A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning

 

Maria Dorota

As virtuous men pass mildly away,

   And whisper to their souls to go,

Whilst some of their sad friends do say

   The breath goes now, and some say, No:

So let us melt, and make no noise,

   No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move;

'Twere profanation of our joys

   To tell the laity our love.

Moving of th' earth brings harms and fears,

   Men reckon what it did, and meant;

But trepidation of the spheres,

   Though greater far, is innocent.

Dull sublunary lovers' love

   (Whose soul is sense) cannot admit

Absence, because it doth remove

   Those things which elemented it.

But we by a love so much refined,

   That our selves know not what it is,

Inter-assured of the mind,

   Care less, eyes, lips, and hands to miss.

Our two souls therefore, which are one,

   Though I must go, endure not yet

A breach, but an expansion,

   Like gold to airy thinness beat.

If they be two, they are two so

   As stiff twin compasses are two;

Thy soul, the fixed foot, makes no show

   To move, but doth, if the other do.

And though it in the center sit,

   Yet when the other far doth roam,

It leans and hearkens after it,

   And grows erect, as that comes home.

Such wilt thou be to me, who must,

   Like th' other foot, obliquely run;

Thy firmness makes my circle just,

   And makes me end where I begun.

 John Donne

Sonnet 29

 

Magnific

When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,

I all alone beweep my outcast state,

And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,

And look upon myself and curse my fate,

Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,

Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,

Desiring this man’s art and that man’s scope,

With what I most enjoy contented least;

Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,

Haply I think on thee, and then my state,

(Like to the lark at break of day arising

From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven’s gate;

       For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings

       That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

Shakespeare

Let This Darkness Be a Bell Tower

 

Pranab Basak

Quiet friend who has come so far,

feel how your breathing makes more space around you.

Let this darkness be a bell tower

and you the bell. As you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.

Move back and forth into the change.

What is it like, such intensity of pain?

If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

In this uncontainable night,

be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,

the meaning discovered there.

And if the world has ceased to hear you,

say to the silent earth: I flow.

To the rushing water, speak: I am.

 

Rainer Maria Rilke

Ahead of all parting

 

Victor Hugo Casillas Romo

Be ahead of all parting, as if it had already happened.

like winter, which even now is passing.

For beneath the winter is a winter so endless

that to survive it at all is a triumph of the heart.

Be forever dead in Eurydice, and climb back singing.

Climb praying as you return to connection.

Here among the disappearing, in the realm of the transient,

be a ringing glass that shatters as it rings.

Be. And, at the same time, know what it is not to be.

The non-being inside you allows you to vibrate

in full resonance with your world. Use it for once.

To all that has run its course, and to the vast unsayable

numbers of beings abounding in Nature,

add yourself gladly, and cancel the cost.

Rainer Maria Rilke 

In, Praise of Mortality: Rilke's Duino Elegies & Sonnets to Orpheus

On Quitting

glam

How much grit do you think you’ve got?

Can you quit a thing that you like a lot?

You may talk of pluck; it’s an easy word,

And where’er you go it is often heard;

But can you tell to a jot or guess

Just how much courage you now possess?

You may stand to trouble and keep your grin,

But have you tackled self-discipline?

Have you ever issued commands to you

To quit the things that you like to do,

And then, when tempted and sorely swayed,

Those rigid orders have you obeyed?

Don’t boast of your grit till you’ve tried it out,

Nor prate to men of your courage stout,

For it’s easy enough to retain a grin

In the face of a fight there’s a chance to win,

But the sort of grit that is good to own

Is the stuff you need when you’re all alone.

How much grit do you think you’ve got?

Can you turn from joys that you like a lot?

Have you ever tested yourself to know

How far with yourself your will can go?

If you want to know if you have grit,

Just pick out a joy that you like, and quit.

It’s bully sport and it’s open fight;

It will keep you busy both day and night;

For the toughest kind of a game you’ll find

Is to make your body obey your mind.

And you never will know what is meant by grit

Unless there’s something you’ve tried to quit.

