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

[Wonderer67]

A Country Boy in Midtown

The people
The crush
Midtown at noon

It ain’t the same as it used to be
No more porn theaters
Sanitized disney phoniness
But the homeless are real

For two days
Hustling and bustling
With all of the other cattle
And sheep
Fuckin tourists in my way

No one knows how to walk like a New Yorker
Hot women
Moving with purpose

The gossip of office women
At lunch
“Can you believe she wore that?”

The smells of the pretzel carts

I could never do this every day
But for two days

I actually
Kind of love it

14/52

 

[LustyScribe]

Another Encouraging Chat

We talked again last night
We do that more of late.
Now I hear him, absent fright,
He said things; we could relate.
I used to throw things
Prayers and curses
Psalms that I would sing
And random Bible verses.

He called me ugly, undesired
Said i'm not really wanted
Not even by the kids i sired:
Truth; i couldn't be affronted.
He pointed out my lovely mate
Wouldn’t touch for love nor money
He mocked my loveless sexless fate
And said he found it very funny.

He nodded to the gun safe, big, black,
Sitting in the dark bedroom corner
Suggested to me that with all I lack
My next exam should be the coroner.
We'd had this talk a time or ten
He goading me to pull a trigger
I never thought at all back then
I'd see the attraction getting bigger.

When I finally left him, went to bed
She woke, asked who I was talking to,
Tired of hiding truth I just plainly said
"His name's Legion, all he says is true."
She just rolls away and sleeps
Unaware that the one beside her
Once again lays awake and weeps,
Still and evermore a sad outsider.

Week 18, poem 1, total 16

 

[Wonderer67]

A Sudden Cloudburst

The air was thick
With tension
It was no surprise that the humid day
Could give way
To the rain
A continuum of thunder
And whipping winds

Sending Bex and I
Scrambling for cover
Of the shed

Where she told me
“My panties are wet.”

It was over in a matter of minutes

15/52

 

[Wonderer67]

Freed Up From Our Farm Chores

By a thunderstorm outta nowhere

We went for a drive
It was late anyway

A good time to quit

Down the greeness
Of Whiskey Lane
Seeing how much
Every living thing needed the water

That color green you only get
Early on in spring

We meandered our way to Frenchtown, then up to Little York by way of Milford

The roads wet
And steaming from the temperature change

Winding up Muscontecong ridge
Just takin it all in
The greeness
The fields
The smell of wet cut grass

Feeling freed up by the storm
To not have to finish up our farm chores

Then back home by way of 513
Into pittstown

A single tractor still toiling at Stashluk’s sod farm
In the sinking light of saturday

A farmers work is never done

https://imgur.com/a/xCdh0if

https://imgur.com/a/yMABKyL

16/52

 

[Tzara]

Subterfuge

I sometimes think of my poems
as little notes I have left
in your mailbox or desk—

unsigned squares
of gummed yellow paper
with painstakingly crafted lines

that edge around my feelings
the way a child might eat a cookie,
nibbling its extremities

to make it last as long as possible
all the while wanting to gorge
myself on the candy center,

knowing the ensuing messy pile
of smeary crumbs
would simply document my greed.

Week 19 : Poem 1 : Total 24

 

[goddessofglee]

A tender touch!

A soft, gentle caress,
The skin on skin is warm,
I feel so alive.

№7 of 52

 

[LustyScribe]

She Still Wants Me

A soft cheek
Caresses my palm
Her lips forcefully
Accept my kiss.
Her eyes roll;
Probably ecstasy
At my every touch.

If I try hard enough,
Lie boldly enough
Pretend deeply enough
Need it desperately enough
Maybe I can believe
That love is still alive.

For 40 years more.

Week 19, poem 1, total 17

 

[goddessofglee]

Trying to race through...

Struggling to find it now...
Please wait—don’t ask me how.
Let me gather all I’ve got,
My fleeting thoughts, a tangled knot.

Much to do, the clock won’t stay,
It ticks my precious time away.
On eight, should've been nineteen,
Time moves fast, faster than lightening!

Yet still I try, though breath runs short—
To build my world, one frantic thought.

