Words

Words

rise from my heart 

drift from my head 

I catch them in my hands 

and spread them out 

across the waiting page 

Sometimes 

they fall like spring rain 

warm and gentle 

a welcomed drink 

to soil hardened 

by winter 

and in the softened earth 

I glimpse the promise of seed 

Other times 

they come in a torrent 

tearing through me 

washing away the remnants 

of old seasons 

leaving me soaked 

and shivering 

stones uncovered 

weight I cannot carry alone 

There are days 

they fall like autumn leaves 

littering the landscape 

gathered in piles 

or scattered by wind 

the remnants 

of ideology and opinion 

some brittle, some fertile 

waiting to be sifted 

And then 

they drift like snowflakes 

wandering here and there 

until they cover everything 

creating both beauty 

and hazard 

a blanket hiding 

all that lies beneath 

And when the storm subsides  

I find the ground littered with fragments  

Some seeds, some stones  

bound in the hush of the fall 

Each waiting to be carried forward  

by hands not my own 

into seasons I will not see 

Words 

© Ron Simpson Jr. 

December 3, 2025 

Seen

Anonymity cuts deeply 

See me 

Hear me 

Feel me 

I walk through the fire 

The flames licking up my existence 

The residue of ash blowing in the wind 

No one knows my pain 

I walk through the struggle 

Muscles betraying me 

Bones speaking in fractures 

No one hears my cries 

I walk through the darkness 

My mind rebels against me 

My spirit is nailed to the ground 

No one sees me 

I reach out for light 

Life gives me shadows 

I reach out for warmth 

Even my flames are cold 

I listen for a word 

To lift me up 

To steady my walk 

The echoes scream their silence 

Still, I rise 

Unseen 

Unheard 

Untouched 

I am a shadow 

Carrying fire in my chest 

Ashes cling to me like memories 

Silence becomes my song 

I am the echo 

That refuses to die 

I am the flame 

That burns without witness 

I am the cry 

That splits the darkness 

I am seen 

© Ron Simpson Jr. 

December 1, 2025 

A Pearl

Protection

Born of a wound 

not a bruise 

but the kind that cuts 

and keeps cutting 

long after the skin closes 

A hard shine 

grown in the dark 

Impermanence 

A victory forged 

around the weakest place in me 

layer after layer 

laid over the nerve 

that would not stop screaming 

Guarded 

We guard what we make 

with the same shaking hands 

that failed to stop the hurt 

The songs 

The poems 

The griefs 

They gleam 

because they cost blood 

A treasure and a wound 

Revelation 

To reveal them 

is to open the seam again 

let the air search 

for what still remembers pain 

It asks timing 

It asks courage 

It asks a witness 

who will not turn away 

Beauty 

We learn, slowly 

Beauty isn't always gentle 

It forms from fractures 

from pressure 

from what almost unmade us 

But not every wound 

belongs in the light 

Some pearls 

stay buried 

dense with truth 

bending the story 

we never speak aloud 

their weight 

steadily carving us 

into who we become 

There are pearls 

that do not need to be seen 

for them to matter 

© Ron Simpson Jr. 

November 16, 2025

To Reflect:

 

When the dark threatens 

When you can feel it 

Like a chill in your bones 

When the clouds gather 

And obscure the light 

Faith says it is still there 

Hope rides the light 

Piercing the darkness 

It needs only the faintest flicker 

To reflect: 

A memory 

A whisper 

A breath 

That says, ‘Not yet’ 

Refusing to surrender 

Remembering the light 

To reflect:

In another’s eyes 

In a song remembered 

In the warmth of a hand 

Held too long 

The shape of what was loved 

The echo of a name 

The warmth that lingers 

Across the ash of what was burned 

To reflect:

A voice calling back 

The name you thought forgotten 

A step toward the edge 

The shimmer that survived the fall 

The part untouched by the feast 

The ember the dark could not consume 

A defiance in the decay 

A rhythm beneath the entropy 

To reflect: 

A tear unclaimed by sorrow 

A sigh that outlasts thunder 

A light the abyss cannot swallow 

To reflect:

Off the surface of the water 

Through the crack in a stone 

From the echo of a breath 

Buried in silence 

The darkness 

Will not win 

It cannot 

Reflect 

© Ron Simpson Jr. 

October 23, 2025