Courage is not the absence of despair; it is, rather, the capacity to move ahead in spite of despair.
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But Don't Despair
Despair, if you must –
But how's it going to pull you through?
Despair, when you trust
Naught since then there's naught to do.
Despair, should you thrust
Aside your pride, your self-esteem.
And so despair, if it's dust,
The only substance that you deem.
Despair, when a gust
Of slightly breeze can break your stance.
And do despair, when lust
Is your interpretation of romance.
But don't despair, if you can care
About the plight of any other being.
And you can focus on the help,
Support, and altruistic further actions
For the seeing. Be believing,
As despair will start receding
All around – simply since you found
A way to steer you clear
From this: the very cause of your despair!
So give to others; give them all a helping lift:
Despair, you'll find will disappear –
And that has got to be a well-deserved
And saintly gift!
Copyright © Mark R Slaughter 2009
Rain of despair
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despair despair despair despair despair despair despair
poem by Mark R Slaughter
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Now the alternative to despair is courage. And human life can be viewed as a continuous struggle between these two options. Courage is the capacity to affirm one's life in spite of the elements which threaten it. The fact that courage usually predominates over despair in itself tells us something important about life. It tells you that the forces that affirm life are stronger than those that negate it.
quote by Paul E. Pfuetze
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Despair Of The Early Morning
DESPAIR OF THE EARLY MORNING
Despair of the early morning
Despair of the darkness
Despair of the Despair
Despair of Old Age
Despair of the road closed
Despair of nothing to do
Despair of nowhere to go
Despair of endless errands
Despair of money running out
Despair of the message of Despair
One transmits to those one loves.
Despair that has to be resisted
Despair that the light of the day
Will help me overcome
Despair I will pray my way out of
Despair I will in the course of the day
Sometime overcome.
Not the great Despair
The unending Despair
The final Despair.
The small Despair of who I am and where I am now.
The Despair that still can be resisted,
By the writing of a few awkward lines
Early in the morning.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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Despair Is Darkness
DESPAIR IS DARKNESS
Despair is darkness-
Despair is death inside and death in the world and death in one’s own sad soul-
Despair is no way out -
Despair is the place where one is forever stuck -
Despair is the realization that one has done what one could – and one is not going anywhere else-
Despair is the admission of failure-
Despair is no sign of help anywhere around-
Despair is so much lost-
Despair is one‘s life is over-
Despair is regret-
Despair is the sense that one will never have the time to have another chance -
Despair is ‘it’s finished’-
Despair is no way out-
Despair is going down and more down and more dark and more afraid all the time -
Despair is the scream which hurts and does not stop the hurting -
Despair is the understanding that even Death will not save one -
Despair is that the pain will never end-not even with death.
Despair is no way out again and again and again- without end.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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My Despair Comes And Goes
My Despair comes and goes
It is not the ultimate despair,
The despair of those who have forever lost hope
The despair of those who have lost what they never will regain
The despair of those for whom there is no way out
No way to begin again
No hope in any way forever
My Despair comes and goes
It is a small Despair compared to many others
When I am in it of course
I believe it like theirs Hopeless forever hopeless
But then a new day begins,
Or a friendly voice says a friendly word
Or something good and positive happens
Or the weather changes
Or some hurt goes away
Some sign comes
And slowly slowly
I am not there anymore.
My Despair comes and goes
It is not the worst Despair
Not yet-
Yesterday I was in Despair
Today I am almost already not
I pray my writing this
Will help some despairing reader feel
They too will hope again.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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Despair Is Heavy
DESPAIR IS HEAVY
Despair is heavy
And I am heavier than I have been in a long time-
The cold and the dark and the damp
Also weigh me down.
I still can move
But more slowly now
And with much more aching.
When will the minor pain become paralysis?
And when will the weight kill me?
Perhaps I am done forever
And will never move again
And the weight will take me all the way down
So low I will not even be aware anymore of my despair.
