sun has returned

however; however

i can’t stay awake

Mark Strand, "Eating Poetry"

~ starry

Niche - an aspec poem

Apparently, I’m not alone.

I showed my friends

my poems

unleashing the deepest whispers of my soul,

my yearning for intimacy, but never sex,

for sensual touch, for nudity and closeness, for even things considered sexual but aren’t sex to me,

and my friends,

they have said,

it resonates with them.

They get it.

And it isn’t something I expected

because nobody ever talks about us.

So here we are.

This one goes out

to the asexuals who want all that intimate depth

but with none of the expectations

of sex.

This one goes out

to all the aromantics who want that intimate depth

but with none of the expectations

of romance.

We’re out there,

and sometimes,

we are beautifully passionate

or quiet and subtle.

Whether it be to hold hands tenderly

or it be to bask in one another’s unclothed glory,

never feel an obligation to do it the way society says is Proper

because it is the allo way.

Disregard it, dear,

throw it to the wind,

and forge the path that works for you,

in all its complexities,

with all your specific wants and needs.

Do not let such things go unspoken and unfulfilled.

Let this world know what you want and expect.

And maybe, you’ll find

you’re really not as alone as you feel.

It turns out, more often than not,

someone feels the exact same way.

writing is kind of torturous why did i have to choose the art most likely to drive you fucking crazy

are there any poems u could recite from memory?

yes there are! ❣️ off the top of my head, i can recite first fig by edna st. vincent millay, wet evening in april by patrick kavanagh, wild geese by mary oliver, won’t you celebrate with me by lucille clifton, summer night by yena sharma purmasir, this be the verse by philip larkin, rain by raymond carver, and asami writes to korra for three years by natalie wee, which is the longest poem i can recite, which i chose as my first ever favorite poem about five years ago, and which still makes me feel as though i’ve lit a small lantern inside my heart to this day

wanna drinka lotta fluids get my calories in tho i hate my job i do it that's my salary sin; and i'm screwin' up the mission every fuck that i give so i used to have ambition now i just try to live. i had my share of trauma startin' young as a child so i stay prepared for drama can't be dumb in the wild, but to fit the smaller spaces thaat i could do me in i split and caged my face: masks in a museum.

🪆would love one featuring Russian thoughts on God! ✝️

SO. I could have sworn that I've posted "Avvakum in Pustozyorsk" on this blog before, but I can't seem to find it so here it is.

(For context, this is written in the voice of a 17th century Russian Orthodox priest and religious dissident (an "Old Believer"). Avvakum was sent to the military outpost of Pustozyorsk where he was imprisoned four fourteen years, then eventually burned at the stake. It uses this historical voice to reflect on the religious persecution of the Soviet era. Also, it's fairly long, so I've highlighted my favorite stanzas.)

Avvakum in Pustozyorsk The walls of my church are the ribs round my heart; it seems life and I are soon bound to part. My cross now rises, traced with two fingers. In Pustozyorsk it blazes; its blaze will linger. I’m glorified everywhere, vilified, branded; I have already become the stuff of legend: I was, people say, full of anger and spite; I suffered, I died for the ancient rite. But this popular verdict is ugly nonsense; I hear and reject the implied censure. A rite is nothing – neither wrong nor right; a rite is a trifle in God’s sight. But they attacked our faith and the ways of the past, in all we’d learned as children, and taken to heart. In their holy garments, in their grand hats, with a cold crucifix in their cold hands, in thrall to a terror clutching their souls, they drag us to jails and herd us to scaffolds. We don’t debate doctrine, of books and their age; we don’t debate virtues of fetters and chains. Our dispute is of freedom, and the right to breathe – about our Lord’s will to bind as he please. The healers of souls chastised our bodies; while they schemed and plotted, we ran to the forests. Despite their decrees, we hurled our words out of the lion’s mouth and into the world. We called for vengeance against their sins along with the Lord; we sang poems and hymns. The words of the Lord were claps of thunder. The Church endures; it will never go under. And I, unyielding, reading the Psalter, was brought to the gates of the Andronikov Monastery. I was young; I endured every pain: hunger, beatings, interrogations. A winged angel shut the eyes of the guard, brought me cabbage soup and a hunk of bread. I crossed the threshold – and I walked free. Embracing my exile, I walked to the East. I held services by the Amur River, where I barely survived the winds and blizzards. They branded my cheeks with brands of frost; by a mountain stream they tore out my nostrils. But the path to the Lord goes from jail to jail; the path to the Lord never changes. And all too few, since Jesus’s days, have proved able to bear God’s all-seeing gaze. Nastasia, Nastasia, do not despair; true joy often wears a garment of tears. Whatever temptations may beat in your heart, whatever torments may rip you apart, walk on in peace through a thousand troubles and fear not the snake that bites at your ankles – though not from Eden has this snake crawled; it is an envoy of evil from Satan’s world. Here, birdsong is unknown; here one learns patience and the wisdom of stone. I have seen no colour except lingonberry in fourteen years spent as a prisoner. But this is not madness, nor a waking dream; it is my soul’s fortress, its will and freedom. And now they are leading me far away and in fetters; my yoke is easy, my burden grows lighter. My track is swept clean dusted with silver; I’m climbing to heaven on wings of fire. Through cold and hunger, through grief and fear, towards God, like a dove, I rise from the pyre. O far-away Russia – I give you my vow to return from the sky, forgiving my foes. May I be reviled, and burned at the stake; may my ashes be cast on the mountain wind. There is no fate sweeter, no better end, than to knock, as ash, at the human heart.