 Edgar Albert Guest

What Life Should Be

 

Sarah Treanor

To learn while still a child

What this life is meant to be.

To know it goes beyond myself,

It’s so much more than me.

To overcome the tragedies,

To survive the hardest times.

To face those moments filled with pain,

And still, manage to be kind.

To fight for those who can’t themselves,

To always share my light.

With those who wander in the dark,

To love with all my might.

To still stand up with courage,

Though standing on my own.

To still get up and face each day,

Even when I feel alone.

To try to understand the ones

That no one cares to know.

And make them feel some value

When the world has let them go.

To be an anchor, strong and true,

That person loyal to the end.

To be a constant source of hope

To my family and my friends.

To live a life of decency,

To share my heart and soul.

To always say I’m sorry

When I’ve harmed both friend and foe.

To be proud of whom I’ve tried to be,

And this life I chose to live.

To make the most of every day

By giving all I have to give.

To me, that’s what this life should be,

To me, that’s what it’s for.

To take what God has given me

And make it so much more

To live a life that matters,

To be someone of great worth.

To love and be loved in return

And make my mark on Earth.

Pat A. Fleming

Inner Peace

 

StockCake

I ask the moth how to live and it tells me of the perfect moon

I ask the worm how to live and it tells me of the perfect root

I ask the bird how to live and it tells me of the worm

I ask the trees and they say: child, remain deep

rooted, I ask the bees and they say: kid, never settle. Dance.

Where should I be then, and how should I go? I ask.

I ask the snail that has made a home in my shoe

I ask the skyscraper that houses people like snails

I ask the black eye of the storm, chase my tail,

talk back to the wind, I walk the length of the pier

until I am worn and the pier unchanged, as the sea dances

and remains in place.

One day you will stumble upon the stillness

of the woods after rain, upon that vast and gentle

conversation, sky to earth, and you will forget to ask.

One day you will hold the curve of your own face

with the same reverence you hold for stars, close your eyes,

say spontaneously, silently:        Here.

                                                    A dancing light.

                                                    A locked room.

Amy Wolstenholme

Freedom

 

Dunca Daniel

Freedom from fear is the freedom

I claim for you my motherland!

Freedom from the burden of the ages, bending your head,

breaking your back, blinding your eyes to the beckoning

call of the future;

Freedom from the shackles of slumber wherewith

you fasten yourself in night's stillness,

mistrusting the star that speaks of truth's adventurous paths;

freedom from the anarchy of destiny

whole sails are weakly yielded to the blind uncertain winds,

and the helm to a hand ever rigid and cold as death.

Freedom from the insult of dwelling in a puppet's world,

where movements are started through brainless wires,

repeated through mindless habits,

where figures wait with patience and obedience for the

master of show,

to be stirred into a mimicry of life.

Rabindranath Tagore

No One Told Me

 

shutterstock

 

No one told me

it would lead to this.

No one said

there would be secrets

I would not want to know.

No one told me about seeing,

seeing brought me

loss and a darkness I could not hold.

No one told me about writing

or speaking.

Speaking and writing poetry

I unsheathed the sharp edge

of experience that led me here.

No one told me

it could not be put away.

I was told once, only,

in a whisper,

“The blade is so sharp—

It cuts things together

—not apart.”

This is no comfort.

My future is full of blood,

from being blindfold,

hands outstretched,

feeling a way along its firm edge.

David Whyte

The Gift of Love

 

Raja Tilkian

 Love follows me around

until I turn towards it

and see my own face

shining inside this Heart.

Love walks away

and leaves me alone,

but only when I close my eyes to it

and wonder where it is.

For Love is always beaming it’s glow

no matter if I come or go,

it is always loving me,

living me,

being what it is, through me

in perfect glory and attention.

There is nothing else I could do

but dance with it,

praising “thank you”

and feel it’s beautiful warmth.

There is really no place to go

no thing to comprehend

when the feeling heart is full

and when I am a fool for it.

I go mad with love,

crazy for it’s current.

It pulses inside these veins

and moves the body triumphant.

