What Poetry Moved You?

[iwalkalone]

An Angel Cries

 

 

Isn't is sad when an angel cries?

Small pearl drops fall from the skies,

holy water flows in tears,

human burdens their only fears.

They live among us everyday,

to help guide us on our way,

it upsets them to hear our lies,

Isn't it sad when an angel cries?

Everyday they absorb our pain,

in their tears it will remain,

we may ask what goods it for?

But everyday they are fighting our war.

Some battles won whilst others lost,

earth to be rebuilt at such a cost,

life streams are broken when they try,

isn't it sad for an angle to cry?

[iwalkalone]

Here i am crying, but i told my self the next

time i will cry is when i k*ll myself. Im crying though. How can i break like ths How can i cry?.... u ask..... it's like death wounderful but sad. but thats me.All sad, sad like the black hole of sadness. How, how how, can i break and cry when i should'nt. But im dead. I'v been dead all my life so how......why........why do i cry tonight?

[spongebobby]

after all these years, still my favorite poem.

 

and after all these years, i still post in lower case--because of e.e. cummings.

 

somewhere i have never travelled

 

somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond

any experience, your eyes have their silence:

in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,

or which i cannot touch because they are too near

 

your slightest look easily will unclose me

though i have closed myself as fingers,

you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens

(touching skilfully, mysteriously) her first rose

 

or if your wish be to close me, i and

my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly,

as when the heart of this flower imagines

the snow carefully everywhere descending;

 

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals

the power of your intense fragility: whose texture

compels me with the colour of its countries,

rendering death and forever with each breathing

 

(i do not know what it is about you that closes

and opens; only something in me understands

the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)

nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands

 

-- e. e. cummings

[TNT Hsia]

For the Longest Time

-Billy Joel

 

Oh, oh, oh

For the longest time

Oh, oh, oh

For the longest ...

 

If you said goodbye to me tonight

There would still be music left to write

What else could I do

I'm so inspired by you

That hasn't happened for the longest time

 

Once I thought my innocence was gone

Now I know that happiness goes on

That's where you found me

When you put your arms around me

I haven't been there for the longest time

 

Oh, oh, oh

For the longest time

Oh, oh, oh

For the longest ...

 

I'm that voice youre hearing in the hall

And the greatest miracle of all

Is how I need you

And how you needed me too

That hasn't happened for the longest time

 

Maybe this won't last very long

But you feel so right

And I could be wrong

Maybe I've been hoping too hard

But I've gone this far

And it's more than I hoped for

 

Who knows how much further well go on

Maybe I'll be sorry when youre gone

I'll take my chances

I forgot how nice romance is

I haven't been there for the longest time

 

I had second thoughts at the start

I said to myself

Hold on to your heart

Now I know the woman that you are

You're wonderful so far

And its more than I hoped for

 

I dont care what consequence it brings

I have been a fool for lesser things

I want you so bad

I think you ought to know that

I intend to hold you for the longest time

Edited December 1, 2006 by TNT Hsia

[iwalkalone]

A Gas Butterfly

 

Tell me what's happening to me?

Why is my heart beating so fervently?

why has this madness, like a wave,

Broken through the rock of habit?

 

Is it my strength or just my torment

I'm too disturbed to tell:

From the shimmering lines of life

I extract a forgotten phrase...

 

Is it a thief who turns his lantern

Upon the crowd of dreary letters?

I can't help reading the phrase,

But haven't the strength to go back...

 

It really had to flare up,

But it only harries the darkness;

All night, like a gas-flame butterfly

It trembles, but cannot escape...

[iwalkalone]

Till death do us part I will hold you

Till death do us part I will be there for you

Till death do us part I will protect you

Till death do us part I will love you

 

Till death do us part?

What does it actually mean?

Is it about being together,

Until we die?

 

Till death do us part I shall carry you

Till death do us part I shall care for you

Till death do us part I shall be with you

Till death do us part I shall love you

 

Till death do us part

Will not be the end of my love

For as long as I exist in body or soul

My love for you will carry on

[cuatro_ojos]

"The Road Not Taken"

by Robert Frost

 

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveller, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

 

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

 

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

 

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

 

------------------------------------------------------

 

Don't Quit

by anonymous

 

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,

When the road you're trudging seems all uphill,

When the funds are low and the debts are high,

And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,

When care is pressing you down a bit,

Rest if you must; but don't you quit.

