The New Woman
THE stone that all the sullen centuries,
With sluggish hands and massive fingers rude,
Against the sepulchre of womanhood
Had sternly held, she has thrust back with ease,
And stands, superbly arrogant, the keys
Of knowledge in her hand, won by a mood
Of daring, in her beauty flaunting nude,
Eager to drain life's wine unto the lees.
So she shall tempt and touch and try and taste,
And in the wrestle of the world shall lose
Her dimpled prettiness, her petals bruise;
But moulding ever to a truer type
She shall return to man, no more abased—
His counterpart, a woman, rounded, ripe.
poem by Arthur Henry Adams
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A Rusty Nail
I ran a nail into my hand,
The wound was hard to heal;
So bitter was the pain to stand
I thought how it would feel,
To have spikes thrust through hands and feet,
Impaled by hammer beat.
Then hoisted on a cross of oak
Against the sullen sky,
With all about the jeering follk
Who joyed to see me die;
Die hardly in insensate heat,
With bleeding hands and feet.
Yet was it not that day of Fate,
Of cruelty insane,
Climaxing centuries of hate
That woke our souls to pain!
And are we not the living seed
Of those who did the deed!
Of course, with thankful heart I know
We are not fiends as then;
And in a thousand years or so
We may be gentle men.
But it has cost a poisoned hand,
And pain beyond a cry,
To make me strangely understand
A Cross against the sky.
poem by Robert William Service
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I Dreamed.... (Hands)
i dreamed last night...
and all i could see were hands.
sometimes hard and calloused,
sometimes soft and feminine.
skilled hands, laborer's hands,
loving hands, nurturing hands....
fingers digging in the dirt,
fingers holding a pen.
fingers playing a piano,
fingers unbuttoning blouses.
hands extended, hands gripping the rope,
hands holding the shovel,
hands covered with resin.
hands folded in prayer,
hands balled into fists.
hands stuffed in empty pockets.
hands that define both history,
and destiny!
hands scarred and bruised,
hands covered with age spots.
hands that speak many languages.
hands that know mistakes, and failures.
hands that built fires,
hands that put fires out!
hands that wiped away tears,
that picked up trash,
and revealed souls....
whose hands?
my hands, your hands?
god's hands?
does it really matter?
hands engaged and involved,
in the very act of living!
poem by Eric Cockrell
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Our Truths
i
they were first
the baby's hands opening
slowly as fingers
ii
God has a fan that
He spreads open
to display
iii
then he closes it
all fingers as one folded
fan
iv
it is us
all truths kept back
to the Hands of God
so lovingly kept
back to its
proper place
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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She has all Ireland in her blood
She has all Ireland in her blood,
All Ireland's need of sword and tears,
With memories dim before the flood,
And conflicts of a thousand years.
No son of Italy should love
A heart the centuries have worn.
She had no thought of kissing lips—
She held her womanhood in scorn.
And all her joy is blackest pain,
And all her love is bitter woe.
Then you must leave her side again.
That is no path for you to go.
poem by Lesbia Harford
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Spotless hands
With her hands together she prayed,
when I was sick sat at my bed
and with bright eyes she looked into my soul
past how things look on the exterior
and now that life, destiny destroys me,
it is still she that stands with me,
she is still kneeling
for the salvation of my soul
where she stands with spotless hands,
held together
hands that carry the marks of life,
while she asks for no own gain
only bringing me the whole time to God,
never complaining over her destiny.
[O smettelose hande (O spotless hands) by N.P. Van Wyk Louw.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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Unconditionally Open
these hands,
that took yours
and walked away from all
we knew.
these hands,
that laid brick,
cut wood,
plowed gardens,
picked up trash
built fences for the dogs,
held the children
when they were small,
held your hands
at the hospital
stroked your body,
touching forbidden places
with gentleness and
passion
wrote the poetry
hidden in your eyes
these hands,
now old and calloused,
sometimes tremble,
sometimes hard as stone
these hands are open,
without fear or trepidation,
unconditionally open
waiting for yours.
poem by Eric Cockrell
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Canto XII from The Heights of Macchu Picchu
Arise to birth with me, my brother.
Give me your hand out of the depths
sown by your sorrows.
You will not return from these stone fastnesses.
You will not emerge from subterranean time.
Your rasping voice will not come back,
nor your pierced eyes rise from their sockets.
