Condensed Supernova by Nicole Barth [2/15/2020]

Not too long ago, 

you said I was a

Condensed Supernova, 

with all the trillion years of history 

bubbling out of me 

in ripples of cosmos 

and a smattering of constellations. 

And the truth is, you're right. 

I play with the immensity of atmospheres 

and listen to the winds of fate 

like a howling lullaby. 

I am subtle like a hurricane 

and as quiet as a tempest. 

I let the sunlight flood in 

through my pores 

just as quickly as 

fury sets me aflame. 

But you are the waves that crash against me,

smoothing my edges like tumbled sea glass. 

You are the lull of camomile tea 

that pours into my cup, 

the tranquility of 

Sunday mornings

and as certain as the sunrise. 

You are the constant to my wavelengths 

and the harmony that finds me 

again and again.  

Flourish by Nicole Barth [10/14/18]

I felt symphonies pour through your fingertips
as they glossed over my hair.

You had constellations brewing in you
as the Sunday hum rolled over us.

An embellishment of
freckles and smirks
confined in the ambiance
of you and me.

You were the tune I knew too well and the repetition
 that steadied a hummingbird heart like mine.

You soothed
and rocked and breathed and rolled
like ocean waves,
and somehow shifted like melted silver.

Glistening and cool,
tranquil and collected.

You had every element in you and
somehow cradled me still.
I watched you like the universe
housed in a planetarium.

Summer Breeze by Nicole Barth [6/23/18]

I met you in the wilderness,
where my language was foreign.

I felt you cushion me
like the moss beneath my feet.
You were warm and somehow familiar,
beneath the canopy of trees.

You swayed like forest grass,
interlacing your voice with my own;

You were the ivy growing around me,
stretching further into the details of my fiber.

Your words reminded me
of the breaths the earth had known. 

Muse by Nicole Barth [6/19/18]

You pulled me into the infinite
and swallowed me,
elasticizing time;

Long and rolling
like the limbs
of you,

My love,

Whose pulse intertwined
with my own like
whispering
heart sighs.

It makes no difference.

We have our own
and needed none
within the longer melody of ourselves.

And it all came pouring out of me
like water bursting
through its dam.

I never knew a balance. 

Writing Poetry by Nicole Barth [6/19/18]

It's Monday morning.

We plead exhaustion;
cocooning ourselves
and shifting the blinds;

Laments that slip out of
our mouths in extended yawns.

So
we prolong it with a stretch,
lengthen our limbs;

So much effort,
it seems,
to let the words
roll out of bed.

Except
for sometimes,
the words drip
like Sunday morning. 

The Etymology of You by Nicole Barth [9/3/17]

Your roots are based in early morning 

muffled breathing under 

the melody of a rickety AC

and an ambiance of unfolded laundry. 

You're black coffee in 

maroon mugs with rounded lips; 

hair slicked back with tap water, 

and the way you toast my bread. 

You're the wrinkled shirt untucked

and the Nintendo left charging 

on my grandma's antique chair. 

You're poetry I can't finish 

and definitions soon to come. 

If I Were a Poet by Nicole Barth [5/9/17]

I've been taught it takes a lot of
Prowess to be a poet;
That finding beauty in metaphors
And explaining the color of his eyes
In a way that isn't akin to
Pools,
orbs
or
crystalline

Could  bring me accolades.

I've been inculcated with
Datum after datum
That poetry should evoke emotions
And physical responses with every line;

That there's no sense in writing
If your Public's heard it all before.

Well,
I've seen and heard plenty
And been taught even more.

But why wait for the perfect line,
The inimitable truth;
The glistening metaphor,
When the core of it,
The very vibration with which you speak
Ignites the crowd?

Speak the truth;
Write your reality

And continue the creation. 

Into the Deep by Nicole Barth [5/9/17]

And if my words could travel through the
Ocean, down the fathoms,
Would they find you
In the sum of  your profundity?
Would the echoes of last night
Wander through depths to meet you?

Would you join me,
Whispering like the seaweed
On the ocean floor?

If I Look by Nicole Barth [6/15/16]

The city pulsates,
bursting in a glorious cacophony;
Truck horns blaring their condescension as
Gothic, Art Nouveau and
Victorian buildings spectate;

Buildings thrown together like the misfits
of New York City populace.

