new year

Unlike You: a Poem

“Unlike you . . .” a prompt from Kay A.

In less than a month,
unlike you to care about the wreckage of the Titanic that is my heart.
I have witnessed you stampede on
and trample me barefoot.
Yet,
the teeth you bared is what
I have come to expect.

Family taught me
(for better or worse)
to murder with mercy.
When you were flashing your baby teeth,
sharpening like knives,
I was practicing my smiles
in polished glass.

Unlike you to offer condolences
or express empathy,
and yet, the past few days,
while Lazarus has been in the tomb,
a different side of you has been exposed.

Unlike you to show warmth,
still a reptilian cold underneath,
but the air is a bit milder now – less frost,
less chill.

Unlike you to offer benevolence and yet,
a crack of a smile,
a beginnings of generosity.

Is it possible you were murdered by my mercy?
Killed by my kindness?

Or did New Year’s resolutions just fall
a few days behind on this calendar?

I’m not one to gaze the gift horse
in the mouth,
but I do have my suspicions
when you were flashing those fangs,
honing them like knives,
and are now sweet as spun sugar.

Just call me Doubting Thomas
if your kindness only lasts as long as
Lazarus was in the tomb.

Isabelle Palerma

A Cage for Your Heart, the Softness of Sadness, and the Gentle Lull of Love: a Poem

An architect constructed you a mansion
for your heart and you called it a cage.
He crafted each room with so much caution
and care.

The muscle nestled between your ribs
felt like a boulder I was incapable of swallowing,
I am a myth,
tugging on strings that have strangled me.

My fantasies were polished glass shards
shattered by laments and heartbreak.
Ancestors draped mirrors
with black organza in bereavement
after a loved one died.
The fabric is as light as a ghost,
so tell me,
how did I still I wake up with
bits of glass crunching beneath my feet?

The sadness was a fragile creature –
the weight of black organza –
and yet I am a myth,
desiring nothing more than to pull
the strings that choke me.

But it’s gentle sometimes,
sneaking in like a moth,
as soft as a ballerina’s skin
and barbed wire.

Our wires danced across the dance floor,
and if you watch,
we might just choke on the memory,
the softness of sadness, and
the gentle lull of love.

Isabelle Palerma

2023: a Year of Independence

To recap 2023, I moved to Independence, Missouri, in the last few weeks of December 2022 and started the new year with a brand new beginning. I left everything and everyone I knew to try a fresh start.

I lived with a roommate in Independence for a couple of months before we quickly learned how incompatible we were. I had a couple of jobs and worked on my writing.

For a few months, I just kept my nose to the grindstone, job searching, writing, making new friends, and creating art.

All the while, I was dealing with a bully who spread rumors about me and devastated my self esteem, which resulted in me tearing down this website and rebuilding it from scratch.

I let her erode at my self esteem until there was nothing of me left, and I was hospitalized. I was hospitalized twice last year because of my issues with my mental health.

I struggled immensely with being so far from my family and my loved ones, but I found a way – I continued to work hard and got a publishing offer on my debut novel and my poetry chapbook.

I made new friends while living in Kansas City and met a lot of great and memorable people. I experienced a lot of amazing things, whether meeting film directors and actors from genre films who encouraged me to shoot my own movies or going to see an aerial performance in an ice crystal cave.

I met people like the Mormon who wanted to marry me or the girl who took me to expensive lingerie boutiques and went swimming with me long after the pool had closed.

It was a year of ups and downs, but most importantly, it was a year of growth and new experiences.

We’ll see what 2024 holds.