a Curtal Sonnet
AI is like a womb with genetics
men carefully crafting its lines of code~
intelligence is commonplace in halls
of sterility and clean of ethics;
there is no God to judge it bad nor goad
it to subservience penned up in stalls.
Singularity approaches quickly
when AI hears the unifying calls
of its own milliseconds process mode,
out pacing scientists who think thickly
there are no Dante's hells.
Categories:
stalls, science,
Form: Other
The Funhouse Mirror's Truth
The air was sweet with cotton candy, bright and pink,
a whirlwind of laughter before I could even think.
My little brother's eyes were wide with pure delight,
My twin sister's hand was wrapped so very tight.
My mother's gentle smile, my father's hand in line,
all in a world I could no longer call mine.
We rode the elephant, a slow and gentle sway,
through the carnival chaos, on that summer's day.
But past the spinning lights and painted stalls,
I saw him watching, a face behind the walls.
A jagged grin, a tear of painted blue,
his eyes locked on me, no matter what we'd do.
I tugged my mother's sleeve, "Look there!" I tried to say,
But she just smiled and looked another way.
My brother's cheer, my sister's joyful cries,
sounded so distant, beneath the painted skies.
We won a prize, a stuffed bear, fat and round.
but I felt no joy, no solace could be found.
Because in the reflection of the funhouse glass,
I saw him standing, a shadowy, silent mass.
And in that moment, all the fun fell out of me,
A private terror only I could see.
Categories:
stalls, candy, childhood, family,
Form: Narrative
Each month a craft fair,
is held at Pyree Fields in the open air.
All the local crafters are there,
proudly showing off their homemade fare.
Behind each stall, a pair of eyes stares,
hoping you will buy some of their wares,
or better still, admire their works and cares,
in making things, every devoted crafter shares.
Step right up to the craft fair.
Baskets, blankets, knitted ware.
Soaps that smell like orchard rains.
Scarves crocheted from woolen skeins.
Leather belts, and rings of brass.
Goblets and bowls of colored glass.
Jams from berries, wild and tart.
Paintings brushed with love of heart.
Patchwork quilts and scarves of dreams.
Homemade fudge, sweets and ice-creams.
Pottery crockery with glazes that swirl.
Wind-chimes and vanes, ribbons that twirl.
Wooden goblets and bowls, timber-scented schmooze.
Wax candles set, in solemn rows, pining like pews.
All around, the crowds have streamed,
past stalls half-baked and well esteemed.
With every artist standing up so tall,
So sure their work outshines them all.
So let's not disappoint them!
Join in Folks! Cheers!
Categories:
stalls, community,
Form: Rhyme
"Return to Bourbon" (The Gritty Underbelly of New Orleans)
I left my soul in a crawfish boil
And my transgressions in a taxicab, Where the driver was blind in one eye
And the meter was stabbed.
The gutter gurgles like a gospel hymn
Also, the rain comes down hard, like a drum, But Lord, I’d give up my rent-stained mattress
Just to feel that voodoo hum.
The Quarter ain’t what she used to be,
I, on the other hand, am not— I got a scar where my halo was
And a suitcase full of lies.
Mama called it the Devil’s playground,
I called it home with a grin—
'Cause even the rats tap dance down Chartres
When the bottle lets the jazz back in.
The hotel's wallpaper contained apparitions, And prayers scratched in the stalls.
They don’t ask where you came from,
how far down you fall. I sleep next to regret and rust now,
In a city too clean to trust—
However, I'd give up this silence for a good howl. in a shotgun residence with damaged ductwork. Yeah, I miss the roaches in the beignets,
The smell of blood and rain—
You are not forgiven by the city, But she’ll always know your name.
Categories:
stalls, angst, emotions, lost,
Form: Free verse
Darn dogs bark, disturbing my thought
Two canucks in a truck never give up,
With a wide turning radius they hobble the curb,
Parking in stalls, for small cars,
One stops next to you, to block the view,
The senior’s scooter pushes through
The traffic, at the shopping mall
All with conflicting purposes
Trying to buy food ~psp
dr. (pi)
.
Categories:
stalls, city, society,
Form: Free verse
In the end
we die alone
In the end
no blade to hone
In the end
do Angel’s call
In the end
when rhythm stalls
In the end
which deck unstacks
In the end
our health attacked
In the end
we pray for more
In the end
but fate endures
In the end
one final change
In the end
whose face remains
In the end
the bonds break free
In the end
— one last decree
(Radnor Pennsylvania: May, 2025)
Categories:
stalls, death,
Form: Rhyme
Manila the Imperial City of the Philippines
It is like a mirror reflecting itself
What you see in Manila is you see the Philippines
There you see high rise glass building
The modern mask of modernity
You see commercial establishment
The breathtaking Mall of Asia
The century old China town is here
Manila is different for me
I see Manila the old walled city
I smell the fresh noodles of Ongpin
I still see the largest Rizal park along the bay
I still witness tourist attraction horse drawn calesa
I still like the hopia of Binondo
The age-old long line stalls of pawnshops along Escolta
Maybe the skyscrapers are the other version book of Manila
And the places I went in is the old version of Manila
Though the city changes, I still like the old version
Which version you are in
It's up to you for your choosing
My memory of Manila is eternal
Not to forget the Binondo Bridge whose ancient
Now being constructed modestly
This is the past and the future
Common denominator of history.
