Final Poems

Selfish Over Selfless (S.O.S)

Trying to let go, hold close, what is mine.

Yours to hold, consoled rose, where is mine?

Create where fate and fortune misalign.

Oft told, soon find, in throws all that is mine

Time may just tell, after space mates with hell.

Heaven knows, Angels withhold, who is mine.

In passages pens pray, forged roles made

Budding chapters, foretold woes, which is mine?

One day courage great, peace and poise maintained.

And heart so bold, must impose, this is mine.

NC

Plus One

All

Throughout

day's Autumn

Love possessed loss,

Palming midnight hours

Haunted caress cowers

Dawn hauls a tale of caution

Staunchly approaching 2nd thermal law

Practiced, quandary withdrawn chaos.

Reverie must pay- priced at shadow's cost

Bondage to all lost, retains then- gone, now

False truths shelter blame, housing disheveled thoughts

In order- Fault, not good enough

Propped notions, renounce cause;

Coiling knees run common

To beg, walk, or crawl Down washed waters,

Night drops

Fall.

NC

 Ruins of Broughton Still waiting

As time has grown

Reaching the long arm of the Lord

Undertake short-comings

And curious downfalls

Where lowly spirits pace

Mulling, never having the opportunity

To do so from grace.

Memories shrined in concrete slabs

Citizens of a promised land, roaming the surface

Echoing thrills for a promising future, heeded in the forest. NC

Living Suicide I'd like to

Kill myself

Possessive Me

My-

Self

To recognize

Not find,

To think

beyond, not behind

An idea founded on broken self impression. I, seized

Perfect self expression

Seek decease

From a diseased brain

Torments the mind

Like pious plots

Overthrow the seat of the throne. NC

April's Fool

Compelled to think

Be without thought

Ruminating in momentous pause.

Nothing will come of nothing,

If I come walk this way-

A heavier task could not have been imposed;

Suspending time hardly shoulders the weight.

Over shoulders where we recognize mistakes,

Assuming position where hearts are often misplaced.

Still, love is too young to know what conscience is...

Never sought to enlist as soldier, but always fought in its place;

To fit the mold, overlook the cracks in the clay.

NC

Good Grief

Grief carries with it the undone

Retrofitted into new experiences

Overtly cradled by second chances

Wherewithal the bounty is lonesome;

Trusting the process, while skeptic of patience -

Holding on is letting go, in equal and opposite directions.

NC

The Trail

How quickly

The road traveled

Vines with unweeded mistakes

Brushes of secrets

Make deadly any escape.

Hollow bearings

and tattered remains,

In deed

No one would claim.

Lurking heart

Eerie judgement

Passerby fear,

Grounds for either Truth or dare

Hidden figures lament,

Paying the price where no currency is spent

And horror resides in the distance apart

Making all the difference

On the road not taken

Spotting only redress from afar.

NC

Meta In these pastures The past allures, All that drifts, never gone. An ocean of space The only concept of time

Vastness, a reminder I am but a small thought in a bigger mind. Vested with synonymous power, Foundation for design. NC

Bedside Window They waved In a somber breeze I said good- Bye to the trees that uplift me Rooted in Knowing, My shelter comes from above And feelings Shaded in, Make a body of light complete. Chastised shadows Overcast the soul window Time crystallized- Hello The hardest goodbye Residual longings left behind Evaporate you to sift through mine, Within the hourglass A turn of hand welcomes every lapse. NC

Elegy to September

The golden days of summer fade to grey,

As shadows lengthen, creeping through the trees.

The warmth of August, now so far away,

Gives way to whispers on a cooler breeze.

The leaves, once bright, now tumble to the ground,

Their colors dulled by autumn’s quiet hand.

The air grows crisp, and silence wraps around,

A prelude to the frost that claims the land.

The sun sinks lower, slower in the sky,

Its fading light a memory of fire.

And though the world prepares to say goodbye,

September lingers, filled with soft desire.

With every shiver, every falling leaf,

The echoes of the summer still remain.

But in the chill, there stirs a quiet grief—

The winter waits beyond this fleeting strain.

Sara Lando

Fog Catchers

We build frames in the mist,

thin, trembling screens

to catch what drifts unseen.

The fog rolls in—

silent, indifferent,

and we stand there waiting,

arms outstretched,

hoping to hold something

that slips through fingers like breath.

There is no rain,

no steady downpour,

just the weight of what isn’t,

the grey space between knowing and nothing.

We place our nets in the unknown,

expecting answers to gather,

to form droplets we can drink,

but all we hold is a faint dampness,

a trace of what we never had.

How much of ourselves

do we give away in the waiting?

How many questions rise like fog,

dissipating before we can speak them aloud?

Yet still we wait,

our nets straining against the void,

catching only shadows,

each droplet a whisper

of what was never there.

Sara Lando

Seamless

There was a line, once,

where I ended and you began—

a boundary,

a flicker, a seam,

a ripple between us

thin as breath,

like the edge of dusk

blurring into night.

I stood at the threshold of us,

unsure whether to cross.

Somewhere, without warning,

the line vanished.

