Calypso
Broken boughs set upon
starlit seas of blue—
endless tides of foam
and melodies of you.
Your eyes, dark and dismal as the storm,
but within them a light brighter than the sun.
They are my compass when adrift on waves
of adoration and all the little things I seek.
They are daybreak upon my night,
burning chestnut embers—
specks of light to rattle the stars.
Their cosmic glow has nothing on you
and the galaxies you hold in your eyes.
Your hair is fire on the water
autumn embers of blazing leaves—
falling to the earth and the tides
swept away by the majesty of the sea.
Let me rest there—
lost in those auburn sheets,
where warmth and comfort wrap me
and the scent of vanilla and amber grass put me to sleep.
Your arms are of angels
blanketing me from the night wind;
safe and secure through sea-bound storms—
rocking my ship in lullaby.
You’ve left me lost on the waves
rowing circles in the middle of nowhere
with only your name etched into my map—
and my compass pointing North: to you.
So send your voice to me
in notes on the wind;
let me taste you in the salty air
and breathe in the scent of home.
You are Calypso,
Poseidon,
Emperor of all the sea.
Let me lie here in your calm,
your tempest,
while your waves swallow me.
Marionette
She wrote such beautiful poetry—
limericks and lyrics lined across my flesh
with a knife she called Love, though he felt like Death.
She tore away at the surface,
unearthing the words and notes
of a man she created, hidden so far beneath.
We’re foolish, she laughed—
Foolish fools forging lies,
hidden behind masks only God can see through.
But there is no God in the pages of poetry,
only a puppeteer pulling strings
of the heart, until they wither—they snap.
Snap.
Words linger like echoes—
Pulsating through the veins of a long-lost lover,
bleeding out as the blade digs deeper to the core.
Show me the man without the mask,
the marionette in tangled strings
strummed too hard by the master’s hand—longing for perfection.
Cut him loose and set him free—
free to live and love as she intended,
full of passion for a world he has yet to understand.
But tie him down if he strays,
a babbling lunatic deprived of love
a shell of what he could have been—or who he was made to be.
Dorian J. Sinnott is a graduate of Emerson College’s Writing, Literature, and Publishing program and is currently living in Kingston, New York with his sassy munchkin-mix cat, Scarlette. When he’s not busy at his full-time job, he works as a cat adoption assistant at a local humane society, which he claims is more therapy than work. He enjoys horseback riding, playing violin, and cosplaying his favorite childhood characters at comic cons. Dorian’s work has appeared in Crab Fat Literary Magazine, The Bleeding Lion, Alter Ego, and The Hungry Chimera.
