Roses from demons,
bloom in the night,
beautiful petals,
hiding a bite.
They smell like heaven,
but grow from the grave,
promising love
to those they enslave.
I held one softly,
then watched myself bleed.
Some roses are gifts
some grow from greed.
Poet's Note:
Written for the Skeletons Poetry Contest. This dramatic monologue uses "skeleton of hope" as a metaphor for resilience that appears during grief.
Ash Into Phoenix
You ask why I walk barefoot through this frozen forest?
The broken road cuts me, and dancing fog swirls at my feet.
Every step is heavy and cold.
Demons of sorrow and despair circle me.
I thought grief would bury me in the dark.
Then the skeleton of hope rose from my chest.
He wore a gown of silver, with stars on its glittering seams.
He sat beside me, a golden staff in his hand.
He took my hand and looked into my eyes.
"Hardship burns your old soul," he said.
"From the ash rises a phoenix of hope."
"Grief is fire. Let it light your path."
"In darkness, you can still glow."
He smiled at me, at the person drowning in grief, and said:
"Grief is not a punishment.
It is the polish that strengthens your inner self."
And then I stood, because he was right.
Africa did not deserve what it has become.
Black people lived here with no notion of whiteness,
Believing that black was the only color.
They did not even know that white birds existed.
But when they came like rain in September,
We were taught the meaning of white.
They arrived with white birds and white clothes,
And we rejected our darkest nature, thinking
It was because we did not wash our bodies every day,
For even demons were said to be black.
We started struggling to become brown,
Forgetting that brown is not white.
We began denying our own identity,
Saying that we must be like beautiful birds.
We thought of destroying all the darkest birds,
Claiming they were signs of darkness and hell.
While dreaming of heaven one day,
We decided to buy everything necessary,
As if humanity itself could be bought.
I'm really no better than in times past.
I just cloak my naked demons in three-piece rags.
Weaving webs of deceptions, the lies that they be,
sowing seeds of darkness, from the evil that they be.
Hiding in the shadows, by the darkness of their day,
with their words of darkness, casting shadows along their way.
Setting snares of entrapment, they keep out the light,
they watch in the darkness, as their demons take to flight.
With each spin of a web, the darkness it’s about to be,
as the legions gather round, they make their final plea.
To kill the souls of kindness, till no love can be found,
those who walk in the darkness, to the webs they are bound.
To destroy and be destroyed, by the webs of the night,
one against the other, the demons take to flight.
The demons of my past, were bitterness, hurt and pain’s,
the vengeance of my hate, was boiling in my veins.
A hardened heart, that had turned to stone,
these demons of the past, had become my very own.
All the things that people had done, and said,
tormented and tortured the thoughts in my head.
How these demons, can destroy your future you see,
as they live and breathe, they destroy you and me.
In the shadows of our heart, the truth is hidden there,
but to enter in this way, do we truly dare.
The truth’s of this life, is hidden in the heart,
the demons of my past, now they have no part.
It’s the truths of these things, that sets a person free,
the demons of my past, no longer tortures me.
New Life
Understandable this life. Things are changed
So many, everything. Or just my age? Time?
No, I can’t feel the time, but it recognised
Living in a timeless heart means forever to die
Every moment in my life is death. I feel that
Death feeling, oh, far, but call from, ringing
Live in death, my desire, not calling for life
It’s not casual, dropping a human life is
Not my mistake, human life put me down
– That’s why the demons save you
Life is not for a simple guy, just for gangs
– There is another way. We shall that
Way, way. Hmm. I listen to it a lot of times
Way. But there is only a cruel future, time
– There is another way; we shall take that path
No. Never. But this is my decision. Dark life
Dark and glittering life, Stay, but demonic mind
– Human with a demonic mind, a dark sun
Yes, but I must respect some of my friends
I respect, but after I pass, I will be dark
– And start a new life. On a demonic planet
– Invited
Thank you
So much
My new life
I perceive her as fire, not too smokey
But glossed enough to burn my desire ,
This back street pleasure filling empty pathways
Isolated by moonless eve... guarded by egg shells :
Only the waves know this rapture,
Only the stars hear loud groans,moans...
Although this warmth or heat is rented,
My own misery or angst dissolves
As her skin waxes on mine ... slow
Then fast in restless grind of hours.
We take tingling drops of wine
Before sunlight gleams to rise over sheets
Now crumpled by lust, maybe an ounce of love--
She, draped in mannequin's thin wrap
Is delicate and tough with a heart unbidden :
How in this moment, her flaming eyes
Flirt with my demons... and yet her cunning mien
Restrains surrender of constant ardor--
And while I button her second-hand dress
Our next rendezvous is done, again--again
The comfort of my scourged loneliness,
Allayed by the harlot of my nights.
