It's the 2025 Poem-A-Week Challenge! (This is a *poems only* thread.)

[Wonderer67]

Animal Tracks On A February Morning

Three pronged tracks
On the snow covered culvert
A Mercedes logo
Or busted peace sign
Without the circle

Or maybe one giant
Middle finger

Tracks start with the beginning
And lead to an end
Unless you're a bird
And can go trackless
It got me to think about the tracks
I've left in my life

Takes me a minute
To put two and two together
The trickle of Coopalong creek
Providing background noise

It clicks...
Blue Heron tracks

I know just what it's been doing
Just upstream of our culvert
Fishing
Looking for breakfast
Doing things that herons do

I thought maybe they migrated

I come off the hill
Crunching crunchy snow
Breath, steamy
Visible in the cold air

Evidence of what happens
When I'm not there

As if my "all important presence”
Is really all that important

5/52

https://imgur.com/a/U2KGwmU

 

[Lily Peg]

Winter tale

There will be flowers in the morning
Crocuses budding by the thousands
Spread like a vast carpet of colour
Against the cold grey winter skies.

Such joy! Such a time for peace
So many waiting to return home
So many left bereft and forgotten
Such sadness lost in the frost

 

[LustyScribe]

The One
Her whimpers wake me
I rise with her cries
"Easy, honey; a dream, it seems.
Go back to deep sleep.'

We walk and we talk
Sometimes we sit, silent, still.
Netflix and chill until
We crawl to bed, half-dead.

In my mind, the years behind.
The storms weathered together
Have all run into one.
How many more...before...?

My friend, beginning to end;
How would I cope, keep hope?
Why's the one who wants me
Most my dog, not my wife?

Week 7, poem 1, total 7

 

[goddessofglee]

"Velvet night, Souls entwined!"

Wet lips on skin in an intense embrace,
Beneath the stars, we share this sacred space.
The moonlight casts its glow upon her face,
Illuminating beauty time can't erase.

A rising heat from every heated caress,
Each whispered word ignites a soft distress.
A sigh escapes—like silken bonds... duress.
Our hearts entwined confess what words suppress.

Wrists entwined and ankles tightly bound,
In trust we drown where secrets are profound.
Within her haunting eyes, my soul is found,
Two spirits merge as one without a sound.

Heat rises high—the moon descends in flight,
Bodies joined beneath the velvet night.
Dreams conjoined take flight into the light,
As candle flickers dim against the blight.

Night encroaches, shadows softly creep, Cool winds caress where fiery passions sleep.
Two bodies burn like torches, love runs deep,
And darkness wraps us close before we leap.

Moans abating, echoes softly wane,
Passion sated, yet longing lingers plain.
In midnight’s hush, our bond remains unslain,
For love endures through pleasure, loss, and pain.


Poem №4

 

[MrMrsMrsMr]

Scorched Earth
Rape & Plunder
Fuckem Over it
with Love.

praise be God AmaElonica
and his muppet King.

Night in white water falls
loosening my throat I cry

out in my sleep “Where
are We the people?”

I see the gulf of America in
the great divide between

consent and Non consent
human and Non Human.

Sex has too long been
about the dick moves

between men’s ears
and thighs,

Week 7, Poem 1, Total 9

 

[Tzara]

Video Art

We see legs walking—
blue jeans, black high tops,
asphalt (none too smooth),
an off-white wall
of concrete blocks.
The legs appear to move
left to right, but it's
a travelling shot,
so the actual motion
is the wall. The legs
seem never to go anywhere.
A discarded soda can,
some crumpled newpaper,
perhaps a cigarette butt
enter right, scroll left
and out of the frame
like little everyday facts
that are barely perceived
before being forgotten.
So like the gallery patrons
who stop, watch, fidget,
read the artist's statement,
then exit for the next room
where a black cube emits
soft cawing noises one can
just hear over the faint
hum of the DVD player
as the legs tirelessly
walk and walk and walk.

Week 8 : Poem 1 : Total 8

 

[LustyScribe]

Parking Lot Musings
All that's wrong,
All that's right
Manifested here.
Obnoxious fools
In trucks Daddy bought,
Rear windows, tailgates
And bumpers are
Quilts of convictions
On bumper stickers.

Sickly sweet puffs, clouds.
Not the Marlboro Man;
Vape's the new "Look at me!"
Their new right,
To choke with smoke;
Their child coughs, wheezes,
But Mom does as she pleases,
And their stink sticks
On me.

Uncorraled carts
Because we can't be asked
Can't be tasked
To put things away;
What would your mom say?
But we're busy, too busy
Loading Cheetoes in the car
To walk 15 steps.
Besides, we only walk
On the treadmill
At the gym
By the mirrors
So we're seen and see.

