There Is No Greater Passion than for Beauty2

January 14, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is for a singer/songwriter.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

There is no greater passion than for beauty --

Ecstasy distilled into a song --

Nor calling more exquisite than the duty

To make our own the truths for which we long.

Here's to you, then! And for what you've done

To be the muse who mirrors well our hearts,

Restoring the lone many to the one

Common love that underlies all arts.

O love of being, bearer of our pain!

Well might we praise the gardeners who bring

Our passions into bloom, that we again

Might hear the sunlit bird within us sing.

Long may you ply what practices you've learned,

Profiting all by artistry you've earned.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/ther27.html. For more poems about professions, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/professionspoems.html .

This week’s theme: Performing Arts

January 8: Feelings Are Not Easily Counterfeited

January 9: Actors Wear a Special Mask

January 10: So You Want to Make Your Living in the Theater

January 11: Hrithik

January 12: Charles

January 13: For You, Life Has Its Own Internal Music

January 14: There Is No Greater Passion than for Beauty

For You, Life Has Its Own Internal Music

January 13, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a number poem about a composer’s inner music.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

For you, life has its own internal music,

One symphony with many variations.

Remember, then, to listen and to hear

The melody, resistant to notation,

Yearning with such grace you can’t refuse it.

Emotions are its subtly blended colors,

Intended to be more than you can bear,

Glory draped in pain, delight in fear.

How beautiful! Too delicate to share,

Though bits and pieces may be heard by others.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/foryo8.html. For more poems about professions, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/professionspoems.html .

This week’s theme: Performing Arts

January 8: Feelings Are Not Easily Counterfeited

January 9: Actors Wear a Special Mask

January 10: So You Want to Make Your Living in the Theater

January 11: Hrithik

January 12: Charles

January 13: For You, Life Has Its Own Internal Music

Charles

January 12, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a humorous, philosophical name poem about the common error of thinking you are in control.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Charles undoes his silver studs.

He then rolls up his sleeves

And waves his arms as honking swans

Rejoice at his decrees.

Long may he wave, the swamp frogs rave,

Each joining in the din,

Singing just for him!

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Performing Arts

January 8: Feelings Are Not Easily Counterfeited

January 9: Actors Wear a Special Mask

January 10: So You Want to Make Your Living in the Theater

January 11: Hrithik

January 12: Charles

Hrithik

January 11, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a name poem for a superstar.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Hrithik lives inside a superstar,

Resolutely relishing his role.

Intensity pours out from every pore,

The screaming fans demanding ever more.

Habit turns charisma into gold.

In every moment Hrithik plants a bar,

Knowing well what goods ought not be sold.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Performing Arts

January 8: Feelings Are Not Easily Counterfeited

January 9: Actors Wear a Special Mask

January 10: So You Want to Make Your Living in the Theater

January 11: Hrithik

So You Want to Make Your Living in the Theater

January 10, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a Hanukkah and name poem about making one’s living in the theater.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

So you want to make your living in the theater!

Easier to burn without oil for eight days!

The point of Hanukkah is that God has his ways.

However ...

And what kind of miracle are you looking for, anyway?

No miracle is going to give you back your life:

Days of dreams, days and nights of despair, years and years

and years of hope...

Living at the heart of creation;

Of all the dry movement, flakes of dead talk,

Retakes, rituals, favors for the files,

Rendering one perfect, sparkling scream ...

A miracle takes a lot of rehearsal.

In between, one works and wonders, wonders and counts the days.

Nodding from exhaustion, one says yes, yes, yes,

Even this, yes, even this ...

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Performing Arts

January 8: Feelings Are Not Easily Counterfeited

January 9: Actors Wear a Special Mask

January 10: So You Want to Make Your Living in the Theater

Actors Wear a Special Mask

January 9, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is about how actors reveal themselves while pretending to be someone else.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Actors wear a special mask:

One that's most revealing.

When they pretend they're someone else

They hang themselves to dry.

The tears and screams they've made their task

Leave nothing for concealing.

Each wound must bleed again, or else

The audience won't cry.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Performing Arts

January 8: Feelings Are Not Easily Counterfeited

January 9: Actors Wear a Special Mask

Feelings Are Not Easily Counterfeited

January 8, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a number poem about how actors might convincingly capture a character’s feelings.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Feelings are not easily counterfeited.

