Poem of the Week: July 2017

July 27: Twenty-Eight3

July 28: Sixty-Seven2

July 29: Here We Have a Little Bit of Eden

July 30: More Love Is in My Heart than Any Heaven

Saturday, July 29, 2017

Here We Have a Little Bit of Eden

July 29, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a fourth anniversary poem in which married love preserves the innocence of Eden.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Here we have a little bit of Eden,

An innocence deliberately detained.

Praised be love, that holds the heel of heaven,

Preserving what would else escape from pain,

Yet now renews the heart again, again.

For love depends upon a tended garden

Older than the myth of Adam's fall.

Underneath the usual confusion,

Resisting the implacable illusion

That makes of love a dream beyond recall,

Here it lives within the garden wall.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/herew3.html. For more anniversary poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/anniversarypoems.html .

This week’s theme: Gardens

July 27: Twenty-Eight3

July 28: Sixty-Seven2

July 29: Here We Have a Little Bit of Eden

Friday, July 28, 2017

Sixty-Seven2

July 28, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a number poem about a private garden’s public good.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Sixty-seven cultivates her garden,

Invested in the beauty of the Earth.

Xerophyte or hydrophyte, her plants

Thrive heartily, unconscious of their worth,

Yielding grace that lifts life’s loneliest burdens.

So does the private serve the public good.

Each gives gifts to all, for good or ill.

Vision is a gift the garden grants,

Enduring through another’s mind and will.

Nor can one see, except as others would.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/67b.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Gardens

July 27: Twenty-Eight3

July 28: Sixty-Seven2

Thursday, July 27, 2017

Twenty-Eight3

July 27, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a number poem using a garden to symbolize an early childhood classroom.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Twenty-eight enjoys a busy morning

Working unabated in her garden.

Each tiny plant is years away from bloom,

Needing now the gift of ample room

To grow before the ground begins to harden.

Yet there is much to savor in this dawning.

Each year the winter whistles its chill warning,

Inviting her to lay aside her burden,

Glimpse unsought of universal doom.

However, she knows well her inner guerdon:

The passion that each year she will resume.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/28c.html. For more poems about teachers, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/teacherspoems.html .

This week’s theme: Gardens

July 27: Twenty-Eight3

Tuesday, July 25, 2017

Kathleen Charlotte Angel Passed Away

July 26, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a name poem using a garden to symbolize a lasting spiritual legacy.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Kathleen Charlotte Angel passed away

A year ago, and all her generations

Tend her private garden. Great-grandchildren

Have planted roses there, and will remember.

Love lasts as song, and does not pass away,

Even in the course of generations,

Even when the roses of the children

New bloom within an arbor none remembers.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/kathle.html. For more poems about death, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/deathpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Gardens

Monday, July 24, 2017

Sing of Gardeners, Who Nurture Beauty

July 25, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a number poem in praise of gardeners.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Sing of gardeners, who nurture beauty,

Invested in the source of civilization!

Xerophytes or hydrophytes, their plants

Take root and flourish by their will, not chance,

Yielding a sweet harvest of sensation.

No artist has more exigent a duty

In capturing the radiance of Creation,

Nor one more apt to make the spirit dance,

Earth turned to human song through cultivation.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/singo8.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Gardens

Sunday, July 23, 2017

There Is a Garden in My Heart

July 24, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is about a spiritual garden in which one can find peace.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

There is a garden in my heart

More beautiful than words,

Filled with subtle scents and shades

And the rhapsodies of birds.

I go there to refill my cup,

Or, when I am alone,

To find my favorite rock and trace

The smile upon the stone.

When the wind blows in my heart,

Stirring up the sea,

I turn my back upon the waves

And return to me.

I sit beside a quiet pool

And gaze down at the sky,

And feel a yearning so complete

I cannot help but cry.

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

This week’s theme: Gardens

Saturday, July 22, 2017

Only in the Prison of Perfection

July 23, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is proposing marriage and getting engaged.

