Written: July 30th, 2026, for a contest sponsored by Seth Pina
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Your very skeleton
is not spun from cotton and polyester.
No, it is not carved from wood,
nor forged from metal or steel.
Its substance is—nerve endings,
tissue, and blood—
circulatory systems,
bound,
but not from woven fabric.
A lethal lotus languishes,
lamenting in its limbo,
crouched on bended knee.
A curved carcass, prostrate
beneath time’s passing wheel.
Its chalk-white bones
measure the slow decay,
where darkness lingers
in the hollow space within.
Cyborg of a cyber-skeleton.
Coiled with a steel-stitch
sprocket of subjugation.
Its spinal cord, bound in circuitry,
hums with sorrow.
A crestfallen cranium,
a heavy, hollowed
moon-orb weighed down
by the gravity of grief
in synthesized solitude.
Amidst this woeful wheel,
supplications of skinless steel
fuse forgotten fragility and fortitude
into a fatalistic future.
For you were neither tool nor tree,
but a tight-furled tapestry of flesh—
a weeping engine, bound in bone,
where the wild pulse fights the gear,
and slowly fades to rust.
The tapestry of the indigo sky,
weaved with lattice of silver cloud,
merges with the still sea in the blues.
The dislodged boulders of cognitive debris
strewn away from the waterfront of desire,
the broken dreams epitomized.
The anchorless empty boat
drifts away from the shore of longing,
harboured by desolation,
lodged lonesome in the sanctuary
of the rocky ledge of fortitude.
In the ruins of my splintered heart,
I listen to the voice of the anguished soul,
the mutilated construct of recluse precinct,
encasing the stifling loneliness of poignant prison
where the psyche languishes relentless
within invincible travail,
negating the hope perspective
in the clutch of mental affliction.
The cauldron of dissonance,
remote from the rhythm of life,
its void filled with drops of depression in adagio.
My dormant desires are demolished,
the malleable mind yields to nostalgic purport,
melancholy swathes the remnant yearning.
Inspired by Melancholy, Edvard Munch.
I want to feel the cheer of the season;
I really, really do!
All the kids are waiting for Santa to visit,
Relishing the prospect of new gifts and joy.
Sometimes they receive them, sometimes they don’t;
Sometimes they wish the sleigh would stop by,
And Santa would drop off a small gift of delight.
Some ask for light and warmth, a little glee to share,
Wrapped in a blanket of love and giggles.
Some long to forget hunger and pain, even for just a day.
We give gifts; we choose a child in need,
And try to spread the joy of the season—
But mostly, I feel the cold and the freeze.
Just look around and see—
More kids in need, more kids in pain.
My soul feels almost empty,
But some laughter fills it up.
My heart languishes often,
Longing for the missing piece that I can’t find.
Maybe I am a villain
Who can't embrace the joy.
Inspired by Prince Roger Nelson's song : When Doves Cry
Grey clouds hover over my wasteland,
the desert languishes in the heat of craving,
deprived of the tuneful rain,
until you arrive with drizzling breeze.
In your pulsating embrace
my heart’s oasis resounds
with the symphony of desire.
As the pristine patina of radiant roses
flushes your crimson cheeks,
rhapsody of longing wraps
the mesmerized meadow of my mind.
The cadence of your intimate heart
pulsates within mine,
I float in the ether of euphoria.
I fly with open wings in your sky,
a storm from nowhere tears me down.
You don’t care for the injured bird,
I hide my pain within me,
clasping the broken heart
within the collapsed wings
I desperately curl with mournful sigh.
My tear drops roll unseen for you
on the trail of melancholy,
where I hear the enchanting echo
of the songs we sang together once.
The tune now resonates like
when doves cry.
Topic 1
What Makes You Feel
friendship shattered, bonds fractured, my heart languishes …
palmlike branches sway
in a late august breeze
as the afternoon sun languishes
the waiter brings my glass
of sauvignon blanc
and i feel decadent
alone at a table for four
just me and my muse
taking in the view
summer exhales its last breath
refusing to let go as of yet
while vacationers come
to accept their days are numbered
and do their best to stretch
each divine hour
AP: Honorable Mention 2025
When love is too loud, and lurid,
it languishes in lewd, lusty lakes.
When love is silent, and steadfast,
it sings sweetly with soft waves on sea shores.
When love is motionless and mute,
it meanders to black mold and makes miserable, monotonous marshes.
So let me
love thee silently, softly,
with actions,
with adjectives and valiant verbs.
Saying I love you with
kind kisses,
empathetic embraces,
tender touches,
longing looks,
weary work, and
tedious tasks.
