Labor Is Identity

August 29, 2013 #752

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a poem for Labor 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

Labor is identity
As one is what one does.
Beware the work that will not sculpt
One into what one would.
Remember well the bunko bees,
Defined by work that is
Awash in ugliness and guilt,
Yielding little good.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at http://youtu.be/QhzcumHl0jI.

Sing of Who and Where and What You Are

August 22, 2013 #751

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a birthday number 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/week.html.

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Sing of who and where and what you are
In celebration of your day of birth!
X marks the moment you came into being,
The start of your identity on Earth.
Yet one still yearns to see beyond the bar.

The mystery is never more or less.
Here must be a miracle, and now;
Reality's a miracle, and seeing
Each moment come and go, as years allow,
Even as you sing, and being bless!

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at http://youtu.be/7qAFeLVMWOg.

Agatha

August 15, 2013 #750

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a name 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/week.html.

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Agatha is plain, old-fashioned good --
Giving, caring, loving, generous, kind.
A person doesn't get that way by chance,
Though much can be explained by circumstance.
Her will remains the servant of her mind
As she molds what character she would.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at http://youtu be/Nkse9uVGx8I.

Each Fast Is like a Cleansing of the Soul

August 8, 2013 #749

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a poem for Eid al-Fitr.

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

Each fast is like a cleansing of the soul
In which one's thoughts are purified by prayer,
Deepened by connection to the whole
As one becomes somehow more simply there.
Leaving the sweet holiday behind,
Families feast to bid it fond farewell.
If Ramadan rewards the heart and mind,
The feast rewards the long-neglected shell
Returning to the palace of the wind.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at  http://youtu.be/2kus4XznEFw.

What Can I Do to Keep You from Despair

August 1, 2013 #748

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a poem about mental illness.

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

What can I do to keep you from despair?
You turn from me with darkness in your heart.
It doesn't seem to matter that I'm there,

Or how much more or less I show I care
Once the suicidal drumbeats start.
What can I do to keep you from despair?

Life itself seems what you cannot bear
For reasons that no reasoning can chart.
It doesn't seem to matter that I'm there,

Or that I try to make each day seem fair
With all my passionate will and bumbling art.
What can I do to keep you from despair?

I try my best to love you well, and share
With you your pain, and take your part.
It doesn't seem to matter that I'm there.

There is a stranger who takes over where
There was a friend – loving, playful, smart.
What can I do to keep you from despair?
It doesn't seem to matter that I'm there.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at http://youtu.be/3bPqXnNsXHw .

Death Is a Deliverer

July 25, 2013 #747

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a poem about death.

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

From fierce and pointless pain,
From drugged-out days and nauseous nights
One would not see again;

From life whose only passion is
To free itself from life,
Eternally anesthetized,
Numb to need or knife;

From desperate dependence
And gross indignity,
Lying in the cesspool
Of one's own shit and pee;

From being a non-person
Whose person is abused,
Dethroned from even one's own brain,
Perpetually confused.

Yet though one would no longer be,
The instinct is not gone:
The heart and mind are all for death;
The body lingers on.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at http://youtu.be/ANJh18RKkQs .

I Love My Little Teddy Bear

July 18, 2013 #746

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a poem for children.

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

I love my little teddy bear.
I want to take him everywhere.
His arms are always open and
He has to sit, he cannot stand.

He's always smiling when we play
And says whatever I would say.
I take him by an arm or ear
Or leg, whichever one is near,
And carry him around with me,
And sit him down upon my knee,
Or hug him when I go to bed
And put my head beside his head.

He has a little rip inside
His armpit, which my mommy tried
To sew, but it keeps opening.
My mommy said my dad would bring
A new one home, but I said no,
I wanted this one, even though
He may be old, a little worn,
And delicate where he is torn.

I will be gentle with him, for
I would not want to tear him more.
Tell me, those who urge his end:
Would you throw away a friend?

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HaOs9yVwX9Q .