So Shall the Changing Seasons Mark the Year

January 26, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is dance, used metaphorically.

Today’s poem is a Seasons Greetings poem in which one dances to the rhythm of the year.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

So shall the changing seasons mark the year,

Earth tilted at an angle towards the sun,

As all dance to that rhythm, everyone

Singing down the days, sun-drenched or drear.

One needs holidays to make things clear,

Needs rhythms to reveal how time will run,

Singing as the cycle’s almost done,

Glad still to be although the cold winds near.

Remember that this time of celebration

Endures within the vestibule of winter,

Endures because one’s joy in life requires

That one undo the dark with inner light.

It needs an unremitting affirmation,

Not least because the season can be bitter,

Grace consuming one’s lifelong desires,

So beautiful one dances into night.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/sosha2.html. For more Season’s Greetings poems, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/seasonsgreetingspoems.html .

This week’s theme: Dance, Used Metaphorically

January 22: Kaylee

January 23: Death Can Also Be a Dance

January 24: Dinosaurs Will Dance All Day

January 25: It All Went Far Too Quickly

January 26: So Shall the Changing Seasons Mark the Year

It All Went Far Too Quickly

January 25, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is dance, used metaphorically.

Today’s poem is a love poem expressing regret for not having danced awhile before heading for bed.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

It all went far too quickly when

We started our romance.

We went right for the Broadway stage

Before we learned to dance.

Naturally, we shared the fear

Of intimate intimacy,

And scared to stay while loath to part,

We both longed to be free.

Ah, me! Well, now we're separate

To see how we might feel.

And then perhaps we'll try again.

Our love, I think, is real.

But this time we'll go slow and ask,

Before we head for bed,

If we might try some artful grace

And dance awhile instead.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Dance, Used Metaphorically

January 22: Kaylee

January 23: Death Can Also Be a Dance

January 24: Dinosaurs Will Dance All Day

January 25: It All Went Far Too Quickly

Dinosaurs Will Dance All Day

January 24, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is dance, used metaphorically.

Today’s poem is a birthday poem for children in which dinosaurs dance.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Dinosaurs will dance all day

If you let the music play.

“Happy Birthday!” they will sing,

Crashing into everything,

Crushing cars and trucks and trains,

Bicycles, bridges, buses, planes,

Houses seven stories tall,

A factory, a shopping mall,

Having lots and lots of fun!

And before your birthday’s done,

You should dance and sing like them.

Well, maybe not just like them!

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Dance, Used Metaphorically

January 22: Kaylee

January 23: Death Can Also Be a Dance

January 24: Dinosaurs Will Dance All Day

Death Can Also Be a Dance

January 23, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is dance, used metaphorically.

Today’s poem compares death to a dance.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Death can also be a dance.

Each must grace its final steps.

A life immersed in pain, perhaps,

Too much controlled by circumstance,

Has one more leap to come to rest.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Dance, Used Metaphorically

January 22: Kaylee

January 23: Death Can Also Be a Dance

Kaylee

January 22, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is dance, used metaphorically.

Today’s poem is a name poem about a woman who, unknowing, dances the dance choreographed by her lineage.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Kaylee cannot her antecedents trace.

Awake within her day, she feels quite free.

Yet she is but a dancer in a dance

Long practiced and perfected in advance,

Emerging from her will spontaneously,

Exquisite in its unsuspected grace.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Dance, Used Metaphorically

January 22: Kaylee

Love Engenders Love

January 21, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Birthday, which was celebrated on January 15^th.

Today’s poem reflects Martin Luther King, Jr.’s philosophy of non-violence.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Love engenders love,

Hate engenders hate.

When words descend to blows,

Both lose the debate.

The means become the end,

Regardless of the goal.

The foe you hate becomes

The mirror of your soul.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Birthday

January 15: Maybe It’s a Little Strange that I

January 16: Maybe More than Love Was Needed

January 17: Maybe Some Had Thought I Hoped Too Much

January 18: Maybe There Is More to Life than Living

January 19: Meaning Is a Morning Song

January 20: My Face Is an Icon

January 21: Love Engenders Love

My Face Is an Icon, My Life a Scrim

January 20, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Birthday, which was celebrated on January 15^th.

In today’s poem, Martin Luther King, Jr., reflects on the way his fame has distorted the truth of his life.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

My face is an icon, my life a scrim

Alight with meaning, my words inscribed

Reductively in stone, a hymn

To dreams annually revived.

In me you found a founding father

New, like Lincoln a colossus

Late arrived: righteous Other,

Unavenging nemesis,

The token nigger of American

Heroes, aggrieved but restrained,

Engaged but non-partisan,

Radical but house-trained.

Know that I still believe in you,

In spite of what you've done to me.

Nor can a holiday a truth

Give flesh long flayed by memory.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at https://www.poemsforfree.com/myface.html. For more poems for Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Birthday, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/martinlutherkingpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Birthday

January 15: Maybe It’s a Little Strange that I

January 16: Maybe More than Love Was Needed

January 17: Maybe Some Had Thought I Hoped Too Much

January 18: Maybe There Is More to Life than Living

January 19: Meaning Is a Morning Song

January 20: My Face Is an Icon