He Who Learns Must Suffer
Strange thoughts give words
a pain. A mountain unfolds
a tunnel.He who carries a vase of ashes
must enter the gate to plot a path
for history.Ideas have turned into stones.
A violence erupts in long winter night.
Nobody understands the bird of time
who has lost the flight.
The bones learn the absence of house
in the forest of men. You realize the anointment
of unlearning. A gaudiest opulence
comes slowly in huts. The body becomes
blue in gentle fall of skimmed silence.
A prayer has a pernicious omen.
poem by Satish Verma
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Related quotes
Throwin' Stones
Picture a bright blue ball just spinning, spinning free
Dizzy with eternity.
Paint it with a skin of sky, brush in some clouds and sea
Call it home for you and me.
A peaceful place or so it looks from space
A closer look reveals the human race.
Full of hope, full of grace, is the human face.
But afraid, we may our home to waste.
There's a fear down here we can't forget hasn't got a name just yet
Always awake, always around singing ashes to ashes all fall down.
Now watch as the ball revolves and the nighttime calls
And again the hunt begins and again the bloodwind calls
By and by again, the morning sun will rise
But the darkness never goes from some men's eyes.
It strolls the sidewalks and it rolls the streets
Stalking turf, dividing up meat.
Nightmare spook, piece of heat, you and me, you and me.
Click, flashblade in ghetto night. Rudies looking for a fight.
Rat cat alley roll them bones. Need that cash to feed that jones
And the politicians throwing stones
Singing ashes, ashes all fall down.
Commissars and pin-striped bosses role the dice
Any way they fall guess who gets to pay the price.
Money green or proletarian gray, selling guns instead of food today.
So the kids they dance, they shake their bones
While the politicians throwing stones
Singing ashes, ashes all fall down.
Heartless powers try to tell us what to think
If the spirit's sleeping, then the flesh is ink.
History's page, it is thusly carved in stone
The future's here, we are it, we are on our own.
If the game is lost then we're all the same
No one left to place or take the blame.
We will leave this place an empty stone
Or this shinning ball of bule we can call our home
So the kids they dance, they shake their bones
While the politicians are throwing stones
Singing ashes, ashes all fall down.
Shipping powders back and forth
Singing "black goes south while white comes north"
And the whole world full of petty wars
Singing "I got mine and you got yours."
And the current fashions set the pace.
Lose your step, fall out of grace.
And the radical he rant and rage, Singing "someone got to turn the page"
And the rich man in his summer home,
Singing "Just leave well enough alone"
But his pants are down, his cover's blown
And the politicians are throwing stones
So the kids they dance they shake their bones
Cause its all too clear we're on our own
Picture a bright blue ball just spinning, spinning free
It's dizzying, the possibilities. Ashes, Ashes all fall down
song performed by by Grateful Dead
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
Mystical Night
"The mystical night is not mere night, absence of light. It is a night which is sanctified by the presence of an invisible light...." Thomas Merton, The New Man
From this holy mountain
rises good night
on the gentle wind
of shadowed bird flight.
How I long for darkness
to overtake
day's tired sky,
my upturned face,
and Thou,
oh Night
of Joyful Flame!
with your dark love
set my soul ablaze!
poem by Steven Federle
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Interlude: Songs out of Sorrow
I. Spirit's House
From naked stones of agony
I will build a house for me;
As a mason all alone
I will raise it, stone by stone,
And every stone where I have bled
Will show a sign of dusky red.
I have not gone the way in vain,
For I have good of all my pain;
My spirit's quiet house will be
Built of naked stones I trod
On roads where I lost sight of God.
II. Mastery
I would not have a god come in
To shield me suddenly from sin,
And set my house of life to rights;
Nor angels with bright burning wings
Ordering my earthly thoughts and things;
Rather my own frail guttering lights
Wind blown and nearly beaten out;
Rather the terror of the nights
And long, sick groping after doubt;
Rather be lost than let my soul
Slip vaguely from my own control --
Of my own spirit let me be
In sole though feeble mastery.
III. Lessons
Unless I learn to ask no help
From any other soul but mine,
To seek no strength in waving reeds
Nor shade beneath a straggling pine;
Unless I learn to look at Grief
Unshrinking from her tear-blind eyes,
And take from Pleasure fearlessly
Whatever gifts will make me wise --
Unless I learn these things on earth,
Why was I ever given birth?
