Before You Light the Candles, Say the Blessing

December 4, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Hanukkah, which began at sundown on December 2^nd and will end at sundown on December 10^th.

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

A Hanukkah poem about various functions of the concept of God:

Before you light the candles, say the blessing.

One needs a giver for the gift of light:

Not to answer prayer or make things right;

Not to reward the good or punish sinning;

Instead, to make heart-sense of mystery,

Enduring icon of infinity.

Good God! A portrait of infinity?

An icon we’re interminably blessing?

But our being is a mystery.

Reason has no origin for light.

If the love of God can lessen sinning,

Eradicating wrong, increasing right,

Let God be the champion of right,

Knowing we can’t know infinity,

Engaged in our own struggle against sinning,

Needing someone to receive our blessing,

Noumenon derived from mystery,

A causeless cause of Being, love, and light.

Sing of an imagined source of light,

Embodiment of all that’s good and right,

The portrait hung upon the mystery,

Here to humanize infinity.

As you recite the time-perfected blessing,

Now sing of love, that moves the heart from sinning.

Do we need God to keep ourselves from sinning,

Endowed as we are with reason’s natural light?

Let yourself be tempted by the blessing,

Instinctive impetus for doing right.

Zeal’s too ravenous for finity,

As reason’s boundary line is mystery.

Break like a wave across that mystery!

Each soul must break, must break upon its sinning,

Then draw back into infinity,

Heart ravaged by a loving source of light.

Everything that helps one do what’s right,

Like faith, like wisdom, ritual prayer and blessing,

Lights one’s inner darkness. Sing the blessing,

Ever sinning, ever doing right,

Never far from infinite mystery.

© 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/befor5.html. For more Hanukkah poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/chanukahpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Hanukkah

12/3: Happiness Comes Wholly from the Heart

12/4: Before You Light the Candles, Say the Blessing

Happiness Comes Wholly from the Heart

December 3, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is Hanukkah, which began at sundown on December 2^nd and will end at sundown on December 10^th.

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

A Hanukkah poem using the Hanukkah candles as a metaphor for happiness:

Happiness comes wholly from the heart,

A light within illuminating darkness.

Now the candles flicker, now they flare,

Undulating feeling lighting where

Knowledge must give way to faith and art,

Kindled by the sense that gloom is senseless,

And love can make a song even of sadness,

Harmony in which one sings one’s part.

© 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/happ90.html. For more Hanukkah poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/chanukahpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Hanukkah

12/3: Happiness Comes Wholly from the Heart

Happy, Happy Holidays to You

December 2, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week in honor of the beginning of the holiday season is Happy Holidays.

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

A Happy Holidays poem about the legacy one derives from generations millennia ago and passes on to one’s children:

Happy, happy holidays to you!

A bit of joy before the winter comes,

Pausing for a holiday or two,

Pausing where the ancient stream still runs.

You know, but cannot know, the generations

Having millennia before you come this way,

Over many rites and revelations

Looking to this turn of light to pray.

In each of us the ancient urge still lives,

Dressed in more contemporary clothes,

A cultural inheritance that gives

You something precious to bequeath to those

Still ready to feel joy down to their toes.

© 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/happ89.html. For more Happy Holidays poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/seasonsgreetingspoems.html .

This week’s theme: Happy Holidays

11/26: All Our Friends Have Come to Play

11/27: Hail to the Season of Remembrance

11/28: Happiness Is Rarely Melody

11/29: Happy Holidays

11/30: Happiness Could Use Some Recognition

12/1: Happy Holidays Are Rarely Tranquil

12/2: Happy, Happy Holidays to You

Happy Holidays Are Rarely Tranquil

December 1, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week in honor of the beginning of the holiday season is Happy Holidays.

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

A Happy Holidays poem about the difficulties of dealing with people on the holidays:

Happy holidays are rarely tranquil.

A social moment needs society.

People can be pains, hang on to ankles,

Play hurtful games, whoever they might be.

Yet happy holidays come every year.

Happiness does not preclude some stress.

One often finds that those one holds most dear

Lead one often dearly to regress.