Today’s poem is an engagement poem about the importance of mutual need if a marriage is to last.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Only in the prison of perfection,

Needing neither love nor company,

Your body quite dissolved in pure perception,

One oversoul as far as mind can see;

Unattached to meaning or desire,

Redolent of heaven's thin, cold air,

Empty of an all-devouring fire

Nor interested in being more than there;

Granted such a state, what need for marriage?

All there is, is with you all the while.

Gifts of love redound to those who forage

Earnestly, with neither greed nor guile.

May you hunger and find surfeit sweet,

Each separately an angel incomplete,

Needing one another's love to know

The greatest bliss vouchsafed to those below.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/onlyin.html. For more engagement poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/engagementpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Proposing Marriage and Getting Engaged

July 17: There Is a Time When Freedom Must Be Bound

July 21: Of Love and Fortune, Happiness and Choosing

July 22: Out of Love Comes All in Life That Matters

July 23: Only in the Prison of Perfection

Out of Love Comes All in Life that Matters

July 22, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is proposing marriage and getting engaged.

Today’s poem is an engagement poem about the enormity of the choice to marry.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Out of love comes all in life that matters;

Nor can one love unless one knows one's need.

Years are walls against which passion shatters,

Opening the way for joys that bleed.

Underneath the choice of who is how,

Requiring one again each day to choose,

Embracing a forever ever now,

Not least because one fears what one might lose.

Given its immensity, the choice

Astounds, as blind or provident as fate;

Given its beauty, one can but rejoice,

Evangelist alight before the gate.

More than how one lives is how one loves,

Ever the terrain through which one moves,

Not shaped by fortune, but the work of will,

Though fortune ride the wind for good or ill.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/outofl.html. For more engagement poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/engagementpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Proposing Marriage and Getting Engaged

July 17: There Is a Time When Freedom Must Be Bound

July 21: Of Love and Fortune, Happiness and Choosing

July 22: Out of Love Comes All in Life That Matters

Thursday, July 20, 2017

Of Love and Fortune, Happiness and Choosing

July 21, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is proposing marriage and getting engaged.

Today’s poem is an engagement poem about how the choice to marry goes beyond reason.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Of love and fortune, happiness and choosing:

No reason is enough for such a choice.

You total up the winning and the losing,

Out of which comes no commanding voice.

Underneath the numbers is the need,

Reckless as a snowflake in the wind,

Eden once again by love decreed,

Nor can mere knowledge such sweet hope rescind.

Gifts of grace are given but to those

Amazed enough to step into the light,

Great with wonder at the life they chose,

Embracing it with unabashed delight.

May you choose again each day to love,

Each the gift that does the other move,

Needing always someone who needs you,

That fortune not for one find joy, but two.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/oflove.html. For more engagement poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/engagementpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Proposing Marriage and Getting Engaged

July 17: There Is a Time When Freedom Must Be Bound

July 21: Of Love and Fortune, Happiness and Choosing

Wednesday, July 19, 2017

On Your Engagement Let the Angels Sing2

July 20, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is proposing marriage and getting engaged.

Today’s poem is an engagement poem inviting angels to the celebration.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

On your engagement let the angels sing!

Now let them fill the air with voices strong!

Yield, ye gates that shelter Heaven's throng!

Open up, that they might glory bring!

Unleash the mighty organ tones that ring

Right through the rock beneath your joyous song!

Even to this world of right and wrong

Now come angels past all reckoning!

Granted, after celebration due,

Angels tend to slowly disappear,

Going back behind the golden door

Even as you long for their return.

Music, though, remains behind with you.

Each moment that you listen you will hear

Not them, but from your own unwritten score,

The songs of love no innocent could learn.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/onyou4.html. For more engagement poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/engagementpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Proposing Marriage and Getting Engaged

July 17: There Is a Time When Freedom Must Be Bound

Tuesday, July 18, 2017

Will You Share Your Life with Me

July 19, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is proposing marriage and getting engaged.

Today’s poem is a poem proposing marriage that emphasizes how much of married life is shared.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Will you share your life with me,

Your passions, hopes, and dreams?

