Sunstroke’s Monthly Poetry Compilation is a collection of work submitted by readers, contributors and staff members. Take a seat, light a candle, grab a cup of tea, and dive into the intricate words of our community.

Note On The Hotel Dresser

We keep coming back to the sunrise,
And we return over,
And over
And over some more.
Does it matter which way it finds us?
Staring blankly, and blindly, repeating the score.

But I wish now, for the trees to grasp it,
And hold it still with their green tipped mast,
To keep position for just an hour
And do what we will before it’s past.

Window Seat

By Alex Payne

Two glass polished mirrors
Convex and poking lively,
Stained blue striking errors
Flecked with iron and impurity.

Perching placid passing glance
Stare down strangers with indifferent clarity.
Placing prejudice,
Placing chance,
On passers-by for little more than pleasures of poor pleasantry.

Candy Days Repeating

By Anastasiya Sukhenko

melted hard candy
to my ears
fill my head
so sweet (too sweet
to be good)
harden over my brain
only to crack
from a head tap
at the end of the day
i’ll wake up
ready to choose sugar
over air
again

you said you loved me

By Myesha Phukan

you called me last night
the phone rang at 3 am
when only the devil’s lay awake

sleep clawing at your voice,
the alcohol slurring your words
you
said
you loved me
maybe the liquor won’t let you remember
maybe you don’t remember how
you were kissing her
on the bed that was ours

maybe the memory of her cherry-chapped lips on yours
escaped
flew into the air
only for it to become my nightmare

you came home smelling of roses and peonies,
insisting that it came from me
but only vanilla accompanied the scent that was mine.

do you honestly not remember?

the night i said i loved you
you
                               left
  me
                              for her

Faith

By Samuel Patrick Ava Robertson

The Barren Eden
A body lay ensnared in the vines of the saltless tree
Another drowned in the bitter, ash of the dry river
Callow miscreants
Their souls never received
Death never collected
They told themselves what they wanted to hear
Believed it
Grounded within their hollow carapaces
Only their rancid spirits to accompany them for eternity
Rotting away,
Do they still cling to those beliefs?

SLEEPING BEAUTY FRAUD

By Nerika

Was her beauty truly groundbreaking?
Or could we all have gone without
The great tales of the princely kiss
And the girl who couldn’t say no

Her castle
Her home
Her fairies
All stone

Their dresses prepared
They’ve got nowhere to go
Their crowns all polished
Its shine seen from down below
Girl’s don’t need to know
This story from ages ago

It repeats itself
Her mind
Her heart
Her say
Her.
Things they never hear
Because they don’t fit the fairytale they wish to preserve.

Aurora, her roar hidden in her name.
She’s not your princess.
And Maleficent was not the villain.
You dress yourself in beautiful silver
Hoping they won’t expect you to prick their finger

Was her beauty truly groundbreaking?
Or was it everything inside her that needed saving?
Once upon a dream,
The sleeping are never as they seem.
So as they twirl in their wheel,
Bring forth a spindle, to return how you feel.

---sleeping beauty fraud

Another Version of Another Death

By Marseli Jane Redford

Was that the void of human emotion? Withered and crisped, alone in the dark. Like a burnt page or wasted time.

I thought about the world of other souls like mine that might just exist under a veil of splendor. Or the kind that existed beyond the veil of mortality.

Years of defiled self, years upon years of watery eyes, alone. I didn’t think I made sense to anyone anymore. Maybe ever at all.

The words came out like these words I’m writing. The past shredded through each sentence, with the hope of a new tomorrow strong in the morning, but gone by the end of the day.

Maybe it was all the same thing. All our pain, despair, failure, love. And would our minds blend together like the oceans? Would we become each other, or wither out alone and unrepeatable? The same words in the same ways in those same years all scratched and strewn. Our minds falling apart with our bodies, our humanity and our hope lost decades before our lives.

Can you feel them - the ones who have the same souls as you? Can you close your eyes and picture what they might look like, or where they are?

That is what I hoped to find before fatality arrived, and my time collapsed like the snow in the sun. Where were they?

twenty; girlhood, memories

By Anastasia Doeing

they don’t tell you this in school, but
when you’re twenty your body changes again
hips widen and fat deposits bloom
it’s hard to deal with, at first
because they don’t teach us this in school
and we’re taught that looking forever-16 is the beauty standard
(and the catcalls lessen, because we don’t look 16 anymore)

full-length mirrors show us thighs we were taught not to want:
hair, razor bumps, stretch marks and cellulite
a bulge on your tummy where your organs are being protected by fat, excess fat spilling over panties and jeans
(sucking your stomach in for your whole life gives you breathing problems in the end)

a 1200 calorie diet is used as a torture method,
but they don’t tell us that in school
and our food intake lessens because they make us take our BMIs
(without telling us they aren’t accurate)
schools fester eating disorders and hoards them
the sharpie markings on the bathroom stalls tells us as much

being twenty is something we never expected
womanhood is something we never wanted,
not really
our lives begin and end at sixteen
(or so it seems)
we get to start over whenever we want, though

take a look at your body, at its fat and its cellulite and stretch marks;
that all gives you the power to be alive,
that all keeps you safe
learning to love yourself is hard
it takes effort
but it's worth it
(and the thing is, you don't have to believe it, just keep saying it)
(and eventually, you will)

