I write as near to silence as I can get.
Selima Hill
♥ ♣ ♦ ♠
In the beginning
God created the heavens. Earth
Was more difficult.
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In the beginning
Was the wordle, but wordle
Couldn’t be the word.
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A short poem a day
Keeps the temptation to write
Longer poems at bay.
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A haiku is ars
Brevis that aspires, like us,
To vita longa.
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You might not like this
But you cannot much dislike
Such short duration.
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No use listening
To roses. If they whisper
We shall never know.
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Had it not been for
The Angles, we anglophones could play
At being saxophones.
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Greenwashing is when
Catastrophe’s coated with
Clean conferences.
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Will lyric poets still
Be writing lyric poetry
Come the apocalypse?
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No need to be koi.
Carpe diem, no matter
What your element.
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Mini-minor good,
Better than any make of
Maxi-major bad.
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Only one way in,
One way out. Amazingly
Labyrin-out-thine.
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A traffic cone sits
On the head of the hero.
Glasgow smiles better.
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Dropped capitals: fine
In monastic manuscripts,
But monks had more time.
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Coventry’s three spires
Could be seen from all sides. Now,
Most sides have expired.
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Rather depressing
Can be rather beautiful
When looked at aright.
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Now is the time for
All good men to step aside
For better women.
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Allotments are more
Than war on weeds: peace and love,
And lovage and peas.
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They say the word Love
Is overused. Whereas love,
Itself, is under-
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Double you double
You double you dot. Do try
To make it worthwhile.
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Did it all happen
By happenstance? Half the world
Ruled by psychopaths.
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Porridge is poetry
With whiskey butter. The proof
Is in the porridge.
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Here’s a little dream
Where you’re dreaming of a dream
You dreamed that you dreamt.
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At New Street Station
Last night, the ghost passed me by
Of the late last train.
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If you’re nice, the train
At Platform 5 will take you
Straight to Paradise.
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In the human race
Don’t run too fast. Jesus said
The first will be last.
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Trains and boats and planes,
Cars, bikes, busses and trams, and
Feet and legs to boot.
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Wait for the green man
And be patient with his twin.
Better red than dead.
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See Naples and die
Or see Little Eccleston-
With-Larbreck and live.
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If your choice were this –
Earthly or heavenly bliss –
Which would you most miss?
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We all live to die,
Which explains why we mostly
Spend life dying to live.
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It’s not rocket science
But it’s now the new normal,
I.e., it’s a cliché.
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Escherlators are
Escalators that only
Seemingly escalate.
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Yellow, blue and red,
Thence orange, green and purple.
Black and white? Not quite.
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Mondrian disliked green,
But whether that was mutual
Remains to be seen.
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Red postbox, blue sky.
Push the envelope inside, but
Think outside the box.
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Alas, Alaska!
Que será, à la Palin,
Means baked Alaska.
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I fell out of love
With my pre-loved pullover,
So I post-loved it.
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Seventy-six and
Never been in a mosh pit.
Should I regret it?
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Brexit meant Brexit,
But, for Boris, I resign
Really meant Remain.
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David, Theresa,
Boris, Liz, Rishi. Alack!
Years we won’t get back.
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Will legislators
Who advocate a little state
Auto-evaporate?
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If you must harp on,
Harp on in the form of art,
E.g. on a harp.
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From piano-forte
To pianissimo, impro
Has it all to play.
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Your Royal Highnesses
And every aristocrat, pray
Be orf and don’t come back.
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A republic means
A country that cannot crown
Unaccountables.
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The rich and powerful
Like it when we bow and scrape.
Don’t participate!
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Live life by profit
And loss. Lose your soul and let
Profit be your boss.
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Expensive perfumes
Containing hardly any scent
Make hardly any sense.
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Last night I started
Rebecca again, and tonight,
Reader, I’ve read it.
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They were the best times,
They were the worst times, even
Without genitives.
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A foreign country,
Where things aren’t done the same way.
We call it the past.
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Turkeys, vote en masse
For Benjamin Zephaniah!
