The Ephemeral Gone
By Rp Verlaine

 

How often can you lose everything?
betwix between every dying star
where promises turned to cinder ash.
Having gambled your soul trying to win
riches or worth, elusive, and as far
as a comet's tail traversing its path.
Her face with dark eyes sad yet so aware
walking away, high heels clicking a song
known only to those who've never been lost.
In arms that were safe and never were scared
or eclipsed by hate when night came along
with flames of regret that seared you its cost.
Jewels I bought her- pawned for flights to Spain
gone with my best friend, their laughter remains

 

Mythical Knights and Vampires

She told me as a child, she rarely slept
without horror filled dreams-of crypts and tombs
demons at her flesh, coveting her soul.
A huge cross and garlic, she always kept
over her bed, in a quaint pink bedroom
from thirsty vampires, her blood fed whole.
She survived, she said with fanciful dreams
of medieval times of queens and brave knights
who undid blouse after dragons were slain.
But the monsters truly never left it seems
they became husbands, lovers all brutal types
for whom torture was a most welcome game.
She now lives alone- having killed them all
in stories and rhymes, that chill and enthrall.

 

Rp Verlaine lives in New York City. He has an MFA in creative writing from City College. He taught in New York Public schools for many years. His first volume of poetry- Damaged by Dames & Drinking was published in 2017 and another – Femme Fatales Movie Starlets & Rockers in 2018. A set of three e-books titled Lies From The Autobiography vol 1-3 were published from 2018 to 2020. His latest book, Imagined Indecencies, was published in February of 2022. He was nominated for a pushcart prize in poetry in 2021 and 2022.