# Winner's Showcase



## Travers

In an effort to give more recognition to the winning entries of the monthly Poetry Challenge, here we have the Winner's Showcase.
Each month, the winning entry will be added to this thread to give these poems the chance to get the views they deserve, and to inspire all you poets out there with the cream of our challenge crop.

So, come in, peruse with pleasure and get your creative juices flowing!



*** Links added to poem titles. Click the link and 'like' the poem in the challenge threads - NOT me re-posting it!! ***


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## Travers

July 2013 - "Books" Challenge Winner.

*Kindles and Dinosaurs *by* pigletinportugal

*​How can a Kindle be a treasured friend
this plastic book with no page to bend.
Not dog-eared or torn, stained with salty tears,
margins pencilled with notes from passing years.

They won’t change my mind or feelings cajole
for this plastic usurper, with no soul.
They say it’s great but I don’t understand,
so this Kindle book in our house, is banned!

You’re not listening I say, real books are fine.
I don’t care for Kindle’s latest design.
Gizmos and gadgets don’t interest me
I like the feel of a real book, you see.

I huff, as my battle with words is lost
what price a Kindle with the hidden cost?
Will libraries be a thing of the past
as Kindles advance and the die is cast?

Friends give me their best “I-know-it-all” look
as they chant: Kindles now replace the book.
I sigh, mindful of all the friends I’ve read.
I’m a dinosaur; are books really dead?


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## Travers

August 2013 - "Sunset" Challenge Winner.

*Sunset's Promise* by *Chester's Daughter*

Cotton candy skies
caress my eyes
and set twanging nerves
to rest.
Every day slinks away
with a vivid vow:

my cosmic cocoon
is on its way.

Succor to flay
the daily fray.


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## Travers

September 2013 - "Confessions" Challenge Winner

Kindly click to view:

*cutting* by *lasm*


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## Chesters Daughter

October 2013 - "Trust" Challenge Winner

*Empty Hands by Gumby*

She was daddy's favorite gloves,
often used, then tossed aside;
where every boy who picked her up, 
tried her on for size.

With clumsy, adolescent dips 
in between her thighs, to lips 
that slipped around a truth 
too hard to swallow— 
like those empty gloves, inside she's hollow.

Passed from hand to hand
she’ll never find that perfect fit,
daddy saw to it. 
With every crook of finger 
across baby skin, he carved her up,
an open, tender bud from which he plucked.
She hates him? She hates him not?_
Questions that the flower cannot settle,
a pet theory her McShrinks often peddle._

But late at night she wonders...
if life is such a precious gift from God,
why does living only make her feel so cheap?
Then she’ll chase another Xanax with Bacardi
and slip into the empty hands of sleep.


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## Chesters Daughter

November 2013 - "Being Alone" Challenge Winner

*At middle-night, on upland heights by toddm*

At middle-night, on upland heights 
along a shelf of time-scarred rock,
he would wander beneath the lights
of the glittering celestial clock.

But untold the hours he tarried there,
while wind seethed past him in the grass;
the moon sailed on the night-sea fair
and none came nigh him to harass.

Ever and anon on such mild nights
he made his bed in heather deep
until dawn touched the upland heights
to gently wake him from his sleep.


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## Gumby

December 2013 - "Peace" Challenge Winner

*I Am                 by Pandora*

_

'An unmanned vessel goes in circles' _


I am managing the river. 

Learning the currents, 

flowing and floating

weaving my way,

directed by land that holds me.


I am mother with unborn child,

my life blood shared.

I have a choice of dance,

the love of song. 

I am conducted by miracles. 


I am words, 

the vessel of thought enlightened

and bright.

Carrying me to you,

then Us, 

straight down

The River Eternity.

_
'Peace is at the helm'_


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## Gumby

January 2014 - "Legacy" Challenge Winner

*Pandora's Inheritance                  by toddm*

In a strange way the light illumines
the whites of her eyes, the smiles
and happy balloons, floating away
into an overexposed collodion sky.
High clouds are knife-spread too thin 
across the crimson-crusted morning.
The backyard is a frowning garden,
all monochrome and mildewed;
the birdbath brims with maple leaves
and black frozen water; a drunken 
wheelbarrow slumbers and rots 
amid shadows and unmown grass; 
but dawn is fresh upon the hard mud 
and fragments of plastic playthings, 
little smiling girls and pink-glitter horses 
with broken legs; the air is clean and cold, 
full of serene indifference and the scent 
of chimney smoke; a withered shrine 
of firewood and cinder blocks is forgotten 
in the shade of a dying brown fir; 
the house is locked and empty; she breathes 
on her fingers, and pines for her gloves; 
an icy tear falls from the aluminum awning, 
and shatters upon the crumpled earth.


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## Gumby

February 2014 - "Night" Challenge Winner

Scene Change by astroannie

with pen and inkwell
the writer closes the day
drawing forth darkness


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## Gumby

March 2014 - "Zero" Challenge Winner

*Countdown by Squalid Glass*


I often think about the universe
and loss. But meter is always scarce; 
time is just God doing his worst,
so I guess I’ll make this terse:
You are no longer here.
I look at the far,
dark sky on clear
nights at stars
light-years
go-- ​


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## Gumby

April 2014 - "Outer Space" Challenge Winner

 				 				 				[h=2]Cyber Space 				by Pandora[/h] 				   						 						 				 					 						
_Fingers lightly stream 

pouring warm and cold 
words across a black mat sky.

No here or there,

only time reflects
the vacuum we've created.

Orbiting, 
the shields are up,

truth revolves
yet in another lie.

Empty eyes
hold the soul
that whispers tainted trust.

Whispers from an empty heart,
in blackness . . .

no love's light._​​


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## Gumby

May 2014- "Grow" Challenge Winner

 				 				 				[h=2]Growing Apart by toddm[/h] 				   						 						 				 					 						_Journal entry of Richard Edwards on November 15th, 1963: _

Her smile was like a weak cup of coffee. 
I looked out the window. 
Leaves were fulfilling their autumn vows 
and fleeing away,
far from scolding fingertips.
The sun was falling asleep, 
to dream of moon and stars 
and blinking neon.
The town was settled among the hills 
and railroad tracks of yesterday. 
Colors were fading from the photograph, 
having been left in the sun too long. 
She was saying something I cannot recall.
I smiled. 
She looked out the window. 
Night had crept from the shadows 
and embraced the world. 
But blue neon bathed the parking lot. 
She asked if I was finished. 
I drank the last of my coffee
and, hand in hand, we departed.​


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## Gumby

June 2014 "Opposites" Challenge Winners

 				 				 				[h=2]Opposites Attract 				by PiP[/h] 				   						 						 							 						 				 					 						I am your sunshine.
You are my darkness
A black cloud
In a cloudless sky.

I am your smile,
Your laughter.
You are my frown,
Tears and unhappiness. 						


 				 				 				[h=2]A Dumb Cluck’s Point of View 				by Gumby[/h] 				   						 						 				 					 						Gallus gallus, your bright eyes
     love the things that I despise
     spiders with their bristled legs
     you eat, then lay my breakfast eggs.

     Fleshy worms, slimed with dirt
     for you are but a sweet dessert
     and hopper’s whirring through the air
     with wizened face and big-eyed stare
     (I swear they aim straight for my hair.)

     These creepy crawlies in the grass
     once through your pointed maw have passed
     become the most delightful things 
     from fluffy cakes to sweet meringues.

     My little low and humble bird
     I've learned to venerate your turd
     when tossed upon the compost heap
     come the Spring I’m sure to reap 
     most bountiful rewards.

    And all because what I despise
is beautiful
    in your bright eyes.​ 
​


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## Gumby

July-2014 "The Storm" Challenge Winner

*drama queen *  by escorial
----------------

my life
my mind
my teacup


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## Chesters Daughter

August 2014 - "Compassion" Challenge winners

Kindly click to view:

*Mom's New Bag *by *Gumby*


Kindly click to view:

*let alone* by *Fats Velvet*


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## Chesters Daughter

September 2014 - "5 Lines" Winners

*Abstract Beauty* by *Firemajic

*Blossoms from my garden,
stolen by the summer storm,
becoming nature's watercolor palette,
painting a mural of abstract beauty
on the canvass of my rain soaked lawn.


*Untitled *by *Terry D*

Friends
Sister
Mother
Father
Son
Lines hurt.


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## Chesters Daughter

October 2014 - "Something Wicked This Way Comes" Challenge Winner

*Excerpts taken from Lillian's Journal *by *Firemajic*

I heard the panpipes playing
as I lay shivering in my bed,
my body trembled with dark desire
and my soul was chilled with dread.

