Proverbs for Legislators

November 11, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is politics in honor of Election Day (USA), which falls on November 8.

Today’s poem is a set of proverbs for legislators.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

1. Law is a necessary evil.

2. Pass as few laws as possible, consistent with the demands of justice and the maintenance of order.

3. Where custom is sufficient, there is no need for law.

4. Do not pass laws that cannot, or will not, be enforced, for such breed contempt for both the law and the State.

5. Penalties must be minimally sufficient to deter infractions, given adequate enforcement. Less renders the law ineffective; more inflicts unnecessary pain.

6. There is an inverse proportion between the severity necessary to deter infractions and the certainty of punishment.

7. Enshrine your principles in constitutions, codify your common sense in laws, and leave the rest to regulation.

8. Even more than on your wisdom, the legitimacy of the State depends on your integrity.

9. In public life, integrity requires not only an honest heart but an honest face.

10. Your primary object must always be not the satisfaction of your constituents but the continued legitimacy of the State, for upon that depends the welfare, even the survival, of us all.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Politics.

November 7: Elections, as You Know, Are Bought and Sold

November 8: After All, the Market Runs on Greed

November 9: Even When There’s Little Choice, We Choose

November 10: Fifty-Eight

November 11: Proverbs for Legislators

Fifty-Eight2

November 10, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is politics in honor of Election Day (USA), which falls on November 8.

Today’s poem is a number poem about someone for whom the joy of life is motivation for political action.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Fifty-eight comes often to the table,

Intent on the conundrums of the day.

For her the chance that there she might be able

To shape the world for good in some small way

Yields pleasure that no hunger can allay.

Even as she yearns for peace and justice,

In her the simple moment brings delight,

Gift of being, palpable and lustrous,

However strewn upon the field of night,

The reason and the rage for doing right.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/58b.html . For more poems about politics, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/politicalpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Politics.

November 7: Elections, as You Know, Are Bought and Sold

November 8: After All, the Market Runs on Greed

November 9: Even When There’s Little Choice, We Choose

November 10: Fifty-Eight

Even When There's Little Choice, We Choose

November 9, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is politics in honor of Election Day (USA), which falls on November 8.

Today’s poem is an Election Day poem about the preciousness of the right to vote.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Even when there's little choice, we choose,

Lest we lose the habit of our duty.

Ever tempted to the rite refuse,

Come the day, we recognize its beauty.

There is no greater dignity than this:

In each an equal sense of sovereignty,

Ownership not easy to dismiss,

Nothing less than what makes people free.

Do, then, exercise this sovereign right

As though it could be lost, as well it might,

Yielding in small steps that few can see.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Politics.

November 7: Elections, as You Know, Are Bought and Sold

November 8: After All, the Market Runs on Greed

November 9: Even When There’s Little Choice, WeChoose

After All, the Market Runs on Greed

November 8, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is politics in honor of Election Day (USA), which falls on November 8.

Today’s poem is about the shortcomings of a number of political choices.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

After all, the market runs on greed,

The sunlight of this social ecosphere,

Self-adjusting as supply and need

Set prices to the tune of hope and fear.

The state can intervene, of course, but then

The Capitol might well outgreed the Street,

Playing games with games beyond its ken,

Positioned where the votes and money meet.

What to do? We've tried Utopia,

A nightmare far, far worse than any dream,

Strangling the source of cornucopia,

Sacrificing millions to a scheme.

We are born into a world of sin,

Which if we just accept, we die within.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/after3.html . For more poems about politics, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/politicalpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Politics.

November 7: Elections, as You Know, Are Bought and Sold

November 8: After All, the Market Runs on Greed

Elections, as You Know, Are Bought and Sold

November 7, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is politics in honor of Election Day (USA), which falls on November 8.

Today’s poem is a poem for Election Day about campaign contributions.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Elections, as you know, are bought and sold

Like favors from a well-proportioned whore.

Each scandal is a tale often told,

Creating a brief sigh, and nothing more.

The problem is systemic, deeply rooted

In our view of speech that should be free.

Our courts say even money can’t be muted,

No more than words in our democracy.

Dare we try to limit the expense,

And muzzle those whose PACs are a pretense,

Yielding time to all sides equally?

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/elect3.html . For more poems about Election Day, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/electiondaypoems.html.

This week’s theme: Politics.

November 7: Elections, as You Know, Are Boughtand Sold

You Never Thought that It Would End This Way

November 6, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is death, in honor of the transition from Halloween to All Saints’ Day and then to All Souls’ Day, which is the Mexican Day of the Dead.

Today’s poem is about death as a fitting end for love.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

You never thought that it would end this way,

Yet such an end does not at all seem strange.

If love is true, then death must make the change,

Ending love by taking life away.

Yet though our love is over, mine will stay,

A triumph over death I will arrange,

Rechanneling a fate I cannot change,

That we might still on fields of fancy play.

You never thought we'd share such months of pain,

That you would die in agony, while I

Would be as much a nurse for you as friend.

Yet I would live the whole thing through again

Just once more to look you in the eye

And tell you, yes, this is how it should 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/younev.html . For more poems about death, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/deathpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Death.

October 31: In Memory of Those Who Died

November 1: Here’s a Little Ditty

November 2: I Am the Mirror of Our Love

November 3: I Didn’t Get a Chance to Say Goodbye

November 4: Every Time I See My Pansies

November 5: There Is a Residue of Hope

November 6: You Never Thought that It Would EndThis Way

There Is a Residue of Hope

November 5, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is death, in honor of the transition from Halloween to All Saints’ Day and then to All Souls’ Day, which is the Mexican Day of the Dead.

Today’s poem is to a deceased father about the end of grief.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

There is a residue of hope

In every act of grief,

A beauty at the source of pain,

A truth that brings relief.

Mourning is a morning song

Sung just before the light,

Though little else is visible

To those that watch the night.

And all our tears must turn to grass,

And all our sorrows be

But dissonance that we'll resolve

In some new harmony.

And all our pain must shine upon

The meadows of our grace

That you might share our happiness

And lend our light your face.

Ah, Father! Yes, the music plays

As we dance in the sun,

For dawn returns the joy of life,

And we must all dance on.

Ah, Father! Yes, we must dance on

And leave you far behind,

Though love undo the dying day

And comb the rising wind.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Death.

October 31: In Memory of Those Who Died

November 1: Here’s a Little Ditty

November 2: I Am the Mirror of Our Love

November 3: I Didn’t Get a Chance to Say Goodbye

November 4: Every Time I See My Pansies

November 5: There Is a Residue of Hope