YI.wordswrites

Day 6: Time

Not necessarily a time poem but I think it counts.

Text:

To The Lost Times With My Mother
Burning bright, the light’s embrace,
a gentle, warm, and shining face –
oh, how sweet your voice is made
out to be, through the phone
or when I go back home.

I miss the busy mornings –
when you weren’t there,
and the troubled nights
where nightmares flare.
I’d always hold your hand right there.

Soft and fluffy to the touch
was the blanket right out the laundry,
your gift, I won’t let go of,

for you loved me when
the world had said
my existence was a sin,
and you still love me
to this day. Despite the fact
I ran away.

Day 5: Crushed

A continuation on the one from yesterday kind of.. not a huge fan of how this one turned out but I gotta post it anyway.

Text:
Lead Astray

My dreams have been crushed,
there’s no world beyond –
there’s simply a wall
that I didn’t build, nor wished for.

Crushed like a childhood toy,
like a sandcastle crumbling
overnight, like seaside breeze
waiting to be spent – a trap.

A moment in a mirror
forever locked in time,
like the cries of a reflection
begging to be let outside.

Pray that our walls
don’t turn into lies.
Hope that our stars
don’t start burning too bright.

Day 4: strange behavior

I don’t know why the kitchen out of all places seemed to be what I associated strange behavior with…

Text:
Haunted house?

The kitchen’s looking strange today;
The toaster’s on the floor,
The sink is on and flowing upside down,
The sun is out yet the lights won’t turn off.

I cannot see inside the washing machine,
The twisting void that swirls without me
Pressing any buttons, and the TV
That projects onto the portraits,

The windows looking inwards
act as mirrors. So now I wonder –
where will my real mirror lead?

Day 3: Limbs

This prompt didn’t give me much to be honest…

Text:
What it takes to mean something:

1. A couple extra limbs.
2. A city made of blood.
3. A couple sleepless nights.
4. A dozen empty lines.
5. An extra pair of eyes.
6. Another screen alight

And there you go -
You’ve got yourself a soul,
a shell of one but what’s the difference?
And if it proves to you
too difficult to act as if it’s you,
just count all of the steps down,
and read the manual aloud.

Day 2: A Separation

This is about the war..

Text (not flipped):

/ A Separation /

Constant bombing /
Keep your head up /
Don’t read the news /
Don’t go outside /
Don’t fret too much /
Just breathe and duck /
It’ll all end soon /

/ A Separation /

A war without intention /
A miscommunication /
Human degradation /
A news station’s resignation /
Cultural deforestation /
Structural indoctrination /
A border’s misinterpretation /

Day 1: when I opened my eyes

I saw the world was ending. Because it kind of always is.

Text:

Eclipse

Sunlight’s perched on heaven’s gate -
the sky’s heart set aflame.
Now darkness swallows up the world
like a heavy dream again.

The night remains forever wasteful.
Endless. Where clouds seep through
a broken sky, where endless questions
fill my mind -

My? But where am I in all of this?

In my tiny little room where I get to sit,
watch it all unfold - wait for it to end.
For when the sun comes back -
When the sun comes back..

I’m now too scared to go outside.
From here, through the window’s cracks
I hear the rose’s hymn, their desperate plea,
the winds’ roar, all in sync -

Darkness sleeps
where sunlight used to lay.
The Eclipse is not going away.

Escapril starts tomorrow!!

A poem about a fire (that happened in the sky or just inside a house)

Text:

Flaming Rain

Embers dance within the crackling of flames
I am home, back to how I was before –
Next to the fire pit, not drowning in the floor.
It’s warm, soft, hiding in between these walls.
That’s just the ceiling. The sky is no more.
All I’ll do is sit and watch the fire spread.
Lighting up the wooden planks, the bed,
Then my only hope, the door, the dried up grass,
The shed, the fence, and then the stars, then my head.
It started from inside the house, then spread.
The sky, I see it now, finally, as it rains down,
Washed away in ashes, rising up,
yet I do not care to look.
I knew right then and there –
The world I’d have to leave behind

Would only blankly stare.

Hii! Sorry I haven’t posted in awhile but I have been redrafting a bunch of poems for my Creative Writing project and I really feel like some of the prompts prompted some very interesting ideas, but I didn’t have the time to fully explore them since I had to move to the next poem right away.

A lot of the poems were quick first drafts and I definitely felt like I could improve on them if I were to work on them some more so here is a rewrite of the poem ‘Mediator’ from Day 2 of Escapril.

