The Greater Lines Of Others
THE GREATER LINES OF OTHERS
The greater lines of others
Shadow my own.
I hear them within myself
Making mockery of the lines
I now write down.
The great poets own poetry
And we with the little words
And the big dreams
Might be wiser
To let only our silence
Speak for us.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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I Hear Within Myself The Greater Lines Of Others
I HEAR WITHIN MYSELF THE GREATER LINES OF OTHERS
I hear within myself the greater lines of others-
I began to write ‘I wandered lonely as a cloud’
I thought ‘Continuous as the stars that shine and twinkle on the Milky Way’
I felt ‘When you are old and grey and full of sleep’
I thought again ‘Doth God exact day – labor light denied? ”
I felt in my soul ‘Ah love let us be true to one another For the world which lies before us like a land of dreams ‘
Inside me I heard ‘The world is filled with the grandeur of God’
Time after time I repeated ‘O cursed spite that ever I was born to set it right’-
All in me is poetry more than my own
‘Oh to be in England, now that April’s here’
'Oh wild west wind thou breath of autumn's being'
I do not know how to stop the lines -
More in me than myself is the Poetry of others
And where I begin must end a greater Beauty not my own-
Oh Poem Oh Poetry Oh Poets of the Past
Oh Light of the world greater than my own small light-
Oh singing in the wilderness a song not my own
Oh much more than I can ever be
Others’ Poetry.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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When The Need To Write Poetry
When the need to write Poetry
Is greater than the Poetry one has-
When one forces onself to write lines
Though those lines are lesser poetry-
When against one's own inner emptiness
One nonetheless writes the words down-
When the need to write poetry
Is greater than the Poetry one has
There is lesser Poetry
Perhaps no Poetry at all.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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I Walked With The Lines Of Others In My Mind
I WALKED WITH THE LINES OF OTHERS IN MY MIND
I walked with the lines of others in my mind
Greater lines by far than my own -
But they were the lines of others
Hearing them I could not hear myself -
I walked and let my own voice tell itself
It knew it was a lesser thing
But it was my voice
And hearing it
I know I am alive.
There are a few great poets
But there are many small poets too.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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This Morning I Rebel Against Myself
THIS MORNING I REBEL AGAINST MYSELF
This morning I rebel against myself
Without enthusiasm I approach the page
I do not know where I should go right now
Empty as I am I am afraid.
Yet hearing echoes of a greater voice
And knowing Inspiration real through you
I laugh and wonder if your Greatness makes
A mockery of all I’ll ever do.
Dear Shakespeare in whose most casual lines
Poetry beyond all I strive to seem
I hear you through my minor reverie
Undermine the rhythm of my dream.
So in poor imitation I now write
Lines that won’t survive this angry night.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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Envy Of Other Poets Greater And More Honored Than Me
ENVY OF OTHER POETS GREATER AND MORE HONORED THAN ME
Envy of other poets greater and more honored than me
Only shows how petty and foolish and unwisely ambitious I am-
Each is what he or she is,
And each is only one-
And no one is anyone else-
And better are many, and worse are many-
A poet should write his own lines
And mind his own business-
And take pleasure in the poetry of others
When it gives that.
A poet need not compare and measure himself
But rather simply be what he is.
Write the poems
Leave the honors and the praises to someone else.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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A Poet Became His Own Poetry
A POET BECAME HIS OWN POETRY
A poet became his own poetry
And all he could be
Was lines and lines and lines
Inside and outside
Lines and more lines
Off- rhymes
Finding a phrase
A metaphor
Hearing listening
To sounds
His own mind made.
A poet became his own poetry
And went into the long sleep
Of being only what he wrote.
No one can know how
Reading these lines now
The poet and the poetry live
without themselves.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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I Wait To Hear Within The Words Which Will Mean 'Poetry
I WAIT TO HEAR FROM WITHIN THE WORDS WHICH WILL MEAN ‘POETRY’
I wait to hear from within the words which will mean ‘poetry’
I listen to myself
Only these lines come-
Silence is greater than I am
But I must be, mustn’t I?
The world does not know or care-
Universes in the distance burn bright and then die-
The world does not care
It need not care
Who am I?
What is my poetry?
Billions and trillions and zillions of each and everything
Come into being
And then are not-
Like one of them
The silence will too embrace me
And the vast worlds elsewhere go on
In their indifference
Even to themselves.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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I Wait To Hear From Within The Words Which Will Mean 'Poetry
I WAIT TO HEAR FROM WITHIN THE WORDS WHICH WILL MEAN ‘POETRY’
I wait to hear from within the words which will mean ‘poetry’
I listen to myself
Only these lines come-
Silence is greater than I am
But I must be, mustn’t I?
The world does not know or care-
Universes in the distance burn bright and then die-
The world does not care
It need not care
Who am I?
What is my poetry?
Billions and trillions and zillions of each and everything
Come into being
And then are not-
Like one of them
The silence will too embrace me
And the vast worlds elsewhere go on
In their indifference
Even to themselves.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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I Lost The Music Of My Poetry
I LOST THE MUSIC OF MY POETRY
I lost the music of my poetry
I tried to hear it again
In old lines of my own,
Or in the lines of more musical poets-
Tehillim and Kohleth
Stevens and Keats, Hopkins Wordsworth and Dickinson-
Shakespeare-
But I heard no music of my own
Perhaps I have never really had
A music of my own.
