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M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

“Declaration of Independence: The Unspoken Practiced Interpretation Translated for Modern Readers”
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky #fourthofjuly #4thofjuly #america #independenceday
#declarationofindependence
#independence

Title in blue text on a white background; poem in red text on a white background
“Declaration of Independence: The Unspoken Practiced Interpretation Translated for Modern Readers”
We hold these truths to be self-evident,
That all rich, white men are created equal
And superior to all other creatures which do not fit these criteria.
They alone are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,
That anyone else may endeavor to obtain such Rights
Would pose a direct threat to their Life, Liberty, and their pursuit of Happiness.
—That to secure these rights, and to exclude others who wish to obtain them,
Governments are instituted by, of, and for the aforementioned group of Men,
Driving their powers from the exploitation of the working class
And the unbalanced distribution of Power and Wealth,
—That whenever any group protests or attempts to become destructive of these ends,
It is the Right of the Government to attack or abolish them,
And to institute new Laws without checks or balances,
Laying their foundation on such principles
And organizing their powers in such form,
As shall seem most likely to protect the Safety, Happiness,
Comfort, and Wealth of the Elite.
M. Monty
7/4/25

July 4, 2025 at 11:34 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

“Happy Birthday to Me”
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“Happy Birthday to Me”
Today, I am 24 years old.
Allegedly, my brain is almost done cooking;
I still have about one year left on the timer before it’s officially “done.”
A lot has happened in 24 years,
But I suspect in 24 more years,
It will seem like not much at all.
It is simply confounding to me that I’m only about a quarter of the way
Through my life’s potential.
It is far more confounding to think
Of all the things I’m expected to have done by now.
Own a house? Be married? Have kids?
Commit myself to one career for the next 40—probably more—years?
Once again—my brain is still cooking.
I don’t even know if I want all of those things yet.
I’m certainly not going to try to get them until
The metaphorical toothpick comes out clean
And my brain is left alone to cool.
The American dream, in this economy?
Babes, I’ll be lucky if there’s still an America by the time I’m 25.
Well, I don’t know about lucky.
Surprised, certainly.
Disappointed, a little.
Exhausted, for sure.
Now, for my birthday wish—
I never wish for fortune, fame, or even success.
I wish, as always, only to be happy
And at peace with who I am.
Happy birthday to me ♥
M. Monty, 6/25/25

June 25, 2025 at 5:17 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

Some Shelley in honor of #nokingsday
"Ozymandias"
By Percy Bysshe Shelley
#nokings #poem #poetry #poetrysky

June 14, 2025 at 3:02 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"Leaky Faucet"
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“Leaky Faucet”
My inspiration hits
At the exact moment my pen is out of reach
Or time has run out,
And I must fulfill my obligations
And complete the daily tasks that allow me to survive.
My creativity flows from a leaky faucet
So that nothing comes out
Until the pressure is high
Nothing motivates me to do things more
Than being physically unable to do them
Because I most devote my time and energy
To things that are allegedly “more urgent.”
More urgent in the way that dehydration
Would probably kill you faster than cancer,
But you should probably still do something about the cancer
Because the longer you ignore it,
The more likely it is to kill you.
M. Monty
10/15/24

June 3, 2025 at 12:04 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"Meaning"
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“Meaning”
I don’t believe in a higher power,
In some intelligent being making decisions
That determine the fate of the universe.
I believe we are the intelligent beings
Making decisions that determine the fate of the universe,
And everything else is left to chance.
I exist because a specific sperm fertilized a specific egg.
Why those specific ones?
There isn’t a reason, that’s just what happened.
What created humans? You guessed it,
A long series of random evolutionary coincidences.
When the Big Bang banged,
Why did the stars and planets form in the exact position they did?
Pure happenstance.
That’s not to say that nothing has meaning—
It just means you have to determine the meaning for yourself,
And it might mean something totally different to the rest of the world.
And, while meanings are important to understanding a concept,
Equally so are practical applications.
Once you figure out what something means,
The next step is to figure out what to do with it.
M. Monty
6/2/25

June 2, 2025 at 12:13 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

In honor of #towelday, and also having exactly 42 followers, here's a poem I wrote about the meaning of life, or how there isn't one. I hope it's better than the poetry of Vogons or Paul Neil Milne Johnstone of Redbridge. Maybe it could power a spaceship, but I don't know as I haven't tried.

