The Rustic Poet - Silas Fen

01/14/2026

Structure of the Soul

A spine may hold the body’s shape,
but it will bend more than bone or steel.
You train the limbs to leap escape—
The soul learns how to stand and feel.

Muscle forgets what time has burned.
It shrinks beneath the weight of age.
But every truth the soul has earned
stays etched beyond a weathered cage.

You sculpt the chest, define the form,
But cannot press a soul to grow.
Its strength builds in the storm,
beneath what mirrors fail to show.

The gym refines what eyes commend,
but silence shapes the inner man.
What you defend, and why you bend—
These speak the truths a mirror can’t scan.

The body lifts to claim control,
but pride dissolves in mortal strain.
Only the practiced, tempered soul
withstands the heat of joy and pain.

So train your breath, but train your will;
Align your heart with what is true.
No strength can match the one made still—
a soul built slow, and built through you.

12/31/2025

Freedom asks a final fee,
One love I cannot pay.
I’d rather blind than ever be
The one who sees that day.

So close the world; let silence stay,
Let loss remain unseen.
I keep you whole the only way—
By never knowing what has been.

12/26/2025

God’s Paintbrush

At dusk, the heavens softly sigh,
Day retreats from blushing sky,
There upon the canvas wide,
God draws light, where dreams abide.

No bristles dipped in mortal hue
Could birth such tones of embered blue;
Strokes of fire and whispers low,
He sets the western world aglow.

Trees stand still in hushed applause,
Their silhouettes in sacred pause.
Bare branches inked in charcoal grace
Heaven’s hand, mid brushstroke trace.

The fence, the field, the fallen leaves—
Bathed in warmth the sunbeams weave.
Yet not with hands or oil or clay,
But breath divine, He paints the day.

And just before the night takes hold,
The sky becomes a tale retold—
Of beauty born from quiet hush,
Signed by, God’s silent brush.

12/16/2025

Fate is not always fair…..

I Deserve the Sun

I claim the sun I earn.
Yet corners close like walls.
I ask what I must learn.
Why does my future fall?

I work. I wait. I stand.
The hours test my spine.
I build with honest hands.
Still doubt redraws the line.

Hope knocks; I answer fast.
Fear crowds the door again.
I chase a widened past.
Regret keeps score of when.

I speak my worth aloud.
Silence replies with weight.
I bow to no imposed shroud.
I refuse a borrowed fate.

I choose a steadier pace.
I cut through borrowed gloom.
I meet my mirrored face.
I prune the roots of doom.

I step where warmth can stay.
I name my chosen ground.
I earn the open day.
The shade loosens its sound.

12/13/2025

12/09/2025

What Would You Do For Love

what would you do when I’m shaking inside?
When the dark pulls close and there’s nowhere to hide?
When my voice cracks low and the night feels cruel—
Would you hold the pieces I can barely pull?

Would you steal my pain when it’s too much to bear?
Lift it off my chest just to give me air?
Catch the hurt I swallow so I don’t drown?
Carry the weight when the world shuts down?

Would you breathe the air I breathe when I break?
Stay close enough to feel every ache?
Match your breath to mine so I’m not alone?
Quiet the fear that chills my bones?

Would you rise me above when I fall apart?
Raise me from the floor and restart my heart?
Lift me past the shadows that drag me low?
Hold my hope steady when I can’t make it grow?

Would you wipe my tears though they burn like fire?
Touch the hurt behind every desire?
Guard my fragile heart when it’s barely whole?
Stand at the door of my trembling soul?

For everything you’d do when I’m misunderstood,
For every promise whispered in the dark where I stood,
For the love you’d give even when it costs blood—
For love, I would. I would.

12/09/2025

Demons Run Faster Than Rainbows

They wait beneath each silent breath,
No flash, no color, just the weight.
Joy dissolves, they trace your death,
Then settle near, patient as fate.

You chased the curve, the distant hue,
Each promise bent, just out of grasp.
They never ran—they followed through,
Shadows shaped to match your clasp.

Their feet know roads you dared forget,
Old bridges scorched, unnamed by time.
They harvest every deep regret,
Bind them fast with rhyme and crime.

Rainbows tempt with vows unkept,
Too brief to carry all you bear.
Demons walk where rainbows wept—
No mercy lives in thinning air.

They whisper truths the colors dodge,
Too blunt for hope, too sharp for dreams.
You tried to live inside a lodge
Built high above your silent screams.

But they arrive, not out of spite—
Summoned by what bleeds in you.
They need no map. They ride the night.
Finding pain rainbows slip through.

12/09/2025

Breaching the Drowning

I cannot tell which way is up or through
The weight consumes before I start to try
I doubt my worth as depths distort my view
And drift where loss forbids the will to cry

The world moves on, but I remain below
Its hum above too distant to believe
Call for help though currents steal the flow
Drag me toward what nothing can retrieve

In fear, I stand no longer fit for love
It strikes hardest in the swallowed air
Past collapsed the structures I dreamed of
Left raw, unanchored, stripped, and bare

Try to speak, but silence crowds my chest
It folds and tightens with a quiet sting
Search for guidance, fail to find the rest
Ache for touch, I fear I cannot bring

How to trust, when ruin shaped your part?
How do you want without the old collapse?
A fractured pulse rehearses a new start
Yet offers no clear form, no healing maps

Somewhere under all this broken sound
A faint reminder stirs of what could be
I do not rise, but shift inside the drowned
And wait for some small truth to anchor me

11/15/2025

I’m honored to share that I’ve been invited to read my poem “Embers Beneath the Snow” at this year’s Winter Solstice Poetry Reading on December 21, 2025, held in the candle-lit sanctuary of Las Placitas Presbyterian Church in Placitas, NM.

It’s a beautiful annual gathering of poets and community, and I’m grateful to be part of it.

For those who can’t attend in person, the event will also stream on Zoom. The link will be posted here about a week before the event:
http://www.LasPlacitasChurch.org/ministries/winter-solstice-poetry

Looking forward to a meaningful evening of poetry and connection.