I must shout it out from rooftops,

quickly grab the one beside me.

See, see! Can’t you feel it too?

My eyes alive with fire,

my heart melting in its heat,

this jubilee is You as Me

and Us as It.

Can’t you See?

This is It,

This is All there Is!

Jim Tolles

The Red Poppy

 

 Kukuh Nugroho

The great thing

is not having

a mind. Feelings:

oh, I have those; they

govern me. I have

a lord in heaven

called the sun, and open

for him, showing him

the fire of my own heart, fire

like his presence.

What could such glory be

if not a heart? Oh my brothers and sisters,

were you like me once, long ago,

before you were human? Did you

permit yourselves

to open once, who would never

open again? Because in truth

I am speaking now

the way you do. I speak

because I am shattered.

Louise Glück

in, The Wild Iris

Poppies

  

Santiaga

The poppies send up their

orange flares; swaying

in the wind, their congregations

are a levitation

of bright dust, of thin

and lacy leaves.

There isn’t a place

in this world that doesn’t

sooner or later drown

in the indigos of darkness,

but now, for a while,

the roughage

shines like a miracle

as it floats above everything

with its yellow hair.

Of course nothing stops the cold,

black, curved blade

from hooking forward—

of course

loss is the great lesson.

But I also say this: that light

is an invitation

to happiness,

and that happiness,

when it’s done right,

is a kind of holiness,

palpable and redemptive.

Inside the bright fields,

touched by their rough and spongy gold,

I am washed and washed

in the river

of earthly delight—

and what are you going to do—

what can you do

about it—

deep, blue night?

Mary Oliver

There Are Birds Here

 

Herb Bailey



 

There are birds here,

so many birds here

is what I was trying to say

when they said those birds were metaphors

for what is trapped

between buildings

and buildings. No.

The birds are here

to root around for bread

the girl’s hands tear

and toss like confetti. No,

I don’t mean the bread is torn like cotton,

I said confetti, and no

not the confetti

a tank can make of a building.

I mean the confetti

a boy can’t stop smiling about

and no his smile isn’t much

like a skeleton at all. And no

his neighborhood is not like a war zone.

I am trying to say

his neighborhood

is as tattered and feathered

as anything else,

as shadow pierced by sun

and light parted

by shadow-dance as anything else,

but they won’t stop saying

how lovely the ruins,

how ruined the lovely

children must be in that birdless city.

Jamaal May

in, The Big Book of Exit Strategies

The Bat

 

Nichole Sobecki

Sleek, faery creature,

Strange freak of Nature

That through the twilight comes and goes,

Could we the mystery

Of thy life's history

Resolve, and learn what no man knows,

From what weird forces,

What hidden sources,

Thy winged soul sprang into being

Then might we clearly

Divine more nearly

The world that lies beyond our seeing.

Quaint, mimic angel!

Thy new evangel

Disclose, and share it now with me,

While through the gloaming

Thus lightly roaming,

Thou flittest round this old oak tree;

Tell me what Ages,

What Cosmic stages,

Evolved thy Spirit in the Past;

The far stars glisten,—

Speak, for I listen;

Teach me the Wisdom that thou hast.

Nay, spectral flitter,

Where glow-worms glitter,

Thou art more silent than the sphinx;

Through eras ended

Thou hast descended

Down from the sphere of 'missing links',—

Like pterodactyl

Thy race runs back till

The distance foils our dazèd sight,

To prehistoric,

Rude, allegoric,

Brute offspring of the Infinite.

The Past hath vanished,

From memory banished,

What of the Future canst thou tell?

In words aesthetic,

Sage and prophetic,

Our doubting and our fears dispel;

When life is over

Shall Darkness cover

Thy twilight wanderings with the Night,—

Or from Death's portal

Wilt thou immortal

Speed forth into the realm of light?

Mute mystic rover!

Could we discover

Thy wisdom though thou answer'st not,

There is no human,

Or man or woman,

But hath the knowledge thou hast got;

We know we know not!

The gods bestow not

On thee a wider, clearer view;—

Thou art surrounded,

On all sides bounded,

By thine own ignorance,—adieu!

