“This Otis chain was created from the vibrant community that populates the feeds of the poetically inclined on Instagram. The Otis image prompts [see above] sparked inspiration and gradually the chain lengthened, with poets from incompatible time zones connecting and deep diving off each other's prompts. Much fun ensued. Highly recommend. Get Otising, Otises of the world!”
– Victoria Punch
FIND OUT HOW TO OTIS HERE.
heart, rooster, metronome, card, crystal, bottle, lawn, statue, snake, corn, bee, coat
My heart lives outside of my chest
like a morning rooster’s cry,
the metronome of the light air’s cradle.
I hold the cards I’m dealt – not one heart but two.
Arteries like crystal, sharp, clear.
Like the glass of a low sea bottle from an old ship,
or a mown-short deep lawn with a pale
statue of myself in it, head and shoulders
necklace coiled like a snake, chainmail.
Like a field of corn
my heart is a place to house the bees –
a coat made of my own skin.
- Victoria Punch @victoriapunch_
outside, like, cradle, hold, clear, low, with, shoulders, coiled, field, place, skin
Perspective (TW: suicide)
There is a man outside my window, stray
Like a raindrop ousted from the crowd.
Clouds amass beneath his feet, cradle-mouth
Open in a static hold; body in
Suspended animation driven mad. It's clear
To me (and to him) that he is not falling, head low,
Rather, he is lying still with the earth
Rising to meet him, shoulders wide
Legs coiled like the spring, new growth waiting.
And the ribbons in the field, they are not blood,
They are red snakes, slithering away. In this place,
He is not dead; he has simply shed his skin.
- Malgosia Ip @words.on.rye
stray, crowd, beneath, open, driven, head, still, meet, new, ribbons, this, shed
Eyes stray from the faces before her,
tracing the crowd for any form of anchorage.
Heart racing beneath layers of composure,
seemingly mocked by their open cackling mouths,
Her posture is driven down by gravity and self-loathing,
head full of musty cotton balls,
lungs still expanding in robotic synergy.
No more ghosts to meet tonight,
no one new to fight or flee.
Only muscle memory and the ribbons of time
can pull her body through this moment,
vision blurred but not a single tear shed.
- Pearle Brittman @poesybypearle
before, form, layers, by, down, cotton, lungs, no, fight, memory, pull, vision
(Un)Ending
Before we end, would you lace your hands
into mine, form that aching clasp once more?
Who else will peel back my stinging layers
one by one, who else will kiss me as the lift
plummets down this hundred-storied sky
scraper? Whose lavender cotton neckline
will I suck into these love-worn lungs?
No matter how the time may pass
and fight and fail to heal me,
the calloused grip of memory
will come to pull me under,
a vision of rose-tinted torment.
- Camille Sarah @camisarahpoetry
lace, aching, peel, lift, storied, lavender, will, pass, heal, grip, under, tinted
The sun casts lace silhouettes on the horizon,
And there’s a subtle aching in the cooling air,
As I wait for dusk to come and peel away my sins,
To lift me upwards out of this time-bruised skin.
When I rise into the many storied clouds,
Painted shades of lavender by the fading light,
Will the world look so different from above?
If I pass my sorrows to the waning moon,
Will she heal my wounds and swallow my scars?
When day finally loses its grip over the night,
I’ll rest awhile under her celestial wing,
In a sky tinted indigo by a myriad dying stars.
- Corinna Board @parole_de_reveuse
silhouettes, subtle, dusk, skin, clouds, shades, different, moon, scars, finally, wing, indigo
The last few months have made silhouettes of us,
have scooped out anything subtle and left us stark,
full sun or midnight - no dusk, no golden hour.
Sitting side by side, our skin crackles with potential energy,
lightning sparking at the centre of heavy clouds.
Shades of grey are among the casualties of the year,
and I wish I could feel different, even just for a while.
I think of the moon, a study in both change and constancy,
the way she wears her scars with no shame, the way
her fullness feels like an answered prayer: finally, the sky is fixed.
Quietly I reach for you, arm tremulous as a wing,
and we begin to find indigo, navy and cobalt in the darkness.
- Jen Feroze @the_colourofhope
last, anything, golden, sitting, heavy, among, wish, change, wears, sky, quietly, find
I watched you sleeping last night: a lack
of anything like worry on your features;
golden hair tousled across the pillow, body relaxed
and dreaming. Sitting on the edge of your bed,
watching your heavy limbs twitch and stir as I rearrange
the duvet. Are you among the stars? Flying
through a universe of constellated imagination? I wish
I could change myself into a slip of light and dive
in with you — to the place where sleep wears
a tapestry of wonder, where the sky is an endless expanse
of possibility — I would quietly wrap my arms around
you, find a place to leave a kiss.
