Any railroad man will tell you truly,
If you ballast the ties with river stone,
Your rolling stock is most sure to de-rail.
All your back-breaking labor laying track
Will have earned you no further capital gain.
I don’t even want to hear you complain.
You can’t make the base for the needed grade
By taking cheap and amateurish shortcuts.
You’ll find such lazy effort only leads
Your precious locomotive off the line,
And so, to see the sad end of a train.
Just like chalk art in a hard driven rain.
An engineer can keep his smokebox clean,
But ballast drift will ruin his machine.
BALLAST
Hold me in your arms
your love still keeps me grounded
So that I can move forward.
Hold me in your heart
your faith keeps me cognizant
to know I am always yours.
Faith serves as ballast
anchoring my calmest self -
stress loves to perturb my still.
Faith holes make punctures
leaving me to drown at sea -
stress floats to watch me drown.
Precious counter-weights
ships utilized for sailing,
ballast stones got dumped offshore.
But in empty hulls
sailors found common boulders
held incalculable worth.
(Sedoka)
03/14/2020
Pick-A-Title, Vol 15 - Sedoka - Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Edward Ibeh
Title Chosen - "Ballast"
Buoyant ship built to remain afloat through voyages of my life
As she navigates the stormiest of seas. An unsinkable ship with
Loyal hands at the helm. The ship's keel averts her from toppling.
Look at her forge ahead! Weather-beaten, yet stubbornly endures
Against furious, rising tides; defying all odds against her as she
Sets sail on her perilous, tempestuous odyssey. Indestructible,
This mother ship reaches all harbors intact, for she is, my faith.
Date written and posted: 06/10/2018
This love, enduring - ballast of the soul
is ever curing, thee to mine, not role,
but a clear stream of commonplace, of knoll,
that not division's grinding can control!
Heart spoken, not then of some earthly toll,
life's emptying - its prisons, its extol
is neither weight's dissension or escrow,
that carrying as to mention, only know.
Love's ballast - risen, tempered - Godly show
is faith within, the inner mind's re-vow
does save, and then does throw away the dole,
while joy of true love, living is enow!
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