Hope’s Cackle

Hope, the trickster born from pure FUCKERY

It teases from the shadows,

just out of reach, like the last barstool

in a crowded dive.

You spend a lifetime

kicking holes in paper-thin promises,

sipping bitterness like its Château Lafite Rothschild

Doubting people, the world,

yourself most of all—

a skeptic’s creed tattooed on your eyelids 

And yet, there it is—

a glimmer, faint as a dying streetlamp,

just enough to warm your frostbitten heart.

The sun rises, and for once

it doesn’t look like a cruel joke.

You think, maybe,

just maybe, the bastard wasn’t lying this time.

But that’s when they come—

angels, devils, who knows the difference anymore?

Their wings flutter like melting clock hands,

their smiles sharp as broken dreams in 4k

They don’t ask permission.

They never do.

“Time to go,” they say,

A one-way ticket to paradise

or maybe just the next bar over.

And you laugh, because

what else can you do?

Hope—

that beautiful, deceitful son of a bitch—

waited until your bags were packed

for a journey you never asked for.

A lifetime spent doubting,

and the only thing you’re sure of

is the punchline.