POEM: Tao Remains

Posted on May 27, 2026 by Top Pun

I’ve been reading the Tao Te Ching again lately. I find this writing perhaps the most succinct way to access our source of being…

Tao Remains

The Tao
Before I was borne
Well, as I live and breathe
And when I am only remains
Tao remains

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POEM: Top Down, Bottom Up

Posted on May 26, 2026 by Top Pun

If we have a revolution in America, I suspect that it will be due to massive income inequality…

Top Down, Bottom Up

If you don’t get it
As a madder of fact
That’s exactly the point
Of that rich love
Of a convertible democracy
Top down
And an economy drunk on greed
Bottoms up
Mean wile
The wrest of US
May just find
Ourselves losing it
Awe
That wee ever had
An economy re-nude
What we may
Be left with
Is flash mobs
To arouse a revolution
In the face of
Tops down
And bottoms up

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POEM: Be Getting

Posted on May 25, 2026 by Top Pun

Violence begets violence. May we go to that well, being, and learn to live in peace…

Be Getting

Trying
As won may
Drying
As won may
Where there is no well
Being
What might
Won expect
Be
Getting
Be
Getting
Violence
When awe is a bout
Getting

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POEM: Hi Def

Posted on May 24, 2026 by Top Pun

Multi-tasking dulls our focus. Do one thing at a time, or less…

Hi Def

What might
Be the best
Rendering of Zen
Do one thing
And of the Tao
Do no-thing
A sharp contrast to the dull
Due won thing

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POEM: Star Power

Posted on May 22, 2026 by Top Pun

In this age of foolishness, I just, pay attention to the firmaments of the universe. Won cannot cheat reality, let a loan realty. Today’s poem honors the next us of timely and timeless…

Star Power

I found myself
In heavy years
Yet before long and longing
I was a star
Uncounted light years
A way
And the darker the night
The brighter I peer

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POEM: Stupid Verses Wisdom

Posted on May 11, 2026 by Top Pun

If we are to be saved, it will be by our hearts not simply ramping up intellect. Wisdom is more foundational than intellect for human flourishing…

Stupid Verses Wisdom

Is the whirled messing with you
Crying out
Clean up on I’ll won
Wile we bank on
Stupid
Figuring intellect will
Triumph over
Foolishness
As if whizzed ‘em
Is sum kind
Of algorithm
Reckoning cruelty trumps kindness
If kneaded
Enough!
Humanity is not numb-er crunching
Amor sow
As patience and courage
Yielding
Victory
The ultimate weigh insight
The udder most actions
Beyond halving words
Certainly knot
Dumb
And dumber
As awe surpassing
Mirror hoarse cents

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POEM: Beyond Laudable

Posted on May 10, 2026 by Top Pun

You can’t take it with you, but you can live and die with barns full in a hungry world…

Beyond Laudable

They lived along
Rich life
Making their claim
Money is not that important to me
Soully to die
To wealth
Pried
From their cold, dead hands
Calling a laudable
From beyond

They also will answer, “Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?” –Matthew 25:44

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POEM: To Tithe or Knot Too Tithe

Posted on May 10, 2026 by Top Pun

A poem for my churchy brethren…

To Tithe or Knot Too Tithe

“What is a tithe? A good start. An offering of our best.”

The church debates
For what is taxed as years
A tithe as net
Simp-ly gross
Or an elegant 10% solution
In what is a parent deal
God gets a dime
For every dollar
Abut given
God’s collection deportment
Amor like two cents
Billed
As tradition
Would halve it
Never the less
Fore the truly ambitious
A pro portion of what
You would like to make
In God’s image
The best of you
Or in sum grave
In image
The bust of you

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POEM: For Letter Words

Posted on May 9, 2026 by Top Pun

Here is a funny little poem for today…

For Letter Words

LOVE is a four-letter word
Accept for a spell be
And of coarse
Barring those
Who are staggeringly bad spillers

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POEM: Opening Up

Posted on May 8, 2026 by Top Pun

This poem is a reflection on the comfort I take in that light dispels darkness more naturally than dark dispelling light…

Opening Up

He was afraid
Too open
The box
Having herd
Of Pandora and such
He was heartened
Too here
That which tends
Too happen
Opening up
Boxes unknown
And weighing such situations
Is that light is favored
In emanating, dispelling dark
And not so much the other way
A graceful inclination
In the gravity of things

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POEM: A Wiled Woman

Posted on May 7, 2026 by Top Pun

Here is the ekphrastic poem (based on another work of art) that I submitted as this year’s entry to the Toledo Museum of Art’s poetry contest. I won by not winning, maintaining my amateur status. This poem is in honor of awe of the wild women out there…

Tapestry with Wild Woman Riding a Unicorn

Tapestry with Wild Woman Riding a Unicorn by Gilles Le Castre, Flemish, about 1500–25.

