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Best Poems Written by Nicole Lauren

Below are the all-time best Nicole Lauren poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Nicole Lauren Poem

The Fermi Paradox

My dad took my nine-year-old hand
and led me outside to look at the night sky.
“I’d give you the stars,” and he meant it, but I didn’t want them,
because they aren’t ours. My new telescope showed me blurry planets, 
far out of reach,
and I asked him about aliens.
My dad told me that they’re out there,
that somewhere out there, someone is wondering about me, but we 
just haven’t met yet, and might never will, and I asked why.
Why haven’t we met?
And my dad told me about time, and chance, and space, and distance,
but I was nine, in fourth grade, and to me,
when I don’t see someone I’m looking for,
it’s because they’re avoiding me.

I wouldn’t want to be human either, if I had a choice;
we’ve been doing it all wrong.
Maybe, somewhere out there, someone is telling stories about us, calling us
a cautionary tale, for how we’re destroying ourselves. 
I hope we’re a warning.
I don’t know what scares me more:
that hate is human, or that it isn’t.
To you, a million lightyears away, I hope we never meet.
I hope you visit my grave once when you arrive, you might even know what it means.
I hope you’re better than us.
I don’t know what scares me more:
that we’re alone, or that we aren’t.
Maybe, somewhere out there, someone is doing it right. 

I hope someone is doing it right.

Details | Nicole Lauren Poem

The Goldfinch

The finch dances merry, weaving feathers into music
That spills from overeager beaks and drips light onto slick wings 
Which beat in time with the song, fluttering, flittering, 
Finding life in the sky and where the ground meets it, turning,
Twisting note to the bright forgetful where the now is all
And the past does not exist.
Must it be so wonderful? To let go
And float up on thermals over sunset summer parking lots 
And the people in them, looking up, or down, or anywhere
Except each other, but freedom tastes not-sweet and all encompassing, like
Air, like blood, like the gooseflesh on your arms when that wind catches
And whispers asking to play in words no one can repeat.
How terrible must it be, to be afraid of the fall?
Because I am not afraid of endings, little bird, and you and I
Will fall forever up until we reach the sky,
And when it ends I will be glad to have been there for the beginning of it.
Why fear failing, why fear falling, when the ground will always catch you?
And as the crane jumps on stick feet to the unawareness of dinosaurs,
I too forget waking up. 
How terrible it must be to fear falling asleep!
Because the sky is blue, my dear, and there is no greater honor
Than being a part of that hue someday—
People slave over paper and skin and lightning in metal
Sparking over clumsy fingers meant for braiding grass.
The small bird laughs and flees from the hawk, the raptor, 
Watching rapturously the give and take of prey
And the forgiveness of both sides.
How terrible it must be to be afraid of endings, finch,
And to be aware of them!
But I refuse to mourn myself, and so when I fall, 
I will be glad to have flown at all.

Details | Nicole Lauren Poem

Twice a Day

The clock hangs on the wall, dead
And unmoving. 
Its hands grasp silently at its black borders, 
Pulling uselessly at peeling black letters.
Analog?
Maybe, but it doesn’t matter.
The numbers blink with eyes made of lines. 

It’s out of battery— has been forever,
Since time stood still and the gears ground to a halt,
Left alone for better or worse, 
Forgotten for neither.
The arrows point at their final resting place:
11:58:43.
Two minutes.
No, one minute and seventeen seconds. 
There’s a big difference.
That’s what it said the last time you looked up, 
Bored and searching for an end.
The hands have always been there, you know, 
Pronounced dead at eleven fifty-eight and forty-three seconds.
It’s a blameless accusation, a reminder—
A warning for what, you’ll never know.

T-minus one minute and seventeen seconds.
Maybe the earth will be long empty 
Next time those pointing fingers move,
Slowly,
Inexorably,
Forever inching forward towards the twelve.

It’s night outside, and bright, and the
City is loud enough to drown out the ticking.
You watch the clock, left
Broken out of apathy, and 
For a heartbeat,
You can’t remember which numbers it was on.

Clocks that don’t move don’t tick.

A slow change is still a change.
A slow end is still an end.
If the second hand moved, would you notice?

11:58:44.

Details | Nicole Lauren Poem

Wakeless

With a heavy heart and an early start and no moment’s rest from the crashing dark
The bucking beast beneath his brow cries into the night.
The rain streaks down to join the crowd of cheering, sobbing waves that sound
Like masses burned and baptized— still the ship runs on.
And flowing ebb does spin its web to make his sandy grave instead
But he pushes on in search of dawn long since run aground.

The lightning strikes— crash! 

And here come down its raging crowns of mist and foam that sweetly drown 
The sailor foolish enough to try and tame the steadfast waves.
A moment’s light bestows the sight upon the captain’s endless fight
As man and beast in mindless fear are nothing before the sea.
And skin of clay all melts away as earthly sins are hid from day
But this captain’s made of more than dirt and he opens his mouth to sing.

The wave pounds hard the deck, who’s shards release into the nighttime stars
But still the sailor laughs and grins, his hands slick fast with salt.
The wheel it turns with cold that burns the hands of the man, who’s long since learned
From stormy nights and a freezing life how to be one with the sea,
Who’s fear-fueled sweat is ocean wet and smells like the briny, seaweed threat
Of lonely ends found on careless waves under stars that wave goodbye.

And still his ark alights so stark when the sky casts down those frenzied sparks.
Man caught in the endless war between the sky and the angry sea,
Where rain lashes fierce like fiery tears through the captain’s old and weathered beard
And he laughs and sings along alone to the weeping of the clouds
That vault his church, the long-lived search, and pious and faithful is his urge
To die in storms that wail and howl with voices made of sirens.

