January

November 29, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme, as the days grow shorter and colder, is the approach of winter.

Today’s poem is written for January, born into the winter cold.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

January waits, unsentimental,

Again born into beauty, cruel and kind.

Nor cold nor darkness fools the wily child,

Unweeping in a brutal wind and wild,

As the Earth turns passionless and blind.

Rejoicing in her birth, she dons the mantle,

Yearning to recall what lies behind.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Winter.

November 28: And Now, with the Pensive Coming of the Winter

November 29: January

And Now, with the Pensive Coming of the Winter

November 28, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme, as the days grow shorter and colder, is the approach of winter.

Today’s poem anticipates the special beauty of winter.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

And now, with the pensive coming of the winter,

It’s time to see the beauty of bare trees

And glimpse the rugged silver of the river

So long hidden by the summer leaves.

It’s time to feel the crisp, cold clarity

Of frost that rips right through the veil of air,

Revealing distant mountains one can see

Distinctly, as though suddenly quite near.

Oh, yes, one may be shuddering with the cold

And shuffling like a penguin ‘cross the ice.

Yet as the year comes closer to its close,

It’s time to treasure well the lingering light.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Winter.

November 28: And Now, with the Pensive Coming ofthe Winter

When God's as Real as Santa Claus

November 27, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is gratitude, in honor of Thanksgiving, which falls on November 24.

Today’s poem is about whom to thank when you don’t believe in God.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

When God's as real as Santa Claus,

And temples are works of art;

When the Bible's living literature,

And the Universe has no heart:

One feels grateful,

But to whom?

When the ritual vestments of faith

Are seen only from outside;

And the strength to live in the void

Becomes a matter of pride:

One feels grateful,

But to whom?

When life seems bursting with beauty,

But everything's accidental;

When calling the noumenal "Thou"

Seems impossibly sentimental:

One feels grateful,

But to whom?

When death is an absolute end,

And pain lets one barely get by;

Prayer's a harmless delusion

And the solace of heaven a lie:

One still feels grateful,

But to whom?

This human urge to say thank you,

Unavoidably orphic,

Requires, just for a moment,

A Creator, anthropomorphic:

So that one can feel grateful

To Whom.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Gratitude.

November 21: Thank You for the Gift of Understanding

November 22: Gratitude, like Love, Is Part of Being

November 23: Thank You for All that You Have Given

November 24: Thanksgiving Is a Moment to Remember

November 25: Thanksgiving Is a Time for Giving Thanks

November 26: To Live Is to Be Prey

November 27: When God’s as Real as Santa Claus

To Live Is to Be Prey

November 26, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is gratitude, in honor of Thanksgiving, which falls on November 24.

Today’s poem is a Thanksgiving poem about eating and being eaten.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

To live is to be prey. Meals for microbes.

Horror hangs in the blood like a barracuda

As packs of ravenous viruses howl at the moon.

No flesh is but food. Fierce hunger waits at the crossings

Knowing nothing but lust for the taste of our gristle,

Singing hallelujahs to the Lord.

Give thanks, then, too, for the gift of robust hunger;

In humble gratitude, for the legacy of lust.

Vividly we live and die, our suffering

In perfect harmony with our feeding frenzy;

Nor can we be else but both murderers and murdered,

Grateful for the unsought grace of being.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Gratitude.

November 21: Thank You for the Gift of Understanding

November 22: Gratitude, like Love, Is Part of Being

November 23: Thank You for All that You Have Given

November 24: Thanksgiving Is a Moment to Remember

November 25: Thanksgiving Is a Time for Giving Thanks

November 26: To Live Is to Be Prey

Thanksgiving Is a Time for Giving Thanks

November 25, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is gratitude, in honor of Thanksgiving, which falls on November 24.

Today’s poem is a Thanksgiving poem about compassion for the animals we eat.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Thanksgiving is a time for giving thanks;

However, the reception's not so clear.

As we pass the drumsticks or the shanks,

No Maker holds such severed flesh less dear.

Kindness is a requisite for grace;

So must we be to all that suffer pain.

Gratitude seems slightly out of place

In places where compassion is less plain.

Very few this day will give much thought

In passing to the creatures that they eat.

Nor will we feel the empathy we ought,

Given that we are ourselves but meat.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/than24.html . For more poems about gratitude, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/thanksgivingpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Gratitude.

November 21: Thank You for the Gift of Understanding

November 22: Gratitude, like Love, Is Part of Being

November 23: Thank You for All that You Have Given

November 24: Thanksgiving Is a Moment to Remember

November 25: Thanksgiving Is a Time for GivingThanks

Thanksgiving Is a Moment to Remember

November 24, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is gratitude, in honor of Thanksgiving, which falls on November 24.

Today’s poem is a Thanksgiving poem about friendship.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Thanksgiving is a moment to remember

How little we can do to move the stars.

All we are and have we must surrender,

Nor is Earth less inscrutable than Mars.

Knowing this, we know the need for friends

Sharing both our pleasures and our pain,

Giving, though it may not serve their ends,

In joy the love that will our love sustain.

Very much like water in a lake,

In sum we serve as mirrors to the sky.

No one alone can heaven's picture take.

Given friends, we know the reason why.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Gratitude.

November 21: Thank You for the Gift of Understanding

November 22: Gratitude, like Love, Is Part of Being

November 23: Thank You for All that You Have Given

November 24: Thanksgiving Is a Moment toRemember

Thank You for All That You Have Given

November 23, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is gratitude, in honor of Thanksgiving, which falls on November 24.

Today’s poem is a thank you poem to God.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Thank you for all that you have given:

Happiness and terror, love and death,

Agony and pleasure, pulse and breath,

Night's monstrous dreams, by lusts and longings driven,

Knowledge, hope, despair, and ecstasy.

You gave us, us, by pain and passion riven,

One brief, bright burst of need and glory. Yet,

Unsatisfied, we hunger more to be.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/than10.html . For more poems about gratitude, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/thanksgivingpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Gratitude.

November 21: Thank You for the Gift of Understanding

November 22: Gratitude, like Love, Is Part of Being

November 23: Thank You for All that You Have Given