Look at me from the depths of the earth,
tiller of fields, weaver, reticent shepherd,
groom of totemic guanacos,
mason high on your treacherous scaffolding,
iceman of Andean tears,
jeweler with crushed fingers,
farmer anxious among his seedlings,
potter wasted among his clays--
bring to the cup of this new life
your ancient buried sorrows.
Show me your blood and your furrow;
say to me: here I was scourged
because a gem was dull or because the earth
failed to give up in time its tithe of corn or stone.
Point out to me the rock on which you stumbled,
the wood they used to crucify your body.
Strike the old flints
to kindle ancient lamps, light up the whips
glued to your wounds throughout the centuries
and light the axes gleaming with your blood.
I come to speak for your dead mouths.
Throughout the earth
let dead lips congregate,
out of the depths spin this long night to me
as if I rode at anchor here with you.
And tell me everything, tell chain by chain,
and link by link, and step by step;
sharpen the knives you kept hidden away,
thrust them into my breast, into my hands,
like a torrent of sunbursts,
an Amazon of buried jaguars,
and leave me cry: hours, days and years,
blind ages, stellar centuries.
And give me silence, give me water, hope.
Give me the struggle, the iron, the volcanoes.
Let bodies cling like magnets to my body.
Come quickly to my veins and to my mouth.
Speak through my speech, and through my blood.
poem by Pablo Neruda
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Stone
how is it to be a stone?
how is it to be hard
and unfeeling?
how is it to be still
and immobile
rooted in
its place for years
and centuries
not growing
not speaking not listening
to the songs and sighs
of the river?
how is it to be completely
defenseless against
the moss
that invades and
covers
your body
of stone
the coldness
of the rain and
the boredom of the time
in years, in centuries?
how is it to be just being
inanimate
unmoved
untouched and
untouching?
you
you touch no one and nobody touches you
an island
of stone
you
are the stone
the rock
against
the middle
of the raging river
and i am asking all these questions to you.
oh! i am always the foolish one
petrified
facing you all day and getting
no answers
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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There Is No If...
Remember the first time i told you i love you -
It was raining hard and you never heard -
You sneezed! and i had to say it over
"i said i love you" i said... you didn't say a word
Just held you hands to my shining eyes
And i watched as the rain ran through your fingers
Held your hands to my shining eyes and smiled as you kissed me...
"if you die" you said "so do i" you said...
And it starts the day you make the sign
"tell me i'm forever yours and you're forever mine
Forever mine..."
"if you die" you said "so do i" you said...
And it starts the day you cross that line
"swear i will always be yours and you'll always be mine
You'll ways be mine
Always be mine..."
Remember the last time i told you i love you -
It was warm and safe in our perfect world -
You yawned and i had to say it over
"i said i love you" i said... you didn't say a word
Just held your hands to your shining eyes
And i watched as the tears ran through your fingers
Held your hands to your shining eyes and cried...
"if you die" you said "so do i" you said...
But it ends the day you see how it is
There is no always forever... just this...
Just this...
"if you die" you said "so do i" you said
But it ends the day you understand
There is no if... just and
There is no if... just and
There is no if...
song performed by by Cure
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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What's A Heaven For
'Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp-
or what's a heaven for? '
-Robert Browning
This life
is all
in my hands
It's where I held
dreams desires
Too many mysteries
Losses lives loves
Where I've held words
like broken heaven heart
Lifted up every moment
like a feather or cloud
These hands
once opened
themselves
into yours
Entered
your fingers
one by one
Embraced
each one
as though
unfolding
heaven
I still reach
for you
in the night
My hands
empty
But I keep
dreaming
Or what's a heaven for
poem by Ari' Anna Arena
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Hands!
Hands! Gentle Hands!
When the Field at covert stands,
When your four-rear-old is sweating,
Foamed and fidgety and fretting
As a stray hound jumps the netting -
You can steady him and soothe him with your Hands!
Hands! Clever Hands!
When your tiring hunter lands
Over wall or ditch or double
With his noseband in the stubble,
That's the moment you're in trouble
If you have not got the saving gift of Hands!
Hands! Steady Hands!
When your reins seem useless bands,
With a mad brute going faster
And a toss-up which is master,
You may still avoid disaster
If Providence has given to you Hands!
Hands! Talking Hands!
At the fence below the Stands,
When you call on him to lead them,
That's the moment when you need them,
That's the time a horse will heed them
As you bring him up and help him with your Hands!
