Some folks call her Mother Nature
As they revel in her beauty
Contemplation of her bounties
fuels the maternal mantra.
How could nature be our mother
When we share a common father?
For the One who gave her substance
is the One who gave us being.
We may call her our sister
and adore her stunning beauty
But to call her our mother
is to slight our common father.
When we ignore our Creator
We will choose for Him a proxy
be it nature or another
Man will worship God or Other.
Nature cannot be our mother,
for she did not create humans.
God placed humans over nature
Our servant, she is meant to be.
If you’re looking for your mother
Look up to God, your Creator
For He gave your sister substance
and He bore you for His glory.
The great wild sea roars,
High waves crashing far away,
Stillness on the rocks.
He sits at his stump-desk
as though the forest appointed him
keeper of its minor truths~
wire-rimmed glasses catching the low light,
plaid bowtie knotted with intention.
The wooden laptop waits,
open to whatever thought
the morning has not yet named.
Coffee steams beside the inkwell,
papers scattered like fallen leaves
he has already begun to translate.
Even the landline, absurd in its presence,
seems to understand
that calls here are rare
but always important.
The uncracked pecans rest beside his papers,
not symbolic, simply present~
a reminder that some work
starts with the smallest,
most ordinary labor of the hands.
He studies the papers strewn around him,
each marked with the faint trace
of earlier attempts at order.
For a moment he simply reads,
letting the work tell him
where to begin.
For Epiphany Poetry Contest sponsored by Constance La France
“Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.” ~ Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein
As I embarked upon the world,
I absorbed an idea
that there was some great truth to find.
Coming to believe
that if I didn't possess it, I would be missing
something essential -
like a tin man without a heart.
How could I find this truth?
Would it be through hard work -
study or life experience,
or would it be powerful or divine,
an epiphany
delivered by some kind of angel?
On all the stops that I visited on the road to find out -
parents, siblings, teachers,
books, religious texts, gurus,
philosophers, artists,
people with degrees,
I asked, "What is the truth?"
and my mind became a jumbled, cacophonous mess.
I took a break from the road to truth
to take solace in nature.
For fun, I asked a tree, a hummingbird, and a lake,
"What is the truth?"
No epiphany -
I heard only silence,
beautiful silence.
your tiger can snore
through the wayside and justice
her aether will be
(Weekly Magnetic Poetry Challenge • August 10–16, 2026)
No corolla tutors itself to bloom;
It merely keeps an antecedent vow.
Thus every life appears to choose its form,
Whilst tacitly obeying first ordinance.
The oldest covenants utter least of all—
Yet every pulse remembers their command.
Bring them here!
Even from the ends of the earth.
Let them speak if they could,
Of these feats, acts and truth!
Who gathered the grains of the earth,
And scattered them across the face of the deep?
Do you know who? Step forward!
Step forward and speak!
Who said to the proud waves of the sea, "Enough!"
Making the foundations of the earth its boundary.
If you know who, step forward!
Step forward and speak!
Who wove the mountains and the rocks,
Molten and fire fanned until they were strong!
If you know, who step forward!
Step forward and speak!
At whose voice does the East wind skip,
Like a lover to her bridegroom sprint!
If you know who, step forward!
Step forward and speak!
Whose fingers fashioned Pleaides and Orion,
At whose voice does Bootes shimmer and leap?
If you know who, step forward!
Step forward and speak!
Who is the source and the resource,
Even the completion of all that His Glory wrought?
If you know who, step forward!
Step forward and speak!
18"26
Before the first tongue
suffered the burden of naming,
the garden possessed
its own onomasticon:
Leaf,
Lumen,
Lark,
and one white rose—
an inviolate effulgence
ensphered in dew.
No creature
contested its quietude.
The bee
Received.
The wind,
that elder philologer,
declined dominion.
Only the hand,
catechised by appetite,
confounded wonder
with warrant.
Then
the stem vouchsafed
its green apostrophes.
One thorn
solicited blood
before blood
solicited speech.
Yet the blossom
Withdrew
no redolence.
Its whiteness,
anamnetic of snowfall,
absolved the very air
that coveted it.
Only at vespers
did the ordinance
become legible:
the thorn
was never
the flower's severity,
but sanctity
Assuming
the grammar of sap—
Creation's final rubric,
lest beatitude,
Misparsed
as possession,
translate Eden
into rubble.
