Submissions by toniscales (Lost Girl)
POEMS AND SHORT STORIES
Poet Introduction
I am very critical of my own work but I tend to love intensely, and writing is an emotional release and catharsis I can't seem to resist.
Kiss Me Again
(I'm going to start posting a series of rhyming poems I wrote accompanied to some digital art, hoping to do so in the vein of Victorian ladies' magazines, something like a dark Kate Greenaway for women. They're cheesy as hell but I hope you like them.)
It is only your hands I want on me,
your sweet breath at my ear.
I need you forever and ever, my love,
your soft whispers I ache to hear.
The hour grows dark, the shadows stir.
I need you close and near.
But you are gone so far away;
I die without you here.
The table is set for us...
It is only your hands I want on me,
your sweet breath at my ear.
I need you forever and ever, my love,
your soft whispers I ache to hear.
The hour grows dark, the shadows stir.
I need you close and near.
But you are gone so far away;
I die without you here.
The table is set for us...
702 reads
5 Comments
This Final Moment
(written for HadesRising's "Apocalyptic Doom" competition)
hold my hand
as we watch
that glorious, hungry comet
hurtling towards us
together
arched
over each other's bodies
like coiled snakes
on a spit
trees sizzle
in the distance
as we shall sizzle
come sunrise
touch me
it is not
the astral heat
that warms my skin
but the fever
you inflame
within me
kiss me
taste the red sweetness
of my mouth
as that crimson bloom
lights up the sky
my love...
hold my hand
as we watch
that glorious, hungry comet
hurtling towards us
together
arched
over each other's bodies
like coiled snakes
on a spit
trees sizzle
in the distance
as we shall sizzle
come sunrise
touch me
it is not
the astral heat
that warms my skin
but the fever
you inflame
within me
kiss me
taste the red sweetness
of my mouth
as that crimson bloom
lights up the sky
my love...
610 reads
3 Comments
Identity
(written for Romantic_Head's "I for Identity" competition)
alone at a wrought iron table
this ache to die
painted poles stuck in concrete
like a giant's cigarettes
hungering for a man
with haunted eyes
waste basket
the giant's stone cup
burning the flesh with a cigarette
questioning the destiny of sadness
the diagnosis of a soul
this thing inside
bubbling up in the throat
upon beholding perfect beauty
passion that can’t contain itself
ghostly tentacles of yearning
...
alone at a wrought iron table
this ache to die
painted poles stuck in concrete
like a giant's cigarettes
hungering for a man
with haunted eyes
waste basket
the giant's stone cup
burning the flesh with a cigarette
questioning the destiny of sadness
the diagnosis of a soul
this thing inside
bubbling up in the throat
upon beholding perfect beauty
passion that can’t contain itself
ghostly tentacles of yearning
...
530 reads
2 Comments
Leandra
Sweating fever and Chantilly, I'm all
haunted breath, livid with the sweet
agitation of corsets. The way night
spreads its skirt of blackness. Kiss me
and I’ll taste of broken glass and dirty
windows. My dress so pink and whorled
it looks like a baby's ear. Our dreams
grow riddled with thimbles. With tiny
violins. Darling, I suffer from the most
vertiginous of echoes. Note the softness
of light, the biology of incandescent
things. Even she smells of sleeping
sickness, museums of absinthe.
Understandably there are moans, sighs, ...
haunted breath, livid with the sweet
agitation of corsets. The way night
spreads its skirt of blackness. Kiss me
and I’ll taste of broken glass and dirty
windows. My dress so pink and whorled
it looks like a baby's ear. Our dreams
grow riddled with thimbles. With tiny
violins. Darling, I suffer from the most
vertiginous of echoes. Note the softness
of light, the biology of incandescent
things. Even she smells of sleeping
sickness, museums of absinthe.
Understandably there are moans, sighs, ...
660 reads
7 Comments
Francesca
for Francesca Woodman
One day the neighbors abandoned
all the windows, swallowing shoes,
fingers, and I didn’t dream.
