[x]

Will-o'-the-wispShe wears a necklace made
of bones,
ossified phalanges gripping
her throat
like a rasping phantom.

Her heart is hard
and heavy,
full of dust and debts
unpaid.
Her corset is laced
too tight;
her ribs are being crushed
by lace
and internal pressures crawling
up her throat,
where the necklace chokes them all
back down.

They never found her
lover's head,
guillotined under train wheels when
he tripped
over rails hidden from the pool
of light
cast by the cast-iron lantern.
The railroad
men said it was a tragedy.
She said
he was pushed.
They carried
her by the arm, back to her porch swing
and left.

The hushed glow of distant
lanterns
beckons;

Intergenerationali.

I scribbled unicorns for my mother
and colored in mandala patterns
for my father,
but rarely got an extra glance
for my artistic endeavors.
I put them on my bedroom walls
instead of our blank white refrigerator,
where I could be proud of myself
(since no one would be so for me).

ii.

He’s late on the first day
of class, and I’m not sure
what I’m getting into. It’s the only class
that takes the full hour and a half
and doesn’t even touch the syllabus.

The room is too large for us;
he swings an arm and invites us all closer
before diving right into the first book
of the semester.

I still don’t know wh

TurquoiseTurquoise
beads hang from
her throat, wrists, ears,
braided into her hair,
clinking like an abacus.
The earrings from her mother
with a bell laugh.
The tasteless bracelet from
her cheesy sister who shared
her black licorice hair.
The heavy pendant from
her frail grandmother who wore it
fifty years until Winter
claimed three generations.

CeladonCeladon
glazed shards litter
the pale tiles like a million
green apple slices.
The crunch underfoot
is a gunshot;
the long exhale
is salted with tension.
The plum branch is buried
under spearmint pieces
of pottery, smooth,
cold jade on one side,
textured clay on the other.

The blossoms are already dying.

ButtermilkButtermilk
and white trim walls
hide behind the towering stacks of books
cluttering his kitchen.
The cat purrs on the windowsill,
perking his ears when
the kettle begins to whistle.

He slathers the toast
with butter - the real kind - and
takes his tea with too much sugar,
just the way she likes it.
When the day falls cold,
she leaves with a warmth
growing in the bottom of her chest.

AmberAmber
had a golden waterfall of hair
and tawny eyes that glowed like lanterns
on the cusp of a quiet evening.
The wind rustled through pine needles
and dangling windchimes
in delicious counterpoint
to her honey-drip song and
vanilla-smooth voice
that went down like crushed velvet and feather dust,
uplifted away from my grasping fingers.

JulyThe magnolia tree is the last shade for miles
unless you want to hide in the cornfields,
or spend quality time with the chickens pecking at your bare toes.

Only the mockingbirds truly enjoy the summer haze,
filching birdseed and blackberries
with all the speed their hollow skeletons will grant them,
while anything with feet on the ground simmers like biscuits in the oven.

The mailboxes at the end of mile-long driveways are stuffed to capacity,
because it's too hot to make the trek from the porch swing
and the lemonade will be lukewarm by then.

Even the old barn,
paint stripped by the elements exposing the grayed wood,
is too tired

But Only When I'm SleepingSometimes my hand meets my leaping throat
in a fleeting greeting,
keeping sure I'm still breathing,
still beating a pulse in my leaking veins.

The Watchmaker's Lover - RevisionYour clockwork appendages
were cold to the touch.
The industrial complex of your mind
was grating gear against gear
where the unoiled works
kept clacking away; your atrium
was a tick-tocking machine
that counted the hours while the rust settled in.

The mainspring spiraled round
your mechanical heart tensed
so tightly it showed in your face,
in your quivering hands,
your troubled eyes.
The unlubricated escapement never
released, oxidized into place
from ages of neglect.

Your lonely footsteps echoed
under orange gaslamps submitting
to the glare of red lanterns.
Used parts are yours for the taking;
here, a hairspring; there, slender
legs unde

LavenderLavender
eyes compliment
her pale, coppery hair
and warm skin tone
or so she says, lightly.
I might believe her tittering,
china-delicate laughter
if I didn't know the poison of hair dye
chemicals wafting on my tongue
or the lie of cologne
on her silk blouse.

The feather-down throw pillows
aren't soft enough for my head
tonight.

InfernoSeptember is a sultry tangle
of curly hair and corduroy jackets stretched
over broad shoulders that I've been leaning on,
metaphorically.