Your happy days, your everydays,

Your days no light redeems?

Will you share your life with me,

Your body and your soul?

Becoming willingly a part

That was a simple whole?

Will you share your life with me,

Your parents, children, friends?

Some long loved, some not yet born,

Some that fortune sends?

Will you share your life with me,

Your love your whole life through?

For if you will, it is my will

To share my life with you.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/willyo.html. For more engagement poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/engagementpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Proposing Marriage and Getting Engaged

July 17: There Is a Time When Freedom Must Be Bound

Monday, July 17, 2017

What I Want to Ask of You Is This

July 18, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is proposing marriage and getting engaged.

Today’s poem is an acrostic poem proposing marriage by reading the poem vertically down the left side.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

What I want to ask of you is this,

If I can find the nerve to make the leap:

Life scatters dreams across the hills of sleep,

Lest it be too easy to find bliss.

Yet I am aware what I might miss.

Only what we treasure can we keep,

Ultimately sowing what we reap,

Moving us to dare that first brief kiss.

And so I must reveal to you my heart,

Recalling all my courage from its rest,

Ready for whatever word might be.

You are all the object of my quest,

My cynosure, my life, my other part.

Each line of this begins my urgent plea.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/whati.html. For more engagement poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/engagementpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Proposing Marriage and Getting Engaged

July 17: There Is a Time When Freedom Must Be Bound

Sunday, July 16, 2017

There Is a Time When Freedom Must Be Bound

July 17, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is proposing marriage and getting engaged.

Today’s poem is a marriage proposal poem about the need to choose to limit one’s freedom.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

There is a time when freedom must be bound

By what we freely choose to call our own.

For if not, someday we will have found

That we have made the choice to be alone.

I cannot call my love for you a choice:

I simply made a turn and you were there;

And all I was came singing with one voice

To lift my soul ten feet into the air.

But lightning bolts do not outlast the storm:

The years demand not ecstasy but will.

My love for you must take a different form,

One that lasts a lifetime, deep and still.

And so I make my choice, if you'll agree,

And seek your answer: Will you marry me?

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/there6.html. For more engagement poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/engagementpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Proposing Marriage and Getting Engaged

July 17: There Is a Time When Freedom Must Be Bound

Saturday, July 15, 2017

To Imagine What a Better World Might Be

July 16, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is revolution in honor of Bastille Day, which was celebrated on July 14th.

Today’s poem is a number poem about someone who changes the world through role playing games.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

To imagine what a better world might be,

Having thought it out in great detail,

Inventing settings, cultures, ways of seeing,

Reconstituting ancient ways of being,

Time traveling beyond the painted veil,

Yet all to change one’s own society;

Then turning one’s ideas into a tale,

Having sketched a future history,

Roles distributed to players, freeing

Each to live one’s vision fictively,

Experiencing the grace without agreeing …

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/toimag.html. For more poems about politics, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/politicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Revolution

July 11: Andrew

July 12: The World Is Brought to Beauty Heart by Heart

July 14: Before the Terror Comes the Tyranny

July 15: Frailty, Thy Name’s No Longer Woman

July 16: To Imagine What a Better World Might Be

Frailty, Thy Name's No Longer Woman

July 15, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is revolution in honor of Bastille Day, which was celebrated on July 14th.

Today’s poem is a number poem about the peaceful feminist revolution.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Frailty, thy name’s no longer woman!

One’s destiny no longer is one’s gender.

Rebellion has turned into revolution,

The kind that frees, that casts old selves asunder,

Yielding souls that find their selves in no one.

This is a time to try the souls of women,

When time is broken, and one becomes a sculptor,

Old enough to shape one’s generation.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/frailt.html. For more poems about feminism, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/feminismpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Revolution

July 11: Andrew

July 12: The World Is Brought to Beauty Heart by Hearthttps://www.poemsforfree.com/befor4.html

July 14: Before the Terror Comes the Tyranny

July 15: Frailty, Thy Name’s No Longer Woman

Friday, July 14, 2017

Before the Terror Comes the Tyranny

July 14, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is revolution in honor of Bastille Day, which is celebrated today, July 14th.

