There yonder lay the seemly miniature town.
My mind had first to offload its anticipations,
the mental pictures I had long labored
in vain to piece together.
The image had always been incomplete
without the first sight.
Now there was another burden to bear:
the opposing forms of affection
that demanded reconciliation.
I wrestled with solidity and vagueness,
and together they shaped the culture.
I stood there like a pedestal,
motionless.
The compass had missed its pole,
demanding an overhaul.
I had to assemble the scattered events
of childhood and manhood.
Yet I suppose childhood
claimed the day for itself.
A phone call came.
My friend is dead.
“Let’s hurry to the funeral,”
Said the weeping voice.
Upon arrival, all kinds of crying
Echoed through the room, Everyone in sorrow
And mourning faces.
Around midnight,
Complaining that time stands still, They play Go-Stop.
That sorrowful look in their eyes
Slipped away to somewhere far, before I knew.
The one who lost money
Sighs deeply, and keeps on
Playing the sorrow.
The one who won money, with a hidden
Funeral flower blooming on the edge of his lips,
Keeps on playing the cards.
Yet the only one still grieving in this place,
Was the traveler who had already gone far away.
treasures of our ancestors passed down through many hands
O, weary traveler, tossed ashore by fate
Despair not, though long has been the wait
Finding yourself hurled back to the very start
Wisdom is simply nevermore to depart
Not a journalist job
No research for answers to resolve
Fun and Relaxation
A vacation
Total get away
On this trip, I will be alone
I had my doubts
The thinking had to be worked out
I was used to traveling with someone
Thoughts kept popping into my head
Then step out and have courage instead
What if I was killed?
Worst scenario, what if I was held hostage?
All the above being nothing to think about
Faith is packed into my suitcase and linked to my mind
Excitement for the journey
Knowing I am never alone
Heaven above oversees and known
Inspired on my mind
Traveling I will go
Maneuvering flow
Tell you about my trip when I get back
Catch me if you can.
Café au lait and croissant.
Dreamy visions of Paris by the Seine.
I close my wanderlust eyes.
Wordku: 5-7-5 words
AP: 2nd place 2026
Dates and times.
Shapes and forms static.
But I’m as grand as a shower curtain.
Things pointed out to me.
Time didn’t occur.
At some point, it just became “me, my thoughts, collapse.”
A chart to explain everything to me.
Got thwarted by the bursting tennis ball of nothing.
When I see calendars?
I could believe them but then I spoke to myself.
They just are lines of lines of numbers.
And I am a fluttering being.
Dates and times exist as I do.
As glossed over, rambling, jumbled, and ran out of pencil lead.
The grotesque nature of time is a quest to me.
Whether it is 2025 or 2011.
I do know what year it is when I’m crying.
When I’m flustered the scars unravel.
And I know what year it is- the year of mistakes.
I think I can time travel if they let me.
And they won’t.
Time exists as.
It’s funny, I don’t believe in heaven, but every time I pay homage to the dead I look towards the sky.
I hope I don’t end up there when I go,
I’d much rather be the dirt travelers tread on.
In a café of clocks with smeared hour-hands I land,
A dusty time-sprinter, spring-loaded and grand.
I knot the past with a spark in my palm,
Deciding: “Shall I rewrite the war? Or just calm
the moment I spilled coffee on my first big report?”
I vanish to Versailles with a croissant in tow,
Pause the king mid-chant, whisper, “Maybe say ‘no.’”
Or maybe I nip to my dorm room at dawn,
Swap my quiet “yes” for a bold “let’s go on!”
I blink, I grin — the universe hiccups.
If I stop the stock crash, I’ll be rich, maybe safe.
But if I snip the bruise from youth… will the laugh leave my face?
I flick the lever, the cosmos swirls like confetti,
Time hands me back my mess, still a little sweaty.
Because changing one wink of what-was may yield what-could-be,
And I sip lukewarm coffee, wondering who I’ll now set free.
I step from whirring future gears
To shadowed halls of moss and mire,
Where candles flicker, knowledge fears,
And hope is but a guttering fire.
Cobblestones echo underfoot,
A market square of mud and cries—
Peasants barter, beggars brood,
Monks guard secrets, wary-eyed.
The plague carts rattle down the lane,
A priest’s Latin lost on cold stone,
Superstition thick as rain—
Witch or wise, you die alone.
