Facts Are Never Simply What Is True

September 4, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is professions in honor of Labor Day, which is celebrated today, September 4.

Today’s poem is a philosophical number poem about the need for statisticians.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Facts are never simply what is true.

One looks at them as one would look at notes

Resounding in the context of a key

That makes sense of it all. No note evokes

Yearning but from an aural point of view.

Each fact, as well, requires an inner key

If one would make some sense of it. It, too,

Gives way to meaning as it numbly votes,

Having shrunken to a number, to construe

The truth of a surmise statistically.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Professions

September 4: Facts Are Never Simply What Is True

Volunteers Are Willing to Take Risks

September 3, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is sacrifice, in honor of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha, which falls on September 2 and commemorates Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son.

Today’s poem is about the motivations, rewards, and need for volunteers.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Volunteers are willing to take risks,

Out-of-pocket for some leisure time,

Letting love and joy dictate the tasks

Undertaken for some modest dream.

No one volunteers but for a vision

That never fits but may oblige a truth.

Each finds some ideal with which to fashion

Ends that are of hard-earned wisdom wrought.

Relentless need and hunger rule the world.

Still, volunteers do all the good they can.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Sacrifice

August 28: Thirty-One5

August 29: Forty-Three4

August 30: Thirty-Eight8

August 31: Allen

September 1: Forty-Three5

September 2: Giving Gives Far More than We Intend

September 3: Volunteers Are Willing to Take Risks

Giving Gives Far More than We Intend

September 2, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is sacrifice, in honor of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha, which falls on September 2 and commemorates Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son.

Today’s poem is about the grace of giving.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Giving gives far more than we intend.

In everything we do is what we are,

Vastly different than we comprehend,

Infinite as any quark or star.

No one ever loves for some clear end,

Gripped by grace that breaks beyond the bar.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Sacrifice

August 28: Thirty-One5

August 29: Forty-Three4

August 30: Thirty-Eight8

August 31: Allen

September 1: Forty-Three5

September 2: Giving Gives Far More than We Intend

Forty-Three5

September 1, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is sacrifice, in honor of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha, which falls on September 2 and commemorates Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son.

Today’s poem is a number poem about how parental sacrifice changes one.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Forty-three is mainly now a father,

Offering himself to others' needs.

Remember that such love can give no quarter,

Taking one where obligation leads,

Yielding up a joy that breaks and bleeds.

To love is to become oneself another,

Heeding new hopes as the old recede,

Repurposing one’s self to serve some other,

Embracing what one’s former self concedes,

Ever mounted on quixotic steeds.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/43e.html. For more number poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/numberpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Sacrifice

August 28: Thirty-One5

August 29: Forty-Three4

August 30: Thirty-Eight8

August 31: Allen

September 1: Forty-Three5

Allen2

August 31, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is sacrifice, in honor of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha, which falls on September 2 and commemorates Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son.

Today’s poem is a name poem about someone for whom others will need to sacrifice.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Allen sees the future far too clearly:

Life in debt to those for whom he cares.

Living thus dependent hurts severely,

Even though he knows they love him dearly,

Needing his strength more than he needs theirs.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/allen2.html. For more poems about people with disabilities, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/disabilitiespoems.html .

This week’s theme: Sacrifice

August 28: Thirty-One5

August 29: Forty-Three4

August 30: Thirty-Eight8

August 31: Allen

Thirty-Eight8

August 30, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is sacrifice, in honor of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha, which falls on September 2 and commemorates Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son.

Today’s poem is a number poem about a hand surgeon who sacrifices the health of her hands in order to heal the hands of others.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Thirty-eight is skilled at healing hands,

Hard at work each day on wrists and fingers.

In her hands are hands, so what she feels

Requires the same tissues that she heals,

The tiny tangles over which she lingers.

Yet her own must leap to her commands.

Ever deaf to her own hands' appeals,

Intent on what each patient probe reveals,

Guiding blades, she puts her wrists through wringers,

Harsh in her devotion and demands,

The toll intense, as she well understands.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/43d.html. For more poems about various professions, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/professionspoems.html .

This week’s theme: Sacrifice

August 28: Thirty-One5

August 29: Forty-Three4

August 30: Thirty-Eight8

Forty-Three4

August 29, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is sacrifice, in honor of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha, which falls on September 2 and commemorates Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son.

Today’s poem is a number poem about sacrifice when one has children at the same time one’s parents begin to need help.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Forty-three sustains his love of life,

Old enough to know what he must do.

Responsibilities have come with age,

The burden and the blessing of this stage,

Yielding joys less pure than those he knew.

There are the distant child and former wife,

Hard truths that no resentment can assuage.

Retired parents soon will need him, too,

Encumbering him on both sides as the view

Encompasses more grace than he can gauge.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/43d.html. For more number poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/numberpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Sacrifice

August 28: Thirty-One5

August 29: Forty-Three4