Thusly, Ever Thusly

By Ian Bowden

trudge and tramp and trek and toil
grit and dirt through the mountain pass
beneath our boots, we move the earth
sloth and pain, our sins repaid
chains, raw skin, caked blood, red soot
bobbing torchlight points the way
stars eddy apart, the peaks too tall
cutting through sky, a branch in the river
valleys as caves and slopes as cliffs
enslaved by the roof of the world
tasked to turn her till eternity

not a limerick

By Ian Bowden

all teachers will know
dr seuss and ed poe
are among poets who don't write good poetry
but i'm of the mind
if you can make each word rhyme
you know more than the teachers who claim knowetry

of the limerick it is claimed
the rhyme scheme is too plain
the sonorous charm wears too thin in recitation
i will wholeheartedly agree
such poetry just should not be
and in its place i write this aural masturbation

As Engraved into the obsidian stone of Brünhaerdt's Tomb:

A world without gods
led by words without souls
Lives in the minds
Of all us fools

Old Nod Note

By Ian Bowden

Old Nod Note's next election vote was coming in the month of may
Nod's last hope was a six foot rope for each ballot gone astray
Old Nod's knights thought him none too bright and their votes wouldn't swing his way
Nod knows now no knights never knew Nod knew no knights never nay

The Wording Hour

By Ian Bowden

In the Wording Hour, so long and cold
The Wordsmith makes his rounds
He carries light his tomes of old
And brandishes his sounds

He forms and reforms in refrain
At forge that glows so bright
No ill his sentences contain
They float through air at night

Indescribable, the Wordsmith's work
For those not of his ilk
Ability in his hands doth lurk
To turn words into silk

No word known is beyond his grasp
No form beyond his power
A wordsmithing hammer in his clasp
He writes The Wording Hour