My body burned with wanton heat
as I lay in the cold moonlight,
bewitched by the lust I felt
on this wild enchanted night.

I fell into a restless sleep,
had dreams of strange desires,
of cloven hooves and polished horns
and caresses like molten fire.

I dreamed I ran through a twilight mist,
down to a secret glen 
and hid behind a twisted tree
to catch a glimpse of him.

His skin was alabaster white,
horns polished sliver bone,
hooves gold and cloven,
face like the gods of ancient Rome.

I dreamed that from the forest edge
there appeared a druid maid,
and she danced in the moonlight
to the panpipes that he played.

She let her garments slowly fall
revealing all her charms
and ran across the secret glade
and wrapped him in her arms.

He then picked her flowers
and twined them in her hair.
then swept her up in his arms
and carried her to his lair.

Amber lightening split the sky
and opened up a monstrous pit,
Cerberus from the abyss came forth
as the flames of hell were lit.

In the morning when I awoke
I found crushed flowers in my hair
and the aria that the panpipes played
drifted in the sultry air.

With the waning of the solstice moon
my belly began to swell,
protecting the seed that was spawned
when the beast escaped from hell.

666 was the demon's mark
on my unholy newborn son,
woe to all who survives this night--
something wicked this way comes...


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## Chesters Daughter

November 2014 - "Lost" Challenge Winner

*The Rape of Innocence *by *Firemajic*

Like a book you opened me
read every line and word,
with a red pen you rewrote me.
Afraid of your touch, I ran
and you chased me
across unknown galaxies
where stars are not stars--
but tears yet uncried.
And there, in a solar vortex 
you captured me.

You led me to obsidian mountains
where we played in crystal snow
made of unbearable pain and despair.
You laughed as you gathered shimmering dust
in your silver needle and plunged it into
my innocent veins I whispered "do it again".

I followed you to magenta canyons
where we explored sacred burial grounds,
and there we caressed each other
with the fire of our desires,
and slept for long years 
in the red dust of our destructive passion.
I lay naked, breathless in your arms
moaning "do it again, do it again".

You ran and I followed you
to an enchanted forest,
and you hid in crushed velvet ferns--
and watched me.
A wounded animal seeking a repreive
from the labyrinth of pain.
the stars were just stars,weeping bitter
silver tears that left tracks on my arms,
and the taste was wine on my parched lips.
Alien creatures screamed in terror 
at the sound of my grief as I call to you
"do it again", do it again".

It was there, In the deep woods dark
where you came to me,
and timidly I offered you my book.
In bold red strokes you signed your name
and wrote "The End".
You devoured it, every line and word,
until nothing was left.
And as I lay dying,I wept
"do it again, do it again, do it again.
*
Congrats from all of us, Jul, for being the very first entrant in the history of the Challenge to amass three consecutive wins!!!!*


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## Chesters Daughter

December 2014 - "Gift" Challenge Winners

*Playing Catch *by *John Oberon*

You were nine
When I threw your first high fly.
I threw it as best I could.
I lost it in the sun,
But you didn’t.

And somehow, by the time it came down,
You became a man, and caught it.
You stood near your wife and kids
As you threw it to me.

And all my love burst inside me
As the ball smacked firmly in my glove...
All my love that was thrown to a boy,
Caught by a man,
And thrown back to me.



Kindly click to view:
*
Resurrecting the Bone *by *Gumby*


*

The One That Will Always Top Them All* by *Chester's Daughter*

_If never_
_these weathered pads_
_get to tear through_
_gaily patterned paper_
_again, _
_it's fine by me._

_Department store fodder_
_meant for materialistic cattle_
_is nothing more than feed,_
_and we all know what remains_
_once it's digested._

_Abodes, autos, boats,_
_and stacks of greenbacks_
_have zero value_
_to this savvy heart,_
_which took its licks to learn_
_when and when not_
_to yearn._

_I am the grateful recipient_
_of the greatest gift of all,_
_a living, breathing son,_
_stashed somewhere safe_
_and gaining weight_
_while learning how_
_not to self-hate._

_His stalwart efforts_
_to relocate his soul_
_repeatedly thwarted_
_by He _
_who designates the dole._

_No man-made bauble_
_can outshine grace, _
_and every time I cup_
_his vibrant face_
_to gaze into eyes_
_no longer plagued_
_by a desire to die_

_the universe is mine_

_and his._

_Let those in need_
_have their presents_
_of useless fluff_

_for against all odds_
_we still have each other_
_and on our plane_
_stripped of worldly trappings_
_with or sans wrapping,_
_where the insistence to breathe_
_is the most exigent deed_

_being half of our duo_
_is much more than enough._

_I love you, Matt,_
_keep buffing that rough_
_and continue to gift me_
_with every moment_
_of your earthly presence._


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## Chesters Daughter

January 2015 - "Remembering the Old; Embracing the New" Challenge Winner

Kindly click to view:
*
Remembering The Old *by *PiP*


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## Chesters Daughter

February 2015 - "Words" Challenge Winner


*Let There Be Words* by *astroannie*

words create worlds
some say this world
is the word of god

god became man
as men became gods
crafting new worlds

each in his own image
words made real
alternate truths


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## Chesters Daughter

March 2015 - "Take Me Out of Pity" Challenge Winner 

*An Unwanted Burden* by *J.J. Maxx

*The blade was swift, the cuts exact
A life removed of innocence.
My youth destroyed but left intact
And left to live this cruel dispense.

To be alone with scars as kin
To walk ashamed for who would stand
The wretched soul accursed by sin
In shifting towns with Christian hands.

They pray for me, the pious few
Contrite in deed and slow in mind
The breath of fools to hide taboo
And keep the wicked few confined.

But girls grow up, scars and all
And learn to see beyond the stains
So soon I'll go to buildings tall
Away from pity, break the chains.


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## Chesters Daughter

April 2015 - "Shades of Grey" Challenge Winner


*A Thousand Shades of Gray* by *rcallaci*

In black of night and bright of day
in the pits of hell and heavens bay
there comes to us a middle way
hooray, hooray, hooray- 

with tints of black and hues of white
the world unfolds to mans’ delight
where daemons and fae hold equal sway
hooray, hoorah, hooray-

We are all gray strings and things made of clay
diddle le do diddle le de diddle le day …


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## Chesters Daughter

May 2015 - "The Beast Within" Challenge Winner

Kindly click to view:

*Ambiguity* by *Greimour*


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## Chesters Daughter

June 2015 - "Deception" Challenge Winners

Kindly click to view: 

*Duplicity *by *Nellie



**Interlocking* *Triangles* by *astroannie*

He calls me "honey"
... afraid he'll say the wrong name ...
I call him "baby".
*


Drivers Ed 101 (offensive word)* by *Gumby*

She was well into her fifties
when daddy ran her down
on the road to enlightenment.
Eighteen wheels of ignorance
never leaves pretty road kill.

There had been signs along the way
of course, but they were hidden
by the forest of family trees.

Sounds of daddy raging at the Telly
as Dr. King marched into history
blended with the aroma
of mama's fried chicken in the kitchen.

Every Sunday, the straight and narrow
road to heaven, singing

_Jesus loves the little children
all the children of the world...
_
in the little white church—
inside and out.

“_Of course _you're welcome 
at the family reunion
it's been sixty years for the folks now
but, about your grandson, sis...”

_No niggers in the family photos
even if they are blood.
_
Daddy always taught us—
when you're driving
you don't swerve
for a rabbit in the road.


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## Chesters Daughter

July 2015 - "Gratitude" Challenge winner.

*Small Things* by *Darkkin*

In a world that just keeps screaming, fighting in battles and debate--
There is a place of refuge, a place away from all the rage and hate.
It is a quiet place, still, shaded, quite forgotten and small—
A place where things, those little things matter, count for all.
There is no map to point the way, no app to get there quick.
It is known by those who have been broken, lost, sick—

Found between one breath and the next, when something shifts,
be it a gaze, a burden—but something in the perception drifts—
Revealing this place hidden within the folds of the raging world.
Little things--a warm hand around which thin, cold fingers are curled,
the flight of a milkweed seed, the simple ability to see, to read—
Foolish many call it, but they cannot comprehend the simple need.

--Why does it matter?

Because it is such a small thing, this place called contentment—
Known to those whose faith in the small things is true.
--The key is sometimes as easy as a basic, thank you.


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## Chesters Daughter

August 2015 - "The Tide(s)" Challenge Winner

*Tidal Tales* by *​Terry D*

I watch giants dancing in the sky,
a tip, a twirl, a soft caress, at first too close then swept away,
to pirouette within the dark, then slowly rush to kiss again.

