Poetry

By Jamie Aneil Patel a million miles away ill always be here and by your side i have grown and have nothing to hide a million miles away i miss you boniclide. By Jamie Aneil Patel

By Marisol Aguilar Upon a hill I sit, With my pail that quenches many, I wait for the rain, When it pours, I open my mouth, Filling it until satisfied, When the sky is clear,  It's a beautiful sight, But I curse at the world, Too many unsatisfied, Stick and stones with words of poison, Wash the mouth of ungrateful, As I wait for the storms of many, To silence demands, The skies forever clear, With a bright sun and cheerful birds, I sit up on this hill, Shackled with greed of

By Marisol Aguilar The gentle breeze against my hot skin gives comfort to my dry mouth. Eyes burn as colors of pink and yellow fill my view. A taste of sweet burns my throat, scaring the smell of metal away. Wobbling through cactus and feathers, acid falls adding to this strange sensation.  Hand reaches for the sun but forever away, heart swells with delusional thoughts of freedom.  Big cats walked past me unimpressed as the specks of sand flew with the birds. Surrounded by n

By Marisol Aguilar Like a baby. I wish I could sleep forever, eat as much as I like, stare at the most random things. But wait.. I do that already. I’m a bum, though I’m not proud. I learned many things. For one.. I miss the pointless conversations with others, laughing, even the weird eye contact.   I miss the breeze, the sun, the bugs, the nature, the beauty of this messed up world we call home.  I miss the long car drives. Just to walk around and admire the material things

By Nicole Cervonaro You painted me into your background Can’t remember when Muted tones, diluted, Dimmed, hushed. First draft  I was your foreground Your focus, Each brushstroke, tenuous at first, Then fervently create the form. Vibrant, vivid, no question  Where your vectors led. Draft two Your focus shifted, My form became more Amorphous, Moved to the midground. Your brushstrokes became more  Careless, where tender detail had been, Great washes now covered them. Once your p

By Nicole Cervonaro It seems innocuous at first Brightly coloured flowers a delightful distraction, You crouch down to pick one, a vivid golden- hued bloom, But as you attempt to rise with your prize, The vine twists around your foot, tripping you where you stand, you fall forward, headfirst into concrete, it  takes your breath away, you cannot call out for aid. Lying still, you realise your fist still grips tightly  around the little yellow petals, now crushed but somehow in

By Nicole Cervonaro It begins with the oil can Each joint begs, jaw clenched From dreams, nightmares Head full of straw There’s light outside Is it the sun or the incessant  Lamp in the courtyard? The earth continues to spin  And so does my head Reaching for something solid, stable My hand just catches air Coraggio Bully Bottom Wait.. that’s the wrong story I have the nerve to face another round But will my broken body let me? I’m ready for another journey down the yellow roa

By T They said I was wrong before I learned what “wrong” meant. Too much of me where they had less. Legs like twin oaks in a family of reeds. They waddled quick and neat, I moved slow and towering, a rhythm the pond didn’t yet understand. At dinners, they whispered. At swims, they left me behind, not because I couldn’t keep up, but because my stride made ripples that reached farther than theirs ever could. I tried to fold myself smaller, bend the gift I was born with, just to

By T the world is black and white, but i wear colour like a rebellion. like a reminder that i exist beyond the grey that softness and strength can live in the same skin. when i dress up, i’m not dressing for the world to see me. i’m dressing to see myself. to find my reflection in fabric that hugs, flows, drapes, shields; to be wrapped in something that feels like me, not what they expect me to be. this is my armour. not metal or masks, but linen and leather, silk and denim.