It is a heavy day now
And I am too heavy a person
And Heaviness is in the air
And rules the Universe
And everything is sinking down
And falling into its own meaninglessness.
Life is heavy
I am heavy
Everything is heavy now and getting heavier.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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Meet My Despair
Meet my despair,
She doesn't even show signs of care.
She knows she'll be my destruction,
That's the meaning behind her construction.
Meet my despair,
You can taste the foul death in the air.
She smirks at the cause of my untimly death,
It makes her lose her frigid breath.
Meet my despair,
She's my burden to bear.
She'll dance on my grave,
Ah, she's so brave.
Meet my despair,
her name's.357 magnum.
She's truly lovely.
She's truly mine,
My despair.
poem by Steven Elsner
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Despair Comes Knocking
When despair comes knocking
There’s no one home
Gone out shopping
And not alone
Despair comes knocking
Every damn week
I try not to care
But he still leaves me weak
But despair comes knocking
Every single day
I keep shooing him off
And sending him away
Despair comes knocking
But what does he want?
Is he here to stay?
Or just here to taunt?
(Itajaí - 27 February,2009)
poem by Melanie Walendowsky Baker
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You are My Teacher
If I should meet you
on the dusty road of life
Do not despair
for I am your teacher
If you should stumble
while crossing my muddy path
Do not despair
for you are my teacher
If we should cry alone
and falter in hurricane winds
Do not despair
for they are our teachers
If our souls should meet again
with tattered and worn-out shoes
Do not despair
for we have not learned
poem by Antoinette Kopperfield
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Gen Despair
Despair -
When hope is snuffed out like a guttering candle.
Despair -
When hope is sadistically excised with surgical precision.
Despair -
When hope is torn from a half-living body in huge gobbets
By rapacious beaks and ravening teeth.
Despair -
When hope is annihilated.
poem by Mill Field
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The Pit of Despair!
The pit of despair is a deep, dark lonely place,
In which the likes of evil people face.
A place of solitude, misery and misfortune,
To where the tainted hearts must go.
People like Christina, Dayton, Jerry and Nate should be,
While the devil makes them pay for their sins.
A deep, dark hole,
Where sinners pay a toll.
From the dark depths of the earth.
Despair comes to take the souls of dark hearted people.
The pit of despair is not a friendly place,
For once you are there you may never leave.
While you’re in despair you will know pain,
For you will be tortured for days end.
Despair is hard, damn near impossible to escape,
Especially for a child how has seen rape.
Some people have escaped and are happy,
While others have not and are miserable.
Down they plummet,
To the cold depths of the underworld,
Where they are being waited for.
When in despair,
You’re in place where no one wishes to be,
You’re in hell, a place of despair,
The Pit of Despair.
poem by Sara Tober
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Trapped In Despair
I was placed in sadness
I was placed in darkness
I was placed in fear
Trapped in a place called despair
Despair is cold
Despair is unkind
Despair he lingers all the time
You find yourself clinging to the light
Just praying for that light
Please light save me for I am…trapped in despair
Then you see the light and it turns to your eyes
it turns to your smile
at the sound of your angelic voice…
the place grows warm
all fear flees
the light that is your eyes fills this place the darkness is chased away
My sadness has vanished
You extend a firm hand and rip me from despair
You wrap your arms around me and whisper in my ear…
Never again will you be…trapped in despair.
poem by N.S. Colette
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Again
I see you turn your back on life again
And I see your stumbling down worked smooth again
I feel despair kissing our lips again
I feel despair holding our hearts again
You hear me crying behind your back again
You hear my heartbeat slowly down again
I feel despair kissing our lips again
And I feel despair holding our hearts again
I feel despair kissing our lips again
And I feel despair holding our hearts again
Oh baby yes
I feel despair kissing our lips again
And I feel despair holding our hearts again
I feel despair kissing our lips again
And I feel despair holding our hearts again
Despair holding our hearts again
That's right
Yeah
song performed by by H.I.M.
