Happiness Is Wholly in One's Power

December 26, 2013 #769

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a poem for New Year’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

Happiness is wholly in one's power
As one provides the chords to fit the tune,
Pleased to play sweet music by the hour,
Pleased to harmonize one's passing gloom.
Yet there are days demanding dissonance,
Needing harsh accompaniment to pain.
Embrace them, then, and give them resonance,
With brass enough to brighten a refrain.
Years are symphonies of varied mood,
Each sketched out by fate, filled in by you.
As the woodwinds dance, the basses brood,
Resolved in beauty – crafted, yes, but true.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLeU9VVDS4M.

Melodies of Christmas Wait All Year

December 19, 2013 #768

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a Christmas 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

Melodies of Christmas wait all year,
Eager to renew their joyous song,
Ready to transmit infectious cheer,
Restive after resting all year long.
Yet when they finally fill the crisp, cold air,
Caroling across the crowded streets,
Harmonies one cannot help but share,
Resonant with rhymes the heart repeats,
Instantly, it seems, the season ends,
So soon the sounds of celebration fade.
The family gatherings and time with friends
Make way as cold, dark everydays invade.
Alas, the melodies' brief hour has fled!
Sleep well, sweet carols, through the year ahead.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at http://youtu.be/TP-LdXS1lW8.

Seasons Sing in Four-Part Harmony

December 12, 2013 #767

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a Seasons Greetings 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

Seasons sing in four-part harmony,
Ending with a coda full of light,
A hymn to joy upon a long, cold night,
Shining like a candle annually.
Of course, they don't sing simultaneously,
Nor can one without love hear them aright,
Singing through the blessings and the blight,
Glad tidings joined imaginatively.
Rejoice, then, as the angels do, in music,
Even in your silence full of song.
Every season has its canticle
That fits into the glory of the whole.
Infinity is yours, if you would choose it,
Nestled into moments short and long,
Grace embedded in each miracle
Singing to the senses of the soul.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

And These Are the Islands

December 5, 2013 #766

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is a poem for the victims of Typhoon Haiyan.

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

And these are the islands, tiny green drops
On the broad bright blue canvas of tropical seas.
And these are the great white wheels spinning like tops,

Swallowing mountains as the sea swallows rocks,
Swallowing churches and children and trees,
Swallowing islands like tiny green drops

With their warehouses, schoolhouses, dollhouses, shops,
With their dreams and intentions and sweet fantasies,
All smashed by the great white wheels spinning like tops

That gorge on the profits of energy stocks
And the fumes of our lust for convenience and ease,
Heedless of islands like tiny green drops

And the people who live on them tending their crops
Or working in offices, homes, factories,
Devoured by monsters spinning like tops

In a line of disasters no tragedy stops
Despite the raw poignance of powerless pleas …
And these are the islands, tiny green drops.
And these are the great white wheels spinning like tops.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at http://youtu.be/pskpL9Jv9pM.

Best Believe in Miracles

November 28, 2013 #765

Dear Subscriber:

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

Best believe in miracles!
One need not be a fuelless flame,
Nor come to Earth as Jesus came,
Nor be unnatural, for we
Indeed all miracles must be,
Each of us unfathomable.

Some think we are fathomable,
Eliminating miracles,
Though that quite clearly cannot be,
Hosting, as we do, the flame,
Each on fire as dancing we
Like God's first light from darkness came.
Into life we lilting came,
Zestful, frail, unfathomable,
Amazed at everything, as we
Believed all things were miracles
Except what was – that inner flame
That must unfueled forever be,
Having lit all things that be.

Glad to come when we first came
Alight with the eternal flame,
Blessed with gifts unfathomable,
Rich in daily miracles,
Innately loving, longing, we
Embraced what seemed as real as we,
Lending life to all that be,
And all around were miracles.
Nor were we skeptics when we came,
Determined to be fathomable,
Knowing fuel accounts for flame,
Even so-called fuelless flame,
No longer needing faith as we,
Now fathoming the unfathomable,
Adult, aware, alone would be.

Even so, in love we came,
Living proof of miracles.
Like the miracle whose flame
Endured eight days, we kindled came,
Nor could be less unfathomable.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at http://youtu.be/OsfbM9fFSTA.

The Point Is What You Have, Not What You Don't

November 21, 2013 #764

Dear Subscriber:

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

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

The point is what you have, not what you don't.
How can you be happy when you won't?
All of us at times are angry, sad,
Nervous, testy, thinking we've been had,
Knowing life for others turned out better,
Sure that in most dealings we're the debtor.
Granted, granted. But fortune is a choice
In which you find your music and your voice,
Vividly in tune with what you see
If you would live your life harmoniously.
None can choose acceptance without seeing
Gifts that come unsought from simply being.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite the poem on YouTube at http://youtu.be/n-rvvcunRms.

How Lovely to Live as Marriage Intends

November 14, 2013 #763

Dear Subscriber:

This week’s poem of the week is an anniversary 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

How lovely to live
As marriage intends:
Partners in pleasure,
Passionate friends!
Years come and go;
The story goes on:
Work, will, and wonder,
Each day too soon gone.
None could know better
Truths that all know:
In well-tended joy
Each embraces the woe
That, shared, finds what solace
Hearts can bestow.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Watch me recite this poem on YouTube at http://youtu.be/lHmbgALLMh8.