fawned-with-a-pen

[fawned-with-a-pen]

divining woman

Charcoal lips and fine silk

Witch hazel and snake's milk

I'll divine my way into something else

I'll divine my way into someone else

Like a butterfly or a prettier girl

They burned all their witches

Until there were none

Still, I see their ghosts

In the edges of the surgeon's knife

In the traces of my yearning stomach

In the crescents of my fingernails I've bitten to the quick

Or maybe they all turned into butterflies too

Taken quivering flight, lost to a god

Who made woman of man's rib

One who would watch long hair smolder on the pyre

As the stars blinked, weeping

Into the silence

[fawned-with-a-pen]

the hearth

Hestia holds the embers in her

Cold little hands

Her burnished eyes roll

She gnashes her matchstick teeth

Stoking the fire is a sickening way to live

Smoke in the lungs, crisping the lips

Blackening the smile

And yet, someone must do it

Eldest daughter, left behind

While younger siblings rape and roam

Mother gone, father banished

Poor little Hestia, all alone

And yet, there’s something beautiful

In the crackling of the embers

In the devouring of the wood

In the violence of the flame. 

Hestia draws a log from the fire with her hands

For once she is warm

She licks the cinders

And swallows them whole.

Fireside Poetry Contest

hello all,

December is a hard month for many, so i hope this finds you well. this month's prompt is:

fireside

fires have served as the anchoring point for humans and their attempts to reconnect, tell stories, prepare meals, and stay safe. it is fireside that stories are told, that food is shared, that warmth is sought and found. where darkness is pushed away from the ones we care about.

you may reblog this with an original poem of any style and length, but it MUST have something to do with the prompt.

this month will have three winners, so please share this, and remember, any and all are welcome to enter. winners will be announced on the 1st of January, and will he reblogged here. all entrants will be reblogged to @poetryisalive for ease of review, and for extra visibility.

thanks for your support and interest.

catch you all fireside.

[fawned-with-a-pen]

and I

And I will catch window-slatted sunlight

And I will stir under the sheets

And I will drink my morning coffee

And I will forget how to weep

And I will stretch and rise from slumber

And I will dance across the tile

And I will draw the sun-shorn curtains

And feel the dimples in my smile

And I will wear my best pearl earrings

And I will take and I will give

And I will live in blinding sunlight

For I deserve to live

[fawned-with-a-pen]

dust to dust

I am too fond of disintegrating,

I'm afraid

Feeling myself slip through my fingers

Like sand.

A breath of cool morning air

And I am floating through space

Without a tether again-

No stars, just dust.

I am the particles drifting through the fog

Until they are made into something else.

[fawned-with-a-pen]

hunger

Hunger gnaws at me

It grinds dull teeth against my belly

It whets its blade against my ribs

I am empty

I am stretched thin as a canvas

As a hide tanning in the sun

As the picked-clean bones

Of some long-forgotten skeleton

There is some cavity inside of me

One that yawns and

Opens its maw and howls with want

The hollow space between my ribs

Has split lips and dark eyes

And looks like me

[fawned-with-a-pen]

glass

I peel back my gums 

With my fingers

And see broken glass in the mirror

Instead of teeth

The shards glisten in the light

Wicked, like weapons

Lustrous, like pearls

Fractals catch the light

I must hold my breath to stop from weeping

When did I become so jagged?

When did I first start to change?

I am never quiet

I can never bite my tongue

Lest I bite it off.

[fawned-with-a-pen]

resurrection

A corpse may lie so happily

And weather into skeleton

Bones all clean, all set to dry

Stark amongst the soil there

What draws me from my sanctuary

There in the bosom of the earth

I cannot know, I cannot hear

But feel a calling, not of mirth

But of desperation, a plaintive cry

The moon's pale face, her parted lips

Her words so clear, and yet they sigh

Resurrection, resurrection

And so I wake.