IV. Wisdom
When I have ceased to break my wings
Against the faultiness of things,
And learned that compromises wait
Behind each hardly opened gate,
When I can look Life in the eyes,
Grown calm and very coldly wise,
Life will have given me the Truth,
And taken in exchange -- my youth.
V. In a Burying Ground
This is the spot where I will lie
When life has had enough of me,
These are the grasses that will blow
Above me like a living sea.
These gay old lilies will not shrink
To draw their life from death of mine,
And I will give my body's fire
To make blue flowers on this vine.
"O Soul," I said, "have you no tears?
Was not the body dear to you?"
I heard my soul say carelessly,
"The myrtle flowers will grow more blue."
VI. Wood Song
I heard a wood thrush in the dusk
Twirl three notes and make a star --
My heart that walked with bitterness
Came back from very far.
Three shining notes were all he had,
And yet they made a starry call --
I caught life back against my breast
And kissed it, scars and all.
VII. Refuge
From my spirit's gray defeat,
From my pulse's flagging beat,
From my hopes that turned to sand
Sifting through my close-clenched hand,
From my own fault's slavery,
If I can sing, I still am free.
For with my singing I can make
A refuge for my spirit's sake,
A house of shining words, to be
My fragile immortality.
poem by Sara Teasdale
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Throwing Stones
Picture a bright blue ball just spinning, spinning free
Dizzy with eternity.
Paint it with a skin of sky, brush in some clouds and sea
Call it home for you and me.
A peaceful place or so it looks from space
A closer look reveals the human race.
Full of hope, full of grace, is the human face.
But afraid, we may our home to waste.
Theres a fear down here we cant forget hasnt got a name just yet
Always awake, always around singing ashes to ashes all fall down.
Now watch as the ball revolves and the nighttime calls
And again the hunt begins and again the bloodwind calls
By and by again, the morning sun will rise
But the darkness never goes from some mens eyes.
It strolls the sidewalks and it rolls the streets
Stalking turf, dividing up meat.
Nightmare spook, piece of heat, you and me, you and me.
Click, flashblade in ghetto night. rudies looking for a fight.
Rat cat alley roll them bones. need that cash to feed that jones
And the politicians throwing stones
Singing ashes, ashes all fall down.
Commissars and pin-striped bosses role the dice
Any way they fall guess who gets to pay the price.
Money green or proletarian gray, selling guns instead of food today.
So the kids they dance, they shake their bones
While the politicians throwing stones
Singing ashes, ashes all fall down.
Heartless powers try to tell us what to think
If the spirits sleeping, then the flesh is ink.
Historys page, it is thusly carved in stone
The futures here, we are it, we are on our own.
If the game is lost then were all the same
No one left to place or take the blame.
We will leave this place an empty stone
Or this shinning ball of blue we can call our home
So the kids they dance, they shake their bones
While the politicians are throwing stones
Singing ashes, ashes all fall down.
Shipping powders back and forth
Singing black goes south while white comes north
And the whole world full of petty wars
Singing I got mine and you got yours.
And the current fashions set the pace.
Lose your step, fall out of grace.
And the radical he rant and rage, singing someone got to turn the page
And the rich man in his summer home,
Singing just leave well enough alone
But his pants are down, his covers blown
And the politicians are throwing stones
So the kids they dance they shake their bones
Cause its all too clear were on our own
Picture a bright blue ball just spinning, spinning free
Its dizzying, the possibilities. ashes, ashes all fall down.
song performed by by Grateful Dead
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
Sticks And Stones
Sticks and stones, might break my bones
And words, shall never harm me,
I was told that story, when I was a Boy
Along with the birds and bees, I believe
So I lived my life, through that advice
That was given to me in my youth,
That sticks and stones would break my bones
And words could do no harm was true.
So I stayed away from sticks and stones
And tried never calling anyone names
But the sticks still arrived, in my life
And also the words of hate and pain.
But then I had healed from broken bones
And bruises and all the nasty cuts,
It made me stronger, then I thought longer
About the words of hate and such.
Because the words of hate, I couldn't escape
As I noticed them around everyday
Destroying ones soul, until life they'd let go
Or asking GOD for vengeance as they'd pray.
Sticks and stones had broke my bones
And words of hate had really harmed me,
As I look around, I can still hear the sound
Of hate, and belittlement, and bigotry.