A Wiled Woman

She lives
In what
Might be called
Common daze
When she counters a seemingly fierce lyin’
Dwelling in the forced
Scaring smaller creatures
When she vouches fore awe of the earth
The soul point of being
A beautiful unicorn
Is having no need of a “permit”
As there is only won
I ride on
Uncorrected

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POEM: Cheeto Wrapper

Posted on May 6, 2026 by Top Pun

Yo yo, the Bully-in-chief is still vying for a Nobel Peace Prize…

Cheeto Wrapper

Cheeto President TrumpYo yo
We’re on the brink
Of total permanent peace
Or absolute annihilation
Yo yo
We interrupt this dark spectacle
The live theater of war
With that cliché rustle
Of the Cheeto wrapper
Yo yo
Pain know tension
Too The Man™
Up to his elbow in an empty bag
And stained hands
Mumbling sum thing a bout
It is just
Annoys

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POEM: Rooting for Light

Posted on May 5, 2026 by Top Pun

The darkest nights produce the brightest stars…

Rooting for Light

Firmly planted
In the hole, why’d whirled
He found himself
Going to dark places
Awe ^ the more ^ sow
As baring the lighten dark

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POEM: Stair Well, If You Can

Posted on May 4, 2026 by Top Pun

This poem is a reflection on the race to the bottom that we often rationalize ourselves into when faced with insecurities…

Stair Well, If You Can

They were faced
With two sets of stairs
Up
And down
Dark
Unknown
Given choice
Gravity
Winning
They descended
From along lyin’
Of heirs

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POEM: Hard to Reed

Posted on May 3, 2026 by Top Pun

When the strongest winds hit, it’s even better to be a reed than a mighty oak…

Hard to Reed

He is a kin
So so might
He oaks around
Little nuts
Who just
Helled there ground
Still
He dances
In the light breeze
And compassed within
The darkest hurry can
Bows prayerfully
In the I of the centeredness
A mist
Fallen trees
And rising tides
Not withstanding
Mysteriously moving
Hard to reed
Even a storm rider
Syncing up
With awe around

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POEM: My, My, My

Posted on April 26, 2026 by Top Pun

I prefer life with awesome saws…

My, My, My

My feet are on the ground
My head is in the heavens
My heart spills beyond horizons
Wear life is bigger still
Accept may be
The see
And awe
That due

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POEM: As Airs to the Thrown

Posted on April 25, 2026 by Top Pun

I suspect that it is no coincidence that America loves zombie apocalypse movies. How many will be surprised that “normal” brings societal collapse? This poem speaks to this zeitgeist of our age, our moral childishness.

I think of this as mostly driven, or at least exemplified, by our tolerance of ecological collapse; however, globalized capitalism profiting off our own destruction may be the core depravity. Either way, our disregard for natural limits in nature or human decency will lead us to grievous ends. Pay now with courage and regard for ancient wisdom, or pay later…

As Airs to the Thrown

The whirled is getting
Smaller and smaller
Until we run out
In plan it B
Knot to mention see
Let a loan be
Intransigent
Upend till
Our lust chants
Awe hail lucid nation
Until hour last will and test meant
A decided con jury
Yet so so many
Will be found dumbfounded
As airs to the thrown
Soully sullied
Dead walking still

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POEM: Nobodies, Boy

Posted on April 23, 2026 by Top Pun

I am a big fan of nobodies, as in “Nobodies gonna do that!”

Nobodies, Boy

I am a boy
Yet I am nobody’s boy
Boy, I am a nobody
A nobody among nobodies
Weave got it awe
Together
Us nobodies

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POEM: Awe is Won

Posted on April 20, 2026 by Top Pun

Violence is a low bar where people go to pound down, that unquenchable thirst…

Awe is Won

When life is divided
There are too fundamental questions
Violence is the answer
Two neither

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POEM: Living in My Mined

Posted on April 19, 2026 by Top Pun

This poem is about sorting out what is mine and not mine…

Living in My Mined

I searched the whirled
It was what
It was all a bout
And soully after
A sweeping
Inspection
And awe-embracing travails
Did I
Whys up
What was mine
To mine

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