Freedom

 

Freedom is

Like oxygen,

Like breathing,

 

You only notice

 

Once it's gone,

Once someone

Forces it to end.

 

 

© 2026 Edward P. Morgan III

This Life

 

I've spoken truth

As well as

Spun my lies.

 

Angry or artful,

Neither leaves

A deeper impression.

 

I know how to shape

My tongue to relate

This infernal tale,

 

I just don't know 

If this life holds up

To its scrutiny.

 

 

© 2026 Edward P. Morgan III

Death Note 2

 

I never belonged

In your world,

So I seek

Another.

 

I've seen what

I needed to see,

Said what

I needed to say,

 

Except...                                     (I'm sorry)

 

It's my turn

To be selfish,

To leave without

Saying goodbye.

 

Let my fellow

Wanderers

Comfort you,

Too late.

 

 

© 2025 Edward P. Morgan III

Silence

 

Every silence

Has a quality.

 

Anxious,

Cautious,

Conspiratorial,

Contentment.

 

Ominous,

Anticipatory,

Smoldering,

Stillness.

 

If every silence

Asks a question,

Then each also

Provides an answer,

 

Casting the long

Shadow of elusive

Truth, or lies,

You must embrace.

 

 

© 2025 Edward P. Morgan III

Amber

 

A friendship frozen in memory,

Drowned by resinous trauma,

Fossilized to golden crystal,

Agelessly preserved,

A yellowed relic of the past.

 

If only I could strip away

The ossified layers,

The friend within might

Re-emerge, hale and whole,

Ready to renew our time together.

 

 

© 2025 Edward P. Morgan III

Dreaming and Dying

 

When I was young, I focused

More on my companions

Than on my calling.

 

Older now, I fixate

More on that calling

Than those companions.

 

At each point, I thought

The one more important

Than the other.

 

At each point,

I was wrong.

 

Now, my life runs backwards,

Reassembled in the wrong order

For the wrong reasons.

 

Like a mirror, once broken

The past can be rearranged

But never fully restored.

 

Deep cracks remain,

Shattering the image

Of who I thought I was,

 

Of who I thought

I would be.

 

Afraid to wake,

Afraid to sleep,

I will never rest comfortably

In that frame again.

 

 

© 2025 Edward P. Morgan III

Signs and Spirit Animals

 

I was born beneath the stars

Of Pisces. When I was young,

I swam like a fish underwater.

But before I crawled ashore,

I lost my twin in the stormy sea 

Of our mother’s womb,

Which may be why I

Can no longer drink like one.

 

My family gave us each a spirit animal,

Mostly for convenience at Christmas.

My grandmother’s was an elephant,

My mother’s a whale,

My cousin’s an owl.

If we didn’t choose,

One would be assigned.

I eventually received a wolf.

 

Years later, I was admonished

By a prospective girlfriend

To drop the lone wolf attitude.

That made me smile. Or maybe

It’s just my nature to bare my teeth.

Besides, if I had two wolves within me,

They wouldn’t fight;

They’d form a pack.

 

Earlier, my family had tried to give me a dragon,

But my dragons are fierce, not cute like theirs.

Later I returned to that mythological beast

As my screen name on a Taoist forum.

As Chinese luck would have it, the year

Of my birth is their Green Wood Dragon.

Which resonated like a personal koan:

Who would craft a dragon from green wood?

 

But were I to stain my skin with signs or spirit animals,

On one shoulder would perch a griffin rampant,

The heraldic symbol of my line and my brand,

On the other, a simple house cat

Gazing skyward in shadowed profile,

Felicia, Nyala, Smoke or Samarra,

Any of Bast’s Chosen I’ve been honored

To serve in the temple where I rent space.

 

I’ve always longed to be marked by something special,

Some tribe, some clan, some band of brotherhood.

Instead, I am destined to die alone and unadorned,

An imperfectly heard chord in this life’s ballad.

 

 

© 2025 Edward P. Morgan III