The Truelove

 

Iuliia Bondar

There is a faith in loving fiercely

the one who is rightfully yours,

especially if you have

waited years and especially

if part of you never believed

you could deserve this

loved and beckoning hand

held out to you this way.

I am thinking of faith now

and the testaments of loneliness

and what we feel we are

worthy of in this world.

Years ago in the Hebrides,

I remember an old man

who walked every morning

on the grey stones

to the shore of baying seals,

who would press his hat

to his chest in the blustering

salt wind and say his prayer

to the turbulent Jesus

hidden in the water,

and I think of the story

of the storm and everyone

waking and seeing

the distant

yet familiar figure

far across the water

calling to them

and how we are all

preparing for that

abrupt waking,

and that calling,

and that moment

we have to say yes,

except it will

not come so grandly

so Biblically

but more subtly

and intimately in the face

of the one you know

you have to love

so that when

we finally step out of the boat

toward them, we find

everything holds

us, and everything confirms

our courage, and if you wanted

to drown you could,

but you don’t

because finally

after all this struggle

and all these years

you simply don’t want to

any more

you’ve simply had enough

of drowning

and you want to live and you

want to love and you will

walk across any territory

and any darkness

however fluid and however

dangerous to take the

one hand you know

belongs in yours.

David Whyte

Life is Fine

 

Alpgiray Kelem

I went down to the river,

I set down on the bank.

I tried to think but couldn’t,

So I jumped in and sank.

I came up once and hollered!

I came up twice and cried!

If that water hadn’t a-been so cold

I might’ve sunk and died.

    But it was      Cold in that water!      It was cold!

I took the elevator

Sixteen floors above the ground.

I thought about my baby

And thought I would jump down.

I stood there and I hollered!

I stood there and I cried!

If it hadn’t a-been so high

I might’ve jumped and died.

    But it was      High up there!      It was high!

So since I'm still here livin’,

I guess I will live on.

I could’ve died for love—

But for livin’ I was born

Though you may hear me holler,

And you may see me cry—

I’ll be dogged, sweet baby,

If you gonna see me die.

    Life is fine!      Fine as wine!      Life is fine!

Langston Hughes

in,The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes 

Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night

 

Peter Vahlersvik

Do not go gentle into that good night,

Old age should burn and rave at close of day;

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,

Because their words had forked no lightning they

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright

Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,

And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight

Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,   

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,

Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Dylan Thomas

in, The Poems of Dylan Thomas

Dockery and Son

 

Alberto Guglielmi

 ‘Dockery was junior to you,

Wasn’t he?’ said the Dean. ‘His son’s here now.’   

Death-suited, visitant, I nod. ‘And do

You keep in touch with—’ Or remember how   

Black-gowned, unbreakfasted, and still half-tight   

We used to stand before that desk, to give   

‘Our version’ of ‘these incidents last night’?   

I try the door of where I used to live:

Locked. The lawn spreads dazzlingly wide.

A known bell chimes. I catch my train, ignored.   

Canal and clouds and colleges subside

Slowly from view. But Dockery, good Lord,   

Anyone up today must have been born

In ’43, when I was twenty-one.

If he was younger, did he get this son

At nineteen, twenty? Was he that withdrawn

High-collared public-schoolboy, sharing rooms

With Cartwright who was killed? Well, it just shows   

How much ... How little ... Yawning, I suppose

I fell asleep, waking at the fumes

And furnace-glares of Sheffield, where I changed,   

And ate an awful pie, and walked along   

The platform to its end to see the ranged   

Joining and parting lines reflect a strong

Unhindered moon. To have no son, no wife,   

No house or land still seemed quite natural.   

Only a numbness registered the shock   

Of finding out how much had gone of life,   

How widely from the others. Dockery, now:   

Only nineteen, he must have taken stock

Of what he wanted, and been capable

Of ... No, that’s not the difference: rather, how

Convinced he was he should be added to!

Why did he think adding meant increase?

