they say actions speak louder than innuendos
so true and when you speak in riddles
know that your subtleties are lost on me
i'm left not knowing how to feel
so if my responses seem anything but direct
i admit that it is absolutely so
i'm often in a quandry and have no words to say
AP: 3rd place 2025
Love Impasse
I am not ashamed to say it—
I trace demons of you in the stars—
perhaps because I cry at your abandon,
for once, you were the riddle in my bones.
But do I blame?
No—I should have known
where our paths split,
where an anxious exit waited slyly—
maybe I, too,
left constellations behind.
I rarely trust
simplicity of things
thanks to your abandon.
All I know is that I Loved you—
and have Loved you
and Love you—
But I could never lay my full self
in the tide of your shifting light,
nor could I assuage the storms
you held so close.
Though you are silent,
your thoughts pervade me
like serpents
silent as a crypt,
but hissing inwardly…
bleeding inwardly—
your presence in the sky sears me—
I have been woven into
your tumultuous pulse—
but the question remains:
do you feel the weight of me?
I see where my hands have cut you,
now that I bear the scars you left
just as deeply.
I have searched the ashes and all ends
for something that could spark
what we dismally buried—
a single ember—
a Hell—that
could heat up the crushing cold places
we once deemed Love.
We are at an impasse
There's nothing I can say
at this point I think you're
better off if I just go away
I tried to talk to you
Just to explain how I feel
I try my best to keep it real
But you don't hear me when
I tell you I'm sad and I miss you
You only see complaints being issued
I pour out my heart to you
but you say being depressed
Is something I choose to be
but I just miss you so much
can't you see??
So, I bite my tongue so hard
there's blood in my mouth
I don't know what to say anymore
But I need to let it out
I'm confused and I feel
like we're out of touch
Maybe I say I love you
way too ing much.
You accused me of being
like a broken record
on repeat
over and over
with no retreat.
At this point
I know I should
probably just go away
because I make you miserable
when I stay.
But like a moth to a flame
you just keep drawing me back
I want to be near you
without all this flack.
It's funny
all you really had to say
was "I miss you too"
but you never did which makes me
so ing blue.
©SamHarty
marooned -- unwhole as i am
a piece of me missing
adrift in its emptiness
throbbing in angst
furious at the impending silence
yet clinging to it like i never want it to lift
hovering in limbo -- life being too short
to be caught in this game of catch-22
AP: Honorable Mention 2023
I am not ashamed to say it—
I revisit you—perhaps because
you discarded me and you
meant something to me.
But do I blame?
No—I should have
seen where there
was an easy exit—
and perhaps it was me
that discarded
you.
I am not sure
of simple things anymore.
All I am sure of
is that I love you—
and have loved you.
but I could never give
you all of me and risk
it all not knowing to
whom your heart
belonged.
Even though
you are silent as death now
I feel you deeply and
I feel I mean something
to you—but my dilemma
is that I am unsure of
you and all I know is
that I inflicted pain
just as I feel pain
from you.
And I have done
what I could to resurrect
the death between us—
not that a simple talk
could mend what is
already broken.
I
always
imagined
things would have changed
we would have moved on
yet here we are
loggerheads
impasse
still
If
enough
pressure is
applied to a
bad situation
pressure builds up
and sometimes
the dam
breaks
Ninette: 1/2/3/4/5/4/3/2/1
Note: playing with the form, all well here! :-)
Painfully shy schoolboy and girl
break long, awkward silence with small talk.
The classmates flash sheepish smiles...
with nervous giggles here and there.
Both too timid to get to first base,
to cross the threshold of "I like you"
Bite Size Poem No.16 Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Line Gauthier
Date written: 08/02/2021
Ego borne conflict having arisen,
no resolution seems to be in sight,
with one participant spewing poison,
the other unwilling to call day, night.
Hearts divided needing the healing light
but the light too is seen by sight divine,
for those and those only who do align
and so the remedy of no avail,
as both souls languish in pain self assigned,
unable to secure the holy grail.
