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

[_Land]

Permanent Collection
By Bear Sage

We are all walking museums
of private catastrophe.

The child's handprint still on the wall
where he pushed away from the cancer.
Three years. No one has painted over it.

Your mouth full of apologies
you practiced choking on.
Tongue a dead slug behind the smile.

The woman who scrubs her thighs raw
in the shower. Water never hot enough
to boil out what he left inside her.

The man who checks the lock seven times before bed
because his brother's brains
dried on a different door.

Blood under your fingernails
from clawing out of your own throat.

Medication bottles lined up
like headstones. The ones that worked.
The ones that made you fuck strangers
in parking lots to feel anything at all.

Your child's shoe—just one—
in the river. They never found the other.
You keep it in your car.
You smell it when you forget.

We are meat galleries, bone archives.
Our catastrophes ferment in our organs,
pickling our kidneys in what we can't say,
corroding our hearts with every
swallowed scream.

The exhibits leak.
They seep through our pores at 3 AM.
They drip from our mouths
when we say we're fine.

 

[Tzara]

National Popcorn String Day
December 13

The kernels, unflavored for stringing,
Are laced onto thread for their slinging
Over limbs of a tree—
It's all quite Christmassy,
Though chaotic with all the string flinging.

Week 49 : Poem 1 : Total 74

 

[Angeline]

Perspective

We nearly were lost
on the way to the city,
turned off by a sign
heading to New England States.
I'd think about it later,
four women waiting,
four fantasies about you,
three of which would die
there at JFK Airport
when she leapt into your arms.
Forty years later
I spotted a photograph
of the two of you
smiling and still so in love.
i don't hold any rancor:
time gave me the gift
of perspective. I'm alive
and I wasn't lost
after all. Another road
led me to a better place.


Week 49, Poem 1, Total 61

 

[42BelowsBack]

Caterwauling (18+]

Teen Tomcats, shirtless, furious rippling chrome —They’re all just wheel standing,
gawking, romantic motorcyclists —looking at all the hot moms, their hot bodies
the color of hot sand —Their motorcycle kick stands unleashed under streetlights
At nights all the fathers’ daughters are lost to the distant sounds of their laughter.
(18+) Teens trying to blind each other in the testosterone of their open mouths.


NQ48

 

[42BelowsBack]

In Your Mouth

My body parts were spoken. In fingertips cascading silks
the sheets under my body, all were spoken in your mouth,
in celestial guidance, sightings were spoken, rocking
transactional opening, the spirit was spoken physical,
emotional, in your mouth, all were spoken.



NQ49

 

[_Land]

The Mathematics of Middle Age
By Bear Sage

Fifty-two years,
a deck of cards complete,
each suit a season I have shuffled through

hearts worn on sleeves,
diamonds in the street,
clubs wielded young,
spades turning earth anew.

The jokers played,
the aces spent and saved,
the kings dethroned,
the queens reclaimed their ground,

while time, that patient dealer,
has engraved
its wisdom in the lines
where youth was found.

I stand now at the table,
chips stacked high
with memory’s currency,
experience’s gold,

and know the game’s not measured
by the skywe’ll reach,
but by the hands we’ve dared to hold.

Fifty-two—the number sounds like falling,
like autumn’s mathematics,
winter’s sum, yet spring still
whispers in my body, calling:

The best cards yet may be the ones to come.

 

[Remec]

The snow falls upon the trees,
I am beset by winter's chill;
Would the cold bring me to my knees?
The snow falls upon the trees
and I can't help but think it frees
more than it hinders, but still,
the snow falls upon the trees,
I am beset by winter's chill.

Week ? Poem 1 Total 7

 

[Remec]

There was no Limbo, I was simply damned,
cursed with in-laws and lost cousins all season
long, How have they come? And why have they all

seemed fit to drop in on me and mine? It's all
craziness and then some, such a damned
time of it that I almost forget the season

Almost, that is, but enough eggnog brings the season
in to clearer focus, enough that I can put it all
aside and think of changed Scrooge, not Marley, the damned;

"Bah humbug", be damned; 'Tis the season, after all.

Week ? Poem 2 Total 8

 

[Angeline]

Log Basin

When the night is long
I snuggle in my warm bed.
I dream of how Sun
wakes the frozen Delaware.
I dream of skating
along the icy basin
where once logs floated
downriver to the city.
Now it's modern times.
The river carries no logs,
the towpath's remnants
are overgrown in patches.
Does no one come here
on wintry December days?
There was an ice hut
and mugs of hot chocolate
to warm the skaters.
Our noses twitched from the steam
Daddy called us his rabbits.





Week 49, Poem 2, Total 62

 

[SapioSexual9]

Why I hate Thanksgiving.

Daddy will ignore anything that rhymes with maps
including maps. He will stare by the well, meaning,

mountains, by the high hanging stars. We will find
a cheap motel along some forgotten highway,

It will be midnight. There will be a clock ticking.
Getting out of the car will be clown car chaotic.

Eggs and smokey bacon will fry in the morning.
Daddy will roll his t-shirt sleeves, drink a coffee,

light his smoke with Momma’s cigarette. We will
leave quickly. Daddy will reverse one handed, his

arm outside the car window. I will forget my teddy
bear. The big one with Daddies stash hidden in it.