Text:
“Mediator

I walk the thin line between
Reality and fiction, down that path,
A directionless performance
Of damasked dreams; the other two -

One bathing in sunlight,
One greeting the moon -
I stare at the world mirrored in
The reflection in between the two.

A reflection of a blindsided wish
To cling to prosperity.
Or a turn taken in the wrong direction
Creating disparity

Between what lies in the exact middle;
One who never left anything forgotten.
A mirror is only a memoir of what could be
And could have been; only not what is.

Time and space separates us all
As we each go down our own roads
One is a friend, one is an enemy, the third
Is me wishing we went down the one
In between.”

Day: wait Escapril is over...hmm, anyway, here’s a little poem about poets.

Now that Escapril is over I think I’ll take a bit of a break from posting every single day, but will still try to post every now and again until I *inevitably* pick another daily challenge because I think it was very helpful for me to just focus on putting something out there without worrying about how good it is or obsessing over how imperfect and unfinished it was.

Text:
“A Poet

I used to think it was some old man
wearing a suit - a black and white
photo in a history book, but no,

it seems to be some letters
with sprinkled dream dust over
a drawn-out voice message later
embedded into the clicking sound
of flashing letters on a screen -

I did not ask for this -
to be obliterated by your vulnerability,
only to have it numb the sounds of your
overwhelming sense of self - I did not.

At least those old poets didn’t make me
feel like there was something wrong with me
for wanting to put a full stop instead of an empty space”

Day 30: even now, after everything?

This is Escapril, the poem.
A poem made out of every other poem I’ve written this month.

It’s chaotic and strange and abstract and full of random ideas not fully fleshed out, but at least it’s here. The whole point was to capture a slice of every other poem and put them side to side in one short little story.

Escapril has been amazing and I want to say thank you to everyone who has been a part of it ❤️

Text:
“Even now, after everything?

All the birds now sing your name,
like the cracks in broken mirrors
do the days feel, like the pieces of
the window that won’t make me bleed
because now they’re covered in snow.

Breath turning into ice, piercing
my chest, like an endless echo of
the voice that once was dear -
seeps from my mouth, wave
after wave, wrapped inside a
spider web made out of grains
of sand, wings made out of plastic
wraps - water only washes us ashore.

But a flood of wild dogs runs across
the street, the bakery, in a
roundabout of lost souls, they
roam, chewing on unbreakable
wishbones - I wish I’d taken those
with me...on the train to paradise -
I could have had something better
to do than simply wait for the world -
to churn into action - shine in ruby red.

Sitting in the passenger seat, I dream of
reflections of my own imagination inside
the endless void of the horizon, I make
a note of every bird that’s flown by,
but I hear whispers coming from street
lights: they flash in red, it simply wasn’t
meant to be - I gesture to make a turn
and so the world unravels right in front of
me, watching as we dive into the caves of
My Secret Hideaway.

An image of a feather on top a pile
of snow is what I’ve drawn alongside
the photo of a black butterfly. I wonder
how good of a play all of this could make...
as I am driven farther down, locked inside
an image of this world that I have found.”

Day 29: goodbye

This one is about saying goodbye to your home. Even when you leave home for a little while there’s a certain comfort in the fact you’ll be back one day, but there’s also a kind of worry that the only thing you’ll do for sure when you do come is leave. But I guess some parts always stay in exactly one old place, buried or not.

Can’t believe Escapril is almost over like??

Text:
“Treasure Chest

Pack your bags and books,
tear down the tapestry
of memories in your
childhood room -
put them in one of
the chests in the back
of your mind, lock them tight.

Seal them up with duct tape or
bandaids and make sure they
are flammable and waterproof
or dig them up a small grave
because beauty sprouts from
rain, but so does the pain from
throwing all of it away and now,
say goodbye to everyone, for they
are not allowed to see the treasures
in the gaps of your bursting chest,
but you will come back one day
to see yourself packing up again.”

Day 28: extreme dissonance

So the idea of dissonance stated of with “harmony” and “singing” because that’s one of the things it refers to, but then it made me think of discord and so from that the “The Apple of Discord” and now I don’t know if I’ve written about a chaotic day in the Roman Coliseum or a about a bunch of kids who don’t take theater seriously...anyway, I also played around with these “-“ and tried to make it so that you can read it only from one side and it tells a certain story, read from the other from another point of view or read both at the same time for extreme chaos (or should I say dissonance...) I didn’t have enough time to fully think it through, but for now this should do.

