The Price of Three Crowns

What is it you worship
when the room grows quiet,
when applause has wandered home,
when the bank has closed its doors,
when the one you loved
has forgotten your name?

Is it gold—
that faithful liar
who promises tomorrow
yet rents your soul by the hour?

Is it fame—
that painted saint
who kisses your forehead
only while the crowd remembers
how to pronounce your name?

Or is it love—
that invisible monarch
who asks for everything
yet signs no contract
promising it will stay?

The world keeps selling
the same impossible dream:

Have all three.
Keep all three.
Lose nothing.

But no one tells you
that every kingdom
demands a different king.

Money loves attention.
Fame feeds upon attention.
Love survives only
where attention
is freely given.

Try to hold them all,
and your hands become too busy
to embrace anyone.

Choose fortune,
and your calendar
becomes richer than your memories.

Choose glory,
and strangers memorize your face
while those who built your heart
forget your voice.

Choose love,
and there may come nights
when your pockets echo,
your name disappears from every headline,
yet one pair of eyes
still recognizes you
without introduction.

Perhaps that is why
balance remains
the rarest miracle.

For money asks,
"What can you earn?"

Fame asks,
"What can you become?"

Love asks only,
"Who are you
when no one is watching?"

Three questions.

Three crowns.

One head.

And no soul
has ever worn them equally.

Some inherit riches
and lose themselves.

Some inherit applause
and die unheard.

Some inherit love
and discover
they possessed
the only treasure
death has never learned
to steal.

So before you spend
your life climbing
someone else's mountain,

decide
which silence
you wish to come home to.

The silence
of a vault.

The silence
after the cheering stops.

Or the silence
shared between two souls
who need no audience
to know
they have found eternity.