We will go back and find it. There will be a siren.
Momma will stay Daddies arm and say, of all the

conflicts, this Thanksgiving doesn’t need a life or
death situation. Lil brother will cry about everything.


40/52

 

[Tzara]

Polaroid

She wouldn't remember this,
found stuck between the pages
of a novel I never finished.

But finding it I remember
the warmth of her body,
her eagerness in bed.

What I miss most, though,
is her smile, her downcast eyes,
as if she didn't want to see

how much I wanted her,
which could be why she left
and why I never read this book.

Week 49 : Poem 2 : Total 75

 

[kreemi_pi]

in the winter night
frozen breaths in frosty air
my lips brushing yours

 

[42BelowsBack]

The picture.

Examining the picture / two people /
fucking / black / white / charcoal / cross
hatched / scratches layering his back
his chest his ass.

Caught staring back her scorched thighs
stretched white canvas skin, I see only
/ I realize / she is still fucking him / close /
post divorce.



NQ50

 

[Remec]

Promise Fib​

I
would
never
(not ever)
speak badly of you,
no matter how things go with us,
unsav'ry mem'ries
are ignored
replaced
by
bliss.

Week 49 Poem 3 Total 8​

 

[amitheotherone]

Drawing of life

Sharing words, unrehearsed and free
Those dark things, life love the sea
Secrets slip out, trust grows fear flees
Lines appear flow, light shadows glow
Your spirit escapes, hearts truth flows
Connections made, friendship too grows
Give and take, lost and found light
Dark to light, sunset to sunrise flight
Eyes lips smile, heart souls too shine brite

 

[SmilingLez]

Respect steadies me.
Trust opens me.
Worship rises when you look at me.
We choose each other.
No hiding.
No doubt.
Your honesty disarms.
My devotion answers.
I give freely.
With you, surrender feels sacred.

 

[Angeline]

Awakening

I won a contest
in an afterschool program.
I can't remember
what for or why I was there
but I loved the prize,
a color-by-number set
with bright pots of paint,
two brushes and canvases.
I was very proud,

but when I showed my daddy
he was furious!
The smiling man in long robes
and the fancy cross
made my daddy so angry
that he took that set
and threw it in the garbage.
That's not who we are!

This was my gentle father
who taught me to dance
the Lindy Hop and read me
stories at bedtime,
stories of Harry the Horse
and Nathan Detroit.
The man with the cross looked kind.
He seemed gentle too,
but if that's not who we are,
someone tell me who I am.

Week 49, Poem 3, Total 62

 

[SmilingLez]

New Job Jitters


First day.
Nerves singing.
Train quiet.
Office empty.
Skirt adjusted.
Sumatra blend.
Measured carefully.
Machine hums.
Coffee dark.
Bag unzipped.
Notebook. Pen.
Silence waits.
I exhale.

 

[Tzara]

Purpose

under this gray sky
a lone hummingbird seeks out
the few remaining flowers

so why do you ask
me watching you drink coffee
what I am doing today?

Week 50 : Poem 1 : Total 76

 

[Angeline]

Be-In

Green meadow filled with music, incense wafting over the crowd.
Freedom feels like voices shared or hands that touch without a care.
Remember Woodstock, how you felt when songs soared through summer air?


Week 50, Poem 1, Total 63

 

[amitheotherone]

Trembling thoughts

Anxiety too wakes, from a locked tomb,
stretching forth, rising ticking boom.
Time slows, heartbeat quickens pace,
mind focused left, lie after truth chase.
Emptiness blooms, shadow eclipse glare,
boiling mind steeps, alone no one cares.
Sanity shakes awake, day ends bends,
consciousness slips, dream grips blends.

 

[Wonderer67]

Fuck The Winter

My well went dry
Scratching out ideas
In the dirt
Or frozen ground

Concepts and ideas
But just not getting em down
On “paper”

Describing the ice crystals
On my windshield
When I’m late for work
Some beautiful design
And narrowly missed wrecks

The sound of an ice scraper
On a frosty December morning
Steam coming from my nostrils
Cusses cumming from my mouth

Or finishing poems from my last road trip
Or drinking with The Effigies
Or hacking at firewood-
Making small logs outta big logs
Or committing suicide 538 times this fall
After 538 nites of bad sleep

I won’t get to 52
Quality over quantity
I always swear

It’s gotta be right

38/52

 

[amitheotherone]

Cat bird seat

Easy way out
or the cat got your tongue?
Rain filled days
or your heart been wrung?
Words never said
or those aces never played?
Sins used to win
soul sold for them debts payed?
Full moon glow
or coyotes laughs and cry’s?
Red sunrise burns
or winds to wings to soar and try?

 

[SmilingLez]

A short Trochee

Touching fingers, burning skin
Pulling closer, breathe me in
Lips are moving, tasting fire
Bodies tangled, raw desire

 

[Tzara]

Separation

the bamboo grows lush
and thick between our houses
even the birds won't perch there

yet I heard you sing
with the finches last April
and still hear you this winter

Week 50 : Poem 2 : Total 77