Text: (excuse the formatting...)
“Discord

In strife, we sing - harmonies, in sync,
at the class theater - masking our interior,
rushing by the front door - in shambles,
its golden handle - for us to ramble on
speaking over and - beyond our pity trifles
louder to make a stand - in thoughts recycled
against the ones who - set us free, but with no ruler
made us dress like Romans - of the coliseums
do not listen when we - in these hallways roam or
ask if apples are okay - you wanted them to be,
to throw instead of - including gold, discord and
red...tomatoes - treachery, for beauty only gives us
- End of scene.”

Day 27: ink

So you know those abstract looking pictures of splashed ink that are used in psychological tests? Yeah I was thinking of those and how the first one that came to mind was the one that resembles a butterfly and so I wrote this poem about those coming to life after we draw them ourselves.

It’s (supposed to be) about how in an attempt to give life to our own creations we might end up doing things that others would call us mad because of (and we really are mad...), but at the end it doesn’t matter how badly it went, we still get to call them “ours”.

Text:
“Inkblot

My feather’s grip outlines the insides.
My finger’s tip fills in the drawn lines.
My own creation occupies the space
Of the air it dried in, the page it left.

Dysfunctional carriers of spring
flap their wings in blotches of ink,
I tried to set them free, thinking their
darkness shouldn’t be bound to eternity

and yet I tried my best to blend
the black and red without lament,
but to no avail, our king was still frail,
withering, in a silent, fleshless wail.

Only one was left alive, but I did not
send all of them to die...in my attempt
to give them life, to give them breath,
I only let the air make their inkblots shred.

They called me crazy.
They called me mad.
but I called him mine:

My own king butterfly”

Day 26: nothing more beautiful

Beauty comes in so many forms that sometimes we don’t see the ones meant for us...or something. anyway, nature poem that may or may be about nature!

Text:
“Softly, gently

I could go and on about the luscious
summer fields, the touch of sunlight,
blowing dandelions in the cold wind,
soft clouds descending in unending
waves of sweeping gales on sleeping
armies of grass soldiers holding their
blades in honor of their love for their
Motherland - I stand with them. Stare
at the infinite horizon, the dark depths
disposing of unrequited burning desire
in washed away pots of wisdom of that
which wasn’t meant to be - softly, gently,
this is how a life is taken, summer dreams
of misguided beauty in a cold embrace - dying.

There’s nothing more beautiful...
than feathers falling on fresh snow.”

Day 25: pareidolia

Okay definitions first: a mental phenomenon that makes us see faces and other objects in completely unrelated settings.

The pareidolia in this one lies in the seeing of the human marble statues that may not be what they’re shown to be...maybe the statues are just something that’s familiar, something more human, but is that just because they’re art?

Text:
“Secret Hideaway

In a corner of the woods, tucked
behind small vines and roots
hides a lonely pond in turquoise
guarded by untrodden paths.

No more shall it’s serenity
be left undisturbed, two statues
have now risen up, one of man
and one of his beloved counterpart.

They wear their crowns of green,
their hands reach out across
one from the middle of pond
the other back to where it belongs.

I step closer next to where their eyes meet.
Her marble touch cries out to me
“Please, save me from this misery...”
He sits and reads silently...

Their roots - now untangling.”

Day 24: crossroads

Maybe that road that you didn’t go down would’ve left you in the exact same place after it lead you to another road...or maybe all roads lead to the same destination just at different speeds who am I to know?

Text:
“*not meant to be
You think that with every step,
entire worlds have slipped through
the cracks between your fingers,
forever lost to indecisiveness

and doubtfully replaced by complacency
but the truth is - they have. your arms are
now painted in potential for new signs
to misread and memories to misplace

for these two roads diverge into one
after they join hands in the intersection
between leaps of faith and failures and
the roundabout of missed* opportunities

until it all comes back
around
again”

Day 23: clock

This is me doing my best “Whisper of the Heart” retelling and if you haven’t watched that movie then what are you doing??? Ehm, I meant to say that it’s about two lovers stuck inside a clock and they can only meet when it hits 12, but the prince comes looking for his princess every single hour without hesitation.

Text: (a bit out of form because Instagram formatting but still)
“Whispers of The Clock

Two hands reach out/but never meet in time

one rules the day/the other rules the night

she sleeps and dreams/he moans and weeps

comes back whenever/she could possibly be seen

but to no avail/she hides behind her wooden veil

sounds of ticking arms/far apart bind them to one

he comes again yet/she is still sleeping in her gown

he persists gallantly/his undying love he pleads

but still retreats behind/the hour’s patient arms

until the light of dusk/showers that foreboding arm

every single night when bells/ring two arms about to meet

he sings her favorite lullaby/she comes out to say goodbye “

Day 22: in the distance, a small shape

This poem is basically me just writing down all the fancy space words I could think of. It also plays around with the idea of things that look small from where we see them, but are actually epic galactic warfares up close. Only this one time will I say the sky is boring...