The seamen with leather faces
pull women’s bodies from shore,
my mother’s waxen head floating
like an eye. That beautiful
suffocation. I am forever chasing
the woman in the wallpaper,
aching to brush her gray, knotted
hair. In my jeans pockets errant
objects rattle. Black-room
ballerinas, dirty girls. Puppet
girls. Butter knives and broken
light bulbs. They form poltergeists
and scream at the...
One day the neighbors abandoned
all the windows, swallowing shoes,
fingers, and I didn’t dream.
The seamen with leather faces
pull women’s bodies from shore,
my mother’s waxen head floating
like an eye. That beautiful
suffocation. I am forever chasing
the woman in the wallpaper,
aching to brush her gray, knotted
hair. In my jeans pockets errant
objects rattle. Black-room
ballerinas, dirty girls. Puppet
girls. Butter knives and broken
light bulbs. They form poltergeists
and scream at the...
696 reads
5 Comments
Belinda
The library is an obsolete skeleton.
All gothic portraits and haunted
quilts. I say to the librarian
in her tight skirt, No, not romance,
not that pain. I’ve been smoking
a whole pack of cloves in a night.
Crying in the planetarium where
we traverse that black, beautiful
emptiness. How the word home
tastes like the red glow of VACANCY.
I’ll paint my mouth thin as a music
box dancer’s. Rename the constellations,
all the poisons while my yellow dress
slides to my feet. You wouldn’t believe
the sound it makes. 2:01 a.m. and ...
All gothic portraits and haunted
quilts. I say to the librarian
in her tight skirt, No, not romance,
not that pain. I’ve been smoking
a whole pack of cloves in a night.
Crying in the planetarium where
we traverse that black, beautiful
emptiness. How the word home
tastes like the red glow of VACANCY.
I’ll paint my mouth thin as a music
box dancer’s. Rename the constellations,
all the poisons while my yellow dress
slides to my feet. You wouldn’t believe
the sound it makes. 2:01 a.m. and ...
791 reads
6 Comments
Raven
This is a diagram of a girl,
lick of tongues, bones, hyacinths.
A seduction of lace and balconies.
So easy to be lost in the violent
patchwork of her thoughts.
The haunting curve of his mouth
at her ear. She hangs above him
on her scarlet trapeze, cardinal
as an ibis. Red as sin. You lure
me with suicide and pearl buttons.
A pocket watch sunk to the
bottom of a well. Meanwhile
I pray on staircases. Turn my
head to the wall and remember.
My dreams riddled with thimbles.
With tiny violins. You’ll gorge me
on satin...
lick of tongues, bones, hyacinths.
A seduction of lace and balconies.
So easy to be lost in the violent
patchwork of her thoughts.
The haunting curve of his mouth
at her ear. She hangs above him
on her scarlet trapeze, cardinal
as an ibis. Red as sin. You lure
me with suicide and pearl buttons.
A pocket watch sunk to the
bottom of a well. Meanwhile
I pray on staircases. Turn my
head to the wall and remember.
My dreams riddled with thimbles.
With tiny violins. You’ll gorge me
on satin...
660 reads
2 Comments
Lisbeth
In the vampire movie, I’m the kid
with the gun. I feel your hands
as others feel God, close all
the shutters and collect the tire
wrenches. Oh my hunger shakes.
It's haunting the way her wrists
curl about his neck, dripping
with the most delicate of charms.
Heart-shaped and terrible. At night
I cry over your gap-toothed smile,
the windmills troubling me
as I collect hostile swans.
Your breathing making me tremble
like a small kitten. My mother
tells me I look terrible without
makeup. In high school I...
with the gun. I feel your hands
as others feel God, close all
the shutters and collect the tire
wrenches. Oh my hunger shakes.
It's haunting the way her wrists
curl about his neck, dripping
with the most delicate of charms.
Heart-shaped and terrible. At night
I cry over your gap-toothed smile,
the windmills troubling me
as I collect hostile swans.
Your breathing making me tremble
like a small kitten. My mother
tells me I look terrible without
makeup. In high school I...
