Category: Other

Hear My Words

jackiewrightauthorLeave a comment

Your love haunts me like a dusty piano playing hymns in an abandoned manor.

Your gaze is a delirious fever dream that makes me forget my morals and manners.

If I learned my lesson not once but twice, why do I yearn for you each evening?

You are the one I think about when it rains and when my lungs cannot stop heaving.

When this comes to an end, like all things must, will you still hear these words?

Will you burn your life up like an old house, or will you tell me you got bored?

We both know you have wounded me, and I have cut you open with my snarls.

When we look back at ourselves in twenty years, will we want to erase these scars?

-Jackie

Paradox

jackiewrightauthorLeave a comment

To all the friends we lose while navigating our own journey.

Twice a month, I dream of you walking these streets,

Calling me mad and calling out my undying greed.

Strangely, that still fills me with hopeless joy

Because you turned our friendship into this cheap decoy.

We fell apart when I turned to better choices,

Pointing out your mistakes, your antithetical voices.

I wasn’t nice or fair, I admit it now, honey,

But neither were you, begging for favors and money.

My paragraphs were petty, and your love was cheap.

I hate growing up; some nights I can’t even sleep.

These paradoxes pile up on my doorstep like mail.

You’ll judge me harshly when I finally fail.

These words mean nothing in the grand scheme of things.

They might reach you, and they might really sting.

I hope you’ve moved on, I hope you remember.

I was never kind enough to let you be tender.

-Jackie

People Pleaser

jackiewrightauthorLeave a comment

If it’s not yet my problem,

I’ll ensure it becomes one.

If the grave is still empty,

I’ll fetch my newest shotgun.

Give me names and two roses,

Give me thornes and forgiveness.

My nose grows in my sleep

While being stuck in your business.

I lie just to keep swimming,

To keep winning these trophies.

I know I made this bed tidy.

Baby, I made it for me.

I’ll take breath to my coffin,

But I’ll refuse to scream.

Baby, didn’t they tell you?

People pleasers don’t dream.

-Jackie

The Temptress

jackiewrightauthorLeave a comment

I

Make room, you people!

Start digging a hole.

It’s not about who you know,

It’s about who you control.

The magazines said it best:

She’s a vicious beast.

Lower those lip corners

But never ever head east.

Hide your sons in the attic,

Raise your daughters with pride.

If her scent still lingers,

Make sure that you hide.

II

“Yet another fragile victim is joining the ranks

Of those she seduced with bullets and tanks.”

“Could he truly fall for her sardonic gaze?

Did the blade run through or did it gently graze?”

“Were her lips cherry red when she said the words?”

“I bet he fiercely fought her crooked swords.”

“She killed that marriage, she must be punished,

Ripped apart at the seams, starved and banished.”

III

My homeland has no enemies,

My palace has no door.

It’s my essence that frightens them.

La petite mort.

A victim of their making

In the devil’s clothing.

Their eyes follow me north

Where I am decomposing.

The fingers point at me,

Their tongues shoot right through.

It took me twenty years

To wrangle this little zoo.

My country has no traitors,

My palace has no gate.

Come right in and test me.

If you dare, take the bait.

-Jackie

The Haunting

jackiewrightauthorLeave a comment
Photo by Eugene Golovesov

There was a chill in the sigh that escaped your lips

Before your words drove blades into my bruised neck.

I thought I knew it all back when we built this ship.

I thought we could find a shore if I stayed on the deck.

My fingers wore your calluses like they were jewels,

The moonlight made my dark worries seem too small.

While I was asleep, you took the profits and tools,

And you hid the last prophets in my bedroom walls.

“A willing participant, a creature well below me.”

Did I will your cruel plans into my tranquil life?

Once they bury me, will they think of me as a trophy?

Will they ever find the chains, the cages, the knife?

-Jackie

Burnout

jackiewrightauthorLeave a comment

The skin under my eyes grows older each evening

Yet I cannot grow up unless my heart stops beating.

My potential screams at me for being and breathing,

My mascara runs away in streams as I’m kneeling.

The only breeze on my bones is the ghostly face

Who haunts my dreams and leaves a bloody trace.

I store my dark thoughts in the lousiest maze

But once they find the weak point,

I will be buried in haste.

-Jackie

Revenge Is My Faith

jackiewrightauthorLeave a comment

The gray ladies by the lake embellish my crimes

With jewels and bloodlust, and twists that scare me.

My knives puncture flesh and dance on red dimes,

Yet no one with a kind soul calls me Bloody Mary.

These palms do not butcher for pennies or thrills.

Revenge is my faith but I can replace faux gods.

If your grandmother’s story gives you a cold chill,

Keep your hands in your pockets to beat the odds.

-Jackie

Your Ghost

jackiewrightauthorLeave a comment

That ghostly string that ties us together,

It keeps tipping people over

When I stand up for what is right.

Those late night thoughts I gave you,

They keep bruising my knees

Whenever I see an unfiltered light.

That hand you used to touch my back,

It haunts my darkest nightmares,

And I wish I could kill you.

Your pale eyes stare me up and down.

They chase my every success.

But you won’t stop,

Will you?

-Jackie

The Long Road

jackiewrightauthorLeave a comment

A piece of me fell out of your holey pockets

As you carried my weight for seventeen miles.

The rivers were cold and the winds were ruthless.

The gods were playing with their rusty dials.

My waist broke under your touch like a twig

But the moonlight fell on my spine with grace.

Hope still flutters deep in my hollow bones.

When they unearth me, you won’t save face.

-Jackie

Sacred

jackiewrightauthorLeave a comment

These wooden doors I carve out on Friday nights

Turn to gravestones under the Sunday light.

These violet hopes I hold in my bottomless pockets

Grow engines and shells, then turn into rockets.

The pit in my stomach tells me money is sacred

But only if I can imagine them naked.

The scarf on my neck gives me scars so bloody

I curse the cruel gods who created my body.

-Jackie