Intimum

Intimum Thoughts – Psychology Poetry Summer 2026 collection ‘Dark seas’

→ Intimum – the innermost, the deepest hidden essence.

→ Intimum (neuter form of intimus):“the innermost, the most hidden, the deepest within.”

What lies within the most hidden corners of the self? Intimum invites you to explore the depths of human psychology and emotion through verse.

We are now seeking submissions for our Summer 2026 Collection: Dark Seas. We want to read your most personal reflections on the self – thoughts that usually stay submerged. Selected poems will be featured on our portal, with a series of poetry recital events to follow.

What to Send: Poems exploring the self, psychology, or the landscape of human emotion. Any length, style or form is welcome.

Deadline: 31st August 2026

How to Submit: Either through the Contact Us page or via email at intimum.chrysp@gmail.com. You can also add a comment in this page. Or just use the form below.

Submitted poems

This section contains the poems that were submitted and approved for the collection.

The Darker Side of Life

I lived in a land of total despair
With my friends, suicide tendencies I did share.
No work, no food, just starvation
A corrupt government causing desperation
I need to leave this vile world
A new life for me must be unfurled
Onto a dinghy I was thrown
Told to leave and find a new home
Many days in a sea so rough
My life was now incredibly tough
Would I survive, I had my doubts
As I got weaker with sickness bouts
My hands and face now red and sore
Surely my body couldn’t take much more
A new life in another land felt out of reach
Then suddenly I saw lights along a beach
My heart shuddered with great expectation
As our perilous journey had reached it’s destination.
But past the lights our boat sailed on
and soon the glow was almost gone.
Onto a shore we came to rest
In total darkness and insect infest
In the cold and stony silence we felt so insecure.
Having travelled from one life of poverty
to a dark grey totally miserable looking shore.

~ Richard Palmer

Mother Tongue

The virus of love remains alive; it never disappears.
It stays asleep in the furniture, in the sheets, waiting patiently for us in rooms, in caves, in the pages of our poems.

Through wandering notebooks, a view from my city.
But I no longer recognize any heartbeat from there now.
Here is my city.
Where I met you.
And everything that you are and
The years pass, magazines change their covers and I walk through these streets
That I now know so well.

I see myself in the mirror wearing this dress sewn from memories.
And I see someone, but it isn’t me, though perhaps it could have been
If I had stayed there in the damp prison cell
Of a life waiting for me to return…

In these sunny hours the wrinkles dance on my face when you appear in my path.
Do you still remember…
Do you still know when…
What times those were…
But I remember nothing.
And to return to your arms
I would have to burn my life here and leave it as an offering at the entrance,
To listen to an unknown language
Whose words I understand completely.

The air is so warm we can walk barefoot on broken glass
And at last I can gather all the memories.
You are not in my mind for more than two minutes at a time
A walk through a museum of lost objects
Where once you caressed my skin with words,
The same words I hear now.
I recognize your voice.
At last I am not ashamed to understand your language.
But how can two different mouths breathe poetry onto me
With the same handwriting?

Let’s climb onto this nocturnal ship,
Let’s dance on it, sleep on it, wake somewhere far away, very far
In the north.
And through these dark curtains make love to me
Like a poet writing his greatest poem
With disappearing ink.

And the sea breathes. Its lungs move to the rhythm of the algae.
The wind sets fires in my chest; the flame flared when I reread the poems about you. Entire forests of memories turn to ash, inside an ashtray I keep on my nightstand.

But the virus of love remains alive; it never disappears.
And one day this love will awaken, its echo
A rain of shooting stars,
And we, two timeless souls rising above my city.
Or ours.

~ Anisia Evelyne Morariu