Spitting Matchsticks: a Poem

White knuckle it,
and the pain still sears through these autumnal bones.
Crumble them like my skeleton has memory.
It hasn’t forgotten the calendar days piling up
(as thick as novels).

It’s time to start spitting matchsticks
and not caring about the consequences (the aftermath) of fire.

My ears, stuffed with cotton, muffle the sound
of silent, blood-curdling screams.
I have crushed tears into my palm
and have screamed silently
into lungs of shower stalls
(yet the world still whirls
as though I were flung off a carnival ride).

I wasn’t being coy when I said “no”.
I was being adamant.
My teeth marks in your shoulder blade should serve as a reminder.

I will punch through glass
with words alone.
No amount of duct tape, super glue,
will repair the realms destroyed.

Memories are like binge drinking.
I wake up with my throat burning.
(The ghosts wail outside my house,
rattling the windows and
causing the rafters to shudder.
Begging to be let in.)

He mistook my empty for hollow
and tried to fill me when I was merely seeking fulfillment.

Another left shadows form-fitted to my figure,
lying, saying I was just an angel slut
falling
when really, a shove sent me
flying.
(The truth tastes as rusty as nails and goes down just as smoothly.)

He lied to me about the taste of electricity,
claiming it was a needle to a vein.
And all I ever wanted was the stars to be bright enough,
I never needed a neon sign again
in this town.

These memories are skyscrapers,
and these skyscrapers are leveled by volcanoes.
(And now, I am soaring like a phoenix, above the rubble,
taking me beyond the landscapes I once knew.)
No longer do I care about where these matchsticks may land,
nor who may scorched by the words that sear.

Isabelle Palerma

Where Memories Once Towered like Infernos: a Poem

I remember tasting the tobacco shored in your lungs,
and you had the courage to tell me
my auburn hair smelled of a bonfire.

I once vowed a dress I owned would forever smell of rain
and my ink-stained fingertips would fidget – restless
with memories,
but now, when I cradle myself to sleep,
my eyes are empty.

I no longer name the silhouettes
that landscape my bare walls
or dance along my broken skeleton bones.

I remember when my brittle skin was
scented like my favorite library,
but no one picks up an abandoned tome
when the ink that travels the pages
is nothing more than a smudge and ashy dots.

I am an empty teacup in a house that is
haunted with your name.
When I reread the letters you wrote me,
shards of glass glitter along voids of thought,
threatening to lacerate the emptiness.
To puncture the silence where
memories once towered like infernos.

Isabelle Palerma

Poet Spotlight On: Alfred Gremsly

Alfred just recently shared with me a reader review which I feel entitled to share a part of with you all before including his interview. A reader of Alfred’s poetry had said the following:

The candor of this review honestly speaks volumes about Alfred Gremsly’s poetry, and while I am just starting to familiarize myself with his poetry, I can tell he has the same intentions I do with my writing and my day job – to provide a voice to communities normally stigmatized.

Alfred Gremsly is an American born poet who writes about mental health and the struggle that comes with it. A lifelong sufferer of anxiety, depression, and other mental illnesses, Alfred began writing poetry at the young age of twelve as a means of escaping his own mind.

Whose poetry style is most like your own?

I don’t know if anyone’s poetry is like mine.
I don’t read a lot of poetry, and if I do read, it’s going to be something that’s complete opposite of what I write.

Have you received formal training for writing? If so, what’s your background? If not, what got you interested in poetry writing?

I started writing around age 12; I was a very depressed kid. We lived in the country and had nothing to do, and so, I would make homemade books for myself of my thoughts and feelings.

Who are some of your favorite poets?

Some individual poets I like to read are Jan Serene, Ashley Jane, Angie Waters, Margie Watts, and Sarah Kay Collie.

How do you feel when you’re writing a poem? Is it cathartic or do you find it draining? What types of emotions do you experience when writing poetry?