13-November-2020
My oars were broken
I couldn't sail, I was
at an impasse, alone
but you came along
and mended me, with
your craftsmanship,
now we are in sync
sailing together as
one, in the ocean blue
Contest: Metaphor Of Love Poem
Sponsor: Bobby May
11/5/19
Sometimes words fail
As change bleeds blood
Thoughts now derail
In drowning flood
In impasse here
Dry sultry feel
Touch feels unclear
Words fail to thrill
A roadblock sign
Tells tedious streak
A force now blind
Binds yet wit weak
Surge of lost cause
In misty mind
A broken course
Drifts debris grind
A crooked reach
Beyond mere fit
Spikes each to each
Beyond mad wit
And in the end
This broken way
Can now attend
Impasse like clay
Leon Enriquez
26 October 2019
Singapore
Anger is the impassable wall. Freedom extinguished. Coming to a grinding halt. Caught in a bottomless pit somewhere between understanding and acceptance. Obsolete inflamed ignorance. Crushing hearts, while empty kindness tramples the spirit. Strangled benevolence into an abyss of human cruelty. So into the infernal death the chasm coils.
The bird spirals
With wings full spread
In his quest for sovereignty
Holding the winds of change
Beneath his breast
He is lifted far above
A determined direction
With feet tied
And no way to land
What do I say to her, my dear daughter- now married, a mother
of two, life upside down? A nightmare of sad changes and so many
unknowns- since early-onset Parkinson's has come to claim him-
her love for many years. She is slowly losing him, and he is not the
same. Their daughters, now nineteen and twenty-four, also miss the
wonderful 'old dad' they love. Hard to accept this doom fate brings
to us; for sure- there is no cure. No words, except to say, I'm here
for them each day to wipe their tears- soothe their aching hearts.
I am here for them- I am here for us. Together- we'll stay strong.
God help us accept
this unbreakable impasse-
Parkinson's Disease
Sandra M. Haight
~3rd Place~
Contest: Pick A Title - Vol 4 Haibun
Sponsor: Edward Ibeh
Judged: 05/24/2019
Our younger daughter's husband was diagnosed with early-onset
Parkinson's disease, both motor and cognitive, four years ago,
when he was 50 years old. They've been married for 26+ years.
In the fetal position, in leaks of rust and rot, in the wet self-dug grave, a pushy dead man is passing time. An evasiveness of words, a haziness of consolations, a thorough count of merits and sins and the fear of death - they're gone: he’s finally dead. Oh, how he loves the certainty of death! Perhaps, probably, maybe. Life is clouded by uncertainty. Let's leave the vagueness of adverbs for the living… Suddenly, footsteps! voices! a golden pipe’s call! Now, any moment, a sentence will be announced: the darkness or the light where to, may be… Oh, no, he’s thinking “may be” as if he were alive!
Life, death, existence…
Oh, unbreakable impasse!
Taphotherapy*.
* A voluntary and temporary burial for therapeutic or meditative purposes.
17.05.2019
Pick A Title, Vol 4 - Haibun Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Edward Ibeh
I am looking for new ways to bedazzle you.
But I am at an impasse and I can't move.
I feel like a bird with no wings,
Like a ship with no sail,
Like a car with no engine,
Like a swimmer with no water,
Like a runner with no track and field.
In my mind I move my feet but I don't move.
I want to wow you like I once did.
I want you to be in awe of me.
Your approval means the world to me.
I long to see you smile from within.
These words are spoken every day and
night to a life size mirror on the wall.
Alexis Y.
5- 8-18
She would, she says incensed, leave one, in an instant, would
go miles to the east, miles and miles away from one,
where one would never, ever "darken her door again".
And she would, she says, her eyes filling suddenly with tears,
"go there for good, never, ever to return, so help [her] God"!
Her "there" is only centimeters away on any road map,
but inside one's breaking heart her "there" might as well be a
million light years away.
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