by Ainne Frances dela Cruz
In dark girls I see your skin. The lines of veins delicately whispering on the underside of your arms. The graceful motion of your fingers, how you always seemed on air, entrapped with wings; you who only had to rise to fly.
I, in another time, I see you. Dark of night, and dead weights, as everything must be to your ancient body. Yet, I love this of you. Even the headiness of the scent of entrails rushing after you, slapping on my hair, and I am left, matted and bloodied. And my heart left matted and bloodied.
I see now, you wanted to eat my heart. Dark blood pulsing through arteries. Transparency? Doesn’t my skin scream my love? Yes, my heart is yours. You only had to ask.
Do you remember Chinese water torture? One drop a minute to a prisoner would seem like an eternity of waiting for the deluge. And this, your wings rushing through light, beating through my ears like bats, high-pitched, tortures me. Wanting to get through your skin, carried away on your nails. Wanting to be you, dark as flight, as flight is, to one land-bound.
I am bound to one who flits from transparency, to a land opaque, where feelings must darken, and become murky. From water to blood, from oxygen to air so thin and pure, I have trouble breathing. But this is what we come to in the end, isn’t it? You have clutched me so tightly that I can let go and fall, but always find myself in your talons. The nails curved inwardly, my stomach heaves.
To become one, to be so close that the skin you hold is my skin, that when I look through the dark, I can see you. To hold me as if I was in you, your skin, your blood, my blood, one. This is what you do best, isn’t it? Touch things about to vanish. In your eyes I see myself. Will you see me always this way? Lips stained with your blood, fingers gripping your wings.
Do you want to fly? you asked. I nodded. Then close your eyes. The first bite, the first tear at my skin does feel like weightlessness. Levitation, blood escaping from me, finally free, skin to skin, and body to body. No longer heavy. You carried me forever. You don’t have to do so now.
I can fly.
Paper Monster Press Dream Pop Issue
Copyright ©:
2011
A few random poems:
- Afridi Love
- Betrayal poem – Alice Notley
- To George Felton Mathew poem – John Keats poems
- The Cottage Hospital poem – John Betjeman poems
- Яков Полонский – Поэт и гражданин, он призван был учить
- Aubade by William Shakespeare
- Hug O’War by Shel Silverstein
- A Sonnet Occasioned by the Bad Weather Which Hindered the Sports at New-Market in January, 1616 by William Drummond
- Paralipomemnon
- Robert Burns: On James Grieve, Laird Of Boghead, Tarbolton :
- Less Than The Cloud To The Wind by Sara Teasdale
- Lesson In Grammar by Vernon Scannell
- The Mysterious Cat by Vachel Lindsay
- On The Move ‘Man, You Gotta Go. by Thom Gunn
- Олег Бундур – Силачи
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- English Poetry. Philip James Bailey. Festus – 41. Филип Джеймс Бэйли.
- English Poetry. Philip James Bailey. Festus – 44. Филип Джеймс Бэйли.
- English Poetry. Ella Wheeler Wilcox. The Blasphemy of Guns. Элла Уилкокс.
- English Poetry. Algernon Charles Swinburne. The Triumph of Time. Алджернон Чарльз Суинбёрн.
- English Poetry. William Barnes. Second Collection. The Heäre. Уильям Барнс.
- English Poetry. Isaac Watts. Hymn 2. Исаак Уоттс.
- English Poetry. Henry Livingston. To the Memory of Sarah Livingston. Генри Ливингстон.
- English Poetry. Edna St. Vincent Millay. Assault. Эдна Сент-Винсент Миллей.
- English Poetry. Lucy Maud Montgomery. As the Heart Hopes. Люси Мод Монтгомери.
- English Poetry. Rupert Chawner Brooke. In Examination. Руперт Брук.
- English Poetry. Percy Bysshe Shelley. Satan Broken Loose. Перси Биши Шелли. Тень Ада
- English Poetry. David Herbert Lawrence. Whales Weep Not!. Дэвид Герберт Лоуренс.
- English Poetry. Thomas Aird. The Devil’s Dream on Mount Aksbeck. Томас Эрд.
- English Poetry. George Eliot. How Lisa Loved the King. Джордж Элиот.
- English Poetry. Charles Lockhart. Epistle to a Friend, with a Copy of Burns’s Letters. Чарльз Локкарт. Послание другу при возвращении ему томиков стихов Бернса
- English Poetry. Charles Wesley. Hark! A Voice Divides the Sky. Чарльз Уэсли.
- English Poetry. Robert William Service. My Room. Роберт Уильям Сервис.
- English Poetry. John Townsend Trowbridge. Midwinter. Джон Таунсенд Троубридж.
- English Poetry. Robert William Service. Dark Glasses. Роберт Уильям Сервис.
- English Poetry. Robert William Service. Dark Glasses. Роберт Уильям Сервис.
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works