Flowing robes trail behind, tidal bridges tracing steps
like platinum memories of cosmic grace.
The briefest touch, gives birth to stars,
natal light so very old; 
gas enfired,
gleaming orbs.

The dance continues far from here.
I see the Titans with my voyeur’s eye, pressed to glass,
piercing sky, watching courtships as old as time.
Nothing moves, nothing stays, God plays god in minor ‘c’,
but it’s Newton’s apple that drops the tune
while I watch giants dancing in the sky.


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## Chesters Daughter

September 2015 - "Contradictions" Challenge Winner

*Thirty Years On* by *Boofy*
​Conscious of the truth,
whilst lying through our teeth.
Two clashing opinions,
both of them believed.

And it’s called doublethink
when we tell ourselves
that something should be sold
and that same thing should be shelved.

I’m very outspoken
and I can’t stand clichés.
I admire my son’s faith
and hate it when he prays.

Average Joe for parliament!
He’ll speak out for the masses…
He’d have to go to Eton first
and take some middle classes.

It’s a fact, The War on Drugs
is sad but necessary,
and that Alcohol Prohibition
was futile in the twenties.

The key to doublethink, a skill
we daily utilise,
is to train ourselves in Crimestop
and stop using our eyes.

And stop using our minds as well,
For if we manage it,
we can speak sweet ignorance,
an unrestricted bliss.


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## Chesters Daughter

October 2015 - "Lost and Found" Challenge Winner"


*Five-Fingered Faith* by *Gumby*

The act of letting go
isn’t easy
and fearless leaps of faith
are often aided 
by a well placed finger stomp.


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## Chesters Daughter

November 2015 - "Singularity" Challenge Winner
*
I Am *by *jenthepen*

Unique, uncommon, unusual, in fact,
Of a distinctly peculiar kind.

There’s no need for space-time theories and such.
Don’t try calling Einstein online.

Just relax, connect and listen awhile,
*You are *​Singularity defined!


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## Chesters Daughter

December 2015 - "Glimpsed" Challenge Winner

Kindly click to view:

*The Glance* by *inkwellness*


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## Chesters Daughter

January 2016 - "Fiery Glow" Challenge Winner 

*Walking Home* by *jenthepen*

True blackness is something that can be touched, 
with a pressing squeezing velvet weight 
all hung with soft whispering leaves. 

Footsteps are noises that drum in the mind 
when they come from behind or ahead, 
instigating a tingling dread. 

A light is something that hovers ahead 
and is glimpsed down the length of the road, 
wavering as it draws close. 

A threat is something with lumbering gait 
and malevolent fiery glow, 
as relentlessly slow as fate. 

Fear is something that crowds into the mind 
and leaves dread choosing what it will find,
a chaos that cannot be read. 

Relief is something that’s caught in a name 
and foolish shame, as a neighbour is met 
and salutes with a wave of a cigarette.


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## Chesters Daughter

February 2016 - "Refuge" Challenge Winner

Kindly click to view:

*Panic Room* by *Phil Istine*


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## Chesters Daughter

March 2016 - "Poisoned Chalice" Challenge Winner

*Child of Mourning* by *Anonymous*

We found Nirvana on the black slopes above the sea
painted each other with soft volcanic ash
I sculpted you with my soft hands
shadowed angles and hard muscle
closing my eyes to your addiction
I worshiped you on my knees


I tasted the elixir of your passion
a seductive drug
sweet addiction on my lips
fire in my throat
poison growing in my belly
sea breeze soothing our heat


In a driftwood shack by the sea
I gave you a son
sculpted of our desire 
fragile as silk foam on waning tides
tiny translucent starfish fingers
perfect ocean pearl skin


Your poison contaminated
the sacred chalice of our son's body
helpless I screamed a primal curse at mortality
I buried him in the soft ashes of your addiction
as you moaned your denial
I never forgave you


You begged me to kneel and worship you
no longer addicted I moaned my denial
cowering in soft grey ashes of our passion
weeping acid tears of hate that eroded my face
I filled the empty chalice of our love with poison
as the sun set I watched as you disappeared into the sea


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## Chesters Daughter

April 2016 - "Suffer the Children" Challenge Winners

Kindly click to view:

*Childhood in Chains* by *Tealynn*


*Baby Haunts Her Corner* by *Chester's Daughter*

Baby sports more prints
than bagged forties 
passed 'round her corner.
Eyes never to see twenty,
reflect a century's
worth of torture.

Mater shared her habit
with busty preteen 
in threadbare bra,
now every venous road
is run ragged
by spawned track star.

Cheeks peek
from beneath 
a tiny denim tease,
when you wanna work,
advertising captures sleaze.
Daddy takes his share,
pink limo must be prime,
gotta have a guardian
to keep the tricks in line.

Mama's a magician
who makes stuff disappear,
bags, bucks, and self-esteem
vanish when she's near.
"Can't sell my shriveled prune,
but you're still nice and ripe,
best pass that pipe on over
cuz it was me who gave you life."

Spoonfuls of sugar
amply sweeten the pot,
those lovely little nods
are all poor Baby's got.
Despite stiletto wobble,
she's always in the game,
palming chips 
from countless hands
'fore dawn dents
dark's bruised remains.

Ghost leans upon a lamppost,
glittered orbs drooping closed,
slurring a seductive pricelist
with her pretty ass exposed
and perceiving the scent of pig
through a septum deprived nose.

Illuminated aluminum
declares Times Square,
but that's just for the tourists,
walking dead are well aware
a bleary peer at the sign back
bares Satan's Thoroughfare

an avenue of excess
worn down to cobblestone,
sprinkled with spent syringes
and powdered babies' bones.


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## Chesters Daughter

May 2016 - "Necessary Lies" Challenge Winner

*Necessary Ink *by *Darkkin*

A measure taken, crown to toes, the tip of a chin.
A smirk and a shrug saying nothing, saying all—
A battle, two sides and only one allowed to win.

Raised reading of fabled green gables, alpine goats,
a black horse with a three penny spot, a lost shoe,
djinns, seven swans, and a girl in a rough skin coat.

Necessary lies, these stories captured in faded ink.
No truth in the words, just nonsense to illustrate—
by word, by deed: Try, yet take the time to think.

Empathy, learned through the eyes of these lies,
alongside the truth, by turns beautiful and cruel,
endowed her with the ability nay, a right to try.

Bright and swirling, both the dress and the mind,
she peered from her shell, a bubble circumscribed.
Naïve, yes, but only fools give trust that is blind.

Trust, more precious than gold, harder to earn.
By word, by deeds, secrets in the little things,
sensed, seen. A hand in trust offered in turn.

But there are those, who never sought to learn.
Folk clad in naught but ignorance seek to take,
lashing out when denied, advances spurned.

A lacquered bubble about her, a living shell—
fluid and breathing. A hint of a shimmer, there
in her eyes, the workings of some illusory spell.

It wasn’t much, but enough, to garnered a look.
He came striding up, a spoiled, polished tough.
Not of the tribes that earned, but those that took.

She might have been the first, no way to tell,
but being raised among those who seek to earn,
she told him no, gave him a look: _What the Hell!_

A hand was offered, but not one of earned trust.
Furor rising at a plain spoken no, he struck out,
leaving her, eye blackened, sprawled in the dust.

The parallels she drew, those thoughts that flew,
shock dwindling to deep seated pain—Breathe!
The tears, the price of a lesson only takers knew.

Laughter filled her ears, as she rose, wiping tears.
Spine straight, bone shattered ‘neath a purple mar,
she wouldn’t let their golden boy have her fear.

Necessary lies, those stories captured in faded ink.
Journeys come full circle, facing pasts and fears,
The axiom: Try, yes but take the time to think.

A measure taken, crown to toes, the tip of a chin.
A smirk and a shrug saying nothing, saying all—
A battle, two sides and she did not let him win.


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## Chesters Daughter

June 2016 - "Echoes" Challenge Winners:

*Words* by *Terry D

*Words burden like anchors.
Damage like blades.
Stain like blood.

And they echo.



Kindly click to view:

*Debugging* by *Gumby*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

July 2016 - "Interwoven" Challenge Winners:

Kindly click to view:

*a small place in Poland* by *ned



**Fragmentation Finale* by *Chester's Daughter

*There's a stranger inside skin
leaving little room for me,
living rent free,
and I can't recall 
when she slithered in.

Not bound by the box,
the bossy sly fox
started twanging strings
making mouth
and muscles
do horrible things.

She seems to favor
aberrant behavior,
the worse the better
for her to savor.
Now dry eyes drown
when no one's around
and desire for disaster
secretly adorns plaster.
Maniacal murals
done in plurals

because once is just not enough,
no missed messages allowed.
Swirling purple and black
extol impending payback,
yet no one sees it but us.

