The mountains keep their secrets well—
in their silence, they bear the grief of stone,
the centuries pressed into stillness,
each stratum a tale of what once was
and what shall ever be.
One looks upon them and thinks,
they have never known what it is to fall.
But does one not hear them groan
beneath the weight of themselves,
the way they shift in the night
like old men turning in their slumber?

Each crack in the rock does whisper
of pressures unseen, tectonics
of ancient sorrows long since stilled.
In this, they are alike to us:
holding fast to the unspoken,
wearing their jagged edges
as though they have no need of gentleness.
But hark—does one hear it?

The way the wind grazes their faces,
how even the stone does yield to that
which is so soft it has no name.

We come to them burdened,
bearing the weight of days
like a sack of heavy stones,
each one a moment believed
to be the end of something vital.

We hold them close, believing
they are all we have—
these small griefs that anchor us
to the ground we tread upon.

But the mountains know
what we have not yet learned—
that every stone shall one day
become dust,
every peak worn smooth
by the selfsame wind
that now does caress the face.
We are not less for this,
nor are we more.

We are but the shape
life has taken to know itself,
to feel, in this brief span,
the vastness of what it means
to be.

Consider this:
the stars, too, shall perish,
and yet their light does wander
the corridors of space,
filling the night long after
they have burned themselves out.
We are no different.
What we are now, in this moment
of small sorrow, shall pass.

It is not the end,
but a whisper in the vastness

of what we are yet to become.
So let the mountains speak to us.

Let them tell how even they
must break and bow to time,
how their strength lies not in
holding firm, but in the slow
unfolding of their edges
to the universe's touch.

We are not small,
nor are we infinite.

We are the echo
of all that has ever been
and all that shall ever be.

Listen, and one shall hear
how the mountains weep
not because they are broken,
but because they are becoming.

                                                  And so are we.

Beneath the rotted floorboards, time pulses,  
an arterial thrum of root-veined clocks.  
They do not tick for kings, nor bow for breath,  
but coil their echoes deep into the loam,  
dragging splinters of once-wooded oaths  
into the mouths of worms.  

What is time here, but the taste of damp?  
But the drag of green shadows across unblinking stones?  
A language older than lungs,  
a song of split seeds whispering their secrets  
to the weight of a thousand buried steps.  

Above, the weightless still mvoe,  
mistaking hours for thresholds,  
grinding moments into calendars  
as if order were a thing the earth might honor.  
Their laughter carries, thin as copper wire,  
breaking against the stone’s unhurried shrug.  

Here is the truth:  
roots keep the time,  
counting each second by the shade of moss,  
each century by the rise of the hawthorn's spine.  
And we are nothing to it,  
fleeting as the rain on uncarved stone,  
as brittle as the leaves  
crushed under their own arrival.  

I laid my ear to the ground once,  
and the earth opened a crack of sound—  
not a scream, but a swallow,  
a voice neither cruel nor kind.  
It told me this:  

"Do not fret your passing.  
Even your dust will kneel  
and grow itself into shadows.  
The clock of roots will claim you too,  
a heartbeat winding down  
to something soft and green."

I tried to build a world from quiet moments—  
small, whispered things that barely held their shape.  
But everything ran together,  
blurred like wet ink on skin,  
and I stopped knowing where it started,  
or when it stopped being mine.  

You once asked me what it felt like  
to carry the weight of so much.  
I said it wasn’t heavy—just scattered,  
like leaves caught in the wind,  
never settling, never landing  
where I thought they would.  

But somewhere in the chaos,  
I found stillness,  
a soft gravity that kept pulling me back,  
not to the things I’d lost,  
but to the things that stayed,  
the ones that never needed names.  

There’s a pull to what we don’t say,  
and maybe that’s where the truth rests.  
Not in the grasping, not in the struggle,  
but in the letting go—  
in the acceptance  
that some things are meant to drift,  
to settle in places we never thought to look.  

The edges of this world I’ve made are still rough,  
but now, they feel right.  
I’ve found peace in their sharpness,  
in the way they’ve held together despite the breaking.  
Even the void, it turns out,  
has a sweetness  
when you stop trying to fill it.

I don't want to live forever,
I don't want to be flattered,
I don't want the world to know
that I was here and that I mattered,
I don't want any wealth,
I don't want the baubles that it buys,
I don't care if the sun is setting
or if it's morning on the rise,
I don't crave your fleeting fame
Nor the glory that you chase,
I'll not be trapped in moments,
I'll be set apart, no trace,
I do not seek a peaceful life,
I wish not to be "free,"
I want to be as fathomed
and as forgiving as the sea

Is there a solace for words?
A place to be, asides a page
A space to be, asides a line
Tell me, is there more for words?
Asides the guile of being spoken
Or is speech all there is,
For an art form so golden.

Is there a haven for thoughts?
Like souls, it seeks solace
A page, like flesh, holds it bound
And speech, like death, sets it free
is there more for words,
Asides that which eyes can see
is memory a grave,
And thoughts a curious dig.

Where do read poems go?
The heart, the ears or the soul?
If all there is for a poem is reading,
and all there is for a soul is living,
Where do dead poets go?
The hearth, the ether or a stow?

Man builds his palaces and fortresses of stone
to last him a thousand years
while clouds drift by that last not long,
as brief as the drop of one tear.

The clouds’ only constant is their change
as they curl into filigrane wisps,
or flocks of white sheep on a blue range,
or black towers wreathed by blitz.

But one day these monuments will topple and fall,
leaving behind only a trace
for future archaeologists who’ll struggle to recall
whatever had been in this place.

The clouds, meanwhile, disperse and reform
in the wandering winds that cover this earth
to tower up high in each new storm
as they constantly repeat rebirth.

Finally the sun has come out from behind the clouds to dry my wet cheeks. A gentle breeze hums through the trees and the sound of a blackbird singing anchors me in the moment. My heart is grateful for this green buffer of solace amidst a world gone crazy. Whilst the angry mobs, baying for blood, stalk the streets of a crumbling power hungry paradigm, there are glimmers of light appearing on the horizon as many more souls gather in love to dance to the beat of a different drum.

Once again I feel myself dwelling on the margins, quietly retreating to the edges to join my witchy ancestors, watching and waiting for the storm to pass.

My bones hold the memories of the burning times as I sink into the quiet earth and the cool wind caressing my skin brings some relief. Walking on the razors edge of longing for connection and needing to lie low, to hunker down in the one place I can feel safe, alone.

Around me I see signs of the storm passing and new buds appearing with the promise of another flowering and harvest to come. In the warm evening light, that kisses the tips of the leaves, a gentle smile wraps itself around my heart and a glimmer of hope returns. ‘This too shall pass’, the wind whispers, ‘this to shall pass’…

Graffiti artist
sprays to say that “I was here” —
Ozymandias

In a nook of an old stone church
a cherub basks in the vesper light —
A childlike innocence for which I’ve searched
that seems to slip into the onset of night
Fade not away, you sweet dear boy
and never lose your childlike joy
Fight, fight
the snares of twilight