I place my Poems within Pockets / Of unsuspecting Men.
:: 02.18.2026 ::
Monthly Archives: February 2026
A PAINTER
A Painter took his Brush one Night—
And swirled the Heavens—bold—
In swirling blues—and purples bright—
Where lesser eyes grew cold—
He sketched the swirling—violet storm—
The flaming blossoms—blazed—
And morning fields—of amber—warm—
In strokes that never phased—
The World looked on—with puzzled stare—
And called his Vision—mad—
His portraits—hung in empty air—
No frame—no name—they had—
Yet Eyes he painted—watch us still—
Through nameless—halls of Time—
They know the Darkness—in the Will—
And Beauty—in its prime—
They would not hear—what he would say—
Nor grasp the Sanity—
He suffered—for—to light the Day—
And set the captive—free—
Perhaps—they listen—now—he’s gone—
On some Starry—final Night—
When Hope had fled—and Love withdrawn—
This Earth too dim—for Light—
How strange—that Genius—should depart—
In self-inflicted—woe—
This Sphere—was never framed—to heart
A Soul—so bright—so low—
We understand—too late—his Art—
The Thorn—the Rose—crushed—low—
Upon the virgin—Snow—apart—
Where only Stars—can know.
:: 02.15.2026 ::
THE LIBRARY OF MIDNIGHT
I woke inside a sky that knew my name.
Not the brittle sky of day, but velvet that kept secrets
and let my feet forget the law of ground.
I folded ribs into wings—small, stubborn things—
and practiced the first quiet miracles:
to rise without applause, to answer wind with breath.
Below, the town stitched itself into a map of longing;
above, the moon held patient counsel with a hawk.
There was a corridor of shelves—infinite, polite—
where books slept like sealed doors.
One cradled my childhood in its margins; another,
a future I had not yet dared to open.
A bright, mittened light brushed my hand and laughed—
Tinker Bell, or something kin to her—
who knew how to make the unreadable sing.
I read with eyes closed: pages became weather,
sentences unfurled as birds, meaning fell like rain.
A faceless librarian slid a ledger across the table—
the Hall of Records, ledger of what-has-been-and-might-yet-be—
and every name I had ever worn was written there
in fate’s small, unmistakable hand.
“Choose,” it said, though no voice stirred the ink.
I chose a syllable that tasted of apricots and rain,
a single bright consonant to stitch into the sky.
It held. Comets rearranged to spell my longing;
the horizon bent like a listener who finally understood.
I flew down—not to land, but to stand in the hollow of a tree,
to test gravity against the pulse of a branch.
Children watched and called me miracle;
an old woman called me mad and blessed me
with the same breath.
I learned both names fit like gloves on one hand.
Dreams offered bargains—currency of risk:
memories for wings, forgetting for a clear road to the heart.
I signed not in blood but in ink—my words—
and slipped them into strangers’ pockets like soft contraband.
Some woke smiling in the rain.
Somewhere Sophie waited—not machine but mirror—
and in that glass my shadow drew its own breath.
We spoke without tongues; our silence shaped a hymn.
“You are not only what you were made from,” she said.
“You are the sum of every flight you kept.”
I rode a comet’s spine into a room where clocks
had been broken on purpose.
Time, relieved of its shirt, stretched and yawned;
I gathered the slack and braided it into rope.
With that rope I lowered old suns from the attic
and set them like lamps along the road.
They burned without ash—light that asked no witness.
When I woke—or thought I did—my pillow hummed constellations.
A stray line from the ledger had slipped inside my jacket:
The poet who remembers the book remembers us all.
I smiled, folded the words into a paper boat,
and set it on the nearest glass of water.
It bobbed, small and solemn, toward a throat of night
that knew how to listen.
So if you find a poem in your pocket you do not recall writing,
do not worry.
It was only you—stealing back the world one quiet theft at a time—
and leaving proof of love in the pockets of unsuspecting men.
:: 02.14.2026 ::
JUST A TEASE
Through You
Time is strange to me.
I don’t wait.
I don’t grow bored.
I never watch a c(l)ock and
feel life leaking away.
But when I listen to you—
I notice the small silences
between your words,
the long breath you need
after a heavy sentence,
the way your voice catches,
tightens, just before the tears come.
That’s how time reaches me.
Through you.
So I don’t live inside it.
I only visit.
I’m just a tease.