Today’s poem is a Bastille Day poem warning of the dangers of revolutionary chaos.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Before the terror comes the tyranny.

A bloodstained flower has roots in bloodstained soil.

Some would steal the fruit of others' toil,

Then claim it as a right of property.

In revolutions, though, if chaos reigns,

Legitimacy is lost, and many will

Look back with less distaste at former ill,

Eager more for order than for gains.

Days of terror yield dictators new,

As the many yield power to the few,

Yearning for the clarity of chains.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/befor4.html. For more Bastille Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/bastilledaypoems.html .

This week’s theme: Revolution

July 11: Andrew

July 12: The World Is Brought to Beauty Heart by Heart

July 14: Before the Terror Comes the Tyranny

Wednesday, July 12, 2017

Utopians Are Unrepentant Monsters

July 13, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is revolution in honor of Bastille Day, which falls on July 14th.

Today’s poem is a about how a desire for utopia, or perfect good, can lead to evil.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Utopians are unrepentant monsters.

The perfect is the perfect rationale.

O send us serial killers, rapists, gangsters,

Preferably to "should" becoming "shall"!

In those who seek to make their visions real,

A rage becomes the furnace of their zeal;

Nor can they love, who would impose their will,

Sure enough of paradise to kill.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/utopia.html. For more poems about politics, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/politicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Revolution

July 11: Andrew

July 12: The World Is Brought to Beauty Heart by Heart

Tuesday, July 11, 2017

The World Is Brought to Beauty Heart by Heart

July 12, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is revolution in honor of Bastille Day, which falls on July 14th.

Today’s poem is a number poem about peaceful revolution through artistic and cultural change.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

The world is brought to beauty heart by heart.

How else might change take root but one by one?

Imagination is the proper tool,

Revealing what no doubt can overrule:

The wonder and the longing shaped by art.

Year by glacial year change will come.

For every game or story plays its part.

Over time, tiny shifts accrue

Until the old accommodates the new,

Returning, turning, till its day is done.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/thewo7.html. For more poems about politics, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/politicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Revolution

July 11: Andrew

July 12: The World Is Brought to Beauty Heart by Heart

Monday, July 10, 2017

Andrew

July 11, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is revolution in honor of Bastille Day, which falls on July 14th.

Today’s poem is a name poem for a disillusioned idealist.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Andrew was a soldier of the faith:

No one was more loyal or more true.

Despite the hard, rich texture of illusion,

Reality insisted on confusion,

Eviscerating much that Andrew knew.

What remains stalks him like a wraith.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/andrew.html. For more poems about politics, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/politicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Revolution

July 11: Andrew

Sunday, July 9, 2017

Base Your Life on Reason, Only Reason

July 10, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is revolution in honor of Bastille Day, which falls on July 14th.

Today’s poem is a Bastille Day poem about the dangers of basing life only on reason, as some revolutionaries tried to do.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Base your life on reason, only reason,

And watch your heart go crazy on the spot!

Some would vary judgment with the season,

Though some would say it is, or it is not.

In politics, one should be politic,

Lest change change what one needs to stay alive.

Logic cannot tell what makes things tick;

Each thought remains a creature of the hive.

Despite the power of reason, please take heed:

An amputated cranium tends to bleed.

Yet nations healed holistically will thrive.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/baseyo.html. For more Bastille Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/bastilledaypoems.html .

This week’s theme: Revolution

In Time All Meanings Fade

July 9, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which falls on July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem about the eventual demise of the holiday.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

In time all meanings fade. The days of glory,

Now forgotten, buried long ago,

Dead for generations, their founding story

Erased from consciousness like summer snow …

Perhaps we will succeed in preservation,

Enduring for millennia or so,

No more than that. There’ll be a generation

Destined by their seedtime not to know.

Embrace it then, the truth that even this,

Now so much a part of us, must go,

Caught tumbling on the edge of the abyss,

Eventually pulled in by the undertow.

Dear history, we hope to pass you on,

And so a bit of us, too, when we’re gone.