As I, myself, am a lifetime sufferer of depression and anxiety, I have extreme highs and lows. Unfortunately, it takes being in those extreme lows in order for me to get out what I’m needing to say.


I sometimes feel as if writing is a curse of sorts –
so horrible would be the feelings and emotions I’m under while writing.

A lot of my poetry features fractured versions of myself as a narrative voice. What subjects do you write about and how are they influenced by your own experiences?


I write about what I’ve been through in life’s journey – my struggles with mental illness, the feelings of being mentally ill. I have overcome a lot through in life through poetry. I now have a grasp on my depression and anxieties, and I’m now on a mission to help others suffering from mental illnesses.

Where can readers find more of your poetry?

https://instagram.com/poetalfredgremsly

http://www.alfredgremsley.com

https://a.co/d/5B8OkmR

I’ll Be Dead before I’m Better

Am I just pretending
there are voices in my head?
And can anyone else hear
a single thing they’ve said?
Am I really talking to someone
who has been talking back to me?
Or have I just become
a psychotic mystery?
Life’s no fun pretending
when you need a friend
and a therapist is not the answer
when you want the words to end.
Can anyone hear the voices
that are screaming from my head?
I’ll be dead before I’m better
if I’m not already dead

– Alfred Gremsly

Isabelle Palerma

Poet Spotlight On: Carol Goldstone Majola

Carol Majola is a trained ECD educator, business management student, self proclaimed poet and author, and aspiring entrepreneur. She is passionate about community building and helping youth tackle social ills affecting them. Majola is advocate for issues such as bullying, GBV, and substance abuse. She believes that her purpose is healing and that words written or spoken are powerful to break but also heal and she found healing in poetry. To Carol, the two most powerful things are love and words.

When did you start writing poetry?

I fell in love with poetry when we were learning about the history of our country when we were in school, when whites and blacks were separated during the apartheid era. And I fell in love with how expressive the writers of the “struggle” were and how they used the art to cope with their pain and loss, to communicate their feelings more eloquently. But it was when I lost my father at the age of nine, that I wrote my first poem.

What are your favorite words?

I am a lover so my favourite word is “love”.

My name “Carol” because it means “a joyful song”. I feel it explains why I love music so much.

Do you have a particular style of poetry you write? Have you ever experimented with form poetry? What were the results?

I do not think I have a particular style of writing my poetry, although most of my poems are in a similar structure. They are more expressive than rhythmic though.

I love words and playing around with words and therefore experimenting with form poetry was inevitable. My first exposure to poetry was form and studying poetry. With my work, I feel that form gave it more structure and allowed me to experiment with my rhyme scheme. Although the consideration of my lines and stanzas made it seem limiting in how I could express in depth, it did teach me careful consideration of my word choice.

April is Global Poetry Writing Month. Who are some of your favorite poets from around the world?

One of my memorable olden day favourite poet together with the likes of Charles Causley, would be a South African Poet by the name of “KEORAPETSE WILLIAM KGOSITSILE” who was not only a poet but a social and political activist who lived in Exile in the US in 1962. I love how he encouraged interest in Africa, African poetry and the practice of poetry as a performance art. Origins and Santamaria are some of my favorite works by him.

Maya Angelou has always been my favorite, as well as Rudy Francisco. I have my recent favourites who I have experienced through social media – Yaw Osafo (KINGYAW FROM GHANA) residing in the states and Hafsat Abdullahi (HAVFY FROM NIGERIA)…such powerful young poets.

A Conjugal Suicide

Floating, barely breathing
beneath the waters,
In a bottomless ocean.
Drowning, for I sold myself
at the price of trust
I recklessly handed over.
Sun rays cast between my fears,
Water covering my stream of tears,
My wails muffled in the deep,
Not even those shoring at sea
Can see me, nor my weeps hear.
I am dazed swimming in agony,
In a sea a path to which I built
With brick and mortar with which
I tried to build my home
That now lies desolate and forgone.

– Carol Goldstone Majola

Isabelle Palerma