May Poetry Compilation
The Sunstroke Monthly Poetry Compilation is a collection of poetry submitted by Sunstroke readers and staff members. Take a seat, light a candle, grab a cup of tea, and dive into the intricate words of our community.
Submit to future compilations at hello@sunstrokemagazine.com!
Photograph by Annie Millman
Untitled by Emma-rose Allan
Go back to jail
Revolving doors
Masses are the poor
There’s so much we don’t know we must explore
The ones on top have known for years what’s already in store.
Simple pawns on a chessboard No wonder why we all speak up and still feel so ignored.
Reading countless books to escape this reality
Close the pages back to being endlessly bored.
The Great Design by Reece Herberg
when life was finally found on mars it was / a fossil of the beta fish i buried in my backyard / the tree swing in the forest that was closed off after a local suicide / mice in the church basement / the grocery store clerk who told me to get a pistol before moving to the city / cars in the parking lot clouded with smoke / a woman selling crystals and homemade CDs from her backseat / the drought in california / TV dinners in single parent households / the seven deadly sins and a checklist / small plastic baggies in the pockets of suburban fathers / the silver cross that dangled from his neck / irony / the first time i saw my reflection in the public bathroom toilet become replaced with yellow bile / static from the radio / convenience store signs / hospital bills in the mailbox / the elbows of my grandmother / green thumbs against electric sockets / the prescription bottles in my family’s medicine cabinet / the crows feet of my grandfather / plans for the apocalypse / spiderwebs in the junction box / an arm poking through the cat door / neon glares from the television set / watered down vodka / hair dye in the bathroom sink / light coming through my bedroom window / salt against fresh wounds / the last grains of sand in the hourglass / cracks in the pavement / forgetting the days of the week / knowing one day my mother will say my name and it will be for the last time
Bedside Table by Melizza Montes
I have a bedside table and on it are books of love poetry
Pages filled by poets with stories of those like you and me
With every turn of the page it gets harder and harder to see
Why you and i aren’t meant to be.
I have a bedside table and on it is my dearest journal
Every line dedicated to how i thought our love was eternal.
Spent my time day dreaming about you that I became nocturnal
causing ink stains on my hands and fingerprints on my journal.
I have a bedside table and on it is my favorite candle
You gifted me this candle because it smells of your cologne
You told me to light it when i need you near me and I’m all alone.
As it burns I close my eyes and it begins to smell like home.
I have a bedside table and on it is how I romanticize ever detail about us
I read about how a love like ours, there is none
And write about how it’ll happen for us, it just takes time
And every night i fill my mind with their poems and journals with mine
About a love that never happened regardless of the amount of time.
Because at the end of the night it’s just me and the dearest
Bedside table of mine.
Midnight Quarantine by Grace Sullivan
irises roll back
and mattress dissolves
tapestry fades
and walls come crumbling down
i invite the mist in, let it fog up reality
until my vision is only straight ahead
i only touch what isn’t tangible
like somebody’s hand
feel fingers meet mine, imagine i can feel more
than 100% cotton
when the walls rebuild themselves
and mattress meets body again
i don’t feel like sinking back in
i have felt enough to last
until the next night
Nostalgia by Taylor Linn
I pulled my dresser
back from my dorm room wall,
unearthing a time capsule in miniature.
A printed photograph
dated 1999 smiles up at me,
frozen in time.
I see myself taking their photo on a disposable Fujifilm,
then dropping off the film at Rite Aid the next day.
Some things will never change:
The beer in 1999 is still stale,
the basement is still sweaty,
and they still wear leis at Beta Luau.
I have no clue
who these people are
but I wish I did.
They must be 35 by now,
if they’re still alive.
Teendom By Eva Gelman
this street isn’t real and this house was torn down a long time ago
and now again it is not yet built.
coming back to the place where you were carries a sour aftertaste:
lemonade-lips on mine
the cardboard sun still shining.
i hear laughter and smoke coming from the old playground.
the great oak that held my secrets with its not-yet-ember sap is old and dry.
a cigarette could finish it.
the yellow paint on my bedroom walls dried dull--
i left here hoping that a change of color scheme would suit me.
each new address was tailored to my shape
the buildings tall and broad and tapered at the waist.
they changed me as i changed.
i’m all-blue now
the city’s silken gray is soft against my skin.
when i squeeze my eyes shut i sometimes still see the faded yellow;
it lingers after i open
hovering over my vision like a foggy lens. it’s simple--
i threw too many golden dimes into a fountain here.
i’m back to pick them up.
at least that’s what i tell myself.
Sorrowless Loss of Life by Mira Hartley
Crowds sway on canary yellow dance floors of moonlight
Grins cost nothing
They create their own currency of sugar skulls and velvet curtains
Angels buttered onto lawn chairs
Tinkering with martini glasses laced between ghostly pale fingertips
Whisper between sips
Just keep dancing
No one was sued for a tango
Families of cheshire's grin glow live in houses made of star nectar
They live their sun honey lives without any sticky lips or fingertips
Black is not apart of their vocabulary
I live in a nook of soot
Webs of salty tears
Trace poems through cheekbones caked in dark matter
Always dizzy from spinning holes threatening lives better lived
One finger clings onto the rim
I like to watch it slip
Barrenness is where my angels lie
In beds wrapped in butterfly wings
I itch to fall into fatal
Cuddle with the smell of baking apple pies that thrives in the desolate
Death does not in fact equate sorrow
I yearn for
Departure from the viewing of others sun honey lives
Ecstatic discovery of what it means to rest in joy
An orchestra of fireflies kissing my heart strings
Timeless existence of rosemary sealed door frames
Hands wiping away tears for something other than lonely
Everyone's invited
There's only one finger still slipping
Untitled 22 by Kat Mackay
Find me in the holes of your sweater,
The one I told you I’d give back.
Find me in the memories I thought I’d emphatically forgotten,
but emphatically,
failed
I know you will find me
because we will
never become
Obsolete.
I know you will find me
because your fervor
Is inexorable.
I know you will find me
because I’m not good
at hide-and-seek.
Why haven’t you found me yet?
The sunset changes for you,
Time lends herself to you,
The glitter under my bed gleams for you,
I stop myself.