 

Life is queer with its twists and turns,

As everyone of us sometimes learns,

And many a failure turns about

When he might have won had he stuck it out;

Don't give up, though the pace seems slow;

You might succeed with another blow.

 

Often the goal is nearer than

It seems to a faint and faltering man,

Often the struggler has given up

When he might have captured the victor's cup.

And he learned too late, when the night slipped down,

How close he was to the golden crown.

 

Success is failure turned inside out;

The silver tint of the clouds of doubt;

And you never can tell how close you are,

It may be near when it seems afar;

So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit;

It's when things seem worst that you mustn't quit.

Edited December 8, 2006 by cuatro_ojos

[naked_angel]

the invitation

oriah

 

 

it doesn’t interest me what you do for a living.

i want to know what you ache for

and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart’s longing.

 

it doesn’t interest me how old you are.

i want to know if you will risk looking like a fool

for love

for your dream

for the adventure of being alive.

 

it doesn’t interest me what planets are squaring your moon...

i want to know if you have touched the centre of your own sorrow

if you have been opened by life’s betrayals

or have become shrivelled and closed

from fear of further pain.

 

i want to know if you can sit with pain

mine or your own

without moving to hide it

or fade it

or fix it.

 

i want to know if you can be with joy

mine or your own

if you can dance with wildness

and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes

without cautioning us

to be careful

to be realistic

to remember the limitations of being human.

 

it doesn’t interest me if the story you are telling me

is true.

i want to know if you can

disappoint another

to be true to yourself.

if you can bear the accusation of betrayal

and not betray your own soul.

if you can be faithless

and therefore trustworthy.

 

i want to know if you can see Beauty

even when it is not pretty

every day.

and if you can source your own life

from its presence.

 

i want to know if you can live with failure

yours and mine

and still stand at the edge of the lake

and shout to the silver of the full moon,

“yes.”

 

it doesn’t interest me

to know where you live or how much money you have.

i want to know if you can get up

after the night of grief and despair

weary and bruised to the bone

and do what needs to be done

to feed the children.

 

it doesn’t interest me who you know

or how you came to be here.

i want to know if you will stand

in the centre of the fire

with me

and not shrink back.

 

it doesn’t interest me where or what or with whom

you have studied.

i want to know what sustains you

from the inside

when all else falls away.

 

i want to know if you can be alone

with yourself

and if you truly like the company you keep

in the empty moments.

[habahabatuta]

The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe (1845)

 

...Quote the Raven, "Nevermore."

[gonefishing]

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart

and try to love the questions themselves,

like locked rooms and like books

that are written in a very foreign tongue.

Do not now seek the answers,

which cannot be given you because

you would not be able to live them.

And the point is, to live everything.

Live the questions now.

Perhaps you will find them gradually,

without noticing it,

and live along some distant day into the answer.

[iwalkalone]

Death Of An Angel

by Joseph Smith

 

 

I once knew a lady named

Misery

she lived in a damaged world

she calls to me in transparent dreams

 

a lonely star

outside

the closed universe

 

she was my twisted soul

 

long ago

she experienced

the darkest of

pain

 

beauty was something

she could not

believe

 

I once knew an angel named

Evil

she traveled like a

ghost into the shadows

 

her heart was dying for some form of

life

 

all seems balanced

now

the angel burns to

die

[iwalkalone]

Crazy doom, And a flower blooms,

Boom KaBoom, your out , before I count

to 2,

Played your cards damn you messed up

fool,

Angel of death, Bloody eyes black ,

So gloom,

Beautiness and Tenderness I would assume,

Id love to give you a kiss but it would

all end to soon,

Roamed a carnival,

Oh,

Heres a balloon,

 

Saturated pain to slowly seep through skin,

Beautiful purple eyes ,

I got lost in your haze,

One day ended,

To end both our days,

I see all grey ,

But you spark color in my lone dismay,

 

So shall we stare upon Mother Moon ,

And in minds begin to pray,

Please dont let this night end,

For' Tommorrow, I cant see you again,

Brings forth another bad day,

To dream and stare around at my

four corners all day.

[naked_angel]

the dance

 

i have sent you my invitation,

the note inscribed on the palm of my hand by the fire of living.

don’t jump up and shout, “yes, this is what i want! let’s do it!”

just stand up quietly and dance with me.

 

show me how you follow your deepest desires,

spiraling down into the ache within the ache,

and I will show you how I reach inward and open outward

to feel the kiss of the mystery, sweet lips on my own, every day.

 

don’t tell me you want to hold the whole world in your heart.

show me how you turn away from making another wrong without abandoning yourself when you are hurt and afraid of being unloved.