He won't press for answers
and I won't trouble him with my problems.
So he complains about the weather –
he's never gotten used to these sticky, southern delta summers –
while I hold the door
and press the call button.

The half-lit elevator drops us off above Dante's first layer.
I feel sorry for anyone beneath,
but I've indulgences to buy
and my own hell to return to.

But there's a light in my pocket –
abandon not all hope,
and

smile.

FirefliesWe kept cicadas and caterpillars in mason jars, but never fireflies. My brother still has a cicada from three years ago, sleeping away under the lid. Grandpa says it'll stay that way for 17 years like all cicadas do, and it's okay to keep them safe.

But we don't catch fireflies; they don't live that long. They say light travels faster than anything, but our bugs are fat lazy things that travel nowhere in a big zigzag. The tall grass lights up with tiny little flashes every night all summer long and all is dark not two months later, but for the time being they don't even know they're dying.

Concerned WordsWhen we part for the evening
he tells me to "be safe,"
and I'm never sure what to say.

So I settle for "I'll try,"
as though that's all it takes.

JulietDarling,
You never were my Juliet.

The CemeteryRaindrops pockmark the granite tombstones and ruffle the weeds growing up from the bones in a kingdom by the sea. Stormclouds roll in on an icy bite wind and the gates creak wide open to wave to the ocean, beckoning the newcomer in. The ashen-faced angels caught up in the tangle of twisting vines that bind up their wings with sharp nettle stings look into the distance with passive resistance while the wind gives a voice to their sighs.

The newcomer halts under the shower of drops as the gates swing open wide. The crash of the waves sets his senses ablaze but the weight of his gait on the sandy shore makes an uncomfortable shift with each str

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Hell is MurkyBloodstained hands drip dye into conscience.

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The Dying Season II

by =SilverInkblot, Sep 27, 2012, 9:24:07 PM
Literature / Poetry / General Poetry / Free Verse

_{Hazel cider eyes
like a pumpkin light
glance out the empty window.
No crunching footsteps chart the driveway;
no cast away candy wrappers decorate the weeds.
The table is set with ginger snaps
and cinnamon rolls sticky with glaze.

Melancholy
is two caramel apples,
a mug of spiced tea,
and no one to share with.
The candy apple red stains on her wrists
fade and return, dependent on the ratio
of bitter to sweet. She nearly
trips over the cat in her distraction.

Her lips are frosted with dark chocolate.
She re-lights the candle on her porch,
snuffed out by the wind.
Distant laughter from bedsheet ghosts
and cardboard wing angels pass
by the wrought iron gates creaky with disuse.
She tastes ash and too-ripe
pumpkin in her dry mouth.

Waxy scarecrow fingers pinch
the candles out one by one –
nobody is ringing her doorbell tonight.
Even the cat takes his leave,
slinking by before the door closes
and bounding into the night, slipping
through the iron bars chained together
with a heavy padlock.}

The Dying Season IIby =SilverInkblot

Literature / Poetry / General Poetry / Free Verse

Take two. (Original.)

I asked my professor friend for a bit of advice. He pointed out a few things I hadn't noticed such as the number theme I had going with the original (I'll let you find the pattern in this one

) and gave me a less cliched direction to take this in. Still not quite where I want it to be though, so I'll probably revise it at least one more before submitting it to the competition.

I do like it more now, but I don't think the loneliness theme is quite pronounced enough - it's there, but you kinda have to look for it, and I don't think the significance of the gates really comes through. But he wants to see my second draft, so there is that

!TheColdwaveCatatonic Oct 2, 2012 Writer

This is pulchritudinous.

=SilverInkblot Oct 3, 2012 Hobbyist Writer

Whoa, big word

Thank you!

~DNA-The-Authoress Sep 27, 2012

I definitely like this one better than the first. I felt the gates were important, but I didn't (and still don't) really know why. And I can see the loneliness theme, but it wasn't the first thing I noticed while reading.

=SilverInkblot Sep 27, 2012 Hobbyist Writer

The plot I'm trying to convey (in this incarnation) is that a lonely woman sets up this wonderful Halloween treat and no one comes - because she forgot to unlock the gates. I keep getting too wordy in the process of trying to tell the story though.

~DNA-The-Authoress Sep 27, 2012

Oh! Okay. Hmm... I shall have to reread it now.

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The Dying Season II

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