Victories Retain the Stench of Death

November 12, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is war, in honor of Veterans Day, which was celebrated yesterday, November 11.

Today’s poem is a Veterans Day poem about honoring the dead on all sides.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Victories retain the stench of death.

Each is cause for gratitude, not joy.

Those who win are fated to destroy

Every grace whose beauty gives them breath.

Remember those who fell on every side,

And grieve not just for those you call your own.

No torturer or tyrant dies alone;

So may you weep for every fratricide.

Death is no fit dwelling place for pride,

And hatred's not a passion to enjoy,

Yet all who feel have reason to atone.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/vetda2.html. For more Veterans Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/veteransdaypoems.html .

This week’s theme: Veterans Day

November 6: Veiled in Glory, One Looks Back and Grieves

November 7: Victories Require Validation

November 8: Veterans Have Served Their Time in Hell

November 9: Voices of the Dead Are Rarely Heard

November 10: Velcro Feelings Disconnect

November 11: Veterans Are Fugitives from Hell

November 12: Victories Retain the Stench of Death

Veterans Are Fugitives from Hell

November 11, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is war, in honor of Veterans Day, which is celebrated today, November 11.

Today’s poem is a Veterans Day poem about how one’s hardened heart is not so easily softened.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Veterans are fugitives from hell,

Escapees from death pursued by pain.

The truth they left behind makes truth insane;

Each nightmare is a truth they know too well.

Reason is unreasonable when words

Are whips that drive believers to the kill,

Necessary to sustain a will

Stirred by the sweet morning songs of birds.

Decencies are frills to put aside

As hearts are hardened for the jolting ride,

Yet on return are clamped and hardened still.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/veter2.html. For more Veterans Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/veteransdaypoems.html .

This week’s theme: Veterans Day

November 6: Veiled in Glory, One Looks Back and Grieves

November 7: Victories Require Validation

November 8: Veterans Have Served Their Time in Hell

November 9: Voices of the Dead Are Rarely Heard

November 10: Velcro Feelings Disconnect

November 11: Veterans Are Fugitives from Hell

Velcro Feelings Disconnect

November 10, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is war, in honor of Veterans Day, which is celebrated on November 11.

Today’s poem is a Veterans Day poem about how the observance of Veterans Day allows one to move on without forgetting.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Velcro feelings disconnect

Eventually, but these

Time does not dissolve, their outlines

Etched into the sea.

Rest easy, then, as we erect

Among new-planted trees

No ordinary wayside shrines

Sustaining memory.

Days like these allow one

Again to move on. For what is gone

Yet lives, remembered ritually.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Veterans Day

November 6: Veiled in Glory, One Looks Back and Grieves

November 7: Victories Require Validation

November 8: Veterans Have Served Their Time in Hell

November 9: Voices of the Dead Are Rarely Heard

November 10: Velcro Feelings Disconnect

Voices of the Dead Are Rarely Heard

November 9, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is war, in honor of Veterans Day, which is celebrated on November 11.

Today’s poem is a Veterans Day poem about the need to remember.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Voices of the dead are rarely heard.

Each of us should set aside the time

To listen to their lost and anguished words,

Evocative as distant church bells’ chimes.

Reason cannot reason to life’s end,

A moment of its own annihilation.

Nor can any witness comprehend

'Ere death what might exist beyond sensation.

So let us long remember those who died,

Doing honor due, for they were loved

Alive and dead by those whose hearts abide,

Yet yearning though the mountains be unmoved.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Veterans Day

November 6: Veiled in Glory, One Looks Back and Grieves

November 7: Victories Require Validation

November 8: Veterans Have Served Their Time in Hell

November 9: Voices of the Dead Are Rarely Heard

Veterans Have Served Their Time in Hell

November 8, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is war, in honor of Veterans Day, which is celebrated on November 11.

Today’s poem is a Veterans Day poem about how vets’ anguish never wholly leaves them.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Veterans have served their time in hell,

Emerging on the sunny side of pain,

Taking with them always shards of night.

Even in the midst of their delight,

Rich in all that love and luck can gain,

Armed memories rise that know their weakness well.

Now death joins the damned ones in their cell

'Ere we can remove them from the slain,

Snuffing out their suffering with our light.

Days and years diminish not the blight,

As only those who've been there can explain,

Yet walking by the side of those who fell.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Veterans Day

November 6: Veiled in Glory, One Looks Back and Grieves

November 7: Victories Require Validation

November 8: Veterans Have Served Their Time in Hell

Victories Require Validation

November 7, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is war, in honor of Veterans Day, which is celebrated on November 11.

Today’s poem is a Veterans Day poem about the need to justify wars.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Victories require validation.

Each act of violence must file its brief.

The loss of loved ones must find consolation,

Ennobled by some passionate belief.

Regard, then, all the murdered of the ages,

Aghast at all the words that justified,

Not without cause, the ever-righteous rages,

So small against the sum of those who died.

Due consideration waits on sages,

Aloof from the concerns of either side,

Years hence, when all are drained of hate and grief.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/vetda3.html. For more Veterans Day poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/veteransdaypoems.html .

This week’s theme: Veterans Day

November 6: Veiled in Glory, One Looks Back and Grieves

November 7: Victories Require Validation

Veiled in Glory, One Looks Back and Grieves

November 6, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is war, in honor of Veterans Day, which is celebrated on November 11.

Today’s poem is a Veterans Day poem about the difficulty of putting war behind one.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Veiled in glory, one looks back and grieves.

Each day of war is like a year of peace.

The nightmare, long since over, never leaves,

Endures because one won’t give up its lease.

Remembering’s an act of loyalty,

As though one could so keep the dead alive.

Nor does what’s real seem like reality,

Since that is not what will at length survive.

Dreams of death and terror do, in time,

Adjust to one’s routine as duties chime.

Yet nothing will one’s lust for life revive.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Veterans Day

November 6: Veiled in Glory, One Looks Back and Grieves