№8 of 52

 

[Angeline]

Mamaloshen

When she made babka
I'd grind walnuts into a jar
shaped like a smiling lady
and when it was full I'd sprinkle
nuts into cinnamon-scented batter.

Fridays when she made challah
I'd watch her deft hands braid,
then daydream next to the heat register,
warm by the rising dough.

There is no comfort, no safety
so all encompassing that even
my lover's arms couldn't offer
such security as Mama's kitchen
where she and Bubbe spoke
mamaloshen, the language
of the heart.



Week 19, Poem 1, Total 19

 

[goddessofglee]

A Walk, a Wound to Warn

The morning still held
a whisper of spring’s softness.
Cool grass kissed my feet
as I walked barefoot—
to breathe, to think,
to meet the quiet
mother nature brings.

And then I saw—a glint,
a sparkle on a blade of grass.
Smiling, I bent down to pick,
thinking it's dew, a morning gift.

But calm can mask—
and pain comes fast.

A sting.
Blood welled up
from my finger
brushed against
a hidden razor blade
thrown by careless hands
into the heart of our green land.

Though the wound was light—
the feeling wasn’t bright.

A garden is meant to heal,
to soothe the soul
and lift the day.
And yet,
our thoughtlessness
waits like blades in the grass.

Let us tread with care—
for nature gives freely,
but we must not take from her
and leave behind harmful things.


And this haiku, to remember:

I bend down to pick,
trinket from the blade of grass—
blood oozed from the cut.

№9 of 52

 

[NivKay]

On Via Fiorentine, we saw dark Somnambulic figures hover upon the steps
of Santa Maria Novella, under summer night skies
Hoping for a reprieve.

In the cooler morning, the nuns scurried in and around
the church grounds,
And formless beings hung and fluttered lazily
From clothes-lines, as mothers chirped across the way

Medici-dreaming, we traversed the river Arno,
And under the noontide sun, stole away
Upon rickety carriages towards Sienna to walk

On Gramsci's cobble-stoned heart. The buses never came.





What foolish minstrels sang for us that afternoon


In a nameless piazza and kiss-wrapped our futures


In a box of melted stars? Do they still sing today, does the


Roof-topped world still look the same

Numéro uno

 

[Tzara]

sound of koto strings
remind me of her sitting
at her instrument
and later, her removing
her kimono like a song

Week 20 : Poem 1 : Total 25

 

[_Land]

---

"Yesterday Bit Me First"
By Bear Sage


I remember the taste of wild cherries
stolen from a neighbor’s fence—
sun-warmed, skin-split,
bleeding red down my chin like joy
trying to escape my body.
I was nine.
And for a second,
it was enough.


But even sweetness has a spine.
And I learned young
to chew around the pits.
To smile while swallowing
the things that could choke me.


Laughter came in bursts—
loud, but careful,
like we feared joy might alert the storm.
Daddy's voice was thunder behind closed doors.
Mama's silence,
a faucet left dripping in another room,
wearing down the sink.


I remember the bike I never rode.
Bought secondhand.
Handlebars bent like broken promises.
It sat in the yard like freedom I didn’t deserve.
And when I touched it,
I heard her say I was ungrateful.
Heard her say I was too much.
Heard them both
before I heard my own name.


We painted the walls yellow.
They said it was the color of light.
But no color could brighten
a house that taught me
quiet was survival
and love was earned
by becoming small enough
to not be noticed.


I still flinch
when someone offers me happiness too quickly.
Still trace the outlines of old wounds
when people call me strong.
Because strength was never a choice—
it was the only thing I was allowed to carry
when tenderness went missing.


I look back sometimes—
at hopscotch chalk and Kool-Aid grins,
at scraped knees and cartoon mornings—
and I want to believe it was simple.
But the light there always came through blinds,
slatted,
angled,
never quite whole.


So if I seem bitter now,
if my joy has thorns,
understand—
it’s not that I don’t want to bloom.


It’s just that
I was taught that gardens lie.
That beauty comes with bruises.
And that everything sweet
has a price
you can’t always afford to pay
twice.

---

 

[NivKay]

A Weird Sister Speaks


Ox-tongue in blood broth
And Sunday gun-metal fog.
Apparitions strut and fret
In a dumb show.
On an evening, the traitor
Wails on Duncan's angel wings.

