Empyrean
  • Featured
  • Poetry
  • Fiction
  • Contests
    • Poetry Contest
    • Fiction Contest
    • Non-Fiction Contest
  • Support us
  • Advertise with us
  • General Submissions
  • Moon Submissions
  • Zodiac Submissions
  • Issues
  • Featured
  • Poetry
  • Fiction
  • Contests
    • Poetry Contest
    • Fiction Contest
    • Non-Fiction Contest
  • Support us
  • Advertise with us
  • General Submissions
  • Moon Submissions
  • Zodiac Submissions
  • Issues
Working: Vol. 4, No. 2 - Issue 14 Summer 2025

The Seeds We Plant

Issue 14
Planting seeds in soft soil
sprouts from earth
diverse fruits that nourish--
assist from birth,
empowering bodies to flex and bewilder,
propelling minds to mount the moon,
dream beyond our prism--
see through our toil.
 
Planting bullets--
blood in baked concrete,
sprouts from cracks
another blade in a blindsided back.
Morgues stuffed with mutilation
from blown buses, car rams,
An endless supply of stifled minds,
endless sets of feet stubbornly unmoved,
inhaling through nose decaying man
exhaling from mouth--
defeat.

Michael Roque, born and raised in Los Angeles, discovered his love for poetry and prose amid friends on the bleachers of Pasadena City College. Now he currently lives in the Middle East and is being inspired by the world around him. His poems have been published by literary magazines like North Dakota Quarterly, Cholla Needles, The Literary Hatchet and others. 

Copyright © 2025 Empyrean Literary Magazine, L.L.C.
  • Featured
  • Poetry
  • Fiction
  • Contests
    • Poetry Contest
    • Fiction Contest
    • Non-Fiction Contest
  • Support us
  • Advertise with us
  • General Submissions
  • Moon Submissions
  • Zodiac Submissions
  • Issues