There Is No Substitute for Lifelong Longing

October 19, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is joy.

Today’s poem is about the relationship between joy and longing.

I welcome comments on my poems at http://nicholasgordon.blogspot.com.

Yours,

Nick Gordon

There is no substitute for lifelong longing.

One may be happy, but there's always more.

Now might be perfection, but one’s yearning

Is like a wave that seeks the distant shore;

And when it gets there, sweeps across the sand

In ecstasy, relieved of want, at peace;

Then sweeps back again, away from land,

Within a rapture that will never cease.

What perfect love, that cannot reach perfection,

But like the universe, must ever dance,

Singing with the sheer joy of affection,

Savoring the mysteries of chance.

There is a satisfaction in desire

Unsatisfied, that sets the soul on fire.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/ther37.html . For more philosophical poems, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Joy.

October 17: Sing, My Loved One! Sing of All the Glory

October 18: Grace

October 19: There Is No Substitute for LifelongLonging