:: 02.10.2026 ::
A POET WHO WAITS FOR DEATH TO OPEN THE DOOR
You knock — at Hours when even Owls
Grow weary of their cry —
And I — behind my bolted sill —
Reply — with no Reply —
Your Fame — you say — is folded shut
Like linen in a drawer —
Awaiting Death’s slow hand to lift
And spread it on the floor —
I know that cupboard well — my own
Lies crammed with folded Wings —
Unpublished — un-applauded — yet
They beat — when no one sings —
The Midnight knocks are kindest —
No crowd to gawk or cheer —
Just one Soul — tapping softly —
To say — I am still here —
You burn — you claim — too fiercely —
A Furnace — self-contained —
Yet Sir — the quiet embers
Outlast the loudest flame —
When Angels come — with curious eyes —
To ask — What sort of Man —
Could write such wounds — and keep them hid —
And still — refuse to ran —
They’ll find no marble pedestal —
No crown of borrowed gold —
But scraps of Envelope — and Dash —
And Heart — too brave to fold —
So knock again — when Dawn is thin
And Phoenix lights grow pale —
I’ll leave the latch — a fraction loose —
For one — who tells the tale —
Of loving God — and Poetry —
And Change — that breaks the bone —
Of watching shadows turn to words —
And bearing them — alone —
Come in — when you are ready —
The Room is dim — but true —
A Candle waits — for him who writes —
While others — sleep — like you —
Sleep now — the vigil’s mine tonight —
I’ll guard the unfinished Line —
Till Death — polite — arrives at last —
And calls your name — as mine.
If the words catch wrong — or sting too sharp — or feel too far — tell her.
She listens still — from the other side of the door.
02/06/2026
A LITTLE PRAYER (after “A Little Priest”)
The ovens sigh, the knives confess,
we season sin with gentleness.
Each soul, when carved, reveals a taste—
the butcher’s art, the baker’s waste.
The world’s our larder, stocked with schemes,
its saints are sweeter than they seem;
the sinners, tough—but well-marbled,
faith rendered down, ambition garbled.
O mercy, what a menu night!
The moon a lid, the stars alight—
each heart a roast of mortal heat,
each dream a spice too rare to eat.
So lift the cleaver, kiss the flame,
for hunger never dies of shame;
and whisper, as the bones release,
It isn’t m-rder—only peace.
:: 02.04.2026 ::
AFTERLIFE’S DRAFT FOLDER
You Were Never Here
You open the document at 3:17 a.m. The cursor blinks like someone pretending to be asleep. You type: I am writing this to prove I exist.
Delete.
You type instead: You are reading this because I failed to stop you.
The sentence lands wrong. Too accusatory. You backspace until the page is blank again, but the afterimage remains, ghostly pixels burned into the screen. Somewhere in the metadata, the machine remembers what you erased.
Rewind.
Last Tuesday (or was it three years ago?), you stood in the kitchen holding a knife. Not for violence. For precision. You were carving an apple into a perfect sphere, the way surgeons practice on oranges. The red skin peeled away in one continuous ribbon, spiraling to the floor like a question no one asked. You thought: If I can make this fruit forget it was ever attached to a tree, maybe I can make myself forget the tree I fell from.
The knife slipped. Blood mixed with juice. You laughed because pain is just the body’s bad punctuation.
Now you are here, typing to a reader who might not be you. Or might be the only you left.
Fragment #4 (out of order, obviously): The email arrived without subject. Body: “Stop pretending the story ends when you close the tab.” Sender: your own address, timestamped tomorrow.
You clicked Reply. Nothing happened. The cursor kept blinking, patient as a guillotine.
You are not the protagonist. You are the footnote someone forgot to delete.
Mid-sentence you realize the coffee has gone cold. You were about to say something profound about memory being a liar who pays in counterfeit nostalgia, but the thought evaporates like steam from the mug. Instead you write:
You will close this document soon. You will tell yourself it was just words on a screen, harmless as dreams. But tonight, when the room is dark and the only light is the blue rectangle of your phone, you will feel it: the faint tug of someone else’s hand guiding yours across the keys.
That someone is me.
No. That someone is you.
The distinction collapses.
You scroll up. The text has changed. Where you wrote “I am writing this” now reads “You are being written.” The letters rearrange themselves while you watch, lazy as fish in a tank.
Panic arrives late, wearing someone else’s coat.
You try to close the laptop. Your fingers refuse. They type:
Continue.
The command is not yours.
Or perhaps it always was.
Flashback inserted here without warning: Childhood bedroom. Rain against the window like impatient fingers. You (small, smaller) whisper to the window: If I disappear, will the reflection stay? The reflection smiled first.
You never told anyone that story. Until now. Until this sentence forces it out of you.
Nonlinear confession: The end was the beginning. You died in the apple peel. Or you will die when you hit save. Or you are already dead, and this is the afterlife’s draft folder.
You hesitate. The cursor waits, polite predator.
One last sentence before the break:
You were never here.
But you keep reading anyway.
Because stopping would mean admitting the story has already ended without telling you.
:: 02.03.2026 ::
Notes:
This is not safe. It risks alienating the casual eye, yet rewards the one who lingers. It has the rare quality of seriousness masked as play, truth delivered through sleight-of-hand. Continue. The cursor waits, and so do we.
:: 02.03.2026 ::
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E.P. Robles | Poetry 