A Valentine Is Nothing Like

February 14, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Valentine’s Day, which is celebrated on February 14.

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

A Valentine’s Day poem about what a Valentine is, and is not, like:

A Valentine is nothing like
A chocolate or a rose.
For in a week these shall be gone,
But Valentines remain.

If love were always sweet to tongue
Or fragrant to the nose,
Each day would be like Valentine's,
And we would go insane.

A Valentine just hangs around
Waiting to be kissed
Long after special days have passed
And every days are here.

So one is wise to choose one well
And chocolates to resist.
For in the midst of mania
It's nice to have one near.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Valentine’s Day.
February 8: Hunger Is an Organ Tone
February 9: Although Our Love Is Over, It Remains
February 10: Be with Us in the Circle of Our Love
February 11: Blessed Are Those Who Cherish Well Their Loves
February 12: Carrie Is My Valentine
February 13: From a Secret Admirer
February 14: A Valentine Is Nothing Like

Blessed Are Those Who Cherish Well Their Loves

February 11, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Valentine’s Day, which is celebrated on February 14.

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

A Valentine’s Day poem about the importance of cherishing one’s love:

Blessed are those who cherish well their loves!
Each enduring love is like a river:
Making bloom the land through which it moves,
Yielding bounty in exchange for labor.
Very few appreciate this treasure,
As most desire more while giving less,
Liable to miss joy pursuing pleasure,
Each dragged into love under duress.
Nor does one understand so easily
That love requires one to be a lover:
Intimate in ways that set one free,
Needing for one's sense of self the other,
Even as one is oneself an other.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/bless3.html. For more Valentine’s Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/valentinesdaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Valentine’s Day.
February 8: Hunger Is an Organ Tone
February 9: Although Our Love Is Over, It Remains
February 10: Be with Us in the Circle of Our Love
February 11: Blessed Are Those Who Cherish Well Their Loves

Be with Us in the Circle of Our Love

February 10, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Valentine’s Day, which is celebrated on February 14.

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

A Valentine’s Day poem from a group to a stranger who is alone:

Be with us in the circle of our love,
Even if by chance you are alone.
Our greetings will, we hope, propitious prove,
Uniting our good wishes with your own.
Remember there are those who think of you,
Vested in the will to be a friend.
As distant hills give depth to what we view,
Let these distant words new vistas send.
Each life is lived behind a sheltering veil,
Not lifted but for love. Yet when we will,
There is a wind that shifts the curtain frail,
Invading with kind thoughts the spirit still.
Now may we all enjoy this special time,
Each to each a new-found Valentine.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Valentine’s Day.
February 8: Hunger Is an Organ Tone
February 9: Although Our Love Is Over, It Remains
February 10: Be with Us in the Circle of Our Love

Although Our Love Is Over, It Remains

February 9, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Valentine’s Day, which is celebrated on February 14.

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

A Valentine’s Day poem to a former lover:

Although our love is over, it remains
An unfrequented garden in my heart,
Its beauty quite inseparable from pain,
A wilderness where once was willful art.

I hope a little piece of you is still
Reserved for me, a place you may not go,
But where my room, untenanted, can fill
A moment with my music, sweet and slow.

There are no wishes like a former lover's
That from the dark, repentant night must shine.
And so though we have both moved on to others,
I send you from afar this Valentine.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/altho3.html. For more Valentine’s Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/valentinesdaypoems.html .

This week’s theme: Valentine’s Day.
February 8: Hunger Is an Organ Tone
February 9: Although Our Love Is Over, It Remains

Hunger Is an Organ Tone

February 8, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Valentine’s Day, which is celebrated on February 14.

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

A Valentine’s Day poem about the ubiquity of longing:

Hunger is an organ tone,
A single note sustained
Perhaps until one is before
Paradise arraigned.
Yearning doesn't end with love,
Vintner of despair.
All the love one can conceive
Leaves some longing there.
Even in one's lover's arms,
Needing nothing more,
There's a void within the heart
Increasing loss with store.
Nor can one love but feel that pang,
Empty at its core.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Valentine’s Day.
February 8: Hunger Is an Organ Tone

Poem of the Week

February 9, 2012 #671

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a poem for Valentine's Day.

You can hear me read the poem and listen to the music for it at my site by going to http://www.poemsforfree.com/week.html .

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Verities are strangely often true.
A lifelong love needs words, as faith needs prayer.
Let me, then, retell my love for you,
Each word alive with what is always there.
Nowhere else can passion be at ease,
Temptation without fear of consequence,
Instinct whose sole purpose is to please,
Nakedness made safe by innocence.
Even in the midst of work and worry,
'Mid doubts and disappointments, I am sure,
Surviving through the avarice and hurry,
Decent and restrained, is something pure.
As I am yours, so I know you're mine.
You are my love, my joy, my valentine.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Poem of the Week

February 12, 2009 #519

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a Valentine's Day poem.

You can hear me read the poem and listen to the music for it at my site by going to http://www.poemsforfree.com and clicking on "Poem of the Week." You can also cast a vote for it to boost its popularity on Yahoo Buzz.

You can post a comment on the poem or read other comments on it at http://nicholasgordon.blogspot.com.

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Some might think, perhaps, that I'm not pleased
At how you've trivialized my name and day.
In fact, I think romantic love's one way
New recruits for paradise are seized.
True, the object is the kind that's squeezed.
Very well! We're flesh, and though we may
Awaken first to lust, at last love's play
Leads us to redemption by degrees.
Each soul must find its way from love to Love,
Needing love, beside itself with need,
Though through pride reluctant to give in.
In cards and flowers, chocolate hearts, and such,
None but must recite love's gentle creed,
Each proclaiming tenderness within.

© by Nicholas Gordon