Text:
“In the distance, a small black hole

A purple vortex slowly eats away
at bits and pieces of the night sky.

A Hydra with black holes as teeth
- heart of darkness and filled with
madness, consuming sparkling stars,
fighting congregations of constellations -
a single singularity bound to eternity,
comet spears of piercing light
try to satiate its planet-ridden
prismatic rays in purple blaze.

I never understood why
people look up to the sky -
oblivious to oblivion and its
endless, pointless matters.”

Day 21: glitch

Glitch gave me some ideas I didn’t know what to do with so instead of technology I just wrote about what it would feel like to live out a glitch and act with no remorse...maybe feeling nothing at all makes everything feel the exact the same way. Not sure about the title, but for now it’s gonna be like this.

Text:
“I killed something I shouldn’t have

The birds sing while I lay -
in warm, inviting summer rays,
counting down until the day
I get to see them all again

- felt the same.

Last time I felt what it was like -
to burn, I turned petals into embers,
houses into shambles, letters...
into paper anvils, hammering away

at the hands that let them stay -
In motionlessness, I decay,
my train of thought crashed
into an burned out, empty day.

I killed something I shouldn’t have -
The birds sing while I lay
on a withered flower field
with a carcass in my hands

- felt the same.”

Day 20: stranger than fiction

Reminiscing about daydreaming in class...isn’t it strange that fictional worlds exist in our own separate realities? This is veeeery experimental, but the idea has some potential.

Text:
“Imagination

The ground’s been lit afire
and so have I, but I fly higher
in the deep blue skies that I despise
I close my eyes and

I am getting out of bed,
repeating the phrase inside my head:
“1973 was the year he was pronounced dead.
1973 was the year he was pronounced dead.”
Count your notes...In the car’s windows
I see -

visions of rivers, forests and burning trees,
hear crackling embers and sounds of footsteps,
heroes that scream “pull back evil demon,
we are the kings, your reign now ends” and

I hear the bell ring and am getting out my pen
and paper; remember yesterday’s fantastic
presentation, circle or cross, breathe, and look down
to the

Highest Mountains, I am drifting off again.”

Day 19: mirror

Reflections on reflections of reflections of the past...wonder how badly that could go? Or is it just me being mad at myself?

Text:
“Reflections

Is your reflection really alive?
Or is just a puppet to your eyes?
Does it whisper back to you
Or does it listen without a clue?

With contact lenses that seem to be made
out of glass that lets you see your past
self - endless repentance of mindless
frustrations with no explanation...

Love comes with strings attached
to pieces of broken glass after
spending too much time staring
at a reality shattered by your hand.”

Day 18: nightmare

So...nightmare reminded me of shadows and here’s a short poem about two dancers in the shadows.

Text:
“A dream on stage

Shadows dance in masked embrace
Behind a curtain on a rose-swept stage.
They laugh and cry, they fly and die
dramatically falling into place,

into each other’s arms and back again
smiling for the days that have waned
but their shadows only tell the tale
of two lost souls, dancing till they’re frail.”

Day 17: power

Power to the people... or to the ones that as such. What would power man of he was a machine? I guess the idea from yesterday of a perfect mechanical city didn’t go away and so now here’s this!

Text:
“Powered by your past

Steam clouding the skies -
churning clock towers springing into life,
the city’s call rings inside your ears -
yearning to remake you.

The body of a man, once awake -
dreams of sleep - and rainy days,
skies that darken - instead of ones that shine,
there is no balance - in perfect lives.

He dreams of living things - that take
from nature - to keep themselves alive,
not powered by the thought - of a future,
pending - sent, received and never-ending.

He dreams of waters - ones that don’t rust,
permeating aquamarine - that touches
your skin - not ingrained in bursting seams
of oily necklace strings - holes in your reality.

Who will wake you up -
when your mother’s dead? - when you refuse
to budge to power - not let yourself be devoured
by the city you once inspired.”

Day 16: bird of paradise

Paradise could potentially be a world manufactured to be perfect and that’s how the birth of a steampunk bird came to be...I guess this one was a bit random, but it was fun to write.

Text:
‘Bird of paradise
Feathers made out of metal -
heart that pumps oil -
eyes made of out of glass -
thoughts in springing coil.

A perfect creature - in a perfect world,
that of manufactured boiling passion -
a mailman that doesn’t ask how your day went.
Wearing its heart on a necklace...

It carries the hope of those -
whose making it consumed,
for permanent power is pointless
without someone to rule

over this living, breathing -
City of Jewels.

