The ticking of silence

The mind becomes a ticking
time bomb, silence
settling like a fog.
Questions have no answers
and the weight of every one of them
smothers
what you do have.
You cannot breathe, for the journey
your mind takes you on
a whirlwind of emotions
you run down rabbit holes
better suited to a tale of Alice
and the person you wish to be
is masked
by this temporary madness …

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Published on Medium: P.S. I Love You for Poetry Sunday

Find the complete version here.

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©2020 Christine Kelly
All Rights Reserved.

Photograph by the author

 

We the People

We the People
was our birth,
our beginning. But, we are no longer
We the People. How long has it been
since we could claim to be We
instead of Them or Us?

We the People
is an idea we fetishize,
placing it on a pedestal
when it is meant to be read
cover to cover,
intended to be worn
until it slides over us
like a second skin,
covering us in a common identity …

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Published on Medium: P.S. I Love You for Poetry Sunday

Find the complete version here.

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© 2020 Christine Kelly

All Rights Reserved

Photograph by author

Saturday Storms

It’s raining, a drink of water after parched days. The ground was littered with odd drops, scattered randomly, before the thunder came and the heavens opened.

The rain always stops me in my tracks. I wait. I watch. I wonder. And my heart aches with some unfathomable feeling that soaks me to my core with a haunting want  …

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Published on Medium: P.S. I Love You for Poetry Sunday

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© 2020 Christine Kelly

All Rights Reserved

Photo by Nadia Valko on Unsplash

Denouement

The ivories he tickles
are behind her eyes
accidentals touched
strings struck …

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Published on Medium: P.S. I Love You for Poetry Sunday

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© 2020 Christine Kelly

All Rights Reserved.

Photograph: my own

Every moment

It defies explanation or definition
yet persists — 
days when it is there, quietly
sitting in the corner
waiting to speak, 
other times
words filling me
with a rush –
images vivid in tone and texture.
What is it that calls my pen to action
my being to yearning …

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Published on Medium: P.S. I Love You for Poetry Sunday

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©  2020 Christine Kelly

All Rights Reserved.

Photograph by author

Five days

Five days
and you will get on a jet plane
winging your way westward.
So much,
so little
time
to have …

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Published on Medium: P.S. I Love You for Poetry Sunday

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:

©2019 Christine Kelly

All Rights Reserved.

Photograph by the author

Not a girl of summer

I am not a girl of Summer
though the sea runs through my veins
and I would happily swim
from dawn to dusk.

I am not a Coppertone baby
with flowing yellow hair,
golden strands gleaming
in the sun, perfection of tan skin
and white smiles.

I am a girl of Autumn,
of Winter
burnished leaves and snowy landscapes
my favorite things;
books and fires and sweaters and long walks
my pleasures.

I am the pale girl
with hair brown as a sable coat,
soft and rich and full of depth.
But
it is when its copper threads catch the sun
unexpectedly
you’re given a hint of the fiery and passionate nature
oft hidden
revealed to few
known intimately
only to one.

:

© SirenSong1208

Once more, with feeling

Beginnings,
new dawn breaks
with a whisper. Layers
peeled back like blankets
or the first glimpse of skin
in summer;
winter, a recent memory.
Left hand foraging for comfort …

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Published on Medium: P.S. I Love You for Poetry Sunday

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© 2020 Christine Kelly
All Rights Reserved

Photograph by author

 

Writing true

Sometimes
writing is like slipping
off your clothes 
in the waning light of day.
Effortless
exhalation on a sigh.
Most often it is retching
in solitude, a heaving up
of your insides.
Results that are never pretty,
generally painful
but necessary …

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Published on Medium: P.S. I Love You for Poetry Sunday

Find the complete version here.

:

©2020 Christine Kelly
All Rights Reserved.

Photograph by the author

 

Sentimental stirrings

Waylaid by sentimental stirrings,
unintentional memories
found folded in my pocket.
The faint scent of those yesterdays
clinging to the paper …

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Published on Medium: P.S. I Love You for Poetry Sunday

Find the complete version here.

:

©2020 Christine Kelly

Photograph by the author