Godmothers Aren't Fairies in a Tale

May 7, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Mother’s Day.

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

A Mother’s Day poem for godmothers:

Godmothers aren't fairies in a tale,
Offering a world that cannot be.
Demand of them glass slippers and they fail,
More likely to do favors naturally.
On them you can depend for a relation:
They offer gifts and guidance with a kiss.
Having taken on the obligation,
Each freely out of love gives what she is.
Real godmothers have no wands or wings,
So they must work with wisdom, love, and things.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/godmot.html. For more Mother’s Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/mothersdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Mother’s Day.
May 3: Mothers Never Mind a Little Cuddling
May 4: How Might One Find the Strength to Will One’s Fate
May 5: Mothers Are as Mothers Do
May 6: Miracles Wear Ordinary Clothes
May 7: Godmothers Aren’t Fairies in a Tale

Miracles Wear Ordinary Clothes

May 6, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Mother’s Day.

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

A Mother’s Day poem about recognizing each child as a miracle:

Miracles wear ordinary clothes.
One rarely sees them naked on the street,
Taking outdoor showers in the rain,
Hushing crowds with sheer full-frontal grace.
Each is wont, at times, to pick her nose,
Refuse to keep her room or person neat,
'Mid daily chaos, daily wars sustain,
Swaddled in the fleece of time and place.
Deep within the moment there is beauty,
A radiance that lights with love one's duty,
Yielding one quick searing face-to-face.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/mirac3.html. For more Mother’s Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/mothersdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Mother’s Day.
May 3: Mothers Never Mind a Little Cuddling
May 4: How Might One Find the Strength to Will One’s Fate
May 5: Mothers Are as Mothers Do
May 6: Miracles Wear Ordinary Clothes

Mothers Are as Mothers Do

May 5, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Mother’s Day.

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

A Mother’s Day poem about the need to celebrate substitute mothers:

Mothers are as mothers do, and yet
Often they are neighbors, friends, or aunts.
The common thread is love that will endure -
Hardy, patient, generous, and sure,
Embrace beyond all act or circumstance.
Remember them this day with love, and let
Sweet words reverberate within their hearts and dance.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/moth19.html. For more Mother’s Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/mothersdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Mother’s Day.
May 3: Mothers Never Mind a Little Cuddling
May 4: How Might One Find the Strength to Will One’s Fate
May 5: Mothers Are as Mothers Do

How Might One Find the Strength to Will One's Fate

May 4, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Mother’s Day.

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

A Mother’s Day poem for a woman who cannot have children:

How might one find the strength to will one's fate,
Accepting childlessness with heartfelt grace?
Perhaps no joy can take a child's place.
Perhaps no love can such loss compensate.
Yet one ought not regret one's present state,
Making oneself the self one would erase,
One's identity, with all one would embrace,
The one no other fortune could create.
How beautiful to cherish who you are,
Even your frustration and your yearning,
Reveling each moment in what is,
'Mid joy or pain, the miracle of being.
So might you sometimes sail beyond the bar,
Distant from the restless tidal turning,
And let the wild wind fill you with its bliss,
Yielding to a presence that is freeing.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/howm14.html. For more Mother’s Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/mothersdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Mother’s Day.
May 3: Mothers Never Mind a Little Cuddling
May 4: How Might One Find the Strength to Will One’s Fate

Mothers Never Mind a Little Cuddling

May 3, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Mother’s Day.

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

A Mother’s Day poem about the need to cuddle:

Mothers never mind a little cuddling.
On such sweet moments happiness depends.
There is a melody in mothering
Heard by those long lost in means and ends,
Enduring music that such anguish mends.
Remember, then, to cuddle while there's time,
'Ere the great gates close on innocence,
Severing the soul-cord by design,
Delivering the child to providence,
Adult enough to live behind a fence,
Yet cuddling still where souls still intertwine.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/moth18.html. For more Mother’s Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/mothersdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Mother’s Day.
May 3: Mothers Never Mind a Little Cuddling

How Can Love Hold On So Many Years

May 2, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is anniversaries.

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

A 25th anniversary poem about the beauty of lasting love:

How can love hold on so many years?
A passion lasts, we're told, no more than two.
Pleasure is more rich when passion clears,
Pouring forth from love to love renew.
Years of love can gather to an ocean
That reaches an erratic constancy.
When there's no wind, it seems bereft of motion;
Elated by a breeze, the waves run free.
No love can last unless there is the will.
Tapestries are woven by design.
Years pass and love continues, stronger still
For all the years of labor in each line.
In life, if there is one, then we are blessed,
For whom we can be totally undressed;
Take off our selves and find our spirits fair;
Hunger for sweet love, and it is there.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/howca6.html. For more anniversary poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/anniversarypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Anniversaries.
April 26: Here There Are No Platitudes to Share
April 27: Home Must Be a Daily Re-Creation
April 28: How Beautiful the Blandishments of Spring
April 29: How Beautiful the Light upon the Water
April 30: How Can I Say What Is Too Much for Words
May 1: Is One Month an Anniversary
May 2: How Can Love Hold On So Many Years

Is One Month an Anniversary

May 1, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is anniversaries.

