Seventy-Four

April 11, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is aging: the changes in perspective, health, wisdom, and satisfaction.

Today’s poem is a number poem about the change in perspective that comes with reaching 74.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Seventy-four savors his sweet time.

Each day is more a gift than was the last.

Vested less in things he has to do,

Even though he still has quite a few,

Now he sometimes lingers in the past,

Taking in the music of a vast

Yearning that no memory can define.

Fortune is now more a windward view

On which he looks nostalgically, a sign

Unquestionable that he has crossed a line,

Reaching back for what he once reached to.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/74.html. For more number poems, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/numberpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Aging.

April 11: Seventy-Four

Thirty-Three4

April 10, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a number poem for a woman who is good friends with herself.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Thirty-three is OK on her own,

Having found a bit of peace alone.

In love and friendship she prefers some space,

Returning happily to her own place,

The sanctum that her clarity confirms.

Yet she mingles well on her own terms.

To be alone does not mean to be lonely.

Happiness does not come coupled only.

Reveling in the simple fact she's free,

Each day she's with a friend whom she calls “me,”

Even as time tugs at her heart, though gently.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/33d.html. For more number poems, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/numberpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Friendship.

April 4: I Don’t Want You to Think that You Must Do

April 5: Sixty-Five

April 6: For Most of Us Life Passes like a Dream

April 7: Courtney

April 8: I Don’t Understand What Happened to Us

April 9: May Our Friendship Last Forever

April 10: Thirty-Three

May Our Friendship Last Forever

April 9, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem wishes a friendship could last forever.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

May our friendship last forever;

May I sail upon your sea.

May we go through life together;

May there always be a "we."

May I be your endless sky;

May you breathe my gentle air.

May you never wonder why

Each time you look for me, I'm there.

May we be for each a smile

Like the warm, life-giving sun;

Yet when we're in pain awhile,

May our suffering be one.

May we share our special days,

The happiness of one for two;

And if we must go separate ways,

Let my love remain with you.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Friendship.

April 4: I Don’t Want You to Think that You Must Do

April 5: Sixty-Five

April 6: For Most of Us Life Passes like a Dream

April 7: Courtney

April 8: I Don’t Understand What Happened to Us

April 9: May Our Friendship Last Forever

I Don't Understand What Happened to Us

April 8, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem asks why a friendship has ended.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

I don't understand what happened to us

Or why you have turned away.

Of course you are free to do as you like,

But first I have something to say.

To me it had seemed we could go on forever,

So close were our hearts, and at ease,

So much did we share, yet the words never faltered,

So I thought as time did as it pleased.

Whatever I did that has made you unhappy,

Or am that is not to your taste,

Or would be were I to return to your graces,

Or won't be if I am replaced:

I want you to know that your friendship is something

I treasure, and would not now end.

If you would be willing to turn to embrace me,

You'd find in me still a good friend.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Friendship.

April 4: I Don’t Want You to Think that You Must Do

April 5: Sixty-Five

April 6: For Most of Us Life Passes like a Dream

April 7: Courtney

April 8: I Don’t Understand What Happened to Us

Courtney

April 7, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a name poem for a woman who knows how to be a friend.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Courtney is an all-embracing friend,

Open to the winds of whim or need.

Underneath her smile is a smile

Radiating outward like a sun.

To her the joys of friend and self are one,

Nor is her cheerful deference a style:

Each moment is a perfect book to read,

Yet not with any passion for the end.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Friendship.

April 4: I Don’t Want You to Think that You Must Do

April 5: Sixty-Five

April 6: For Most of Us Life Passes like a Dream

April 7: Courtney

For Most of Us Life Passes like a Dream

April 6, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a poem about how one needs friends to break out of the prison of the self.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

For most of us life passes like a dream,

Revealing only what is on our minds.

Inside the prison of the self we see

Each object as a shadow on our wall.

Nothingness awaits, as sure as night.

Did I not have you, dear friend, I might,

Shadow on a shade, not be at all.

How much we need a word beyond our sea:

In love and laughter, thoughts of different kinds,

Perhaps, with luck, unraveling a seam.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Friendship.

April 4: I Don’t Want You to Think that You Must Do

April 5: Sixty-Five

April 6: For Most of Us Life Passes like a Dream

Sixty-Five

April 5, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is a number poem for a woman who cultivates both plants and friendships.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Sixty-five surrounds herself with beauty –

In her home, her garden, and her duty.

Xerophytes might flourish without rain;

This woman likes more temperate terrain

Yielding fruits and friendships, grace and grain.

For her there is a unity of toil

In caring for community and soil,

Vineyards of the heart and of the hand,

Ecologies of love and of the land.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/65b.html. For more number poems, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/numberpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Friendship.

April 4: I Don’t Want You to Think that You Must Do

April 5: Sixty-Five