“Probability”
I believe in the power of probability,
Of chance, or luck,
The power of coincidences.
I don’t believe things happen for a reason,
I believe things just happen.
Things are always happening,
All the time, all at once,
And sometimes when more than one thing
Happens at the same time,
They come together and make something bigger happen;
But sometimes things don’t happen together
And nothing big happens.
Life and existence are just things
That are happening.
Why speculate about reasons why?
Why does it matter why certain things happen
And other things don’t?
What does there have to be a higher power
Making them happen?
Why can’t things just happen and exist,
And we let them?
M. Monty
9/3/24

May 26, 2025 at 1:41 AM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"The Beauty of Age"
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“The Beauty of Age”
The beauty of age is so often overlooked
For the fear of becoming irrelevant or forgotten.
Silver hair that glitters in moonlight,
Or white hair, soft and bright as a blanket of snow.
Wrinkles tell a person’s story—
Each one a moment of laughter, worry, or sorrow.
They are proof of our emotions, our humanity.
The crow’s feet by your eyes
Tell me all the times you’ve smiled and frowned,
And age spots are remnants of all the time you spent
Reveling in the warm sun.
If I should be lucky enough to grow old,
I would not hide it with creams and dyes.
I’ll welcome signs of aging,
Embrace them with open arms,
And wear them like a badge of honor for the life I’ve lived.
M. Monty
5/20/25

May 20, 2025 at 12:13 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"To You"
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“To You”
To know the author’s intent
Is to live the author’s life
And understand it with more clarity than perhaps even the author themself.
Sometimes—
Often—
The author doesn’t even know what they mean.
Sometimes they figure it out much later,
And sometimes it remains a mystery.
Sometimes the meaning changes,
And sometimes what they wrote
Isn’t true at all anymore.
Sometimes it never was.
Sometimes it’s not about what it meant to the author,
But what it means to you, the reader.
What does it mean to you?
M. Monty
8/14/24

May 20, 2025 at 12:57 AM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"A Poet's Daydream"
One of the very few poems I've ever written using both meter and rhyme together
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“A Poet’s Daydream”
Evanescent
Effervescent
Incandescent
Luminescent
It’s the essence
Ever-present
Oh, god bless it,
Missed the exit.
M. Monty
5/18/25

May 19, 2025 at 2:00 AM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"The American Dream"
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“The American Dream”
It was always just that—
A dream.
The kind that you want to hold on to,
The dream you don’t want to end,
Because when you open your eyes, it starts to slip away.
And as you become more awake,
As you slowly gain consciousness,
You realize that it didn’t really add up,
That the logic wasn’t there.
It was just a fantasy that your subconscious created
To help you cope with reality.
Whatever the dream was,
A white picket fence and two point five kids
Or a cozy little house in the country with some chickens and a garden
Or an apartment in the city with a studio where you can live off of your art
It doesn’t matter what it was.
It wasn’t realistic,
It wasn’t believable,
Not when you woke up
And could see reality again.
How could you ever have all those things when you can barely make ends meet?
How much time would it take to earn it when it costs 20 minutes of your life
Just to buy eggs?
When it costs 60 hours just to pay one month’s rent,
30 if you have a roommate.
More than that, really,
Once you pay the government to steal from you,
Steal your money, your rights, your humanity.
And even if you could somehow afford it,

