- This topic has 69 replies, 65 voices, and was last updated by Hafsa.
- Topic
tpsg. PublishingWelcome to tpsg. Community Poetry Contest!
Write a poem (up to 20 lines) on the following prompt. (Enter by replying to this prompt)
Poetry prompt:
Frida Kahlo, “Girl with Death Mask (She Plays Alone)” 1938
(Photo: Wiki Art, Fair Use)
tpsg. Publishing
- Replies
- Death in Disguise
There she’s posing, all alone,
Holding a pretty marigold.
Innocence creeping through her eyes,
Veiled beneath a mask, white as lies.With death looming aroun
- This reply was modified 2 months ago by Hafsa.
- Unnamed
Have you ever experienced a neverending fall?
Sinking into a ditch which has no pit
descending in circles, blue hues in view
and no struggle enough to move you
as if some other force is ho - Goodbye, forevermore
Goodbye to thoughts that you were mine,
To crafted truths and love’s design.
Goodbye to the joy we used to share,
To moments lost in thinning in air.Goodbye to the trust I
- I would burn holes in this veil of self
Wage wars within the abyss
Would walk barefoot on coal
And glass of my undoing
Until the stones of my own self
break me open
I repay my debts in lands, in - ‘Tis a story I’ve yearned to speak
The lathered brush of my mother
Plumped my face like ale
And mustard grimace, shrieking from
Eyelids fresh from ‘whining’ as she says
A soil - The Monster Who Was Buried but Not Dead
I stood barefoot in my dress,
Innocent-looking, ready to impress.
But the darkness within began to howl,
Still, I clutched hope’s flower—fr- This reply was modified 2 months ago by Emaan. Reason: difference of font
- In the rusted swing of a ghost-laced park,
She hums to the hush where the daylight won’t spark.
A porcelain mask with a grin too wide,
Covers the face that the world denied.Crows are her choir, w
- Long before I became a sculptor
I searched for eyes that shined like stars
A heart that bled like flung paint
Long before I carved the perfect smile
Before I hollowed eyes into vacant sockets
Before I - A little girl is standing alone, as a hollow shell.
So silent, her anguish gaze speaks of nothing
Her tiny hands carrying withering flower
But the fragrance lingers away
Her innocence ravaged yet hold - Topic: she knows
She knows its not too late,
Time isn’t so cruel; it waits,
For her eyes to close,
Those gentle orbs covered,
Snuggling in the warmth of her skin,
The rush of her blood,
A feeling - Night-light
O beautiful ghosts of my fears
Dance with me, this waltz bizarre
Tell me as I hold you close
Is it life that we dream and we dance
Or is it something other
That shrouds us chillingly so - Topic: Sarcastic World
They call me in love because of my world The world i make with the pieces of my heart
They call it luck because of the look
Unaware of the thoughts running in my head !
The th - She is the girl with the death mask,
heart once pure,
now glistening with evil.
Is it the souls around her, that made her heart turn to stone?
or has the darkness always been under the - On the doorstep,
She awaits his arrival —
A wrinkled smile,
A frowning forehead,
Dying brown orbs,
And grey, floating hair.
But he
Never arrives.Lost in a world where he knows
Not himself, nor any - A clay pot,
And a silver stove —
She cooks her meat,
And serves her gore.Reckless, she stands near the
Blaze of hell,
Painting her skin
For him to sell.Her heart, her gaze,
Her broken bones,
Her - the morning after i died
i woke up to the smell of naan chanay, and my father’s chair scraping the floor at the dinner table. i heard the glass plates clinking against one another, befo - To what face this mask belongs
Oh! Lord, I am torn
This facade discerns into lonely night
Alas this life has turned into fight
A war of me and intricacies of my mind
This madness is turning me blind
G - Salt speckled skin and dark locks that cling to it the way I want to
You’re beautiful in your misery
The gray under your eyes, the sluggish ink in your veins
Hollowed out cheeks, hollowed out ey - O dear my dearest life
Take me all to take my eyes
I am no good
As per my good
I am no bad
As per my bad
My dreams drowned and face froze!
I am not a lily in bloom,
I shall cry unless my doom.
Pick m Behind the facade, a corpse lies still
A beauty lost, a soul that’s chilled
The mask of happiness, a disguise so fine
Conceals the truth, a heart that’s lost its shineEyes that once s
- In twilight’s womb she spins her thread,
A porcelain mask, the face of dead.
Eyes like ink that never dries,
Hold galaxies of silent cries.She dances slow where shadows creep,
Her lullabies pu - some times, I am a good daughter to you, mother.
other times
to you, father.
sometimes, I am one to none of you.
never one to the both of you together.your sorrows, father, glister like an emblem
- THE BLADE CUTS BOTH WAYS*
Every story needs a villain,
so I stood, Looked in the mirror, wondering if I should.
