What can I say?
Did I know you wouldn't stay?
Why did you play?
Was our bond just moldable clay?
Why did I get a formal "father",
When I just wanted a "dad" who'd bother?
When I was small, I wished to be big,
Tired of playing this childhood jig.
But once I grew up, I wanted back small,
To escape the shadows that made me feel tall.
My teenage years were drowning in tension,
While they relaxed and lived on a pension.
You demanded so much more,
I asked, "Is there nothing else in store?"
You screamed that you still wanted more!
Was my existence just a tedious chore?
They want the girl to build a home,
Though she was left to weep alone.
Mother sees the rising evil,
But she prefers to love her own
Sweet devil.
I am crushed by the shape of what is missing.
I remember being here before in the quiet—
carrying the weight of rust and neglect—
encased in the void of a vanished world,
bleak as unturned steel.
The house I served is lost to the grounds,
demolished, bitter, left to its own decay,
reduced to a whisper of distant awe.
The beams that once carried warmth within
can no longer support their mangled frame.
Yet this brass still drags my resolve to belong,
heavy as a foundation of bricks and stones,
insisting that survival is something to endure.
We believe life’s splendor must be clear of stain,
but absence is a shadow you cannot ignore.
You are gone—you have been gone for years—
still your presence lingers, a voice in the woods;
louder than the machines that tore you apart.
Through the lingering stench of diesel and turned earth,
Memory is an artisan, bringing forth
from shadow to light,
crafting its art from discarded planks.
I turn the key one more time in the dark—
And the phantom door opens.
melancholic tidings—
optimism asystolic, now
fool’s paradise.
laconism stentorian
saline fluid agglomerating
“malignant” obfuscates,
formulates black stars.
fluttering, clouting
against ghostly pale tile.
aesculapian screams
circumnavigate weak cerebrum,
foxtrotting endlessly,
cold-blooded mockery.
serene bedrest
sinking linen counterpane.
morphing, suffocating
anaemic stature,
tasting like metal.
thrashing abnormal growth
actuate tunnels unending
i feel it.
i feel everything.
head encumbrance,
vessels strangulated,
blue skin a horror.
needle-punctured, scanned.
inhuman study. a specimen,
neglected medical non-priority.
fragile. no mind.
deteriorating. weaker.
sick. morningly.
please. help. ignored.
stained. vomit. pale.
monitor accelerating.
oxygen. chemotherapy.
please. help. me.
i. am. human.
bottom. medical. food. chain.
neglect. oxygen. oxygen.
oxygen. oxygen.
need. medicine.
nurses.
loud.
sonorous.
ringing.
light.
hunger. thirst. taste. smell. vision. touch. hearing.
taste. smell. vision. touch. hearing.
vision. touch. hearing.
touch. hearing.
dont. go.
hearing.
loud.
asystole.
a spiral of despair
in all truth we cannot reach for an absent hand
nothing there
the sun will rise
how can anyone understand
dark skies
you cared
fixed on command
scared
a spiral of despair
how can anyone understand
scared
The grumpy wind cries through bottle glass and bone,
Grain silos whine like widows at the gate,
Each sunrise shows up but exits the dongas alone.
The main street sighs,its colors ages out of date,
A dronkie in overall insults the deserted mine,
His guffaws crack,deranged,underneath the weight.
The spaza still sells nyaope and wine
And phantoms line where concertinas used to play,
Their sounds of tiekie draai to hosannas of turpentine
Youngsters pursue tyres that stagger,then spin away,
Grime hides their glee,fields no longer yield,
Old topies sit like statues at close of day.
You comprehend-beyond the rot,
The shattered shield,
A determined ditty reverberates tenderly through pain
We take photographs with people
So they could remember us
And leave memories behind
So they don’t forget us.
And the contrast
Between the two are the same.
We leave these moments
Scattered,
Hoping that somewhere
Somebody will discover them
And make sense of everything
We chose to neglect.
The Good was Taken out of the Summer
The good was taken out of the summer,
With her garden patch left abandoned,
Lettuce heads and scallions gone wild,
Her sweet summer plans all spoiled.
