Author: poeaxtry_

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Day 7 of my 100 Days of Poetry series is about intentional creation, refusing extraction, and building space for voices that are too often talked over, repackaged, or erased. This poem speaks to the act of creating with purpose, not as spectacle, not as trauma currency, but as documentation, resistance, and invitation. It is about community built with care, not permission, and about forward motion that actually follows through.

Creating Curated Change

I don’t write of

trauma

  pain

life’s unseen stains

to pass an emotional buck

Not one to complain

Unseen pain outside of me

I do not

have not

will not

seek unsolicited help to

shoulder a burden that

no one can claim to own

outside of me

I weave words willfully

immortalized receipts

capturing points of view

perpetually prevented from

participating in literary and artistic

mind meetings

Expect me to be

never

asking permission

from a single soul

and

stopping for the same

Current and future people like me

need opportunity to see

other people’s perspectives

that actually relate

consciously communicate

No more stolen

minority

  makers

    manifestations

    through creation

Curated creative community

No more requirements of

status

  education

    plausible politeness past

wreck the walls that gatekeep creation

Forward action, curating change,

no more complaining with zero follow-through

Creative creatures collect, creating change

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Poet’s note

This poem was written as a refusal. A refusal to create for consumption alone, to package pain for approval, or to dilute language for comfort. The “curation” here is not exclusion, it is intention. It is about protecting creative spaces from extraction while still opening doors for those who have been historically shut out.

The idea of “immortalized receipts” speaks to indie publishing minority works both mine and community, to proof of lived experience, and to the power of language as record. This piece centers community that creates with accountability, forward action, and care, rather than performance or proximity to status.

“Creating Curated Change” is a declaration of practice, not theory. It challenges the idea that creativity must be polite, credentialed, or palatable to matter. Instead, it argues for community built through conscious communication, lived perspective, and actual follow-through.

This poem invites readers to consider not just what they create, but how, why, and who is allowed to participate. Change does not come from endless critique alone. It comes from collective making, from tearing down the gates, and from building something better in their place.

Links

Speaking of community and creations don’t forget you can submit work to our first quarterly by emailing poeaxtry@gmail.com or submitting a form.

Deadline is 2/12/2926

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Day six of the 100 poems in 100 days threads project brings us to reflection, memory, and the quiet ache of missing those we love. Today’s poem, Life Expectancy, explores the stark reality of time lost and the enduring shadow of absence. As we approach the end of the holiday season, this poem reminds us that love and grief are intertwined, that the moments we have with those we care for are precious, and that the time spent apart stretches longer than we often anticipate.

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Life Expectancy

How melancholy it brings me

to be,

when

reminding myself

I’m likely to miss you an eternity

longer than the time I got with you.

Though I know our time in this life

is never guaranteed,

if my life expectancy is at minimum

average,

what I’m saying will ring true

More of my time will be spent

missing you,

your light,

and your love,

my sweet mother,

than the amount

actually spent with you

Though if this proves untrue,

I will have been plagued

by joining the good in dying young

Either way, my projected

forecast,

bleak, and for longer

than the coming week

Poet’s Note

Life Expectancy came from the deep reckoning of loss. Writing this poem allowed me to put into words the enduring ache of missing my mother, the arithmetic of love and absence. The piece reflects the tension between the fleeting nature of life and the permanence of memory. This is a meditation on grief, love, and the small, precious moments we hold dear. It is a reminder that poetry can capture both sorrow and reverence.

Day six of this 100-day poetry journey underscores the truth that love outlasts the life we are given. Life Expectancy asks readers to reflect on their own relationships, the moments shared, and the times lost. As we read, we are reminded that today is the only day, and the memories and love we carry are infinite. Through this poem, I honor my mother’s light and invite you to hold close those who matter most, to cherish each fleeting moment, and to confront grief with honesty and reflection.

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Day 5 showed up after a meme. It said simply “immigrants belong in Ohio.” This happens to me when the world won’t shut up long enough for the words in my mind to behave. Memes, commercials, fragments of conversations, and other randomness become lines to poetry.