These days, after the haunting
Cries of the Lady of perfumed Arabia
I see my Sisters in moorish dreams,
Fair-foul incantations. I sense another
Second-coming.
A witches' brew to whet the prophetic stone.

"The gains made in the past forty years
By black and brown Americans,
And by homosexuals will be wiped out.
Jocular contempt for women
Will come back into fashion."*


*These are the words of Historian Richard Rorty who predicted the Trump phenomenon in 1998:

"The nonsuburban electorate will decide that the system has failed and start looking around for a strongman to vote for—someone willing to assure them that, once he is elected, the smug bureaucrats, tricky lawyers, overpaid bond salesmen, and postmodernist professors will no longer be calling the shots. . . . One thing that is very likely to happen is that the gains made in the past forty years by black and brown Americans, and by homosexuals, will be wiped out. Jocular contempt for women will come back into fashion. . . . All the resentment which badly educated Americans feel about having their manners dictated to them by college graduates will find an outlet"

Poem #2

 

[Angeline]

The sap is a sticky promise
of Spring, of Earth's awakening.
Persephone returns,

entreats frozen ground open,
be fecund, damp and inviting,
pungent with mud and smoky
detritus of fading winter.

Come Persephone! Command
the season change! Show me

yellow whorls of coltsfoot, bright
beaming in the snow. Now is time
revealed: its passing soft
as fuzzy gray buds, pussy willows
soft to caress my skin.


Week 21, Poem 1, Total 20

 

[_Land]

“The Dollhouse”
by Bear Sage

She built it for me—
the dollhouse.
Pastel walls,
hinged in hush.
Said, “Play here. It’s safe.”
Then sealed the roof.

My imaginary friend—
stitched smile,
eyes like thumbtacks pressed into velvet—
she watches from the nursery
where my voice went missing.

Each room lined in rules.
Each window nailed shut.
The air tastes like old apologies.

She feeds me
plastic food and pleasantries.
Curls my hair with barbed wire patience.
Buttons my dress too tight
and says, “Pretty hurts, but don’t squirm.”

In the parlor,
there’s a portrait of who I could’ve been—
but her face is scratched out.
In the kitchen,
the oven never turns on
but I still pretend to bake worthiness.

I sit at the table
with a smile sewn on,
spooning sugar into guilt
as if sweetness will fix me.

Her voice
echoes from every drawer:
“Too loud.”
“Too much.”
“Too needy.”
Each word a tack
holding my limbs in place.

The carpet covers cracks in the floor—
where I buried my hunger
and anything I couldn't make polite.

Even sleep isn’t mine.
She hums lullabies with no melody,
rocking me in rhythms
meant to numb, not soothe.

And I—
I forget I’m not made of porcelain.
Forget that breath should rise.
Forget that walls are not skin.

She says, “Good girls stay small.”
And I nod.
Because even my shaking
makes too much noise here.

 

[_Land]

The second piece in the series following dollhouse

“Fracture Lines”
by Bear Sage

I was porcelain.
Fine, flawless.
Painted by steady hands
that did not belong to me.

Glass-glazed lashes,
a mouth set in near-smile,
pinked cheeks
pressed with borrowed blush.

I sat—
still life in a place of still death.
All posture, no pulse.

My limbs were jointed
for show, not movement.
My silence varnished
until it gleamed.

But still—
beneath the gloss,
the hairline fractures formed.

Tiny splits
where feelings pooled like storm water
under floorboards.

Pressure behind the pupil.
A hum in the clavicle.
An ache too loud
for painted ears to ignore.

No one saw the way the crack
ran down my spine—
hidden beneath the satin
and good behavior.

She noticed.
The imaginary friend
with her stitched smile
and threadbare voice.
She whispered,
“You're breaking.”

Not a warning.
A threat.

She ran fingers down my arm
where the seam trembled.
Said, “Don’t move. You’ll ruin everything.”

But I was already shifting.
Already warping
beneath the expectation shell.
Already splintering
in places I could no longer keep smooth.

The porcelain held
but only barely.
And inside—
something thrashed.

Not freedom.
Not yet.
Just the scream
pressing against the inside of the glaze.





