Stony Brook

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Stony Brook by Valerie Parente

Words about my self are so cold
because this conscious stream is frozen.
I’m making faces under the surface
in the name of what’s unspoken.

I questioned life on solid ground,
but I never stood a chance
at clinging to the rocks
that blistered my own hands.

Underneath the ice I laid on
was an isolation I schemed
where I was swept away by the current
as the current swept by me.

I still cross that stony brook
but I know better this time
holding my own breath
in a space so traumatized.

– Valerie Parente (5-26-2023)

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Her

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Her by Valerie Parente

You never knew her
You knew of her
And the way
She played with fire
Just like every
Woman prior
Who learned the hard way
To be the wiser
Against the system
That would conspire
To dim the light
From her lighter.
A scarlet red
She is a fighter
Among the flames
She has grown brighter.

– Valerie Parente (5-21-2023)

The Grand Review (A Fantasy Chronicle)

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The Grand Review by Valerie Parente

Now an enlightened Moonchild, Elissa claimed
the greatest discovery of the human race.
And with a quill pen dancing between fingers
she wrote in kraken ink, the law of existence.

When you have died
you review your life.
This is called the Grand Review
and it’s when you view life as you.
Right now, what you are witnessing
is also called, Living.
How..? You might ask.
Everything you endure is the past.
You think right now you are alive
but you have already died
a covert angel, playing it all out
but it feels like you’re here and now
and your very sense of the present
is proof of your everlasting presence.
When you return to your angel form you’ll admit
it does not feel so dark, does it?
Death is one with your life form,
a dual state you cannot hide from.
Little human, cry no more.
You died when you were born.
Do not fear death,
you’re doing it every moment.

– Valerie Parente (4-23-2023)

Believe In Me (A Fantasy Chronicle)

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Believe In Me (A Fantasy Chronicle) by Valerie Parente

Illihana grabbed his collar
and begged him in her grief,
“Believe me when I say
don’t believe in me.
I cannot be the girl
that you need me to be.
With this black hole in my chest
and my heart on my sleeve
it’s only a matter of time
before I collapse to gravity.”
But there was nothing she could say
to convince Sir Dovetail to admit defeat
because when he looked in her eyes
a glimmer of light was all he could see.

– Valerie Parente (3-14-2023)

Statues

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Statues by Valerie Parente

Built up from the ground
by the same hands they tear down,
statues with a soul
sold long ago,
can’t relate to the struggles
of their talentless doubles,
speaking so highly
above the stain of society,
as we scream “Who do you think you are?”
to these egos gone too far,
but we’re starting to catch on
how they’re the statues yet we’re the pawns,
oh how do you think they’d act
if we turned our backs?
No more eye contact with their bluffs
when they look down on us,
but it is them who will break
under the pressure of their hate.

– Valerie Parente (2-26-2023)

Time… It Heals

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“Is it true?”
“Is what true?”
“… That time heals the pain?”
“Yes, as time goes by you will smile at their memory instead of cry.”
“Is that because you start to forget about them?”
“No. You do not forget- you remember. You remember all those times together instead of that one moment you lost them.”

– Valerie Parente (1-6-2023)

Frostbite

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Frostbite by Valerie Parente

I don’t think peace of mind
is meant for those alive.
There’s no such thing as closure
there’s only getting older
and though I say I pray for relief
there’s a stronger part of me
that’s encased in thick ice
from the post traumatic life
and I know if I let it melt away
I won’t know who I am today.

Here I am, frozen alive
and it is not a surprise.
To live is to identify with time,
to live is to be encased in ice
and it confuses most
that it feels far from cold.
When frostbitten on the skin
it feels like perpetual burning
and I never quite let go
of the warmth in my soul.

– Valerie Parente (1-2-2023)


Sunrise (A Fantasy Chronicle)

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Sunrise (A Fantasy Chronicle) by Valerie Parente

Elissa grew up to be an enchantress
understanding the dark art of semantics
“Would you do it again?” her peers asked.
She declared, “I wouldn’t change the past
but I will tell you this of darkness
preach not what you practice.
It would be a grave mistake
to go out of your way
to create pain out of nothing
in an attempt to feel something.
Thou shall respond to darkness
while the sun sets
knowing the sun will rise again
along the horizon.”

– Valerie Parente (12-6-2022)