 S. Waddington

On Houses

 Eric Kim

Then a mason came forth and said, Speak to us of Houses.

     And he answered and said:

     Build of your imaginings a bower in the wilderness ere you build a house within the city walls.

     For even as you have home-comings in your twilight, so has the wanderer in you, the ever distant and alone.

     Your house is your larger body.

     It grows in the sun and sleeps in the stillness of the night; and it is not dreamless. Does not your house dream? and dreaming, leave the city for a grove or hill-top?

     Would that I could gather your houses into my hand, and like a sower scatter them in forest and meadow.

     Would the valleys were your streets, and the green paths your alleys, that you might seek one another through vineyards, and come with the fragrance of the earth in your garments.

     But these things are not yet to be.

     In their fear your forefathers gathered you too near together. And that fear shall endure a little longer. A little longer shall your city walls separate your hearths from your fields.

     And tell me, people of Orphalese, what have you in these houses? And what is it you guard with fastened doors?

     Have you peace, the quiet urge that reveals your power?

     Have you rememberances, the glimmering arches that span the summits of the mind?

     Have you beauty, that leads the heart from things fashioned of wood and stone to the holy mountain?

     Tell me, have you these in your houses?

     Or have you only comfort, and the lust for comfort, that stealthy thing that enters the house a guest, and then becomes a host, and then a master?

     Ay, and it becomes a tamer, and with hook and scourge makes puppets of your larger desires.

     Though its hands are silken, its heart is of iron.

     It lulls you to sleep only to stand by your bed and jeer at the dignity of the flesh.

     It makes mock of your sound senses, and lays them in thistledown like fragile vessels.

     Verily the lust for comfort murders the passion of the soul, and then walks grinning in the funeral.

     But you, children of space, you restless in rest, you shall not be trapped nor tamed.

     Your house shall be not an anchor but a mast.

     It shall not be a glistening film that covers a wound, but an eyelid that guards the eye.

     You shall not fold your wings that you may pass through doors, nor bend your heads that they strike not against a ceiling, nor fear to breathe lest walls should crack and fall down.

     You shall not dwell in tombs made by the dead for the living.

     And though of magnificence and splendour, your house shall not hold your secret nor shelter your longing.

     For that which is boundless in you abides in the mansion of the sky, whose door is the morning mist, and whose windows are the songs and the silences of night.

Kahlil Gibran

in, The Prophet 

 

The Coming of the Ship

 

StockCake

Almustafa, the chosen and the beloved, who was a dawn unto his own day, had waited twelve years in the city of Orphalese for his ship that was to return and bear him back to the isle of his birth.

     And in the twelfth year, on the seventh day of Ielool, the month of reaping, he climbed the hill without the city walls and looked seaward; and he beheld his ship coming with the mist.

     Then the gates of his heart were flung open, and his joy flew far over the sea. And he closed his eyes and prayed in the silences of his soul.

     But as he descended the hill, a sadness came upon him, and he thought in his heart:

     How shall I go in peace and without sorrow? Nay, not without a wound in the spirit shall I leave this city.

     Long were the days of pain I have spent within its walls, and long were the nights of aloneness; and who can depart of his pain and his aloneness without regret?

     Too many fragments of the spirit have I scattered in these streets, and too many are the children of my longing that walk naked among these hills, and I cannot withdraw from them without a burden and an ache.

     It is not a garment I cast off this day, but a skin that I tear with my own hands.

     Nor is it a thought I leave behind me, but a heart made sweet with hunger and with thirst.

     Yet I cannot tarry longer.

     The sea that calls all things unto her calls me, and I must embark.

     For, to stay, though the hours burn in the night, is to freeze and crystallize and be bound in a mould.

     Fain would I take with me all that is here. But how shall I?

     A voice cannot carry the tongue and the lips that gave it wings. Alone must it seek the ether.

     And along and without his nest shall the eagle fly across the sun

     Now when he reached the foot of the hill, he turned again towards the sea, and he saw his ship approaching the harbor, and upon her prow the mariners, the men of his own land.

