October 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.
Photo by Jas Calcitas
The Joker is Wild
By Ms Pablo
the joker is wild and I'm twenty-four
rivers won't flow my way anymore
the joker is wild and I'm twenty-four
like an illegitimate child, I want more out of life
a bit more love and light
up in my head of dusted clouds
toxic rain created mounds
of solitude and strains
linked to the chains
one cannot break
but only wish to take
away from their skin
and bend into little pins
one for every day
one for the sun that kept me warm
one for each may
and one for the storm
that couldn't kill me
Damp Innocence
By Bee Hurley
i It’s easier to make space for other people’s noise when it’s cooler, when the grass kisses your cheeks gently, rather than protruding from the ground in dissatisfied, browned curls. When you feel a little closer to angels and a little less swollen with summer. Angels feel closer in the cold when your ankles are cold because all your long socks are in the washing pile that hasn’t dried yet. After all, now the nights have become more than just respite from the sweat and the heat and the cruelty of one’s own soul. They have become damp and a little crueler themselves, the frogs know about it, they begin to soften their song until one day it stops and no one bothers to notice.
ii I never thought I was a person for the cold, but the heat bends me into shapes I never intended to take. Or at least I’m blaming it on the heat. But maybe I’m simply not as good a person as I’ve always hoped to be. I suppose I’ve always hoped to be a good person.
iii But often I think that I am a monster and am only kind to prove to myself that I am not. That in itself is monstrous. Other times I think that we’re all fallen angels, myself included. We die loving, obsessing. We can’t pull ourselves from passion for long enough to take a breath. And so all we have to show for how much we’ve loved is bruises. Today my head feels like a bruise.
iv Here I am staring at the computer screen writing to you about angels and the weather when there is so much hurting going on that I have done nothing about. I’m ever so sorry, reader.
today is your birthday
By Mariam Alaga
today is your birthday and I faulter in my restraint
to ask nothing for you
no hopes, or open heavens or hellfire
to ask nothing of you, ask nothing of me
whose body you chose to bury the hatchet in
with your hands, so nimble in passing
then so stiff to hold.
deified in your ability to carve an absolution out of me
this sunrise inspires mourning in me
penning an elegy to what was so misguided to attempt
once desecrated and desiring to venerate my honor
today is your birthday and I ask everything for me
all hope, and heavens floodgates
ask of myself the tenderness so denied to me
to make use of this hatchet and separate from
the misplaced shame, in all the chaos.
And what do we do when we feel this way?
By Claire Shepherd
And what do we do when we feel this way?
When we feel this way
We go to river banks
And wait until the snow melts
We take off all our clothes
And trace fingertips down our ribcage
We wait until the sun sets
And when it rises again
We fall
And let the water bathe us
And when we grow thirsty
Open our mouths
And let the river become
What is known as we
Find out how to submit to future Poetry Compilations here.