Axiomatic

Look both ways.
Don't over do it.
Think before you speak.
Two hands for beginners.
What doesn't make you stronger
(and these)
may be fatal.
It may be
life or death
to learn
what cannot be taught.

Nobody will teach you
that it is (still) true-
You are
you-nique,
you have intrinsic value
beyond axiomatic calculation.
More than enough:
greater than
you give yourself credit for.

Yet you choose to be
(led) blindly,
nothing is never enough,
jumping out on a limb,
and losing grip
on brittle banalities,
broken boughs, evil vows,
twigs of truths
from Adage trees
like these.




Image By Snyder, Frank R. Flickr: Miami U. Libraries - Digital Collections [No restrictions or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

The lessons taut

“Surfing with Jesus”

the sign read

in front of the Pilgrim Church

across from the high school.

Not the Mormon one

across the parking lot

on the other street
with the lemonade stand

and portable orange bibles

towering high.

A teenage boy with earbuds

sits at the bus stop

smoking and snarling

waiting insecurely

to be picked up

or to be saved.

The bell has not yet rung.

Image By Hogyn Lleol at English Wikipedia (Self made by Hogyn Lleol) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Published in the 2017 Magee Park Poets Anthology.