To me it was dilution. Where do these

Innate assumptions come from? Not from what   

We think truest, or most want to do:

Those warp tight-shut, like doors. They’re more a style   

Our lives bring with them: habit for a while,

Suddenly they harden into all we’ve got

And how we got it; looked back on, they rear   

Like sand-clouds, thick and close, embodying   

For Dockery a son, for me nothing,

Nothing with all a son’s harsh patronage.   

Life is first boredom, then fear.

Whether or not we use it, it goes,

And leaves what something hidden from us chose,   

And age, and then the only end of age.

Philip Larkin

O Me! O Life!

 

Farhad Irani

O Me! O life! of the questions of these recurring,

Of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities fill’d with the foolish,

Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)

Of eyes that vainly crave the light, of the objects mean, of the struggle ever renew’d,

Of the poor results of all, of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me,

Of the empty and useless years of the rest, with the rest me intertwined,

The question, O me! so sad, recurring—What good amid these, O me, O life?

Answer.

That you are here—that life exists and identity,

That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.

 Walt Whitman

suppose

Ron Spohn

suppose

Life is an old man carrying flowers on his head.

young death sits in a café

smiling, a piece of money held between

his thumb and first finger

(I say “will he buy flowers” to you

and “Death is young

life wears velous trousers

life totters, life has a beard” i

say to you who are silent.—“Do you see

Life? he is there and here,

or that, or this

or nothing or an old man 3 thirds

asleep, on his head

flowers, always crying

to nobody something about les

roses les bluets

                         yes,

                                 will He buy?

Les belles bottes—oh hear

, pas chères”)

and my love slowly answered I think so. But

I think I see someone else

there is a lady, whose name is Afterwards

she is sitting beside young death, is slender;

likes flowers.

E.E. Cummings

Silent Friend of Many Distances

 

okeyphotos

Silent friend of many distances, feel

how your breath enlarges all of space.

Let your presence ring out like a bell

into the night. What feeds upon your face

grows mighty from the nourishment thus offered.

Move through transformation, out and in.

What is the deepest loss that you have suffered?

If drinking is bitter, change yourself to wine.

In this immeasurable darkness, be the power

that rounds your senses in their magic ring,

the sense of their mysterious encounter.

And if the earthly no longer knows your name,

whisper to the silent earth: I’m flowing.

To the flashing water say: I am.

Rainer Maria Rilke

Tree

 

StockCake

Yes, often an olive wants to be a fish,

An almond often wishes to be a bird

I am pretty well accustomed to being like this now

Just a while ago I changed into human form

For a few minutes

My supple soft skin, my bones and the flesh wrapping around them

They all felt eerie to me

But in a while when I revert to being a tree

How fondly I will reminisce

About the human body I have now

My fingers, nails, and joints

How marvelous!

I have bones; I have muscles to pull my bones,

And skin covers all

My blood is coursing on and on

I can move myself, like this, any way I want to

I can point at the sky

I can stroke my hair!

Grasses, leaves, fruit or branches cannot do what I can –

They stretch their branches, turn their leaves

Lazily toward the light,

Yes, really, “lazily” as you’d say in human tongue

But when I was a tree, it did not feel so lazy

Rather, it was more like securely

Rather, it was more like steadily

What is this fury inside the human body?

It makes me dizzy

Look

Bones and muscles shed their old selves

To make new bones and muscles

Much has changed between now and just a while ago

When I first met you

So this is what aging means, isn’t it?

Uh,

Your two manly hands

Like rough palm leaves

Rest on my two shoulders

What is this numbing warmth your hands convey

To my muscles and bones?

To speak

We trees don’t have words

Time is running out

Once the time comes, I won’t ever be

A human like this, forever

Tell me

How else are humans different from trees?

What is this?

What is this mysterious warmth

That comes to me through your fingers?

Tell me,

Something I missed doing

Not much time left

Yes –

What a pleasant thing to do, to respond.

Please, tell me.

As I place my hand here like so

The sound of your blood rushing in your chest

Grows so fast

Time is running out. Please, please tell me

What is the biggest thing I missed doing.

I feel as if there is something I should do, something fervent

Something I’d move my muscles for

Something I’d violently rub my joints for

To chat

Isn’t there something else that is more important?

