved her blood. Parched years that I've seen That may be hers to appear: foul, lingering Death in certain war, the slim legs green. Or, fed on hate, she relishes the sting Of others' agony; perhaps the cruel Bride of a syphilitic or a fool. These speculations sour in the sun. I have no daughter. I desire none.

Weldon Kees • The Last Man

[syphoning-gasoline]

Poetry update for my mutuals on here. I'm going to cease posting my poetry on here for a while. I had already known this, (I totally forgot though) but every poem I post on here is ineligible for publishing because it is technically published once it hits social media or a blog. That's the short of it. This is a goodbye of sorts.

The long part is this:

I have cultivated my poetry here on this blog for over ten years now. Some of you have indirectly shaped the style my writing has grown into. I do not mean that halfheartedly, some of you have sincerely inspired me to push myself past my comfort zone with your works. I want to express my gratitude for all you've done. You made me want to call myself a poet someday.

This blog has had such a major impact on my life. It has been a safe space for me, a place to access drafts and all of my poems anywhere, and to share my work. I even posted some while in rehab eight years ago and many in sober houses when I didn't have a phone. I used poetry as a way to process emotions and events that felt too large to digest. It has always largely been confessional as well as connecting through the bit of interaction I'd get with people around my work.

Writing has been as impactful on my life as years of therapy and A.A. I noticed while driving to work once after a night without sleep because of an opossum that I reflexively began breaking down that numb, gutter feeling into words and then a scene and lines. Chopping up and arranging what I'm feeling into a poem, and then posting it on here, has become second nature. It has become the way that I have managed to feel my emotions in a way that is not so overwhelming that I retreat from them. I have processed grief and trauma and love and loss here. Thus, I am sad to postpone it for a while. It really feels like I'm saying goodbye to an old friend.

Last year at 27 I decided that I would allow myself to do what I have never done out of fear of failure; try to take my poetry seriously. Try to look at it critically, as a piece of art, and improve it. Try to get one of my poems published in a competition or magazine somewhere when I'm 28, because that was the age Mary Oliver first got published. So I've been pushing myself out of my comfort zone and reading a larger variety of poets and even a poetry textbook I once thought was far too daunting (I hated schoolwork). I've been trying to lend what I learn to my own critiques of my work.

This month I will turn twenty eight. I will need to write an entirely new portfolio of things I can submit to competitions and magazines because of not being able to use what I posted here. I am going to commit more of my time to writing and learning and less to leisure.

It's not unlikely I will get nothing published, but if nothing else, I hope to grow as a writer from this. I will be very happy with just that. I have felt so fulfilled to see my growth this past year.

I hope I have good news in a year, and if it doesn't work out I hope you have all forgotten. And I'll shyly slide back into here posting my poetry again.

Lastly, if you have made it all the way to the end, thank you again. If you have any advice for me, I am a novice and would welcome anything. Poets to read, publication tips, tips on forming a community, and if you'd like to exchange poetry privately and would be open to criticizing my work for me a bit I'd welcome it.

"The most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time". -Mary Oliver