Learning to choose is hard
Theological Alibi – 7th July 2026
Let me show you what they assembled.
Lavender is an AI engine
that flags tens of thousands of Palestinian men for death.
The Gospel spits out more than 100 bombing targets a day—
names that once took military intelligence a full year to gather.
Where’s Daddy, the sick name of a tracker
that follows a man home,
then kills him there,
where his children are.
Twenty seconds.
Enough time for an officer to glance a target,
just long enough to see the shadow of a male.
This is not the fog of combat.
This is a factory.
Those who run it believe the land
was promised to them by God.
That is the sum that should stalk your sleep—
the slickest killing apparatus ever turned on a people,
operated by a state with a theological alibi.
The same trap is deployed against anyone who speaks up.
They tell the queer organiser:
those people would never stand with you.
They tell the feminist:
those people would never march for you.
The chorus does not shift.
Your compassion is wasted
because the dying do not echo your words.
A child should not need the correct ideology to deserve to live.
That is not a radical statement.
It used to be the floor.
The thing everyone agreed on
before we began means-testing
who deserves to live.
A child in Gaza did not script Europe’s antisemitism.
A family in Rafah did not run the death camps.
Yet they are paying the bill all the same—
in levelled streets,
in families,
in children.
Every major military on earth is studying what Israel has done in Gaza.
They are taking notes.
The manual being drafted in plain view
proves that you can kill at scale,
from a distance,
with a 20-second glance and
a holy text as a warrant,
and the world will watch and qualify and explain.
This poem is a paraphrase of an article that I failed to note the URL for but you can find information on Lavender, The Gospel and Where’s Daddy? here. It is sickening. Israel is a sick society, and for both Jews and Palestinians to remain safe, it needs to be destroyed.
Today’s Daily Stoic poem:
Our Duty To Learn
Even after suffering so
Learning lights the way to go
The names and dates can be forgot
The moral lies within the plot
The Price Of Admission – 6th July 2026
the burning is needed
stepping against gravity
in ascension
that friction is the rub
pushing the pin in deeper
to gain information
the pain is the point
Today’s Daily Stoic poem:
Rise And Shine
This is the work I was made for
There’s no reason to be annoyed
Comfort always settles the score
So willpower must be employed
Fading Name – 5th July 2026
I had another reminder that time is running out
Will there one day be a legend?
Is it for that I strive?
Nothing left here
No thing
Left
It seems that the further I go, the further back I get*
I’ve got shovels for deeper digs
But I won’t let you cry
Please shed no tears
For me
Now
A made-up form, lines of syllables; 14, 8, 6, 4, 2, 1
* appropriated from Mudhoney
Today’s Daily Stoic poem:
No One Said It’d Be Easy
Nothing can deter the good from honour
Nothing will lure them into what is base
If doing good was easy, everyone would do it
Pleasure and power always need more space
Now I Carry Matches – 4th July 2026
wearing kindness
as a shield
for the fear of being forgotten
performing happiness
to keep the peace
for an uninterested audience
~ one hand clapping ~
setting things on fire
keeping warm
an unappreciated sacrifice
demanding more
to stoke the embers
until the field is full of ashes
low maintenance
(badge of honour)
boundaries not asserted
a tool on the shelf
cherished for function
once broken, to be forgotten
no longer building a house
just settling accounts
....
raising the price
putting value in place
a privilege reset
silence as an answer
is not absence
a space to be filled with love
bridges to the past
of approval over need
of popularity over peace
of convenience over comfort
need the river set on fire.
This poem is inspired by Bella Smith’s If You Think I’ve Changed, You’re Right and the title is taken directly from there.
Today’s Daily Stoic poem:
Protect The Flame
Protect your own good in all that you do
For everything else take what is given
It’s a small flame burning inside of you
And it needs to right fuel to keep living
The Cipher – 3rd July 2026
Today, I will grow more grass,
though I still don’t understand it,
but that’s a thrill for me to say
I don’t know.
Let’s play a game of guessing
and say the outrageous ideas aloud.
Maybe today, we’ll crack the code
together.
Inspired by Walt Whitman’s Song of Myself, 6 [A child said, What is the grass?] and this analysis of poetry in general by Isaac Kolding, from which I learned that grass was another name for poetry. I seem to be riffing on the idea of ‘I don’t know’ often these days.
Today’s Daily Stoic poem:
Turn Have To Into Get To
Align your will with whatever happens
So nothing happens against your will
All those things you get to do
The mundane ‘have to’ ‘gets to’ be a thrill
Hollow Objectives – 2nd July 2026
With infinite entertainments
And food delivered to the door
In climate-controlled environments
We couldn’t wish for anything more
But all with meaning begins to fade
We writhe with agony under the weight
Of an existential crisis made
As we focus on our internal state
Today’s Daily Stoic poem:
On Duty and Circumstance
Amongst opportunities and obligations
So many questions will arise
Duty is found on solid foundations
So circumstance is never a surprise
The Hunt Is Over – 1st July 2026
The hunt was for survival
The food was merely fuel
Now captive dancing monkeys
Has weakened the gene pool
Eating as performance
Is this a paradise on earth?
Slovenly and fattened up
For all of nature’s worth
Welcome to Universe 25
Coming to a city near you
Down into the behavioural sink
As all animals are wont to do
Inspired by another David Elikwu newsletter, this time about overabundance, how captive tigers are overfed by tourists and no longer hunt and the Universe 25 experiment, where rats in paradise ended up killing each other.
Today’s Daily Stoic poem:
Do Your Job
Whatever anyone does or says
I must show my true colours
Every action, part of a system
Shared by the many others
Narrow Path – 30th June 2026
Spotlights follow all movement
careful of each step made
Riding high on applause
disconsolate at any boos
Hearted or disapproved
it's here the game is played
One wrong step strikes out
it's the narrow path to choose
A thought inspired by the Tao De Ching
Today’s Daily Stoic poem:
The Obstacle is the Way
Someone may impede our actions
But they can’t impede intentions
Obstacles become satisfactions
To practice a form of excellence
Screen Shrine – 29th June 2026
Inspired by this article at Blackbird Spyplane, which centres around this quote* (paraphrased) from Karl Ove Knausgaard’s My Struggle.
When you realise the world is always the same
It’s just your view that changes
To make life interesting, you make it into a game
To win or lose
It’s all the same
*This life gives you nothing
You’re just passing time*
Accepting nothing in surrender
More alone than ever, in mental decline
Trapped in the goon cave shrine
Ironically, even in writing this, I didn’t take the time to read the whole article yet!
Today’s Daily Stoic poem:
1994ever 