Don’t vote for Christmas.
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Humanity and
Humaneness: hopelessfully
Syninymical.
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Hey Joe, where you going
As eponymous hero
Of that hateful song?
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One can never be
Too clever, except when one’s
Too clever by half.
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Initial ID
Isn’t the real entity
Of identity.
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Be true to yourself.
That is, if you remember
Which self is your self.
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Whether you travel
Near or far, it’s not easy
To arrive at who you are.
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Are you a glass half-full
Or a glass completely empty
Sort of not-full glass?
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Cleverness is nice
But it’s not clever to be
Clever but not nice.
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Look up on YouTube
Led by Donkeys and you’ll see
We’re led by donkeys.
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Rejoice and be glad!
For this poem is both short and
Comprehensible.
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I wasn’t really
There in the 1960s:
I remember them.
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At seminary
I learnt being good is better
Than bothering God.
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A world religion
Is a cult that’s currently
Holy sectcessful.
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The dead don’t come back.
The living don’t want to leave.
Brexit’s total crap.
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Paz em três linguas.
Síocháin i dtrí theanga. Mír
Ve třech jazycích.
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Neznámý jazyk.
Krásný schovaný výhled.
Otevři okno.
Teanga iasachta.
Radharc an-álainn i bhfolach.
Oscail an fhuinneog.
Lingua estrangeira.
Vista linda não vista.
Abre a janela.
A foreign language.
A beautiful unseen view.
Open the window.
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Would you have others
Do unto you, sisters, brothers,
As you do unto them?
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Perfectionism
Plus imperfectionism
Makes humanism.
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Not knowing how to spell
His name didn’t diminish
William Shakspere’s fame.
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I wandered lonely
As a cloud that floats on high
Over No Entry signs.
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Half of England owned
By one percent is serfdom
In a change of clothes.
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Sod the effing bastards!
(Unpoetic language is fine
If kept to one line.)
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The fearless soldier
Goes down fighting. The writer,
Right to the full stop.
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Does, mirror, mirror,
On the wall, Mandela Effect
Affect you at all?
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Indefinite a
And most definitely the
Shouldn’t end like that.
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Please bring some apples
Up the pears, when coming down
The pears and apples.
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Being invisible
Shouldn’t mean you can’t be heard,
Just you can’t be
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As mighty oak trees grow
From little acorns, just so
Plant little poet trees.
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Always a better,
Always a worse, but never
A mediocrer.
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Be the best you are,
Not the worst you’re not, and let
The remainder rest.
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Pandemonium, pan,
Pandemic, saucepan, frying pan,
Panic, deadpan, pan.
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How to put the world
Out of order: pander to
People like Putin.
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Undisputedly,
A murderous psychopath,
Vladimir Putin.
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A prayer for Putin’s
May parade: May it rain, may
It rain, may it rain.
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Says Mr Putin,
Don’t be good. If I could be
More evil, I would.
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Which side gets butter?
Patriarch K thinks it’s better
Side by side Путин.
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I’m coming for you,
Владимир Путин. My name
Is Fate. Как дела?
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Seven, eight, nine, ten,
Eleven. Evil bastards
Don’t go to heaven.
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Tories are revolt
Ing. Boris Johnson’s revolt
Ing. Why aren’t we re
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Political poems
Can be too polemical.
Peace is poetical.
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Poems won’t stop a war.
Perhaps that’s not what they’re for.
Here’s a curse instead.
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So far, Century
21 has been somewhat
A disappointment.
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The Taliban ban
Women from doing what men can.
Ban the Taliban!
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Will the world survive
Is a fuss about nothing.
The worry is us.
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Leave the Moon alone!
Be content with fucking up
Planet Earth, our home.
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Things could be better
Elsewhere in the multiverse,
If not multiworse.
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A part of our world,
Our galaxy and universe.
Unique. You and me.
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Even the erudite
Can confuse what’s eruright
With what’s eruwrong.
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Whilst waiting in line,
Synchronised jigging of hips
Might help pass the time.
