Kurt Philip Behm

All Scepters Disowned

I don’t bow to money,

I don’t bow to fame

I kneel to that one thing,

that time cannot change

I don’t speak for ‘right,’

and won’t speak for ‘wrong’

My liege is the truth,

all court jesters gone

I don’t hope to be knighted,

my shield more concave

And rejecting all title,

the past still enslaved

My will lay unbroken,

my heart for a throne

A crown jeweled with memory,

—all scepters disowned

(Villanova Pennsylvania: June, 2017)

Together As One

Eighteen or eighty,

my age the words hide

Beginning or ending,

a life or death slide

My breath stays unseasoned,

its truth zero-sum

A child or a sage,

—together as one

(Villanova Pennsylvania: June, 2107)