The King of Terrors comes not with
a sudden roar, but as a quiet shadow falling across the final door.
He sits upon no mortal throne,
A quiet shadow, vast and lone,
On silent, unreturning wing.
The pulse grows slow, the candle
dims,
The noisy world begins to fade,
A quiet stilled through all the limbs,
A quiet peace within the shade.
They call him dread, they call him
night,
The final end of earthly tears,
Yet past the gloom there waits the
light,
Beyond the king of all our fears.
as the last leaf falls
my tree bare boned and lonely
without my presence
Every stagnant day is a violent exhaustion,
coercing a broken frame to hallucinate its repair.
Within, my chest is a blackened crater.
Last embers burned out long ago.
No smoke.
No lingering warmth.
Now, only grey ash remains
where my beating heart should rest.
I spend every ounce of fading strength
just to pass as a lesser shade.
I am petrified.
Should I stop acting?
The void would swallow me whole.
Yet no one bears witness.
No one hears the rapture of my collapse
behind the polite greeting,
the quiet smile.
Am I just a spectre at their boundary gates,
bare hands wrapping the bars
while they gather by the light?
The threshold is an uncrossable chasm,
carved directly into my bones.
To want what they take for granted,
to not reach out,
to leave empty palms resting in the leaden air,
is a quiet, sterile agony.
The weight
is slowly,
inevitably,
walking me to my tomb.
Another spring
Counting rings
No longer dark
Dog days wait, for their bark
Signaling life has been in bloom
And soon
A beautiful reality will arrive
You do not really die
Glorious sunshine
Photosynthesis dines
Fed well
From nature's magic spell
Can't you tell?
Arbor figure matures
Always sure
About wilderness’ door
No one ignores
Relaxed, whistling tunes
Branches dance and swoon
Turning everything green
Shade is an escape dream
Then things turn
Brown and burn
Chilling breeze sighs
Giving a ride
To the foliage who occupy
Twigs ready to say goodbye
Fall scheduled to begin
Giving the end
A win
Low temperatures chattering bite
Haunting the cool night
Crumbled leafs descend
Crinkling no bend
Completing their beauty rein
Realizing it's just a plants game
Meeting with the rake
Realizing the bag is ready to take
Them to the disposable bin
No need to call a next of kin
Since they will be shred
Rip and dead
Until spring
And another ring
Appears
Exclaiming the tree is here
Giving a reason
To celebrate each season
Letting the seeds
Do their deed
And grow more trees
The sorrow of those wandering clouds is a beautiful poem,
And your futile halt along the way is nothingness.
Your hand’s gesture is an unknowable confession,
And within civilization, your shadow is the light.
The cup that weeps, left all alone,
Is your dream.
The joy that follows behind laughter
Is your tree of solitude.
Your confession, cast beneath that starlight,
Is the fluttering butterfly of a life in the mire.
Your unfulfilled return, flying far and wide,
Is a pain that belongs to you alone.
Your unresolved grief that will not die, even in death,
Is yet another beginning for you.
- The End -
cowboy can faultlessly eye cauldron of brandy
but carbocyclic camphorweed forgotten
his youthful kith unquietly loll in Kursk
to guard nefarious nightshade
(Weekly Magnetic Poetry Challenge • July 13–19, 2026)
Your lips, like the hues of a rainbow light,
Your white skin, stained in a milky glow,
Your dazzling hair, swaying upon the meadow bright,
Your skin, softer than the softest falling snow.
The rainbow light, beholding your lips of grace,
Fades away, leaving only a scarlet dye,
While the milky glow is buried in your skin's embrace.
Your dazzling hair shines brighter at the meadow’s silent greeting,
And the winter snow, touched by your beauty, turns to a gentle flurry.
In a midsummer night’s dream,
I met you and became a flower.
Offering all my scent to you,
A petal's kiss, like our very first hour.
Your lips, like a blossom of scarlet hue,
Your skin, stained in a milky glow,
Your eyes, like the falling flakes of snow.
Since all of this is but a passing dream,
Kiss not my petals, I pray,
But pluck me by the roots away,
And plant me in the pot within your room.
For I shall offer all my sweet perfume
Unto you, and you alone—
So cast away all other scents you’ve known!
Peter pan who lived by the sea,
Found summer as hot as can be.
He sat in the shade,
With cool lemonade,
Birds dropped waste on him from a tree.
showed up when the ballet stopped
and slippers were still
The other shade of green
was when the rain desisted
and grass stretched itself
for something more
The other shade of yellow
was when I stopped
looking at the sun,
when she winked at me,
knowingly
All the other colors fell in line
I found jasmine
when I was heartbroken,
walking barefoot on pavement
to the mailbox
I was looking for something,
something that wasn’t there
A piano on the beach
A shell in a snowstorm
Oil spread across blank canvases
W
i
l
d
reigning over the smudges I tossed
crimsons and violets and fuchsias galore...
merging together to form a tree bark hue
the deepening browns often relate the most~
unique and fertile as the shades can ever become
wild and bitter like lattes blended with vanilla
down to earth and relaxed as a warm light source
making my skin go reddened and vibrant
like parakeets nesting in trunks and serenading
or moss clinging to nearby marble, discovering a home
sort of like a fashion statement, a mild accessory
but these browns won't linger in silhouettes
just keep me pacified and add to soft ambiance
while aiding to the beauty of belonging
and the silkiness of softness which surrounds us~
A big green tree stands in
the park.
It has a coat of bumpy bark.
It shades us when the sun is
stark.
Under the shade of trees, we need to be
to veil the sun, invite our shaded bliss
with lonely hearts and nowhere else to flee
we'll satisfy our love with every kiss
held in the soft luminous hush of light
possessed by the gifts that love can render
we carve our names on warm walls of delight
and drift through dreamy realms of surrender
we'll feel the depth and breadth of love's allure
that warms the cooling shade's enchanting brew
in the mists of your eyes, I find fervor
to fill this hidden haven with what's true
Oh, could all moments gather into this
When each measure of time becomes a kiss
Shade for a book
underneath the lifeguard’s stand,
lightweight umbrella.
You're on the wall - a shadow.
Only in this way dare I address you,
frequently pretend that you are here,
yet say: but you are a shadow,
a shapeless shadow.
And yet I know who you are as that shadow
creates a shape, even a penumbra,
within my mind's eye.
Should such curiosity prompt misery?
Should this misery prompt pleasure?
(written 15 Oct 2025; placed 23 May 2026)
In shaded modest forests grow
the tiniest white bells pure as snow.
Their wild perfume will stop the show
beneath the charm of any rainbow.
AP: 1st place 2026
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