Acceptance Poems
Half-Price Books
by Sienna Wong
We are told to never judge books by their covers, but what if I blushed for your dust jacket and stayed for your script? I read you until your binding was just as beautiful as the coat she hard-cover slipped around your spine.
I hardly read the novel's acknowledgments, but I should've figured there was a reason her name emerged twice in the dedications. I forgot that your seemingly perfect pages had been red ink-stained by her fingertips, she was your editor and I was simply a girl marveling at your words.
All of your punctuation was carefully orchestrated, and I wondered if she excised the spaces in your dialogues, crossed out your fumblings, your stuttering, her thumb and forefinger leaving spit prints like stamps as she flipped through your raw material.
I’ve only read the finished product.
Did she weep over your pages? The water damage left rippling scars on your paper. So when I’m leafing through the whole of you, all I can see are the ever-aching remnants of her touch.
She left eraser crumbs in your gutters, and you didn’t mind that her fingers excavated your contents, removed your run-on sentences until you spoke in the soliloquies every lover wants to hear. Sometimes I wonder which words are yours, and which ones she fixed.
......
Is it?
by zeynep yildirim
Worth it I mean.
The Breath and Withhold you lose trying to convey your Feelings to the World next to xou.
The Stamina you need to develop, to last beneath those crushing Waves of self doubt, self pity and self loathing.
To surrender the Ability to recognize your Reflection after having forgotten which dream to follow.
Endless Moments wasted for a shred of foreign, mindless acceptance.
How come you are ready to lose so much of yourself when you don´t even know what you´re so desperately in Need of.
Ready to thrash between wanting to go unseen and hide your Mistakes or stick out to feel an ounce of Uniqueness.
Because this is not going to end.
It is not going to end with you losing a Battle against yourself in order to blend into the Mass to the Point where you´ve forgotten your favourite colour.
Within your Lifetime the only Thing you´re going to realize is that what you´ve been looking for is right there.
......
Chiron
by Pierpaolo Gobbi
Oleanders, heavy with flowers
branching out in the cold mist
to witness an ungodly scene.
All around us the air stood still
not a blow on the mount
as if Zephyrus himself was waiting.
Tragedy in my arms
while I teach my murderer
......
The Best Moment
by Somali Mukherjee
The moment we do
Perceive that we’re imperfect,
We try to succeed.
False Insanity
by Somali Mukherjee
No need to hurry;
No need to hustle;
The waves do carry
Our each sandcastle.
Life contains a measured beat;
We need to accept all;
Freedom has a deep seat,
As we're given the call.
......
Inner Universe
by Doreen Lundie
A thousand whispers
Echo in my mind
The what ifs and the maybes
That have kept me here, confined.
An inner universe forgotten.
An undiscovered life
To find the courage of acceptance
To heal the child inside
Storm Chasing
by Taryn G
I always thought storm chasers
were a little crazy
these men with cameras
and beater cars
driving into the middle of nowhere
to chase an impending disaster.
Their faces would be split with a smile
almost drunk with pleasure
as they maneuvered their car across fields
and roads
......
Flower
by Rhys O’Donnell
It is summer.
On my walks I have frequented the most beautiful flower you could conceive. It stands in a clearing across from the gravel path I stand on. I stood in awe of it every time I passed until I realized I could not live with myself if I did not approach this flower.
So I walked off my gravel path into the meadows; an experience that was unnatural to me. I approached the flower and was even more baffled by it up close. Its petals showed an assortment of different colours; each different and distinct from the other. I conversed with it telling it my deepest secrets, my dreams, my fears. It did not turn away from me or look at my soul with disgust. It stood tall despite its short stature and remained in bloom not coiling away from me.
I soon began talking with it every day never skipping my walk. Each day I’d notice a new petal I had not discovered. I wished to see them all, to be the only one who caressed them gently. One day a thorn pricked my hand, and I was left bleeding, but I wasn’t angry with the flower. I was merely excited to discover its every thorn and learn to navigate them. To show it I care for them just as much as Its petals.
A vase, I’ll put it in a vase and take it home, where I can spend the rest of my life with it. I approached it like I do every day I walk to the meadows and bend down to speak with it. Today however is different. This flower will be mine and mine alone until we wither away. I pull out my shears and press it to its neck, but just as I am about to cut. I look at it and I cry.
For I know that to bring it with me would only make them wither. What a grave crime it would be to rip it from its home where it bloomed into my life. I could change its water every day, give it the comfiest vase, put it on the windowsill where all the sunshine could reach. I could even preserve it so that its beauty would last forever, but I know this is a falsehood; it would be nothing but a husk. All these things I would do, yet I know the only truth is that this flower cannot remain happy or healthy if it were mine.
......
Flower
by Rhys O’Donnell
It is summer.
On my walks I have frequented the most beautiful flower you could conceive. It stands in a clearing across from the gravel path I stand on. I stood in awe of it every time I passed until I realized I could not live with myself if I did not approach this flower.
So I walked off my gravel path into the meadows; an experience that was unnatural to me. I approached the flower and was even more baffled by it up close. Its petals showed an assortment of different colours; each different and distinct from the other. I conversed with it telling it my deepest secrets, my dreams, my fears. It did not turn away from me or look at my soul with disgust. It stood tall despite its short stature and remained in bloom not coiling away from me.
I soon began talking with it every day never skipping my walk. Each day I’d notice a new petal I had not discovered. I wished to see them all, to be the only one who caressed them gently. One day a thorn pricked my hand, and I was left bleeding, but I wasn’t angry with the flower. I was merely excited to discover its every thorn and learn to navigate them. To show it I care for them just as much as Its petals.
A vase, I’ll put it in a vase and take it home, where I can spend the rest of my life with it. I approached it like I do every day I walk to the meadows and bend down to speak with it. Today however is different. This flower will be mine and mine alone until we wither away. I pull out my shears and press it to its neck, but just as I am about to cut. I look at it and I cry.
For I know that to bring it with me would only make them wither. What a grave crime it would be to rip it from its home where it bloomed into my life. I could change its water every day, give it the comfiest vase, put it on the windowsill where all the sunshine could reach. I could even preserve it so that its beauty would last forever, but I know this is a falsehood; it would be nothing but a husk. All these things I would do, yet I know the only truth is that this flower cannot remain happy or healthy if it were mine.
......
Fracture
by Liam Erb
I broke my mirror
Grains of glass lay on the ground
The shards poke my feet and stick in my hands
It’s definitely been more than seven years of bad luck
Putting shards back in the frame just is not the same
The holes in my reflection are annoying
Sometimes, I wonder why I’m trying so hard to fix my mirror
Glue at least gets the shimmering pieces back up
......