”Mirror, mirror on the wall,
How do I make the villain fall?”
̶ - THE BLADE CUTS BOTH WAYS*
Every story needs a villain, so I stood, Looked in the mirror, wondering if I should. ”Mirror, mirror on the wall, How do I make the villain fall?”“
- Hold your eyes to your heart
For I have come to tell you your deeds
Here you see a child full of greed
Aquired a flower from the heaven of thee
Hold your tongues for they will be cut
My monstrous sku - The tide starts rolling in,
And onlookers run in terror,
The whole world seems to move backwards in a rush,
As she alone stands on sinking sand.Face to face with the common enemy, but what do they
- i was only 5
when i realized
i was a little bit different from the other kidsthey laughed,
i remained silent.
they cried,
i wondered why.
they jumped, played, ran –
i stayed in the corn - Emotion Exploration
A burst of emotions collides in my heart.
What could they even be?
My mind drifts to the endless possibilities - In a valley where mountains sleep cold and stern,
A girl stands masked, with no road to return.
Her skull-face whispers of life’s fleeting breath,
She dances with shadows, befriending death.A wil
- She stands where storm clouds softly groan,
A tiny girl, yet all alone.
Her dress is pink, her hands are small,
But death’s cold mask hides it all.A wilting flower, hope’s last breath,
Clutched - The child stood still, with wounds on her face,
Fearing the loss of herself, judging the pace.
The strikes got her shattered, as if struck by a mace—
Unable to heal, she was poisoned with grace.Wh
- Who am I ? What to tell?
Who to say? and what to expel?
Life’s depiction has put me in haste.
Deceiving truths and a reality to escape.
Man is enemy of himself.
Rather liar - “Come play with me”
a soft voice spoke
softer than petals of jasmine
it broke through my defenses
it made me take a lookThe sight sent chills
I tried to reply
My words caught in my thr - I wish to tell what I felt…
They look away from portraits marked by silent pain,
Yet every line reveals the tale of shattered faces’ strain.It’s nothing new — my life has long been wrap
- This reply was modified 2 months ago by Nisar.
- A little of everything….
A little of everything, she deprived the most,
That ‘little’ became a lot, none of them ever thought.
She’s seen too much to be the world’s newe- This reply was modified 2 months ago by HARSHINI.
- My daughter hums a song
Her Nani never wrapped her in
As we slept in a cold crusted room far from the mardanaAll these spaces and summers of life
No melody has ever righted our wronged bloods li- This reply was modified 2 months ago by Saba.
- The house still stood ablaze,
Flames rising from its frame
The red and yellow hue in the sky
The blackened walls and siren chimesThere she stood bruised and maimed
Wearing a frock that had turned - The Mask They Gave Her
They told her, “Be quiet, be good, behave,”
So she wore a mask they wanted her to save.
Too bold, too strange, too much to take—
She learned to bend, to dim, to fake.Sh
- I’m a murderer. A killer.
Yes, it’s a fun game…What if you see everyday is testing you??
To give birth to a new you!!The death process is brutal
But, nothing can be gained witho - A plague and a love match,
She plays alone
Frayed and the worlds collapse
She prays aloneBare-footed silent laugh
The weather takes a toll
Sunny, but the winds smash
A sea of desert, no shoreSo
- This Isn’t a Mask [Tania Bilal]
They dressed me in pink and called it love.
But no one told me how to breathe inside it.
I held a flower, it died in my hand.
Like everything they swore would stay. - Title: Dream
I had a dream when I was four.
I was in a vast field, on my own.
I heard cries around me,
Yelling, where is she?
I followed the voices,
Taking each step with trouble
Until I found my moth - Skull-cup. Not hiding. Drinking sky.
Why does the warm light make the shadows cry?
Sun-gold sticky on my cheek like tears I didn’t shed.
Shadows? Not dancing. Feeding.They chirped “She p
- The Girl Who Danced with Shadows
There once was a girl in a coral-pink dress,
Who played in a world full of beauty and mess,
With mountains behind her and sky overhead,
She danced with the livi - In shadows deep where silence dwells,
A girl walks slow where sorrow swells.
Her face is bone, her gaze is none,
A mask beside her- games begun.No eyes to see,no tears to shed,
She dances soft with - Unnamed,Unbroken
They gave her a face carved in bone,
a hollow smile—too wide, too still.
She wore it well, as children do,
obedient to the silence,
to the chill.
She clutched a stem of sunlight
in - She carved God’s eyes with a butter knife
Fed them to rats they squealed with life
His tongue still twitched so she sucked it clean
Spat in His mouth
“How’s that for serene?”Melinda’s
- ASURA – For being a girl
Genesis of a girl child;
Being an ASURA girl
Consider herself a curse, a burden
And a misfortune for the family.
