Reflection Poems
Something About The Waves
by Nancy Nile
It was something about the waves
Rising strong and tall
Breaking soft and small
A sense of calm my body craves
It was something about the reflection
A distorted being holding me captive
A version of me that speaks in cursive
It’s easy to forget the mirror too is broken
......
My Murder Confession
by Melvyn Kairupan
In a haze, I stumble,
tripping over my own feet,
dragging my breath through a hill drowned in fog.
Cold. Fucking cold.
Solitude chewing through my skin,
biting into my bones.
And then—
you.
......
Songs For My Dark Mother: Translations from Shakta Poetry 2011
by Rudra Kinshuk
Songs For My Dark Mother: Translations from Shakta Poetry 2011
1.
Repose faith in Kali, why so anxious?
The delusive night being over, the dawn blooms.
The sun rises to dispel pall of darkness,
regards to Lord Shiva
......
Before I Finish Counting My Ceiling
by Fidelis Peter Olowu
Today, the first of a brand-new month,
Yet our pockets echo emptiness -
Our due wages lost
In the fog of bureaucratic forgetfulness.
I confess: I am bombastically bamboozled,
By this chronological altitude
Where salaries take sabbaticals
While sweat still glistens on honest brows.
This devilish delay
Be-devils the hoi polloi,
......
Ode to "Aquaphor"
by Callie Hayes
Flashback
to when we were nine
His guts
really hated mine
I was new
He didn't even know me
I didn't know
why he felt so strongly
......
Morning clouds
by Jupiters Angel
I do not know
What I can not think.
I do not see
an excuse to be.
I can hear
avoid to fear.
I can not walk
Shadows to stalk.
I can not talk
unrequired words seem to squawk
......
Aftermath
by Aditi Hayaran
I've tried everything, still you nag,
Stressing me with every conversation you drag.
Again and again, every day,
Anticipating the words before you even say.
I tried ignorance, explained, sometimes yelled,
Yet again failing to do so as my eyes welled.
Enough yelling, I don't even want to cry,
Enough calm from me, now I'll reply.
Here they were, the words I shot,
......
backward-facing carriage
by Rikske Kessner
"Backward Carriage, Early Draft of a Life"
The train shudders
through a corridor of fields,
windows flicking past barns, pylons,
a rusted ute half‑sunk in grass.
I sit face against the direction of travel,
watching the day unspool behind me,
......
what’s been holding you?
by Rikske Kessner
“ what's been holding you?”
Let the body speaks first.
Not in grand declarations —
just a slow drag across the shoulders
after too many hours upright,
the way a tightening throat
swallows when you've more days
than you meant to,
......
The Unsent Message That Learned My Name
by Oscar Auliq-Ice
It was nothing,
that is the cruelty of it—
nothing that should have grown teeth
and learned how to bite from the inside.
A moment so ordinary
it would not have been remembered
if memory were a fair judge
and not a loyal conspirator.
......