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

An anniversary poem for a one-month anniversary:

Is one month an anniversary?
"Anno," after all, refers to "year."
But in my heart there's such a celebration
That bells must ring! And words? Well, I don't care.

In our lives there will be many years:
The world will turn and turn around our love.
Real anniversaries will come and go,
Yet none could more than this my wild heart move!

I know this cannot be what it might seem:
A perfect song that will not have an end.
It's just the newness makes it seem like spring,
Yet though it age, it will age like wine.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/is1mon.html. For more anniversary poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/anniversarypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Anniversaries.
April 26: Here There Are No Platitudes to Share
April 27: Home Must Be a Daily Re-Creation
April 28: How Beautiful the Blandishments of Spring
April 29: How Beautiful the Light upon the Water
April 30: How Can I Say What Is Too Much for Words
May 1: Is One Month an Anniversary

How Can I Say What Is Too Much for Words

April 30, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is anniversaries.

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

An anniversary poem about how each might know how the other’s love feels:

How can I say what is too much for words?
A rainbow cannot fit into my heart.
Perhaps we should be musical as birds
Perched singing of our love with practiced art.
You cannot taste my happiness, or feel
A little of the chill of your caress.
No word or metaphor can make it real,
Nor song contain the truth I would express.
In my love there are mountains miles high,
Valleys rainbow carpeted, and wide
Enough for clear, still lakes to steal the sky ...
R-R-R-R!!! I cannot tell you what's inside!
So you must turn to what you feel for me,
And read therein my tender rhapsody.
Reach deep, my love, and I will be there, too:
You have me in your heart, as I have you.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/howca2.html. For more anniversary poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/anniversarypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Anniversaries.
April 26: Here There Are No Platitudes to Share
April 27: Home Must Be a Daily Re-Creation
April 28: How Beautiful the Blandishments of Spring
April 29: How Beautiful the Light upon the Water
April 30: How Can I Say What Is Too Much for Words

How Beautiful the Blandishments of Spring

April 28, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is anniversaries.

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

A 3rd anniversary poem about the difficulty in the first few years of adjusting to marriage:

How beautiful the blandishments of spring!
Arrays of passion blooming in the aisles,
Pleasure surfeited with loving lust!
Pain then follows, Eden come undone,
Yielding to what love could not foresee.

Time, yes, time will soon its sweet balm bring.
Hurt rejects; commitment reconciles.
In love, the gilt-edged currency is trust,
Redeeming what has many years to run,
Delivering what looks like destiny.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/howbe3.html. For more anniversary poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/anniversarypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Anniversaries.
April 26: Here There Are No Platitudes to Share
April 27: Home Must Be a Daily Re-Creation
April 28: How Beautiful the Blandishments of Spring

Home Must Be a Daily Re-Creation

April 27, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is anniversaries.

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

An anniversary poem about the interplay between physical homes and love:

Home must be a daily re-creation
As two make whole a space not wholly theirs.
Places are part passion, part sensation,
Pending love to place the charms and chairs.
Yearning can appropriate the earth,
Annexing stone to self and eye to sea;
Nor can the wind bring wandering souls to birth,
Needing love to wake their will-to-be.
In shared dominion domicile sits,
Vestal fires lighting hearth and heart,
Equal reigns derived from equal writs,
Restorations none can tell apart.
So must home be both gift and cherished choice,
An outer bulwark and an inner voice,
Requiring love to work its wonders well,
Yet well worth loving for both pith and shell.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/homemu.html. For more anniversary poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/anniversarypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Anniversaries.
April 26: Here There Are No Platitudes to Share
April 27: Home Must Be a Daily Re-Creation

Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 5

April 25, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Earth Day, which is celebrated on April 22.

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

Part 5 of an Earth Day poem depicting the eventual destruction of the environment and the more environmentally friendly civilization that will follow, inspired by The Fifth World at https://thefifthworld.com/:

Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 5

I dance the dance of the hawk.
I am the hawk, hovering over my prey,
Diving, diving to clutch it in my talons.
I am my prey, struggling to break free,
Knowing the terrible fate that awaits me,
The frightening fall when those talons let go,
The painful shock when I hit the rocks below,
The sharp beak shredding my dead body,
The delicious taste of my meat in the hawk's hungry craw.
And I will hunt and be the prey of others,
Dancing, dancing, in a dance that for this moment
Is completely all that I am.