This house has been set ablaze; ashes rain like snow,
covering what has become my deathbed.
A weighted blanket of ruins lies heavy upon my chest.
Laboured breaths and the taste of soot coat the back of my throat,
stifling oxygen from reaching the whites of enervated eyes.
Blue-tinted lips incoherently whisper, flirting with my demons,
living in purgatorial gloaming
whilst my spirit hovers between diminishing light and shadows.
Reality blurs, amalgamating with hallucinations
where demons dance in a macabre ballet,
reenacting repressed sorrows,
torturing an undead heart to the brink of insanity.
With each twirl, each act, tales of desperation are etched onto flesh.
Riverlets of blood stain the sheets bright red,
as tourniquets are nowhere to be found.
There is no way to halt the flow;
emotional instability will be my bloodletting.
Every second ticks by a little quicker
until each heartbeat grows fainter.
A clenched jaw relents,
eyes roll backwards,
and a damaged soul is severed from its mortal coil,
yet its fate is left undetermined,
flailing in the in-between forevermore.
The songs I urge for,
hold the heaviness you breathe in to me,
How you paint poetic parallel pieces,
in a porcelain poison photography,
Place the gate of my fingers,
on your chaotic contradictions,
Let them explore vigorously
Beneath and beyond the boundaries of what could be,
In a room full of our piercingly powerful dreams,
Let us be the object to these unfinished tasks
taken to treat our new found ecstasy,
So choose us, between hell and earth.
and with fire, flirt with my demons
that profusely starve for you,
Bursting into our very own heaven ,
written from the tales of our souls,
Carve me, for I too have held wounds,
Hurt me , because you hurt too,
Shall we sing our pain
in an unstoppable sonata?
I see the beauty in the orchestra,
It’s untamable, yet leashed,
Irresistible, although weak,
You are a dangerous dare,
I could never share,
The addiction , your words
have brought on to me.
They see the scars and turn around,
and fear the winter in my chest.
The moment that my ghosts make sound,
they flee like all the rest.
But this is me - the blood and scar;
the quiet panic and midnight cry.
You can not love my brightest star
without the blackness of my sky.
So come and sit beside my open grave -
the griefs you have to dig to find.
I do not need one who can save;
just one who can love my mind.
Step past the signs upon the wall,
press your palm against what is dead;
If you love me, you would love me all,
and flirt with the demons in my head.
Seduce the wolves that hide my war,
and kiss the acid from my biting tongue.
If you should shrink from what's in my core,
then leave while our love is young.
Take the match and strike my bone,
and marry the ghosts that haunt the floor.
Love me until my madness is shown -
and still choose to love me more.
Flirt with my demons
We chase that which destroys us.
We know we shouldn't!
Winner 3rd Place: Language of Love, Ink Empress (Sponsor) 6/1/26
In shadows deep, where silence grew,
I fought a battle, none ever knew,
The weight I bare, a heavy chain,
While smiles hid deep, the hidden pain,
They laughed and chatted, lost in the day,
oblivious to the demons in my way,
I wore a mask, crafted so bright,
yet the tears fell, softly into the night,
I cried for help in whispers faint,
But their backs turned, as if by fate,
A gentle plea, a grasping hand,
Yet they missed the signs, the need to understand,
Now the echos linger a haunting sound,
Of moments lost, of love untold
They stand in sorrow, crying when it's late
Wishing they had noticed,
Before it was fate.
I eat demons for breakfast and plant them
Far away- Where no life is detected,
To spare another.
Your life does not call to see demons,
Simply so you can live it.
Some of us do not have that luxury-
Long ago we formed in darkness,
To travel to places that even nightmares
Cannot reach.
And that is why we can see what those
Cannot see.
Labels do not hinder us
I eat demons for breakfast and plant them
Far away – where no life is detected,
To spare the other.
You want to see angels and ghosts?
Careful of what you call into existence child-
For not all seeing is believing,
And not all will spare you either – And
Before you know it, nothing but fear
Will consume you.
I eat demons for breakfast and plant them
Far away – where no life will ever be detected,
To spare
You.
They say he has a sweet soul, yet I'm in dismay, my mind feels burdened, like it's filled with
decayed clay.
In fear, I reel from the chaos each day, setbacks and self-sabotage lead me astray.
Oh, please, don't let my thoughts lead me away.
Each day is a battle to keep the wolves at bay; I must remind myself, not every sky is grey.
This sweet soul hides a dark hole where my inner child lays, praying in shadows that
today's the day I'm not finally afraid.
He has a sweet soul, but they can't see the mental toll, how heavy my mind weighs on
my ability to behold, the world clearly illuminated, like a story untold.
It takes much to control and patrol my inner night, as my demons needs soothing and
rest to find light.
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