704 reads
3 Comments
Calliope
I’ve lost a lot of blood. It runs out
of me like God. My mother was
ballerina-white. Wore flapper
dresses and silver tap shoes
while dishes rotted in the sink.
Danced to the sinuous rhythm
of milk sweating to the floor.
I hang suspended over the bath tub,
smoking cigarette after cigarette.
Every hope lost you could ever
grow to love me. The shelf lined
with girls in mourning gowns,
gray as the dolls they found
floating in the river. How the
hemline of my dress speaks
of child abuse and gin. Wolves
and witches in...
of me like God. My mother was
ballerina-white. Wore flapper
dresses and silver tap shoes
while dishes rotted in the sink.
Danced to the sinuous rhythm
of milk sweating to the floor.
I hang suspended over the bath tub,
smoking cigarette after cigarette.
Every hope lost you could ever
grow to love me. The shelf lined
with girls in mourning gowns,
gray as the dolls they found
floating in the river. How the
hemline of my dress speaks
of child abuse and gin. Wolves
and witches in...
706 reads
3 Comments
A Dream Fulfilled
(written for Romantic_Head’s “Erotic Thriller” competition)
Inspired by the 1928 silent film [i]Pandora’s Box, where the girl Lulu, whose beauty has inspired such tragedy in others, meets her match, Jack the Ripper.
[/i]
I do not know it yet
but I have been wandering
the streets for you
I’m a woman who has released
such tragic outcomes
the deepest darknesses within others
perhaps it is because
of the impossible beauty
I was granted
as soon as I see you
I want you
my blood
obeying your eyes ...
Inspired by the 1928 silent film [i]Pandora’s Box, where the girl Lulu, whose beauty has inspired such tragedy in others, meets her match, Jack the Ripper.
[/i]
I do not know it yet
but I have been wandering
the streets for you
I’m a woman who has released
such tragic outcomes
the deepest darknesses within others
perhaps it is because
of the impossible beauty
I was granted
as soon as I see you
I want you
my blood
obeying your eyes ...
743 reads
5 Comments
Althea
She’s haunted by a sense of futility
in everything she does. I wait
to be told I’m worthy. You knew
we could never escape, caught
by our hair under glass bottom boats.
By our parents’ white-knuckled grip.
I was drowning in the emerald music
of fish when you pulled my body
from the rocks, their song
a shivering green. Mama always taught
me to fear boys like you. To flee
the delicate danger of my own ankles.
By June I’ll succumb to the language
of bruises. The yearning for the
blue-haired girl to tell me her name.
How she...
in everything she does. I wait
to be told I’m worthy. You knew
we could never escape, caught
by our hair under glass bottom boats.
By our parents’ white-knuckled grip.
I was drowning in the emerald music
of fish when you pulled my body
from the rocks, their song
a shivering green. Mama always taught
me to fear boys like you. To flee
the delicate danger of my own ankles.
By June I’ll succumb to the language
of bruises. The yearning for the
blue-haired girl to tell me her name.
How she...
686 reads
3 Comments
Lilith
We place our ears against the table,
listening. Only the ghosts can make
us whole again. Daddy won’t touch me,
he’s convinced we’ve let the spirits
out. Claims we are riddled with disease
and dark forces. We are all Ouija boards
and divining rods. Wrought iron fences
and too-hard polished surfaces. We
collect objects for a love spell.
Pilfered needles from a wedding dress,
the spindly hands of a clock. The shadows
of lost children illuminating the beds
where we sleep. Oh our crepe de chine
mouths. We are consumed by fever, ...
listening. Only the ghosts can make
us whole again. Daddy won’t touch me,
he’s convinced we’ve let the spirits
out. Claims we are riddled with disease
and dark forces. We are all Ouija boards
and divining rods. Wrought iron fences
and too-hard polished surfaces. We
collect objects for a love spell.
Pilfered needles from a wedding dress,
the spindly hands of a clock. The shadows
of lost children illuminating the beds
where we sleep. Oh our crepe de chine
mouths. We are consumed by fever, ...
847 reads
7 Comments
DU Poetry : Submissions by toniscales (Lost Girl)