A hand emerges, slim and silver

Lit by freshest softest moonlight

Like a daylily in the spring

Like a new thing born again

Bare ribs gleam like silver bars

Teeth shine in a barren skull

Crowned with ivy, marked with scars

I peel off the roots which had

Lined me so like jewelry

The starlight shines, a dazzling sheen

Startling to a beast like me

Grown so used to dark and depth

Suddenly to be set free

I take my first breath, lungless void

Expands, contracts, and lives again

Blood courses beneath my skin

Drawn like a sheet over skeleton

And, though I do choke it back,

Something surges from within

I let life take all from me

Now it is my turn to take

My body cries out with the locusts

Awake, awake, awake

[fawned-with-a-pen]

the stars stuck on my ceiling

Silken words of a velvet night

Black licorice against the inside of my cheek

Pinpricks of stars against blackened sheet

Still don't quite live up to the stars on my ceiling

Those I prefer, those are sweet

Plastic, plastered, glow-in-the-dark

My childhood bedroom was lit by the glow

Of false constellations-

Picked by the hand

Of a child who, for once, was allowed to play god

A time long-forgotten, yet clutched to my chest

Perhaps, even grown, I should arrange them above my bed

And, as I sleep, dream of a world

Sweet as sugardrops:

Stars stark against the night,

Twinkling faintly, laughing,

Braiding my hair.

[fawned-with-a-pen]

burnout

Claimed by the fire as it twists us in the

Brilliant, blazing, brazen,

Faded

Light.

Our arms are outstretched towards the sky

Stars twinkling in our hair like dew

As purple blows out red with a whisper

And a kiss

That burns her lips

But leaves her dazed

And happy.

We are left, suspended

In a dazzling atrophy of day versus night

We grow old together under that sky,

Burning with heat

And love.

As the moon weeps for us

The sun is extinguished

Quickly, like a candle flame.

[fawned-with-a-pen]

a moth in autumn

The autumn is a breath of rain

A muzz of mist upon my skin

It sits at my doorstep, waiting, breathing

It raps its fingers on my window

An echo lost into the din

I wait inside my warm cocoon

Outside is muffled, bleary, bleak

And yet it draws me, curls its fingers

Into hair still wet with sleep

It draws me forward into the deep

Into the land of mystic dreams

Foggy, bleary, weathered seams

Stretch and, against their binding, weep

Out past my doorstep do I creep

The autumn breeze nips tenderly

Stings at ankle, kisses cheek

My wings are wet with afterbirth

I drip with dewdrops, thinning, sweet

As morning mist on rose petals

There is no sun, there is no dry

I quiver in the misty moor

Of autumn as it wrings its hands

And twists them into vacancy 

Were it bright, I would but fly

Against the sun, my silhouette

Would darken stark and proud, and yet

All is quiet, all is still

The singing of a whippoorwill 

Heralds mourning still to come

I’ve been lured from my sweetened home

As moth to flame is oft undone

My wings still crumple, paper-thin

Reluctance is my dearest friend

But into autumn, I am born again

[fawned-with-a-pen]

aphrodite from the chasm

The black, sucking depths of the ocean

Boast shadows swishing with deepest currents

Woven with wringing spectres, leviathans in that empty vacuum of space

One must know that even pearls are wreathed with darkened clouds that frighten their lustre 

Nestled in swirling sands which are thus disturbed 

By currents, set prowling, like panthers

Aphrodite burst from such a place,

Gasping, grasping at the sea foam

 

We know the ocean like a mother, 

And also like a father–

Familiar to us,

Yet so far away.

[fawned-with-a-pen]

☾ Introduction ☾

fawned | she/her | 23

hey there, and welcome to my writing blog!

I'm a 23-year-old creative writing undergrad who loves nature, horror movies, my pets, my sweet girlfriend, reading and writing, and drinking substantial amounts of tea and coffee. I'm so happy to start sharing my writing with you all, which at the moment will currently consist mainly of poetry and short stories!

byf: I will potentially be posting nsfw content in the future.

please dni if you are:

under the age of 18

my commissions are currently open! check 'em out if you're interested. :)