Feet on empty roads,
the horizon unwinds like a question
you don’t need an answer to.

No map, no guide — 
only the rhythm of your own heartbeat
echoing against the mountains,
through alleys,
across the spaces no one names.

You carry your compass inside you — 
a needle that spins toward silence,
toward the weightless pull of knowing
that being lost
is a kind of home.

The wind carries conversation
from leaves to lungs,
and you answer without speaking.
Every step is deliberate,
every shadow a companion,
every sunset a direction.

Alone is not loneliness.
It is the luxury of listening
to the world bend toward you,
and the miracle
of moving through it
unrushed, unclaimed, unbroken.

You are both path and wanderer,
both question and answer.
Finally at peace.

__________________________

Copyright. Thanks for reading! Enjoyed it? Share it — or follow me on Medium.

Source of inspiration: This particular piece explores the feeling of why I love hiking so much.

solivagant — purposeful wandering was originally published in iPoetry on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

The witches bellowing under my breath,
faltering stars fade into my stare,
careful whisper of the dawn,
would you carry my tears till I die?

Following woes, waiting for such a curse,
would these masked hollows fervor such a dream.

In the end, my heart yearns for desolation,
whatever your eyes may unveil.
In the end, my love melts into blissful oblivion,
whatever the oceans may hear.

The sound of agony,
the touch of fallacy,
I can feel my teeth sinking into the barbs
of my untasteful woes,
feeding on its whispering mages of lost cause.

I bite my tongue till I bleed into your trust,
but in the end,
I am the fool.
What have I become?
Who have I become?

I can feel the ache,
wasted dreams awaken from within,
from the depths of sorrowful tears.
Surely I should bury this wane,
Who am I hiding myself from?

I keep yearning for comfort,
for peace,
for the truth,
but only I know what I truly yearn for…

For the whispers of your care,
for the silence of your caress,
for the nightmares of your desires,
for you.

A Note from the Poet:-

Sometimes, we continue to do the things that hurt us the most. It can be loving someone who doesn’t share the same affection. It can be pouring yourself into a career you never truly wanted to pursue, but feel you must because of pressure. It can be showing kindness to souls who have wronged you, hoping for the next day even when you know it might be worse, accepting the decay that slowly comes forth, accepting the suffering because, somehow, you have convinced yourself that it is necessary.

I guess that’s what Woes is about. It is about the things we endure and the reasons we give ourselves to endure them. It is about longing, obligation, love, pressure, and the quiet ways we abandon parts of ourselves while convincing ourselves that it is all for something greater.

And perhaps, in the end, you tell yourself that all of this suffering is for them.

For you.

— Ananya Iqbal

A little note

Welcome, and thank you for being here. These poems are pieces of thoughts, feelings, questions, and moments that I’ve carried with me. Some may be heavy, some may be tender, and some may not make complete sense at first and that’s totally alright. I hope you find something in them that speaks to you, even if only for a moment. Please feel free to reach out to me. I’d genuinely love to hear your thoughts, interpretations, or simply what a poem made you feel.

P.S. You don’t have to understand every poem. Sometimes, it’s enough to simply feel it.

Woes was originally published in iPoetry on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Beneath the skies, there lies the beauty of the unheard,
silently warding off the shame of treason.
Time shall not forgive,
nor the saints’ diatribe,
for these words of true ordeal
cut deeper than the truth of the grim.

As the show must go on,
have you no shame at all?
The righteous lust shall seek its curse,
whatever this shade of calm withholds.

Silent surrender,
breathing through this tempest of trite.
What have you here, my dear — 
your wailing whispers of shared titles,
tainted with the bouldering blood
of witches long past.

Detesting the sirens of forgotten past,
polluted minds of fetid hearts,
molded into a casting of words,
the desires of timid séance.

The aftermath of right and wrong,
of blood and war,
upon the shoulders of her brother’s dreams,
wickedly amputated.

Whipped and watered,
a life of meagre harm…
what, then, shall we follow?

Stolen dreams,
stolen nightmares,
stolen the silence between them.

by Ananya Iqbal

A Note from the Poet

Stolen from our hearts, our ideas, our secrets, our fears that may remain unfathomable to some, we hide it so dearly but it is always stolen, by our loved ones, by spirits that we have never heard of, by the water of life itself. It is the way of life, that’s what you have been told and so the cycle repeats, endlessly. Even the water that carries the comfort of dread with care participates in the act of stealing.

That’s our understanding of loss, in truth. And it is heartbreakingly necessary for the life that runs deep into the depths of our planet, it may sound senseless, absurd even, to some, but when the truth hurts the most, it is when it truly devious.

—Ananya Iqbal

A little note

Welcome, and thank you for being here. These poems are pieces of thoughts, feelings, questions, and moments that I’ve carried with me. Some may be heavy, some may be tender, and some may not make complete sense at first and that’s totally alright. I hope you find something in them that speaks to you, even if only for a moment. Please feel free to reach out to me. I’d genuinely love to hear your thoughts, interpretations, or simply what a poem made you feel.

P.S. You don’t have to understand every poem. Sometimes, it’s enough to simply feel it.

Stolen was originally published in iPoetry on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Oh, sacred clutter,

leave room for the present,

be gentle with the past,

like melted gourmet mutterings,

familiar sweet tastings will pass,

a tender farewell surrenders,

holding back a doll's tears mask.

It is wasteful to seek comfort,

under a shrinking totem tree,

your heart grows strong and truer,

in the loneness of the trickster sea.

The present is shrewdly caring,

only for today.

It pushes forward

in wild unknown places,

where future children play.

by Bill Pezzimenti

www.billpezzimenti.com

The Removalists Hymn was originally published in iPoetry on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

There is no time.

There is you.

There is you and us

In our fickle design

how we choose to live,

And give, to each,

moment,

Who we pray to,

on solemn knees

In a verse or a song

That sparkle like

red oak leaves

In our everyday.

We are followers, each.

on social media.

on politics.

Inside stadiums.

on a communal beach.

outside of our earned beliefs.

There is no destiny clock

ticking away our skittish lives.

We all would be free

If we weren’t busy with

our invention of time, of ourselves,

our schedules,

and futile deadlines.

There is you and us,

for other poems to rhyme.

There is you and us

in our fickle design.

Moving faster, mostly,

in between, captured

by skeleton seconds,

past corroding,

confusing,

black and white

highway ghosts signs

listened for instruction

on war.

on feelings.

on shedding skin,

from the divine, inside

unseen,

the breath in your mind,

as it accepted defeat

by following the child inside,

covered in blood scrapes

and righteous deceit

the criminal country,

playing on the mass graves

of parachocial presumptions

ceremonial assumptions

of when and

who’s to starve

and who’s to eat

in the cold

in the heat.

There is no time.

by Bill Pezzimenti

www. billpezziment.com

There is No Time was originally published in iPoetry on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.