Does it consume my time? Sure.
My money? Of course.
My health? Probably.
My ability to think? Naturally.
Is there great risk in it? If you're not careful ...
but of course you'll be careful
even if it makes you less so by nature ...
So why?
Why flirt with disaster? What's to be gained?
Escape.
Relatively inexpensive; perfectly legal; sometimes quite celebrated.
Christ said not to worry, didn't He?
Well - here's how, you nervous, fearful fool!
And the sweet icing atop the cake -
you ease up on the reins.
You lose the mental strength
to rein in your appetites.
So you'll get your escape - and the sickly sweet thrill
of knowing that your most selfish, raw desires could gain control
and do what your right mind would be far too shamed to endorse
in the Light.
24 August 2025
finished last few lines by 8:31 AM; started the poem some days prior.
If an apple a day
keeps the doctor away
to such proverb
he'd not subscribe
as the income lost
to defray his cost
foolish he would ascribe
and instead
if looking sickly feeling ill
on my deathbed
a home visit plus pill
he'd quickly prescribe
as a patient I used to be
but now a customer that is me
and the Hippocratic Oath
he ducks like a quack
as to quote it he is quite loath
I took a loan
to build myself a home
just a little space to breathe
to rest without chasing time.
For a while, I lived with ease
forgot the ticking clock
watched joy bloom like flowers
but never watered the debt behind me.
So I borrowed again
to pay what I once owed
then borrowed more to mend the last
circling like a bird with broken wings.
Yes, I tasted success
but couldn’t chew its fruit.
I had lost all my teeth
trying to do too much with too little.
It’s hard to tell if they’re playing tag,
or thrusting nectar-drunk love at each other—
mid-June attempts at getting it.
Maybe they’re fighting over first flowers—
legs twitching in hypoglycemic half-paralysis,
like the buzz of waking mid-vacation,
still dazed, muscles aching, but that stinger,
coiled stiff for the week.
Their terror-tails would end me,
or at least suspend me, breath held between
here and wherever histamine takes it.
I appreciate the bees, I really do,
their work, their faith in growing things.
But the anaphylactic risk of their existence
in relation to mine turns close proximity
into a kill-or-die situation:
all stabs and fury, and neither of us
wanting it to end that way.
R-egardless
O-f
W-eather,
E-arth
N-aturally
A-cclimates,
V-ictoriously
E-nduring
R-ainstorm,
I-njustice,
D-isaster,
I-nclemency,
A-nd
N-ature's
O-nslaught
©bfa051325
Monocrostic (Birthday of Rowena Veridiano)
My parents didn’t teach me love—
I learned it from the silence.
My mother never asked
why my eyes were red.
She looked,
but never really saw.
My father only noticed me
when I made a mistake.
Love,
in our house,
was conditional.
Thin.
Breakable.
Absent.
So I taught myself
how to hug my own shoulders
when no one else reached out.
How to whisper "it's okay"
when the shouting outside
made the inside of me tremble.
I learned to wipe my own tears
before they stained the floor,
before someone saw
and called it weakness.
I held my own hand
when the weight of the world
pressed down like a roof caving in.
I taught myself how to survive—
how to exist
in a house that never
felt like home.
And I survived.
But at what cost?
Time was money was when a mindful mate
That gave me time enough to feel its feel--
The touch of grain and texture of its state,
How one hesitates ere part with the bill--
Crisper the notes harder to part was it,
The time it takes to wean out the wallet
That gives enough time to be wise and discrete
To look into, to wait, deliberate
That slows me down enough to weigh its worth.
UPI now cuts that safety circuit
That technology calls it empty mirth,
Not watch out, weigh and well in time to quit.
Technology oft looks an empty boast,
And I know well: comfort comes at a cost.
___________________
Sonnet |01.06.2025| change, money
It's right out in the open for everyone to see ~
puppets bought and paid for
dancers strung and played
delusional parrots with microphones
hostages read the demands of a madman
while maintaining somewhat of a poker face
It's never been so obvious : integrity has its price.
AP: Honorable Mention 2025
Today I discovered the sun
Not that the sun was ever invisible
Not that the sun was ever lost
Not that the sun was ever elusive
Not that the sun was ever obscured by an unattainable cost
Today I discovered the sun
When I removed the blinds from my windows
So that the sun could find me
What does it cost to let a soul bloom and grow,
But love and sincerity, my dear fellow?
Like a gentle smile on a passing face,
Wrapping me like a warm embrace.
A soothing hand on my shaking one,
Its warmth still lingers though all is gone.
A shared laugh in the storm we face,
As the gloom fades without a trace.
"You are the best," beamed a child I once saw,
And O'—when did older souls let kindness go?
So tell me now, my dear fellow:
Did it ever cost to let a soul grow?
Through ages past, we forged ahead,
With gleaming tools where dreams were led.
Soft metal pipes, they carried flow,
Yet silent poison crept below.
A glowing spark, in dials bright,
Lit up the dark, but stole the light.
Brushes kissed lips, an artist's pride,
Yet bones grew frail as youth subsides.
Fibers woven, fire's foe,
In walls and mines, their curse would grow.
Lungs turned stone, and whispers fade,
A heavy price their lives have paid.
Secrets stirred in shadowed halls,
Where science's call brought down great walls.
Beasts reshaped, but lost their core,
What soul survives such cruel rapport?
Beauty painted to beguile,
Yet venom lurked in every vial.
Tremors came, minds slipped away,
For fleeting grace, the toll we pay.
Now batteries hum, and engines thrive,
Yet flames may leap where sparks survive.
The earth protests, its veins run dry,
What cost we bear, we must decry.
Each step we take, each bright new flame,
Holds truths we fear to give a name.
But heed the past, its lessons learn,
Lest futures bright to ashes turn.
Cassandra, you who knew the leaves of time,
And traced them in your mind before they fell:
A gift perhaps for mortals too sublime,
Perhaps a cloak of darkness suits more well.
Cassandra, did you wish this thing to be?
To reach beyond the veil the future lays?
To now and all of time at once to see?
To live a life thus spread across all days?
Cassandra, had they heard, then Troy would stand,
But how can little merit know the best?
Too rare a soul for that more brutal band;
And so a diamond fell with all the rest.
You suffered twice, before and when Troy lost:
A gift immortal comes with mortal cost.
Between the time card and the grave,
We trade our days for dollars spent.
Each sunrise mortgaged, sunset saved,
For what we call accomplishment.
The hamster wheel spins endlessly,
As we chase what we're told to need.
Survival isn't thriving, see—
Just breathing while our spirits bleed.
To make a living isn't life,
Just passage through familiar halls.
The true wealth lies beyond the strife
Where joy, not obligation, calls.????????????????
the angst you feel is energy
in fact adrenaline
to fuel the fire needed
to face your fear
and profit from
the opportunity at hand
AP: Honorable Mention 2025
Last Reflection
You have paid the ultimate price,
And I, made the greatest sacrifice.
When the time came
You answered the call
And gave your all.
My son, what remains of you
Lies in this casket in dress blues.
I hope the cause was just and true,
So, I, will not your death rue.
I know that you were brave
And other’s lives did save.
I know most will forget your name
But I can’t find it in my heart to blame
For they may be standing here like me
Knowing what it takes to be free.
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