     And his soul cried out to them, and he said:

     Sons of my ancient mother, you riders of the tides,

     How often have you sailed in my dreams. and now you come in my awakening, which is my deeper dream.

     Ready am I to go, and my eagerness with sails full set awaits the wind.

     Only another breath will I breathe in this still air, only another loving look cast backward,

     And then I shall stand among you, a seafarer among seafarers.

     And you, vast sea, sleepless mother,

     Who alone are peace and freedom to the river and the stream,

     Only another winding will this stream make, only another murmur in this glade,

     And then shall I come to you, a boundless drop to a boundless ocean.

     And as he walked he saw from afar men and women leaving their fields and their vineyards and hastening towards the city gates.

     And he heard their voices calling his name, and shouting from field to field telling one another of the coming of the ship.

     And he said to himself:

     Shall the day of parting be the day of gathering?

     And shall it be said that my eve was in truth my dawn?

     And what shall I give unto him who has left his plough in midfurrow, or to him who has stopped the wheel of his winepress?

     Shall my heart become a tree heavy-laden with fruit that I may gather and give unto them?

     And shall my desires flow like a fountain that I may fill their cups?

     Am I a harp that the hand of the mighty may touch me, or a flute that his breath may pass through me

     A seeker of silences am I, and what treasure have I found in silences that I may dispense with confidence?

     If this is my day of harvest, in what fields have I sowed the seed, and in what unremembered seasons?

     If this indeed be the hour in which I lift up my lantern, it is not my flame that shall burn therein.

     Empty and dark shall I raise my lantern,

     And the guardian of the night shall fill it with oil and he shall light it also.

     These things he said in words But much in his heart remained unsaid. For he himself could not speak his deeper secret.

     And when he entered into the city all the people came to meet him, and they were crying out to him as with one voice.

     And the elders of the city stood forth and said:

     Go not yet away from us.

     A noontide have you been in our twilight, and your youth has given us dreams to dream.

     No stranger are you among us, nor a guest, but our sun and our dearly beloved.

     Suffer not yet our eyes to hunger for your face.

     And the priests and the priestesses said unto him:

     Let not the waves of the sea separates us now, and the years you have spent in our midst become a memory.

     You have walked among us a spirit, and your shadow has been a light upon our faces.

     Much have we loved you. But speechless was our love, and with veils has it been veiled.

     Yet now it cries aloud unto you, and would stand revealed before you.

     And ever has it been  that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation.

     And others came also and entreated him. But he answered them not. He only bent his head; and those who stood near saw his tears falling upon his breast.

     And he and the people proceeded towards the great square before the temple.

     And there came out of the sanctuary a woman whose name was Almitra. And she was a seeress.

     And he looked upon her with exceeding tenderness, for it was she who had first sought and believed in him when he had been but a day in their city.

     And she hailed him, saying:

     Prophet of God, in quest of the uttermost, long have you searched the distances for your ship.

     And now your ship has come, and you must needs go.

     Deep is your longing for the land of your memories and the dwelling place of your greater desires; and our love would not bind you nor our needs hold you.

     Yet this we ask ere you leave us, that you speak to us and give us of your truth.

     And we will give it unto our children, and they unto their children, and it shall not perish.

     In your aloneness you have watched with our days, and in your wakefulness you have listened to the weeping and the laughter of our sleep.

     Now therefore disclose us to ourselves, and tell us all that has been shown you of that which is between birth and death.

     And he answered,

     People of Orphalese, of what can I speak save of that which is even now moving within your souls?

Kahlil Gibran 

in, The Prophet

On Self-Knowledge

 

Free Stock

And a man said, Speak to us of Self-Knowledge.

And he answered, saying:

Your hearts know in silence the secrets of the days and the nights.

But your ears thirst for the sound of your heart’s knowledge.

You would know in words that which you have always known in thought.

You would touch with your fingers the naked body of your dreams.

And it is well you should.

The hidden well-spring of your soul must needs rise and run murmuring to the sea;

And the treasure of your infinite depths would be revealed to your eyes.

