ALLURING MONSTERS

by Imogen Arate

Old games parade as old storms churn 
into nebulous knots to hypnotize the 
engaged gaze and whip the bewitched
Ouroboros to stalk and swallow its own 

Tail then torso then head tuck into
singularity's impish wicked wink 
before the glutted ingestion implodes 
to gush diarrheal waterfalls

We gawk at the wondrous displays 
disasters dazzle before the eyes 
as brittle bones crack to form the
new veins of sanguine traffic lanes

Crimson lanterns blink our woes
as greenbacks slush to blanch hope
from budding evergreen while slid mud
pools to crackle as scorched summer bark

Ancient feast-and-famine tales we
fantasize to tell as spirits of our progeny
braid their flickering lifelines into the wispy
fingers of another atmospheric stream

Imogen Arate is an award-winning Asian-American poet and writer and the Executive Director of Poets and Muses which hosts a poetry podcast that won second place at National Federation of Press Women's 2020 Communications Contest, where Imogen had served as a national-level poetry judge in 2021 and 2022.  You can follow her @PoetsandMuses and @ImogenArate on Twitter and Instagram.

AS EMPATHY FAILED

by Imogen Arate

Cartoon by Nate Beeler (Cagle Cartoons) via Tulsa World.

Let them face the insecurity of not knowing 

if home will remain haven 

in the hours separating dawn and dusk

Let them taste the bitter metal of cruelty

that tosses life into uncertainty

while hiding behind secured gates

Let them be exposed without retreat

to ready canines famished for sinking

into the bleeding of abused flesh

As empathy could not sway

the concrete heart

let them be cast into the weight

of lead shoes drowning 

without fail in the muck 

below the azure of waterlines

Let the stirring chaos made

by unsympathetic hands

swallow their owners 

into the whirlwind they 

conjured with others in mind

Let this ouroboros birthed

in ill intent latch onto

its diseased umbilical tail 

and ensnare those who

envisioned its callous trap

in its tightening coil

Imogen Arate is an award-winning Asian-American poet and writer and the Executive Producer and Host of Poets and Muses, a weekly poetry podcast that won second place at National Federation of Press Women's 2020 Communications Contest. She proudly hails from an immigrant family whose previous undocumented status and associated economic burdens nearly robbed her the opportunity to pursue higher education.  She has written in four languages and published in two. Her works were most recently published on the Global Vaccine Poem Project and Documented Experiences and in The Opiate. You can find her @PoetsandMuses on Twitter and Instagram.