Tag: dVerse

Love Of Language – 22nd March 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 16 Comments

A name acrostic (start and end) shared with dVerse MTB

kalima – Arabic for word
gharāmī – Arabic for my passion/deep love
qalb – Arabic for heart
Al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyya – Arabic name for The Pen League

Kalima comes to life with learning
Haskell, patron to his gharāmī
Almustapha, The Prophet, his qalb
Literary love, spirit, The Forerunner
Immigrant Al-Rabitah al-Qalamiyya
Lebanon, still home – sweet Lebanon

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

The Sign Of True Education

Once the paper has been earned
To show all what was learned
Amounts to little if not understood
And reflected on for the greater good

The Poetics of Plumbing – 18th March 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 5 Comments

Within the quiet, I withhold the pain
My muse compels me forward to explain
The pushing of the pen, pulling at truth
I prostrated at each fountain of youth

My muse compels me forward to explain
Yet my words are wrestling within this art
A secret lodged between the lines and heart

The pushing of the pen, pulling at truth
To release my demons, open the cage
A relentless filling of every page

I prostrated at each fountain of youth
All in search of a tap of flowing ink
I write this sitting in the kitchen sink

A trimeric poem, inspired by Dora’s recent use of the form and another poem, belatedly written for Punam’s dVerse prompt, which asked us to use opening lines from books as closing lines to poems. This one is “I write this sitting in the kitchen sink,” from I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

Impossible Without Your Consent

When the circumstances seem to crush
Throw them out as poor assumptions
When the outside is painted with a frustrating brush
The inside must not consent to these disruptions

The Hills Outside Zoro – 16th March 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 13 Comments

I’m no fan of trigger warnings – this is real and happening in the world. We NEED to deal with it.

~~

without conjecture
without further classifications
they were HUMAN BEINGS

– two ‘girls’
– two ‘foreign’ girls
– possibly ‘runaways’, ‘problem’ children

one thing can be classified though
and that was the act
– ‘rough fetish’ sex –
(useful adverbs, not useless adjectives)
yet fetish implies consent

and how do we know?
because Mister E. said so
casually
describing how the bodies were buried
in the hills outside Zoro
after being strangled to death
during the act.

this is no longer ‘A Serbian Film’

“please arrange payment
to this Bitcoin address
3cr9tpvegeg4zg ppeddzmmc94hzusebhn”

Shared with dVerse OLN #403. Angry.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

That Sacred Part Of You

Blessed, we are, with reason
to navigate all circumstance
To improve ourselves is sacred
Responsibility doesn’t favour chance

Sydney Harbour Blues – 14th March 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 32 Comments

Shared with dVerse Poetics – landscape. This one took a turn and describes the mixed feelings I have about one of the most beautiful cities in the world, one that I very much enjoyed meeting and living in for twenty-plus years.

Let me tell you a story,
one that denies what is seen;
because my eyes were open
without understanding what had been.

The lemon eucalyptus was unknown
to those such as me;
star-eyed sailors
on a voyage of discovery.

By the time of my arrival
all the murdering was done,
so I celebrated the widest skies
while never holding a gun.

The abundant harbour waters
the bridges that were since built,
were symbols more than cricket
to hide away our guilt.

Where the forest meets the city,
right down to the water’s edge,
all the sorries were insincere –
the surf repeats its pounding pledge.

The floods and fires – lost control –
so nature’s revenge befits;
glass houses return to the rocks,
like an opera that never quits.

I can hold you in my mind’s eye
now that I’m so far away.
Learned that anywhere is everywhere
and everything is nothing anyway.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

Self-Deception Is Our Enemy

When we think we already know
We’ve halted our chance to grow
Meet ego with hostility and contempt
24 hours a day – no one is exempt

Few Feathers – 13th March 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 27 Comments

I’ll never say that I miss you,

the bird that left few feathers for my pillow,

an ache I will never confess,
but whoever runs their fingers along my bones 

will feel your name etched on each one 

with a cornerstone of soiled sentiments.

This poem is really a collaboration, with only a little input on my part. Lines 1, 4, 5 and 6 were written by EC at the erroneous choices blog, in a short piece titled ‘lies we live under’. It stood out to me as a brilliant, poetic little paragraph that I thought I could use the idea, along with the last two words, as an alliterative full stop. EC was gracious enough to allow me to use it in full and so here it is, with my two added lines, shared for the dVerse quadrille prompt – bird.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

One Day It Will All Make Sense

It seemed like a disaster
But became a lucky break
We are a terrible forecaster
But reason makes no mistake

My Only Friend – 8th March 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 23 Comments

Your trinkets, they light up my eyes,
gifts glowing through the smooth ice.