What is it?

What is this something humans do to be wholly human?

Just a while back

When you placed your manly hands on my womanly shoulders

My female muscles and bones felt a certain

Fulfillment and warmth

Doesn’t that have much to do with

What I have yet to do?

Am I not missing something

Something violent

That goes well with the fury of metabolism

In this human body that holds bones and muscles?

But maybe I am wrong

Am I just babbling human words

While thinking like a tree?

What?

Are you saying I’ve missed doing something?

Tell me

Please

Why do you hesitate?

So you are saying, aren’t you, it is different from

Talking,

Pointing,

Jumping,

Counting numbers and the like?

Goodness, how pained you look!

I thought humans had a wonderful thing called words

Which allow you

To convey, to inform or to express anything you want to,

But there are things that words can’t help –

Ah, there’s no time left

I want to know

What it is that I missed doing

With no words,

This

Is what you can tell me, isn’t it?

As you clasp my shoulder as you are doing now

With your five fingers wrapped around my shoulder

Your thumb

Your forefinger

Your middle finger

Your ring finger

And your little finger

Five shocks run through me

Hurry! Time is running out!

Hiroshi Kawasaki

Phase One

 

Alexander Krivitskiy

For leaving the fridge open

last night, I forgive you.

For conjuring white curtains

instead of living your life.

For the seedlings that wilt, now,

in tiny pots, I forgive you.

For saying no first

but yes as an afterthought.

I forgive you for hideous visions

after childbirth, brought on by loss

of sleep. And when the baby woke

repeatedly, for your silent rebuke

in the dark, “What’s your beef?”

I forgive your letting vines

overtake the garden. For fearing

your own propensity to love.

For losing, again, your bag

en route from San Francisco;

for the equally heedless drive back

on the caffeine-fueled return.

I forgive you for leaving

windows open in rain

and soaking library books

again. For putting forth

only revisions of yourself,

with punctuation worked over,

instead of the disordered truth,

I forgive you. For singing mostly

when the shower drowns

your voice. For so admiring

the drummer you failed to hear

the drum. In forgotten tin cans,

may forgiveness gather. Pooling

in gutters. Gushing from pipes.

A great steady rain of olives

from branches, relieved

of cruelty and petty meanness.

With it, a flurry of wings, thirteen

gray pigeons. Ointment reserved

for healers and prophets. I forgive you.

I forgive you. For feeling awkward

and nervous without reason.

For bearing Keats’s empty vessel

with such calm you worried

you had, perhaps, no moral

center at all. For treating your mother

with contempt when she deserved

compassion. I forgive you. I forgive

you. I forgive you. For growing

a capacity for love that is great

but matched only, perhaps,

by your loneliness. For being unable

to forgive yourself first so you

could then forgive others and

at last find a way to become

the love that you want in this world.

 Dilruba Ahmed

The Shape of Silence

 

R.R. Leone

It never begins loudly.

No slammed doors.

No thunder of words.

Just a pause

that lasts

longer than it should.

At first you tell yourself

they just need space.

Everyone needs space.

So you wait.

But the quiet stretches.

Minutes become hours.

Hours become something heavier.

You replay the last conversation

like a physician studying scans,

searching for the fracture

you might have missed.

Was it that sentence?

That question?

The look on your face when you spoke?

The mind becomes a detective

in a crime scene of memory.

Meanwhile the room fills

with a silence that has weight.

The phone stays dark.

No message. No explanation.

Just absence.

And the strange part is

how silence changes the body.

Your breath grows shallow.

Thoughts circle faster.

The nervous system begins to signal

something it cannot name.

Not anger. Not grief.

Something closer to panic.

Like slipping beneath water

and realizing

no one else noticed.

At first you tread carefully.

You assume air will come back.

A word. A message. A sign of life.

But the surface keeps moving farther away.

And the quiet grows deeper.

You begin to understand something

no one ever teaches you about love.

Connection is oxygen.

And when it disappears suddenly,

the mind does what bodies do underwater:

it fights.

It searches.

