24 Poems ~ 24 Hours
My name is Heather, I live in a small town in East Tennessee.I have loved writing and especially poetry for as long as I can remember. I was the kid hiding under the sheets with a flashlight just to read "one more chapter". Some of my favorite poets are ee cummings, Sylvia Plath, Carl Sandburg, WB Yeats, Allen Ginsberg, Leonard Cohen, Charles Bukowski and Pablo Neruda. I haunt my local libraries and bookstores waiting to find the next book I'm going to fall in love with. I love to lie to myself, as in "I can read a few more pages then go to sleep." And "after I buy these books I'm not going to buy anymore until I read them all." Reading and writing are my refuge and the most natural things I know. I am so excited to participate in this marathon and go on this journey.
She was a stunning one, wasn’t she?
Her skin just dripped of glory.
Behind her steps she left a trail of
many men adoring.
Her milky hands were as
fragile as tears,
she handled them like lace.
Her smile was radiant,
her laugh was contagious,
a sound that can’t be replaced.
But she kept to herself,
that graceful girl,
the lady who died in white.
In life she possessed such
unmatched beauty
even death to her is kind.
In the bubble and whir of white noise around us
I heard your voice speaking to me.
The rest of the world fell silent.
I heard your voice and the percussive beat of
our two hearts.
The whole world softened and fell away to
make room for the miracle happening between us.
I love you for who
you are, and
not what I wish you to be.
It intrigues me how in this world filled
with chaos and christs nothing
can soothe me like you.
No massage or therapy can calm me
like the affliction of your touch.
Your smile and kiss is
all I need to pull me from
my cloud of questions, lost keys
and too many teeth gnashing
and demanding at once.
You ground me in a place where
others’ lives don’t rely on my
punctuality or presence.
When the violence of society is over
I retreat to you,
Where questions can go unanswered
and yours is all I need to be.
Pretty little boxes
all lined up in a row.
One by one aligned themselves
but knowing not what for.
With their colorful labels
placed neatly to display
what might come to fill them
some hopeful little day.
‘Til then they’ll sit politely
lids lying open in wait
for something to fill the dark
some pretty little day.
The ear piercing silence of having
said too much hangs over our heads.
That last word fell, dragging with it
a love that we placed too high on a pedestal.
I tap my nails in a vain attempt
to drown it out.
We submit to quiet shame and
wonder when it got this bad.
You sigh and turn on SportsCenter.
I flip thru an outdated Rolling Stone.
I watch helplessly as the remains of our love
slip like shadows thru my fingers.
Dark as misery.
Incomprehensible as air.
I am found breathless, bound
in the parenthesis of your kiss.
Unknown to my undoing, you
hold my heart, enclosed in your fist.
Gentle sighs deplete the quiet,
minutes tick away unheard.
The world is twirling on its axis
yet here its ceased to turn.
(A million stars will dance tonight
because you are in the world.)
A flame of hand, a shock of lips
all my secrets you’re unfolding.
But safe within this secret bliss
your heart I’m sweetly holding.
(Oblige the sun and bless the moon
a song of secret is her tune.)
I am your wildfire.
Your burning Santa Anas.
With heat that makes men come undone
Strong enough to melt the sun.
(His surface drips like wax.)
Uncontrollable at best.
Spontaneous Combustion.
Ashes on my breath.
Keep your distance, love,
or be burned to your death.
(Love is a fairy tale made up in your head.)
Locust girl won’t talk.
She creeps beneath grass and damp
soil to parallel play with worms.
She is of no consequence.
Here, she is only mineral to dirt.
Locust girl can almost feel the sun.
Deeper she burrows into her earthen den.
If sun can find her so can he,
smiling sickly as he pries away her sweet pulp.
He will rip off her wings, fry them
up with a sprinkle of salt.
He will dine on a salad of her legs,
procure a pudding of her soft belly.
Finished, he curses her with sour breath,
tosses her masticated body back
into the muddied tomb.
She, the loveless leper.
Slut of the grave.
Locust girl acquaints herself with worms.
Turns stiffened legs up to a liberated sun.
On her back, belly exposed, wings
folded beneath her.
She waits in silence for
the strength to fly and
abandon her defiled shell
in the grave.
You are Damned
Calcuable Man.
A sack of sacrifice
strapped to your shoulders.
A handful of silver,
a kiss on Christ’s cheek.
Romans on the road and
you taking us down with you.
Divine in your deception you
smirk at your Holy plan.
Secrets between the two of you
to bless us with salvation.
Yet I, I am left with your seed
and a mouthful of soot.
Apologies, apologies, apologies,
regret to fill our bellies.
No water or wine.
No bread, no fish.
No absolution from
your sacred sin.
I am a shadow of your House.
Dirty floor, dirty feet.
A rabid wolf at the threshold
snapping at my bones.
Thirty pieces of silver,
stars in my darkened sky.
Flung at the boots of soldiers
marching you to your demise.
Oh Precious Martyr, I your Misses.
Wherefore lies the fault in your foolishness?
Did you find eternal life at the
end of that rope in the Yew tree?