 

tell me a story of who you are,

and see who I am in the stories I live.

and together we will remember that each of us always has a choice.

 

don’t tell me how wonderful things will be . . . some day.

show me you can risk being completely at peace,

truly okay with the way things are right now in this moment,

and again in the next and the next and the next. . .

 

i have heard enough warrior stories of heroic daring.

tell me how you crumble when you hit the wall,

the place you cannot go beyond by the strength of your own will.

what carries you to the other side of that wall, to the fragile beauty of your own humanness?

 

and after we have shown each other how we have set and kept the clear, healthy boundaries that help us live side by side with each other, let us risk remembering that we never stop silently loving

those we once loved out loud.

 

take me to the places on the earth that teach you how to dance,

the places where you can risk letting the world break your heart.

and I will take you to the places where the earth beneath my feet and the stars overhead make my heart whole again and again.

 

show me how you take care of business

without letting business determine who you are.

when the children are fed but still the voices within and around us shout that soul’s desires have too high a price,

let us remind each other that it is never about the money.

 

show me how you offer to your people and the world

the stories and the songs

you want our children’s children to remember.

and i will show you how I struggle not to change the world,

but to love it.

 

sit beside me in long moments of shared solitude,

knowing both our absolute aloneness and our undeniable belonging.

dance with me in the silence and in the sound of small daily words,

holding neither against me at the end of the day.

 

and when the sound of all the declarations of our sincerest

intentions has died away on the wind,

dance with me in the infinite pause before the next great inhale

of the breath that is breathing us all into being,

not filling the emptiness from the outside or from within.

 

don’t say, “yes!”

just take my hand and dance with me.

[Mobius Stripper]

A song from Cat Stevens touched me today ...

 

To the youth of today as they were yesterday

Torn between partying & making a difference

Wanting to do both but realizing one contradicts the other

Thus instead blaming the previous generation

For the mess they themselves contributed as well

Because they are the larger mass market

To whom the law of supply & demand caters

Knowing very well that one day

They will become the previous generation.

 

Oh very young

What will you leave us this time?

You're only dancing on this earth for a short while

And though your dreams may toss and turn you now

They will vanish away like your daddy's best jeans

Denim blue fading up to the sky

And though you want them to last forever

You know they never will

You know they never will

And the patches make the goodbye harder still ...

 

Oh very young

What will you leave us this time?

There'll never be a better chance to change your mind

And if you want this world to see a better day

Will you carry the words of love with you

Will you ride the great white bird into heaven

And though you want to last forever

You know you never will

You know you never will

And the goodbye makes the journey harder still ...

 

Oh very young

What will you leave us this time?

You're only dancing on this earth for a short while

Oh very young

What will you leave us this time?

[nightingale]

Ode:

Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood

by: William Wordsworth

 

THERE was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,

The earth, and every common sight,

To me did seem

Apparell'd in celestial light,

The glory and the freshness of a dream.

It is not now as it hath been of yore;—

Turn wheresoe'er I may,

By night or day,

The things which I have seen I now can see no more.

 

The rainbow comes and goes,

And lovely is the rose;

The moon doth with delight

Look round her when the heavens are bare;

Waters on a starry night

Are beautiful and fair;

The sunshine is a glorious birth;

But yet I know, where'er I go,

That there hath pass'd away a glory from the earth.

 

Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song,

And while the young lambs bound

As to the tabor's sound,

To me alone there came a thought of grief:

A timely utterance gave that thought relief,

And I again am strong:

The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep;

No more shall grief of mine the season wrong;

I hear the echoes through the mountains throng,

The winds come to me from the fields of sleep,

And all the earth is gay;

Land and sea

Give themselves up to jollity,

And with the heart of May

Doth every beast keep holiday;—

Thou Child of Joy,

Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy

Shepherd-boy!

 

Ye blessèd creatures, I have heard the call

Ye to each other make; I see

The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee;

My heart is at your festival,

My head hath its coronal,

The fulness of your bliss, I feel—I feel it all.

O evil day! if I were sullen

While Earth herself is adorning,

This sweet May-morning,

And the children are culling

On every side,

In a thousand valleys far and wide,

Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm,

And the babe leaps up on his mother's arm:—

I hear, I hear, with joy I hear!

—But there's a tree, of many, one,

A single field which I have look'd upon,

Both of them speak of something that is gone:

The pansy at my feet

Doth the same tale repeat:

Whither is fled the visionary gleam?