An underwater silence full of
graceful gestures and
mysterious moves…
…letting love lead, and last a lifetime.
You've seen the sunlight
now you mask your pride
Friends tell you where to go
Keep on a straight line
peaceful shades of green
strides past you
There's a commuter strip demur
back to cover hes read his Daily Mail
the burglued fox languishes
Making sense of the passing years
Lost in a wherewithal
Is it time to change ?
to purify your soul
or cry to the wind?
Mind marooned
in complex convolution,
obscurity singular
in each living entity.
The psyche silhouettes
unique elements,
to alien attributes
they won’t adhere.
The reserved recess
hides the riddles,
sub-conscious search
completely clueless.
Probing entreaty,
the preserve persuasive
of outside world,
can’t contrive
the forsaken mind.
A pining prisoner
of own making,
a crumpled cocoon in
introvert isolation,
I see subsided
all the faces fading
faceless in oblivion,
me wedged secluded
in egoistic web
of self-adoration.
My morphed mind
turns Nemesis,
makes a mirror
of mirage for me.
Gazing gripped,
lurching to the oasis,
it’s only me
I always see,
reflected radiant
from cobalt cauldron
of the luring lake,
confined content.
In self-veneration,
a pretentious perspicacity
of fake facsimile,
I notice Narcissus
in me lonely lurk.
A secret switching
over to obsession,
specter senseless
lies latent,
languishes listless
beneath brazen layers
of arctic acuity
in the dark,
frozen…
if attention be absent, then we are not present
in as not quite so in active mindful cognition
thus Turiya as screen of consciousness
dims for awhile its resplendent lustre
as presence languishes in stupor
softening attention rescues us
with ego resistance removed
requiring active negation
in a mode of surrender
to the light of Self
aflame within
On the wings of winter afloat abandoned in northern wind,
the wilted leaves of longing waft away rustling recluse,
my frosted nest clings captive to the skeletal tree,
I count in heartbeat the footsteps of frozen twilight hour.
The elan of earnestness turns into arctic embrace,
as you fly away to the sun shine sky of indigo incognito.
In the frosted debris of desolation in the glacial nest,
I hibernate in memory with the frozen feather you leave.
The lonely bird languishes with the wings twisted in torment,
folded up within the mangled manor of the marooned mind.
I can’t fly in the wake of your evanescent flight,
my heart’s fervent warmth dissipates unfelt.
The latent desire to span the sky sinks in the sad eyes,
the feelings fail to touch the remote reminiscence,
as I find the defoliated trees dance in the snow sonata,
attuned to the melody of the song of winter wonders.
The winter blizzard blowing in my wanton world
immobilizes the weary wings of my frigid fervor,
brings the breath of old times through the frosted door of mind,
in my winter slumber I dream you will return in spring.
Like the last glowing embers of a once roaring fire I wait
For the winter winds and night to blanket me in the frigid dark
A beauty, solemn, and severe
To the depths
And the bone
And the tattered heart, once in flames now languishes
Still reaching
But a flicker
sere
summer
languishes,
encouraging
anticipated,
tempestuous.
blusterous
autumn
rain
“Every wall that would entrap me has a door that would free me. And I languish because the fear of freedom often leaves me preferring the familiarity of the wall.” Craig D. Lounsbrough
I'm languishing in self-pity
My cat is lost in the city
Grieving for my itty bitty
Missing kitty Missing kitty
Again, I find myself alone
Nobody calls me on the phone
Weeping for loved ones I have known
Fate, I bemoan Fate, I bemoan
A poet languishes each time
He seems to be bereft of rhyme
Unable to write poems, sublime
It is a crime It is a crime
Artists languish in mortal fear
that their paintings will bring a tear
Like Van Gogh who lobbed off an ear
End of career End of career
Who has not languished in despair
pining over things hard to bear
Anguish reveals how much we care
Heartache beware Heartache beware
The journey languishes in the penultimate misty mile
for the forlorn facsimile of my being silhouetted still
at the fading fringe of the unfolded future obscure,
observing the blazing skyline of transient radiance.
The ordained kaleidoscope turns with time
with the vacillating vista of life’s lattice laid
on the mindscape copying the chameleon colors
of the ashen wasteland or the emerald meadow.
The vivacious vision draping the delightful dreams
with the eclectic tapestry of the transient ecstasy,
engraved on the wings of the beguiled butterflies,
focuses on the fulfilled fervent form self-designed.
As I travel across desolate desert dunes to the oasis,
or along the gleamed garden path to spring’s sanctum,
I capture the collage created by snapshots of beauty
in my mind frame, the window of vision on the world.
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