Is this barometer,
Ignored arrows,
A hundred lights,
Potholes and fights;
Is this who we are?
Busy people buying
Spending, amending
Our lists to meet our lusts
To be filled?
Are carts of carbs
All we care to carry?

Out by the road,
Sitting with his sign
His eyes plead
As his pride bleeds.
He sees, hears, feels
Our scorn.

We rush in,
Ignore our way out.
"We'd help," we say
"But it's bad seed.
He'd spend it on beer,
On meth or weed."

So we hustle home,
Bud Light to the fridge,
Prescriptions put away
And eat Taco Bell
Because after all that,
I'm too tired to cook

Week 8, poem 1, total 8

 

[Lily Peg]

Whirligig

Press your face against the window
Hold the toy and dance the day
Push your tiny hand into the box
Taste the rain - run out to play
Watch the trees swing and creak
See the leaves cross the earth
Smell the fungi, soil and damp
Hear the rushing, hustling surf
Run the path and race the line
Spin the toy held in your hand
Sail the windmill, ground the flower
Spin the toy at your command

Words do whirl and interlard
Thoughts change, images break
Like our toys and our hearts
Take on different meanings sake
Ideas, wisdom, common sense
Fail by the wayside in absent time
Toy in hand spin with the wind
Watch the cycles, catch the rhyme

 

[MrMrsMrsMr]

Move Fast. Break Things.

With a face like cardboard
the special Government
Employee’s email, tells me
I don’t need a spare tyre,
the A.I says it’s awful, think
of the planet, a spare tyre is
a fraud, you don’t need fraud
it is wasteful to carry excess
rubber in your trunk.

The very next day, the email
asks my handbrake to justify
what it did last week? It goes
on to declare failure to justify
will result in being semi-fired
which means kind of fired?

The day after that the traffic
lights are fired. I am informed
traffic lights are corrupt, they
can’t be trusted. Who controls
them? They are evidence of
intrusion in our lives. People
don’t like them.

They are Right. Traffic lights
are mindless bureaucracy!

&
what do I know? I’m not a car
Mechanic? Intersections don’t
design cars. People will work
intersections out with common
sense and horns.

Grownups and intersections
don’t need oversight.

The next day, I notice my brakes
are missing, I am told; going fast
is good for chainsaw business!

I am petrified. I can’t move. There
is no longer a brake pedal. How
will I pump the breaks when wet?
My husband says, don’t be silly,
just think of it like being fucked
in the ass.


Week 8, Poem 1, Total 9

 

[Lily Peg]

Academic Pandemic

Theorise - debate
Technologise fate
Emphasise calling
Patriarchal state

Formulate each star
Defend the nearest war
Decorate and honour
Quantify nature's law

Operationalise the terms
Categorise each part
Reduce feelings to an object
Cognition without heart

Clarify the aims
Maximise the gains
Validate or ruminate
Academic brains

Practice the sci-ence
From an ivory tower
Load up the waggons
With knowledge=power

 

[Bn2f]

The Sustenance You Seek


Surrender
I submit
Unto my back lying prone
Cartilage and bone - the hot blood sustenance you seek
You beast

Eat.
Eat me all.
Feast on this body
Take me raw, swallow my whole
Carnivore

Finished
I’m beyond done
Wrinkled sheets, sweat stains the remains
Nothing left in wake of you for scrap seeking scavengers
Praise! Hail! The apex predator

 

[Angeline]

America

The flag and anthem remain but the concept is evaporating.


Week 8, Poem 1, Total 9

 

[D_K_Moon]

Voices In Dreams

Voices in dreams,
Words I cannot understand,
Faces hidden,
Always looking away,
Dreams I cannot remember,
Feelings of being,
Empty and alone.

 

[Wonderer67]

Suicide Road

I drove home
On suicide road

I shoulda known better

But I proved I could do it
Over and over

The night was approaching
A February orange sunset
Off to my left
Striated clouds
Slate gray
Between orange and the blue of night

Intersecting with the dying color
Of farm field after farm field

An Ocean Between Us by
The War on Drugs was playing on my playlist
Gentle on my ears
And tranquil on my soul

A perfect soundtrack

I’d beaten it again

https://imgur.com/a/tW2DH9b

 

[Tzara]

Koi Pond

its surface stippled
by soft rain and undulant
from the slow shifting
of their sleek bodies beneath—
there, the bright flash of color!

Week 9 : Poem 1 : Total 9

 

[Wonderer67]

The Most Februaryest Day Ever

It was light out
But the sun never shone

The sun barely scraped against the horizon
I could hear it
Distant iron oxide rasping against
The edges of mother earth

There were no bright colors
Just blonde cornfields
Fuzzy with stubble
Sticking above the dirty snow

Brown trees of the woods
Scratching at the clouds
The vanishing plane between earth and sky

In the midst of this
I split kindling
Making big logs
Into smaller logs

A prisoners task?