There are still broken bones and nasty cuts,
As I see as I enter every day with a walk,
But doctors heal then, as they are new again
But the words of hatred never balks.
In my life I have made many choices,
And I hope with one I don't stand alone
Never to ever use any word of hate
As I don't mind getting hit with sticks or stones.
Randy L. McClave
poem by Randy McClave
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Night Turned Into Day
my night is turned into day
my day is turned into night
thoughts ideas creativity fight
with bodies endurance to write
time ticks exhaustion due slays
mind rapture pace swift runs
body at rest at last fail lays
creativity passion turns burns
long hours of night wither away
creativity turns night into day
my night is turned into my day
poem by Terence George Craddock
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The Bones Of Angels
Long shadows
Bright light
That falls to the front
From a darkness behind
There is no end
To this mountain top
Inside these stones
Only peace will we find
Inside out
We're all part of the stone
That makes up the mountain
And harbours the bones
The bones of angels
That showed us the way
You can feel them at night
While they sleep through the day
The bones of angels
The bones of angels
Together we will be
Forever we will see
I see you
And I see me
And the bones of angels
song performed by by Chris Rea
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
History Stones People.
History stones people.
They stoned Moses, David and Linclon,
history did that for all to see
Marbel and cement,
that's all it leaves behind
of a long changing life.
Great heroes of time,
fall under the mercy
of the sculptor's knife.
History stones faces,
in a way that would make
ecclestias cringe.
History stones feet,
in a way that would make
piligrims cry.
History stones life
to always stay fresh,
yet, what is life without
the sins of the flesh.
All the radical kids
get stoned
and never change
or even move a muscle.
All the sword raising warriors
history stoned
without blood in their veins.
You can see all the victims
that history stoned
when you walk in the park,
they got kings
and queens
hell, they even got Gods.
They are there captive
in history's stones,
never to be again what they were;
wilting flesh and
breakable bones.
People look up at them
they are victims too.
History's stones fall far,
even on to you.
Those stoned to live
are like the ones stoned to die.
enslaved to the search
of the frozen smile.
Life is a burning bush
that doesn't get consumed.
not a dead rock
or a statue of history.
It's a fusing wind
of happinnes and misery.
An exploding volcano
of courage and fear.
It is the stem of the flower
struggling through the seasons
to stand and bloom
above the drying soil.
Life is the fighting wave
you see at sea
forgotten and denied
by the stones of history.
poem by Samuel Katz
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The Wintertime Blues
Anna is wearing dark gown
winters spells holding her down
swear the clocks stopped
hope my ears not blocked
with these winter time blues.
The astral stars run long
I'm writing her love song
reading her taro card sign
unmasking her seductive design
with these winter time blues.
Ocean blue birds gone west
I play blues to confess
how true love never dies
is elusive and often flies
with these winter time blues.
Winter creates heady weight
lovers and others call fate
where ghost of past reside
astral lovers swim the tide
with these winter time blues.
Seasons veil creates unrest
despair is often house guest
while I learn her blues song
singing all the night long
with these winter time blues.
Anna is feeling lost tonight
laying still in cool starlight
waking slowly in full view
while last line spins clue
with these winter time blues.
poem by Wayne Falconer
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only sure weapon against bad ideas is better ideas. The source of better ideas is wisdom. The surest path to wisdom is a liberal education.
quote by Alfred Whitney
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
One More Night
No jacket required, 1985
One more night, one more night
Ive been trying ooh so long to let you know
Let you know how I feel
And if I stumble if I fall, just help me back
So I can make you see
Please give me one more night, give me one more night
One more night cos I cant wait forever
Give me just one more night, oh just one more night
Oh one more night cos I cant wait forever
Ive been sitting here so long
Wasting time, just staring at the phone
And I was wondering should I call you
Then I thought maybe youre not alone
Please give me one more night, give me just one more night
Oh one more night, cos I cant wait forever
Please give me one more night, ooh just one more night
Oh one more night, cos I cant wait forever
Give me one more night, give me just one more night
Ooh one more night, cos I cant wait forever
Like a river to the sea
I will always be with you
And if you sail away
I will follow you
Give me one more night, give me just one more night
Oh one more night, cos I cant wait forever
I know therell never be a time youll ever feel the same
And I know its only words
But if you change your mind you know that Ill be here
And maybe we both can learn
Give me just one more night, give me just one more night
Ooh one more night, cos I cant wait forever
Give me just one more night, give me just one more night
Ooh one more night, cos I cant wait forever
song performed by by Phil Collins
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
Silence
Silence in the language
Is the absence of speech
Silence in the conversation
Can be so remarkable and rich.