She flaps my tongue
and praises once sung
now ramble in reverse
cackled to tackle
intended targets
with a sniper's aim
meant to maim.

I'm ankle deep
in dropped flies,
downed victims of _her _rise,
for surely it can't be me
goring egos so brutally.

Or can it?

Too many hushed fears,
shushed tears, yes dears,
hear, hears, silenced jeers,
concealed sneers, 
and broken dates
with pinking shears,
engraved an invitation

to myself

she is me
and we
will always be

one.

Weary of being pestered,
the muted me sequestered
kept crippled and bedridden
has learned to walk and talk

and what I held in
set her free.

Melded by angst,
the world has my thanks
now never alone
I'm no stepping stone

take care where you tread.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

August 2016 - "Hidden" Challenge Winner

*Archaeopteryx* by *​ned*

Proposed in 1859
As Darwin challenged The Word
That dinosaurs, are of course
Ancestral to every bird.

Finally hunted down in China 
Petrified in ashen cover
A ghostly vision of transition
From one class to another.

Given wings, unlocked from rock
Where it may have lain forever 
For it clearly shows, in delicate rows
A dinosaur sporting feathers.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

September 2016 - "Charm" Challenge Winner

Kindly click to view:

*The Charmless Poet* by *ned*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

October 2016 - "Mementos" Challenge Winner

Kindly click to view:

*Instructions for My Madness at the Last Supper*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

November 2016 - "An Answer" Challenge Winner

*Bohemian Dream *by *jenthepen*

There has to be an answer, he sang, 
as he watched the fireflies dance. 
The promise of eternity shone 
in a weed and mushroom trance. 

She had silently sought the answer 
in the greyness of his eyes. 
Hiding the pain of lotus pose cramps
she tried to internalise. 

His answer was on the underground, 
a gloss of ebony hair, 
a classical first class art degree 
and truth in that sultry stare. 

She packed up Krishna along with him, 
her trust in nirvana impaired. 
Answers, she found, come one at a time
and are very seldom shared.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

December 2016 - "No Legacy" Challenge Winner

*Overlooked* by *jenthepen*

You’ll know her by her pinched white face,
black clothes and scraped-back hair;
in the corner of the frame,
life’s human signature.
A pixelated incidental,
accidental oversight
of the camera lens.

A doorway of a bombed-out house,
a dusty doss house queue,
in earthquake, war or pestilence,
she’s always there,
a detail of the wider view.

Read the story in her face,
life’s hidden imagery.
Inconsequential indentation,
insubstantial interaction
with the gazing eye. 
Her passing presence in the shot
more potent than the whole.

Face in a crowded cattle truck,
a back-drop to military might.
Eyes at a dusty window pane
as tanks roll into sight.

She, with nothing left to leave,
denied last words to share,
no legacy for a careless world,
save that empty, haunting stare.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

January 2017 - "Control" Challenge Winner

Kindly click to view:
*
Correcting Bad Behavior* by *clark*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

February 2017- "Free Will" Challenge Winner

Kindly click to view:

*"My Entry" *by *Gumby*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

March 2017 - "Collision Course" Challenge Winners

Kindly click to view:

*The Old Woman and the Sea* by *Gumby


**For Jordan (Mature Content)* by *Chester's Daughter*

There were five or six;
the succession so rapid,
my mind was hard pressed 
to rival their pace.

The month of March
and fireworks
are an unlikely mix,
and the fight-or-flight tingle 
in my fingers
suggested my body knew
what my brain 
had yet to grasp.

Frustrated
by echo-induced impotence
and streetlamp starved yards
that forced me to abandon
a back window,
I swept the iPad off of the bed
and onto hard wood
praying a call would be made.

While coons battled over garbage,
I counted seconds
reaching six hundred and two
before my ears
picked up the approaching wail.

With optimism, I envisioned
some spattering of near misses
sprayed from a rolled down window
with none drawing blood

but in actuality,
it was a walk up;
close and personal
and done with purpose.

I was playing Candy Crush
in the wee hours,
of the Lord's day,
no less,
when I heard a murder.

As I attempted to number each pop,
projectiles smashed through
untinted Lexus glass
on a collision course
with the tender flesh
of a 21 year old male.

As I bemoaned my inability
to fix a location,
or make a call,
that young man clutched his neck
to staunch substantial flow

and he was petrified

and alone

and with his position unknown

I could not help him.

While my face flinched
and I paused my game,
his body was being riddled 
by bullets
on what should have been
a serene pre-dawn morn.

Curse the silence of suburbia.

At least in my old hood
it was harder to hear,
and when one cannot aid
another in need 
and so near,
background noise
becomes a gift.

As that undeserved surge
began to ebb,
I hope someone held him.

I would have.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

April 2017 - "Infidelity" Challenge Winner

Kindly click to view:

*He Could Never Learn Chess or Solitaire* by *sas*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

May 2017 - "Choices" Challenge Winner

*Sidelined* by *jenthepen*

More roads untravelled than trod
unlocked doors avoided
options that dwindle with empty years
yet still the fears linger in fingers that fumble
with choices in shadows of gain or of loss.


Courage that falters in the face of
no consequences
bravery beaten 
by the undisclosed.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

June 2017 - "Footsteps" Challenge Winners

*Graven Image* by *jenthepen

*he tried to walk in bigger footsteps
as though _himself _was not enough
strange to think role models are chosen
frozen in minds as a pale reflection
mirrored in moulded lives.

he never quite got it but thought he did
measured his life by memories
sad to think that footsteps he followed
required suppression of creative expression
denial of insights and love

he was more than he ever knew


Kindly click to view:

*FitBit Blues* by *PiP*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

July 2017 - "Sand" Challenge Winner

Kindly click to view:

*Sandstorm* by *midnightpoet*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

August 2017 - "Secret Treasure" Challenge Winner

*The Butcher's Wife (Mature Content)* by *Pete_C

*Frosty mornings she'd pull me
into that bed still warm
from her husband's flesh;
his heat and scent slumbering
in those sheets,
lingering long after his mortal meat
had hauled him off to market.

We romped, but with an ear cocked
listening out for the vicious slash
of his cold blade
against the sharpening steel;
the consequence of his early return
never voiced between us.

She'd twitch and writhe,
grind herself into my greedy mouth,
and as she closed in on that moment
I’d wrestle her around
with all my strength,
throw myself into the toil
until her body sucked me dry
and spat me, like a husk,
into the morning air

Then just one kiss and we would part.
I’d leave her in that bed,
womb filled with secret seed,
nipples aching for another touch,
her womanhood restored.

And me? I had it all.
A warm spot between her ample thighs
and every day
fresh liver for breakfast.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

September 2017 - "Deceit" Challenge Winner
*
Phantom Pain* by *Firemajic*

Spinning make believe chores into epic endeavors
makes them last for many mundane hours
takes my mind off unused rooms
and lips un-kissed 
and a bed where passion has passed away
if I shake the sheets, memories like dust motes
swirl and dance in a vicious vortex
pulling me into a black hole
so I pretend everything is the same
religiously scrub, sweep and polish
while dark matter collects
like phantom dust bunnies, in the closets of my mind
I wash your chipped coffee cup every day
even though you have not used it for months 

It has been a good day
no mail was delivered to the deceased
and no one called
asking to speak to a dead man...


----------



## Chesters Daughter

October 2017 - "Find Meat on Bones" Challenge Winners:
*
Kindly click to view:

the numbers that kill you *by *ned

**Peep Show* by *Pete_C

**Southern Fried Chicken* by *sas*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

November 2017 - "Magic Jesus Finger" Challenge Winners

*Kindly click to view:
*
*[conversion]* by *Phil Istine*


*Run Away* by *sas*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

December 2017 - "Christmas Reservation(s)" Challenge Winners

*Nativity* by *ned*

And did we cross
that eternal rift with his gift
of presence

for what was lost
in all our innocence?

Lain amongst the fodder
the harbinger of love

reaches above
to grasp his mother's
ringless finger.


*Give Me This Wish, I Wish Tonight* by *Firemajic*

*Cheap cardboard angel
blind eyes and dirty wings
impaled on top of the Christmas tree
oblivious to ravished wrapping paper
spangled bows and ribbons 
crushed boxes and cheap toys

Under my red blanket
I am invisible 
hidden from lascivious eyes
protected from predatory stares
that stab me in the back
exposing the knobs of my spine
like a broken string of pearls


Curled under my blanket
I pretend I am a Christmas angel
made of cardboard that does not bruise
safe in the sanctuary of the tree
hidden in the dark boughs 

Blind me to the eyes
that rape me
protect me from dirty fingers
that probe my innocent vulnerability 
leaving filthy prints on my thighs 

Cowering under my red blanket
with shattered spine
and eyes that weep dirty pearls
I wish I was that angel*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

January 2018 - "No Rhyme Nor Reason" Challenge Winner

*The Sight (Language) *by* Chester's Daughter*

In their state of blindness
they could discern no rhyme nor reason
while I dug a hole in its proper plot.
Whispers of my madness
became my shadow
even when the earth turned its back
on the sun.

