For Someone Who Devotes His Life to Trees

April 25, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is trees in honor of Arbor Day, which falls on April 28.

Today’s poem is a number poem for a forest ranger.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

For someone who devotes his life to trees,

Of whom it may be said he does much good,

Rejoicing in the natural harmonies

That come from land with no one else to please,

Yielding grace instead of wheat or wood.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/forso2.html. For more poems for Arbor Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/arbordaypoems.html .

This week’s theme: Trees

April 24: Find Your Perfect Mentor in a Tree

April 25: For Someone Who Devotes His Life toTrees 

Find Your Perfect Mentor in a Tree

April 24, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is trees in honor of Arbor Day, which falls on April 28.

Today’s poem is a number poem for an actress, urging her to be like a tree.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Find your perfect mentor in a tree,

In something rooted firmly to the ground,

Free to soar up high into the heavens,

To reach for light, to shimmer, to astound,

Yet also to reach deep where none can see.

So might your roots explore the rich, dark soil

Even as your branches seek the sun,

Vested in the gift you have been given,

Evangelist of beauty, passionate one,

Not able to tell ecstasy from toil.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/findy2.html. For more poems for Arbor Day, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/arbordaypoems.html .

This week’s theme: Trees

April 24: Find Your Perfect Mentor in a Tree

Free Markets and the Wilderness

April 23, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is the environment in honor of Earth Day, which is celebrated today, April 22.

Today’s poem is a political poem about the myths of free markets and the wilderness.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Free markets and the wilderness

Are equally fictitious,

Myths of the nineteenth century,

In turn naïve and vicious.

One assumes an ecosphere

That never was, a place

Missing one key animal –

The indigenous human race

That for millennia lived there,

And like the wolves and bees,

Created the true ecosphere,

The one the white men seized

And held as their dominion

For farms and homes and schools,

For factories and offices,

And, yes, for nature’s jewels

That they then called the wilderness,

Curated for vacations,

While those who had once lived there were

Removed to reservations.

The market also never was

Nor ever could be free,

Any more than wilderness,

Of its humanity.

All markets are manipulated

Out of need or greed,

And that’s the only law, though

It’s one you’ll rarely read.

For few would waive advantage to

Unfettered trade restore,

Or see their families starve

To obey some so-called law.

The myth of the free market is

A tool to bludgeon those

Whose interests would be served

By protections they propose,

While those who see the market as

Pristine as wilderness

Themselves break every rule

That might cause them to earn less.

Free markets and the wilderness:

Two myths some would infer

From what would serve their interests.

But of course they never were.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: The Environment

April 17: From Desert to Forest, from Sun to Shade

April 18: Twenty-Eight5

April 19: Thirty-Five8

April 20: Twenty-Six4

April 21: Thirty-Six7

April 22: Twenty-Eight6

April 23: Free Markets and the Wilderness

Twenty-Eight6

April 22, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is the environment in honor of Earth Day, which is celebrated today, April 22.

Today’s poem is a number poem about the need to include all of nature in our social contract.

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

Yours

Nick Gordon

Twenty-eight would change the social contract,
Writing in provisions for the Earth.
Even as one cedes one’s sovereignty,
Needing to be governed to be free
To live unharmed, each soul of equal worth,
Yet now we must include the spiritual Outback.

Early on we knew what we forgot:
Individuals are parts, not wholes,
Granted a communal mystery
Here within a universe of souls
That equally includes each wren, each rock.

© by Nicholas Gordon



Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/28f.html. For more poems about the environment, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/environmentalpoems.html.

This week’s theme: The Environment
April 17: From Desert to Forest, from Sun to Shade
April 18: Twenty-Eight5
April 19: Thirty-Five8
April 20: Twenty-Six4
April 21: Thirty-Six7
April 22: Twenty-Eight6

Thirty-Six7

April 21, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is the environment in honor of Earth Day, which falls on April 22.

Today’s poem is a number poem for someone who is devoted to preserving wilderness.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Thirty-six is helping to restore

Habitats hit hard by civilization.

In wilderness there is exquisite art,

Relegating humans to a part

That humbles the reclaimed imagination,

Yet whets an avid appetite for more.

So do we glimpse the glory of creation,

Insignificant enough for awe,

Xerophytes who'd quench a thirsty heart.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/36g.html. For more poems about the environment, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/environmentalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: The Environment

April 17: From Desert to Forest, from Sun to Shade

April 18: Twenty-Eight5

April 19: Thirty-Five8

April 20: Twenty-Six4

April 21: Thirty-Six7

Twenty-Six4

April 20, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is the environment in honor of Earth Day, which falls on April 22.

Today’s poem is a number poem about the wilderness as our natural home.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Twenty-six enjoys the wilderness,

Which was, until quite recently, our home.

Even now, with craft, we can survive,

Needing nothing more to stay alive,

Though there is not much wilderness to roam.

Yet what there is, is touched by holiness.

So we live in towns in deep distress,

Instinctively at odds with all we've known,

Xerophytes pure waters would revive.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/26d.html. For more poems about the environment, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/environmentalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: The Environment

April 17: From Desert to Forest, from Sun to Shade

April 18: Twenty-Eight5

April 19: Thirty-Five8

April 20: Twenty-Six4

Thirty-Five8

April 19, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is the environment in honor of Earth Day, which falls on April 22.

Today’s poem is a number poem about how nature reflects the deepest inner experience.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Thirty-five is on a long plateau,

Hiking through deep woods and sun-drenched fields.

It is a lovely path he follows well,

Reading signs no alphabet can spell,

The wordless whispers that his woodcraft yields.

Yet he knows he still has far to go.

For him, the journey is the only end,

Intense and vivid, mystically at peace,

Vistas of the heart at every bend,

Echoes of the soul that never cease.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/35h.html. For more poems about the environment, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/environmentalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: The Environment

April 17: From Desert to Forest, from Sun to Shade

April 18: Twenty-Eight5

April 19: Thirty-Five8