But let there be no scales ot weigh your unknown treasure;

And seek not the depths of your knowledge with staff or sounding line.

For self is a sea boundless and measureless.

Say not, “I have found the truth,” but rather, “I have found a truth.” 

Say not, "I have found the path of the soul.” Say rather, “I have met the soul walking upon my path.”

For the soul walks upon all paths.

The soul walks not upon a line, neither does it grow like a reed.

The soul unfolds itself, like a lotus of countless petals.

Kahlil Gibran

in, The Prophet

Self Satisfied Lust

 

freepik

Her cheeks heat

At the first sign of lust.

Her palms, they itch

With the need just to touch.

Her bottom lip, slick and bruised,

Caught between her anxious teeth,

The only sign of need

As her fingers dance lower.

Her breath catches lightly

As her fingertips drag,

Down past her curves

To the place where she

Aches the most.

The slick slide of fingers

Causing her toes and stomach

To curl,

Skin flushed with heat

As her shining lips part

In a choked off moan.

Thoughts and fingers

Moving quickly,

Shoving her toward

Release,

Pulling her under waves

Of needwantdesire.

Her back arched

Wantonly,

As her eyes flutter shut

The pleasurepainpleasure

Of too much and

Not enough

Causing her moans

To jump in volume.

Fingers curling between

Aching thighs,

And her body trembling

While pleasure crashes over her.

Erica

The Encounter

 

freepik

You came to the side of the bed

and sat staring at me.

Then you kissed me-I felt

hot wax on my forehead.

I wanted it to leave a mark:

that’s how I knew I loved you.

Because I wanted to be burned, stamped,

to have something in the end-

I drew the gown over my head;

a red flush covered my face and shoulders.

It will run its course, the course of fire,

setting a cold coin on the forehead, between the eyes.

You lay beside me; your hand moved over my face

as though you had felt it also-

you must have known, then, how I wanted you.

We will always know that, you and I.

The proof will be my body.

Louise Gluck

in,  The Triumph of Achilles

Orphan Lamb

 

pngtree

A black lamb centered in a green field,

his thin breathed-into sides confirming

his bereft call for milk amongst the bedraggled

white fleeced mothers, looking on,

who stood and watched, not hearing

‘plaintive’ or ‘lost’ or ‘waiting to be fed’

but the cry of another mother’s son

needing to find his own way back

to the flow-source of milk and the warm

fleece hug of his mother’s belly

swaying above the teat. They would stand

above his black skeletal form beneath the trees

dropping their heads to drive him off

and stamp and turn again, nudging their own

half hesitant, half happy lambs away.

We walked the fields an hour looking

for a mother standing alone or with a single lamb,

the burnt sun falling to a misted light,

the trees become silhouettes, black as the lamb itself,

our eyes and ears in the crowded field

bent to the ancient prayer rising around us,

the evensong of grief and motherhood,

call and response, wanting and not wanting,

the church bell call of a passing rook

sounding the hour as the last pale

just burnt gold of a cloud framed

our shadows, walking the lit vale

toward the car, toward loss, toward

something in our low disappointed voices

trying to remember from childhood both

the sense of source and the act of being pushed away,

where we were wanted and where we were not.

In the end, we took him home, to a waiting mother

who had lost her own, penned in a barn,

her grown head turned away in the wooden crush

so the lamb could drink and hours later

in the sweet hay strewn dark of the enclosing barn

the mother ewe could smell her own milk

tasted through the lamb’s own breath

their mutual life come to life by self-recognition,

the black lamb pulling mightily at the dugs

as the mother looked on, as we looked on,

and looked at one another

passing the tiny airline bottle,

the faint breath of whisky from our nip

misting and pluming in the half-lit barn.

The single, full malt taste of something met,

a breathing through in the chest, a way of coming to

and of tasting again, the essence of wanting to live,

something paid for by our seeking and our patience,

just a tang, a hint, a mere breath in the glow light,

of being born again.

David Whyte

in, The Bell and the Blackbird