[Source]

If words were everything
We would be halfway
To the moon and back,
A streak of light, white-bright
Against the night sky
Driving darkness far away
Into the distance
Of a forgotten age.

If promises were
The elixir of life
We would nymph-like never age,
Never yield to the chiseling
Hand of time, etching its
Designs into our very bones.

Word by word they have built up
Grandiose things, carcasses that
Loom large, Colossus-like over us;
Selling us bamboo dust for sandal wood,
Trading Hope for the control
A snake charmer’s pungi wields.

When truth like a troubled troubadour
Arrives, we find that we’ve been had,
The facades we have pined for, a house;
But of cards.
—
Loosely related to the prompt for Day 23 – Card…