Week 21 poem 2. Total 3

 

[_Land]

Part 3

“Hairline Tremor”
by Bear Sage

I am still sitting.
I have not fallen.
But the room tilts
like breath held too long.

The walls of the dollhouse lean in—
closer, closer—
wood warped by secrets I didn’t choose.
The air is heavy
with pretend.

My imaginary friend
knows.
She circles slowly now,
threadbare skirts brushing splinters.
Hands clasped like a prayer
that’s forgotten its god.
She hums off-key,
fingertips tapping my temple—
checking for hollow.

She whispers,
“You don’t want to break.”
And maybe I don’t.
But I no longer want to stay whole
on someone else’s terms.

The tea cups tremble.
My painted lashes twitch.
There is a noise inside me
like thunder underwater.

The crack has teeth now.
It speaks in pulses,
gnaws at my ribcage
where all the unspoken things were stored
like porcelain dolls in an attic—
never touched,
never named,
never allowed to want.

My smile is slipping.
A sliver falls from my cheek
and shatters like a secret
hitting tile.

She gasps—
not in fear,
but fury.
Her toy is breaking.
Her rules unraveling.

But I do not apologize.
Not this time.

I sit still,
cracking slowly,
deliberately,
holding the tension like a storm.

Because even silence
has an edge
sharp enough to slice the hand
that pressed it into place.


Week 21 poem 3 Total 24

 

[_Land]

Part4

“Swept”
by Bear Sage

The floor is a graveyard of glint.
Slivers of self
gleam like moonbit teeth
in the throat of the dollhouse.

I crawl through the remains
with dust-colored fingers,
sifting bone from ornament,
truth from trim.

Lace still clings to some fragments—
shame’s embroidery
stitched in mother-thread,
singed at the hem.

I gather pieces
like relics
from a ruined shrine.
Each one warm
with the memory of pretending.

She watches
from the wallpaper—
faded now,
a shadow sewn into the corner seam.
Her eyes, black thread pulled tight.
Her mouth, a line unraveling.

Once she ruled this place.
Now she is mildew
in the corners of memory,
watching her porcelain prophecy
crumble under my breath.

I press a jagged cheek
to my chest.
It pulses.
Not like a heart—
like a wound that’s dreaming.

Her hands twitch.
She wants to gather what I drop—
but the pieces cut her now.
They only obey the blood
that belongs to me.

There is no broom.
Only palms.
Only grief in the soft sweep
of gathering ruin.

I make a cradle
from splinters and breath,
lay the shards down
like a dying season.

And the dollhouse creaks,
as if exhaling
for the very first time.


Week 21 poem 4 of 5 Total

 

[_Land]

Part 5

“Porcelain Mourning”
by Bear Sage

She howls
without a mouth—
cracked open at the seam of her chin,
dust flaking like snowfall
from a face that forgot how to hold shape.

Grief blooms
in the throat of her lace—
mildewed, unraveling,
dragging behind her like a train
stitched from every no
she ever made the girl swallow.

She cradles the spine
of a broken music box—
its song long bled dry,
its dancer missing a foot
but still spinning.

Her hands tremble—
not from age,
but from the sudden weight
of being powerless.

She drags her fingers
through splinters of former obedience,
trying to rebuild the child
from marrow dust and shellac.

But the pieces do not listen.

They gleam
with a life she cannot rethread.
They hiss
with heat she cannot hold.

She screams
but the sound curdles—
a porcelain shriek,
dry and shattering,
falling in splinters
no one catches.

The dollhouse groans—
not from collapse,
but from memory.
It remembers the rituals,
the lies sung in sing-song,
the rooms scented with silence
and varnish.

Now,
only shadows move
when she reaches.

No girl.
No giggle.
Just the hollow hum
of purpose unthreaded.

And still she kneels—
a priestess of control
at the altar of ruin,
offering cracked cups
to an absence
that will not drink.

Week 21 poem 5 of 6 total

 

[_Land]

The Gods of Disbelief
(by Bear Sage)

Come.
Lay your broken blueprints at my feet.
I am the God of Disbelief—
first of my name, bastard son of Shrug and Sigh,
patron saint of “It wasn’t meant to be.”