As a teen, she might be killed either for - “The Girl Who Played With Shadows”
She wore a skull not out of fright,
But as a shield from day to night.
A flower clasped in trembling hand,
Alone she stood, too young to stand.The wor
- An Untold Story
Beyond the mask, a story’s disclosed
Of grins that suppress, and sobs that unfold
A pretence of courage, a heart that’s sore
A wish for care, and someone to adoreShe wea
- An Untold Story
Beyond the mask, a story’s disclosed
Of grins that suppress, and sobs that unfold
A pretence of courage, a heart that’s sore
A wish for care, and someone to adoreShe wear
- “She Plays Where Silence Grows”
She plays where silence chokes the air,
Beneath a sky too bruised to care.
Her mask, a grin of hollow bone,
A child’s face carved in silent stone.T
Retribution
- I Grew Into the Mask
I didn’t know what it was
When they tied it to my face.
It smelled like old rain
and something no one dared to bury.
They told me I was playing—
But the ground kept still,
an- This reply was modified 2 months ago by Zaryab. Reason: increase in lines
.
- This reply was modified 2 months ago by Xander.
- Playtime
She wears a skull to hide her face,
A child alone in death’s embrace.
No giggles rise, no games are shared,
Just silent fields and skies that stare.A flower clutched in fragile hand,
She - I’d cry out loud
Even shout your name
Above the dead man’s gore
Away, far and beyond
Till my child can revere
The by-gone dawns
And I’d chant marigolds
To make you a bed
And the wind - Hollow and in-between
For this pain to transform into peace
I know, is an unlikely illusion
I would even settle for it as it is
Suffering has a center
Unlike me, hollow in betweenTell me tales of
- I wear a red mask, a fiery disguise
Anger and pain, a burning surprise
Familiar hell, a cycle I know
Filling others’ voids, my heart’s an empty showI hide my true self, behind this mask’s mig
- Title: Rendezvous at the Detention Center
I was born in the Red Sea,
the one that cut my mother open,
and took her years to recover from,
and now I live in stasis,
on the brink of m - She Plays Alone
In her fist, a wilted bloom,
petals softer than the lies he crooned
She wore a skull to feel less seen,
a girl turned ghost in a porcelain sheen.The wind hums lull
- This reply was modified 2 months ago by Noor_ul_huda.
- Will you stay?
For a while, to play with me?
As the home became empty from time to time,
Even happiness left the place that once aligned.
I forgot how to laugh, as no one was there to hear.
I started Flower of death, in her hands.
She plucks at it, and she plucks.
One by one, they all fall. (petals)
When none remains, so does she.- Who am I?
I do not know
who I am.
I have masks
many of them.
I use them often,
I use them much.
I do not know
my true face.
It has been so long
It has been so long.
I know it would,
the scari - I feel the weeds. Soft against my fingers. I should move. I can’t
I stand in the dirt. MY feet wet. I should walk. I can’t.
I smell dried blood. I want to clean it. I should clean it. I ca - A Flower in the Graveyard
She walked where stillness grew like weeds,
among the shadows, no one feeds.
Her hands were small, but held the weight
of things too dark to name as fate.A mask of bone
- Will you play with me?
Last one to leave the nest.
I saw all the birds flew.
Opportunities lurk on their horizon.
Another sky hosts their welcome.
I am stuck, in the house; once called home.
More bre - 4 am story
As I sit here in this immense dark
Around 4 am, I hear that knock
I wonder if it is an illusion
Or if it is that ghost of the past
So I let it in, and it sits beside me
It digs up my old wo - (My savior?)
Would you do anything?
When I’ m lost in my scars.
Would you come to save me?
Or what would you do?Would you hug me?
Would you hold my trembling hands?
Would you stare at my tear
Hafsa
Wania
Ayesha
Zunaira
Haskill
Emaan
Nabisha
Nabiha
Preesha
Hajra
Hyda
Ayesha
Rameesha
Hareem
hafsa
Filza
A.H.M
Ayan
Ushma
aaira
Saleha
Soha
Fatimah
Sumayyah Raees
fatima
Syeda
Eimaan
HAMZAH
Waniyah
Ebaad
Nisar
HARSHINI
Saba
Adan
Kiran
Arwa
Aasiyah
Tania
Ayesha
Jyid
Nero
Adeela
Tabeen
Abdul
Affaf
Areeba
Alesha
Wolf
Mahrukh
Zaryab
Xander
Unaiza
Zinnia
Ezza
Jannat
Hasan
Noor_ul_huda
Alizay
Tanya
Sara
Zeest
Zunaira
Hibah
Shifa
Nishwa- The topic ‘Poetry Contest Prompt – June 2025’ is closed to new replies.