Silence is an atmosphere you make
And it's the situation you break.
Sometimes it tells you more
Than thousand words told before.
Silence is a feeling
Which is very intensive
Poorly created
It can be very offensive.
Silence can be so different
It has a lot of meanings
It's an expression of yourself
It shows your feelings.
There is a silence
That brings you peace
And you feel yourself
Being at your ease.
There is a silence of mystery
Like being in a dark wood.
There is a silence of happiness
When you are loved and understood.
There is a silence that frightens
There is a silence of anniversary dates
This silence reminds you
Of those lost fates.
There is a silence in music
When you listen to it and dream
But...suddenly...it stops.
Then...the sounds come to their extreme.
The prayer in silence
Is your inner world
When you dream in silence
You are just not heard.
Silence is golden
Or so I've heard
But it sometimes hurts more
Than a single told word.
Silence is golden
Or so goes a lie.
This silence of fraud
Do not need a reply.
Silence when you are in love
You do not need words.
Silence when you are fooled
You don't know what to say afterwards.
But...the best moment of silence
When you take my hand
I know you do not pretend
You just look at my eyes and I realize:
It's love, it's happiness.
Larisa R (Odessa, Ukraine)
poem by Larisa Rzhepishevska
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
What If... Again And Again!
what if it never rained again?
what if the night went on forever,
and the dawn never came?
what if all my dreams turned to salt,
and lightning left the skies?
what if my body turned to ashes,
and my bones were scattered unknown?
what if my name were lost
to the emptiness of time...
and my heart, cut as firewood,
to feed a stranger's fire?
what if everything i've done,
forgotten as if i never lived?
what if i never held you again,
never kissed your lips,
never looked into your eyes?
what if there were no God,
and death were the end? ...
what if for the simple touch of your hand,
i'd do it again, and again!
poem by Eric Cockrell
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Claustrophobia
For a patch of happiness
you rushed into the arms
of clouds. Only to fall back with tears.
The glazing authority of moon
hangs on the poverty of spiked wisdom.
Betrayal is the norm of celestial thinking;
how can you accept a dropp of death?
What is your motive
in watching the pain?
A path, a tunnel,
a precipice. The collage of purity
has the innocence of sorrow.
And truth, sails like a phoenix.
There is complete silence.
The flameless fire collapses
lapping up the anger.
Pouring out all the heart beats,
emptying the mind
darkness lowers the wheels
between muscles and bones.
Your body is eaten half by dusty thoughts.
Claustrophobia chokes the little stanzas
you are afraid, some one cares for you.
poem by Satish Verma
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Thoughts and ideas - (Talking through my hat)
Break and husk
thoughts and ideas that,
without reason,
I smashing them like nuts
into my head – mortar with pig iron pestle.
Lay and hatch
thoughts and ideas,
and younglings,
instead of fly,
I keep them under latch
in my head – cage of neurons,
dendrites and axons.
Knead and raise
thoughts and ideas
but let me tempted,
and without reason,
instead of bake them, I play
“of thieves and bobbies”
with bullets of dough
shot from my head – automatic gun.
Pull kernels out of
thoughts and ideas
but I put not them to spring
and hundredfold harvest to bring,
I chain them necklace
that my poor mind
who walks nomad
through my head – ballad
to put it neck
in a night with moon
and than to catch
in a fairies dance
and hungry of blue
to soar in the stars.
***
Thoughts and ideas
are shrieking through my mind
as lost migratory birds
in an autumn of rains.
Thoughts and ideas
- arrow-shaped cranes with wet wings -
fall all at once
in my head – moorland
of thistle and mud.
Bevies of ideas
and useless thoughts
surround my mind
how ravens give wheel
carrions to be
through my head - waste land
by boiling and winds.
Thoughts and ideas
go round
like a pack of wolves
with empty bellies
through my head – winter of frost,
winter of sleet
with my mind
thoroughly frozen
by fright and a biting wind.
Pick
bunches of thoughts and ideas
caressed by the sun of mind
in bacchanal vineyards
planted on encephalic hills.
I squish them
and expect to get wine
and get drunk
in my head – tavern where the smoke
knife just cut it
and air is sourbitter.
