Bruised bitter apple:
the horror! To roll across my tracks.
Of the crab variety,
we decipher what's in cider.
Fright, how might, precisely,
the worms persisted- when once
flesh was tender enough?
Now they are dead, the apple dented
where butted their unsuspecting heads.
When guts are made a graveyard,
no Wicked Queen’s power overrules
the external grotesque, or the royal
inner circle’s internal damage, ringed
  like trees,
   like circles of hell.
Sour taste, and, more importantly--
wriggling, struggling,
self-pesticidal hopes and dreams.
Unsightly to fit their environs.
Some as parasites, but some only friends.

By: Jack Wilder (Ramon Carlos T. Castillo)

Inhale, exhale— I make a long trail,
Like writing the lines of which you love to read,
A call of the aching heart,
Are seen through the words my soul would bleed.
With my hard work, your mind I feed.

And I think about it— life,
So I pick one, straighten it up,
And ignite the inspiration coming from within me,
As I show you the light through paper, pen, and nicotine,
In return, you fuel my perseverance,
And give meaning to my existence.

Such a long trail it is— life,
I think to myself as I puff off a trail of smoke into the night,
The smoke of which is a lot like life,
Long all at once— and gone in one blink.