In each there is a telltale watermark.

Faces may emote, the tense brows knitted,

The eyes and anguish may be finely fitted,

Yet audiences sense the missing spark.

The trick is not to be, but to become,

Here within a moment yet to be.

Remember that the whole is not the sum.

Each soul has depths no character can plumb;

Each word's a window onto mystery.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Performing Arts

January 8: Feelings Are Not Easily Counterfeited

Fly upon Imaginary Wings

January 7, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is epiphany, both for the holiday that was celebrated yesterday, January 6^th, and in the sense of any sudden insight or perception of meaning.

Today’s poem is a number poem about epiphanies that seem to come from an alien voice within.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Fly upon imaginary wings

Over every dark and windswept storm.

Rise above all turbulence and harm

To where the white-robed angels praises sing,

Yearning for eternal peace and joy.

Even as the winds your worlds destroy,

In you there is an alien voice, and calm,

Giving forth the word that rapture brings:

Holy, holy is all life and death!

There is a paradise within each breath.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: New Year’s/Epiphany

January 1: Happiness Is Something that One Settles for

January 2: Joy Leaves a Bit of Wonder in Its Wake

January 3: There Is Much Pleasure in the Love of Learning

January 4: Cyberspace, Silent Space

January 5: You Think You Can Just Dive into the Sky

January 6: Each Year Again the Gifts Are Given Gladly

January 7: Fly upon Imaginary Wings

Each Year Again the Gifts Are Given Gladly

January 6, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is epiphany, both for the holiday that is celebrated today, January 6^th, and in the sense of any sudden insight or perception of meaning.

Today’s poem is a poem for Epiphany about the meaning of gifts.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Each year again the gifts are given gladly,

Perhaps because one wants to be a gift.

In goods there can be good, yet sometimes, sadly,

People get the thing but not the drift.

How could the wise men come without a token,

A gift to give the child, new born a king?

Nor could their words speak as their gifts had spoken,

Yielding love incarnate in a thing.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: New Year’s/Epiphany

January 1: Happiness Is Something that One Settles for

January 2: Joy Leaves a Bit of Wonder in Its Wake

January 3: There Is Much Pleasure in the Love of Learning

January 4: Cyberspace, Silent Space

January 5: You Think You Can Just Dive into the Sky

January 6: Each Year Again the Gifts Are Given Gladly

You Think You Can Just Dive into the Sky

January 5, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is epiphany, both for the holiday that falls on January 6^th and in the sense of any sudden insight or perception of meaning.

Today’s poem is about the wonderful arrogance of thinking you can have epiphanies.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

You think you can just dive into the sky,

Wake up bluebells with a sunny smile,

Explode like a nebula, devour light like a black hole.

You think, just because you are motionless,

Time falls through you,

And your imagination has the reach of God.

You think, whirling like a meteorite towards death,

Incandescent with the loveliness of an April morning,

You can, even for a moment, be eternal.

You think that just because you can think these things,

You can be these things, that poetry is truth,

And that you, tiny insignificant you, can just dive into the sky.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/youth2.html. For more philosophical poems, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: New Year’s/Epiphany

January 1: Happiness Is Something that One Settles for

January 2: Joy Leaves a Bit of Wonder in Its Wake

January 3: There Is Much Pleasure in the Love of Learning

January 4: Cyberspace, Silent Space

January 5: You Think You Can Just Dive into the Sky

Cyberspace, Silent Space

January 4, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is epiphany, both for the holiday that falls on January 6^th and in the sense of any sudden insight or perception of meaning.

Today’s poem is a philosophical poem about the epiphanies that surround us.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Cyberspace, silent space;

Outer, inner sense of place.

Current with the human race;

The Infinite’s imagined face.

All the world in one’s embrace;

All existence in each trace.

Time goes on; one keeps apace;

Time stops, and one is filled with grace.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: New Year’s/Epiphany

January 1: Happiness Is Something that One Settles for

January 2: Joy Leaves a Bit of Wonder in Its Wake

January 3: There Is Much Pleasure in the Love of Learning

January 4: Cyberspace, Silent Space

There Is Much Pleasure in the Love of Learning

January 3, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is epiphany, both for the holiday that falls on January 6^th and in the sense of any sudden insight or perception of meaning.