I ride the wind over a narrow canyon.
A slender radioactive river twists painfully towards the sea.
Below me the canopy stretches from coast to coast,
From pole to pole, green islands in a swollen ocean.
The poisons still seep out of their decaying containers.
The Earth swallows them, embraces them, cooling, cooling,
Healing, healing for the next hundred million years.

At night, above us, the stars once again tell their stories,
Once again guide us on our journeys, reveal their beauty.
Once again our spirits sing in harmony with those around us.
Life itself is music, is dance, is grace, is a thing of beauty,
As it once was, as it is again, as it will remain forever.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/winds5.html. For more poems for Earth Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/earthdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Earth Day.
April 19: One Wishes Earth Were Not So Decimated
April 20: Endless Earths
April 21: Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 1
April 22: Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 2
April 23: Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 3
April 24: Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 4
April 25: Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 5

Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 3

April 23, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Earth Day, which is celebrated on April 22.

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

Part 3 of an Earth Day poem depicting the eventual destruction of the environment and the more environmentally friendly civilization that will follow, inspired by The Fifth World at https://thefifthworld.com/:

Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 3

Eventually, Earth rebelled.
Gates were breached, selves flooded.
None could claim sovereignty, none could deny
That they were droplets in an angry ocean,
Spray that lashed a drowning shore.

Ah! How quickly I became we, and then wee,
Conscious of our inconsequence,
Too late to save the billions of lives
Leveraged by civilization.

Selves, attempting desperately to return to spirits,
Pounded on locked doors, not knowing how to get in.
Too late to learn a lifetime of disciplines, mysteries, rituals,
Of ways of living, loving, speaking, thinking, perceiving;
Too late to become a child again and be nurtured in humility and awe;
Too late to learn that freedom leads to slavery,
While servitude leads to different kinds of freedom.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/winds3.html. For more poems for Earth Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/earthdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Earth Day.
April 19: One Wishes Earth Were Not So Decimated
April 20: Endless Earths
April 21: Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 1
April 22: Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 2
April 23: Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 3

Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 2

April 22, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Earth Day, which is celebrated on April 22.

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

Part 2 of an Earth Day poem depicting the eventual destruction of the environment and the more environmentally friendly civilization that will follow, inspired by The Fifth World at https://thefifthworld.com/:

Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 2

The original sin was the sin of self.
Self sprang from spirit and said:
I am I. I am not you.
From this falsehood came much evil.
Humans claimed dominion over the Earth,
Plowed deep wounds into the land, enslaved animals,
Enslaved their own brothers and sisters.

I am I. I am not you.

They poisoned the Earth for millennia,
Poisons that still leak from their cisterns,
From their white-hot chambers,
From their mounded waste,
From their drowned or buried ruins,
From their long-forgotten hearts.

I am I. I am not you.

Immediately, spirit was struck blind,
Became deaf, became dumb, became silent,
Could no longer hear the words of wolves,
The whispers of wild grain,
The songs of trees,
The passions of wildflowers;
Dwelt alone behind the borders of self,
Cut off from the spirits that surrounded it, besieged it,
From the ocean of spirit that thrashed against its walls,
From the love that waited at its gates.

I am I. I am not you.

But you are us.
You poisoned us,
You poisoned all of us
When you poisoned yourselves.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/winds2.html. For more poems for Earth Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/earthdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Earth Day.
April 19: One Wishes Earth Were Not So Decimated
April 20: Endless Earths
April 21: Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 1
April 22: Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 2

Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 1

April 21, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Earth Day, which is celebrated on April 22.

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

Part 1 of an Earth Day poem depicting the eventual destruction of the environment and the more environmentally friendly civilization that will follow, inspired by The Fifth World at https://thefifthworld.com/:

Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 1

This song is a whisper of wind,
The groan of a tree trunk,
The patter of raindrops on leaves,
The buzz of bees buried in bluebells,
The burst of birdsong at dawn,
The breathless silence of sunset,
The canopy of stars above the canopy of forest
Seen from an outcrop high above the forest floor.

Why song?
The sounds of Earth are beautiful enough.
Why painting?
The flowers are beautiful enough.
Why dance?
The bound of a gazelle is beautiful enough.
Why stories?
Our lives are beautiful enough.

Surrender, surrender, surrender,
And you shall become a spring
Gushing up from the bowels of the earth,
Watering the wild garden of the world.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/winds1.html. For more poems for Earth Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/earthdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Earth Day.
April 19: One Wishes Earth Were Not So Decimated
April 20: Endless Earths
April 21: Windsong for a Healing Earth: Part 1

Endless Earths

April 20, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Earth Day, which is celebrated on April 22.

