zebrablack

My poems remain explorations of the subconscious erotic They are lunar anamorphic streams of consciousness.

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Challenge

Challenge of the Month III: January

New beginnings, a fresh start. A new chapter in an old story, or a new story altogether. Write about the start of something new. Fiction or non-fiction, poetry or Prose. $100 purse to our favorite entry. Outstanding entries will be shared with our publishing partners.

Inkwellwriter5

I. She wipes the tears from her eyes that never come, and saves them for the rain. Collecting each in a mason jar and promises to set them free one day. She takes her smile from her pocket and paints it on her face. Untucks her heart from the sheets that kept it warm at night, only to place it within a cage of ribs to hold it up right.

II. She pulls her hair up and knots it in a bow, so the breeze won’t misplace her soul. She smiles but it’s no more real than a fairytale that hasn’t been written in her book, for her pen does not write of happily ever afters. Staring at her reflection, her green eyes fight to look alive. Heavy breaths expelled from lungs that don’t seem to work.

III. Carry on little girl, the world is cold. Zip up your jacket and block out the sun. It doesn’t care to lay touch on skin too cold to touch the world. It is at your fingertips, ones you refuse to extend, to grab the moon and pocket more than smiles, girl you could have the stars.

#hope

Inkwellwriter5

Fall

Go ahead my sweet girl & fall in love with everything that kills

#micro #poetry

Inkwellwriter5

Leave me unholy

Still chasing the cedar waters of the pines with ghost, holding hands with memories better left in the woods. Where my soul was once clean & untouched by the crumbling churches and stained glass choices, running from the life of a preachers voice. Sleeping on altars through services, wearing shame as a dress made of the dirtiest linen, lips blood soaked in mercy, never tasted.

Left with handprints on white skin from altar boys who couldn’t resist kissing behind wooden pews, their vile fingers tracing the hem of my skirt, staining my flesh in sin. Staring into the eyes of the devil & daring his intentions because that’s what preachers daughters do. Pressed against the fountain where souls were once washed clean in baptism, now tarnished by dirty hands and missing skirts. Washing my mouth out with the unclean water, promising never to do it again.

We all rebel from the day we are born, cursing our life and assuming we deserve to touch sky with delicate fingertips, yet I have never known nothing more intimate than lying to myself & drenching my salvation in shame, while the good Lord watched. Father always said, I was kissed by the devil, little did he know I was hell bent & marked by the flames. I still taste his bone & ash every time I drink from God’s fountain with empty eyes.

#sins #poetry

Undermeyou in Romance & Erotica

Sempiternal

I didn’t know what to do with my hands. I let them rest in my lap and kept my body turned toward him. He mostly focused on the road while he talked. I let his voice float over me. It stopped my twitching mind. It silenced my inner doubts. It was the self medication I had searched for for as long as I could remember. He focused on the road while I focused on his voice. I stopped thinking of my hands. I stopped thinking of my breath. I drowned in the night air. Eyes closed and heart barely beating. And my left hand all on its own came to rest in his right. And his thumb painted circles in the soft web of skin between my fingers. And his voice painted circles on the soft web of veins beneath my skin. And the night painted it’s circles on the webbing of my lungs. And suddenly everything was incessant. Suddenly I was no longer ephemeral. And suddenly everything was waiting.

Challenge

Challenge of the Week XCIV

Lies and Liars. Perhaps it's a time when two accounts conflicted. Perhaps it's a lie you've told yourself since before you can remember. Write on the themes of lies and liars. Fiction or nonfiction, poetry or Prose.

Shorts & Flash

Chapter 21 of 28

Undermeyou

The Cure for Insomnia

“So, do you think that you’re interested in her? As more than a friend that is...”

I close my eyes for just longer than a blink, but I see years pass by. A handshake, a smile, a car ride in the rain. I see a waterfall, a dark bedroom, and her hands crawling up my thighs. I smell her smoky breath, and I feel her fingers in my hair as she pulls my mouth closer. My chest constricts, and I drop my head into my hands.

“Kayla? Do you need a moment?”

“No. No, I don’t need a moment. Thank you, though. Um. No. I don’t like her. Like that. I uh...I think I might love her? I mean. I have Natalie. I am with Natalie. I love Natalie. No. I’m not interested in Jade. She’s a close friend, but I don’t want more from her. It was just casual. Just fun.”

My therapist is not amused. Her single raised eyebrow makes any further comment unnecessary, so I hold her stare until she caves.

“Kayla. I need you to understand that this only works if you are honest with me but also with yourself. And more than that even. If you aren’t being honest, you and Natalie will never work. You can hold onto her for as long as you want. But you won’t be happy, and neither will she. It’s no surprise that you can’t stay asleep at night. You’ve both already had deeply intimate relationships that you tried to keep a secret from one another. Not to mention that you seem scared to admit that you may have been more happy in this secret relationship.”

I don’t respond. My mind is still racing through footage of Jade and what each moment meant to me. I’m thinking of nights when I held her in cars and beds and on strangers’ couches. Bars and parties. I’m thinking of how she felt like a part of me that I had lost. Of how many times I stayed with her when I should have went home and slept in my own bed. Her eyelashes brushing my neck and her hand in mine. Her soft voice whispering into my skin. I’m thinking about her slight frame. Of when I should have been holding another girl in my arms and how much easier it was to just hold onto Jade instead. How easily she could always convince me to go on adventures. How she actually made life an adventure. I’m holding the moments out in front of me to study.

“I want to back up, Kayla. You said you might love Jade? Do you believe that? Why are you holding on to a relationship with Natalie if you love Jade?”

My head is pounding with thoughts. I throw them up like so much bile poisoning my heart and my mind. I can hear the pressure building inside of me more than I can feel it. It sounds like I am underwater. I squeeze my eyes closed and swallow hard. I swallow Jade, and I forget what she felt like. My face feels hot and tense.

“No. I didn’t mean that. I just meant that she was fun. I had a lot of fun with her. I loved my time with her. I don’t love Jade. I love everything that we did.”

And for a second I almost believe myself. So when she picks me up it’s easy for me to look her in the eye before I get in the car.

“What’s up, babe? Get in.”

“I don’t love you. My hands aren’t yours to hold. And my eyes aren’t yours to hold. And you should have never kissed me. I don’t think you’re beautiful or any of that shit I told you. I’m glad you played along, but I think we both know the fun is over.”

“Kayla. What? Where is this coming from? Who said anything about love? Can you just get in the car?”

“Fuck you, Jade.”

I turn and walk home. I fall asleep holding Natalie. I pretend I don’t feel someone else laying beneath my arms. I pretend I can’t hear someone else’s shallow breathing. I pretend this is home. I pretend I’m not scared. And the lie’s so pretty, I don’t even need to open my eyes the next morning.