Today’s poem is a number poem for a twelve-year-old about the epiphanies that come from learning.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

There is much pleasure in the love of learning,

When all the world unfolds before your eyes.

Each new thing that you can know or do

Leaves you with a greater sense of you.

Vistas come before you undisguised,

Each with insights churning, turning, burning.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/ther41.html. For more poems to children, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/childrenpoems.html .

This week’s theme: New Year’s/Epiphany

January 1: Happiness Is Something that One Settles for

January 2: Joy Leaves a Bit of Wonder in Its Wake

January 3: There Is Much Pleasure in the Love of Learning

Joy Leaves a Bit of Wonder in Its Wake

January 2, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is epiphany, both for the holiday that falls on January 6^th and in the sense of any sudden insight or perception of meaning.

Today’s poem is a philosophical name poem about capturing the wonder of joy through art.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Joy leaves a bit of wonder in its wake,

A sliver of silence, celibate and bright.

Some would sell their souls to get it right;

Others such ambition would forsake,

Not willing to pursue so chaste a light.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: New Year’s/Epiphany

January 1: Happiness Is Something that One Settles For

January 2: Joy Leaves a Bit of Wonder in Its Wake

Happiness Is Something That One Settles for:

January 1, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is epiphany, both for the holiday that falls on January 6^th and in the sense of any sudden insight or perception of meaning. But since New Year’s Day falls on a Monday this year, we’ll have one more New Year’s poem for today and then begin the theme of epiphany tomorrow.

Today’s poem is a New Year’s poem about happiness and time.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Happiness is something that one settles for

After the ups and downs of ecstasy.

Perhaps one doesn't know what one is looking for;

Perhaps one doesn't realize one is free.

Year's end is time to tally up the tentacles,

Needing an occasion to take stock.

Everywhere are angels singing canticles

Well beyond the confines of the clock.

Years, no more than seconds, are but moments,

Each eternity again, again.

All live on the wheel of joys and torments,

Returning to the ramparts of the wind.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/happ23.html. For more poems for the New Year, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/newyearsdaypoems.html .

This week’s theme: New Year’s/Epiphany

January 1: Happiness Is Something that One Settles for

Here Again We Have a New Beginning

December 31, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is new beginnings, in honor of the New Year.

Today’s poem is a New Year’s poem about beginning repeatedly at the start of each new year.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Here again we have a new beginning,

An old refrain to start a brand-new verse.

Perhaps the belly droops, the hair is thinning;

Perhaps each year the memory gets worse.

Yet new beginnings always start with hope,

Needing hope to nurture innocence,

Endeavoring to find a way to cope

When nothing deeply thought about makes sense.

Years come and go; Eden doesn’t change.

Each new year we toddle forth again,

Afoot into a world that’s ever strange,

Restored by some great turning tide within.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Christmas/New Beginnings

December 25: Christmas Is a Song of Joy and Love

December 26: Iven Lee

December 27: Sixty-Six3

December 28: Fifty-Two4

December 29: Thirteen2

December 30: Welcome to Our Family

December 31: Here Again We Have a New Beginning

Welcome to Our Family

December 30, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is new beginnings, in honor of the New Year.

Today’s poem welcomes a newborn into his or her adoptive family.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Welcome to our family,

Dear child of our hearts!

Welcome to the bond of love

Of which you now are part.

Welcome to our waiting arms

That will your world enfold.

Welcome to our way of life

That will your future mold.

Welcome to our hopes and dreams,

Our faults and foibles, too,

For some of our soul-seeds, hand sown,

Will bear sweet fruit in you.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/welco5.html. For more poems about adoption, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/adoptionpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Christmas/New Beginnings

December 25: Christmas Is a Song of Joy and Love

December 26: Iven Lee

December 27: Sixty-Six3

December 28: Fifty-Two4

December 29: Thirteen2

December 30: Welcome to Our Family

Thirteen2

December 29, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is new beginnings, in honor of the New Year.

