delos ~ a poetry collection

spindle
my brain makes racket in my head.
it turns and churns like a creaky bed.
i feel like a maiden stuck high in a tower,
awaiting the chill of every hour.
my limbs are locked, my touch is numb;
there's a pounding in my body like a beating drum.
every thought is cast aside, rejected.
i do not dream to be affected.
i am dull, never in haste.
safe up here, i am never chased.
when i dream, i wonder how it would taste--
freedom, on which life is based.
alas, i can not taste the air,
as my wounds are salted and my lungs are bare;
twisted out, they lurk and share
whatever they believe is spare.
upon my finger, i'll stab the spindle.
better to be asleep than to dwindle.

congratulations
congratulations are whispered.
they do not mean them.
less of a breath, more of a hiss.
this is a word said under the radar,
cloaked in bitterness.

sky
barbed with lightning, stabbed with thunder--
the sky is known by its cover.
the black cloak of night, the white hood of clouds--
better this than mourning shrouds.
and of course, there is the rain
with elegies and daisy chains.
evening meadows, tying loose ends--
the rain, funerals befriend.
open casket, glassy eyes--
it's those clear mornings i despise.
the sky is bright blue on a day full of gloom,
and i hate it so much that i stay in my room.
ignore all the sunshine, ignore all the waves--
please don't go out, do not yet cave.
life is so much lovelier on those sweet, odd days
splattered with mismatched clouds in arrays of grays.
still, whether the sky is blue, gray, black, or not,
the sky is the sky, forever a lot.

climb
oh, i see your eyes
(and the pain in them
despite your smiles).
oh, i see your heart
(blasted open, pried apart).
oh, i see your wounds;
the pain you hid by hollowed moons.

sweet dear one, you must listen to me
when i say none of this is your fault.
you think if you search yourself hard enough,
you'll see why your trust covered your wounds in salt.
you wonder what you did to provoke such behavior.
darling, none of this is because of you.

you climb and you climb, higher and higher;
you thought the one you trusted climbed with you.
when your arms and legs buckled
and your knees and hands shook,
you spasmed and he did not catch you.
darling, you're falling.
it's a long way down.
there's a pit in your gut
and a rip in your heart
as your mind scrambles desperately, but listen:
this is not your fault.

it is a long way down.
your ears drown out all the sound.
the one who cleaved
your trust in two
is still climbing.
you sob, dry-eyed yet crying.
people will stare
at your wounds, but who cares
when there are people who love you to shield you.
yes, it is a long way down.
but there are people who care
and those people will catch you.
you will climb again, if that is what you wish.
what your trusted one gave you, back you will dish.
this story is revenge if you want it.
but your kindness outshines his fragile ego.
close your eyes, smile since now you know.
this right here is your fight.
i know you'll do whatever is right.
whether it's driving the knife deeper or pulling it out,
your trusted one will bleed and when it's his turn to shout,
no one will come to help him.
his mercy will be living, his curse will be dying alone.

the people who love you help you when you fall.
i doubt anyone will help him when he does.
~

A/N: i wrote this poem for/to my friend, whose significant other broke their trust. i wrote it a month and a half ago but was afraid of sharing it. but then i realized that other people could want or need to hear this, too. so, here you go <333

decompose
my heart runs away from me,
my soul lies flat,
and my brain decays.
is this what rotting feels like?
to die slowly,
tortuously, turned inside out and back again
until everything you knew
has evaporated?
i'll let the earth take me,
feed my soul to the water and wind,
create carbon dioxide to help plants breathe.
i'd rather burn than die this way.
but i'm forced to decompose.
i suppose it is poison's way of burning.

hubris
you have yet to earn
my stamp of approval.
don't think too highly
of yourself.
your hubris just might be
your undoing.

careful, child
balancing too artfully
on the precipice between child and adult.
on the edge of what is right and what is easy.
on the brink of fighting or fleeing.
the wisest soldier picks and chooses
the battles they take part in.
do not scoff at caution
when a canyon yawns beneath you.
do not roll your eyes at wisdom
when it is wisdom that keeps armies alive.
do not laugh at choice
when it is choice that constantly saves your skin
and might one day choose to take it.

do not underestimate
the hold your hubris has on you.
it grips your neck in meaty fingers,
gluttonous for pride and glory.
you lust after what it tells you to,
thinking that it isn't greed
if it is well deserved.
you must learn
that hubris inflates
with everything you earn.
you think its touch guides you
when all it does is threaten and divide you.