But look—within the abbey’s walls,
A child’s voice stirs the silent night,
Tracing stars on parchment, small,
Dreaming truths beyond the fright.
If I could change one thread of fate,
Would I bring a book, a spark,
A word of science to translate
The world from brittle dark?
But history’s woven, coarse and tight—
A single tug might fray the seams.
So gently, I leave one lantern light,
And trust the dawn to find their dreams.
If I could press a button—just one,
A brass lever humming in a midnight room—
And shudder back through history’s run,
I’d pause before the urge to bloom.
Would I fix the world?
Avert a war, mend a broken vow,
Convince a poet not to end his song—
Or simply wish I’d learned the cello by now?
Perhaps I’d find the seven-year-old me,
Ears crimson with playground shame,
Letting the bullies’ words root deep—
I’d kneel and whisper, “Your name is not their game.”
Or would I stand on the moon’s dust,
1969—Neil Armstrong’s boot suspended—
And yell, “Try a somersault!” just for the laugh,
So history books would end, “and then he upended.”
Maybe I’d just nudge Newton’s apple,
Make it miss his head by an inch,
And watch him wonder, “Did I imagine that?”
While gravity waits at the bench.
But here’s the truth:
Every itch to change the past
Is really a wish for mercy, for someone—anyone—
To say, “You did okay. At last.”
So I’d use my power not for grand designs
Or rewriting the universe’s rhyme.
I’d find a lonely moment—mine or yours—
And simply show up,
On time.
Oh, to be given the special chance
to rewrite history with but a glance
So many things in so many ways
So many words to simply un say
But, above all, I would like to give
My mother the days she couldn't live
The flu stole her when I was but two
She was someone I so wish I knew
She missed many hugs and so did I
I sent kisses to her in blue sky
Such a time she missed, Earth and I aged
she would hardly know us, at this stage
I'd love to find those moments for her
Show her what Earth now has to offer
The years added up, we'd need to find
Every hour she left behind.
The time traveler desires to undo
the mess he made the first time through.
The kiss he stole rebounded like a dart
to lodge inside his blackened heart.
The more he stole the more he bled
like going downhill on a sled.
He hit the street and then the wall,
Time slowed down into a crawl.
Please, he begged, rewind this film,
truly I shall make amends.
I will marry her if once again
you grant me leave to begin
from when I caught her glance,
and then perchance
she will grant my wish
and give her kiss
to mend my roguish heart.
Sunday afternoon, small shuttle bus making its rounds, there we sit in our seat headed for como zoo, a lone traveler boarded the bus with his cart in tow, man’s belongings all wrapped up tight.
The man an older gentleman I’m sure with a story to tell, takes his seat tired from traveling alone, gets told their cracking down on people bringing carts on the bus, my heart sank as he wasn’t doing any harm..
The lone traveler nobody with him, what’s the harm? Here we are going to the zoo, mother daughter time, fun times are ahead, but this lone traveler sadness shown on his worn face..
What happened to us all being children of GOD? Aren’t we suppose to love one another.. oh how we’ve gone backwards in this society, judging someone because of the way he Carrie’s his belongings, for my brother is on the brink of homelessness..
We got up to exit off the bus, a quick prayer I said in my heart, his name I never asked, Lord wherever he is, please take care of him, the lone traveler, Christ go before you, tonight your way, oh how I wish I could bought you some food, Jesus will full your soul up with HIS food of faith mercy, May Gods blessings keep you safe my friend..
I postponed being amazed by time, a traveler without aim,
Until, before my soul could die, I learned,
That all that aches has dissipated like smoke under the silver moon,
A flock and a shepherd, shadows of a long-forgotten tale.
Whoever places my bare and fragile bones in an envelope,
Will write a letter of my cowardly and humble feelings,
The black angel, ruling over all that love touches,
Forbids your bleeding heart the wellspring that cries.
Bandaged with a death buried in the stretching future,
The eternity of the moment hides in the despair that surprises us,
The tears of my life, wilted fortune floods you,
The universe in my inspired soul seeks to hide away.
To our earthly life, I give an imponderable and gentle meaning,
Your perfection, my love, only you make it seem without pain,
You are the one who will birth my steps into eternity, forever,
Because your love, like a god, spreads within my soul.
Your love carries a dull dissatisfaction, ever-present,
Our contemporaries feel it and echo it along the way,
Announcing to the present-past, until the last breath,
That your Christ, my beauty, long ago ceased to exist, but turns into our dream.
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