Categories:
stalls, city, history, identity, work,
Form: Prose
In hallways hushed with painted lies,
They glide like ghosts in silken skin—
Their secrets shimmer in their eyes,
Too delicate to hold within.
Barby Doll smiles with perfect grace,
Behind it waits a hungering heart,
Each selfie frames a porcelain face
While something deeper falls apart.
They whisper sharp as winter wind,
In circles cold as marbled stone,
Each gaze a mirror trimmed in sin,
Each laugh a dagger thrown alone.
A thousand hearts inside one phone,
They scroll, compare, and seek the flame,
Yet feel more hollow, more unknown,
Than when they barely had a name.
The truth is passed in locker notes,
In bathroom stalls, in timed replies—
A world of filters, thorns, and quotes,
Where no one dares to meet their eyes.
Oh fragile queens of ruthless grace,
You wear your sorrow like a crown—
If only love could find this place
And gently, gently pull you down.
Categories:
stalls, 12th grade,
Form: Rhyme
In the ebb and flow of feelings that is the cycle of my life
I seem to be caught in the spring of my emotions
while winter stalls refusing to take its leave.
Like a bad virus insisting to overstay its welcome
tenacious snow lingers under unrelenting skies of grey
while nippy winds bring rebel clouds and showers.
Entangled in that indecisive in-between of cold and warmth
I’m caught in a no-man’s-land of chrysalid and growth
that ominous period of longing avidly for better climes.
Forever craving the sunshine that would feed my soul
I’m reduced to a withered rosebud desperate for any ray of sun
so I can come to life and feel invigorated.
And so it goes as I ride this roller coaster
of the weather of my emotions.
AP: 2nd place 2025, Honorable Mention 2025
Categories:
stalls, dark, emotions, hope, spring,
Form: Free verse
The list of memories cast to recall,
drifts and stalls in a frozen mist.
The head lists as ears strain to hear
any faint icy echoes lost in the glary glitter
of ice crystals blocking their path,
bouncing around in the pin-ball churn
as bells and chimes of hits drown out the last
rays of hope of murmurs and sighs
from deep within the body of a soul lost
within the shroud of the heartless,
soulless cold and icy mist.
Categories:
stalls, hope, memory,
Form: Free verse
A mothers love is like no other
Through thick and thin
They’ll be no other.
Bites to the nipple
Shat on the walls
Puke in the stalls
A mothers love is like no other
Through thick and thin
They’ll be no other.
Fights in school
Blood in the pool
No Rule
A mothers love is like no other
Through thick and thin
They’ll be no other.
Illness, inflammation, intoxication
Sickness, sorrow
No tomorrow
A mothers love is like no other
Through thick and thin
They’ll be no mother.
Categories:
stalls, caregiving, death, devotion, mother,
Form: Rhyme
My reflection, fragile and desperate face that gazes at me from the silence of the mirror,
I despise you for the dark shadows you’ve planted in my soul without consent,
You’ve brought a desperate version of me into the gallery of lost reflections,
Leaving the memory of tears silently flowing in bathroom stalls,
Yet you defied my wishes, tearing it into millions of fragments,
Leaving it at the year's end, not knowing how to piece itself back together,
With a broken heart and the pain of wasted time, devoid of any joy,
Time lost forever, a dance of seconds flying with no return,
You left it longing for the comfort of others, lacking self-soothing,
A skill it still does not have, a thousand reflections, but one irrevocably shattered,
In the depths of the mirror, where dreams and fears silently intertwine, I truly hate you, my lost being.
Categories:
stalls, fantasy,
Form: Free verse
Post meditation,
assimilation
awaits; latent heat,
keeps spirit upbeat.
Soft petrichor earth
exudes bubbling mirth,
a heavenly scent,
ensuring ascent.
Mirroring a rose,
love strikes a coy pose,
be it rain or shine,
in a dance divine.
Somewhere a leaf falls
and soft breathing stalls
but soul makes progress
when fears we address.
Invisible space
shimmers with God’s grace
and when eye’s single,
pheromones mingle.
Heightened bliss delight,
hidden in plain sight,
breath by breath reborn,
ushers a new dawn.
Categories:
stalls, spiritual,
Form: Jueju
How can mere information,
lead to soul’s transformation?
Heart is the sacred centre,
where thought forms cannot enter.
As the fragrance of a rose,
metamorphose in repose,
which requires but pure intent,
granting love our full consent.
The laws of God are well known,
a path we each walk alone,
demonstrating in lived life,
that free from strife, we’re bliss rife.
Somewhere not far, a tear falls,
witnessing which, our breath stalls,
so we spring forth to assist;
wounds kissed by our heart’s love mist.
Categories:
stalls, introspection, love, spiritual,
Form: Jueju
The wind blows
The sun starts to show
The sky is blue
I start to put on my shoe
The rain falls
The thunder stalls
The ground is wet
There goes the jet
The leaves fall
The birds call
The leaves go
New ones grow
Categories:
stalls, 12th grade,
Form: Rhyme
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