There wasn’t a shovel in sight
as I clawed an ever-deepening crater
in unforgiving earth that utilized
twigs and pebbles to flay my fingers
to the bone.
My presence there was premature
for the ground is aware when to ready
so it found my intrusion abhorrent
and kept its efforts to thwart me steady,
but like most souls, dirt is denied 
glimpses of the future.

The sun rose and set
and downpours erased my progress
until my third week in
when I finally met the required depth
and was a spectacle no more,
just a poor witless woman
incapable of rhyme nor reason.

I retired to my rocker,
ragged digits wrapped in bloodied gauze
gripping its arms as I swayed.
It was six days until that toil of love 
stolen from difficult soil
embraced what was left of my son,
and I dug it wide enough
so that on the seventh day,
I finally rested 
next to my child.

On my bodice was pinned a note:

That shadow of insanity 
bestowed upon me was unearned
As to no rhyme nor reason
I believe you’ve all now learned
Not only had I reason
unlike you I was not blind
And just to negate the former
I’ve left these words behind
You whores have just been treated
to my final fucking rhyme.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

February 2018 - "False Fronts" Challenge Winners

*There ARE Monsters in Fairytales...* by *Firemajic*

*Once upon a time
we could have saved each other
Now our disease can only be erased 
by innocent hands
entwined in our sickness
I can't find any way to rewrite us

We share the same genetics 
indelibly inked on the same page
self destruction spelled out in short lines
a script that cannot be changed
and that scares the shit out of me

I look the other way
not wanting your disease
inscribed on my eyelids 
I already see it in my fingerprints
and your pain is tattooed on my ribs 

Pretending nothing has changed 
you share your tattered 
battered umbrella
scant shelter for two sick siblings
huddled under illusions

Look into my sorrow!
Scavenge my memory dumpster
maybe you can decipher
my discarded mind scribbles
then cover them with your graffiti 
and illustrate our Fairytale

Blind to my decline
effortless I tripped
fell down that rabbit hole
into your make believe world
tell me what you read
in my storybook eyes

Cover your mouth when you SCREAM.....

**

Respect* by *ned*

if I believed the moon was cheese
quite probably
you'd laugh at me

but if instead, I also said
that ball of brie
is my deity

should I then expect
your utter respect?



and though a fool
I'd take my kids 
from school

to teach as I please
on matters of cheese

lay down the law
in metaphor

with others of my ilk
regarding mother 
nature's milk

and how it churns 
as it slowly turns

so always faces
our world in phases

forever marking time
surely, a sign 
of the divine



yes, we would grow in number
from dumb 
to dumber

build a temple
of stone and bricks
call ourselves 'lunatics'

inventing prophets 
from history
with revelations of the mystery

it's all there 
just take a look
faithfully transcribed in our sacred book



and should the astronauts 
drill for oil
they'd find cheese beneath the soil

and if not, we know what to say
god is displeased 
in some large way

we'd stand as brothers
blame the others

til holy war 
is begun
with worshippers of the sun

but even that 
would not end it
for within our church there'd be a split

between camembert and mozzarella
with the british of course 
favouring cheddar

in a conflict that rumbles 
on for years
through centuries of blood and tears

taking up the sword 
in his name
and instruct our young to do the same

til all that's left 
is death 
and shame...



and so it came to pass
that once again
I ask

to those of you disaffected

should blind faith 
be respected?


----------



## Chesters Daughter

March 2018 - "A Touch of Grace" Challenge Winner
*
The red wheelbarrow...* by *sas*

is not really red, in the tall grass.

He left it kicked over, in the short grass 
when no one was left to care about carrots
or what he grew, or that he forgot
to memorize faces before winds
found only corn-silk to tousle beside him

like someone
not forgotten—like someone not there.

It took a long time for blue to rust red.
It took but a moment for blue to rust him
into someone he wasn’t with infidel hands
slammed 
never folding in grace at the emptied table.
God was a weed, his centerpiece.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

April 2018 - "Duplicitous" Challenge Winner

*Kindly click to view:

**Waiting *by *Cugoano*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

May 2018 - "Entombment" Challenge Winner

*Just a Minor Renovation* by *Chester's Daughter*

He'd set himself up for disaster
leaving mottled marks of plum
on skin once alabaster.
Such is the right
of a sadistic lord and master.
Or so he thought.

Years wrapped 
in syllabic barbed wire
unrolled from the reel
aka the tyrannical tongue.
Pinching then pricking
every word a tiny scar
until no fresh flesh was left.
Payback is a bitch
and his breath 
now but a hitch
is proof positive.

Once, I had a model's nose,
now it wobbles
like a Saturday night drunkard
with a dislocated knee.
I am so pleased 
even a pristine patrician nose
is useless
when no oxygen can be found.

Hark, I hear a scratching sound.

Lungs that need to feed
claw desperately
forcing former weapons to follow.
Bet those fingers 
are numb nubs by now
no longer 
prone to pummeling
your domesticated "cow".
Think this lowbrow 
has earned your bow.

Insufficient space, you say?
Nay, surely a man 
of your caliber
can find a way.
That framing serving as a womb
will soon become your tomb
so despite your girth
embrace rebirth
and stop 

begging.

I’ll have your mum to lunch
to use her shoulder as a crutch
while you moulder
behind the kitchen hutch
as I clutch Kleenex
and bemoan your disappearance.

Yep, you set yourself up for disaster,
I pipe up happily
as I spread fresh plaster
elated and secure
for these walls can't talk
and you can't endure
much longer

I'm sure.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

June 2018 - "Mean Streets" Challenge Winner

*Lil' Cowboy* by *Gumby

*He rode the white horse 
in mama’s womb,
she bucked him out 
on a crack house floor.

Jitter baby, jitter,
shake, sweat,
crusty vomit, 
cardboard bassinet.

He can’t sit still for Gramma’s hugs;
she’s raisin’ him to be a man
not no gangsta thug,
sees him play in the street
on his white stick horse,
shoot finger guns at passing cars.

She prays baby, prays,
shakes and sweats;
this child won’t rest in peace
in no cardboard bassinet.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

July 2018 - "Washing Bones" Challenge Winners

*Face the waves* by *toddm*

Face the waves that touch our country;
breathe the starlight, admixed with brine;
swim amidst bright dreams of morning
tossed and tumbled through the night;
a strong desire for wind is upon us,
driven fierce by unseen tempests,
pushing the waters onto pale shores
through wild and wavering shadows;
these fair bone-cages are being washed,
serene in the warm and ebbing tide;
the fragile half-light is burning down
into the depths illumined in the eye;
such twilight and silhouetted smiles,
such longings between the water-pages,
longings not understood by youth:
the endless minstrelsy of frothy waves,
eyes bright beneath star-spray blossoms,
and the dying of each wave in its turn.


*The Woodworkers' Daughter* by *Chester's Daughter

*Her scale screamed
less than six stone,
most of which
was exclusively bone,
yet when she showered
she scoured her skeleton
in an unquenchable quest
to wash away weight
only she could see.

But that came later.

In the beginning,
blessed with a normal BMI,
she’d been content hiding
behind her snare and cymbals,
but a one of a kind voice
forced her front and center
where endless eyes focused
on her imperfections

most sadly born 
of her own misconception.

Please the mother.
Please the brother.
Please the fans.
Forget herself.
Her sacred voice had no say.
Powerless to plan her own steps,
she took control another way.

Thin was in
and audiences did not pay
to see a sloppy slob sashay.
So she starved and purged,
popping laxatives
with metabolic uppers
in record numbers
to immediately usher out
what tidbits she took in.

She dropped pounds
but her lying eyes denied the loss
so her weight plummeted
down
down
down
as desperate to lose more
she clawed at death’s door
finally feeling 
in command
of her situation
until the little she had left
failed her 
in pursuit of preservation.

A solitary savior
was found in a network 
of collapsed vessels
and through a tube
her dying landscape was watered
as its larger cousin
force fed the crops.

Her tissues greedily gulped
what they needed to succeed 
and ounces married bone
but alas 

it was too late.

Syrup of ipecac
had laid to waste
the love starved muscle 
nestled within her chest.
With almost no warning,
her beat deserted her.

At the age of 32,
her caloric war ended,
her unique sound
forever gagged and bound
for greener pastures.