Then those small logs were split
Into the thinnest strips
And sticks
I could manage with my axe
And hatchet

A hypnotic endeavor

I achieved some higher state

I could see my breath
And didn’t feel cold

Rather, I felt warm
Full

I wasn’t blowing out the fires
I was ready to start them

It was the most February day imaginable
And I celebrated it
Cuz, fuck
Tomorrow might not ever come

6/52

 

[LustyScribe]

The Unliving Room
Alone at last in the living room
I hear the house heave a sigh
As if it feels my sense of doom
As if it senses time go by.

Why do we call this room that?
This isn’t life, and it isn't giving
Me memories I'll look back at
When I'm almost done living.

Roku, YouTube, and Hulu too;
Other people's thoughts and dreams
Their sins and stuff they've been through;
Lives they've lived for me, it seems.

I should get up, get up and out,
I need to breathe, walk, have fun
I think I'll see what life's about
Once I finish the Lost reruns

Week 9, poem 1, total 9

 

[SpermFactory]

My first divorce scene
excluded a prenup.

So unexpected, you’re home
a weekend early!

Trussed and blind folded,
I imagine, you are smiling,

as I say, “…it’s for a play”

“it’s called method acting.”

“I deny everything.”

“She’s your friend..?”

“we haven’t done anything…”
yet.

I hear you rustling in your bag,
Then a click? Then your reply,

“A body is a line, and your line says
you’re fucked.”

in the background I can hear her,
your friend, sniggering.

(The Fucking Bitch)! You, your friend
and Our marriage exit stage left.

(8)

 

[Angeline]

Hollywood, Florida 1960

We walked
under vibrant blue skies
listening to the ocean
calling us louder, louder
until we arrived, waves
welcoming us like thunder,
but fizzy in bubbly giggles
around me when I sat,
ecstatic toes dug in wet sand.

You'd read your Daily Forward,
spectacles perched on your nose
and I'd collect shells, watch hermit crabs
scuttle then disappear. It was magical,

green-blue forevers stretching
to the horizon, birds shrieking
and coconut lotion smells, flip flop
walks and pineapple spears
from a fruit stand, a world

of oranges and jars of honey, waxy
bits of hive sunk in them like treasure
in those long ago grandfather days
recollected from another century.



Week 9, Poem 1, Total 10

 

[Bn2f]

PHUCANCER


I’m done receiving offerings of earnest prayers.
I’m not impressed by news of upcoming medical advances.
Growth, by any other measure, would be a good thing,
But today my son should be 8.
I miss his goofy face and made up dances.

I found my middle school bully on Facebook
And reached out to bury my anger and be friendly.
Looking gaunt, she said she was thankful to be in remission.
Even revisiting a pain still raw
I wouldn’t wish your affliction on any of my worst enemies.

Knowledge of your existence adds to my fears of seeing a doctor.
I sense your exuberance to show yourself upon my latest breast exam.
Unimaginable! Desiring myself to kill! Yet…
I wish you breathing life like the lives you’ve taken,
So to strangle your cell dead with my bare hands.

 

[MrMrsMrsMr]

‘The Art Of The Meal’

Nobody needs a kitchen when you already have a dining room.

Week 9, Poem 1, Total 10

 

[D_K_Moon]

Forbidden Thoughts

I want to - touch you,
My words,
They whisper,
What I want,
Desire,
My pen,
Is my finger,
Touching,
With my words,
Arousing,
Forbidden words,
Secrets,
Wanton thoughts,
Expressing,
A need,
A hunger,
Feel my thoughts,
My words,
My pen,
My finger,
Touching,
There.

 

[Tzara]

On the Process of Composition

Raindrops, window pane,
my keyboard quiescent.

I sip some more tea
and wait for one bright image
to nestle here on my desk.
​

Week 10 : Poem 1 : Total 10

 

[Bn2f]

Bonnie & Clyde


Distinction between what is fog, what is clear
Chose you to burn from fear of coffin
To rest in urn these tears come often
And truth on my sleeve responds to the fear…

What becomes of the memories of one when there’s no mourning place to be visited?
Under the night’s skies and beneath waterfalls hold the echoing scenes of our lust
Bonnie and Clyde would envy the heated crimes of spontaneity committed by us
Alas, it now remains solely in my heart and mind that you once existed.

 

[Lazaran]

Fates of Muses

Where have they gone
Those happy muses
That once inspired
Destroyed by war
Displaced by Fire
Deported by ICE

So much loss
So much lost

Shame!!!