$What are the odds that they would allow you to be happy? “They,” of course, being the ones who rely on you to keep sleeping, Keep dreaming, Keep hoping that one day you could have a fraction of what they got From exploiting all the dreamers. The ever-present Dream, always out of reach, Is what motivates us to work hard, And if we just work hard enough, They can afford a second island or a third yacht or a fourth jet And maybe, if we’re lucky, and if we just work hard enough, They’ll let us keep just enough of their money to be able to eat. Because it is their money, and when they do give us some, we’re only borrowing it. It always goes back to them in the end. But of course, they dangle the Dream in front of us, The carrot that entices the livestock, And they give us enough to keep us hungry So that we snarl at any other animal who comes near us Just in case they try to take what little we have. Except we don’t eat money. But we aren’t allowed to eat unless we have it, Or unless some other hungry animal is kind enough to share theirs. And at night, when we’re sleeping, They play lullabies in the barns and the coops So that we keep dreaming our sweet Dream, To remember what we think we’re working for So we won’t try to dig our way under the fence and destroy the farm. M. Monty 5/13/25$

May 13, 2025 at 4:22 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"Bad at Something"
I wrote this several months ago, but I felt like it fit
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“Bad at Something”
If you want to be good at something,
First you have to stop being afraid of being bad at it.
If you want to be an artist,
One who makes beautiful things,
You have to be willing to make something that is
Ugly.
If you want to be a poet
Why creates lovely, moving imagery
And thought-provoking works,
You have to be willing to write something
So stupid and ridiculous-sounding
That just thinking about it makes your cheeks burn in embarrassment.
You have to be willing to fuck something up so atrociously
That you almost never want to try again,
Yet you do still try again.
And again.
And again.

Until you start to get lost in the process of creating;
Then you might be surprised to find you’ve created something you love,
Something you’re proud of.
Then you keep doing it,
Again,
And again,
And one day you look back at past attempts,
And you smile as you look at the ugly ones
That slowly became less and less ugly,
And when you find the first one,
The ugliest,
You find it’s not nearly as ugly as you remember.
M. Monty
09/29/24

May 10, 2025 at 11:22 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"Magnolia Blossom"
Years ago, my grandma started drawing and painting birthday cards for all her kids and grandkids. I've recently continued the tradition. This is the one I made my mom for Mother's Day this year

Pencil drawing of a white magnolia blossom with a yellow center, dark green leaves, on a lightly shaded green background

May 10, 2025 at 7:14 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"Letter from a 21st Century Ghost"
The thought of our future haunts me, and I haunt it back.
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“Letter from a 21st Century Ghost”
Dear future reader,
History happens so much slower when you’re living through it
Than when you’re reading it in class from a textbook.
Future reader,
Are there still textbooks?
Are there still classes?
Are you still taught to read?
My dear, sweet, future reader,
If you still exist,
Please know that I don’t ask these questions
With malice or scorn,
Nor do I look down on you and assume
That you willingly choose ignorance.
Perhaps, I hope, you are not ignorant at all.
But from where I’m currently sitting,
Everything that’s happening around me,
As I find myself once more waiting for the other shoe to drop,
Hope is wriggling out of my grasp
As I imagine your future.
Tell me, what became of our “great nation?”
Did it become Great Again?
No, did it ever become Great at all?
For me, it still hasn’t become great,
At least not for all.

Tell me, future reader,
Who were the first to go this time?
No, on second thought, don’t tell me.
I suspect I already know.
But who were the next ones
To be declared illegal?
To have their humanity revoked
Along with the citizenship that was supposed to keep them safe?
I wonder if I’ll be in the next group,
Or the one after that.
Which part of my identity did they criminalize first?
Future reader, I’d like to ask you a favor.
Look me up.
Search for my name.
Is it on the list of the dead?
Was I labeled “missing” or “fate unknown?”
Or was I given the cursed role of “survivor,”
Doomed to live with my pain and loss
While being told it wasn’t real and didn’t happen
And also lauded for my bravery and strength
And promised that it will never happen to anyone again
Even as it already is, still is, always was, never stopped.

