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Love's Dark Reflection #lovepoetry #poetrydaily #poemaday

Love was never a heartbeat. It was the echo left behind after the heart forgot why it was still beating. It arrived wearing another person's face, its hands stitched together from promises that had already begun to rot. I welcomed it. Not because it was kind, but because loneliness knows how to mistake a wolf for warmth. Every smile it offered cast a longer shadow. Every whispered "forever" fed another ghost sleeping beneath my ribs. The thought of love is a clever liar. It builds cathedrals from broken mirrors, then asks us to kneel before our own reflections, calling the illusion destiny. How eagerly we obey. We water flowers that grow from graves, write poems to people who never truly existed, and embrace memories still unborn. Love watches. Silent. Patient. Like a spider waiting in the center of a web woven from hope. It never forces us inside. It simply lets us believe the silver threads are rays of morning light. By the time we understand, the sky has forgotten our ...
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Smiles that return every "December"

We gather again beneath December lights,
Same chairs, same room, same practiced cheer,
Laughter rehearsed like an old carol
That everyone knows, but no one feels.

Hugs are exchanged like obligations,
Warm on the outside, cold within,
Eyes smile first, then mouths follow,
While hearts stay carefully hidden.

The table is full, yet something starves—
Truth waits outside with the night air,
Jealousy sits quietly between plates,
Hatred dressed up as polite care.

Compliments sharpened with quiet comparison,
Success weighed, failure displayed,
Every story told to outshine another,
Every silence is carefully staged.

We call it family, we call it tradition,
Year after year, we return the same,
Dragging old wounds through tinsel and candles,
Renaming resentment as holiday flame.

By midnight, masks grow heavy on faces,
The smiles crack but never fall,
We promise love, we promise visits,
Then leave with nothing settled at all.

And so it repeats—another December,
Another gathering, another disguise,
Until Christmas comes knocking again,
And we meet once more
With the same fake smiles
And the same quiet lies.

© 2025 Gloria Penelope


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