Mike Stott Poet Free verse

Skeleton Speakeasies

Lover, Lover
The nighttime sings our names
Ballads of the figurative Juliet 
Radios hiss hearts spilled the shadows hide naked ambition stilled
Neglected emotional hills wafts through valleys of past lives
Karmic backlogs review their closing percentages
Futures flood the floors hold the line between fate and tears
Shadow people alone in the twilight
Illuminated letters, walls woed to sleep
Dreams from the shoreline as phantom vessels waltz on the silver linings 
Postures of stable footing, top of the line, kings and queens of value
Thumbs circle the knuckles, bone kisses bone, the familiar taste of home
Haunted hems lines explored in tribal pursuits
Please keep me waiting
The specter of tender frames evaporates
Morning ghosts caress the memory in travel
Neckties versus deadlines
Power brokered, breath that betrays the dream
Folded napkins
Cocktail napkin epitaphs 
Check please

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Beata Agustin September 21, 2026 at 7:26 AM Thanks for sharing this... exposing your thoughts through your unique poetic style. Welcome to Poetry Soup. I welcome you with the love of the Lord, expressed by John 3:16 of the Bible, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." Be blessed.

Alison A Smith September 17, 2026 at 7:04 PM A beautifully cinematic piece: its fragmented, incantatory free-verse form feels perfectly suited to the nocturnal, gothic atmosphere. Images such as “phantom vessels waltz on the silver linings” and “cocktail napkin epitaphs” give the poem a haunted glamour, while the recurring intimacies of bone, breath, memory, and waiting keep its dark emotional landscape deeply human.