Divides + The Conquered

Two sips of swills to come

Image by Jay Soundo.

Sidewalk Cracks - Chelsea Nelthropp

I’m teetering,
Between sidewalk cracks.
These elephant feet
Can’t avoid
The growing chasms,
Rapidly metastasizing
On burning pavement.

Even if I jump,
The air is too thin.
I don’t want to fall in.
Tiptoed sighs
Only further the divide,
Breaking the camel’s backWith stilettoed bayonets.

Even if I conquer
The climb,
By traversing spacetime,
Broken feet can only
Eradicate distance
By creating more.

If you reach for me
With spider web fingers,
Tangle me
In your safety net,Perhaps the chasm
Will corrode or
Self-implode,
A greedy blackhole
Carelessly consuming
Untouched asphalt.

But, if the path
Eats me alive,
If the divide
Is too far to climb,
If the cracks
Break backs,
Just know that,
The sidewalk
Wasn’t to blame.

Pavement can’t move
What deaf ears
And blind eyes
Have already
Doomed.

© Chelsea Nelthropp 2025 - A version of Sidewalk Cracks was originally published in Scuzzbucket.

Image by Giona Mason.

She Commands - Edward Swafford

She sways, she pays…
Sultry silhouette draped in crimson bengaline
Lashes thick, mascara ravenlike
Prismatic and poised
She commands, the space between
Cognizance concordance consent
Male gaze intensity thermic
No cooldown, Leering jeering
Surreptitious shadows bottlenecking
A swarm of ladies and ‘gentlemen’
Constraints of disorderly conduct in check
“Mate, hands off the bodywork”
Supine searchlight follow
Her scent her trail her sus
Cep-ti-bil-it-y
Room after room after
All, she commands
Attention.
Abstract thoughts
Unwelcome
Dark desires colorblind to courtship
Christ, did she say you could buy her a
Drink laced with bale?
Iced with wintergreen-flavored
Duplicity?
Drunken tailwinds fan her stride stumbling
Into man, oh man!
Trembling
Such strong arms vicelike grip
EXIT sign cue adrenaline
She commands, ten (or more) commandments
Creator turns a blinding eye fate
Binding her on this predestined first
STOP
No means knowing
She’s
Stage
Frightened.
Shaken stirred stymied submitting
Sweet submission, somber sacrilege, spilt
Sentences
Dispersing down decolletage
Visionaries transmuting vacant face
She’s swamped
Man, oh man!
“You must lift, bro”
Braided with muscle apathy atrophied
Furrowed brow puckered countenance
Lips part for a mutiny mute button
Pressssssssssed - hushed in taciturnity
An eternity ensuing
Deep breath
Pitilessly pugnaciously prodigiously
Prodigal son - nowise empathy
She commands?
She.
Commands.
Veneration.

© Edward Swafford 2025 - A version of She Commands was originally published in Scuzzbucket.

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