Independence Challenge- voting

Here are the poem entries for the quickie challenge I hosted a few days ago. Voting will last until Sunday night. Results Monday morning.

PM me the number of which poem you're voting for.

Thanks for participating!

#1 Caged thoughts

My hand feels the war
raging between my thoughts and pen.
A few words diameter my thoughts
while the pen inks out a blot.
The words turn captive
and the thoughts- silent;
as the pen rules a blank paper.

Yet the words never plan to surrender
just like the former imprisoned India,
and get buried under the pride of the pen;
which boasts to have carved sapphire stories;
yet forgets a vintage truth-
the wisdom of a pen is spined by an array of radiant words.

And the words determine
to spread across the confines of the page
liberalizing every dime essence and worth they hold.
The mind hence unbottles the wrinkled thoughts
which forces the pen to scribble on the untouched canvas.......
And a revolution dawns.

Words to be included in the poem as mentioned :

1 synonym of freedom : Liberalizing
2 antonyms : captive, imprisoned
A birth stone : Sapphire stories (Bright stories)
Lights : radiant words
Something of value : vintage truth
(just being a lil creative)
Ref. of some kind of Independence : Imprisoned India ( Indian Independence )

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#2 Pocahontas

Garnet dreams scorched upon the land
By the people who think they can take what they want
Their greed engorged
By the promise of gold
They slaughter to carry on satisfying their desire
Reaching out thieving hands
To shackle the land
But the natives don't lose hope
They will fight for their freedom and land
Without the liberty of being able to give up;
It's do or die
Flashes of rifle shots tear down lives
Blood spatters on the dusty ground
Who are the savages now?

Bare feet fly through the woods
The beating of the drums seeming to shatter the Earth's very core
She knows the path that she must follow
She has chosen her own destiny
Flinging herself on the ground between the enemies
She begs to stop this war

Reference to independence:
But the natives don't lose hope
They will fight for their freedom and land
Birth stone: Garnet
Something of value: Gold
Something that lights up: Rifle shots (old rifles where you have to light a fuse to shoot)
Synonyms and antonyms: Shackle, freedom, liberty

Note: Pocahontas is about when men from England sailed over to America to take the gold they thought that the natives had (which they didn't have any of). They planned to kill anyone who stood in their way, and they went to fight the natives but Pocahontas persuaded them not to fight, and the English left in peace.
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#3 Lantern.

Was it that long ago I was restricted,
by soldiers of our country wearing
badges I turned away from,
to give my life for another in the womb?

I now face each storm arising among
the unpredictable desert winds.
But I know independence-
it is unable to be redefined for it
is our very soul that it exists to shine through.
Independence, to raise my children
in soil not bound by regulations as to
how many breaths can be blossomed
from our home.

My daughter's daughter was days
away from liberation,
but now she is a lost voice
still being searched for in lonely
hours where a hero is needed.

An emerald stone stood surely around
her ring finger,
while time kept guessing when beauty
would betray a soul striving for
freedom to be acknowledged,
as the most beautiful art.

Confinement. Incarceration. Liberty...
The chronometer precisely counting
memories as it stood at the windowsill
while my granddaughter became Death,
but not its shadow.

She was a lightning bug
caught up 'tween winter's passage,
and her light is no longer stuck,

it's burning for all of earth
to open their eyes and no longer
settle for making peace
with darkness.
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#4 Conversations with Freedom

The night keeps you fumbling
on left over portions
of a conversation, while fireflies
hang wingless from the moon as it bares
down upon empty streets.

There are no footsteps treading the
corridors of our town, and existence is
to be kept in the stitches of a duvet,
between the rubble of our sins,
and the pages of a passport,
for we are detained as half baked and impractical,
yet unfettered are our souls.

There are moments when we approach
the thread and ponder on unravelling
what we cannot express, but our shadows
drag us back to comforting rooms and
unopened windows, draped in topaz curtains and
smudged with urgent fingerprints.

There is always someone beside you, or half a step behind,
wedging you in yesterday and the first chapter of independence
lies unwritten in a suitcase that's yet to be made.

And the night hides a diamond, but you are oblivious,
for if you'd touch your skin with love, you'd see
just how precious you really are.

You wouldn't stay and let life bound you to the walls.
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#5 King's Jewels

They found an emerald
on the King's crown
(buried beneath the Earth
the day he sought liberty)
glistening - rainbows bouncing
off the jewels, a royal magician.

They didn't know he had
jewels, a quiet man
who kept to himself, a King
almost in poverty - forcing
his servants to leave enough
elbowroom for him to feel
the leeway in his decisions.

Perhaps he had more to hide
than they realized.

Independece = Liberty, fleeing, seeking solace.
Freedom words = liberty, elbowroom, leeway.
Something of value = crown/jewels
Birth stone = Emerald (May)
Something that lights up = Jewels in sunlight

Going to be so hard to pick a vote!