I come from a city of car exhaust and
cigar smoke that lines the
entrances of canopies and foliage;

I am the halal cart greeting you
in front of the Natural History Museum;

the Oak trees in Central Park,
the homeless on the bench;

the runner in the bike lane;

The light at 4 a.m.

Armonía by Nicole Barth [4/9/16]

We dance

in every undulation of a vast ocean;

humming along velvet skies and
whispering truths that crash

against me like sea foam.

You have stardust in your eyes

and a stained glass window for a soul.

We live in syncopated rhythms.

van Gogh's Tea Cup by Nicole Barth [12/26/15]

You are the sea of watercolors
in the bottom of a porcelain tea cup;

the infusion
of lavender and indigo symphonies,
serene in our microcosm...
and, I, your eddy.

I have always been the fresh water fish
shifting the current in you; floating through
rose petals and chamomile tea
in an infinite loop.

And together, we are the ocean's expanse,
forever rising and falling as one.

To you, Unknown by Nicole Barth [7/28/15]

I am tranquil in the realm
of infinite possibilities;
in the expanse of you. Of me.

I will find your soul
in the lullaby night.

I will not fear
the crumbled earth.

For you and I will be the same;
drifting in concentric circles.

Here and Now by Nicole Barth [7/17/15]

I live in spirals of violet and flashes of gold,
in refracted light through stained glass.

Ichor in my veins;
drums beating in my bones,
I expunged doubt
plaguing my trembling hands.

I am a California wildfire,
fearless in the summer night.

Exonerate by Nicole Barth [6/5/15]

I am the breath in a whispering forest,
the chill of midnight air,
the expanse of an open field.

I dance with each of my footsteps.
I am alive within my blistered feet;
present in these bones.

Again,
and again,
my constant heart.

I find the hallowed touch.

Onward by Nicole Barth [6/5/15]

A pattern: I Find truth.
I speak; I thrive; I grow.

I know boundless exhilaration
coursing through my fingertips;
streaming through my veins.

Exhale toxins.
Exhale hate.

Inhale
the possibilities
of my fate.

I speak; I thrive; I grow.

Tracing Constellations by Nicole Barth [1/30/14]

You followed the cosmos of my skin,
as your index finger traced a circle around
the beauty mark on my left clavicle.

Here I am,
I thought, as you paused mid-orbit.

I will always be the topographical map of chapped lips,
the number of ribs you wrapped your arms around,
and the constellations beneath your touch.

How To Feel by Nicole Barth

Baby, I can teach you how to feel,

take you away from inverted city lights.

Remind you of what’s real.

Come on over, if you’d be so kind. Escape from this ordeal.

Tangled, naked with your thoughts at night.

Baby, I can teach you how to feel.

Nestle into my arms and learn how to heal.

Use my breaths as your metronome. You’ll be all right. 

I can remind you of what’s real.

When normalcy and piece of mind feels surreal,

I’ll hold you long past midnight.

Baby, I can teach you how to feel.

When your life loses its general appeal,

allow our palms to reunite;

remind you of what’s real.

Mutual admiration makes our lives ideal,

I’ll keep your demons out of sight.

Baby I can teach you how to feel,

Remind you of what’s real.

Ashcroft by Nicole Barth [8/25/13]

I felt the unexpected crispness of Colorado air seep
into my pores and spread
across my lungs.

Gasping like a newborn
thrown into open country, a scintillating kaleidoscope
illuminated the sky above me.

I breathed in souls,
thriving between the slats of a long forgotten cabin.
The rotting wood held  truths I will never know.

Memories immortalized in rusted nails.

Whisper by Nicole Barth [7/22/13]

I believe in love notes,

in the transparency of shuddering ink
across featherweight paper;

carefully and fearfully construed in a rainstorm

of  touch and light.

Saudade by Nicole Barth [6/17/13]

Your hands;

the way they make and move
and illustrate the words that sear my lungs.

Too encumbered and hungry to voice them myself. 

Your kisses like dew on the morning grass.

Our laughter: sudden like a summer storm. 

If I could,

I'd tell you home is your lips pressed against my neck.

Your sonorous breaths, my metronome for the coming day.