Love Is Not a Simple Yes or No

February 5, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

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

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

A love poem about how to identify true love:

Love is not a simple yes or no.
Only will and time ordain its truth.
Visions of sweet pleasure come and go.
Embracing love takes wisdom more than proof.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/lovei4.html. For more poems about love, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/lovepoems.html .

This week’s theme: Love.
February 1: A Love Duet for Contrary Voices
February 2: Dreams Do Come True
February 3: Fools Desire Flesh; the Wise Love Souls
February 4: Love Comes Unexpectedly
February 5: Love Is Not a Simple Yes or No

Love Comes Unexpectedly

February 4, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

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

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

A love poem about the depth of spiritual experience that can be had through love:

Love comes unexpectedly,
An arrow to the heart,
But stays only reluctantly
Through patience, will, and art.

The full-length version of the story
Has both joy and pain,
Boredom, lust, betrayal, glory,
Anger, comfort, shame.

It ends in grief, inevitably,
Through death or separation,
The harshness of the agony
As strong as the relation.

So why, then, love? And why persist
In love long after passion
Has gone its way? And why resist
An urge one need not ration?

The answer is in something more
Than fantasy and pleasure --
A passion passion never saw,
A hunger beyond measure;

A longing for the One in one
One longs for all one's life,
And is love, yes, the same that binds
A husband to a wife.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/lovec3.html. For more poems about love, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/lovepoems.html .

This week’s theme: Love.
February 1: A Love Duet for Contrary Voices
February 2: Dreams Do Come True
February 3: Fools Desire Flesh; the Wise Love Souls
February 4: Love Comes Unexpectedly

Fools Desire Flesh; the Wise Love Souls

February 3, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

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

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

A philosophical love poem about the wisdom of choosing love over lust:

Fools desire flesh; the wise love souls.
Friendship, kindness, generosity,
Humor, wit, a harbor free of shoals --
These bring far more joy than ecstasy.
Yet there are those who, bored by harmony,
Prefer an edgy dissonance that holds
The prospect of a life near duty free,
Adventure unconstrained as time unfolds.
There is, of course, no choice without its cost.
One must be this or that or in between.
And what one isn't stays within the heart.
Wisdom lies in knowing what is lost.
The self's less self less selfless, and more mean,
While loving is a rich yet ruthless art.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/foolsd.html. For more poems about love, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/lovepoems.html .

This week’s theme: Love.
February 1: A Love Duet for Contrary Voices
February 2: Dreams Do Come True
February 3: Fools Desire Flesh; the Wise Love Souls

Dreams Do Come True

February 2, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

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

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

A love poem about the need for dreams to survive disillusionment before they can come true:

Dreams do come true, but only when
They make it through despair,
Limping into everyday
Transformed beyond repair.

No dream would be a dream if it
Could pass for something real,
Nor would we sail for paradise
Would it its shoals conceal.

So it is with love: the dream
Long longed for, now possessed,
Must be a dream no longer, but
An emperor undressed.

Stark naked it must come to us
In unaccustomed shame,
And we must take it in our arms
And love it all the same.

And we must love love as it is
That dreams might still come true,
Mangled into miracles
To make our lives anew.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/dreams.html. For more poems about love, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/lovepoems.html .

This week’s theme: Love.
February 1: A Love Duet for Contrary Voices
February 2: Dreams Do Come True

A Love Duet for Contrary Voices

February 1, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

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

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

A love poem contrasting free love with commitment:

A LOVE DUET FOR CONTRARY VOICES

ONE

Let me love you as I would,
Not as you will or as I should.
For love, to linger, must be free,
And what you wish for isn't me.

TWO

You might love me as you would,
But I must spurn you, as I should.
For though love is a choice that's free,
Once made, it means that you love me.

ONE

Only you? I might love two,
Or three or four. As might you.
For love will ever have its way,
Regardless what we do or say.

TWO

Those who say that they love two
Love only one--themselves. For you
Confuse desire with love, whose way
Is willed, regardless what you say.

ONE

Is willed? Confuse love with desire?
But what is love without the fire?
A cage in which two birds expire,
Each to each a gutless liar.

TWO

Love begins, yes, as desire,
But then one must maintain the fire,
Lest it, lacking care, expire,
Making one a faithful liar.

BOTH

On this point we both agree:
Love loves not dishonesty.

ONE

But some would love upon the sea,

TWO

While some would love more vertically,
That past and future rooted be
In one well-tended, fruitful tree.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/aloved.html. For more poems about love, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/lovepoems.html .

This week’s theme: Love.
February 1: A Love Duet for Contrary Voices

January 31, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

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

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

A philosophical number poem about the desire to share beauty:

Thirty-four sings softly in the moonlight,
Hoping to disturb a passing soul.
In beauty only does one see God's face,
Reckoning the power by the grace,
Touching so the sunlight in the coal.
Years of song are swallowed by the night.

Fear not, for the miracle of sight
Opens up a window on the whole,
Unveiling a glimpse of time and place
Resplendent as the song one sings alone.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/34b.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Music.
January 25: Now Is Just the Time for Non-Stop Jazz
January 26: Thirty-Seven Is Immersed in Beauty
January 27: Isabella Loves the Sound of Music
January 28: Forty-Seven Listens to Her Music
January 29: Sixty-Five Suspends Her Animation
January 30: Thirty-Five Has All the Joy He Needs
January 31: Thirty-Four Sings Softly in the Moonlight

Thirty-Four Sings Softly in the Moonlight

January 31, 2021

Dear Subscriber:

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

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

A philosophical number poem about the desire to share beauty:

Thirty-four sings softly in the moonlight,
Hoping to disturb a passing soul.
In beauty only does one see God's face,
Reckoning the power by the grace,
Touching so the sunlight in the coal.
Years of song are swallowed by the night.

Fear not, for the miracle of sight
Opens up a window on the whole,
Unveiling a glimpse of time and place
Resplendent as the song one sings alone.

© by Nicholas Gordon

To see this poem on my site, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/34b.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html.

This week’s theme: Music.
January 25: Now Is Just the Time for Non-Stop Jazz
January 26: Thirty-Seven Is Immersed in Beauty
January 27: Isabella Loves the Sound of Music
January 28: Forty-Seven Listens to Her Music
January 29: Sixty-Five Suspends Her Animation
January 30: Thirty-Five Has All the Joy He Needs
January 31: Thirty-Four Sings Softly in the Moonlight