Future reader, I cannot possibly comprehend what your world might look like,
But even if it looks nothing like mine now,
One day it might start to.
Maybe it’s a cliché to say that history repeats itself,
But there’s a reason that clichés becomes clichés.
And if you ever find yourself thinking
“That will never happen to me,”
Just know, future reader,
That you are deeply, gravely mistaken.
M. Monty
5/7/25

May 8, 2025 at 1:01 AM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"Lasting Impressions"
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“Lasting Impressions”
Two sets of hoof-prints in the freshly fallen snow
A mother and her fawn
Seeking shelter from the bitter cold.
Did they find it?
Their tracks are quickly buried in a sea of white,
Leaving the answer unknown.
One set of foot-prints in the sand along the shore
The poet, lost in thought
Finding solace in their solitude,
Searching for questions,
Which, for a poet, can be harder to find than answers;
Their thoughts keep them company, never lonely though certainly alone.
Thousands of boot-prints stamped in the dirt
Soldiers marching forth
Following orders sent from above.
Thousands more boot-prints trail in from the other direction,
In the middle, where they meet, the footprints are indistinguishable
And when night falls, so are the soldiers who lay prone.
Another set of foot-prints in the garden,
A perfect match for the others
Showing where the gardener tilled the earth
And planted the seeds
And now, day after day, returns
To reap all that they had sown
M. Monty
5/1/25

May 1, 2025 at 10:02 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"How to Write a Poem"
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“How to Write a Poem”
Spend the first couple lines/
Introducing the problem./
Bring in a metaphor or two,/
Like you’re setting up bowling pins/
Ready to be knocked down/
Or putting up a hay bale/
To use for target practice./
Dwell on the metaphor for a moment,/
Drawing it out, drawing back the bowstring/
As you take aim,/
Then suddenly let go as the arrow/
Slices through the air/
And makes a bullseye right at the heart of your point.//
M. Monty
4/29/25

April 29, 2025 at 2:38 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"Poisonous Peace"
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

"Poisonous Peace"
Everything becomes poison when you have too much of it./
Drink too much water and it leeches the salt from your blood and kills you./
Eat too much sugar and your body can't regulate it./
Peace is wonderful until it's not./
Refusing to see injustice for the sake of keeping the peace,/
Valuing the status quo more than human lives,/
Poisons the idea of peace,/
Rotting it to its very core./
Oppressors rely on the bastardization of peace by the masses/
To vilify those who seek justice and equality./
Change could be achieved peacefully/
If peacefulness wasn't valued more than change./
Clinging to something so tightly/
Only ensures that you lose it altogether/
Instead of loosening your grip/
And allowing it to come back when the time is right.//
M. Monty
4/28/25

April 28, 2025 at 4:36 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“Divided”
A nation divided against itself cannot stand,/
Unless it’s on the necks of those who built it./
There’s nothing to fear but fear itself/
If you’re the one that everyone is afraid of./
“We the people” never included me—/
Odds are, it wouldn’t have included you, either./
Revolution is only justified/
As long as you look like them, act like them,/
Talk like them, think like them,/
Want the same things as them./
When they do it, it’s revolution;/
When we do it, it’s terrorism/
Even when the only things to get hurt/
Are property, stocks, and egos./
They aren’t in terror for their lives,/
They’re in terror for their pockets/
Which are lined with the lives and labor/
Of we, the people.//
M. Monty
4/28/25

April 28, 2025 at 2:23 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"Holy"
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

“Holy”
My journal is to me
What others’ Bibles are to them.
I turn to it for comfort, guidance, advice.
I seek answers from within its pages.
It inspires me, and shows me truths about myself
I had not previously seen.
I study it, reading and re-reading verses,
Coming back to my favorite ones over and over,
Finding new meaning each time.
It is precious and holy to me
In a way that nothing else has ever been.
M. Monty
2/15/2025

April 17, 2025 at 12:20 AM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"Blood"
#poem #poet #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky

"Blood"
When my mind is wounded,/
The words flow out like blood/
From a bullethole./
The blank page catches the ink/
Like a fresh bandage,/
The journal filled with used and discarded/
Dressings and gauze from past injuries./
But two things can be true at once,/
And my old, dried up blood/
Can help my fresh wound close/
A little bit faster./
M. Monty
4/14/25

April 16, 2025 at 12:12 PM

M. Monty

@mmonty333.bsky.social

"Home"
It's been nearly four and a half years since I lost my childhood home to a fire. Several things have reminded me of it recently, and I've shed more tears over it in the past week than I have after the week that it happened
#grief #loss #home #poem #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #poetrysky