Andrew

July 11, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is revolution in honor of Bastille Day, which falls on July 14th.

Today’s poem is a name poem for a disillusioned idealist.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Andrew was a soldier of the faith:

No one was more loyal or more true.

Despite the hard, rich texture of illusion,

Reality insisted on confusion,

Eviscerating much that Andrew knew.

What remains stalks him like a wraith.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Revolution

July 10: Base Your Life on Reason, Only Reason

July 11: Andrew

Base Your Life on Reason, Only Reason

July 10, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is revolution in honor of Bastille Day, which falls on July 14th.

Today’s poem is a Bastille Day poem about the dangers of basing life only on reason, as some revolutionaries tried to do.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Base your life on reason, only reason,

And watch your heart go crazy on the spot!

Some would vary judgment with the season,

Though some would say it is, or it is not.

In politics, one should be politic,

Lest change change what one needs to stay alive.

Logic cannot tell what makes things tick;

Each thought remains a creature of the hive.

Despite the power of reason, please take heed:

An amputated cranium tends to bleed.

Yet nations healed holistically will thrive.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Revolution

July 10: Base Your Life on Reason, Only Reason

In Time All Meanings Fade

July 9, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which falls on July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem about the eventual demise of the holiday.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

In time all meanings fade. The days of glory,

Now forgotten, buried long ago,

Dead for generations, their founding story

Erased from consciousness like summer snow …

Perhaps we will succeed in preservation,

Enduring for millennia or so,

No more than that. There’ll be a generation

Destined by their seedtime not to know.

Embrace it then, the truth that even this,

Now so much a part of us, must go,

Caught tumbling on the edge of the abyss,

Eventually pulled in by the undertow.

Dear history, we hope to pass you on,

And so a bit of us, too, when we’re gone.

Yet more than that no yearning can bestow.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/intime.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)

July 3: Fantasies Endure the Test of Time

July 4: Just Think of How It Was That Hot July

July 5: I Wish There Were a Washington

July 6: In Every Heart There Is, of Course, Corruption

July 7: Justice Is as Justice Does

July 8: Is This the Beginning of the End

July 9: In Time All Meanings Fade

Is This the Beginning of the End

July 8, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which falls on July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem about the dangers of indebtedness to other nations.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Is this the beginning of the end?

Now is when we start to fall?

Debtors to both foe and friend,

Eventually obliged to all?

Perhaps we can pull out of this,

Electing leaders who will lead,

Not stuck in this paralysis,

Dreading most what we most need.

Each must give that all might gain,

Nor ought we shun the sacrifice.

Could we but bear the healing pain

Equally, we'd pay the price.

Dependence on another's will

Assumes that we their coffers fill,

Yielding ever to their advice.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/isthis.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)

July 3: Fantasies Endure the Test of Time

July 4: Just Think of How It Was That Hot July

July 5: I Wish There Were a Washington

July 6: In Every Heart There Is, of Course, Corruption

July 7: Justice Is as Justice Does

July 8: Is This the Beginning of the End

Justice Is as Justice Does

July 7, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which falls on July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem about the influence of the past on the present.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Justice is as justice does.

Under every is, is was.

Laws must be applied by those

Yet longing for their long agos.

For every change imposed by will

Oppressions linger, strangle, kill.

Underneath equality

Remains a brutal legacy,

The wandering ghost of slavery

Haunting still our history.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/justi2.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)

July 3: Fantasies Endure the Test of Time

July 4: Just Think of How It Was That Hot July

July 5: I Wish There Were a Washington

July 6: In Every Heart There Is, of Course, Corruption

July 7: Justice Is as Justice Does

In Every Heart There Is, of Course, Corruption

July 6, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which falls on July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem about the ubiquity of corruption.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

In every heart there is, of course, corruption.

No one is immune from lust and greed.

Democracy accommodates this need,

Embracing what might else lead to destruction.

People cannot people an ideal.

Equality's a myth, has always been

No more than something to put favors in,

Dependent on the lie that it is real.

Each decision is a battlefield,

Not of ideas but interests, yours and mine,

Calculated shrewdly to define

Exactly what advantage each might yield.

Do not be discouraged: Evil is

As much a part of us as love or bliss.

Yet what is not a wound cannot be healed.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/ineve6.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)

July 3: Fantasies Endure the Test of Time

July 4: Just Think of How It Was That Hot July

July 5: I Wish There Were a Washington

July 6: In Every Heart There Is, of Course, Corruption

I Wish There Were a Washington

July 5, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is Independence Day (USA), which falls on July 4th.

Today’s poem is a July 4^th poem wishing every nation could be as lucky in leadership as ours was.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

I wish there were a Washington

For every failed state,

A Jefferson or Madison

To guide them through the gate.

I wish there were a Lincoln

For those now ripped apart,

A Roosevelt or Kennedy

For those that have no heart.

I wish each had the fortune

With which we have been blessed,

And found in their own founders

Fit heroes for the quest.

I wish, I wish, I wish, I wish,

But such things none can will.

One can only plant the seeds

And shape the soil well.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/iwisht.html. For more poems for Independence Day, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/july4thpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Independence Day (USA)

July 3: Fantasies Endure the Test of Time

July 4: Just Think of How It Was That Hot July

July 5: I Wish There Were a Washington