In happy holidays one finds a song

Dancing in involuntary heads,

Asking one if one would sing along,

Yielding tears that sheer nostalgia sheds,

Song of love whose yearning can’t be wrong.

© 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/happ88.html. For more Happy Holidays poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/seasonsgreetingspoems.html .

Audio and Video Music: Sovereign Quarter. By Kevin MacLeod. Performed by Kevin MacLeod at the Free Music Archive under an Attribution license.

This week’s theme: Happy Holidays

11/26: All Our Friends Have Come to Play

11/27: Hail to the Season of Remembrance

11/28: Happiness Is Rarely Melody

11/29: Happy Holidays

11/30: Happiness Could Use Some Recognition

12/1: Happy Holidays Are Rarely Tranquil

Happiness Could Use Some Recognition

November 30, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week in honor of the beginning of the holiday season is Happy Holidays.

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

A Happy Holidays poem about the need to celebrate happiness:

Happiness could use some recognition,

A word or two of pleasure and of praise.

Perhaps it's not a matter of cognition.

Perhaps it needs the help of holidays.

Yet there is ample cause for unshed sorrow,

Hapless housemate one can’t leave behind,

Old comrade that will still be there tomorrow

Lest one lose the past and go forth blind.

In holidays there is a happiness

Deep and wide enough to hold the whole,

A truth that is too subtle to express

Yet satisfies enough to still the soul,

Serving as the gift that pays the toll.

© 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/happ87.html. For more Happy Holidays poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/seasonsgreetingspoems.html .

Audio and Video Music: Trust. By Jahzzar. Performed by Jahzzar at the Free Music Archive under an Attribution-ShareAlike license.

This week’s theme: Happy Holidays

11/26: All Our Friends Have Come to Play

11/27: Hail to the Season of Remembrance

11/28: Happiness Is Rarely Melody

11/29: Happy Holidays

11/30: Happiness Could Use Some Recognition

Happy Holidays

November 29, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week in honor of the beginning of the holiday season is Happy Holidays.

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

A Happy Holidays poem from an ecumenical point of view:

Happy Holidays! Whichever ones

Apply: Jewish, Christian, secular!

People should be less particular,

Perhaps because the labels aren’t sums.

Year's end's a time of darkness, true, but when

Has outer darkness darkened inner light?

Our separate faiths at this sweet time unite,

Lighting one large room beyond our ken.

In celebration there is more than joy:

Days of feasting bind our friendships fast,

A fat and full embrace of things that last,

Yet holy in what sense one might employ,

Savoring all rites that spirits buoy.

© 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/happyh.html. For more Happy Holidays poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/seasonsgreetingspoems.html .

Audio and Video Music: Concerto for 2 Oboes in F Major Op9 no3, 1 Allegro. By Tomaso Albinoni. Performed by the Advent Orchestra at the Free Music Archive under an Attribution- Share Alike license.

This week’s theme: Happy Holidays

11/26: All Our Friends Have Come to Play

11/27: Hail to the Season of Remembrance

11/28: Happiness Is Rarely Melody

11/29: Happy Holidays

Happiness Is Rarely Melody

November 28, 2018

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week in honor of the beginning of the holiday season is Happy Holidays.

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

A Happy Holidays poem describing happiness as the bass voice in a quartet:

Happiness is rarely melody

As other voices jockey for the lead.

Perhaps it is most comfortable as bass,

Pleased to underlie the others' grace,

Yielding to their histrionic need,

Holding up their fragile harmony.

On holidays, however, it becomes

Less self-effacing, stepping forth to sing,

In moments filled with labor, love, and longing,

Deep descants on the beauty of belonging;

After which, again retiring,

Yet not before the harried heart takes wing,

Softly at the base of life it hums.

© 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/happ33.html. For more Happy Holidays poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/seasonsgreetingspoems.html .

Audio and Video Music: Sonata No. 1 in F Minor: Adagio. By Ludwig von Beethoven. Performed by Daniel Veesey at the Free Music Archive under a Public Domain License.

This week’s theme: Happy Holidays

11/26: All Our Friends Have Come to Play

11/27: Hail to the Season of Remembrance

11/28: Happiness Is Rarely Melody