- Karan Chambers @karanchamberspoetry
sleeping, like, body, edge, watching, stars, through, light, place, endless, arms, leave
We’ve been sleeping this way, limbs folded together, for an age
The exhale of our sighs flowing like silk over skin
Ripples of your body whisper, drawing me closer
Toes curved over the edge of a waterfall - always, I dive in
I count your breaths, watching the rise of your chest
Chart the constellation of your freckles, utopia of stars
I weave subtle moonbeams through my fingers
Tip light into balance - matched, the night is ours
Molten pools in place of my throat, kindled sparks
Strike bone; fuel the heat of an endless fire
Unravelling, I’m smoke and liquor inside of your arms - both
Consumed, we leave the flames to burn higher
- Laura Jameson @laura.is.writing
folded, silk, whisper, waterfall, constellation, weave, balance, throat, bone, unravelling, rise, higher
We folded the chips in, you and I—
chocolate silk swirling ‘round
and a whisper escaped your furrowed brow.
Like a waterfall, I fell into it. Say what, lovey?
You’ve always been my constellation, my shining star,
the way you weave your little smile around my heart.
I am never in balance, always fumbling about.
But there it was, up from your throat: I love you, mommy.
And every bone within my skin
—a swift unravelling.
We watched our cookies rise through the oven glass
higher and higher, and I savored every gooey bite.
- Leslie Yeary @lesliemichellepoetry
skin, glass, fumbling, say, love, swift, swirling, brow, chips, smile, savored, always
From our beginning I’ve only known sleep shared with whispered skin.
As raindrops to glass, I too fall with the rhythmic hushing we yield to.
I find you fumbling in the dark but have I ever told you I’m reaching out too.
I hear you say my name, it’s searching tone, rising, hunting and hunting for
moonlit love to find you, to bring you into the folds of tepid cotton comfort.
From crimson cries you’re now fluent in fret it’s a swift pull at my bones.
Swirling umber strands, I watch the sky littered with stars as I unravel your woe within them.
Your brow slowly releases as slumber beckons you back and back and back.
As dawn chips away at dusk, I watch rest desperately dissipate into silver,
but I still smile, warm sheets, buttery breath and cold corners are all
savored in silence, I breathe you in as you exhale out a final ”mama.”
The sandman didn’t share that it’s always you who keeps nightmares at bay.
- Jemma Chawla @new_stanza
only, whispered, out, hunting, pull, cold, keeps, final, watch, bones, you, fall
We are the only species with whites in our eyes, to follow
the path of each other’s gaze as lashes whispered sweeping lines
Mired in a belly of butterflies, out comes a lost girl’s fire
Which wolf do we feed on this heartbeat hunting spree?
With every blink a flood, I pull back my thorny veil and taste the crush
Let the cold be surrender in its belt of gasping breath
He keeps my urge to tear my tongue in check
Hand brushed against my back, the final push
I watch the callus of suspicion shed its jagged skin
As the bones of his affection hold the weight of blood and grit
‘I’m going to love you into the shape of oceans’
Like a river flows to the mouth of another, we fall.
- Lisa Perkins @lisaperks
breath, veil, let, heartbeat, eyes, lost, back, another, crush, skin, gaze, going
As I draw breath up through my spine
Slowly, the veil begins to lift
I let myself enter into full immersion
My heartbeat syncs with the divine
My eyes vision through illusion
Time suspends and I am lost to the other side
I live to eternity and back in that moment
Another reality, no less palpable than life itself
Yet, there is a crush my soul feels when being called back
The way re-entry sheds my ethereal body and skin
The way the cosmos adjusts my gaze upon landing
But my soul remembers where it has been and where it is going
- Jen Holly @the_write_vibe
draw, slowly, enter, syncs, vision, time, eternity, reality, feels, sheds, landing, soul
also including the 12 original prompts from the first poem:
heart, rooster’s, metronome, cards, crystal, bottle, lawn, statue, snake, corn, bees, coat
my heart can’t draw me on into the future
the clock runs slowly by the rooster’s cry,
its ticking helps me enter by the metronome
its beat syncs like a pack of cards
under the crystal vision of the moon.
my mind is held like time inside a bottle,
a dark lawn of eternity, this sky
a statue of reality through the numbered
days. my heart feels like a snake
that sheds the skin of the old year, a corn husk,
landing soft: and then, only then, do the bees gather to
coat my soul with hope
- Victoria Punch @victoriapunch_
