Best Poems Written by Josephine Scott

Below are the all-time best Josephine Scott poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

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Love, version 1: reflections on personal experiences of love, inspired by reading bell hooks

Wounded by its lack
Distrustful of it 
Inured to its absence 
In thrall to its allure
Fooled by its simulacrum
Estranged from it 
Paralysed by fear of losing it
Inexorably exposed to it 
Resolved against it 
Consumed by longing for it
A scholar to its foreign texts 
A slave to its compulsions 
Compelled to search for it
Forever 
Hopeful

Copyright © Josephine Scott | Year Posted 2025


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Alone

Too painful to hope
And foolish to dream
Turn away from it all
That's easier it seems

Forget about heart
Abandon the soul
Lead with the head
Forge a new goal

To shut out the hope
Protect from the pain
Rewrite the dreams
The rules of the game

Send it down deep
This unbearable need
Cover it over
No more shall it bleed

Less painful this way
No love to be yearned
Contentment enough
Alone can be learned

Copyright © Josephine Scott | Year Posted 2025

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Not Bad Enough - if reading this helps even one person feel less alone and seen, I'll be happy

My pain is not big enough
All around me other people lay their pain bare
Exposing their insides to the world
I witness, I watch
Learning only that 
My pain is too ugly and not bad enough
Mine to bear alone 

My pain is unfinished, unpolished
Who am I to lay claim to such distress
My pain is not special enough, not shameful enough
I perform too well, my pain hidden from view 
My words are not adequately evocative or provocative 
My despair is mundane, boring
Not worthy of attention 

My pain is self made; my own worst enemy 
Not deserving of pity 
A self-defeating paradox, a self-fulfilling prophecy
Nothing to be rewarded or tended to here 
My grief, unremarkable; my sorrow, too ordinary 
The unbearable pain of my existence: an overused cliché
Nothing special in my brokenness - not broken enough  

My pain is not bad enough - yet must be edited to spare others
Hide the depths of despair, the tears, the dark moments 
Lest I be too much and simultaneously not enough
Too sensitive, not strong enough to bear the weight
Yet, strong enough to hold the pain of others
To bear witness, to soothe, to contain
A paradox of pain and self loathing
Poetry of self pity the only salve

Copyright © Josephine Scott | Year Posted 2025

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Lesson

To trust is to risk betrayal
To need is to risk emptiness 
To hope is to risk rejection 
To feel is pain

Head too busy
Heart too heavy
Skin too thin
Feel too much

Turn away from it all
Pull up the drawbridge 
Turn off the lights 
Detach and numb

Deny feeling
Reject need
Stifle hope
Trust no one

Copyright © Josephine Scott | Year Posted 2025

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Inexorable

I want you to come to me
Like the moon comes to the sun
Like an inevitability
Like dawn after deepest night 

I want you to come to me
Like waves breaking on the shore
Like a natural order
Like calm after a raging storm

I want you to come to me
Like the moth drawn to the flame 
Like irresistibility 
Like sweet release from exquisite pain

I want you to come to me 
The oxygen breathing life to my fire
Like symbiosis
The reciprocal synergy of desire

Copyright © Josephine Scott | Year Posted 2025


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Tomorrow

So heavy
Too heavy to hold up my head
I rest it on my arms
Too tired to be today 

So weary 
Too weary to pay much attention 
To the chatter and the questions 
That beset me today 

To hope, to dream 
To wish for better 
All of these things escape me today 

No sun can be glimpsed 
Through the dark gloom 
Of today.

And so
I wait for tomorrow 

Copyright © Josephine Scott | Year Posted 2025

Details | Josephine Scott Poem

Shame

Hot on the heels of need
A feeling like no other
A crawling, spreading sensation
Insides leaking out 
Too painful to show
Too needy
Too sticky 
Repulsive and ugly
Overwhelming urge to hide 
Curl up; defend with rejection 
Soothe with avoidance
The bliss, however temporary, of numbness 
Until
Need is awoken again 

Copyright © Josephine Scott | Year Posted 2025

Details | Josephine Scott Poem

Love, version 2

Wounded
Distrustful 
Inured
Enthralled 
Fooled
Estranged 
Paralysed
Exposed
Resolved 
Consumed 
Scholar
Slave
Compelled
Searching 
Hopeful

Copyright © Josephine Scott | Year Posted 2025

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