I am kept in a bottle,

A glass vial,
Within an unbroken void.

You may be too.

We are cast out—floating
Amongst Saturn's rings,

Encased in glass
Meant to keep our
Fragments from colliding.

Maybe they should,
Collide that is, and burst

Just like stars

But instead of dying,
We bring forth galaxies,

All starting from sealed
Bottles they thought

We could never open.

Awkward and lanky,

not a boy and not yet a man.

Youth, litheness; potential

and yet, still teachable.

Somewhere, in a field of static snow,
a violin lies unplayed,
its strings breathing the hushed tension
of storms caught between clouds.
The bow, discarded, angles like a broken wing
bent under a sky so gravid with noise
it forgets to weep.

Each string hums an unspoken question:
Why does silence gather such gravity?
The wood remembers a hand
that carved hymns from the void,
its grain bearing witness
to the weight of creation.

I watch from afar,
a shadow swallowed by dusk,
where soundless specters rise
from the soil's yawning absence.
Their mouths are mirrors,
reflecting only the things
we dare not say aloud.

Once, I held the bow myself,
my breath the metronome of eternity.
Each note spilled from my trembling hands
like the lifeblood of gods
we did not mean to summon.
Their voices still echo,
fragile filigrees caught
in the harp of my ribs.

Now, even my shadow refuses me.
The light fractures around it,
falling into the fissures
between longing and despair.
Still, the violin waits,
its patience the only hymn
worth singing.

I bend to pick it up—
the silence shatters.
Each shard catches the light,
spinning a constellation
of unplayed songs.

And in the final note,
a blade of sound cuts through me,
splitting marrow from bone,
memory from dream.
The echo hangs like a question
only the dead might answer,
and I am left to wonder
if it was ever meant to be played at all.

You’re swimming in so much potential
You’re always one crashing wave
Away from drowning in it
You’ve been treading water
Fully aware
You’re on borrowed time
How much stamina
Do you think you have left
Before your muscles will start to shake?
How many life jackets
Have been thrown at you
That you pushed away
Just to preserve a facade
Of the man you think you should be?
If you aren’t careful
You’re going to find yourself
In the deepest parts of the sea
With no one around
Your muscles will give out
Your pride will drag you down
Your lungs will be flooded
With everything you could have been
You will drown
Under all the best parts of yourself
All the parts
You were never brave enough to embrace

It's okay, you don't have to pay. It's covered
By (assurance) of Grace

On Judgement of Value

Food for the world on a gold plate
Something so small has so much weight
For who can weigh eternal life
And who can say that life has a price
This world will rate and measure
Criticize and place you at its leisure
But the Lord uses a different system
Jesus took our place as spotless victim
He looks into the heart of hearts
Where the human soul resides
He moves past even the locked parts
To find where the treasure lies
He sees beneath the surface. Hidden,
Lies untapped potential; something more
And from the depths it has risen
Like waves to crash upon the shore
Who can know the mind of God
Or understand God's actions?
If beauty is in the eye of the beholder
How beautiful we must truly be
For God made us in His image
And so dearly loves you and me

Oh human how low can you be?
In your eyes, I see
A loneliness you cannot keep.
Why do you feel this way?
Must your soul linger in twilight's sway?
Or maybe I've been looking at you the wrong way?

Look closer and see;
Through this mirror, there's a limit to what you can be.
After all, what it means to truly see
Is by closing your eyes and then breathe—

One, two and three...

Take a look inside,
Where nothingness and darkness abound.
Then came a cosmic bang—
Matter racing, light spills across the sky,
As the universe burst to life

Day by day, this universe expands.
Through stars, we meet
And moments we make stand.

Dreams to fulfill in the bloom of your prime,
Steady and bold, like mountains climbing high,
Values sculpted by the passage of time,
And desires stretching beyond the endless sky.
Home to myriad of galaxies,
Where stars like waves crash in cosmic seas,
Holds the wisdom of ages long past,
A race known for eons to last.

All these years of existence welling up inside,
Hidden truths unseen by the naked eye.
So for a fleeting moment,
embrace the tide;
For you are more than a label or a guise.

Just like the universe, forever in motion,
Born from the void, a spark of creation,
You are not just a mere flesh in the trials we bear;
You hold galaxies within you, infinite and rare
—
An ever-expanding universe, that is who you are.

✍️ P.Earl

🖼️ No Game No Life

Hey look!
A man of potential
Gifted with intuition
Anyone can see

Oh there!
A man who’s capable
Such range they can go
All things they can be

Come see!
A man so dedicated
Devoted to their crafts
Never will break free

And here!
A man with future
Sure would travel far
Oh how they all believe

Lo you!
Nothing but man of potential
The unknown awaits
Life’s all uncertainty

Prithee!
Be more than man of potential
Let all hopes set off
Expectations reached
Let man be of more than potential

Dud Bomb!
The worker was moved from the explosive mixing shop
Into the bomb assembly shop to see if he could manage
Explosive mixing was a fine art like producing wine
He used the wrong ingredients twice and was out
Given a last chance in the assembly shop
The most important job in the entire bomb factory
Ordnance production was hard difficult work
Not every worker could manage under pressure
Yet keep the error free high skill level alive
The batch of explosive he made still worked
It went bang but at only 50% of its potential
When a bomb exploded it needed full yield
Faulty weapons could cost the Allies the war
If the worker had no issues assembling bombs
Things were back on track for war production
If he proved incompetent he was drafted
Into the infantry where the action would be hot!

i feel like potential is dripping out of the tips of my fingers
golden ochre spilling across every surface
staining everything it touches
marks and scar of waste to show that all i do is fail
use it use it use it
make use of this potential before it leaves you, my mind screams
use it use it use it
so i do i do i do
and slowly ochre turns to a shimmering bronze
i can't pay it any mind