Today’s poem is a number poem for someone about to enter adolescence.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Thirteen is a very lucky age!

Hope runs strong as brand-new powers emerge.

In thought and feeling one has turned a page,

Revealing childish pleasures one would purge.

The future is a large and empty room,

Easy enough to furnish with one’s dreams!

Eventually, one’s brightest flowers will bloom.

Now best friends forever share their schemes.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/52d.html. For more number poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/numberpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Christmas/New Beginnings

December 25: Christmas Is a Song of Joy and Love

December 26: Iven Lee

December 27: Sixty-Six3

December 28: Fifty-Two4

December 29: Thirteen2

Fifty-Two4

December 28, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is new beginnings, in honor of the New Year.

Today’s poem is a number poem for someone about to begin a new career.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Fifty-two is ready to begin,

Invested in a new and bright career.

Futures are incorrigibly uncertain,

Tending to inspire both hope and fear.

Yet she finds the wherewithal within.

There is neither lock nor code nor curtain

Where her source of strength has always been,

Open to whoever would come near.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/52d.html. For more number poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/numberpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Christmas/New Beginnings

December 25: Christmas Is a Song of Joy and Love

December 26: Iven Lee

December 27: Sixty-Six3

December 28: Fifty-Two4

Sixty-Six3

December 27, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is new beginnings, in honor of the New Year.

Today’s poem is a number poem for someone just recently retired.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Sixty-six is happily retired,

Immersed in interests she has long enjoyed.

X-ray well her will and you will find

That none of its resolve has been destroyed.

Yet now a bit less shuffling is required.

So has her leisure left her spirit buoyed,

In labor lost, but of a different kind,

Xerophyte in bloom, by grace inspired.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/66c.html. For more number poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/numberpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Christmas/New Beginnings

December 25: Christmas Is a Song of Joy and Love

December 26: Iven Lee

December 27: Sixty-Six3

Iven Lee

December 26, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is new beginnings, in honor of the New Year.

Today’s poem is a name poem for new-born child who has been named for someone else.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Iven Lee's a newborn,

Very much adored.

Each soul just coming through the door,

Named for one who came before,

Lives within a chord,

Each note from some heart torn,

Each motion something more.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Christmas/New Beginnings

December 25: Christmas Is a Song of Joy and Love

December 26: Iven Lee

Christmas Is a Song of Joy and Love

December 25, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. Since Christmas falls on a Monday this year, we’ll have one more Christmas poem for today and then begin the theme of new beginnings tomorrow, in honor of the New Year.

Today’s poem is a Christmas poem to a child about the importance of giving at Christmas.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Christmas is a song of joy and love,

However it is sung, however rendered,

Rich source of childhood pleasures that will prove

In later life a lesson long remembered.

So may you share the joys of Christmas time,

Though still a child, by giving more and more,

Making child and adult combine

As slowly, slowly you approach that door,

Surer of what giving might be for.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/chris4.html. For more Christmas poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/christmaspoems.html .

This week’s theme: Christmas/New Beginnings

December 25: Christmas Is a Song of Joy and Love

Crazy Christmas

December 24, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Christmas, which is celebrated tomorrow, on December 25. Tonight is Christmas Eve.

Today’s poem is a Christmas poem to a child about joining in the angels’ song.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Crazy Christmas! Angels falling

Down like snowflakes from the sky.

Hear their joyful calling, calling

Each to each as they go by.

“Peace on Earth! Good will to all!”

They sing on this cold Christmas Eve.

Oh, my child, heed their call,

And in Creation’s good believe.

For angels know far more than we,

And every word they say is true.

So with them join in joyfully,

And sing to them, as they to you.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Christmas

December 18: Come to Christmas with Clean Hands and Heart

December 19: Myths Are Our Immortal Mentors

December 20: Everyone Loves Christmas

December 21: Maybe There’s No Magic in the Morning

December 22: Maybe Christmas Means a Little Less

December 23: Christmas Should Be Always in One’s Heart

December 24: Crazy Christmas

Christmas Should Be Always in One's Heart

December 23, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Christmas, which is celebrated on December 25.