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

An Earth Day poem imagining our wandering the universe in search of a home once we have ruined the Earth:

Endless Earths! An infinite number spins
Around their suns, full of lusty life,
Revolving islands, with ravenous creatures rife,
The untouched Edens waiting for our sins.
How might we treat them better than our own
Despoiled Earth, once a garden grove,
As, banished to the stars, we restless rove,
Yearning for a place that feels like home.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/endles.html. For more poems for Earth Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/earthdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Earth Day.
April 19: One Wishes Earth Were Not So Decimated
April 20: Endless Earths

One Wishes the Earth Were Not So Decimated

April 19, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Earth Day, which is celebrated on April 22.

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

An Earth Day poem about the environmental damage of overpopulation:

One wishes Earth were not so decimated:
Viscera ripped open, entrails exposed,
Eden stripped bare, over-cultivated,
Returning cash crops as demand explodes.
Poor Earth! Raped and forced to bear the children,
Of whom but few can find milk at her breasts.
Poor children! Forced to wrestle with their brethren,
Undernourished brood of the unblessed.
Let Earth be, O humans! Let her be!
All of you, reduce your numbers now!
The Earth's goods could be shared more equally
If there were wealth enough to go around.
One wishes there were fewer to care more,
Needing less, that time might Earth restore.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/onewi.html. For more poems for Earth Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/earthdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Earth Day.
April 19: One Wishes Earth Were Not So Decimated

Erase My Soul

April 18, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Ramadan, which begins on April 13.

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

A poem for Ramadan and Eid al-Fitr about the peace that comes from erasing oneself through prayer:

Erase my soul and let me be
Invisible as air.
Detain me in Your emptiness
And let me be just prayer.
Let my passion disappear;
Focus well my mind.
Immerse me in infinity
Till at peace I turn to see
Ramadan behind.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/erasem.html. For more poems about Ramadan, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/ramadanpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Ramadan.
April 12: Ramadan Reminds Us that the World
April 13: Rapture Comes Most Easily Within
April 14: Read the Holy Book as Though Asleep
April 15: Reason Is No Cause for Revelation
April 16: Righteousness Remains the Rock of Faith
April 17: Rights Are Not Equivalent to Freedom
April 18: Erase My Soul

Rights Are Not Equivalent to Freedom

April 17, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Ramadan, which begins on April 13.

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

A poem for Ramadan about how the individual shapes and is shaped by society:

Rights are not equivalent to freedom.
All have claims upon the lives of all.
Make yourself a servant of the kingdom,
Acting in the interests of the whole.
Deeds are sermons preached upon the plain
As each from each has much to lose or gain;
Nor is faith the free choice of one soul.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/rights.html. For more poems about Ramadan, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/ramadanpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Ramadan.
April 12: Ramadan Reminds Us that the World
April 13: Rapture Comes Most Easily Within
April 14: Read the Holy Book as Though Asleep
April 15: Reason Is No Cause for Revelation
April 16: Righteousness Remains the Rock of Faith
April 17: Rights Are Not Equivalent to Freedom

Righteousness Remains the Rock of Faith

April 16, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Ramadan, which begins on April 13.

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

A poem for Ramadan about the need for righteous behavior to sustain faith:

Righteousness remains the rock of faith,
As what one does sustains what one believes.
Mere hypocrites might pray, the Prophet saith;
Actions must be words the heart conceives.
Do, then, what acts and rituals are due,
As faith becomes a flame that feeds on you,
No less than as a fire consumes dry leaves.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/righte.html. For more poems about Ramadan, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/ramadanpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Ramadan.
April 12: Ramadan Reminds Us that the World
April 13: Rapture Comes Most Easily Within
April 14: Read the Holy Book as Though Asleep
April 15: Reason Is No Cause for Revelation
April 16: Righteousness Remains the Rock of Faith

Reason Is No Cause for Revelation

April 15, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Ramadan, which begins on April 13.

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

A poem for Ramadan about the need for revelation:

Reason is no cause for revelation.
A moment comes and goes; a word endures.
More than sense must underlie sensation.
A holy mind and heart such faith secures.
Depend, then, on your fasting to awaken
A love of Allah easily forsaken.
Nor is there mooring where one's reason moors.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/reason.html. For more poems about Ramadan, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/ramadanpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Ramadan.
April 12: Ramadan Reminds Us that the World
April 13: Rapture Comes Most Easily Within
April 14: Read the Holy Book as Though Asleep
April 15: Reason Is No Cause for Revelation