how rotten this inheritance

59 posts1, 2, 3, 4
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aviannnnn my lovely poetry buddy
i've been meaning to leave a comment on here for a while, so i'm just gonna insert my thoughts on all of these breathtaking poems :D
my body will be remembered here, in the way
i twist shattered things into creation.

...WHAT. this lowk made my heart stop for a second, honestly. throughout your thread you have these devastating metaphors and lines that make the rest of the poem that much more powerful.
also I lovelovelove the connection throughout with creation and inheritance. I know you haven't necessarily been doing a theme, but overall these poems just have this dark, blood-red depth to them.
[quote[we are recursive, propagating and dying
in different seasons. i think of you as tulips,
alive for the spring and dead for the year,[/quote]
THE NATURE CONNECTIONS >>>>>
i have always adored your heartbreak poems because I feel like you put such power and yet helplessness into them--and although I know the feelings behind them aren't amazing per se, you twist them into art. to quote you, you twist shattered things into creation, and that is what I love about your work.
I cannot wait to see more of this thread, I will be waiting with bated breath!! haunting your poetry till you can get it to the place you want it to be!!!
love ya, poetry buddy <3
like the stars chase the sun




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three word mantras i am afraid of (4/7/25)
i will not tell you i love you
because what if i don't mean it
and what if i set the precedent
to always love you when i never did?

we are unanimous in our distance,
backs pressed together while we reach
in opposing directions. i ask you to
love me when i know i will never reciprocate---

a give-and-give relationship in which
you are the sun and i am the sunflower;
i do not know how to show affection
other than taking yours for myself.
Last edited by Avian on Thu Apr 10, 2025 1:00 am, edited 1 time in total.
it is always another hand that guides me.




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martyr (4/8/25)
mom asks for permission to do something
other than clean for the night and what she's really doing
is begging to be relinquished from a responsibility
that was never hers to hold and what she is asking is for
me to hold the burden and what she is asking is to
pass these idiosyncrasies to my trembling hands.
it is always another hand that guides me.




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mender-never-mended (4/8/25)
i.
again i am the mender, sewing the lacerations together
with my hair. again i abdicate myself into something
you are pleased with. you step on the pedestal and
pretend this is an act of mercy. i want to tell you that it is
nothing more than pardoning (forgive-and-forget) but
i stay silent within my indignations (i-remember).

ii.
i recall january, when i descended and shed my feathers
for three days straight. i did not speak to you in my molting,
and unlike so many reviving forms of life, i remained mutated.
(forgive-and-forget-but-i-remember) vehemently;
there are shatter-shaped wounds beneath my naked wings.

iii.
you cannot identify extremities, which is why you are
so quick to anger. my heart feeds on it; festers into
something almost-breaking. you dissipate before i can
disparage myself into another fictive memory.
you push the idea of me onto my existence and i become.
(forgive-forget-i-become-who-you-want)
it is always another hand that guides me.




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tidal requiem (4/9/25) in collaboration with @theromanticchemist
here i am gazing at you and here you are staring
at her--we are oceans untold, saltwater on different sides
of the same ever-turning planet. irony would have it we orbit
but never collide, an ever-lasting cycle of push-pull.

why is it that you always have to be my moon?
tugging me forever away from my bearings, underlining
every one of my darknesses in light. i want you to see
me as i am, take my hands in devotion and succumb to the tide.

you will always gravitate to her, she who shines more
than i dream of you and me--you will always pull me towards the
stars, and as long as she exists i will always fall back to the sea.
because i can pretend you are my sun when we know that she
is yours, and to that you are the moon reflecting all she will shimmer.
it is always another hand that guides me.




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down for submission
it is always another hand that guides me.




User avatar
Gender Female
Points 994
Reviews 56
four lines of dreaming about you (4/10/25)
my mother told me to follow my dreams &
i see you everytime i close my eyes so
i will (endlessly relentlessly) chase after you even if
you never look over your shoulder.
it is always another hand that guides me.




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five lines of thinking about you (4/10/25)
you have never been more of a contradiction than now;
so tangible yet so fleeting. i can see us in theory—
put a face to the kind of affection i want,
but you are transient in actuality, a brief entity
that i can brush my palms against but never hold.
it is always another hand that guides me.




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father's rage/daughter's repose(4/10/25)
i will never slam a door because it is
the sound of my father's anger. i am
implicitly gentle---the doors do not cry
at my touch, the floors do not creak under my weight.

my children will know anger as something softer---
i will tell them about the nature of silence and placidity,
but they will also know to be bold and unapologetic.
i will teach them to be loud, but they will never
know the gripping tenseness of watching their mother
become fervent and fiery within her anger.
it is always another hand that guides me.




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i drive when i feel things (4/11/25)
it always comes back to this---
the bend in the road, the sun in my eyes,
one knee pulled up and the car on cruise.

i find contentment here, where
there is no one else to witness unbridled joy.
it's times like these where i am reminded what i am made for---

sometimes this inheritance is not so rotten after all.
it is always another hand that guides me.




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never a romance in the face of tragedy (4/12/25)
we are a tragedy; at least from where i stand (alone),
our non-existence is inevitable. i beckoned you closer,
and at every point and turn, you walked to her.

your eyes light up when you see her in the same way
mine do when i gaze at you. we are contrasting
and falling apart before we ever existed.
it is always another hand that guides me.




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i am
implicitly gentle---the doors do not cry
at my touch, the floors do not creak under my weight.


ouch. <3 excellent things being done in this thread! nice work!
hush, my sweet
these tornadoes are for you


-Richard Siken


Formerly SparkToFlame




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there's a ladybug on my lamp (4/13/25)
i wonder if she is just trying to find a home---
maybe she was looking for the sun
and found something artificial instead.

i wonder if she will ever reach the sun,
fly up toward it until she gets too close
(it will never be close enough).
it is always another hand that guides me.




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Gender Female
Points 994
Reviews 56
the buzz is back so i write it away (4/14/25)
the buzz is back and i am a swarm.
mom tells me i am emotionally intelligent but
i am not verbally adept---i must write to name all that i feel.

i will put the weighted stuffed bunny
you gave me on my chest so i feel grounded,
so i do not ascend into the state of intangibility (where i am unreachable)

my chest still aches with emptiness and
i attribute it to the fact that the hive has infected my heart,
the one that never felt more than platonic and familial love yet is somehow

still so shattered. i tell you i am a mender
and never the mended. you nod your head and say
"yes." we are both sorry, and i can pretend that you are really beside me.

i remind myself this is all in the place where
someone (him and me) exists. we have never been
a possibility. and the buzz is back and it surrounds my glass insides until

i am scattered marrow.
it is always another hand that guides me.




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pomegranate seeds / fruit of the earth (4/15/25)
i eat the pomegranate seeds—a duality of create and kill;
my own demise is what i will pass down. death is an inheritance—
eve ate the fruit long ago and so must i.

this was foretold; our death was imminent
from before the beginning. we inherited this rotten earth
and it will continue in our lineage like an antique
kept high on a shelf, collecting dust and faded memories.

i want to apologize to the earth for my inherent apathy,
tell her that she was destined for greater things,
but i will send a letter on lined paper and it will become redundant—
i will return to ignorance in my selfishness.

i drive across the bridge and admire the seagulls.
we coalesce knowing we have inherited our deaths.
it is always another hand that guides me.



Books give a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and life to everything
— Plato