nepenthesdeluxe

[nepenthesdeluxe]

[nepenthesdeluxe]

a cheeky little deconstructed folksy number

over, over, four leaf clover,

light the candle just to blow her

out. she'd burn up if you'd let her,

over, over, firesetter.

over, over, loveless lover,

fear of what must be discovered,

fear alone of being lonely,

loveless love, my love, if only.

loveless love, my star, my silence,

unaware, unfettered violence,

all the emptiness in my hands,

how i prayed for your defiance!

how i prayed for bloody mercy:

that you'd fight so as not to hurt me,

watch wax break and burn, unfurling,

bow and bend the otherworldly

and allow

the molten, liquid form

of something no longer holdable

on your hands.

which you can't.

silly man.

over, over. that's the plan.

[nepenthesdeluxe]

hermetisch 1

neonlichtverstreckt. wir lagen

fischerhakenkrumm-hermetisch,

eng umschlungen wie zwei böse träume

in ein und derselben nacht. und

die rote sonne

jagte einen leeren mond.

sie wusste schon von spiegeln, damals, aber

noch nicht von sich selbst.

so wie der mond die sterne kennt.

so wie der mond sie kennt.

im sommersamt, da hatten sie uns noch

nebeneinander eingewickelt. wie

kristallglas an kristallglas lagen wir,

wie haken krumm, so lagen wir,

hermetisch eins, so lagen wir,

im licht verstreckt, so lagen wir,

im neonlicht versteckt. nur tote körper,

leere gläser jetzt,

nur wein auf dem parkett,

ganz ungehalten.

[nepenthesdeluxe]

hurt people! hurt people! sweat and silence trailing off your lips like some conlang for the dispossessed. i come from a deadbeat dynasty. where everyone is loved                   and nobody is held and you keep looking for love in places it can’t breathe, all just so one could call it seeking. is it my fault that i’m too choked up to kiss? a broken heart beats down on broken skin. is it my fault that i refuse to peel the crust off my old scars? sweat and silence ringing in my ears untouched by linguistic hypotheses and love is it my fault?

[nepenthesdeluxe]

//i never wanted my lipgloss back but i don't think you ever understood that

among too many things i'd lost at your place (one town over) among many things of very little value among seashells, human waste and steam //an anchor among things that weren't mine (and never were at your place one town over) //something to return to //until you'd returned it

//did you know? //did you expect? //you never do and, pray, //you never will red leaves on the asphalt. and a dead rat. //i hope you never will. bloated bodies underwater in the riptide. //i hope you never will.

[nepenthesdeluxe]

you, dog. you, dog, can’t bite. but growl (and growl you do) and show your gums from where they’ve pulled your teeth that you were told were rotten.  and it’s known when you regard the mirror you do not regard yourself. you see another dog, out grieving for a pack that never left, that never died that simply never came you, dog, get into bed with anyone at all just so you have a warm place to sleep and let them put the collar on you just so you’ll be held, you, dog. you’ll follow anyone at all just so you know you cannot lose the path you, dog, don’t know if you could bite. you, dog, you know that you would never try. you know your teeth are rotten. 

[nepenthesdeluxe]

bettanu for a shipwreck

awash in the wave adream, sleep, stay in your grave that keeps you from land

not ice nor cold air - safe, sun-untouched, anchored there forever unmanned

so still lies the sea mirrored and calm mercury melts over glass sand

the form of this work, the bettanu, was developed by a user here on tumblr (how cool is that??), @smp-writes, who I also felt deserved special acknowledgement as the first person who liked my work on this platform. if you happen to read this: it was an honor being inspired by you :)

[nepenthesdeluxe]

my teeth, my jaw allowed me to love you like a dog, love you like a cicada husk, to love you like black mold. vaporous lobotomy and then i'll let you pour some violence down my throat. and it's not just to fill a hole but to fill the hole, pit that needs no other pittance, all is good that ends the well. i don't think you like me anymore. i don't think i care. your fist is skin enough.

[nepenthesdeluxe]

how to swim get in the water. this might be cold at first. get used to it. you need to get in the water. until you can’t feel the ground under your feet anymore. and then you just swim. just do it. just fucking swim. what the fuck are you doing? how can you not fucking swim yet? oh shit.  yeah, well this is not on me. i really tried here.

[nepenthesdeluxe]

to the pigeons

to the ones who can’t even recall being cast out. and yet still yearn for home. to those who never felt the touch of warm and wanting hands and still  seek skin on skin- humanity and soft embrace - in arms that ask to choke them. to the ones whose wings were clipped through parents past. whose teachers could not teach to swarm and soar away into a heart that, still, stands open to them. to the ones who never flew at all, but clawed and crushed and carved a place out in the pavement, when the dovecotes have been burnt. to those trawling the town for kisses finding them under the impact of a boot։

i’m very sorry.

[nepenthesdeluxe]

ether between your lines the pens scratch imprints :spectres of your soul stuck to the words in bottled connotation. lost carnation, petals crushed and paint distilled, what color were you? you, my spirits, have you stripes? my sprites bound into booklets not to know you but to love you, for we all lie.  we are poets after all.

[nepenthesdeluxe]

i understand the violence it took to become that gentle. i understand.  but you have yet to grasp the gentleness, the love within my violence, softest warmth begetting blood on fur that i wear like a medal, on my neck my crown of thorns, my wedding band, it’s you for whom i bite.  and you have yet to grasp the fear, the care with which i keep you safe, under my watch no jaws will ever find their way to you, nor any tooth, no tear will ever be torn from you, for it’s you for whom i bite. and you have yet to grasp my devotion, no others beside you could I keep, no kin, no consanguines except in what is bled and in my mouth i’ve whet my wolfish little knives for you, it’s you for whom i bite.  i understand the violence it took to become that gentle. i understand. and so i bite.

kept seeing the image up top everywhere and decided to write something as a sort of excercise. i don't feel like i did it justice, might rework the third stanza especially but frankly i don't know how to improve it rn so i'm letting it go be free for now. The "the violence it took to become that gentle" thing is a popular quote whose source i can't remember, original post for the image is this reddit post afaik.

[nepenthesdeluxe]

when your thoughts are like wasps in honey: plump in body, dull in soul and soaked in heavy sweetness, saccharine and leaden, drown and deaden sting and flight and all that gave them shape, make whole their golden prison, unicolor prism, tint the world a warmed-up hue. no cold, no ice, no crisp like knives to cut the bloated floaters, nothing left inside but wasps in honey.