God smiles. The devil always laughs— in a world where one
man can be a hero to all, but never a hero to themselves. But life
is life, and that’s something we all have to live. Growing ****
for hands, doing your best to explain all of life’s noisy jazz.
Improvising grace with filthy tools, sculpting silence from
the din. Finding gains from feeding peas to peace— small
offerings to vast ideals. But we’re all just boiling in the ***,
seasoned with hope, too numb to scream it all out.

Guess I’ll be filming a field of angels, watching them grow
into a movie I’ll never get to see. Faith on reel, a fate unreleased.
Goodness is easier when it’s clinical; cut, clean, and color-coded.
But look too closely, and even virtue starts to rot under the
microscope. But good to know most prefer playing doctor
to ever being a patient— yet none of them have the patience.
It's just one's self-diagnosis without much reflection.

Guaranteed: casual racists smiling their remarks so sweetly
that even the laughter sounds like applause. But I less applaud
for I’m more appalled – but we all live in a world.

Two wild tales to tell — there are two stray dogs chasing
pedestrians again. That’s the story they’re telling the authorities.
Meanwhile, on a sunnier day, a ledger’s pages yellow daily —
all outlasting the smoke of all the fires you swore were for your
own good. Cigarette-stained fingers; noir pages of a crime scene
unnoticed — that’s what it feels like, loving someone who’s
stopped seeing you as their focus. Funny, isn’t it? They stole
your heart but make you feel like a thief, for stealing all of their
time. They claimed they needed space, but weren’t they the ones
who first called you, their star?

The mirror in your bathroom is cracked; you can’t wash
it with your tears. But hasn’t the bathwater been quietly
counting them all?
____________

Now, there’s finance to be contemplated — those complicated
relationships, where compromise is contemplated, but then
quietly makes things complicated. But let someone hand me
a sans discussion —they’ll only subtract the font of my love
language, erasing the letters of my love before I’ve spelt them
out. To say we don’t talk like we used to. But truthfully?
We never spoke that deeply at all. As a lot of people still
drown in their shallow thoughts.

A touch of time —
feels like marigold marmalade,
like spending slow summers together.
Syrup-dripping tears sting as they stick
to your face, attracting bees; and those
jarring truths of a dream unfulfilled.
It stays sealed in glass—sweetness
postponed, a closed jar never tasted.

You plant a flower of hope in the smallest
of gardens, and prove that even a drop
of nectar can fertilize your faith.
You want to rest in blessings, but
blessings move — so must you.

You pray for daily bread, but life
kneads your hands into making it.
You earn your piece, then spread it
like marigold marmalade on warm bread.

Because life isn’t so sweet; dreams only
taste a little once you finally get a bite.
And Lord, could we be forgiven for
craving the fruit of another’s labour?
As we mistake living for pleasing —
and forget to live for our destined reason.

Practiced hope becomes the sermon we preach —
Seeking justice, and trying to live peaceably; but
Even peace has weight — bone, muscle, presence;
And some days, I feel so lost in this present.

Slipping into reflections, my mirror-skin cracks.
When all the smiles I wear shift with the script —
All these different moods, and a different cast.
The broken hands of time can't be set in a cast,
Yet we keep fishing for love, throwing out our
Hearts, trembling hands; hoping it's a good cast

For youthful exuberance — my crustacean lips
Would sometimes sound cleverly selfish.
Saying I want everything, but never speaking  
The language of real and given effort.

Still, everything you long to hold completely
Asks for patience — love, answered prayers,
Dreams and hopes —lest they drift from us,
Being quiet as uncast lines on still water.

Plotting a course toward destiny isn’t as romantic as it sounds.
Some days, I feel like I’m walking on half-baked schemes rather
than solid plans—improvising hope on cracked pavement.
There’s a “field of dreams,” sure, but not the kind where the
grass is greener. Instead, it’s overrun with the weeds of
disappointment—unwelcome thoughts I have to keep plucking
from my mind before they take root. As I try to find cover under
the so-called tree of life, but even its shade feels uncomfortable.
Too warm. Too uncertain. And rest doesn't come so easy when
your thoughts are always so heavy.

And tell me—if someone else’s life came with a perfect promo,
polished and so promising, would you still blame me for
my FOMO? I mean, what if their dream life is the one I was
supposed to live? What if I just missed the sign-up link? To catch
myself trying to live out the picture of someone else’s success,
because this life of mine? It’s painfully YOLO. And I try to
keep my horses steady, but envy isn’t exactly a stable creature.
It wears me down, day by day, like I’m stitched together by
Polo—fashionable on the outside, but worn-out underneath.

Failure, though? Now that’s the real villain. It doesn’t just sting—
it lingers, like emotional PTSD. It makes you flinch at the idea
of trying again, as if effort itself is a pointless punishment.
And fingers? Oh, fingers love to point—especially at people
who haven’t gotten far. But when it comes time to point out
themselves, they suddenly feel too short.

Still, I keep my fingers crossed, quietly hopeful I might achieve
something real—something I truly want as a need. It’s a bright
hope, exhausting in its intensity. But even in darkness, there’s
always the flicker of a new light waiting to be found.

Giving myself odd looks, while trying to even the score—
pointing out my faults like counting sins on abacuses.
Too many to tally, and every action I take I just hope
adds up to something. But I’m outnumbered by myself.

Feels like an inverted midnight— too heavy to be noon.
Doing the most, while barely praying at all— maybe
because doubt multiplies faster than faith settles.

Failures pile up like fractions with no common
denominator— just me, subtracting reasons to believe,
dividing purpose by disbelief, and hoping somehow
I’ll solve it all to find some peace.

Trying to count what I can still hold, not out-of-hand
habits or dust-covered promises. My Bible feels more
antique than answers— pages heavy with silence
until I wiped it off and saw… another layer still
hiding underneath. Like dusk, again. But this time,
I opened it— and let it open me.

I guess now, the night we met is just a memory—
    a self-portrait without ****** features,
Only streaks where tears once ran, as the image
   is so blurry, but I still see myself
Running back to you… too easily.

It’s such a sad picture— an enigma, half-painted
   with eager thoughts quietly bleeding
Into the ink of doubt, each brushstroke pulling me
   further from the truth I never wanted to name
Now it just hangs… so awkwardly crooked

You left me walking alone in this gallery
           of only terrible memories.