Grace Comes with a Patina of Pain

April 11, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is health.

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

A get-well-soon poem about the inevitability of pain:

Grace comes with a patina of pain.

Each creature must endure what it desires.

There are days one would not wish again,

When all one is, is wish till pain expires.

Expire it does in time, and will for you,

Lest it seem as though time will not run,

Lounging by the bed though dawn is due,

Sensing savagely you want it gone.

Oh, yes, we know that this is life, and we

Owe life both pain and joy. The will to be

Needs sometimes to rest till pain is done.

© by Nicholas Gordon

If you enjoyed this poem, please like, comment on, or share it so that it might be seen and enjoyed by others. To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/grace2.html. For more poems about health, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/healthpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Health

4/8: Give Your Pain a Bit of Gratitude

4/9: Thirty-Eight Is Running for Her Life

4/10: When Life Becomes a Sea of Pain

4/11: Grace Comes with a Patina of Pain

When Life Becomes a Sea of Pain

April 10, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is health.

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

A poem about both the isolation and need for companionship of someone in pain:

When life becomes a sea of pain

And every moment agony

I must endure again, again,

It is a curse to have to be.

And every moment agony,

And every longing fixed on death;

It is a curse to have to be

And fight by instinct for each breath.

And every longing fixed on death

Even as I must go on

And fight by instinct for each breath,

Sailing thus, though loved, alone.

Even as I must go on,

You watch me helpless from the shore;

Sailing thus, though loved, alone,

I need you with me all the more.

You watch me helpless from the shore

As I endure again, again;

I need you with me all the more

When life becomes a sea of pain.

© by Nicholas Gordon

If you enjoyed this poem, please like, comment on, or share it so that it might be seen and enjoyed by others. To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/whenli.html. For more poems about health, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/healthpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Health

4/8: Give Your Pain a Bit of Gratitude

4/9: Thirty-Eight Is Running for Her Life

4/10: When Life Becomes a Sea of Pain

Thirty-Eight Is Running for Her Life

April 9, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is health.

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

A number poem about running for one’s health:

Thirty-eight is running for her life.

Health, of course, is her concern, not fear.

It seems that humankind was born to run,

Regardless whether after game or from,

There being early on just axe and spear.

Yet even now, a daily run feels right.

Evolved to use our bodies, we must fight

Illnesses whose provenance is clear,

Grappling with the damage we have done,

Healing ourselves by running, running where

The labor of our longing greets the light.

© by Nicholas Gordon

If you enjoyed this poem, please like, comment on, or share it so that it might be seen and enjoyed by others. To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/38i.html. For more poems about health, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/healthpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Health

4/8: Give Your Pain a Bit of Gratitude

4/9: Thirty-Eight Is Running for Her Life

Give Your Pain a Bit of Gratitude

April 8, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is health.

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

A get-well-soon poem about enduring pain:

Give your pain a bit of gratitude.

Endure it with due deference to its cause.

The healing instruments could not intrude

Without obeying certain natural laws.

Each moment is a step towards getting well,

Light shining past the doorway of your pain.

Let time take you gently through this hell,

Sure that time will heal what wounds remain.

One lives in hope yet suffers in despair,

Often bearing more than one can bear,

Needing time to savor time again.

© by Nicholas Gordon

If you enjoyed this poem, please like, comment on, or share it so that it might be seen and enjoyed by others. To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/givey2.html. For more poems about health, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/healthpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Health

4/8: Give Your Pain a Bit of Gratitude

Even When the Sky Is Stone

April 7, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is truth.

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

A philosophical poem about the role of imagination in perception:

Even when the sky is stone

The earth is free to sing;

The best potatoes know the songs

That season every spring.

Even when the wall is dry

The paint is not asleep;

Some foul-mouthed cuckoo keeps it up

With jokes that make us weep.

Even when the frog is free

It may not know the dance;

What good is it to have the right

And leave the choice to chance?

Even when the water's clear

Things aren't what they seem;

To understand the simplest words

There is a need to dream.

© by Nicholas Gordon

If you enjoyed this poem, please like, comment on, or share it so that it might be seen and enjoyed by others. To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/skysto.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Truth

4/1: Facts Are Less Reliable than Dreams

4/2: The Truth Is Far Too Truthful

4/3: What You Think You Know, You Don’t

4/4: A Double-Blind Study Is Truly Doubly Blind

4/5: Beverly

4/6: Each Moment Is a Word of Glass

4/7: Even When the Sky Is Stone

Each Moment Is a Word of Glass

April 6, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is truth.

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

A philosophical poem about words and the perception of reality:

Each moment is a word of glass;

Each life, within a bubble sealed.

No pleasure save what one has said,

No love save self in glass concealed.

How shall we gaze like fiery stars

Upon this gallery of breath?

One says only what one is;

There is no rostrum beyond death.

Speak, then, of dancing particles

Within the curvature of eyes,

And with equations sow the seeds

Upon which data crystallize;

While in the forests lovers gleam

Like whispers on a moonlit stream.

© by Nicholas Gordon

If you enjoyed this poem, please like, comment on, or share it so that it might be seen and enjoyed by others. To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/wordgl.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Truth

4/1: Facts Are Less Reliable than Dreams

4/2: The Truth Is Far Too Truthful

4/3: What You Think You Know, You Don’t

4/4: A Double-Blind Study Is Truly Doubly Blind

4/5: Beverly

4/6: Each Moment Is a Word of Glass

Beverly

April 5, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is truth.

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

A philosophical name poem about language and perception:

Beverly enjoys a conversation.

Even when alone, she chatters on

Vivaciously, convivial as a bird,

Eager in pursuit of some bright word.

Reality to her is a relation:

Language is the sculptor of sensation

Yielding to the wisdom of the stone.

© by Nicholas Gordon

If you enjoyed this poem, please like, comment on, or share it so that it might be seen and enjoyed by others. To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/bev.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Truth

4/1: Facts Are Less Reliable than Dreams

4/2: The Truth Is Far Too Truthful

4/3: What You Think You Know, You Don’t

4/4: A Double-Blind Study Is Truly Doubly Blind

4/5: Beverly