Back at the beginning,
before she was held hostage
by a mistaken mind,
the family 
she relinquished her rights
to please
was as absent as the husband
whose betrayal
had brought her to her knees.

Bedeviled and doomed,
there’s no doubt you believed
you were all alone
as you cleansed 
those fleshless bones

sweet, tragic Karen

everyone
anyone
someone

should have shown you different.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

August 2018 - "Camping Out" Challenge Winner

*Man Out of Time*

Reduced to camping out at home,
he lives the life he knows.
But fearfully now.
Sharpened stakes in hand-hewned holes
defend the land he saved.

Alone in a homeland without a home,
his father, god and memories
stem panic fear and dread
of alien eyes that are on him.
Death waits in far places.

He hunts under the camera’s eye
and makes the news abroad.
For thirty years a diversion,
fodder for assertions
that something should be done.

He knows nor cares of the world beyond
the jungle of his birth.
His only quest to stay alive,
survive as he was taught
and honour his birthright.

The faithful canopy his shield,
dependable stars his guide,
he survives alone
in a shattered world
and waits to join his tribe.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

September 2018 - "Whispering" Challenge Winner

*Black Silk White Dawn* by *Firemajic*

*I dreamed you came to me
though you've been gone for years
you held me close through the night
and dried my black silk tears

Grief like deep dark water
brought you back to me
in my world of black silk sorrow
you kept me company

In my dark dream bed
you gently removed my chains
painful black silk memories
burned away in white flames

Ashes soft as a lover's whisper
caressed my cold skin
and I was beautifully changed
by the black silk wind

Drifting on my dream ocean
suspended above the earth
on a gentle black silk tide
I watched the sun give birth

There on the horizon 
a glimmer of pale light
black silk faded to white dawn
and burned away the night

You left me in the morning
but you helped me through the night
black silk sorrow turned to mist
in the peaceful white dawn light
*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

October 2018 - "Dark Places" Challenge Winner

*Kindly click to view:

Dark Angel *by *TL Murphy*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

November 2018 - "First Light" Challenge Winner

*The Dame Light* by *Darkkin*

Follow it back, along a path of sand,
a tangled tendril amid maple stands.
Go when the last sugar ray is flown,
as autumn fades, the milkweed sown.
—Seek the soft prism of cold fae hands.

As the season breaks, it reveals lands
veiled from covetous eyes and hands.
Marvels forbidden, secrets unknown.
--Follow along a path of sand...

From the veil she comes, prism in hand,
as autumn dies, crimson ‘cross the land.
And with it she comes, prisms sown,
the first light of winter, tyrian blown—
soul of the Dame Light unseen by man.
--Follow, footprints cast in sand...


----------



## Chesters Daughter

December 2018 - "Bells" Challenge Winner

*Kindly click to view:

**For Whom the Bell Tolls* by *Phil Istine*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

January 2019 - "Bow" Challenge Winner

*Kindly click to view:

The Fiddler *by *PiP*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

February 2019 - “Frozen” Challenge Winner
*
Broken Wing *by *TL Murphy*

On a dark river
blood runs thin.
A child of winter from feathers and furs
walks over water
old whiskey still burns 
his barefoot tongue
a broken wing in tumbled stones
where spirit ran
from ice to wind. A caribou man 
less caribou skin
through barren heaven 
boundless cold 
where brothers lay
where mother’s face 
turned lightning strike
and father fell 
under horse-drawn spirits
the holy pale
that shaved his head
and buried his wolf
under brick and glass
clipped his bear-claws 
one by one
.......bbound in inukshuk 
.........someone is here.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

March 2019 - "Long Shadows" Challenge Winner

*Lux et umbra* by *toddm

*The shadows were long within her eyes
from leafless treetops against the skies.
Morning had brought a grey half-light
smouldering at the edge of the dying night.
Should I indeed allow myself to love
this beautiful innocent and fragile dove
lost in a wilderness of tangled winds,
of bright beginnings and bitter ends,
of embattled hopes amid great fears
and joyful tidings after many tears?
She smiled to herself, then looked at me; 
the shadows were gone, from what I could see.
She took my hand and we faced the light
which now filled the world, serene and bright.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

April 2019 - "Silence" Challenge Winner

*Beneath the Sacristy Carpet (Mature Content)* by *Chester's Daughter

*Crumbs of evidence
were silently swept
beneath the sacristy carpet.

No need for parishioners
to be aware
their Sunday sermons
slithered past the guilty lips
of a sly serpent.

For thirty odd years -
from as many 
different pulpits -
Father misled his flock,
the diocese never seeking
to defrock
a purveyor of pure evil.

Hundreds of times
his busy hands
abandoned benediction
to grope inside vestments
tailored for children.

Scarring souls,
marring minds,
leaving countless crumbs behind,
as half-hearted spare prayers
were offered up
by tight-lipped brethren
choked by stiff collars.

Until little Greg McGee,
now a strapping lad
of twenty-three,
tracked Father down
and cornered him
in his latest rectory.

With a chalice of gold,
from which Savior's blood
was served to the fold,
Father's skull was crushed.
Bits of bone
silently scattered
amongst countless crumbs
beneath the sacristy carpet.

The church defiled
hallowed ground
with Father's burial,
as Greg McGee, finally free,
watched on in ecstasy,
both his hands and soul
unshackled

for Pastor convinced police
feeble Father had two left feet
and was the cause 
of his demise.
A little white lie
set to rest beside
serious sins

all silently swept
beneath the sacristy carpet.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

May 2019 - “Mom” Challenge Winner

*Mom’s Crop *by *Chester’s Daughter

*I found Mom out back,
resplendent in a battered lawn chair,
admiring her crop
of eight yellow inhalers,
(good God, she's hoarding empties)
lovingly planted
in freshly turned soil
as dark as my dread.
Orange caps
resembled warped blooms.

Dirt-encrusted 
inhaler number nine
was loosely held
in her muck-covered hand,
her mouth smeared
with loam lipstick.
Seemed exertion encouraged
enough lucidity
for her to realize
she needed a puff.

Sunlight glinted off
thick glasses
sadly magnifying clueless eyes
of brilliant blue
which had been
as sharp as a hawk's
when we’d planted actual vegetables
two decades before.

Within three hours,
a new regime came into power
lorded over by illustrious
Dr. Everything Gonnabealright.
Wearing a smile of cubic zirconia,
he deftly scribbled a scrip
with a dainty hand
as pasty as fresh plaster.
One tablet b.i.d.,
with a full glass of water
if you please.
Hearty claps upon our backs
ushered us out the door.

She never knew
what the pills were for -
clarity could not be coaxed
from vocal chords encased 
in the concrete born of love -
"Just vitamins.", we told her.

Her paralyzing dismay
at a three syllable word
found on page 
twenty-six 
of her dog-eared paperback Webster's
tethered the truth
well within a corral of empathy,
its swinging sign proclaiming
"Leaky lips need not apply
nor are welcome."

Four years later,
like her mind, her lungs abandoned her;
I approached the subsurface abode
which was hers to share with Dad,
an almost empty vial clutched 
(practically crushed)
in a clammy claw.

With my free hand,
I tossed a perfect pink rose,
its petals still warm with 
the breath of my final farewell,
onto ebony soil,
the sight and scent of which
brought forth a recollection 
of the plastic garden
that had heralded
the beginning of the end.
My sister wrestled the bottle
out of my death grip
whispering
"She doesn't need them anymore."

Most of her traits were buried
long before her body.
She passed never remembering
she had ever forgotten
and without the stigma
of a capital “a”
emblazoned into what remained
of her brain.

Our silence had ensured her peace
and protected what little was left
of struggling cerebral cells.


I've never once regretted it.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

June 2019 - “Apologies” Challenge Winner

*Kindly click to view:

NEW AGE TODDLER by PiP
*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

July 2019 - “Drowning in Plastic” Challenge Winner
*
Kindly click to view:

Black Crow by Gumby


*


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## Chesters Daughter

August 2019 - “The Difference Between Rock and Stone” Challenge Winner

*Kindly click to view:

Apache Tear Drops *by *Gumby*


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## Chesters Daughter

September 2019 - “The First Time I Died” Challenge Winner 

*Kindly click to view:

No Tears *by *Mish*


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## Chesters Daughter

October 2019 - “Affection Is a Resource” Challenge Winner

*Kindly click to view:

Obtuse Conditions *by *Mish*


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## Chesters Daughter

November 2019 - “Fading Humanity” Challenge Winner
*
Kindly click to view:

Then The Devil Stole My Soul *by *Andrew Clunn*


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## Chesters Daughter

December 2019 - “Sorry Not Sorry” Challenge Winner

*Memento* by *Jen the Pen

*He was autistic before it was even a thing.