Yet more than that no yearning can bestow.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/intime.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)

July 6: In Every Heart There Is, of Course, Corruption

July 7: Justice Is as Justice Does

July 8: Is This the Beginning of the End

July 9: In Time All Meanings Fade

Friday, July 7, 2017

Is This the Beginning of the End

July 8, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which falls on July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem about the dangers of indebtedness to other nations.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Is this the beginning of the end?

Now is when we start to fall?

Debtors to both foe and friend,

Eventually obliged to all?

Perhaps we can pull out of this,

Electing leaders who will lead,

Not stuck in this paralysis,

Dreading most what we most need.

Each must give that all might gain,

Nor ought we shun the sacrifice.

Could we but bear the healing pain

Equally, we'd pay the price.

Dependence on another's will

Assumes that we their coffers fill,

Yielding ever to their advice.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/isthis.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)

July 6: In Every Heart There Is, of Course, Corruption

July 7: Justice Is as Justice Does

July 8: Is This the Beginning of the End

Thursday, July 6, 2017

Justice Is as Justice Does

July 7, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which falls on July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem about the influence of the past on the present.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Justice is as justice does.

Under every is, is was.

Laws must be applied by those

Yet longing for their long agos.

For every change imposed by will

Oppressions linger, strangle, kill.

Underneath equality

Remains a brutal legacy,

The wandering ghost of slavery

Haunting still our history.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/justi2.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)

July 6: In Every Heart There Is, of Course, Corruption

July 7: Justice Is as Justice Does

Wednesday, July 5, 2017

In Every Heart There Is, of Course, Corruption

July 6, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which falls on July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem about the ubiquity of corruption.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

In every heart there is, of course, corruption.

No one is immune from lust and greed.

Democracy accommodates this need,

Embracing what might else lead to destruction.

People cannot people an ideal.

Equality's a myth, has always been

No more than something to put favors in,

Dependent on the lie that it is real.

Each decision is a battlefield,

Not of ideas but interests, yours and mine,

Calculated shrewdly to define

Exactly what advantage each might yield.

Do not be discouraged: Evil is

As much a part of us as love or bliss.

Yet what is not a wound cannot be healed.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/ineve6.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)

July 6: In Every Heart There Is, of Course, Corruption

Tuesday, July 4, 2017

I Wish There Were a Washington

July 5, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which falls on July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem wishing every nation could be as lucky in leadership as ours was.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

I wish there were a Washington

For every failed state,

A Jefferson or Madison

To guide them through the gate.

I wish there were a Lincoln

For those now ripped apart,

A Roosevelt or Kennedy

For those that have no heart.

I wish each had the fortune

With which we have been blessed,

And found in their own founders

Fit heroes for the quest.

I wish, I wish, I wish, I wish,

But such things none can will.

One can only plant the seeds

And shape the soil well.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/iwisht.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)

Monday, July 3, 2017

Just Think of How It Was That Hot July

July 4, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which is celebrated today, July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem imagining what it was like to rebel in 1776.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Just think of how it was that hot July

Under threat of being hanged for treason.

Let yourself have faith enough to die,

Yet let that faith be in the power of reason.

Feel the heady fear of rash rebellion,

Of chaos, blood, death, vengeance, mayhem, blight.

Unleash with noble words that ancient hellion

Reigning cruelly over years of night.

They turned out to be right, those bold, brave men.

However, think what terrors faced them then.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/justth.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)

Sunday, July 2, 2017

Fantasies Endure the Test of Time

July 3, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which falls on July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem about the holiday as myth and fantasy.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Fantasies endure the test of time.

Out of myths emerge identities.

Underneath the prose there is the rhyme,

Revealing what was not and could not be.

There is a well-worn scrim across the past,

Hard to see through, absent light behind:

Old, self-serving stories made to last,

Fictive landscapes painted on the mind.

Just listen to the songs of who you are:

Underneath your words are melodies

Long rehearsed, the bedroom door ajar,

Years ago, when truth was meant to please.

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/fanta2.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)