You open my world to all weather,
and guide me along every river.

Tethered to your familiar voice,
your songs, a loyal choir.

You carry my family‘s smiles,
and lift me when I am tired.

Amidst your million reminders,
you are my quiet conductor.

What would I hold without you?
In my hands, you are the truth.

Shared with dVerse MTB – couplets and half rhymes. The title is inspired by Aussie band God and their song ‘My Pal’ with the haunting line “You’re my only friend……and you don’t even like me.”

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

Don’t Unintentionally Hand Over Your Freedom

Would you give your body for someone else to use?
So why give your mind to any crook that comes along?
We don’t let people cause us physical abuse
Train and protect our minds to be mentally strong

No Encores – 1st March 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 2 Comments

Not a new metaphor by any means but this is my take on the theatre of life. Another poem, belatedly, written for Punam’s dVerse prompt of using opening lines to books as closing lines to poems. This one is “Here is a small fact: You are going to die” from The Book Thief by Markus Zusak.

Act 1, Scene 1:

Scriptless and shoved onstage mid-scene,
hot lights glaring;
applause and judgment circling
for lines never rehearsed.

And yes,
every actor exits,
no matter how fierce their monologue.
A trapdoor beneath every spotlight.

The curtain falls without exception.

Act 1, Scene 2:

Between the acts of this cabaret
there is that strange, unchoreographed stretch;
where the stage lights hum
and the lines grow thin in our hands.

And those unscripted pauses,
those missed cues and improvised lines…?
They are only the bright, temporary glare,
the hush before applause or silence,

Act 2, Scene 1:

and the quiet truth
that for a moment,
against your choosing…

you were here
in the light.

Act 2, Scene 2:

You owe the audience nothing.
You are simply here, for a brief while,
and your time is yours to fill
or to simply endure, as you must.

No obligation,
only the raw,
temporary fact of existence itself.

Act 2, Scene 3:

Birth – a brutal act that makes me wonder, ‘why?’

Finale:

Here is a small fact:
you are going to die.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

Where Philosophy Begins

Exercise reason, question your beliefs
Consider everything taken for granted
Take the first steps towards inner peace
With the seeds, just yesterday, planted

The Song Sparrow – 26th February 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 20 Comments

Shared with dVerse Poetics Tuesday – use a classic opening line as an ending line. I chose Charles Bukowski’s Ham On Rye, ‘The first thing I remember is being under something.’ I’m not familiar with the story but I ended up with the idea of Hank waking from his dreams and memories of the night before.

I was terrified, my sweaty hands shaking
a brittle-boned cold heat fever
a pillow headache, suffocating
on a bilious, swollen tongue

thick with last night

smoky lungs, coughing iron filing lumps
of congealed blood
bitter, soggy pills in a pail.


She had shimmered in the weak light
through the foggy frame
whispered strawberries through rotten teeth
my ears are catching golden secrets
often repeated on other nights
in other city lights


As the working men clocked out
boots echoing toward small kitchens
a small brown bird tapped rhythmically
at the window
to bring my relief to an end
and the first thing I remember
is being under something.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

To Each His Own

When you give a piece of your mind, it’s refused
Just as you would do when verbally abused
No one feels better, nothing is achieved
No point to giving, if nothing is received

μακάριος – 25th February 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 14 Comments

Shared with dVerse Quadrille #242 – hunger
μακάριος (makarios) is the Greek word for blessed.

I would fill my hollow leg
with all the libraries’ best
To wave the wolves away
at my open doors

My fire burns through these leaves
in cultivation of curiosity

Grafting facts, pruning the fat (…)

Blessed are they which do hunger
until elegant sufficiency.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

The Smoke And Dust Of Myth

Castles of sand are soon erased
The peasant buried next to the king
To our emotions we become enslaved
When in reality – it’s all just nothing

Held Tight – 21st February 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 22 Comments

Shared with dVerse MTB – No Answers

What does the silence want

with the chattering,

when it can’t be turned off?

Silent whispers squeezed in sweaty palms.


Have you ever held a question?


Where does the night go

after waiting so long

for its anticipated arrival?

No respite from the dirtied village dogs.


Has the oak memorised the lightning

bearing the scars, weeping?

The wounds wail as the wind

runs its fingers down its bark.


What name is murmured

on the tip of a sooty tongue?


If my heart were a house,

who keeps opening doors

that were never closed?