Some laughed and called him an idiot -
not unkindly but thoughtless enough to sting.
He was not unintelligent but often curled
inside a world of his own.
A woodland creature that eschewed the light 
and preferred to live alone.


He could be aggressive,
a sudden nastiness that hurt like claws,
a last resort of a mind that is caught
in a trap of cold isolation.
A lifetime at odds with life’s expectation,
unresolved during seventy-six years

until death stepped in like a friend.


All those years, now lost,
frost upon the melting windowpane.
Remembered moments like butterflies

that passed before my youthful eyes.

Guilt and sadness come with disclaimers,
my thoughts the same as theirs,
sorry? not sorry? – ignorance carries no blame.


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## Chesters Daughter

January 2020 - “Quiet Places” Challenge Winners 
*
Kindly click to view:

Escape Quilt *by *Phil Istine



Hunkered Down in Down *by *Chester’s Daughter

*One eye struggles open
to gauge the weather.
What will today bring,
tsunami or cyclone
downpour or drought
blazing bolts or blizzard?

Sans crystal ball or wizard
probability predicts
the sky won't be bright
and my crop of hope
will be dying of blight.

Second eye follows suit,
gaze slides from side to side
squinting at the scenery.
What accessories will be necessary:
boots or boats
scuba gear or canteens
straps to secure me to a basement beam?
Perhaps I'll grab, then drag,
the entire array downstairs
and cower in a corner
of the cellar.

Steady Heddy, ready for all:
accoutrements to combat
every squall.
Initial hailstone hits haggard pane
to herald a horrific onslaught.
Orbs squeeze tight;
I'm not up for the fight.

Being buried beneath 
a blizzard's bulk
won't be so bad
nor would letting the house 
fly or float away.
Not too terrible to be trapped
anticipating
dehydration and starvation
will ravage me to the point of decay.

Today,
I'll stay in bed come what may,
I'm just too damned tired
for defensive plays.
Sometimes it's best
to let a comforter's caress
have its wanton way.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

February 2020 - “Bond(s)” Challenge Winner 

*I’ve Stolen Your Used Shoes *by *Chester’s Daughter 

*I become you.

Every day.

I slip on
unsightly sandals
and shuffle along
filthy floors
while I watch my socks go gray.

I piss in aluminum
as one eye migrates
to the back of my head.
Communal cleansing
has schooled
orbs gone old and cold
to do fancy new tricks.
Hyper vigilance
is better than dead.

I steer clear of uniforms

whether they're weighted
down by batons
and detector wands
or are contraband
fashion statements
of red or blue
wrapped around wrists
itching for a coup.

I scoop up slop
off plastic trays
with plastic sporks.
Luckily,
servings are so scant
my gag reflex
hasn't the time to kick in
even though I'm sure
most of it's been
fished from the bin.

I trade ramen for salt
to lessen taste bud assault
and simply refuse to sample
the gray sausage
dubbed “sick donkey dicks”

even when pressed
by the block bully
looking for kicks,
who, I'm sure in time,
will deliver me licks.

On "A" visiting days
I pray no one will show.

An hour enduring cacophony
and bookended 
by strip searches
makes kin and friends
seem almost like foes.

The caged clock mocks me
and slows its flow
when it knows I'm zipped 
to my lips
in ill-fitting coveralls
the color 
of hurricane clouds
and peppered with rips
with legs that abort
three inches
too short.

I nap
but never sleep
and terror
has taught me well
you die if you weep.

Four months 
undeservedly spent in hell
thanks to a lie
some bastard saw fit to tell.

You’ve been free 
for near five years

yet still I become you.

Each and every day.

Just how you survived
I really can't say.

I beg you to forget 
your haunted shoes,
such loss is no lack,
to my feet they’re now affixed
gratis of a super glue’s kiss

and God as my witness,
I won’t ever 
give them back.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

March 2020 - “Justice Served” Challenge Winner 

*Velvet Revenge (Extremely Mature Content)* by *Chester’s Daughter

*Two red satin bows adorned her hair
but they belonged to another
who was no longer there.

Her girl had been found
gagged and bound
with her flesh savaged
by starving carnivores
and her nether regions ravaged
by something far more sinister
which boasted but two legs.

A ferocious February held the child
in its frigid embrace;
draped in moldy lace
and denied both life and decay,
with her captive spirit 
by injustice still held sway,
she waited in frozen earth
suffering each second
in an undeserved wooden dungeon.

Mother played hide and seek
with mourning’s razor-sharp beak
as she sought the depraved biped 
who had fed his true flock.
She watched the wolves
who for their dinner
used growls to knock
at a well-known door
by weather and claws
both worn and pocked.

She had never favored the village vicar
who cared more for ladies and liquor
than he did the Word.
There was no surprise in her eyes
when she realized
that he wore the look
of forest critters during wildfire
any and each time she neared.
Conviction via fear.

She used loss as a ploy
to capture her prey.
“Oh dear vicar, I feel so low today
will you stop by so we can pray?”
knowing full well he could ne’er say nay.

She prepared a toddy
of her strongest port,
heavily laced
with St. John’s Wort,
of which he greedily gulped.
She smiled when he slumped
in his chair
and pulled one bow from her hair
to pin it to his pupil;
alas, he was too intoxicated to care.

Once roused,
he found himself bound
to a four-poster
with his eye a screaming demon
as his eager hostess with the mostest
prepared his next course.

She took a red velvet sash 
from a child’s Yuletide dress,
which had never been blessed
by her daughter’s flesh,
and with it tied a tight bow 
down below
to staunch
most of his blood flow.
For hours,
he whimpered and pled
as she caressed the second red
satin bow.

Left tied for days,
gangrene had its way,
sepsis forever stilling filth 
via its venous highway.
As the magistrate banged his gavel
while proclaiming she’d hang,
a lullaby she sang
and then twice bent
her body in a bow
as happiness eased
her long-furrowed brow.

Soon after the seventh sunrise 
spotlit the gallows,
Mother was hung.
Red threads peeked from between 
the digits of her death grip,
and as her lifeless shell swung,
her little girl came to collect her.

Justice for all
had duly been done.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

April 2020 - “Pining for the Past” Challenge Winner 

*Kindly click to view:

The Fish-Men Remember *by *ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

May 2020 - “Holy Darkness” Challenge Winner 

*For Your Own Protection *by *andrewclunn*

Scratch marks tracking dates
They cover walls, which keep me safe
Monitors illuminate other inmates,
but cracks let the darkness in

Squeezed until we soften
Feel almost free if I don't resist
Cultivated gardens of invisible irons 
that tighten around my skin

Heretics fight the herd
Pray to our jailers and repent
They will let all of us leave I'm told
once the prison is within


----------



## Chesters Daughter

June 2020 - “Cowardice” Challenge Winner

*A Coward’s Solution for Unpleasant Recollections* by *Chester’s Daughter

*I walk the shoreline
at breaking dawn
on a crisp
late winter morn,
numbed to my knees
by frigid brine,
hoping to freeze
my overtaxed mind.

Passive lips of tide
kiss my steps
and quickly hide
every trace 
I’d been there,
each grain of sand
restored with care.
Tracks of my lone
intrusion erased; 
the sea always rights
what's been displaced.

How I wish the sea 
as company 
everywhere I amble
for then there'd be
no history
of missteps taken 
so senselessly. 

I so abhor treading
this beach alone
seeking to exile
mem’ries
etched in stone -
indelible
for eternity,
forever consuming
inner harmony - 

if only my memory
were made of sand
then unwanted footprints,
upon demand,
would be effaced by
my certain hand
leaving only those 
I can withstand.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

July 2020 - “Almighty Drama” Challenge Winner 

*Hotline: A Quiet Drama [Trigger Warning] *by *Darkkin

*Number on the sign,
dialed it
busy...
busy...
busy...
no need to redial


----------



## Chesters Daughter

August 2020 - “Light(s) Where None Should Be” Challenge Winner

*Final Flame* by *Firemajic*

When I die light a final fire
a glorious celebration, funeral pyre 
then let me drift far out to sea
and smile when you remember me

This flame that burns, I've lost control
scorched my heart, singed my soul
suffocated on poisonous smoke
could not breathe and lost all hope

Watch me as I go up in flames
know that I have loathed this game
sacred love, loving sacrifice
this fragile thing we call life

Let my flame ignite your life
passion born of pain and strife
let my smoke permeate your skin
and start a fire deep within

soaring, dancing in the midnight sky
no longer earthbound, I can fly
a tiny spark soon lost in space
my flame now gone without a trace...


