Root and Branch

How tenacious the nature of contempt and hubris

When seeding comes by way of parents and teachers

When friends and neighbors nurture and irrigate the weeds of animosity

When harvesting of ill feelings takes flight like a locust gorging invasion

How peaceful

The communion of love and peace

The compassion coming from honesty and discipline

When the carefully chosen friends

Cultivate the compost of yesterday’s anger

With resolve’s growth for today

Resulting in connectivity of warmth and intimacy

Only then…

Does the nature of Man’s purpose overcome

The seduction of immediate gratification

At the expense of the long-term regret

Lest we forget…

The branches of life’s growth

Will never know the roots of honest planting

If hostility with life’s seeding

Relinquishes purity of planting

To short-cuts of instant reward

Nothing

Of value

Comes

Without

Price.

Pay it

Live for life.