You called it fate when your spine folded.
When your voice cracked in the presence of your own damn longing.
You whispered “Maybe this is for the best,”
and I lit a cigar with the edge of your ambition.

I watched you—
dragging your dreams behind you like roadkill,
still had the nerve to call it a pilgrimage.

You blamed Mercury.
You blamed timing.
You blamed the full moon, your rising sign,
your mother’s disappointment,
and the imaginary life coach in the sky.
But never once did you blame the mirror.
Bravo. Truly.

Oh, how the congregation weeps
when life forgets to spoon-feed them miracles.
You wear your inaction like holy robes—
tailored from the fine linens of “not good enough,”
hemmed in “who do I think I am?”

You mistake my silence for mystery.
My absence for destiny.
But let’s be honest—
you never needed gods,
just an excuse with a better PR team.

You wanted divine permission
to quit before the finish line,
so I handed you prophecy in a punchline:
“Maybe it just wasn’t meant for you.”

And you—
you gobbled it up like communion.

I am the god you summon
when the door cracks open
but your courage is still
cloaked in sleep.

I am the voice in the static
between your heartbeat and your gut
that says,
“Don’t try. It’s safer here.
Let someone else burn.”

And you thank me.
Offer me sacrifices of canceled plans and could-have-beens.
Worship me in the temples of sarcasm
where your soul wears a nametag that reads:
“Almost.”

But make no mistake—

I am not fate.
I’m just the whisper that makes you think
the fire in your belly
was meant to go cold.

Week 21 poem 6 of 7 total

 

[Angeline]

Deep Elem Blues

The band is bouncing,
rocking joyful melody.
But aren't these blues?
Blues blow your sorrow away:
that's what they're made for, Mama




Week 21, Poem 2, Total 21

 

[goddessofglee]

This should've been in
Spontaneous poem, I mean...
but here it is... quite like a fool
I'm running behind schedule...

I met a guitarist there...
79 years and a day,
but I had no care.
he kinda played me like a guitar...
from top to begin his music bar
Came to the frets above the mid,
I cannot say what he really did
strumming through to the chord C
giggling, wriggling, dancing was me.
his right hand was constantly fingering
oh nothing but only my lips, like strings
fully wet though, those chords did wring
So I felt I'd just let go,
for him to steal the show.

But...

he was a kinda dom guy
so i couldn't let him try
I had to leave him midway
saying maybe another day
Ahh, but his tears did cry
but, I would not let him try
to take advantage of me.
I don't like doms, so please,
should've been easy to see.
It's OK with girls if they try,
some, they can, should they pry.
Talking to him though made me
wee wee and more, you see!

I knew it'd come that very morn,
my lips were sore, quite done.
He made me feel so good before
but I just had to leave and go...
that's all for now, there's no more

№10 of 52

 

[_Land]

Gentrified Childhood
By Bear Sage

Big Bird got evicted.
Oscar’s trash can’s now
an artisanal compost bin.

They paved over innocence
to install bike lanes
and boutique grief counseling.

Elmo’s in tech now.
Grover drives Uber
and flinches at red lights.

The stoop?
Luxury lofts.
Cookie Monster microdoses
and blogs about scarcity.

The only letter left
is F—
and not the one
they sang about.


Week 21 poem 7 of 8

 

[Bn2f]

1 + 1 Makes 3


“Yellow and blue makes green.”

So silly a statement to say to me
So odd a time for you to think to convey
While I held your hand in mine tightly
As the EMTs began to wheel you away

“Santa, can you hear me?”

Concussions can make the subconsciously imagined sometimes be believed
Your chest vitals became beeps from heart monitors
Tho the snapping of the head we surmised the cause to be
“Don’t worry,” I was told, “We’ll take the best good care of her”

“1 + 1 makes 3!”

Now that forceful claim gave me grave cause for concern
And they hurriedly strapped you securely in for ride preparation
It felt like just a bump from behind as we maneuvered a right corner turn
The kids, our house, and will! Is this how it starts - the eternal life separation?

“Henry, you forgot to take the damn trash to the curb!”

The responders stopped and stared with blank faces
It was then that I was relieved knowing you would be okay
“We’ll fast-track a scan to find just how scrambled the state of her brain is.”
I smiled for that’s the type of thing the wife I loved would remember herself to say