Your breath became the air I breathe,

your skin, the map

of my own hands.

There is no shape to this,

no edge to step from.

We are the hum of overlapping sounds,

a rhythm stitched into silence.

I lose myself in the way

your shadow bends into mine,

how the air between us

becomes a single exhale.

Where do you begin?

Where did I fade?

Limerence,

liminal,

that place we inhabit now,

where the distance no longer matters,

where the pull is not a choice

but gravity—

where we are less two people

and more one movement,

a wave curling onto itself,

rolling and dissolving

against the shore.

Caught in the slipstream

of wanting and being wanted,

in the weightlessness

of never knowing

where you end

and I begin.

The horizon shifts and folds—

and I am neither wave nor water,

but the tide

that forgets its own name.

Sara Lando

Indentation

There is a space

in the curve of your neck

where my face fits perfectly,

like a key resting in a lock

well-worn from years of opening, closing,

each turn smooth with familiarity.

Our bodies are archives.

Your skin, soft beneath my cheek,

remembers every touch,

each small repetition,

the weight of my head finding its place

again

and again

and again,

until this hollow was made.

And again, once more.

Like the mark of a pen

on a finger

the indent formed by countless words

written without thought,

we carry these invisible traces

long after we’ve stopped.

If you could see my soul,

you’d see an imprint there too,

a hollow shaped like you,

pressed into me by the weight of your love,

by the quiet acts of being near.

A place that would always recognize you,

even in the dark.

Sara Lando

Fruit Fly

I woke in sweetness,

the air thick with ripening,

and in the sugar-drenched dawn,

I stretched my wings wide,

caught the glint of light

through a peel’s torn skin.

Do you know the color of morning?

Have you tasted time,

how it ferments

So

Fucking

Quickly?

I dance in the golden juice,

time sticking to my legs,

wings catching every shift of air.

The world hums beneath me,

its breath full of warmth and rot,

and I follow the call,

riding its scent through the hours.

It won’t last—

this sweetness, this burn of sun on skin.

I take what is offered:

the softness of fruit,

the light just before it bends.

When night comes,

I will close my wings

on the edge of it all,

my belly full,

the world still humming

in the dark.

Sara Lando

The First Steps Without You

Her tiny feet would stumble, fall, then rise,

Each tender bruise a mark of lessons learned.

With mother’s gentle hands to soothe her cries,

In loving arms, her every fear was turned.

From crawling steps to running through the day,

She grew in strength, her heart a blooming fire.

Each failure was a game she’d learn to play,

A dance of trust, where love would never tire.

But now, a woman grown, she stands afraid,

To walk new paths where shadows cloud her view.

No mother’s hand to hold her when she’s swayed,

No voice to whisper that she’ll make it through.

Yet deep within, a courage softly calls—

A strength she learned from her, through every fall.

Sara Lando

Forever They Live

It is the mortal way of life that all come to pass,

Days then grow cold and seem unnaturally long.

We grieve for our loss, we mourn for the past,

Yet lost loved ones live on in memory and song.

So do not weep because you feel that you ought.

Do not despair for those you can no longer see.

Loved ones live on in our hearts, in our thoughts.

Through love, forever they live in our memory.

• Michael Cunliffe

Sol Descending

When a human tear descends

does a star disappear

from the sky?

When a heart breaks

is there a galaxy out there –

somewhere –

a sun, a god, an angel –

that feels the very air around them

heave and shake?

Or is there nothing but cold

silent vast darkness –

all consuming – everywhere – forever –

eyes closed –

oblivious to the tiny

earth-shattering chaos

of lonely creatures

marooned on a chunk of rock

hurtling meaninglessly

through the dark reaches

of a collapsing

universe.

• Michael Cunliffe

The Poetry of Everything

[or]

Unified Poetry Theorem

There lies, within humanity,

an everything – it is a thread

finer than a spider’s web

weaving through all existence.

It is a neural pathway, a network

interconnecting everything –

the everything of humanity.

It is an equation, a formula

sprawled across whiteboards,

furrowing the cleverest of brows.

It is a heartbeat, a rhythm

pulsing around the dancing crowds

lining wild street parades.

It is a magic, a story

swimming through a child’s mind

as their drowsy head rests on a pillow.

It is a symphony, a dance

of celebration and joy

drawing us into unity.

It is a ceremony, a ritual

of solemnity and remembrance

binding us to ancestry.

It is our yesterday, and our tomorrow,

and it is all of our todays.

This thread is a poetry of what it is to be alive,

to experience the human condition,

to live and breathe and die.

• Michael Cunliffe

The Teachings Of

Land And Water

A stillness, a calmness,

a resolve to remain steadfast,

a willingness to hold true,

to stand strong and bold within oneself,

to be comfortable with what is, to remain.

This is what the land teaches us.

A movement, a shifting,

an openness to seek harmony,

a willingness to change and adapt,

to flow and bend and stretch

and reach into new corners,

to find new space and shape, to become.

This is what the water teaches us.

• Michael Cunliffe

Lived

I lived.

But did I really.

Going through the motions.

Life has lost its shine

Sadness seeps into my face

I truly tried

I lived.