Where is it now, the glory and the dream?

 

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:

The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,

Hath had elsewhere its setting,

And cometh from afar:

Not in entire forgetfulness,

And not in utter nakedness,

But trailing clouds of glory do we come 65

From God, who is our home:

Heaven lies about us in our infancy!

Shades of the prison-house begin to close

Upon the growing Boy,

But he beholds the light, and whence it flows,

He sees it in his joy;

The Youth, who daily farther from the east

Must travel, still is Nature's priest,

And by the vision splendid

Is on his way attended;

At length the Man perceives it die away,

And fade into the light of common day.

 

Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own;

Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind,

And, even with something of a mother's mind,

And no unworthy aim,

The homely nurse doth all she can

To make her foster-child, her Inmate Man,

Forget the glories he hath known,

And that imperial palace whence he came. 85

 

Behold the Child among his new-born blisses,

A six years' darling of a pigmy size!

See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies,

Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses,

With light upon him from his father's eyes!

See, at his feet, some little plan or chart,

Some fragment from his dream of human life,

Shaped by himself with newly-learnèd art;

A wedding or a festival,

A mourning or a funeral;

And this hath now his heart,

And unto this he frames his song:

Then will he fit his tongue

To dialogues of business, love, or strife;

But it will not be long

Ere this be thrown aside,

And with new joy and pride

The little actor cons another part;

Filling from time to time his 'humorous stage'

With all the Persons, down to palsied Age,

That Life brings with her in her equipage;

As if his whole vocation

Were endless imitation.

 

Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie

Thy soul's immensity;

Thou best philosopher, who yet dost keep

Thy heritage, thou eye among the blind,

That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep,

Haunted for ever by the eternal mind,—

Mighty prophet! Seer blest!

On whom those truths do rest,

Which we are toiling all our lives to find,

In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave;

Thou, over whom thy Immortality

Broods like the Day, a master o'er a slave,

A presence which is not to be put by;

To whom the grave

Is but a lonely bed without the sense or sight

Of day or the warm light,

A place of thought where we in waiting lie;

Thou little Child, yet glorious in the might

Of heaven-born freedom on thy being's height,

Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke

The years to bring the inevitable yoke,

Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife?

Full soon thy soul shall have her earthly freight,

And custom lie upon thee with a weight,

Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life!

 

O joy! that in our embers

Is something that doth live,

That nature yet remembers

What was so fugitive!

The thought of our past years in me doth breed

Perpetual benediction: not indeed

For that which is most worthy to be blest—

Delight and liberty, the simple creed

Of childhood, whether busy or at rest,

With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast:—

Not for these I raise

The song of thanks and praise;

But for those obstinate questionings

Of sense and outward things,

Fallings from us, vanishings;

Blank misgivings of a Creature

Moving about in worlds not realized,

High instincts before which our mortal Nature

Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised:

But for those first affections,

Those shadowy recollections,

Which, be they what they may,

Are yet the fountain-light of all our day,

Are yet a master-light of all our seeing;

Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make

Our noisy years seem moments in the being

Of the eternal Silence: truths that wake,

To perish never:

Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour,

Nor Man nor Boy,

Nor all that is at enmity with joy,

Can utterly abolish or destroy!

Hence in a season of calm weather

Though inland far we be,

Our souls have sight of that immortal sea

Which brought us hither,

Can in a moment travel thither,

And see the children sport upon the shore,

And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.

 

Then sing, ye birds, sing, sing a joyous song!

And let the young lambs bound

As to the tabor's sound!

We in thought will join your throng,

Ye that pipe and ye that play,

Ye that through your hearts to-day

Feel the gladness of the May!

What though the radiance which was once so bright

Be now for ever taken from my sight,

Though nothing can bring back the hour

Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;

We will grieve not, rather find

Strength in what remains behind;

In the primal sympathy

Which having been must ever be;

In the soothing thoughts that spring

Out of human suffering;

In the faith that looks through death,

In years that bring the philosophic mind.

 

And O ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves,

Forebode not any severing of our loves!

Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might;

I only have relinquish'd one delight 195

To live beneath your more habitual sway.

I love the brooks which down their channels fret,

Even more than when I tripp'd lightly as they;

The innocent brightness of a new-born Day

Is lovely yet;

The clouds that gather round the setting sun

Do take a sober colouring from an eye

That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality;

Another race hath been, and other palms are won.

Thanks to the human heart by which we live,

Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,

To me the meanest flower that blows can give

Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.