broken inside broken in two broken promise that didn’t come true broken happiness broken joy broken life all destroyed broken dreams broken hope broken will no way to cope broken spirit broken mind broken in pieces and left behind ©copyright 2023 jai unbounded quatrain
Image via Pixabay
some spirits are as fragile as a rose
sweet as honey, lovely to gaze upon
but easily damaged
by callous souls who heartlessly ravage
scribbling hateful words with sharpened crayons—
soft petals wilt ‘neath weight of heavy prose
leaving door open to rot and disease
rose abandons hope, does a sad striptease
©️2023 jai
wounded couplet
Image by Jiří Rotrekl from Pixabay
angry storm clouds hammering rain smothers frothing sea drowns hope of escape ©️2023 jai gogyohka
never able to love and obey
always going her own way
damn fiddler to pay
every day
own
wielding machete, she hacked her way
all would-be white knights, she slayed
damn fiddler to pay
everyday
sown
now body worn out and hair of gray
feet planted in self-made clay
damn fiddler to pay
every day
lone
©2023 jai
trinquint
Image by James Deutschkron from Pixabay
crow arrives on nighttide
feathered aphotic revenant
slips in the window
while she sleeps
burrows its sharp beak
into her seasoned flesh
and tears at
the most tender morsels...
doubts
insecurities
fears
savors the sour flavors
of being hurt
of being fooled
of being played
again...
she learns not to sleep
stays ever vigilant
lest crow
swallow everything
her pride
her independence
her reason
her life...
in the morning light
she sometimes wonders
if crow is real
is a force without
or instead
lives within…
a black cancer
of bone and blood
cawing chaos, while
beating sharp wings
within each breath
scraping claws
through fragile capillaries
frantic to escape
its self-made
prison...
©️2023 jai
Image by Angel Milostan from Pixabay
sprawl in a wrinkled, uneasy bed old demons and new share the covers they jabber and snicker, toss and turn chase away forgetful sleep eyes on the shadowed ceiling I wait for sunrise… pour a cup of bitter, black coffee greet the ghosts of past friends and lovers angry and accusing in their stony silence tears slide down surly cheeks eyes on the cold, damp floor I wait for sunset… pace dingy, dark, shuttered rooms regrets, fuck-ups, and what-ifs gather lamplight glints on gunmetal gray what you sow, so shall you reap eyes on the bore of eternity I wait for death’s release ©️2023 jai
Image by eberhard grossgasteiger for rawpixel.com
home in my memories sets monochrome monochrome walls, roof, and floor—my home gray, the kitchen where my family prayed prayed at a table of weathered gray old photographs of yore yet sparkle gold gold that never tarnishes, nor grows old love cradled me in a warm, velvet glove glove worn by Mother, fashioned with love safe, was I, in that time, in that place place of antiquity—nevermore to feel safe childhood long gone, now rotting driftwood driftwood littering dead sands of childhood ©2023 jai mirrored sestet
a child knows nothing
about the consequences
of the many roads
she will walk in life
until the end
when the last road is chosen
and for better or worse
she arrives at her destination
old, with no more roads left to walk
she then ponders
those fearlessly taken
the ones passed by, unexplored
the hurtful ones
paved with nails and glass
and she realizes that long ago
she lost her way
too late now
she knows, over and over
she picked the wrong roads
always in a hurry
she veered left on a whim
right on a wish
and only has herself to blame
for this damned dead end
©2023 jai
Image by Markus Distelrath from Pixabay
wrapped tightly
in rusty barbed wire
the caged heart beats
listless and erratic
an out-of-time clock…
tick-tock
cruel thorns stab
draws tainted blood
that drips poisonous and black
down constricted ribs
forged by shame and blame…
plop-plop
©️2023 jai
Image by Birgit Röhrs from Pixabay
She stares up at the starry sky while puffs of clouds meander by to silent, dark places not known. She watches alone, all alone, yearning to fly. All her life, she’s been a bird, caged, frazzled, red feathers, eyes of jade; both, no longer as sleek and bright— In fact, she is quite a sad sight…has come unmade. She’s been called a bitch—perhaps, witch? —that wasn’t a spell, just a twitch, muttered with a foul word or two at the one who causes hoodoo, makes her bones itch. One night she will straddle a broom, run away from this life entombed. To the far heavens, she will climb— Yes, stay up long past her bedtime…fly with the moon. ©2023 jai florette
Image by Ruslan Sikunov from Pixabay
On the Fringe of Darkness 