Oh, a eulogy for euphony! This world’s distinct cacophony
Drowns him dry on land that cries and begs for his return.
But captains stay with ships away, long far from love or earth,
And fickle seas receive their own and never end the search!

Details | Nicole Lauren Poem

The Calliope's Song

We open scene, a moonless dream 
Ensconced in night held safe from light
And yet a mind of the keenest kind
Tells tales that tower of daylight hours:

With fleetest foot and fur of soot
The cat runs on, on rooftops long
And splashing paint shows colors quaint
To cover sight’s most natural white—

And flash to sky from far on high
With wings worn where West meets wet air
And formless birds repeat things heard
While blue surrounds with absent ground—

Oh, deja vu, see futures true
With features blurred by Carroll words
And yet the scene will once be seen
And logic spins samara skins—

All on your own, an endless home
Deep doorways stretch in lines yet sketched
By black-ink pen and rod-filled in
All shades of fear that warns they’re near—

And faceless men in groups of ten
All watch the skies with eyeless eyes
And when your neck is craned to check
The sky sees back with eyes full black—

The forest runs with legs of sun
With creatures new, unreal, you knew
But real inside your head they hide
When beeping chime foretells the time—

And colors flash through shades of ash
With pictures drawn approaching dawn
When eyelids blink before you think 
And it ends—

Details | Nicole Lauren Poem

Untitled

Does the feeling left linger on the tip of your tongue?
Looking for sense in these empty-full strokes
To overstep bounds missed in the rush
Begging to see behind the puppeteer’s eyes
      Too quick, it cries, the feeling of void
The long-left loss of nothingness bright
Impression, mimicry, this blurry unrest
Like running the red-light period, stop,
Only to renege, try it once more.
It’s tightness of lungs, jumping the gun,
Skipping the top, lonely step
      Hitting the ground without knowing how
Should there be structure? Should there be rhyme?
On its side, upside down, the reversing of lines.
You stumble, overstep, move on, return
Try once more, but something hurts
To see it, comprehend it, silently
    	 Out of sync, out of time
      Speeding up losing words slow it down
Isn’t something missing, empty, gone?
Once you see it, it’s lost, one thought.
     God growing form from out of the fog
You stumble, the tongue-trick tripwire, return;
The egress of theme, the excess of feeling
Unknown, undone, forgotten, yet keening
To be seen in the light of those bright hundred suns;
The rhythm percussive, disrupted, clipped
Cut short by the brush, this eccentric love
If only to cover it up with the deep.

There is something missing, voided, gone,
But nothing to see beyond.




*this poem is written entirely without the letter 'a'

Details | Nicole Lauren Poem

Selfish

the judge implores me: raise your right hand.
do you swear to lie?
the scalpel pulls my skin back, flaying eyes
vivisect me on the witness stand
for the crime of feeling anything other 
than confidence.

my lips are sewn together with red thread,
a gag order from my mother's mother
whose mother smiled
when she said big girls don't cry.
it's passed down in my blood
80 generations of women who always had to try
just a little harder than anyone else.
my mother looked me in the eyes
to tell me that it's selfish to be sad,
and i haven't cried since.

i am not diamond,
but stone is good enough,
and if i was any less i would shatter
into a million mirror shards
that reveal a seven-year-old who feels far too much,
who has never been the rock for anyone
at all.

it's selfish, maybe, still
i've locked her in my skull where she'll be safe,
where she can't escape, but she beats at the back of my teeth,
begging to be free,
and i don't know how much longer i can hold her.
she rests on the tip of my tongue
in dark mornings and street-lit nights,
her name burns the back of my throat and
crawls up to sleep in the roots of my eyes
because i can't bring myself
to say it
and set her loose.
she tastes like salt and copper—
acceptance wasn't made for me.
i can't let her be seen.

i will hide this part of me until it hides itself.




(the truth is that i'm scared.)

Details | Nicole Lauren Poem

Consumption

Unhinge your jaw, snake, what’s a little more?
You’re eating worlds faster than they make them
And nothing fills you better than a tale of love and war.

You’re ravenous, really, making feasts out of beasts.
You’re every monster’s monster and your hunger never dies
As your shadow stretches over bones you’ve bleached.

Jormungand’s ribs poke like toothpicks in your teeth,
Tying twine ‘round your molars ‘til gaps and the string
Melt to baleen and bone, fangs unused and unseen.

You sift through the dead and your previous meals
Searching for something to take off the edge
Of the wound in your skull that never quite heals.

Come on, snake, devour, it’s all you can do—
You cannibalize the length of your life
When you’ve run out of ways to avoid the truth.

You see thousands of times but won’t open your eyes
‘Cause real life constricts but in mirrors you’re free,
And your hunger hurts no one when you’re eating lies.

Third-person you swallow your tail without help.
The snake, ouroboros, that endless decay;
You’ve consumed every lie and are left with yourself
And you realize too late you ate your whole life away.

Details | Nicole Lauren Poem

Nostalgia

To speak to a snake from beneath your sheets–
This hissing, slithering, serpentine gaze;
The cadence of patience, your eyes it meets,
And sings to the days long lost in that haze.
It stands in your fears, and brushes these walls–
The soft and the silent, your self it shapes;
In seconds of stupor it sighs to your calls,
Resistance to hesitance, those sacred shades.
A shrine to shelter these sordid scales, see–
See this sense, the snake and its sympathy.