Hands! Horseman's Hands!
When the stooping fairy stands
At the cradle of a baby,
She has richer gifts, it may be,
But she never brought a better one than Hands!
poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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Ease Appeases With a Bit of Tease
Assumptions you have held and chosen...
Know they must go.
Those assumptions you have held and chosen,
Know they must go.
Release them to go.
Relax!
Find that place,
Where you can go...
Within.
To bring outside of yourself,
A comfort shown to shine without end.
You seem to be hiding inside too much.
And not enough of you,
Is believed or known.
Those assumptions you have held and chosen,
Know they must go.
Release them to go.
Relax!
First impressions,
Aren't always the best to leave.
Especially when some expect magic...
Unnatural miracles and a tap dance,
Done comfortably.
Assumptions you have held and chosen...
Know they must go.
Those assumptions you have held and chosen,
Know they must go.
Release them to go.
Relax!
Just be you.
You will be surprise by how enchanting,
The unseen you can be,
To dazzle others unexpectedly.
When ease appeases with a bit of tease.
Those assumptions you have held and chosen,
Know they must go.
Release them to go.
Assumptions you have held and chosen...
Know they must go.
Those assumptions you have held and chosen,
Know they must go.
Release them to go.
And relax.
Know ease appeases with a bit of tease.
Just be you,
To dazzle others unexpectedly.
Assumptions you have held and chosen...
Know they must go.
Those assumptions you have held and chosen,
Know they must go.
Release them to go.
And...
Relax.
Know ease appeases with a bit of tease.
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Easter Even
There is nothing more that they can do
For all their rage and boast;
Caiaphas with his blaspheming crew,
Herod with his host,
Pontius Pilate in his Judgement-hall
Judging their Judge and his,
Or he who led them all and passed them all,
Arch-Judas with his kiss.
The sepulchre made sure with ponderous Stone,
Seal that same stone, O Priest;
It may be thou shalt block the holy One
From rising in the east:
Set a watch about the sepulchre
To watch on pain of death;
They must hold fast the stone if One should stir
And shake it from beneath.
God Almighty, He can break a seal
And roll away a Stone,
Can grind the proud in dust who would not kneel,
And crush the mighty one.
*
There is nothing more that they can do
For all their passionate care,
Those who sit in dust, the blessed few,
And weep and rend their hair:
Peter, Thomas, Mary Magdalene,
The Virgin unreproved,
Joseph, with Nicodemus, foremost men,
And John the Well-beloved,
Bring your finest linen and your spice,
Swathe the sacred Dead,
Bind with careful hands and piteous eyes
The napkin round His head;
Lay Him in the garden-rock to rest;
Rest you the Sabbath length:
The Sun that went down crimson in the west
Shall rise renewed in strength.
God Almighty shall give joy for pain,
Shall comfort him who grieves:
Lo! He with joy shall doubtless come again,
And with Him bring His sheaves.
poem by Christina Georgina Rossetti
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Permanence
Set within a desert lone,
Circled by an arid sea,
Stands a figure carved in stone,
Where a fountain used to be.
Two abraded, pleading hands
Held below a shapeless mouth,
Human-like the fragment stands,
Tortured by perpetual drouth.
Once the form was drenched with spray,
Deluged with the rainbow flushes;
Surplus water dashed away
To the lotus and the rushes.
Time was clothed in rippling fashion,.
Opulence of light and air,
Beauty changing into passion
Every hour and everywhere.
And the yearning of that race
Was for something deep and tender,
Life replete with power, with grace,
Touched with vision and with splendour.
Now no rain dissolves and cools,
Dew is even as a dream,
The enticing far-off pools
In a mirage only seem.
All the traces that remain,
Of the longings of that land,
Are two hands that plead in vain
Filled with burning sand.
poem by Duncan Campbell Scott
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Unmade Future
A golden cave was afraid
Of a blue thrust.
Hands were not able to console
the mirror.
Let us step back for a
last laugh. You were talking
to yourself when the canary was
set free from the house arrest.
Ah, the paradise, after all, was
a myth. You had to beg for a violin
for democracy and stoop to pick
up a horsehair bow for playing the anthem.
You had cut your fingers in a fake war
with the moon.It was a miracle
knocking out the stars. A self-made
wound will never need the sutures.
poem by Satish Verma
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On Passing The New Menin Gate
Who will remember, passing through this Gate,
the unheroic dead who fed the guns?
