Here Is All the Heaven One Might Hope

November 18, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

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

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

A ninth anniversary poem about the need to cope with the heaven of a good marriage:

Here is all the heaven one might hope,

A cornucopia of circumstance.

Praised be those who can with heaven cope,

Pleased with each day’s blessings in advance.

Yet there are those who look at life askance.

Nor is heaven anywhere but here –

In your love and gentleness of heart.

None who dwells there happily need fear

The pain that tears self-centered souls apart,

Hard put to find content in life or art.

© 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/herei3.html. For more anniversary poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/anniversarypoems.html .

This week’s theme: Anniversaries

11/18: Here Is All the Heaven One Might Hope

Twenty-Six Is Undeterred by Being

November 17, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is philosophy by the numbers.

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

A philosophical number poem about free will as uncaused cause:

Twenty-six is undeterred by being.

Whatever is will not be merely was.

Each moment is a fluid shaped by will,

Neither moving on nor standing still,

Tide against the rock of what one does,

Yielding to the substance of one's seeing.

Such speculation one might well find freeing,

Images of time that hope instill,

Xeroxes of self as uncaused cause.

© 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/26b.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Philosophy by the Numbers

11/11: Solitude Is Never Yours Alone

11/12: Sing of the Sweet Sunlight of the Soul

11/13: Silence at the Center of the Soul

11/14: The Ocean That We Live on Has No Shore

11/15: The Child Was Merely Accidental

11/16: Thirty-Eight Is More than Just a Number

11/17: Twenty-Six Is Undeterred by Being

Thirty-Eight Is More than Just a Number

November 16, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is philosophy by the numbers.

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

A philosophical number poem about the creation of a new infinity every time a child is born:

Thirty-eight is more than just a number,

Having joined through love the flow of flesh,

Inheriting the future, choosing life,

Rejoicing in the wisdom of a wife,

The seed of which the person is the creche,

Yielding what the years cannot encumber.

Even as the tree is not the lumber,

Infinity awaits your will, as such,

Graced to be the cradle of a grief

Howling through the tapestries of touch,

The passion wrapped in swaddling clothes of slumber.

© 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/38d.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Philosophy by the Numbers

11/11: Solitude Is Never Yours Alone

11/12: Sing of the Sweet Sunlight of the Soul

11/13: Silence at the Center of the Soul

11/14: The Ocean That We Live on Has No Shore

11/15: The Child Was Merely Accidental

11/16: Thirty-Eight Is More than Just a Number

The Child Was Merely Accidental

November 15, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is philosophy by the numbers.

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

A philosophical number poem about the unease of knowing that you might never have been:

The child was merely accidental.

When she looked up, the sun turned towards her,

Each star found her face, space crawled up

Next to her, wrapped her in its many layers,

Touched each eye with a soft finger,

Yet her unease would not disappear.

Even in that radiance, it would not disappear,

In the sweet reluctance of a child's world,

Given the joy of strangeness, given

Her capacity for forgiveness, it remained

That she might not have been.

© 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/meracc.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Philosophy by the Numbers

11/11: Solitude Is Never Yours Alone

11/12: Sing of the Sweet Sunlight of the Soul

11/13: Silence at the Center of the Soul

11/14: The Ocean That We Live on Has No Shore

11/15: The Child Was Merely Accidental

The Ocean That We Live on Has No Shore

November 14, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is philosophy by the numbers.

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

A philosophical number poem about the difficulty of bearing the experience of infinity:

The ocean that we live on has no shore.

However far we sail, we reach no end.

Infinity is simply what we see,

Restoring the first meaning of "to be,"

There being only ocean, nothing more.

Yet that is what we cannot comprehend.

None long can bear that god-like ecstasy,

Imagining oneself at Being's core,

Nor long remove the multiplicity

Each mind within itself must apprehend.

© 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/theoce.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Philosophy by the Numbers

11/11: Solitude Is Never Yours Alone

11/12: Sing of the Sweet Sunlight of the Soul

11/13: Silence at the Center of the Soul

11/14: The Ocean That We Live on Has No Shore

Silence at the Center of the Soul

November 13, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is philosophy by the numbers.

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

A philosophical number poem about the silence at the center of all souls:

Silence at the center of the soul:

Infinite, eternal emptiness;

X within a place, a time, a role;

The nearest you can come to holiness.

You live in pieces; here you can be whole.

© 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/silen2.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Philosophy by the Numbers

11/11: Solitude Is Never Yours Alone

11/12: Sing of the Sweet Sunlight of the Soul

11/13: Silence at the Center of the Soul

Sing of the Sweet Sunlight of the Soul

November 12, 2019

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week is philosophy by the numbers.

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

A philosophical number poem about the experience and function of one’s inner light:

Sing of the sweet sunlight of the soul,

Energy stored as goodness and as grace,

Vivid food for hungry mind and heart,

Enduring source of wisdom and of art,

Nourishment no fortune can replace.

The light of one illuminates the whole,

Yet giving light’s a secondary role.

One first must light with love one’s inner space,

Nor need the sun do more to play its part.

Each ray of light’s the gift but not the goal.

© 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/sing15.html. For more philosophical poems, go to https://www.poemsforfree.com/philosophicalpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Philosophy by the Numbers

11/11: Solitude Is Never Yours Alone

11/12: Sing of the Sweet Sunlight of the Soul