stand tall, primrose
straight-backed, chin high--
you are the kind of beauty
people tend to see
in gardens, art galleries, and grand symphonies.
you do everything in a practiced way--
practiced smile, practiced walk,
practiced voice, practiced talk.
but dread coils in your stomach every time.
not just for fear that this time, you will be unable to do it.
but because you don't want to smile for these people
(so you paste on the smile
people say is either too toothy or too reserved),
you feel anxious tremors wrack your legs
(so you walk carefully in the legs
people say are either too slim or too stout),
you speak softly because people will scold you
whether or not you speak soft or loud
but you stay soft because to them, being loud is being ruder
(so you speak in the voice people say is either
too high or too low, too melodic or too nasally),
and you keep mostly quiet
because they're all saying nonsense
and the words you say don't mix in
(so you try to stick to the talk these people understand).
the truth is, they don't understand you
or your smile
or your legs
or your voice
or your words.
but they "ooh" and "aah" because that is proper,
and they do pride themselves on being proper.

stand tall, primrose.
keep your back straight and your chin held high.
the naysayers are beneath you.
you are both artist and art,
crafting chaos and beauty that they cannot comprehend.

stand tall, primrose.
shoot off another pretty pose.
they don't see the meaning,
but the loss is on them.

stand tall, primrose.
despite the laughs and crows
that they litter when they leave.

stand tall, primrose.
you are your own validation.

a poet's screen
night falls in on
breaking shadows
lit by
background reminiscing
and held by every static word.

rusted in the gallows
when the folks from the gallows
nod their heads,
they do so forced
by gravity or greedy hands.
i used to think
only compassion can strike my cheek.
only i can control the pain.
my face should remain
my own.
but red marks mar my heart
and my eyes weep rust.
when i said "show me the ropes",
i didn't mean like this.

a pull on the world in all the wrong ways
heavy tassels
pull my bones
and drag muscle and skin
to drown in clothes.
prepare the tyranny
for the food chain to collapse.
prepare for the anarchy
to become even wilder.
this is chaos;
this thing that we're born from
and continue to let grow.
there is no taking or breaking
the words and world we've made happen.

sirens live in cliff-side beaches
in sand-flecked words, the wind whispers a secret
legend says only the ocean knows.
here, the moonlight echoes and stars dance to keep it
in the hollow remains of empty hermit crab homes.

sea spray stings our cheeks
and the gusts cut like glass.
this cliff-side reminiscing
will likely be our last.

voices hoarse from screaming
about the ways life seems to hate us.
and with moonlight down on us beaming,
adults aren't here to berate us.

with waves capped with stars, the ocean is inviting.
and we hear voices whisper that they understand
how weary we are from the battles we've been fighting
so we take hold of these sirens' hands.

we dip our feet in the waters of death,
struck by the calm of it by moonlight.
we may be dead with water leagues above our heads
when we stay at this beach past midnight.

shattered, sweet, and isolated
my mind is
shattered, today.

imagine sand
tossed to the wind.
empty hearts
hollowed by seasalt kisses.

caramel haunts my dreams
and i drown in chocolate.

i
choke on my voice.

words are incoherent.

i was made
to be sweet.

but why am i cold?
why am i frozen?
i fear i may never melt.

why am i bitter?
i fear that
i am not what i
was made to be.

why am i locked up
like the rusted tin man
longing for a heart?
oil grease doesn't open me up.
if
storm clouds drop their rain
upon me like
i'm a coat rack
and moss grows over me
in a gnarled mess of green,
i think i'd like
the isolation.

blur
i curse myself
and the way i feel
like breath
fogging up windows
and morning mist blurring the world
and fingerprints pressed to glasses lens
until nothing is real
anymore.

run, summer girl
craving blisters and raisins
and all the things that don't make sense
and remind me of summer hate.

i wonder where that one friend went.
made in a summer, lost in a day.
did she go back to her bicycle cave?
stuck in a school in a home
where there's no love for her own.
split the sidewalk between the wheels of her bike
and let her scuffed sneakers fall.
run, summer girl.
run far away.
where the words won't be able to reach you.

revolution
i've met new friends
and they talk of freedom i've had only in dreams.
adults call it rebellion.
but that isn't what the whisper in my head
and the up-and-down
shaking of my knees like battering rams feel like.
thinking these thoughts, freedom is a whisper
and revolution is the word.