Who shall absolve the foulness of their fate,-
Those doomed, conscripted, unvictorious ones?
Crudely renewed, the Salient holds its own.
Paid are its dim defenders by this pomp;
Paid, with a pile of peace-complacent stone,
The armies who endured that sullen swamp.
Here was the world's worst wound. And here with pride
'Their name liveth for ever', the Gateway claims.
Was ever an immolation so belied
as these intolerably nameless names?
Well might the Dead who struggled in the slime
Rise and deride this sepulchre of crime.
poem by Siegfried Sassoon
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Our Hands
My hands once warm,
And clothed in yours,
my hands once full,
and held in yours.
Empty hands,
Cold hands,
my hands have lost their,
Partner as you once were for me,
Your hands at once rough,
and soft,
Always gentle when in mine,
our hands would meet to fill the cold,
My hands now empty cover tears,
my hands once warm now with
a freezing touch,
your hands are gone,
the warmth they held has left,
these hands of mine.
poem by Rebecca Adams
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Concrete Angle
She walks to school with the lunch she packed
Nobody knows what she's holdin' back
Wearin' the same dress she wore yesterday
She hides the bruises with linen and lace
The teacher wonders but she doesn't ask
It's hard to see the pain behind the mask
Bearing the burden of a secret storm
Sometimes she wishes she was never born
Through the wind and the rain
She stands hard as a stone
In a world that she can't rise above
But her dreams give her wings
And she flies to a place where she's loved
Concrete angel
Somebody cries in the middle of the night
The neighbors hear, but they turn out the lights
A fragile soul caught in the hands of sate
When morning comes it'll be too late
Through the wind and the rain
She stands hard as a stone
In a world that she can't rise above
But her dreams give her wings
And she flies to a place where she's loved
Concrete angel
A statue stands in a shaded place
An angel girl with an upturned face
A name is written on a polished rock
A broken heart that the world forgot
Through the wind and the rain
She stands hard as a stone
In a world that she can't rise above
But her dreams give her wings
And she flies to a place where she's loved
Concrete angel
song performed by by Martina Mcbride
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Frenzied Fingers Run Amuck
When I get you into my arms
I can't control the things that I do.
Fingers grab the hair on your head.
Fingers caress the small of your back.
Fingers travel down your spine
and back up again.
Fingers reach to all corners of your being,
quietly unnoticed at first,
but more frenzied with passing time.
Wild fingers travel your soul
with frenzied action that is hard to stop.
Uncontrollable fingers run wild
until you beg them to stop.
But even then, there's no counting on it.
These fingers like to run wild.
Whenever I place my fingers on you,
frenzied fingers run amuck.
Upon being missed
I felt so bad upon not being missed
I felt it so much when forehead was kissed
Hand was hold firmly and patted on the back
I really came to original world and turned to thank
Mom was silently watching me in disgust
She had enough of attachment and trust
I thought she ought to have known about
But I had thought something else about fall out
She read plain eagerness and anxiety eyes
I was not aware of pale and sullen face
It was speaking of all things as to what had transpired
I was to be questioned on this count without being fired
She was mother and knew all about internal feelings
She imagined how it may have disastrous killings
She wanted to take me to corner and offer advice
When she held my hand firmly I felt it so nice
I am not hard person or having stone face
Any body could play with my sentiments at ease
I had never entered into fray for such type of act
I had miserably failed and this was only real fact
If it was not the mother then who else could offer me solace?
I couldn’t have experienced such pleasure even in palace
It was return of whole universe and her fingers proved
When my head in hairy concentration felt it kindly moved
It was easing my head and exciting all nerves
It was opening all doors as ready to express and serve
I was sinking in another world to miss it at once
I was awakened all of sudden and had little glance
I could think of mother as global figure along with other females
Were they not the lovable for all mankind especially for males?
What happens if some one deserts you at the last moment?
Not complete female race can be associated for unkind movement
My temper was slowly receding and realizing the substance
No one should condemned or hated at once
To love and being loved is entirely different
This can be seen with eyes and is always apparent
She may be in my mind with slight different position
As I have believed in reality and not in any superstition
If she has something in mind for me in particular
It won’t be held back and felt as similar
I had not lost or in fact missed nothing
I am in possession of it as precious thing
No could convince me of divine message
Love is only to reach Him with smooth passage
poem by Hasmukh Amathalal
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