--Varlam Shalamov

TTPD Poetry Week #3

Song: The Outside

The greatest breakups happened last spring

Ask your ex husband and all of his flings

Ask yourself why you're still standing on the outside looking in

I tried to take the road less traveled by

But nothing seems to work the first few times, am I right?

Except for the words and their dwindling mercurial high

A drug that only worked the first few hundred times

The saddest breakups happened last spring

And ever since

I've been to a lot of lonely places

Will you now please let me in?

I want to know how lonely it gets on the inside

I still don't feel seen

@ttpdpoetryweek

the stale end of summer, dripping away, a poem by me - this summer is gold melting in the sun.

a photograph cracked

with age, years glued

to a page opened

occasionally,

i stare back at you

from a place too far

away for clear

remembrance

since i started testosterone in february i have been reading a stanza of andrew marvell’s poem ‘the garden’ every month to track the way my voice has changed. today i finished it :-)

hi! i'm here with another poem. :) this was basically an experimentation with white space and line breaks. i really liked how it came out, ESPECIALLY the structure. so! yeah! sorry the image sizing might be weird? i can't be fucked to really fix it akdsdfjs full poem transcribed below the cut.

"a step by step guide to stopping a panic attack" step one: Remember that this will not last forever. step two: Take deep breaths my lungs wheeze and shudder like a car that won’t start like they’ve been emptied of the gasoline and of the breath and of the will to keep functioning and on the phone my mom asks have you tried controlled breathing i say mom i don’t know what control feels like anymore step three: Find a peaceful spot once i read online that panic attacks can be stifled with distraction and to put ice on the inside of your wrist to confuse your brain but i forgot to fill the ice cube tray three days ago i attempt solace on the bathroom floor with fingers digging into grout and bars of soap and consider sitting in the shower so i can at least be clean step four: Smell some lavender my body is stubborn allergic to things like fresh-cut-grass or scented bath soap like arms wrapped around diaphragm squeezing like hot tea and hemp oil and body scans like blankets like hand holding or soft melody allergic to things like lavender step five: Tell someone your mom or your partner or your father or your roommate or your best friend or your therapist that says sounds like you need to verbalize so it’s off to talk to the neighbor downstairs or the dog in the park outside or the dog’s owner who asks if you need them to call someone such as an ambulance or the bottle of ibuprofen or your failing kidneys or your mother again even though it’s only been 48 hours since the last call or the hotline that will ask if you’ve tried just talking it out step six: Repeat a mantra remember this will not last forever this will not last forever this will not last forever this will not last forever this will not this will

The Two-Headed Calf

Tomorrow when the farm boys find this freak of nature, they will wrap his body in newspaper and carry him to the museum.

But tonight he is alive and in the north field with his mother. It is a perfect summer evening: the moon rising over the orchard, the wind in the grass. And as he stares into the sky, there are twice as many stars as usual.

Laura Gilpin

I don’t know if I just haven’t found the right poetry yet, if I’m engaging with it wrong, or if poetry just isn’t for me, but man I wish I understood and connected with poetry on the level the rest of y’all seem to it looks nice