By T Love, when it is right, does not arrive with thunder, nor demand we bleed to prove it real. It settles in the chest like breath, as natural as morning light. It is the gentle knowing that someone sees you whole and chooses you still. It is safety disguised as laughter, happiness carried in the smallest moments, the brush of a hand, the sound of your name spoken softly, a silence that feels like sanctuary. Love, when it is kind, teaches that to be held is not to be caged,

By T You don’t flinch when I hand you the tangled threads of me, knots from years I can’t untie, frayed edges I’ve hidden in shadows. You read my silences as if they were the loudest thing in the room. You see the cracks, not as flaws, but as the way light finds its path through stone. There are days I am a storm you never asked for, lightning too close, rain too heavy. Yet you stand there, not to stop the clouds, but to hold my hand until the thunder passes. You don’t love t

By T Grief is love’s shadow, not absence but overflow. all the words, all the warmth, all the tenderness that still lives in me, with nowhere else to go. It haunts me, rips me open, and when I reach for you, I come back with nothing but dust and bone. Nowhere. So it turns inward. It claws, it claws, it claws scratches the inside of my skull, pounds against the cage of my ribs. It claws through my ribs from the inside, splintering bone, your name poisoning marrow, consuming ev

By T I am choking on your ghost. Every thought tastes like you… saltwater and blood, love and venom, the sweet rot of something that was alive yesterday and now lies dead at my feet. I tell myself to hate you. I rehearse the words like a prayer, but they slip through my lips, turn to ash, and the ashes whisper your name. I should hate you; for making me believe I was safe, for learning the architecture of my soul just to set fire to it. But my chest still aches for the warmth

By T He didn’t love me. He didn’t… He didn’t even like me. I was nothing but easy. A pawn in his game, A tool to wield when it suited him, A hollow laugh in his mouth, The joke he told behind my back, Wrapped in the hypocrisy of sweet words, Empty promises dripping like poison. He used me, Twisted my trust like a thread, Pulled tight to strangle, Then laughed as I choked on the silence, A mirror cracked by his betrayal… Reflections of lies I swallowed whole. He didn’t love me

By T the house feels like it’s burning now, not a roaring wildfire, just a slow, relentless smolder of forgotten bills, missed appointments, empty pill bottles collecting dust on the counter. i used to hold the hose. tiny hands, barely strong enough to hold back the flood, and yet i kept the roof from caving in for almost two decades. child turned crisis manager, eldest responsibility stuffed into the body of the youngest. but now i’m tired. i stopped. i let the flames lick a

By T The rain arrives like needles not soft, not kind, but like shards of silver glass sharp enough to wake you from the fragile dream of calm. Each drop a wound, each drop a hymn, a lasting reminder of what you’ve lost and have yet to lose The sky splits open, not with mercy but with a cruel, necessary honesty, and you stand in the deluge, soaked through by every truth you tried to hide beneath your skin. And there - above the chaos - the sun remains. Unflinching. Unyielding

By Peter Harris There once was a colourful bird Who lived in the rainforest high, She sang to the sun and the silver moon, Her colours a spark in the sky. But the trees crashed down with a thunderous sound, And her song was a last goodbye.   There once was a cute little field mouse, Who scurried through grasses so tall, She nibbled on seeds in the warm spring breeze, And built her a nest in the fall. But the grass gave way to concrete and clay, And her world grew no space at

By Peter Harris Tell you what, I'm feeling bloody angry. So guess what, motherfucker! You're gonna listen to me, while I rant and swear and growl through my teeth.   Because when I look out at the world and I hear the hate that we hurl at anyone on the other side of a fence, or any person who has a different stance...   Man, it makes me sick. It's like everyone just rises to the hate. No one stops themselves before it's too late. They just jump straight to making fun of what'

By Peter Harris All women know the drill. Look over your shoulder. Cross the street. Hold your keys between fingers. Don’t look too sweet. Hand over top of your glass, when a stranger approaches in a bar. Don’t go jogging when it’s dark. Don’t park too far. Never let a girlfriend go to the bathroom alone. Because you never really are alone When the eyes never cease to roam.   It’s not all men. I promise you that. But her mind still holds a bat. Not for you, maybe. Not tonight

By Peter Harris I can't do right for doing no wrong, And I'm in the wrong for striving for right. That's how it feels after months of psycho-analysing myself. After thousands spent on therapy. These realisations are the mixed messages of me:   1. I'm desperate to heal and to grow, To bury my pain below. I strive day and night To live in the light And reap from the seeds I sow. But the pursuit of self-improvement, The never-ending self-work, Is itself an escape from the hurt.