The Gymnast by Steven Alton
Photography
The Kingdom by Mariam Fuzail
Poetry
truth almost doesn't matter past the walls of our belief
whether a son of adam or a like daughter of eve
whose plenty calls of sorrowed joy are done so silently
and whose every cry of pleasured truth is made so solemnly
it almost doesn't matter past what truth the eye does see
when filtered through our rigid notions of what the truth should be
to know beyond my reasoning what often baffles me
to eye the face of a blinding sun
in all of her prestige
to question the convictions in which one finds their relief
to look with bare simplicity at what one can perceive
while all the world is adamant to turn so violently
on anyone who calls for truth and does so stridently
it almost doesn't matter if we cut the cherry trees
as long as there is lumber and its ripened fruit to eat
for as long as there are forests and as long as there are seas
one can live behind the walls
forever at an ease
for one who sees the heavens all the world won't ever please
every happiness seems all for naught in fading memory
to suffer through a cruelty yet choose to let it be
then whisper admonitions that get carried in the breeze
to live within these kingdom walls where one can never leave
yet never feeling as a slave, although one is not free
to settle for the open plains of one's allotted dreams
relinquishing becoming in this world
to simply be
whether a son of adam or a like daughter of eve
whose plenty calls of sorrowed joy are done so silently
and whose every cry of pleasured truth is made so solemnly
it almost doesn't matter past what truth the eye does see
when filtered through our rigid notions of what the truth should be
to know beyond my reasoning what often baffles me
to eye the face of a blinding sun
in all of her prestige
to question the convictions in which one finds their relief
to look with bare simplicity at what one can perceive
while all the world is adamant to turn so violently
on anyone who calls for truth and does so stridently
it almost doesn't matter if we cut the cherry trees
as long as there is lumber and its ripened fruit to eat
for as long as there are forests and as long as there are seas
one can live behind the walls
forever at an ease
for one who sees the heavens all the world won't ever please
every happiness seems all for naught in fading memory
to suffer through a cruelty yet choose to let it be
then whisper admonitions that get carried in the breeze
to live within these kingdom walls where one can never leave
yet never feeling as a slave, although one is not free
to settle for the open plains of one's allotted dreams
relinquishing becoming in this world
to simply be