Category: Poetry

Shelley’s Christmas Surprise

So Lisa and I came back from PAX Aus feeling all kinds of inspired about the creative scene in Australasia, and decided that we need to actually follow through on more of our ideas. Our first collaborative project (since the last murder mystery) is an Advent Calendar. Concept and art by Lisa, writing by me.

We’ll be updating it every day until Christmas, and asking for reader input as the story progresses – the album is public on Facebook if you want to participate.

It’s dark inside

Fatigue is but a word, so far removed
A shadow of the sweaty groans it brings,
When all I need is sleep, and yet unmoved,
I lie and fight his tugging at my strings.

My eyes are crumbling, weary mines of red,
And yet I cannot let the nightmare wake,
To sleep, perchance to usher in the dread,
I’m still aware. I’m vigilant… I break!

As silent shadows slink around my sight,
And blindness bids me stumble into sleep,
I lose my last connection to the light,
And all alone, in darkness do I creep.

And though I call them dreams, I know inside,
I sleep as Jekyll, but I stalk as Hyde!

 

This piece was written for Nika Harper’s Wordplay #14. The challenge was a sonnet, with the prompts “fading light” and “discovery.”

We, the victors

These hands,
Bent and broken,
Brutal tools of battle,
Rippling with rivulets of red,
Now claws.

No more,
The friends we lost,
It took them like the scythe
Our sisters, brothers, all to dust,
All dead.

We won,
Banners held high,
Yet still the blood was wet
As goblets were raised in triumph.
We won?

Tides turn.
It happened then,
The waters got too deep,
And we were stranded on a rock,
Too late.

Our fault.
We chose to fight.
No compromise was sought,
It takes two fools to stand on pride.
War came.

These hands,
The friends we lost,
Yet still the blood was wet
And we were stranded on a rock.
War came.

 

This piece was written for Nika Harper’s Wordplay #15. The challenge was a cinquain, with the prompts “weak hands” and “won the battle but started a war.”

Experiment One-point-oh

Said the Shaman, sharing solace,
“Leave the darker arts alone:
Time to mourn and time to conjure
Mix the two and you’ll be done.”

Said the acolyte, indignant,
Seething with the pain of loss:
“Ancient one, go stick your wisdom,
I, who mourn, don’t give a toss.

“I will wake the bleak enchantments,
Snare the wards that seal the dead!
I will raise her from her slumber –
Be the payment on my head.

“Sleeping ones, I call upon you,
Hear your mortal servant weep!
Yours the power, yours the glory
Yours to sow, and yours to reap –

“All I ask is one small favour,
In the matter of a girl,
Five-foot-five of soft perfection,
Though but one, she was my world.

“If your mercy would restore her –
Living, as she was before –
I would be your loyal vessel,
Though my powers maybe poor.

“K-thanks-bye,” the boy continued,
And the room to silence came.
The Shaman sighed “You’ve done it now.
Summoning is not a game.

“Foolish child, I tried to warn you,”
Spake he then, and turned away,
“Elder creatures make no bargains,
You are lost as well, this day.”

Soon the darkness overtook him,
Tendrils bearing him beneath,
Still she waits, his girl in heaven,
While he burns, without relief.

 

This piece was written for 13 Days 13 Shorts – a countdown to Halloween, using the theme of “Necromancer.” Check out the awesome submissions and join in the spooky fun!

Torea

My eyes can barely follow her motion, swooping down to pluck a stubborn shellfish from its once safe rocky perch. Only a blur, like some half-recognised shape in the darkness of our bedroom: shades drawn, no hint of starlight permitted inside. I stumble around the bed, trying not to wake you, trying not to let that waiting wooden bedpost leap longingly for my littlest toe, to conjure cunts and fucks and oh my Gods, and wake you, after all.

Yet still she falls, my imagination filling in the frames, a frazzled inbetweener – not even making minimum wage – so I can pretend to watch, and marvel at this graceful being, that I can’t even really see.