Today’s poem is a Christmas poem about how the beauty of Christmas can make life an angel’s song.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Christmas should be always in one’s heart,

Home for joys one never should outgrow,

Rich memories, a source of inner art,

Implanted in whatever one might know.

Sing, then, a melody of joy and love,

Twin columns holding up the holiday,

Making life, however it might prove,

A song of angels sung by mortal clay

So sweetly it seems all one needs to say.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/chris3.html. For more Christmas poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/christmaspoems.html .

This week’s theme: Christmas

December 18: Come to Christmas with Clean Hands and Heart

December 19: Myths Are Our Immortal Mentors

December 20: Everyone Loves Christmas

December 21: Maybe There’s No Magic in the Morning

December 22: Maybe Christmas Means a Little Less

December 23: Christmas Should Be Always in One’s Heart

Maybe Christmas Means a Little Less

December 22, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Christmas, which is celebrated on December 25.

Today’s poem is a Christmas poem to an older child, urging him or her to keep Christmas alive within.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Maybe Christmas means a little less

Each year as the enchantment wears away.

Remember that one key to happiness

Remains the joy one feels on Christmas Day.

Years of faith in Santa Claus became

Childhood’s best encouragement to dream,

Having given fantasy a name

Real enough to seem to more than seem.

In memories of wonder, awe, and pleasure,

Sustained by celebrations every year,

There’s a magic one might always treasure,

Making one’s delight seem far more dear.

As childhood fades, let Christmas not fade, too,

So that its joy can still reside in you.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Christmas

December 18: Come to Christmas with Clean Hands and Heart

December 19: Myths Are Our Immortal Mentors

December 20: Everyone Loves Christmas

December 21: Maybe There’s No Magic in the Morning

December 22: Maybe Christmas Means a Little Less

Maybe There's No Magic to the Morning

December 21, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Christmas, which is celebrated on December 25.

Today’s poem is a Christmas poem about the child’s Christmas surviving in the adult.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Maybe there’s no magic to the morning.

Eventually, life’s a losing game.

Rituals go stale with little warning.

Revelation shrivels to a name.

Yet once each moment was a miracle.

Christmas touched the unsuspecting heart,

Home and Heaven equally empirical,

Reality a play of sense and art.

In everyone that child is still dreaming,

Still living in a world shaped by desire.

Truth is not the fruit of sense but meaning,

More varied than one’s reason might require.

As sunlight gleams according to one’s view,

So may the magic of this day touch you.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/mayb16.html. For more Christmas poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/christmaspoems.html .

This week’s theme: Christmas

December 18: Come to Christmas with Clean Hands and Heart

December 19: Myths Are Our Immortal Mentors

December 20: Everyone Loves Christmas

December 21: Maybe There’s No Magic in the Morning

Everyone Loves Christmas

December 20, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Christmas, which is celebrated on December 25.

Today’s poem is a Christmas poem for children about how all the animals love Christmas.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Everyone loves Christmas,

Even flies and fleas,

Even seals and snakes and snails,

Beavers, bats, and bees.

Elephants love Christmas,

And hamsters, horses, hares,

Penguins, parrots, porpoises,

Belugas, bedbugs, bears.

Don't you just love Christmas?

All the world's at peace.

Wolves lie down with walruses

While goats give gifts to geese.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Christmas

December 18: Come to Christmas with Clean Hands and Heart

December 19: Myths Are Our Immortal Mentors

December 20: Everyone Loves Christmas

Myths Are Our Immortal Mentors

December 19, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Christmas, which is celebrated on December 25.

Today’s poem is a Christmas poem about the significance of myth in shaping our lives.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Myths are our immortal mentors,

Each a sculptor of the heart,

Residing at life’s moral center,

Reigning long through love and art.

Years and generations pass,

Christmas lovingly passed on.

Holidays are made to last,

Renewing what might else be gone.

Inevitably, passions pale,

Souls turn skeptical, and yet

The tales of childhood prevail,

Myths too vivid to forget.

Adults might still, or not, believe

Stories whose lost glow they grieve.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Christmas

December 18: Come to Christmas with Clean Hands and Heart

December 19: Myths Are Our Immortal Mentors

Come to Christmas with Clean Hands and Heart

December 18, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Christmas, which is celebrated on December 25.