Fairy Princess Sex Doll

By Ainsley Louie-Suntjens

I. Fairy

The first time someone ever told me about their
sexual attraction
to me, the first trait he mentioned was
my height.
“you’re so small,
I could do anything to you.”
I bit my lip
and stared at my phone screen,
blue-light bubbles popping up
one after the other.

Back then, I didn’t know what a size kink was yet,
but I knew that I liked
that he wanted me.

II. Princess

Every night before bed,
we would call each other a different nickname.
He liked princess
and I liked that he liked it.
“my little princess.”
My cheeks burned
but my teeth gritted.
He told me I needed to slow down after that.
I just wanted to
please him.

III. Sex

I wanted to feel love.
I wanted to feel love’s lips
nipping at my jaw, licking my collarbones.
I wanted to feel love’s fingers
running down my waist, squeezing into my hips.
I wanted to hear
hot whispers against my navel
and lips pulling away from my nipples
I wanted to feel love
filling me, embodying,
inhabiting.
The imaginings of the first time draped over me
like a chiffon scarf.
The problem with chiffon is that it so light;
it blew off me constantly and
I found myself chasing it
into hurricanes.

IV. Doll

Lights, camera, action.
My eyes roll back
and my mouth falls open into an O.
My limbs collapse around me ball-jointed
and my sticky,
soaked thighs press together like a vice.
I throw my head back, panting.
I imagine him over me,
eyes and hands roving, softening.
My legs wobble as I tumble off the mattress
to go wipe myself up.
I feel him smirk at my
doe-leggedness.
I drown in his deep, tired brown eyes
and rest my hand on his dry jaw.
Warmth drip-drops in my chest
as I lay back.
The bed is empty
but I smile anyway.
Feels good.

The Water Cycle

By Aarti Mukhedkar

I have been misusing the night
In the aeons it takes me to fall asleep.
With my fingertips on the ceiling slowly,
I go through the entire water cycle.

Evaporation:
I think it all out.
My dying houseplant and my wilting sense of direction,
The sun, where has it been?
The, confused:P fact I th.at am d!on’t know how 8when life about,
Words, sentences, cascades of unrelenting memories stain my half-slumber.
There is absolutely no meaning in evaporation,
It is a rude eruption, one that no one asked for.

Condensation:
I distract myself.
I don’t write about these ‘things’,
I have stopped talking about them completely,
Maybe on a cold night, after four and a half glasses of wine, I'll blurt.
But an abrupt giggle gives it away:
I am okay. It was simply a joke.

Precipitation:
It is quiet but every part of my body hurts.
Saltwater drowns my pores,
And for a second it burns,
Before the quiet walks in
And takes over.

Collection:
Too scared to open the notes app in my phone
Because I will write something in between
Grocery List and Bucket List
And it will be as jarring as the Mona Lisa:
There is no metaphor, no onomatopoeia, no eloquence in these feelings,
They are unhinged, raw
Scraps of mind floating in a body.
When it is light outside,
All I think about is how others write;
I crave the goosebumps of love poetry,
The terror of it!
The mystery of finding out and
Caressing cold feelings that don’t sting anymore.
It is as if I am standing on a precipice
Teasing gravity into falling behind me.
Evaporation, Condensation, Precipitation, Collection.
An ostentatious way of saying
One sheep, two sheep, three sheep, four.

what do you call a non-binary cowboy?

By Jim Muntisov

If I became an Elvis impersonator what would you think of me?
A move to Vegas in the midst of a pandemic, would you support me?
Would you think less of me if I wore a fat suit and made no attempt to gain any weight for the role?

What if I started camming?
Would you look at me with your normal look?
If you saw me cum on-screen would you screenshot it?
I'm either on camera not cumming or off-camera cumming; why not streamline the process?
Would it be art or pleasure or business?

It wouldn't be up to me. You would decide. I can tell you my truth but your perspective skews. The bell chimes and I sell the illusion of control. The illusion I see others fall for. Maybe they want to fall for it.

Does my social presence embody the essence of your projection of me?
Do these words feel to you that they come from me?
Am I doing a good job?
Am I still a part of the cast for next season?

September Poetry Compilation