One Night I Saw Aaron

February 27, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

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

Today’s poem is about the sudden death of a friend.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

One night I saw Aaron,

The next he was dead.

Now I can't remember

The last thing he said.

There is no reason,

No reason at all,

Why this one last thing

I need to recall.

The last night I saw him,

He, Mark, and I,

I had no idea

He was going to die.

It was just the usual

Basketball game,

Joking and cheering,

All just the same.

The Earth should have screamed,

Some song should have played,

Some mark should have told us,

All gross and decayed.

But the game simply ended

And we left the gym.

And that was the last

I'll see of him.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/1night.html. For more poems about death, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/deathpoems.html .

This week’s theme: Death

February 27: One Night I Saw Aaron

The Murderous Middle Class

February 26, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week, in honor of President’s Day, is politics.

Today’s poem is about the role of the middle class in injustice and oppression.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

The murderous middle class has no

Hard evidence of harm.

Each paddles round the cubicle,

Maintained by what goes on.

Unburdened by communion with

Romantic harmonies

Discerned by a too-willing heart,

Each dreams of grace and ease.

Reason serves the scavengers, while

Only nightmares tell,

Unspeakable, the evils wrought

So they might thrive in hell.

Middle classes mind the store,

Indentured to the wind,

Demanding nothing but their due,

Decent, honest, kind.

Little do they contemplate,

Entrapped in loss and gain,

Canticles of misery

Lamenting lifelong pain.

As they consume, they wonder why

So many others have to die,

Strangled in their name.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Politics

February 20: Praised Be Those Who Would Distribute Power

February 21: What Promises They Make and Cannot Keep

February 22: George

February 23: What Might Make a Person Want to Lead

February 24: When the World Is Laid Waste

February 25: Position Was Always One of Your Favorite Words

February 26: The Murderous Middle Class

Position Was Always One of Your Favorite Words

February 25, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week, in honor of President’s Day, is politics.

Today’s poem is about taking positions on political questions.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Position was always one of your favorite words,

As in, What is your position on ...?

Here it means opinion, yet

It also means pose,

Not as in pose a question,

But as in positioning oneself in front of a camera,

Going public.

Since the Hungarian Revolution I have preferred

Not to go public. My positions

Seem too awkward to expose.

What my camera sees remains

Undeveloped. I am in no position

To have positions.

My position is that of a scientist who knows

That the last time he was certain of anything

He turned out to be looking into a mirror.

Shaken, I place my questions

Into a mosaic of wonder.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Politics

February 20: Praised Be Those Who Would Distribute Power

February 21: What Promises They Make and Cannot Keep

February 22: George

February 23: What Might Make a Person Want to Lead

February 24: When the World Is Laid Waste

February 25: Position Was Always One of Your Favorite Words

When the World Is Laid Waste

February 24, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week, in honor of President’s Day, is politics.

Today’s poem is about after we have destroyed our planet Earth.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

When the world is laid waste,

And its celebrants are cinders,

And its clothes ashes;

When it is once again a dead rock,

Like the rock that encircles it,

Its dust open to the poisonous wind;

When we have wrought what we've wrought

And done what we've done,

And there is no one left to look back in sorrow or anger:

Ah, then, what a song will never be sung!

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Politics

February 20: Praised Be Those Who Would Distribute Power

February 21: What Promises They Make and Cannot Keep

February 22: George

February 23: What Might Make a Person Want to Lead

February 24: When the World Is Laid Waste

What Might Make a Person Want to Lead

February 23, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week, in honor of President’s Day, is politics.

Today’s poem is a political poem about the ambition to lead a nation.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

What might make a person want to lead,

To bear the brutal burden of a state?

Power is for some a noble need

That only shaping history can sate.

One wishes to do good, but on what scale?

The wounded world lies heavy on one’s heart.

One’s gaudiest ambitions tend to pale

Upon the stage on which one plays one’s part.

So there are just a few who would ascend

To where one’s choices change the way things are,

And over many years to one’s will bend

The iron bolts that one’s bright visions bar.

And yet such power corrupts, unless one sees

The need to search one’s soul upon on one’s knees.

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Politics

February 20: Praised Be Those Who Would Distribute Power

February 21: What Promises They Make and Cannot Keep

February 22: George

February 23: What Might Make a Person Want to Lead

George2

February 22, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week, in honor of President’s Day, is politics.

Today’s poem is a name poem for George Washington, who was famous for not telling lies.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

George does not admit to telling lies,

Even as he tells them every day.

One lives in a perpetual disguise,

Reduced to a self-marketed display.

Great men wear life well, for they are wise

Enough to know the things that none need say.

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/georg2.html. For more poems for Presidents Day, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/presidentsdaypoems.html .

This week’s theme: Politics

February 20: Praised Be Those Who Would Distribute Power

February 21: What Promises They Make and Cannot Keep

February 22: George

What Promises They Make and Cannot Keep

February 21, 2017

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week, in honor of President’s Day, is politics.

Today’s poem is about politicians from the point of view of an apathetic electorate.

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

Yours,

Nick Gordon

What promises they make and cannot keep!

Each year like well-trained dogs they bark and yelp,

An annual charade they cannot help,

Knowing well where they must drive their sheep.

Their vetted visions sow what none might reap;

Their practiced platitudes are off the shelf;

Their chief constituent remains the self;

Still, we vote and then go back to sleep.

We do not care how much they lie and steal

So long as streets are clean and taxes low,

And we are taken care of, more or less.

OK, the self-served suffering may be real

Of those poor souls we do not care to know.

But what has that to do with happiness?

© by Nicholas Gordon

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

This week’s theme: Politics

February 20: Praised Be Those Who Would Distribute Power

February 21: What Promises They Make and Cannot Keep