Contested

By Cliff Lake

 

Contested

 

The rose in the garden stretching thorns,

The sweet embrace awaits…

An innocent lambskin concealing wolf within

(my what big teeth you have).

Access the displayed beauty,

Win more than the proclaim.

Experience warns:

Not everything is as it seems,

Caution is valor’s better measure,

The thorns revealed,

The teeth unveiled,

Let the bloodletting begin.

Poison points made,

Does the other know?

Education ensemble escape enactment,

This game has no winners.

What can one make of the separate claims?

Depends on who they’re talking to –

They never sound the same.

Suffrage! they exclaim to one another,

The refrain rings hollow third party.

Cracked mirror reflections cast,

Jagged perception presented.

Exposition elapses elusive,

Can’t be seen through selective confusion,

Occam discarded.

The thorn that pricks itself,

The pelt that gnaws at the caught leg,

The venom sweetened served,

The side-eyes of the each,

The tales too tightly twisted,

The coins all one-sided,

The spirals self-imposed,

The dancing gone erratic,

The positioning for no gain,

This contest has no prize.

The rose in the garden has blunted thorns,

No embrace can result in sweet-scented capture.

The lamb all exposed bleats from a distance,

The smell of wolf still carries on the wind.

What can they know of each other?

What wariness whispers wordless?

The diversion endures unwon.

 

Cliff Lake 8/6/2025

Copyright © Clifford Lake 2025

Location: Washington, DC, USA

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