Tag: dVerse

The Promenade – 21st May 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 12 Comments

The church’s pale pink spire points to the promenade-
an outstretched hand as a tether,
anchoring her flight to the earth’s quiet gravity,
binding the sky to the soil.

Half-forgotten prayers billow crushed amethyst,
flowing against the wind’s invisible current.
His smile outshines the sun’s shy rays.

Slumbering mosaic fields and houses stacked
like dominoes, waiting for the earth to topple toward
a dark anchor in a world of gentle hues.

A blue-leaved tree-dream sentinel,
drinking the sky,
red cloth weeping its flowers into the grass,
a ghost of faith,
rising from the green hills like a…

…like a spilt bouquet of memories, full of a soft joy.

Shared with dVerse – Chagall picture prompt

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

What Kind Of Boxer Are You?

What advantage from abandoning your pursuit
Of wisdom when this is why you trained?
Skin calloused by suffering bears the fruit
Of all the knowledge you’ve obtained

Ship To Shore – 20th May 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 26 Comments
circle of truth
Blockade on blockade-
   time to sell those stocks.
Unplug the power grid,
   set for financial shocks.

Peace is a boondoggle
   for the dogs of war.
The circle always completes
   from ship to shore.

Business means bucks,
   made at any cost
   until...
   all ledgered lost.

Shared with dVerse Quadrille #248 – dog and inspired after looking up the meaning of boondoggle and having seen the attached image this morning.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

Quality Over Quantity

At the end there are no prizes
For having read every word ever printed
One good book, full of surprises
Reveals more than all that’s imprinted

The Archive – 14th May 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 19 Comments

Shared with dVerse Poetics – what does art say?

Piling up all the ideas,
they amounted to waste;

(shards of dreams)
chaotic,

overwhelming.

Sharp,
j-a-g-g-e-d thoughts,

piled in spires,

leaving only a little sliver of sky
– an unfocused sea of debris.

An ANXIOUS entropy,
SUFFOCATING senses

–

When the records are reviewed
these monuments refuse art.

All the good things erased,
all the bad things entombed –

given to the archive of Anthropocene obsolescence.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

Our Well Being Lies In Our Actions

How quickly time erases such glories
Attached to the regard of others
Let your actions be your own stories
The right action is what one discovers

What Colour Was That? – 7th May 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 26 Comments

Shared with dVerse Poetics – rose. An ‘Afternoon Delight’ is a type of rose, apparently.

An afternoon delight used to be
a beer in a summer garden.
Music played through a window
with the sun hanging lazy into night.

Those tinted glasses of nostalgia
– what colour was that again?
Knowing that it may not be repeated
why continue to wish for it to be so?

As beer became a thing of the past
– a regret of wasted time,
an afternoon delight is a nap
now that the sun sets so quickly.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

How To Have A Good Day

I’ll give you a guarantee
If you want to have a good day
Do good things for free
And you’ll always feel this way

Flowerage – 6th May 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 28 Comments

Covered in its perfume
Splits along the blush
Tender age in bloom*
Blues buried the crush
Seeds outgrew the rind
Bitter harvests follow pursuit
Tasted its sweetness blind
Bruises on the fruit*
Core outlasts the bite
An acerbic birthday suit
Succumbed to the blight

Written for dVerse Quadrille – bloom. Based on two lines from Nirvana’s In Bloom*. ‘Flowerage’ in honour of the Descendents.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

Righteousness Is Beautiful

There are many tricks to showcase beauty
But it’s a deception in which to trust
Choose and even keel, a commitment to duty
Even-tempered, self-controlled, and just

The Message Mosaic – 5th May 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 7 Comments

chaos we’ve embraced
ignoring all predictions
they saw it coming!

prepared, they had already dug their holes
it turns out we’re the bad guys
but that we’ve always known

propaganda will not win this war, and our winter is coming soon

no one notices
the autumnal leaves falling
with small silent bombs

hostages
held
in helicopters 

a message must be
sent, so they
shoot the white girl first

Written for the Chimeric Poetry Scavenger Hunt – a Mosaic Haiku:
the 1st stanza is a Zappai or Senryu, 5-7-5
the 2nd is a Kimo, 10-7-6
the 3rd an American Sentence, 17
the 4th a traditional Haiku having a seasonal word, 5-7-5
the 5th is a Pi-ku 3-1-4
the 6th is a Lune 5-3-5
and, once again, utilising Punam’s dVerse prompt, which asked us to use opening lines from books as closing lines to poems. This one is “They shoot the white girl first,” from Paradise by Toni Morrison.

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

You Are The Project

The raw material is your guiding reason
Your mind, the asset – you, the project
The professional has no laurels on which to rest
They know that practice makes perfect

Celsius 233 – 4th May 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 26 Comments

We, the living knowledge, remember it –
difficult ideas, things of beauty – struggle was
the gift given up voluntarily, like a
candy comforter, where rotten teeth bring pleasure.
We build new campfires with old tales to listen to
and think on the past – it was a pleasure to burn.

Written for dVerse – golden shovel and, once again, utilising Punam’s dVerse prompt, which asked us to use opening lines from books as closing lines to poems. This one is “It was a pleasure to burn,” from Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. Could this then be considered a golden triangle?

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

What’s Truly Impressive

The gossip and notoriety of the rich and famous
Certainly reveals some sort of impression
Perhaps it impresses the ignoramus
Overpowered by their own obsession

All Creations – 3rd May 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 27 Comments

the turtle does not
tell of things he does not know
– only what he’s lived –

the wolf remains strong
lower than all that sustains
– the pack remains strong –

the eagle carries
the heart of all the worlds
– sharing his teachings –

the bear looks on life
with the strength to face her fears
– protecting her young –

the beaver’s vision
a natural gift within
– the way it is done –

the raven, correct
understanding how to walk
– together, in life –

here, the buffalo
maintains the balance and needs
of all creations

Shared with dVerse Poetics – The Seven Grandfather Teachings
I might come back to this prompt as I’m not that happy with this write.
Indigenous Art by Michelle Stoney (except the raven, adapted by Ernie)

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

Show, Not Tell, What You Know

You ate the words but failed to digest
Is your philosophy just a fancy quote?
Actions are the better way to invest
Your time towards what you would promote

Can You Dig It? – 2nd May 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 25 Comments

Indigenous seeds refuse the plough
The dignity of labour takes a while
He digs a well from there to now
She digests history with a patient smile

A digitised map of looted art
She digs a moat of metaphor and stone
From indigent weeds, kingdoms start
Indignant empires overthrown

Written for dVerse Quadrille #246 – dig

Today’s Daily Stoic poem:

Be The Person You Want To Be

First, you must take the time to think
About what’s most important to you
Then take action and do the work
To guide yourself to what’s true

Evolution Of A Myth – 25th April 2026

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 13 Comments

Written for dVerse OLN #406 – Pegasus and the Muses – a mythical story that I was not very familiar with until today and doing some research. Some of the contradictions in the myth raised the questions in the second stanza and had me contemplating how stories evolve over time.

Pegasus, already a devoted companion,
a gift to the Muses as proof
of favour from goddess Athena,
struck the ground with his hoof.

But what were the Muses musing
before the Hippocrene was created?
Just singing, dancing and bathing,
as the daughters of Pierus awaited?

The challenge laid down, divine,
Mount Helicon rose to the skies.
The nymphs declared the Muses won
and the Pierides turned to magpies.