I stand in front of a stone library
that once held great knowledge therein,
but stands now empty under skies dreary.
I whisper a prayer for our sins:

Please, Lord, let the children who follow us
grow wiser than we ever were.
Let them yet be the loving kindness
that we have signally failed to confer.

I doubt that they will ever forgive us
for this fallen world that we’re handing down
thanks to all the blind disservice
by leaving little but ash on the ground.

Before us all stand two stone gates
each leading to diverging roads:
The one leads to our visible fate
while the other fate overthrows.

Please, Lord, let those born in these days
choose the path of the unknown
instead of taking the road that behind us lays:
They shall our foolishness swiftly outgrow.

What few blessings I may pass on to you,
O dear reader of the future’s present,
I give you freely in hopes of a new
rebirth in a world without end, amen.

butterflies flutter -
reach for the nectar of life;
winds change direction.

Twenty years, a lifetime in a breath,
Moments of joy, and trials that test.
A bond forged strong, yet time has shown,
Even the mightiest rivers carve new stones.

Love endured, though struggles grew,
As dreams were altered, plans askew.
Her strength once bright, now shadows cast,
A disability’s weight, a bond held fast.

Yet even love can feel the strain,
When one surrenders to endless pain.
Not by choice, but a path she’s known,
Leaving both to feel alone.

Then a spark ignited, a newfound fire,
A heart once dormant, now lifts higher.
Through your eyes, he sees the light,
A soul reborn, embracing life.

How can one not love a heart so dear,
Yet embrace the joy when new love's near?
Breaking free, not out of disdain,
But to dance in sunlight after the rain.

Steps may falter, but strength is alive,
Together you flourish, together you thrive.
Honoring the past, yet forging ahead,
Two souls united, where happiness spreads.

I will run to the Cross.
The hill where Christ died,
Dead with thee I shall be.
I have seen the blood.

The precious Crimson,
Beloved of them drawn.
I will taste the blood
Here quickening avail.

Seeds, too, were surrounded by darkness
before they became anew—
held close by the quiet earth,
pressed into silence so deep
it swallowed the memory of the sky.

Did they mourn the light they had never known?
Did they fear the weight above them,
or trust the unknowable forces
that buried them so?

And when they split themselves apart,
breaking open to grow,
was it with joy,
or was it pain
that gave way to life?

What, then, of us?

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."

The last rose petals fall to the ground
leaving the rosehips bare
as autumn’s chill again comes around
to strip blooms that had been fair.
The rosehips have hairs all wiry and grey
that also break off, one by one.
Her color is gone, she fades away
until this rose lady’s season is done.
Her petals arrayed on frosty soil
decay gently in the cold rain
while in her hips, seeds are born
to bring forth new roses again.

there is magic in a steaming cup
in seeing with sick eyes
through the white morning

A woman who moves in silence
Her face softened by the distance

She carries a life
not numbered
a beating heart for two
so big the walls bend around her
as if to say
“nevermind the others”