----------



## Chesters Daughter

September 2020 - “Poet’s Choice” Challenge Winner 

*Kindly click to view:

Marooned *by* Gumby*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

October 2020 - “Eye of Newt, Wing of Bat” Challenge Winner

*On the Wings of a Fox *by *​Darkkin*


On the Wings of a Fox: A Villanelle Juxtapose

Deep and doleful, full of doubt a desperate song takes wing.
Ride the winds, soar high as old Turtle in the midnight sky—
Find the Standing Stones where the Silver Selkie still sings.

On a flute of bone, Phi calls Sky Fox to the old obsidian ring—
the Standing Stones of Selkie Wold, wherein nightmares die.
Deep and desperate, that song of the Sky Fox’s velvet wings.

Phi, gaze alight, about her shoulders a Cloak of Shivers clings,
as she cast her bright melody high to draw good Sky Fox nigh.
Doubtful, desperate up from the darkest deep velvet wings sing.

Skin stretched drum tight, the hum of wind floods the stone ring.
Sky Fox, that deepest shadow in a softer night, blots out the sky.
Stars swallowed, veiled by a Sky Fox, come on whispered wing.

Phi clad in Shivers, tucks her flute away, rushes to get her things,
among them her string of pearls so to lasso a Sky Fox now nigh.
Each pearl a day in her years, betwixt her fingers slides and sings.

By tracery touch, through the tenebrous void Phi felt the wings
rush, brush, and bend the breezes in the Stones: It was do or die.
Count the Sky Fox’s thrum, heed the gushes as the heart sings.
Lasso cast. Pearls in a brass ring. Phi beneath Sky Fox swings—

Away from the Stones, snatched high into the sweet indigo sky,
Phi clutched tight to her rope of pearls, beneath Sky Fox swings,
to and fro and back again, each down stroke a sleepy child’s sigh—
so says the wind: Find the Azure Salamander Kin to gain the Eye.

Phi heard the mutter and in her bones knew she had to at least try
to face down that fear bloomed, fear of a horrid, conniving thing
she fled once before, rode paper wings into the sweet indigo sky.

Now duty and deed call her to find the All Seeing Newt’s Eye—
to snatch it up so Pi would not reach the City of Seven Rings.
Phi, the last line of defense for that sleepy child’s dreamy sigh.

Hand o’er hand, Phi hauled onto Sky’s back, a bat flyin’ high—
harnessed, round and about woven by a length of pearl string.
Knees to neck Phi astride, rider of deep velvet in indigo sky.

Before the wind the Fox Bat soars far above the ocean’s cry,
Sky, the Fox Bat blind in the night, sees where echoes sing—
Down to the billows, gunmetal waves hold the echoes’ sigh.

Fold. Hold. Fall. Heed the billows’ call. Follow as stars die—
Phi frees her bubble wand as Sky plunges, unfurls her wings
on a bubble flight through the abyss to find the Newt’s Eye.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

November 2020 - “What is Right, Not Easy” Challenge Winner

*At a Cross Roads* by *Greyson

*as the final leaves
of fall
fall
as this rock continues
its unceasing journey
forward, ever forward
and a pensive mood settles 
over this worldweary wastrel
one thing remains unspokenly true:

what is right for this soul
may be wrong for yours;
what is best for this heart
is nonsensical to the next;
what soothes this paranoid mind
may ever appear wasteful.
for right and wrong
are only true where absolutes reign;
where the trimmed trees
flank uniform streets,
where the dandelions sprouting
beneath the scattered leaves
are forgotten for weeds

and yet, and yet…

just as those forgotten dandelions
hiding among so much ash
waiting to become ash
it comes
that what is right for me
will never be easy to find,
to explain
to show it’s worth—
for it is no buried treasure
but a starving of the soul
a longing ghost pain
which haunts&lingers
when forsaken for another.


so that it may be
easier to do what is right
....................................for me
than to settle my soul to its grave
so others might agree
i am no different from them:
eyes averted from the trees,
ears stopped to the robin’s call
to wander, to be free.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

December 2020 - “So Say the Stars” Challenge Winner
*
Kindly click to view:

**nocturne *by *petergrimes*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

January 2021 - “Black Magic” Challenge Winner

*Kindly click to view:

Black Cat Bone Woman *by *Gumby*


----------



## Chesters Daughter

February 2021 - “Good Bones” Challenge Winner 

*Good Bones* by *Foxee*

She's got good bones
weathered battle damage
humility a tattered flag
wrapping her shoulders
dusting her feet

Heart shot away
a yellow canary cries
from her rib cage

Scarred by flame
expectations seared
bright embers remain
she meets your eyes
steadily

She can touch without crushing
Speak without screaming
Give without gaining

She can take the weight
She's got good bones


----------



## Chesters Daughter

March 2021 - “Dusty Little Curiosities” Challenge Winner

*The Collector *by *jenthepen

*Old dusty curiosities,
miscellaneous discoveries,
a jumble of absurdities,
frivolities and vanities,
collected opportunities
to showcase multiplicities.

Small idiosyncrasies,
impractical obscurities,
mix of peculiarities,
some with similarities,
also a few anomalies
enhancing authenticities.

All sorts of possibilities,
with different personalities;
bottles from old distilleries,
some pictures of celebrities,
pennies that are rarities
and cards from anniversaries.

Monstrosities and forgeries,
Gran’s teeth and other lunacies,
she’s making no apologies
for glaring incongruities;
exposing eccentricities
and maybe insecurities.

Caddies, machetes, china bees,
irrational irrelevancies,
no concept of sufficiencies 
but led by availabilities,
she indulges her propensities
for collecting generalities.


----------



## Chesters Daughter

April 2021 - “Default” Challenge Winner 
*
Death by Default *by *Firemajic*

It had always been there, hiding, waiting
she was blissfully unaware that walked with her
in the shadowed forest and sacred solitude, where her
ink stained fingers scribbled poetry on white paper
and it followed, in her fast paced quest for life and love
loving the life she lived

But it was there, nesting in her chest
under her ribs, sending secret 
tendrils deep into her breasts and bones
icy fingers seeking her life force as she
danced to her dreams, sipping wine
and spending time
as it it was fool's gold

Even while she laughed and loved
it invaded her strong spine
syphoned her energy and
made her bones brittle, a little bit
at a time, until she could no longer climb
wooded trails where she once worshiped
but the trees whispered on without her
and all the while she was unaware

She was losing her auburn hair as she
restlessly dozed in her rocking chair
early winter slipped into late spring, fevered 
dreams came on hungry raven wings and
savagely picked her memories to pieces

She forgot the things she had known
familiar faces, lost loves, wild seeds 
she had sown, poetry unwritten
suspended in time when life
was sweet and so was the wine

Thin skin stretched across fragile bones
her hands moved like wounded doves fluttering
frantically, clinging to the life she loved
finally she surrendered to deep sleep  

Then IT stopped her breath in her hollow 
chest, and at last she was laid to rest
unaware


----------



## Chesters Daughter

May 2021 - “Abandoned Place/Things” Challenge Winners

*Kindly click to view:*

*This Child* by *TuesdayEve


Ties That Blind* by *Firemajic*

You were shooting for the stars
I held you earthbound with
red balloon strings
and knotted kite tails
night lies whispered against
bruised skin

The poetry we wrote
disguised our Band-Aids
ink stained my skin when
you ran trembling fingers
through my hair

Blinded by verses you
engraved on my bones
we clung to our battered yellow
parachute as it plummeted
your words swept away in
free fall chaos

But I can hear you scream

You are tangled in me
entwined in our dead end trip
destined never to make it to the stars

I look into your stoned
shattered eyes and see
blue butterflies battered broken
swirling in a hopeless vortex


----------



## Chesters Daughter

June 2021 - “Walking on Eggshells“ Challenge Winners

*Eggshells Always Crack* by *TuesdayEve*

No matter how they fall
under light footed smiles and lowered eyes
dodging martini mood swings 
and sideways lies
landing is the hard part

The egg cracked this morning 
between a cordial nod and buttered toast
shattered white bits between my toes
and the cat took off ‘round the corner

Barking dogs couldn’t stop the fight
broken promises and defiance ignite
a furied father’s untempered right
milk puddles the table

Invisible, silent good byes
hurriedly reach the door
shadowed by relief once more
eggshells beneath my feet


*In-Laws* by *jenthepen *

You miss so much of me
with your prickly coat of thorns.
All the pristine moments
of careful communication
create a tidy version
of who we might have been.

I sense your fear of me,
watching my love for your man.
Tight smiles grip buds of fun
and squeeze a cold suspicion
from the pores of proffered moments
of warm camaraderie.

A shared love should be no threat
to one, adored as you are.
Yet, the bitter eggshells crush
beneath our faltering feet
as, together, we miss so much
of who we might have been.


----------