Today’s poem is a Christmas poem about making Christmas joyful both without and within.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Come to Christmas with clean hands and heart,

Having dressed appropriately within,

Ready happily to play your part

In making Christmas joyful yet again.

Sing the ancient melodies that bring

To life the season’s harmony and peace.

Maybe you’ll with friends and family sing,

As for one moment want and worry cease

So that your love for living might take wing.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Christmas

December 18: Come to Christmas with Clean Hands and Heart

Happy, Happy Hanukkah

December 17, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is light and darkness, in honor of Hanukkah, the Jewish Festival of Lights, which began on December 12.

Today’s poem is a Hanukkah poem comparing the soul to a Hanukkah candle.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Happy, Happy Hanukkah!

As candles dance with light,

Now watch them on the window sill

Undo a bit of night.

Know that you're a candle, too,

Kindled by a flame

Alight with love, the Holy One,

Ha-Shem, which means, The Name.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/happ81.html. For more Hanukkah poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/chanukahpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Light and Darkness

December 11: Have a Happy Hanukkah

December 12: Bless the Darkness, Bless the Light

December 13: Can One Celebrate a Miracle

December 14: Being in Eternity and Time

December 15: How Beautiful the Hanukkah Lights

December 16: Be Comfortable with Doubt, with Death, with Darkness

December 17: Happy, Happy Hanukkah

Be Comfortable with Doubt, with Death, with Darkness

December 16, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is light and darkness, in honor of Hanukkah, the Jewish Festival of Lights, which began on December 12.

Today’s poem is about how love is an eternity within time, even though every flame must burn out.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Be comfortable with doubt, with death, with darkness.

One’s candle will inevitably burn out.

No miracle can make it last forever,

Nor keep two souls eternally together.

In life there is but one way things turn out.

Embrace it, then, in all its senseless starkness.

Sing of life in all its poignant starkness,

Equally of light and gentle darkness,

The timeless end, however time turns out,

Here, where every holy lamp burns out.

Each finds greater happiness together.

Love is a redaction of forever.

In loving one is for a time forever,

Zen-like in one’s sense of senseless starkness,

Aware that one is one, and that together

Both are singly subject to the darkness,

Embracing still a soul that will burn out,

Touched by love, however things turn out,

Having loved, however things turn out.

Given, one will not exist forever

And like a Hanukkah candle will burn out,

Burning beautifully against life’s starkness,

Radiant dancer lighting up the darkness.

In love and longing, dancers dance together,

Each flame more bright and beautiful together,

Loving life however it turns out,

A miracle of light upon the darkness.

Nor need one need more time to taste forever,

Despite the naked truth in all its starkness,

Knowing that in time all flames burn out,

Eventually that even stars burn out.

Now is forever. The only forever. Together

Now is together forever. Life ends in starkness,

And yet one’s time is timeless, it turns out.

Eternity is now. One lives forever,

Light infinite upon a sea of darkness,

Lighting darkness still. Though lights turn out,

Each was still is. Forever is. Together

Now burning out of love amid life’s starkness.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Light and Darkness

December 11: Have a Happy Hanukkah

December 12: Bless the Darkness, Bless the Light

December 13: Can One Celebrate a Miracle

December 14: Being in Eternity and Time

December 15: How Beautiful the Hanukkah Lights

December 16: Be Comfortable with Doubt, with Death, with Darkness

How Beautiful the Hanukkah Lights

December 15, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is light and darkness, in honor of Hanukkah, the Jewish Festival of Lights, which began on December 12.

Today’s poem is about how the Hanukkah lights are sustained by being rekindled every year.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

How beautiful the Hanukkah lights,

All aglow on winter nights!

Nine candles dancing, dancing down

Until no trace of flame is found.

Knowing they will be again

Kindled to remember when

A miracle such fire sustained

Helps keep alive the inner flame.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/howbe5.html. For more Hanukkah poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/chanukahpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Light and Darkness

December 11: Have a Happy Hanukkah

December 12: Bless the Darkness, Bless the Light

December 13: Can One Celebrate a Miracle

December 14: Being in Eternity and Time

December 15: How Beautiful the Hanukkah Lights