Wordplay: The Reading Spot

"The greatest victory is that which requires no battle." - Sun Tzu This part of the forest is Much too quiet tonight To the majestic old noctuid, though, clinging on to life, It's no new sight. It rests near a pinecone, on a tall tree branch As usual, and waits for its Instincts to drive it to Claim morsels that may fit. Below its branch,  Moonlight glinting in its eyes, A young wild rat emerges from the bushes and Out of hunger, sighs. The pinecone quickly senses  Something off, however, And truly so, because it sees, staring back, A pair of red eyes quiver. The wild rat makes its way over A carelessly thrown matchbox  In dry litter, and slowly and steadily Up the tree, to the scared pinecone it walks. He triumphantly places his grown nails on The ill fated pinecone, but just over it He sees that, quite to his pleasure A little beyond him, an old moth patiently sits. Greed manifests  As he drools onto his paws, And he decides to spare the pinecone; He gently lets it...

S.O.S. *** Claire is seated outside the manager's room, flipping through the pages of 'The Daily Affairs'. She's already read the day's edition, but having nothing particularly better to do, she decided to give it a re-read. She's not much of a 'politics' enthusiast, nor is she into 'sports'. The national and international affairs are the only sections that catch her eye. Now, the newspaper isn't a 'happy' read, so Claire wasn't expecting it to be all rainbows or sunshine. Still, she felt the shivers caress her as she read the increasing number of med. student suicides; most of them occuring due to research failures. She has always considered herself to be among the lucky ones, since she, once upon a time, wished to enter the research field herself. Luckily, just one month into it, she'd decided it was too much, and too unbalanced, for her liking. Thus, each new 'research failure' added more fear into her mind, because...

"I made you something special..." Woken by the Feast day sun Its scorching warmth of joy Matches our happy beaks As we move towards the field. Master has set a lovely banquet Studded with seeds and delicious "pests" We don't know how to thank Master, but We rush to relish, instead. In between gorging sessions I glance at the younglings And my friends  And smile at their smiles "How delicious!", ones' said "A feast for sure!", said another's A few hours hence, Master joins us and Adds to the shine with a staff that glitters; Its gleaming silver matches The harvested rain. I'd stare at it longer, but Master ushers us out Into his chariot's carts  We barely fit, but Master  Isn't frowning, so we don't complain. An hour later Master stops the chariot And leads us into smaller carts On a moving belt. It's been a fun ride so far But Master wishes to make it better! We oblige and settle into the carts Which begin moving; ...

When the knives bond... "I couldn't help it, Dad. He triggered me.", said the thirteen year old boy, Jon. "And how you control your reactions determines type of man you'll become." "But-....it isn't fair." "Such is life. Welcome to the real world, kid." Jon felt his trigger growing yet again, and he tried using his fist-clenching method to overcome it. His mother would be upset if he had another outburst. In fact, the whole point of this camping night-out, she'd said, was to help him calm down, and reconcile with his father. "Pass me that can of sand, will ya'?" Andrew said to his son, a bead of sweat rolling down the side of his head. He'd been at it for three hours now...finding the perfect place, the perfect materials. He wanted the momental monument to be perfect; just like his. He grabbed the can from Jon, tipped off its lid, and started pouring the grains into the foundation pit. "Watch, Jon. The light...