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Live in the mo… Woops!
Live… Woops! … or just keep living
In the past… Perfect!
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Précis: precisely
Saying what was said, but less
Not more. Precisely!
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This might have been like
What one would write, were one not
Sick of subjunctives.
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Is thought inferior
To not thinking? That’s something
One might think about.
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Money makes the world
Go round, whereupon the rich
Round it up, not down.
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If you’re somebody,
Seems you must marry someone
Who’s not nobody.
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Yeats keeps arising
And going, going but never gone
Along to Innisfree.
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La la la la la.
Why should the la la’s be last?
Let the la’s be first!
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Round about midnight
Is about the right time for
Midnight roundabouts.
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Woke up this morning,
Got them City blues. Two nil
Sutton United.
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A game of two halves:
Forty-five minutes followed
By the same again.
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Raynauld’s wouldn’t be
So-cold, if it weren’t he who
Discovered Raynauld’s.
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The extremely unctious
Shouldn’t be that much in need
Of extreme unction.
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Veritas vincit.
Vincit veritas. Looked at
Front or back, truth wins.
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Charity may be
The best of the three, but hope
Is the last to leave.
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Nudging native tongues
To linguacide’s a silent
Sort of genocide.
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The Land of the Free:
A euphemia where people
Get shot frequently.
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America, please
See common sense and amend
That mad amendment.
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RIP but, I
YWBSK,
RSVP, OK?
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Owning a joke shop
Is no laughing matter: it’s
The way they sell them.
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This has been written
By me, A.I. Sadly I can’t
Write my copyright.
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If there is a god,
Let her, him, it or them be
Holy pronoun-free.
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Little Bo Peep’s sheep!
Lost! … Leave them alone! Wagging,
Tails have happy endings.
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Hey diddle diddle,
Cat cow little dog fiddle.
Dish spoon skedaddle.
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Miss Muffet. Tuffet,
Curds, whey. Spider beside her!
Muffet sped away.
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Little Jack Horner,
Corner, Christmas pie, thumb, plum,
Self-praise. Rum-ti-tum.
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Humpty Dumpty. Wall.
Fall! King’s cavalry. First aid.
Alas! Too ovulate.
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Old lady swallowed
Fly spider bird cat dog goat
Cow horse. Dead? Of course.
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Grand Old Duke of York.
Ten thousand men. Up. Down. Up
Up. Down down… Dope.
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Down the woods today?
Surprise! There’s a picnic there
For teddy bears. Yay!
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Go n-éirí an bóthar
Leat, is go mbeadh do shaol lán
Le áthas agus craic.
May the road rise up
To meet you, and your life full
Of Hibernian fun.
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A lesser grievance
Of old age, good grief! is pips
Stuck between your teeth.
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When all’s said and done
And the battle’s lost and won,
Two add two’s still four.
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After poetry, there’s
Doggerel, caterwaul and –
Begad! – bugger all.
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Being in a hurry
We’ve no time to worry about
How timeless is time.
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Live life like a poem.
No matter how hard at times,
Try to make it rhyme.
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Life is a struggle
Of Now versus Then, in which
Then is the winner. Amen.
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Metaphorical
And literal heartache. Not
Even simile.
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Heart failure is bad
But not even half as bad
As failure of the soul.
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I’m dead, I think, though
According to R Descartes,
Erm, therefore I aren’t.
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Humorous alive,
Perhaps post-humorously
Funny on the other side.
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Going down fast. Tell me,
Tell me, please tell me the answer,
Coz this time’s the last.
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When you’re feeling up
Side down, try to ground your feet
Firmly on the ceiling.
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It’s good to talk, good
To be silent. Better still
To know what’s good when.
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What happened before
The beginning began, and
What, after the end ends?
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Spring summer autumn
Winter. Birth adolescence
Adulthood death. Spring
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Et in saecula
Saeculorum orum or
Um orum. Amen.
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Horror without end
Is even worse than an end
With horror. The End.
♥ ♣ ♦ ♠
