The Poetry Marathon

A Photograph

It has to be in sepia, with some of the lighter parts

fading into some past century.

 

I simply can’t imagine you in colour.  Disney characters

live on colour, are shaped by colour.  You, by contrast,

I associate with scent, if sepia has any scent.

 

If it has, then the scent of rosewood, as in an antique

box.  Mahogany doesn’t smell of anything, it is simply

dark, but not as dark as ebony.  Your features are dark

enough, too dark to make out.

 

Except your eyes, which would be almost charcoal.

Almost.  What would really be dark would be your

eyebrows.  The sepia would soften them.

 

And the rosewood?  For your hair, perhaps?  It would be

shorter than mine.  The colour of dark henna, but

henna has its own scent.  That wouldn’t do, unless sepia

and henna go together.  Yes, that might do the trick.

 

Rosewood would have been too much.  I would end up

thinking of your arms, which have never embraced me,

or your shoulders.  Even without having ever met you,

I can’t really think of you as a rose.

 

 

©  Ella Wagemakers, 05.55 Dutch time (= 23.55 EST in the US)

“Her Moving On”

I sit listlessly by.

I listen closely for a sign of life.

Cancer has locked its deadly talons in you.

Swaddled in death’s grip.

It seeps through your pores.

I feel its weight crushing you.

All of the pain with nothing but a hefty morphine dose to gain.

I squeeze your hand and plead with you to kick death in its teeth and wake up.

My pleas and prayers are to avail.

The tears won’t cease.

I have betrayed my emotions all day.

Now a river runs through me, astray.

I cannot bear the thought of her moving unto another plane.

I cannot bear to lose her.

My baby sister.

Bad Habit

Tearing bits and pieces,

shredding thin slivers of flesh.

Nervous tension,

stop holding my breathe.

 

No feeling only numbness,

swollen skin exposed beneath,

not to mention,

keep grinding my teeth.

 

Mouth starts bleeding,

salty sting, surrounding smile,

guessin’ healings,

gonna take awhile.

 

Poem #23: As If I Could Taste Heaven At This Height

In my mind I was better than this.
I am only a letter to you. Writing you in the dark.
Can’t even tell if I am still smiling, let alone nodding
through everything said to me, an implication of encouragement
lost in the delivery.
The crafting noise of woodpecker in early morning helps me
forget almost putting ice into my milk.
And I want to laugh out of context.
Every smile a silent mechanic effortless in its arch,
pendulum happiness reversed, instantly a reflection upturned.
If only you were the paper I sketched verse, perfectly blank.
Surgically, I rake the leaves out of the lawn’s hair,
the posture dad taught me.
A crowd of possible words massacred in mind.
Chores are eventually bereft of their own title,
a surrendered habit. Never thinking the same thing twice,
while doing so. All we are, talk and clatter.
She, the clock, and me, spinning in her hands.
Invertebrate clouds morphing into unspoken,
unearthly contortions. A wind so pure curled in my
palms raised, then departed from my fingers’ slit reach.
The wind in my face, Heaven, I question,
plying me to taste its particle?

Poem 11

I have been…

a baby

a little girl

a daughter

a sister

a student

a friend

a girlfriend

a bride

a wife

 

I am…

a mother

a friend

a teacher

a writer

a dreamer

a survivor

 

I will always be

a mystery to myself

 

Eve Remillard

6/13/2015

little girl again

when you were a little girl i used to hold your hand
and you would slip yours into mine quite automatically-
then a few years later, you were growing into YOU
and i would try to hold your hand and you would pull away-
declaring how big a girl you were;
tried to show me at every turn that you didn’t need any help.
and then you became a teen, quite full of yourself,
arrogant and always the drama queen (I may have had a hand in that)
but still, nonetheless, you were still blossoming into YOU
and I stood by, sometimes angry, sometimes sad, sometimes proud,
sometimes mad…
you still turning into this woman-child that I birthed.
Now, all grown up, family of your own and I find myself
sometimes wondering who is this person you’ve become and where
is the little girl that I often wish would show up when you call.
Most days I know she is gone, sometimes I think for good, but then
something happens and there, out of the blue, my little girl appears again.

(#12/12): “Last Words”

 

A mind obtuse.

My verses bemuse.

Information I peruse.

No inspiration from my muse.

 

She is amused.

“Can’t you deduce?”

 

“This is where I leave you.”

 

© 2015 Silvester Phua

 

For John

At our darkest times, I remind you that you love me. I know because you told me long ago.
You remember.
We try. Politeness courteousness finding our way back to each other. Through all of this, it never occurred to me that I could walk away
From my home and my life
It never occurred to me because you love me. I reminded you and you remember.
We are better together. Child-like adults, making adult decisions and treating each other like adults.
Growing hopes and gardens. Growing fatter and older. Growing together.

For my Lucy

No matter what I say or do.

Remember always, that I love you.

Doesn’t matter which road I travel.

Every path leads back to you.

 

Its in those dark nights inside my head.

When nothings between me and this dread.

I’m alone and cannot be found.

It’s you who brings me back to solid ground.

You light the ways deep inside.

You remind me I’m alive.

 

While I made some mistakes.

But I’ll never stop trying

Because without you baby.

I’m not living, I’m dying.

 

No matter what I say or do.

Remember always, that I love you.

Doesn’t matter which road I travel.

Every path leads back to you.

 

I love you always and forever wife.

Orphelia

We’ve never touched hands;

But I know you better than I know my neighbors;

Our eyes have never looked upon each other in person;

But you see me–and sometimes, through me–better than almost anyone else;

Through our electronic conversations  you’ve seen me at my worst and at my best and when I couldn’t make up my mind to be either;

And I have heard your struggles and your story;

At times I’ve been glad you couldn’t see me cry as you told me what you survived;

If I had one wish in compound parts it would be;

To hold you;

And make our pain stop.

-30-