It reaches upward for something

that isn't there.

Eventually the conversation returns.

Or it doesn't.

But by then something has changed.

Because silence, once introduced,

leaves a mark.

Not a wound you can see.

Just the memory

of how long you held your breath

before realizing

you were swimming alone.

R.R. Leone

Each Moment Is Precious

 

BriBar

The English Lake District, Keswick, Cumbria, UK

Live in the moment,

Just take it all in.

Pay attention to everything,

Right there and right then.

Don’t let your mind wander

To what’s coming next.

Cherish this moment

And give it your best.

Don’t let tomorrow

Make you rush through today,

Or too many great moments

Will just go to waste.

And the person you’re with,

In that moment you share,

Give them all of your focus;

Be totally there.

Laugh till it hurts,

Let the tears drop.

Fill up each moment

With all that you’ve got.

Don’t miss the details;

The lesson is there.

Don’t get complacent;

Stay sharp and aware.

It can take but a moment

To change your life’s path.

And once it ticks by,

There is no going back.

In just 60 seconds,

You may make a new friend.

Find your true love,

Or see a life start or end.

You become who you are

In those moments you live.

And the growth’s not in taking

But in how much you give.

Life is just moments,

So precious and few.

Whether valued or squandered,

It’s all up to you!

Patricia Fleming

Steel Cage

 

Bonny Beth Leah Luhman

We all live happily in our transparent steel cages.

We are happy in our own prison because 

it may be confining but it protects us from the outside world.

That way we need not be effected by the troubles of the citizens of the world.

If we don't like what we see we can change the channel from within our cells.

And even if we watch it we are not effected because 

nothing can get to us within our prison.

But the pressures of the world keep pressing and 

even steel has it's breaking point.

Finally our prison shatters inward cutting and bruising us 

in a thousand different places on the outside and the inside.

The wounds on the outside will heal.

Are you happy with your inner wounds?

You should be.

You earned them.

Steve Hannity

Do You Know What You Want?

 

StockCake

You beg for life, but you race towards death.

You march for freedom, but hide under oppression.

You want your liberties, so you steal them from others.

You want to be equal, but you are in the minority or so you say.

You yearn for individuality, but you are afraid to be different.

You want to be unafraid, but you are afraid of what will happen if you are.

You want to relax, so you speed through life.

You want to be loved, but spread the seeds of hate.

So think care fully, do you want your life, or do you want your death?

Do you know what you want?

Steve Hannity

Instructions Before Visiting Earth

 

forplayday/iStock

In the event that you wake up

and find your soul separated from source

and manifest into material form, don’t panic.

Your condition is only temporary.

You have been selected for the opportunity

of human incarnation.

This 3D simulation is designed

to break up the monotony of eternity

by giving you a fully immersive experience

as a distinct ego identity.

Your body will serve

as your physical avatar

as you navigate a dense and dramatic reality.

There will be many distractions

causing you to forget your true nature and origin.

You will experience a range of emotions

from joy to loneliness to despair.

But remember – no matter

what trials and traumas you encounter,

your soul remains perfectly safe.

At times you may feel lost or afraid.

This is totally normal.

If you ever need guidance,

simply slow down your busy mind

and bring your awareness

to the quiet place

inside yourself.

On this planet, nothing is permanent.

People and things will come and go.

You will fall in love and form sentimental attachments

only to lose everything you hold dear.

So cling to nothing too tightly, even yourself,

and when it’s time to let go, let go with grace,

for nothing is owned, only borrowed.

As you walk among

the people on the planet,

try to be a good guest.

Tread lightly. Remember

that you are only visiting.

Don’t make a mess.

Listen more than you speak.

Give more than you take.

Don’t keep your soft heart

locked inside a glass cage,

protected from wear and tear.

You’ll never make it out alive

and time passes quickly.

So come back with some battle scars

and good stories to tell.

James McCrae

Death, be not proud

 

StockCake

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;

For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow

Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.

From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,

Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,

And soonest our best men with thee do go,

Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.

Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,

And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,

And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well

And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?

One short sleep past, we wake eternally

And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.

John Donne