This series was never meant to be polite, or evenly spaced, or emotionally neat. One poem a day for one hundred days isn’t about discipline alone, it’s about witnessing. Some days whisper. Some days yell. Some days light a match and wait. This for me is mostly about practice, honing my craft, discipline x2 yes, and seeing what my mind will produce for 100 days straight one poem every day.

“I Hope It Burns” is a refusal poem.

Not an argument.

Not a debate.

A refusal to keep explaining what has already been taught, erased, rewritten, and weaponized.

It comes from exhaustion, repetition, and the surreal experience of watching history pretend it doesn’t recognize itself.

This is day five.

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I Hope It Burns

What’s going on in society today?

fuck if I know!

One thing’s for certain though

immigrants belong in Ohio

And Utah, and Maine

Washington, Texas, California

New York, West Virginia

Florida, Nevada

And the rest of the United fucking States

This is so redundant for me to

have to explain

I feel like I’m going fucking insane

Did we not learn in second grade, if not earlier,

what the fucking melting pot is?

I mean, if the only Americans are Natives,

our ancestors with palm colored skin

came here on a fucking boat,

took lives and land

How the fuck are you saying no one else can come here?

The whole damn country is built on it

Melting pot this, melting pot that,

American dream washed-up bullshit

doesn’t mean a thing

when no one’s allowed in

Would you like some crushed ice for that burn?

Poet’s Note

This poem is written from repetition fatigue.

The kind that comes from answering the same questions, hearing the same slogans, watching the same cycles spin louder instead of smarter. It is not interested in convincing anyone. It is interested in naming the absurdity of selective memory, of nationalism that forgets its own construction, of classrooms that taught one story and adults who pretend they never heard it.

The geography matters. The language matters. The anger is intentional, not decorative. This poem is not asking permission to exist, it is documenting what happens when the truth keeps getting told and ignored anyway.

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“I Hope It Burns” doesn’t end with a solution because it isn’t offering one.

It ends with heat.

With consequence.

With the reminder that stories don’t disappear just because they’re inconvenient.

Day five is a pressure point. It holds tension instead of releasing it. That’s allowed. This series isn’t a ladder toward comfort, it’s a record of days lived honestly in a country that keeps pretending it doesn’t know how it got here.

Tomorrow’s poem might be quieter. Or maybe it won’t be.

Either way, the fire doesn’t undo itself.

Ice kofi

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Day 4 of my 100 Days of Poetry series is about those quiet loops of thought, the small moments where we forget ourselves, forget our worth, or forget who we can lean on. Sometimes the fall we’re waiting for never comes, and yet the anticipation itself shapes us. This poem is an attempt to capture that suspended space between expectation and reality.

Profound Fall

Sometimes my brain

likes to play

these little games

Sometimes I forget

that I’m worth

anything at all.

Sometimes I forget

exactly who and when

I can call

I’m counting on the fall,

the metaphorical one

that has yet to come.

Sometimes I forget

that I was even

waiting for it.

It seems this year

I turned 34,

my feet have yet

to leave the ground.

Isn’t that profound?

Poet’s note

This poem was written as a reflection on self-forgetfulness and quiet anticipation. The “fall” is intentionally open-ended, representing both what we expect from life and what we wait for internally. Writing it was about noticing those small pauses, those moments of doubt, and giving them space on the page without judgment. It’s about the tension between inertia and hope, between standing still and yearning for change.

“Profound Fall” invites readers to sit with the internal rhythm of thought and reflection. It asks us to notice where we are grounded, where we hesitate, and how waiting can be as significant as action. Sometimes the profound comes not from movement, but from awareness, from pausing long enough to see where our mind and body meet.

100 days links

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Day three of my 100-poem series… sometimes the calendar moves, but our hearts stay behind, carrying the weight of absence, echoing in the spaces others fill with celebration.

Hurt Like This

Another year

Another empty space

this is just another day.

You all can celebrate your

holiday, cheer,

somewhere not near to me.

Can’t you see? This is just another

day to me.

Except if it were just a day

would it hurt like this?

Poet’s Note:

This poem leans into the quiet ache of holidays when they don’t feel joyful… that tension between the world’s celebration and your own emptiness can be sharp. I wrote it to honor that feeling, unfiltered, because acknowledging hurt is part of moving through it.

Some days carry weight that no calendar can explain… and some poems are just for naming it.

Day two day one 100