It's the 2025 Poem-A-Week Challenge! (This is a *poems only* thread.)

[_Land]

Kick me
By Bear Sage

They wrote it fast,
in a marker that bled.

Laughed like truth
was something you could tape to a body.

He wore it
until the laughter grew quiet.
Until the word Me
began to sound like a wound.

Years later, he would forget their names
but still feel the weight of letters
pressed between his shoulders.

We all do.
Post-Its of identity,
labels that hum against skin:
Too much.
Not enough.
Unlovable.
Broken.
Difficult.

Each one written in someone else’s handwriting.
Each one waiting for us
to decide if it stays.

 

[SmilingLez]

Autumn

Leaves crunch,
a rhythmic whisper,
Nature's music.

Colors burn,
fiery reds,
deep oranges,
rusted browns.

Air -
sharp,
crisp,
cool.

Autumn’s heartbeat pulses,
raw,
fleeting,
alive,
yet slipping away.

 

[42BelowsBack]

Life

An ocean drinks
a drowning man,
breathing body
bobbing lying
face first in the
pause before
the rain.

NQ39

 

[amitheotherone]

First Light

The darkness of last night has passed
Replaced with the new days yawn
Just a sliver as it awakes the day
A taste of what will be the dawn
Something new or more decay
Slivers of white and blue calm
Fires red bring rough seas hate
Today brings what is to be
The new for us to see

 

[SpermFactory]

Humpty Dumpty

I saw the King and his royal
vowels fly over the other day

he was practicing his royal wave
as if to say he is the shit

not for him the Brits stiff upper lip
or any bits below the hips just a

splendid Humpty dump with his
American anally made anus.

In a positive ending like all good faery toilet
tails stocks rallied in issues of toilet tissues.


(38)

 

[SmilingLez]

A Mayfly's Life

Emerging from depths
In the moon's soft silvery glow
Wings spread like whispers
A brief courtship above streams
Life's fleeting, sweet serenade

 

[amitheotherone]

Here and lost

Thankful for all you do
Grateful to see you to
I always get lost you see
Blinded by things and me
Voices, lies I believe
Telling me not to be free
Not to feel these things
That make me scream
But like the seasons
That change with the sun
The voices tell me to
Run, run, run

 

[42BelowsBack]

The weight of the world

stalls outside my window

in a cloud of people. What

bundles in with them. The

wind sounds parched. I

hear dust in their voices,

jungle tracks, dirt roads,

sweat on backs, all of them

pouring through my window.

Across my laden table they

feed their children.

Desperation
is a Motherfucker.



NQ 40

 

[amitheotherone]

Dark Serenade

Full moon rise conducts
Pure darkness is corrupt
Breezes make glass erupt
Calm smooth is disrupted
Light plays dance charades
Shadows mocks every play
Steady current always pays
River sheds his elusive ways
Shiny new suit was adorned
Spot light enlightens seaborne
Diamonds scream for encore

 

[Angeline]

Sum of Her Parts

I'm not like some Raggedy Ann
with a heart pasted on my hips
and I wasn't made with a plan

for convention to smile on my lips.
I'm made whole of discarded parts.
I'm cobbled together in bits

rescued from graves, tossed on carts
to stitch up a foul monster's bride
and serve a foul doctor's black arts.

When I first saw Frank how I cried;
my lightning bolt flashed and I screamed,
newly alive though I'd died

over and over I'd dreamed
of eternal peace but I'm bound
to one made like me, sewn and seamed,

born from the same graveyard ground
and dead to cognition or hope.
O pray leave us where we were found,

dead to cognition and hope.




Week 43, Poem 1, Total 50

 

[Tzara]

Les Yeux Sans Visage

Her features, smooth as polished stone,
still as a pond frozen white
in the ice of winter.

What emotion can we possibly read
in those lonely eyes, isles
of misery in becalmed seas?

Would another's face, however beautiful,
revivify her gaze, or would
the stolen visage wither

like a failed crop sown on depleted soil?
Should she instead ask her father,
her surgeon, to cut even more deeply

so that she could simply, finally sleep?

Week 43 : Poem 3 : Total 61

 

[SmilingLez]

I trace your depths gently.
Fingers move softly, exploring, feeling.
Heat rises with every touch.
A quiet connection,
Wet, intimate, raw.
Your breath quickens.
I want nothing but to bring you higher.
Taking you over the edge,
Then into my arms.

 

[Xenofidelity78]

this is just me
playing with words
yeah that's right
you know what you heard

I feel like the more I speak
the less that they listening
turning on their heels
with their fingers full of dissonance

have we laid waist to our lips
and forgotten how to speak
all we do is engage with symbols
that pump us full of dopamine

we hit the buttons on the phone
and play on the PC
but the more we put up on those screens
the less of us they'll ever be

because we're putting everything out there
leaving our souls bear for all to see
until the site gets un-hosted
and everything disappears with a delete key

 

[Angeline]

3-D

I mailed them to you,
those lacy green silk panties
after I'd worn them
and when we finally met
you watched me put them back on.



Week 43, Poem 2, Total 51

 

[amitheotherone]

Lies Trap

Another day arrives
Awake, late, great
Hurry, fast, race
Punch that clock
Don’t be late
Broke your back
So zombies get payed
To play on their phones
Eat, sleep repay
All that debt anyways
That just repays
The donors you see
Now join the rats
Make them all profits
Not to share
I no we
It trickles down
To pay for their
AI and robots
And their bonus
All the while
Poor fill the maze
After they sent
All the jobs away
We can’t make nothing
Except power and debt
They Maydoffed us all
Skimmed off the cream
All that’s left for us
Are these five pound
blocks of cheese.

