Unbound by the need to ever explain,
Leaving behind the ghosts of blame,
You let the heavy yesterdays fall
And answer no lingering, spectral call.
Just sit for a moment, fragile and bare,
In the quiet rooms of your own mind's care.
Hold your own heart like a wounding friend,
And let the fractured pieces blend.
For sometimes, the soul requires no more
Than to rest its weight on a peaceful shore,
To remember, through tears that gently start,
How beautiful life is, right where you are.
I hide behind dreams,
both beautiful and wounding ...
Please dim the light
and still your beating heart.
Love will come
another time.
You call Him a God of pain, a master of a cruel terrain,
But how else does a sleeping soul break its heavy mortal chain?
If the world were only comfort, a soft and endless sleep,
We would never look inside ourselves, nor ever climb the steep.
You say He stands aloof and high, ignoring every tear and cry,
While forcing helpless, fragile things to bow beneath His sky.
He is a loving Father, guiding heirs through shifting sands,
Our training is the molding of His patient, tender hands.
But look closer at the "True Sons" and the paths of thorns they trod—
It was not a cosmic punishment, but the wounding of a God
Who bleeds within the creation, who shares the heavy weight,
Not a tyrant on a distant throne deciding human fate.
The illusion is a heavy fog, the fray is fierce and blind,
But the pressure of the dark is what refines the human mind.
He does not demand perfection from the lost who weep and pray,
But the cracks inside our broken hearts let the light illuminate the way.
For love is not a gentle sun that keeps us safe from harm,
Sometimes it is the winter wind that wakes us to the dawn.
Walk slowly through your days;
the world will rush without your help.
Let your breath be the first teacher—
it remembers what you forget.
Choose kindness when no one sees;
it strengthens the unseen self.
Small mercies tilt the balance
of a life more than grand gestures do.
Hold truth like a lantern,
not a weapon.
Let its light fall gently,
revealing not wounding.
Listen for the quiet things~
they speak before the loud ones do.
Wisdom rarely shouts;
it waits for you to lean in.
And when the path grows dim,
step forward anyway.
Courage is not the absence of fear~
it is the decision to keep moving.
war
bloody, destructive
hating, dying, wounding
ptsd, army, family, diplomacy
loving, living, thriving
calm, sacred
peace
Gölgeydi Günes' Umut
The world was the shadow of man
Surrounded by
hope
On earth
with his name It was
a tree of emotion Scale-free
on every continent Of
a mysterious beauty It was
a breathing space On the skin of the
earth A person
whose shadow grows
It became smaller as it grew, untimely
Compassion
at the core of humanity Wounding as you
explore the world
Countless
in every corner Sapling of
love and hope As long as it doesn't grow up, in
your heart Nature
melts your house Helpless
with his heart that has become concrete Lives
within four walls
A beauty
in every color Of course, it is in its
essence Like
universal art As long as you love the world
without prejudice, There is healing in every home
As long as you touch your heart, you can
Sinan Gürbüz
What makes a good Child go bad—
Is seldom one great Sin—
But many a gentle Injury
The World slips softly in—
A Promise bent—then broken—
A Hand that failed to stay—
A Rule applied like Winter
To a Heart of early May—
It is not Theft of Virtue—
But Starvation of the same—
When Praise forgets to visit—
And Love neglects its Name—
A Question left unanswered—
A Cry that learned to hide—
Until the Soul, self-parented,
Turns stranger from inside—
The Child does not go Bad—so much
As Good—denied its Bread—
And finds, in darker Cupboards,
What should have first been said—
That Tenderness is Armor—
That Mercy teaches Might—
And those who teach by Wounding
Make Night where there was Light—
Wilful wounding
by shrouded diktat
caging vision
in scarlet pangs.
Numb to lamentation
silver and gold chink.
Amid the rustle
of lamé gowns
silence is nailed
secure.
Emotions sit no straight to meditate,
They look for an emergency exit,
What’s sane and sound gets caught in a Zen state,
Seeks profane whilst a safety valve’s remit.
Raised on a diet of good behavior,
What sane nigh prude do but ponder and brood?
Being quicksilver and nigh cavalier,
But not crude, vaults profane in words plain nude.
This is no way to wield vandalism
Of verbal brand way bit a wounding kind,
Profane words ventilate wrath with wisdom
To bring back lost balance of a sane mind--
A fair device to open up floodgates
That cools raw rage and pre-storm peace creates.
______________________________
Sonnet (tongue-in-cheek) | 18.12.2025 | profane, peace, sage, words
Note: The part - III follows.
India’s caste still decides our dignity—
Not just apathy, but our lived condition,
We react the moment we perceive another’s identity.
The rage of symbols distracts us;
Language flares—
Wounding the non-native.
Our sphere dreams of “Viksit Bharat”,
But it doesn’t rhyme with reality—
We still breathe in the same old Bharat,
With the same claims, yet to combat (discrimination).
As we undergo vicissitudes, knowledge of boundless skies—
Which uplifts us every single time
Like bilingual voices flowing into a multilingual style,
Soaking every vein of mine.
So—educate! Agitate! Liberate!
For in the human rage of this world,
We are sunken in discrimination, differentiation, and segregation;
At every stage.
Come—let us do good, be good,
And stand as one among others.
The Sky came to Light, tonight.
Rumbled quietly, its might, tonight.
Soon such Truth was spilling down in
twilight rivers - washing fresh the birds, the stones.
We muddy, ragged, self-wounding Liars drowning.
Twilight rivers, taking hold by letting go.
In the newmade petrichor
we saw what we’d been before.
We each are truthsellers. We each are liars seeking Truth.
We are aging away from our birthright innocence, our youth.
Has the Sky ever lied to you?
To anyone?
Has the Earth ever offered falsity?
To anyone?
Can our breath, our step serve as Apology?
Can I be me, can you be you? Can we be true?
Killing
time
without
wounding
eternity
Life
in the
balance
life
— on the edge
(Red Lodge Montana: August, 2025)
My love, my love, where are you
My heart is so lonely and blue
You took my life with you when you're gone
And since then, my heart knew none
Everyday, I live in sorrow
As if there'll be no more tomorrow
Thoughts of you run through my head
From first morning walk to bed
In solitude, I carry my pain
My bleeding heart under the rain
The wounding blade of yesterday
Rips me to death everyday
visit your neighbors
often you’ll wear out welcome
telling lies unwise
~
metaphoric yet
as so harmful as hitting
them with an ax,---chop
~
chop, chop, chop, chop, chop
wounding them spoken mouth as
swords kills with arrow
12/18/24
Written words by James Edward Lee Sr.2024©
I can’t avoid
wounding others’ hearts with my words;
oftentimes with sarcasm I do forget
that what for me is jest
is for others a bitter herb hard to swallow.
It’s only later that I come to realize
that I have caused somebody’s pain;
then I, too, suffer and regret my tactlessness. .
So nowadays,
when I engage in discussions,
I take a deep breath and say a prayer
to be calm and be kind,
to respond gently and pick my words carefully,
to disagree without becoming offensive,
or, when I consider it best,
to choose silence, say nothing, and preserve the peace.
Among 3rd Place
Who I Am Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Constance La France
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