Bare basalt bore no banner on its face,
Yet lichen kept the oldest song of rain;
The cliff received no chronicle of grace.
No cedar dreamt the patience born of stone;
A hidden fissure gathered gifts of rain,
Till silence made the heart of granite known.
No moss proclaimed dominion over shale;
It gentled hardness by the law of rain,
Till mountains learnt the meekness of the frail.
Then yesterday gave birth to one green leaf;
The hidden seasons kept their tryst with rain,
And time unveiled the provenance of leaf.
The fern arose where none had granted birth;
The dew restored the first bequest of rain,
Till forests claimed their ancient right on earth.
I left the valley poorer only thus:
The least beginnings outlive loud acclaim;
Stone learnt that quiet is the root of us.
Life is a river with no end,
Teaching the shores how to let go.
Life is the unseen, uncaged wind,
Carving its own path as it flows.
Life is full of laughter bound to sorrow,
Growing hope through shattered ground.
Life is collection of moments we borrow,
A whisper growing through every sound.
Life is journey of finding,
Gaining experience through every choice.
Life is a truth that keeps hiding,
Yet speaks through every voice.
Yield not to the theories of optimism and pessimism.
Be on the fulcrum.
If all lakes and rivers shallowed,
We would miss the beauty of raining.
Half filled is a good omen of achievement.
But half empty gives room for progress.
If everything provided,
Next of kin would lose exhilaration in living.
My waves of emotions have touched here one aspect only.
My verse still half-filled and half- empty.
Neither can be filled nor emptied.
It's nature’s phenomenon!
Place: 5
Is nature's fabric polar, dual, or binary,
or is it only our perception,
so that for each position, there's one contrary,
always without exception?
Are left/right, forward/back, up/down,
nature, itself, or is it our conception?
Is he a serious man or clown
in our language's nomenclature?
Does he live in the country or a town?
When it comes to a human's nature,
each one is either "them" or "us",
and we ask which will command the legislature.
We're creative in our definitions, thus,
nationality, gender, ethnicity or age
decides who rides in the back of the bus.
When one puts a story on a page,
introducing conflict is a must.
Internet users won't engage
unless a headline triggers bloody lust,
causing them to click,
making money, but sowing distrust.
Is the Internet, then, making us more sick -
putting us at odds, one by one,
creating two realities, brick by brick?
Here's a headline I made up for fun:
"Mean Ol' Martians are invading earth!"
Now, do you think earthlings can live as one?
A scavenger was invited to
The land of preservation
The breath of life
Gave him shelter and food.
Alongside his peers,
The fortress of beasts
Shielded him from the elements—
Stepping outside to
Repay their benevolence.
This scavenger returns,
Looking for an answer...
To the grass trampled underfoot,
Leaves plucked without thought,
Fruits are severed from branches.
How is it possible that
Those who came to this world first—
Let us,
The ones who only take
Still upright among them?
The serenity that comes,
As if spread over eternity—
Is all I need to hear...
A blessing for us is
A price they've paid to stay.
Sky tears fill a calm heart with memories
Crystal clear images ripple on the lake
Sentiments condense along the river of time
Overlooked and left behind—
Still,
finding their way back to the sea.
Where upon the earth do I acquaint new life?
A Spirit who scampers upon a banshee breeze,
Unsure—anxious thoughts taking aim, rife, unmoored
Focus unsharp—a fog on a mountain freeze—trees
Seek hope, its landing unannounced, high and lofty:
A child, clay-borne, raised by morning’s star,
and bearing the velocity of love
Untainted, untrodden, undaunted, unstifled—
What nurtures freedom in a nature made for freedom
Time clicks; a moment slips, forgotten.
Hallowed, sought, bought, fraught—a chiefdom
Berean, listening without ears of cotton
Whispering, churning, turning, burning—wind
A persiflage ingested as thunder rumbles, grumbles
Persistence, resistance—conscripted in sin
There, a cry for wisdom, yet stuck—fumbled
Who? A father, mother, sister, brother—kin?
Progeny, cacophony—perhaps fools on atolls
All, forgotten tenets in interplanetary space
The medicament—far-reaching, teaching bleeding souls
Contrary to prevailing belief: to show no grace
Yet responsible life-stewards, a virtuous gift extols
Greater, higher—hope, faith, and love proclaim the Ancient Scrolls
Thunderstruck
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