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Courage
It was said that courage is the mastery of fear…
But not the total absence of it…
I was afraid to love,
I was afraid of pain.
I was afraid of big responsibilities,
I was afraid of having serious priorities…
I was totally afraid to fall for you.
But I need the guts; I need the courage because I do.
I need the courage to be brave,
To learn to face my life ahead…
The courage to learn to live with you…
And I know…
That the courage and the strength that I need would really comes from you!
-aira
poem by Aira Olayvar
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Happiness...Despair
While happiness is the twin sibling of
despair, it is despair that is
the stronger of the two.
In life. happiness are but fleeting moments.
Despair lurks forever in the shadows
of our mind and our hearts...until the
final darkness.
Let judges secretly despair of justice: their verdicts will be more acute. Let generals secretly despair of triumph; killing will be defamed. Let priests secretly despair of faith: their compassion will be true.
quote by Leonard Cohen
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Burnt to ashes
You burnt me, a wound of incomplete,
you remind me, a memory of indiscreet.
Deeply cut, all the way through my heart,
cold-blooded hands tearing me apart.
Mercilessly burnt, all the way to ashes,
move ahead steadily to the flashes...
My sore havoc is only yet to wreak,
and my days are yet to remain in bleak,
but my life seems to carry on,
with hope that despair shall be gone.
But shall despair feel my ominous envy?
Shall it be ungainly, to the hope of melancholy?
Oh I beg my soul, for you to leave,
Oh leave my lonliness spoken and grieve,
for you unhappy, unmerciful and unstill.
What great power lent you untill...
all my skin is burnt
all my feelings burnt
burnt, evermore, to ashes....
poem by Maya Hershey
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Despair, i know you do not like the word
I know you do not like the word
Its color its scent, how we relate it to something black
And smoky and ghastly and ghostly
Some say, red is the color of despair
Others say it is like black coffee because
It does not make you sleep
And make you curl the whole day in
Your dark room without wanting
To talk to somebody and just be there
Alone by yourself, pondering, almost crazy
Not yet anyway, so you go on a compromise
Grey is the color of despair
Dusk, or dawn, or something dawning yet
Like an idea of a suicide unhatched
Delayed like an egg still undecided whether
To hatch or not to hatch and face the world
Of chickens
Despair, what is so big about despair
No big deal, it comes to you whether
You like it or not
As a matter of necessity, face it and state
Its name and stare and say, I muster this
Despair, I am its master and not its slave
And then, when you know all its particulars
You know what to do
Kill it and if it is not killed yet
Well
Well, well, just learn to live with it
Sleep and with, make love with it
And well,
Have kids with despair and call them
Their names: the usual, the normal and
The everyday. And just be prolific.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Anxious
I woke up this morning
scared and anxious.
I woke up with despair.
What ! A dangerous feeling.
God! Are you trying to tell me
something?
If so, may it be clear.
I do not know, how or where
to relieve my despair.
I need strength, for my head
is throbbing from bursting tears.
If I may sing, let me sing.
If I must pray, let me pray.
For I need to relieve
my despair.
Good morning may be, for
I have awaken, or I must say.
Thanks for even having this anxious despair!
poem by Diane Jimenez
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Fashion Awards
Lets go down to the fashion show
With all the pretty people that you dont know
Well sit down in the velvet chairs
Theyll hand awards out for best hair
And if we dont win one, well, then
Well blow off our heads in despair
Well blow off our heads in despair
I smell magic in the room
Flashing lights and sonic booms
Lovely saps all without a care
Nobody said that the world was fair
And if they did say so, well, then
Well blow off our heads in despair
Well blow off our heads in despair
Lets go down to the fashion show
With all the pretty people and piles of blow
Well sit down in the velvet chairs
And hang on tight to our bus fare
And if it falls between the seats
Well blow off our heads in despair
Well blow off our heads in despair
song performed by by Eels
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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