 

[Tzara]

The Haunting

What could be so strange
about the house? The gnarled
trees, sickly and stunted
in the lumpy yard? the cracked
windowpanes? The peeling
paint? It has been uninhabited
for years—surely this is just neglect.

So too the odd sounds. The creaks
simply the normal settling,
the scritch and scuffle only
some few rodents to be expected
in an abode so long abandoned.

The weird chills, merely drafts;
the low shuddering moans, the wind.
Give a good handyman three weeks
and all will be snug, sealed, quiet.
What can possibly go wrong? This house
is a bargain, even an outright steal
in this hyperinflated market.

The deaths? Well, people die,
you know, even the young.
I wouldn't call them "unexplained"
at all. Just misfortune—bad luck.

Week 43 : Poem 4 : Total 62

 

[_Land]

Good evening and happy Friday I hope everybody is having an excellent end of the week and are excited about the weekend.


What all do you think about when you look at the stars?

Inheritance of Light
By Bear Sage

The night folds inward,
a quilt stitched by distance.
Three stitches glint like teeth
in the jaw of Orion,
biting down on the dark.

A low hum lives between stars,
a pulse that never learned language.
Somewhere in the seam
between your ribs and the next light,
the Milky Way spills its quiet inheritance.

You think it’s dust.
It’s the handwriting of time,
still wet on the paper of the sky.

Below, trees lean like listeners
who forgot the story’s start
but remember how it ends,
in a soft, unbroken glow
no one owns.

 

[Angeline]

The Tingler

It's the Saturday matinee
I've got popcorn and Raisinettes.
I'm led near the screen, all the way
to my seat by two usherettes.

The cinema's filled to the brim
It's a kid's highlight of the week
to see what waits beyond the scrim~
a horror show, chills, thrills...a freak!

But not one of us is prepared
for special seats wired for shock,
"Percepto" seats to enhance scares
from Bill Castle, king of film schlock!

When The Tingler scuttles on screen
looking like a mad millipede
my Percepto seat buzzes, I scream
and Vincent Price begins to bleed.

That night I'll put on my costume.
I'm gypsy or beatnik or cat.
I'll join the throngs in the chill gloom,
just another Halloween brat,

but when home counting my candy
toting up Hershey's and Reese's
I'll thank God Dad's near and handy:
no Tingler can spook me to pieces!


Week 44, Poem 1, Total 52

 

[SmilingLez]

One
truth -
duality,
beautiful,
terrible -
perfectly
useless .

 

[Tzara]

A Haunted Landscape

Broken, scarred earth
barren of anything but scrub.
Even the few thin puddles

are salt-encrusted,
poisonous to plants, man, beast.
Perhaps a few vipers

might subsist on insects
or the rough carapace of a spider,
dead and desiccated

in the ruined soil. My hands
wither just looking out the window
as we drive through this wasteland,

praying the radiator doesn't overheat
or a tire burst
as if from stress, fatigue, or anguish.

Week 44 : Poem 1 : Total 63

 

[_Land]

Highlights in Red

Red and orange leaves fall gently
like traces of your hair framing my face.
The air holds its breath around us,
each strand a thread of fire brushing my lips.

Your warmth lingers in the hush,
sunlight pooled against my neck,
the faint spice of your skin
stirring where the wind once rested.

The world tilts amber and alive,
each leaf a heartbeat breaking loose,
falling slow as your laughter did
when I reached to tuck it behind your ear.

Now the branches empty quietly.
The light moves on without you.
Still, I wait beneath its glow,
hoping one leaf will find your face.

 

[_Land]

Grief Is an Entertaining Friend

Grief is such an entertaining friend,
it rarely lets you feel lonely.
It knows all your old stories,
pours another drink,
asks how you’ve been,
then answers for you.

It laughs at the wrong moments,
points to the empty chair,
the quiet shelf,
the way your voice still bends
around a name you won’t say.

It dresses in your memories,
wears their scent,
sits close until you forget
who opened the door.

When the night grows thin,
it hums that tired tune.
You hum along,
because silence feels
too much like goodbye.

 

[Aquelle]

A poem a week
Now it's time, get your rhyme
A poem a week
It's your rhyme it's your dime

Drop me a line
All your words winged like birds
Drop me a line
All your words make 'em heard

A poem for you
It's a gift, spirits lift
A poem for you
Scent of words take a sniff

A poem a week
Or a rockin rhyme a day
A poem a week
Hope my riffin' was okay

 

[Xenofidelity78]

I feel like every time I lay down
a piece of me stays asleep
like I wake up and feel fine
but there's something that didn't keep

there's a sliver of my mind
that's lost in an endless dream
and I'm always so tired
looking for the best of me

because the best is what's taken
at least that's what we're meant to believe
it can't possibly be mistaken
for what we never should have bereaved

we don't know what we've lost
but maybe our loss is our gain
because we're already lost in the echo
and can't resist our refrain

we're trained to hold on to things
to fear mystery and covet what we know
but maybe what our dreams are telling us
is that it's time to let it go

 

[_Land]

The Telescope

By Bear Sage

°

You steadied me with the same hand she rested on your knee.

That weight, quiet, certain.

When you turned my knob, the stars would paint the sky with your love.

°

Her laugh brushed my barrel.

You both leaned in,

and the night cracked open,

a seam of breath and heat.

°

I remember the scrape of your ring,

echoing like her breath on your jawline,

the way your hand held me

just a little bit tighter.

°

The porch holds you still, in silence.

Her chair gone silver with weather.

I keep my aim on Orion,

out of habit, out of hope.

°

If she were still here,

you might still touch me like she touched you,

slow, deliberate,

as if clarity could bring her back,

and bring you back to me.