1 minute read

Tia Paul-Louis

If Only

Tia Paul-Louis

Advertisement

If only times weren’t passing

you’d love me. You’d love yawning bells, chimes, clocks with eyes but no hands and ghost alarms. If only times were blessings

I’d be your kind. You’d love. You’d want me as is: blue-veiled maiden, quiet with a flame-like portrait. Your arms would frame me.

But the hours fall like an avalanche. I’m in your way, and in your final breath, you’d push me off the cliff.

Tipton Poetry Journal – Fall 2021

Little White

Tia Paul-Louis

There’s a little white rose in my garden that won’t get pulled and refuses to be fed. It hangs with a sass that pricks my thumb and index like a porcupine. It whips its head to the side when I frown. And if I stare too long, it tucks under the bushes as if their arms were guardians, and I was a thief. But when I whistle Beethoven, it comes out, apologetic, wanting to dance in the palm of my hands.

Born in the Caribbean and raised in the U.S., Tia Paul-Louis began writing songs at age 11 then experimented with poetry during high school. She earned a BA in English/Creative Writing from the University of South Florida along with a M.F.A in Creative Writing from National University in California. Her works have appeared in literary magazines such as The Voices Project, Ethos Literary Journal, and Rabbit Catastrophe Review. Some of her favorite authors and poets include Langston Hughes, Emily Dickinson, Maya Angelou and Edgar Allan Poe. Apart from writing, Paul-Louis enjoys music, photography, acting and cooking, though she mostly finds herself and others through poetry.

This article is from: