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Tag: daily poems

Connecting Flights: ottava rima

Published on June 17, 2025

Against the current swims the steadfast one
who thinks to beat the ocean at its game.
What starts as just a wager made in fun
becomes, after an hour, much the same
as boasting that you could stare down the sun.
You cannot win. Admit it. There’s no shame
in realizing you are very small,
and not much worry to the world at all.

Against the pull of time, our lives spin out
and at the end, our threadless, empty spools
have sewn us neither certainty nor doubt,
but just the simple winding sheet of fools,
that wraps up both the whisper and the shout
and never bothers teaching us the rules.
That threadbare piece of cloth becomes our shroud.
It’s all the carry-on we are allowed.

17 Jun 2025

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The Edge of War: Keatsian (English) ode

Published on June 17, 2025

Let fly the cannonballs and fiery stuff,
release the fire arrows in the night!
They don’t already know it, but enough
is more than quite enough. It’s time to fight.
What good is mere diplomacy and talk,
when no one listens or misunderstands?
There is no point in waiting any more.
Our greatest weapons will leave them in shock.
When it comes right down to it, no one can
resist the subtle serpent’s song of war.

What good is it, resisting such a force?
It gathers in momentum by the day,
and casts aside all reason. Why? Of course,
because some people love to hear drums play,
and safely, from the hilltops, watch the scene
where lesser men and boys succumb and die,
and count it victory when money’s made.
What does it matter, winning? What’s it mean?
Who knows what is the truth, and what’s a lie,
when the glory and the trumpets fade?

Let loose the hounds of hell, and let them run,
among the poor and hungry fools who fight.
The battle ends before the war’s begun,
a pre-decided case of right and might.
Imagine this scenario’s a test,
a way for culling ignorance from bliss,
to see who gets it, or nothing instead.
What good is knowing who knows what is best,
or wanting to believe the world wants this?
There are no heroes there among the dead.

17 Jun 2025

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The Recipe

Published on June 13, 2025

You want to see the world a different way?
They say you only need a different light.
You choose to flip the switch, or change the bulb,
or light a candle. You get to decide.

You may choose colored filters to compare
the view that might be, from the one you know.
Another person might increase the watts;
or point the lantern differently from you.

There may be something hidden in the dark
that great illumination brings to sight;
by contrast, what is washed out by the sun
may in the darkness share some secret code.

Of course, despite what source of light you choose,
the critical component is your eyes.
No matter how much shadow you dispel,
you see just what you want to see is there.

You want to see the world a different way?
Perhaps all that you need to do is look.
It’s all inside your head, in any case.
The recipe dictates what dish you cook.

13 Jun 2025

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The Eyes Have It: Chaucerian madrigal

Published on June 13, 2025

If we can see a thing, we call those blind
who claim that it is nothing, just a dream,
and ridicule each other’s faulty eyes,

imagining the great truths that we find
are the exclusive provenance of “mine”.
If we can see a thing, we call those blind
who claim that it is nothing, just a dream.

But is it all just a trick of the mind,
a clever ruse of being that just seems
so real we use its spider webs for beams?
If we can see a thing, we call those blind
who claim that it is nothing, just a dream,
and ridicule each other’s faulty eyes.

13 Jun 2025

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Another Marionette: light verse

Published on June 12, 2025

Please tell me: just who pulls your strings?
I’d really like to know.
I see you making pirouettes
and flitting to and fro,
much like a butterfly, who lights
on flowers here and there,
and samples each one with delight
not getting anywhere.

Myself? I am a puppet too,
I dance a merry jig,
although I found out years ago
my role is not that big.
I’m just a nameless extra;
call me Dancer 24.
Someone will play me in a week.
Another’s come before.

What music shall we choose for it,
if we may choose at all?
My preference is for comedy,
or something that they call
an incidental piece of work
best suited for the stage
between epic and throw-away,
mere notes upon a page.

So tell me: when you learned to dance,
who taught you how to fall,
before your clumsy feet learned how
to leap, parade, and crawl?
Whose shadow did you hide beneath
while trying to perform
the act you’ve now perfected,
taking the whole world by storm?

Me? I found books and magazines,
all filled with words and stuff
that in time helped me realize
we’re all just useless fluff
designed to be distractions
from another’s main event:
a small piece of the puzzle.
That’s become quite evident.

But still we must keep dancing,
at the far end of the strings
that out of sight, maintain control
and keep us at our thing:
pretending that we are the show
that people pay to see,
instead of dumb mute puppets
who imagine we are free.

12 Jun 2025

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Anthem: kyrielle

Published on June 12, 2025

Who is it that makes up the rules
for peasants, leaders, sages, and fools,
who builds the narrow seats in schools
to educate a growing nation?

What hand dictates the right and wrong,
transcribes the loyal subjects’ songs?
Who peals the bells and sounds the gongs
for evolution of the nation?

How do we choose the road ahead,
denying self, where we instead
trade in our swords and rocks for bread
to feed all of our great nation?

When does the better day arrive,
that distant future, when our lives
are more than scrimp to just survive
and we become a whole nation?

12 Jun 2025

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Close the Book: haiku

Published on June 11, 2025

I follow no book;
I recognize no guru.
Truth is not written.

Some may point the way;
others show by example.
There is no method.

There is right and wrong;
either can build or destroy.
Both sides are losers.

You know what is true:
the path is not so easy.
It is not a path.

Words may nourish me,
but they are not food.
No one eats hot air.

I do not follow,
nor do I want to lead you.
Our paths simply cross.

Wake up from sleeping;
I am right here beside you.
Let’s see what’s out there.

11 Jun 2025

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