Poetic Stories

It kills me. The indifferent look in your eyes whenever I ask a question. The silence that never leaves. The expression that says you're exhausted by the same old conversation. The unwillingness to even try to understand what it is I'm carrying. Just as you cannot endure pain.

I know what it is to cut deep. To feel the blood run. To dress the wound and carry on as though nothing ever happened. I carry the scars. The memory of them. The courage it took to survive. I didn't even blink, baby. I carry the indifference too but mine is towards life, not you. I carry every time we almost made it. Every near-miracle. Every failure to become a mother. Some grief never leaves the body. I carry every word you've ever spoken that tore a hole through my skin. I went mad to become this calm.

I swallowed my words. Then swallowed thousands more. Just to keep the peace. Just to avoid the drama. And yet, I am drama. What an irony.

I lowered my voice until it disappeared. I've lived for years without one. I stopped using it. I stopped explaining. I learned to love the toxic peace. The routine. The neglect. The absence of care. Because I had to. Even though it is against everything I am. I'm not complaining. I'm showing you the shape of your victory.

Why call it love when everything is just another transaction? Why make plans when they collapse every single time? Why another place to feel as though I don't belong? Another chance for me to hide the tears?

That my cat will stare

Cry to pet her before she goes on to do something else

That something about the stillness is so thick that she can feel it

That something about every racing thought and emotion churning in my stomach is becoming too heavy and thick and unwanted.

The way you leave milk on the counter for too long and it curdles

Sometimes I was sweet.

Too sweet

Even honey in the wrong hands will spoil and rot

Fermentation is an intricate process

Sometimes on purpose

Sometimes accidentally found to have happened

Always a conversion that cannot be undone.

I was sweet

I became something sour and bitter

Something that rots in your mouth

Sweet doesn't last long

Not too long

Like fruit left in the sun too long

It spoils

It goes bad and loses meaning

So you smash it into the ground

Throw it in the trash or pour it down the drain

Not a second thought

Get something new

Or change your mind to something different

It's that easy right

To never think about the mistakes you made

So you glance at the new fruit rotting on the counter

Say it's fine as you walk past it

Check the date on the carton and put it back

It's fine

For now

But never pick it back up

And my stomach will spin and churn

And I'll stare blankly out the window

But the churning will slow down

It will become soft

And I will sit and smile while I watch the bees

Fly or they'll strip your wings for being too wide.

Too free.

Too ugly to be considered a pretty bird.

Fly and never return.

This wicked place eats all that stands.

They don't bother with funerals.

The ashes are like dirt to them.

Fly little crow.

For once they catch you, you'll end up buried in the ground with nothing to remember.

Fly, fly, fly.

Spread your wings into the sky and let the wind be one with you.

Don't look back.

Their torches are lit and sharp are their spears.

They're waiting to catch you off guard.

Fly fly fly.

Never return to this haunted place.

They don't love you here.

They just want your flesh.

For it's damaged,

Forever hopeless,

Expelling any thought,

Of loving again,

Feeling shook,

Confused and torn,

Far from any redemption,

Of being letting myself see past the pain you caused...

©️fallencalliope

Waves of pure emotion against the cliffs that they adore,

And the land turns to the rivers, and clogs them up with silt;

-something insightful

-something beautiful

-something acerbic and yet innocent

-soft but calloused in the ways age

begins to close around you like a shell

or a cage

-something that condemns and forgives

-truth in safe proportion, unthreatening

to the self-delusions needed to sleep

without guilt or nightmare

-something revealing of regret

but marked by hope

-something regarding love or hate or

maybe indifference if the mood is right

-some personal history expressed

in allusion and allegorical myth

-something that moves like touch,

like breath, like skin upon skin,

mouth upon mouth

-some sex, if only to secure attention

-something faithless but willing

to consider

-something brave

-something fearless

-although i am afraid

Jessica Bahr

Was eating peacefully

Brain sends signals

via motor neurons

Tongue catches lively.

Where? Where? Where?

Gotcha!

Chrystal! Chrystal!

Here,here.

Whatever you were eating

A tiny piece

got stuck between there.

Sensory neurons sending signals

Constantly

Dumbo brain playing partiality.

Tongue is yelling here,here

Me not finding anything near.

Toothbrush, floss

Gargle, rinse

Couldn't find it

Testing my patience.

with this

child of mine

she thinks

where i talk

of hard times

is when her mother

& me parted

& bless

i don’t ever

disagree

if the hard times

came later in

the starting over

holding nothing

but time

& expecting

life for others

to be

much the same

which it never was

she feels sad

for me for herself

never knowing

the real reasons

why i left

tho’ her mother

has hints to give

bearing no relation

to the what was

such ignorance

is bliss

I remembered 

how to walk the earth again

what a claustrophobic thing 

it was 

to live indoors

the soles of my feet sing

tickled by greenery 

I pick a dandelion leaf and eat it

recently 

I've been trying to decide

who I want to be 

when I die

I'm thirty five 

and beginning to wonder 

whether I'll ever

be certain 

I have always felt 

less real

than everything around me 

How did I end up,