General Poetry posted April 16, 2025


Exceptional
This work has reached the exceptional level
Darkness consumes a once gentle soul.

Beneath the Skin of Night

by Jacquelyn Popp

Darkness Contest Winner 
The sky forgot the sun that day
And bled in tones of ashen gray.
No stars remained, no winds would breathe
Just silence, thick as rot beneath.
 
He came with eyes like hollow graves
No soul to touch, no light to save.
His shadow moved where none should fall
Like smoke that crawled along the wall.
 
His name was once a whispered prayer
Now spoken only in despair.
The good had left, not all at once
It drained with every silent grudge.
 
He smiled where mercy used to live
But had no warmth left now to give.
The trees leaned back, the earth recoiled
As if the world itself was spoiled.
 
No blood was spilled, he needed none
The darkest deeds leave red to run.
A glance, a word, a poisoned trust
And hearts around him turned to dust.
 
He walks still, wrapped in the night
A man long gone from heaven's sight.
What once was flesh is something more
A hollow door, a myth of war.
 
And those who meet his lifeless gaze
Are lost in time an endless blaze.
For darkness isn't just the sky
It lives in men, and learns to lie.
 

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Writing Prompt
Write a poem about darkness. All forms of poetry welcomed.
Darkness
Contest Winner
Recognized

#45
April
2025


This poem explores the quiet creeping nature of inner darkness. A story of a man who lost himself without ever being found.
Pays one point and 2 member cents.


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