Day 15: plane/train/automobile

I decided to take us on a train ride...

Text:
“Train ride home

At the dawn of dusk, I wait to be carried away,
the muffled sound of footsteps makes my heart
race, thinking I’m on the wrong train, yet
it hasn’t rained since yesterday and I’d brought
my hopes up for a scene to relive. I guess that
will have to wait for me to get back into my head.
I remember how you used to fall asleep
on my shoulder, our hands intertwined.
Up until then, fear was the only thing that
would make me forget how to breathe. But I learned
not to be afraid of losing things I never had.
I wonder if the reflection in the window
of my seat judges me more than I do him.”

Day 14: wishbone

I wish that’s never going to come true...nothing new.

Text:
‘Wishbone

Me and I sit at the opposite ends
of the spectrum, between hope
and hopelessness, like two sides
of the same dream with one
not meant to be. We push and pull,
yet the wishbone in front of us
never breaks, we are stuck
in between a rock and a new space.
We are stuck staring at each other,
wondering who’s the bigger fool.
For I wouldn’t know if facing yourself
would be difficult or if I was just used to it.
Used to being stuck in never ending
exhilaration of fighting off heart-piercing
chest vibrations in an effort to win the war
I lead with the part of me I never wished to be.
I never thought I’d want to break so bad before...’

Day 13: after the afterlife

Comes class with death!

Text:
“Teacher’s pet

You reap what you sow
yet I only reap gold stars
from sowed hate in
death’s beloved name.
A sharpener, a blank page,
and for ink I was taught to use
a fresh soul or a classmate.
Only one will come undone
and learn to roam the city
I’m which they were born
all alone while the rest
will have to make the trip
to their new home through
the roundabout and out
the the womb till they find
their way back all too soon.
Your life never truly ends,
so don’t worry about wasting it.
You will be what gets me
to be the teacher’s favorite.’

Day 12: comfortable

The past is always more comfortable when you’re cold...

Text:
“Mosquito bite frostbite
My room has been snowed in and so have I.
I stay underneath old blankets all day and
instead of opening my eyes, I turn the other way,

dancing in the hurricanes of
pastel colored autumn leaves,
still wrapped in cotton sheets,

reminiscing about the days when
I didn’t care if I was cold and would
slip away every single summer day.

There was no better feeling than
playing tag in the streets, even hide and seek,
running around till our legs would give out,
scratching mosquito bites all the time
and the taste of freshly baked buttered bread
from the first batch at 9PM.

I miss the days when all it took
was comfort for us to be content.”

Day 11: eureka!

I wanted to portray a sort of ‘negative’ eureka moment and so here’s another prose-poem about dogs not always being adorable.

Text:
“Dogs never were man’s best friend...
On a windy summer night, the sound of your own footsteps makes you feel uneasy just like the sky with no stars. People may call the streets lonely but you like the lack of company sometimes, it’s peaceful. You decided to take off your headphones for a change, maybe the sounds of nature would be more comforting. But no, they certainly aren’t, there’s only aggressive barking in the distance and rattling trees clumsily bumping into each other. The dogs were closer than you thought and they are now free from their leashes. They’ve been running around the street you chose to walk on. They keep barking and barking and barking until you realize they do every time you stop to catch your breath. Their howls were less terrifying when they were directed at the moon. You will simply walk away slowly...”

Day 10: i’m worried about her

I’m worried about...the rest of the story and how it will be told...

Text:
“The girl who put the sirens to shame
I’m worried about her
She was washed ashore
when left to drown.

She sang her song even
when no one else was around.

She protected life with dedication
yet reveled in her own damnation.

She knew she needed a new foundation
despite her hatred of newfound revelations.

I’m worried about the world she is about to
flood with the beauty of her mind.”

Day 9: paradox

So...there is the paradox of how even if we chase something (like freedom) that is way outside our grasp, if we somehow manage to get to, it will only leave us with another thing to chase after we get it...Or something I don’t know, I’m not a philosopher I just write big words about wings and humanity.

Text:
“Jacket

Given too much freedom,
I will make the sky all mine.

I will use the shades of the night’s shroud
to paint my wings opposite of what I want.
They give me the warmth of seasons forgotten
and free my mind from fears of falling.

I will still keep my hands in my pockets...

I will be the first man with wings
who never learned how to fly.

I will splash some stardust on their insides,
make sure there are no spots left behind,
unlike that time when everyone I knew left me
alone, finally free of the intricacies of humanity.
..I will let them stay unbuttoned.

I will finally be something
more than just free.”