The good was taken out of the summer,
With green fly festering her roses,
Overwatered orchids on the sill
As her plastic bread bowl lay still.
The good was taken out of the summer,
With Hunter, her dog left in waiting
For her voice, her footsteps, her care
And the fridge in the kitchen left bare.
The good was taken out of the summer,
Put on pause til her homecoming came,
While in convalescence she lay
In a nursing home, day after day.
The good was put back into summer,
When she returned to where she belonged,
To her garden patch, Hunter and flowers,
To sit,
To be still,
To be ours.
Forgotten quanta
the neglecton an anyon
zero in the math—
particles once discarded
unlock quantum computers
Rising unobserved
they shimmer in golden glass
zig-zagging unseen—
how was brilliance unnoticed
in gobble-goop of a yawn
I too drift unheard
neglected in crowded rooms
my pulse fading slow—
a particle in shadow
longing to be recognized
nothing seems to last
flowers weep faded petals
a faint scent lingers
once blooming in bright color
my poems have lost their appeal
emotions wither
wilted words whirl in the wind
bereft of beauty
I strive to remain rooted
hoping for droplets of love
Eileen Manassian
will love be decrepit when
trust is just a word thrown when we cannot win fights,
an excuse rather than a gospel… or is it long before then?
will love be decrepit when
she is home waiting, and he is alone under neon lights,
both drinking, asking, “can we ever be in the same room again?”
when she cannot speak as chaos seep into her pen,
and he cannot sleep knowing they want different nights
when there's no words left to exchange, is love decrepit then?
will love be decrepit when
he tells lies to avoid explanations, and she overlooks them to avoid fights.
a facade of rose gold castle, but what comes after then?
the silence in the castle can blind us, when
we swallow our differences to avoid plights.
love doesn’t lie, but people in love do, is love decrepit then?
truth is never love’s friend, not when
love falters the minute truth bites.
when we ask “will love be decrepit when—”
—it's already decrepit then.
Care and love my tomcats from me desire,
As my neglect leaps from pan into fire.
They wait in silence till their patience tires.
in the wasteland of broken hearts
shattered mirrors line gardens
disheveled and neglected
where sunrays seldom enter
left to their own devices
they piece together
a false reality that’s
fraught with sadness
tangled with despair
and cursed with loneliness
yet somehow always manage
~ to carry on
AP: 1st place 2025
To you I'm just an afterthought
Endearing name that you forgot
A half remembered romance plot
A once frequented sacred spot
To you I'm just an alibi
Some one to cover up the lie,
for when you're with your ride or die
The hush of do not question why
To you I'm just a sideline thing
Someone to keep there in the wing
Who'll nurse the wound, remove the sting
To treat you like a hero king
To you I'm just a pastime game
You play when bored and feeling lame
A mundane chore to keep you tame
To cool your passion's burning flame
To me you're not even a thought
My mind is here; my heart is not
Your love has been erased, forgot
To me you are a dead end plot.
This truth to you is yet unknown
You're blind to signs that I have shown
One day you'll wake up all alone
Regretful thoughts all that you own
Eileen Manassian
I sense here some things sinister—a scent
of sulphur, sulking in a sultry pit;
a serpent’s hiss, expressed from space unlit;
a warm spell spilling from some seething vent;
I find now some things filthy—foul ferment
foaming, frothing; a gaseous, gurgling slit
discharging fetid, festering, sour spit;
malignant mold in cold, cracking cement;
So languid, loath, obtuse I trepidate
on into the black bowels of my home.
Gagging back a nausea’s tepid bubble,
shivering a shudder that won’t abate,
discover I a gory catacomb.—
Woah… I see well now how bad my trouble!
a desert, devoid of fruition
barren, from years of neglect
praying for rain.
Then you washed over me, and I bloomed
Stifled and gasping for affection
wanton for connection, but never satisfied
drowning in desire.
You breathed into me, and I gasped devotion.
Lost, foraging for meaning, for purpose
a foreigner to love's labors
begging for solace.
Your star appeared, to nurture me home.
Now I am a mystery-even to myself
an enigma-filled mirror,
reflecting on who l was.
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