It's just poetry, it won't bite

Blue


06.08.19 Posted in today's words by

Olivia Piper is a student at Bridgewater College in Bridgewater, Virginia, home of the Bridgewater International Poetry Festival.

Blue
By Olivia Piper

Her eyes were nothing like the sea, nothing like the ice, nothing like the sky

Her lips were not a budding rose.
They were the palest orange, like a peach not quite ready to be picked, too sour if you tried.
They were earthy, grounded in the sweat and blood of the stories she could tell.
They enveloped the words she spoke
Turning them into red hot metal tumbling from those pale orange lips
It wasn’t like she invented the language. It was like she destroyed it
Her teeth were hammers that crushed it so she could spit it out to create a beautiful mosaic in the dirt
It’s why her eyes could never be the sea.

Her hands were not slender, graceful things
Her veins were strained and distorted
All the skin pulled tight against the bones and the fingers spread wide apart as she frantically spoke with them
Waving them around her body with enough power to destroy worlds.
No one dared get close
No one dared stay away
It wasn’t poems that gingerly swayed from her fingertips, but expletives fleeing her intensity, her fire.
It’s why her eyes could never be the ice.

Her walk wasn’t like she was floating across the tile
She would never be caught dead doing anything so passive, so dainty
Her shoulders bobbed with the force of her steps, her head following suit
Her hair swished around her ears, never daring to fall into her eyes’ path
She owned the space she occupied, stole it from a world that had never been kind enough to share
She moved like she owned it, like she owned us, and we thanked her for it
She would not be invisible or ignored
she would demand the space and respect
She was physical
Solid
It’s why her eyes could never be the sky

Her eyes were nothing like the sky, the ice, or the sea
She could never be compared to anything so human



5 Responses to “Blue”

  1. Charlene james says:

    Oh, how truly wonderful,
    congratulations Olivia,
    ditto Bridgewater

  2. H. Larew says:

    A powerful, powerful poem. Thanks for sharing it!

  3. Ed Zahniser says:

    Nice, strong poem. The centered presentation works well. Thanks.

  4. Bobbie Troy says:

    wow, very powerful images. well done.

  5. Charlene james says:

    I had to go back and read this again. It is a great poem.
    It should be cast to the four winds and devoured, mightily.

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