Fog of thoughts and ideas
rises from my mind
as darkness on swamps
in late autumn.
Nothing to see
not hear anything
all still is,
just the small brain
flickers in my head – gray curtain
between movement and inertia.
Slacked thoughts and ideas
are resting on benches of mind,
nothing pulling them
with hands and teeth,
I can’t them gather
at work to bring
to get something good
from my head – chaos
where it lacks a poleax
and a stump of elm.
poem by Viorel Petru Trifan
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The door way
I speak through my hands in space.
At a closed doorway, handles with diamond.
Where your eyes are the keys to enter,
where gardens, paradises of this life lie.
In the time that adorns my soul.
The new havens of happiness lie behind that door.
In your journeys, while watching the reflection in my eyes
and suffers while your eyes kiss me.
She got up and approached slowly.
In her eyes dipped, I choked, while she skimmed my lips.
As a goddess of dreams, fell from the sky,
overflowing my heart. Strange silence, walls of enclose towers, in the centre of my heart. Listen to this echo, a dream of falling in a ditch crying,
Crying tears of efforts to silence. Like a bridge, lowered in your moat. I want to go beyond my thoughts, run through the fissures of your lips. That my soul forever wanted to kiss.
poem by Luca Menin
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Silence Of The Damned
Can your hear the silence.
something isn't right.
dead is the night.
who turn out the lights.
then they converge upon me like vulture.
a breeze of wind blows and
bring the chills right down to my very bones.
I know I'm done for but don't even care
cause its not my nightmare but yours.
twisted and turned. living on dead memories.
eating upon them so slowly.
Can you hear the silence.
something isn't right. dead is the night.
Who turned off the lights.
who is it this time.
again they converge.
but this isn't my nightmare.
its yours. watch in despair.
suck in your last bit of air.
no life left for me.
giving up and letting the leeches feed.
for everyone has their needs.
everyone needs to bleed.
and this time its you destiny.
Can you hear the silence.
something isn't right.
dead is the night.
who turned of the light.
who is it this time.
just remember this is not my nightmare but your.
you open the door welcome them in.
so now you must try to fend hyenas off if you can.
if not welcome to the damned.
poem by Ace Of Black Hearts
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Blue sky thoughts
Blue sky thoughts
~
the morning sky
is a canvas of purest blue
like the clear coral sea
mesmerising and endless
a gentle breeze carries bird song
while the warmth of the sun
lays across everything
let this portrait be untouched
is is a masterpiece in itself
poem by Matthew Holloway
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Sonnet XCV: The Vase of Life
Around the vase of Life at your slow pace
He has not crept, but turned it with his hands,
And all its sides already understands.
There, girt, one breathes alert for some great race;
Whose road runs far by sands and fruitful space;
Who laughs, yet through the jolly throng has pass'd;
Who weeps, nor stays for weeping; who at last,
A youth, stands somewhere crowned, with silent face.
And he has filled this vase with wine for blood,
With blood for tears, with spice for burning vow,
With watered flowers for buried love most fit;
And would have cast it shattered to the flood,
Yet in Fate's name has kept it whole; which now
Stands empty till his ashes fall in it.
poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
x12-COLD WATERS
(First poem after the introductory poem of DEAD PETALS)
Cold waters rushed down through her;
Hurting…stabbing…filling her in.
She shivered - then felt her body numb.
How good it felt to hurt that way…
where words are lost,
there’s no much more to say;
Feeling the waters through her skin
to soothe the pain inside.
Hurting more to forget the wound she hide.
Hurting until there’s no vainer than vain…
hurting more to ease the inner pain.
Tears rolled down unnoticed-
as she sat there all alone;
Waiting, always waiting…
for her body to get drowned.
But time seems to play a game with her,
and torment never seem to end.
Strong web of time gleamed clearer,
how she badly need a friend.
But it’s better to hurt that way…
where words are lost,
there’s nothing left to say.
She let the time slowly pass by…
‘the petals shall fall and the water shall flow’;
she never had the time to question why.
Minutes rolled like drops of water;
Time wheeled like a touch of forever.
Still, she let the time to slowly pass by…
‘the petals shall fall and the water shall flow’,
she never had the time to say goodbye.
Yet, her body betrayed her,
So she stood up.
And then for a moment later…
blood flowed like the cold waters.
poem by Jessel Jane Tevar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!