Hard By Celebrations There Are Tears

December 10, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme, with the approach of the holiday season, is Happy Holidays.

Today’s poem is about the sadness that often comes with celebration.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Hard by celebrations there are tears,

A lonely longing for what cannot be.

Perhaps one lets it enter foolishly,

Passionate to weep for vanished years.

Yet living in the moment one is free,

Having jettisoned regrets and fears,

Open to the grace of eyes and ears,

Losing self in silent ecstasy.

In celebrating, one is marking time.

Deep beneath the ritual ballet

A tide removes the trite and the sublime,

Yearning, turning, churning through the day,

Sweeping all one cherishes away.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Happy Holidays.

December 5: Have a Happy Holiday

December 6: Heaven Is a Hollow in the Heart

December 7: Happiness Is Not a Holiday

December 8: How Have the Years So Suddenly Gone By

December 9: Happiness, Even in a Desert

December 10: Hard By Celebrations There AreTears

Happiness, Even in a Desert

December 9, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme, with the approach of the holiday season, is Happy Holidays.

Today’s poem is about celebrating the holidays in a hot, dry desert.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Happiness, even in a desert,

Adjusts well to what moisture it can find.

Perhaps it takes a little extra effort;

Perhaps one needs to keep it more in mind.

Yet one must still depend on celebration,

Holidays transferred from colder climes,

Offering the blessing of relation,

Love that takes the stage at special times.

In such reunions, happiness takes root

Deep enough to tap the deepest well,

Alive and blooming, bearing succulent fruit,

Yearning, yes, for some well-watered dell,

Still able to survive, as time will tell.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/happ42.html. For more poems for the holiday season, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/seasonsgreetingspoems.html.

This week’s theme: Happy Holidays.

December 5: Have a Happy Holiday

December 6: Heaven Is a Hollow in the Heart

December 7: Happiness Is Not a Holiday

December 8: How Have the Years So Suddenly Gone By

December 9: Happiness, Even in a Desert

How Have the Years So Suddenly Gone By

December 8, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme, with the approach of the holiday season, is Happy Holidays.

Today’s poem is about celebrations as stations in our journey through time.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

How have the years so suddenly gone by?

As though we were distracted on a train,

Perhaps absorbed in fantasy, terrain

Passing shuttered from the inner eye.

Yet when the train stops, shuddering through each car --

Holiday or birthday, wedding, wake --

Old enough to feel time's wistful ache,

Looking up, we wonder where we are.

In time, we see the need for celebration;

Days unmarked are lost within the flow.

A journey needs its moment in the station,

Yielding motion to restored relation,

So fleeting one is loath to let it go.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/howha2.html. For more poems for the holiday season, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/seasonsgreetingspoems.html.

This week’s theme: Happy Holidays.

December 5: Have a Happy Holiday

December 6: Heaven Is a Hollow in the Heart

December 7: Happiness Is Not a Holiday

December 8: How Have the Years So Suddenly Gone By

Happiness Is Not a Holiday

December 7, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme, with the approach of the holiday season, is Happy Holidays.

Today’s poem is about how holidays hold families together.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Happiness is not a holiday.

An everyday will do, an any minute.

Perhaps one lingers briefly by the way,

Pausing to breathe in the infinite.

Yet holidays are necessary pleasures,

Holding open else-neglected doors,

Offering a wealth of well-known treasures

Likely to renew depleted stores.

In doing what the holiday demands,

Delighting in its long-obeyed commands,

A separated family now joins hands,

Yielding to a deeper harmony,

Still together, though infrequently.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/happ75.html. For more poems for the holiday season, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/seasonsgreetingspoems.html.

This week’s theme: Happy Holidays.

December 5: Have a Happy Holiday

December 6: Heaven Is a Hollow in the Heart

December 7: Happiness Is Not a Holiday

Heaven Is a Hollow in the Heart

December 6, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme, with the approach of the holiday season, is Happy Holidays.

Today’s poem is about how holidays are occasions to return to the child within.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Heaven is a hollow in the heart,

A little mountain valley fringed by tears,

Pure wilderness, untouched by craft or art,

Pure yearning, undiluted by the years.

Yes, we all have lessons to unlearn,

Having holidays in which to find

Occasional occasions to return,

Leaving burned-out fantasies behind.

Inherent in us all remains the child,

Deep beneath the layers of our lives,

A bit of hope too dear to be defiled,

Yet wandering in an Eden, lost and wild,

Self within the self that self revives.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/heave7.html. For more poems for the holiday season, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/seasonsgreetingspoems.html.

This week’s theme: Happy Holidays.

December 5: Have a Happy Holiday

December 6: Heaven Is a Hollow in the Heart

Have a Happy Holiday

December 5, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme, with the approach of the holiday season, is Happy Holidays.

Today’s poem is a Happy Holidays poem for a child.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Have a happy holiday!

Have a lot of fun!

And give a little smile to

Give joy to everyone!

Each smile is just like music

Everyone can hear.

Happy, happy music!

A bit of holiday cheer!

The air is full of music,

And you can add yours, too,

The sweet and lovely melody

That comes from only 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/haveah.html. For more poems for the holiday season, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/seasonsgreetingspoems.html.

This week’s theme: Happy Holidays.

December 5: Have a Happy Holiday

Winter

December 4, 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 about how winter brings us together.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Winter howls like winds or wolves or weeping,

Inviting us to witness pain and death.

No truth can better penetrate the shell

That insulates our empathy so well,

Essence of the entropy of breath

Returning us to one another's keeping.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/winter.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

November 30: The Wind Brings Down Its Icy Load

December 1: Take from Winter Just a Bit of Hope

December 2: All Winter Long the Willows Wait

December 3: February

December 4: Winter