The Dangers of Mankind is Man
Mara’s hair colour touched by time, her voice hedged—struggling to find its way to me
She had once tried to kill herself.
My flippant thought: Did you succeed?
She looked as she had.
An abandoned relic, bopped-up, surfacing
in her drenched memories—Arbeit macht frei.
The stench of horror clings to her bare flesh,
worn as a wetsuit of near death,
unwashable, unforgettable—always
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Categories:
trauma, grandmother, grief, holocaust, irony,
Form: Free verse
BLOODLINE ECHOES
I walk with a weight that I never quite chose,
But somehow it fits, like the thorn on a rose.
The pain and the beauty, they bloom just the same—
Two sides of a story that whisper my name.
Born of a mother whose roots ran so deep,
But stolen at birth in a silence that still weeps.
They called it
...
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Categories:
trauma, addiction, culture, identity, mother
Form: Spoken Word
The wound that never heals but continues to grow
Skin broken cannot be repaired
Healing is possible but trauma stays their
Invisible to those with a privileged eye
Visible to those who still ache and cry
Skin will cover what the heart won't show
A pain felt by those who know
What it was like to be named ghetto
Time can heal but what if it don't
When the glue
...
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Categories:
trauma, discrimination, prejudice, race, racism,
Form: Free verse
I Left No Trace, In Empty Space
Three days ago, I was buried on
the ground as it seems!
A cascade of issues as the days go by.
The unrelenting sorrows and pain---
Weak, broken, desolation it brings!
I seized the world with open hands,
optimism, smile, love as much as could.
Full of hope, peace and wisdom.
Still joy would vanish out of sight.
I left no trace in
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Categories:
trauma, faith, inspirational, journey, life,
Form: Free verse
Trauma-Induced Dissociation
So, "let it ***ing rain."
"The death of us."
Drowned in fire and ice.
"Good knight"
(Obsidian butterfly) you broke my heart
But, you, (Snow white), shattered my heart, mind, and soul.
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Categories:
trauma, anger, betrayal, depression, mental
Form: Free verse
Listen
Words are just a wrapper—
Truth lives in the ache,
Not in the noise we speak,
But in what starts to break.
We often make remarks,
Wearing their grief like borrowed skin,
But fail to touch the fire,
That burns beneath within.
"I feel alone," we think we hear—
"I'm fearful. I'm not okay."
We answer, "I'm sorry,"
Then turn and walk away.
But somewhere in the
...
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Categories:
trauma, care, emotions, me, psychological,
Form: Free verse
A call for the oppressors downfall
Comfort wrapped in a blanket of security
Never fearing the chance of brutality
Only a freedom granted to those with fair skin
Greeted by the warmth of idiocy
Building a racist system of legacy
With followers who exhibit stupidity
But useful in killing democracy
To continue their self fulfilling prophecy
Of forced superiority
A politicians smile brings a darkness
Poisonous
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Categories:
trauma, body, discrimination, political, power,
Form: Free verse
Us be grateful for what?
Let them eat cake
But with no hands
And a mouth sewn shut
Why us
Why must we suffer with crumbs
And be grateful
To be grateful when slavery ended
When in fact it was they who started it
To feed us poison instead of the antidote
Then feign confusion to why it didn't work
The world sees you as a victim
And
...
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Categories:
trauma, discrimination, freedom, metaphor, prejudice,
Form: Free verse
Born to Rage
I woke with blood in my mouth
and no memory
of the scab that sealed the rasure.
I’m cat-spitting
dog-growling
peregrine-divebombing
rooster-flogging
badger-flipping
hornet-stinging
wolverine-ripping mad.
I fired the sun for showing up late
cursed the fridge light until
yogurt soured in terror.
God called
I let it ring twice.
The therapist said breathe
so I swallowed my tongue
now I speak
in the language of things with canines.
coyote-howl syntax
vulture-vowel decay
the guttural grammar
of
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Categories:
trauma, anger, animal, childhood, grief,
Form: Dramatic Monologue
Thirteen
I found her as a whispered line in an editorial
stuck on the silk folds of a silver jubilee
like regret.
She had bled once in a different continent
A red thread pulled taut at thirteen
Doctors sealed the loom forever.
I was thirteen too, still learning the
topography of my brown skin.
My hands trembled like birdcage doors
unsure whether to open or
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Categories:
trauma, sorrow,
Form: Free verse
The Border Woman
The old woman sat,
eyes like pools of dreams,
and imagined.
If generations of pain can be passed down
through bone and blood,
why can’t love live there as well?
She touches her face tentatively,
tracing the line of her jaw—strong,
etched with the strength of those who came before.
Her teeth bite into questions,
the kind no one wants to ask.
But she does.
She always
...
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Categories:
trauma, deep,
Form: Free verse
I miss my mom
I miss my mom.
I don’t remember much about her,
It’s been over a decade and a half since
I last saw her,
Before she faded into
The person she’s become now.
But I remember when she was kind,
I remember when she loved us,
I miss my mom.
I miss swingset rides,
Her pushing me,
Higher and higher,
Into the sky.
Snapshots, memories,
A blink of her smile,
I
...
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Categories:
trauma, abuse, anger, angst, daughter,
Form: Free verse
We Didn’t Just Merge Frequencies
We Didn’t Just Merge Frequencies
(Poem Type: Lyric or Free Verse)
?
Verse 1 – Spoken, low & deliberate
We didn’t just merge frequencies —
we remade constellations,
spat in the face of fate,
then redrew the sky
with bleeding hands
and crooked halos.
We changed the story mid-sentence.
Ripped pages out of history
and set them on fire —
just to feel the warmth
of our own mythology.
?
Chorus
...
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Categories:
trauma, devotion, emotions, inspirational love,
Form: Free verse
Before the Language of the Senses
Touch me
where I do not tremble.
Make of me a scent
without a name.
Let sound become
what breath once was
before it learned to speak.
Let the tongue
forget
its hunger.
Listen to me
with the skin of thought.
I seek no salvation,
only time
that vibrates
beneath the skin.
...
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Categories:
trauma, beauty, deep, inspiration, spiritual,
Form: Free verse
Not Her Fault
"It was your dress," they replied
Was it? The ripped fabric cried
The 5-year-old's laughter silenced that day
Couldn't even scream, "I'm just a child," and ran away
"It was your shorts," they claimed
Was it? The torn seams proclaimed
The 10-year-old's dreams shattered, flamed
Couldn't even cry, "I'm just a girl," with shame
"It was your clothes," they blamed
Was it? The cloth
...
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Categories:
trauma, 12th grade, woman, writing,
Form: Free verse
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