Perhaps all I have had
Is what I have here-
Short lines of prose
Which also have their rhythm-
But are not true poems
And certainly do not sing together
As my soul would.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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In Between The Lines
In between the lines
as we go about our lives
we often seem to think
no one loves no one cares
In between the lines
we drag our weary feet
and often think who cares
and shuffles mindless
to the beat
In between the lines
we search for gloom & doom
we come up with outrageous stories
that we plant between the lines
In between the lines
we throw caution to the wind
making out the lies
to be a bitter truth
so just bare in mind
what’s just been said
we always learn life’s mystery’s
in between the lines
poem by Kaila George
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To A Friend On The Other Side Of The Earth...
you write and i listen to each word.
you are faraway. You speak in repetitive lines.
there are standards of art.
a poem must be so and so. so does a short story.
unity of plot, choice of words,
fixing the mood and
fortifying the contextual feel.
you are mumbling poetry in winter
inside a train that travels on a speed greater than light.
tomorrow it will be at ten in the morning
when the bullet arrives at its destination
you write.... breathtaking views, flashes of memories.
i listen to a chant. i chant myself.
speaking to speaking speaking.
we are all alone. yet we cope up without any
help from them, damn carpets and
dripping roofs.
whether what you write is poetry or prose
it is not important anymore.
you are a poem that i care for.
i do not know you but there is a shadow
it is enough for me.
damn biters. damn arrivals.
i do the same. Sit back and write.
senselessly. desperately seeking what we still do not know.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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My Twenty Lines
I just read this poem about using just twenty lines,
and it brought these words to my mind.
Who are they to tell us how many lines we should use to speak?
This is America where we have a law known as freedom of speech.
Just twenty lines tell you something about my life in words.
To me that seem completely absurd.
My life is much more than just twenty lines.
Hell I am thirty nine.
And if they except me to sum up thirty nine years in twenty lines
They are complete outside their minds.
How am I suppose to tell you how I nearly died when I was child?
Or how my mother harsh words took away my smile:
In just twenty lines?
Like I said they must be out of their minds.
I guest I can do if I shorten my life.
I don't have to talk about how much I love my future wife.
But her love is the inspiration for a lot of my poems.
So to not talk about her would be wrong.
I have a lot more to say but I'm out of time.
I reach my limit of my twenty lines.
She says, 'Even Greater than Beauty
SHE SAYS EVEN GREATER THAN BEAUTY
She says,
'Even greater than Beauty
Is the poetry of pain and loss'
And out of the depth of our abandonment
The search for reparation
Is what the greatest Music gives-
I cannot answer her
For she has her life and her mind
And she can hear Music in a way I cannot -
Yet somehow always writing lines
Which mean more than I try to say in them
I know for me too-
Feeling in words is a Mystery well beyond me
And my poems too try to say to my mother and father
"Forgive your son for never having been the one
Who wholly brought you Happiness."
poem by Shalom Freedman
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Poetry Has A Rhythm Of Its Own
POETRY HAS A RHYTHM OF ITS OWN
Poetry has a rhythm of its own
I have lost it
I have words
I have sentences
But I have no rhythm-
I have flat lines
One after the blank other
A mind without depth
A sense of lack
But no real way
Of making a music of poetry
All my efforts now
Are like these lines
Without resonance
Simple and single in meaning
Not what a poem at its best
Should be.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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All The Poems Remain Written Where They Once Never Were
ALL THE POEMS REMAIN WRITTEN WHERE THEY ONCE NEVER WERE
All the poems remain written where they once never were
The grass and the skies of Whitman form lines in the mind of Baudelaire
The trees and dark cities of the distance form single sounds in the heart of the poet who cares
Night is more than darkness and day more than an early setting out
Each thing influences the other and calls back its own origins and end
We are going somewhere we will never know whether we write eternal lines or not
Over everywhere can be heard in the morning light the selfsame sound that through the heart of Ruth burned the alien corn
Keats is not dead, and Borges is not dead and Kafka is not dead and Wordsworth and all those who wrote great lines are not dead
Poetry is the last first eternity of the living word
And those who can hear the sounds of others greater than themselves in their own lines know
We are all writing down this last poem for ourselves and no one else
Though as we go to pray each morning the minyan tells us secretly
All our prayers together are more than any single poem can be alone
In the grey long distance where no one hears any poem at all
God writes and rewrites for us all the book of the stars in which dread is no longer a name
And beauty bright bright beauty is heard and reechoed as more than we will ever be
God is the only Poetry in the End
God is the Only One who never will be dead..
poem by Shalom Freedman
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I Wait To Hear The Lines Come
I WAIT TO HEAR THE LINES COME
I wait to hear the lines come
I try to listen only to what has the melody and rhythm of poetry
I wait-
I hear-
But in me deeper than myself some Silence stops my soul -
The words are the words and they can come
'But what this Life is and what I have done in it? '
Is still a question-
After all these years
And old –
Still a question-
I listen to myself
But it is not enough-
Some one else, others must want to listen also
And perhaps they never will-
I have a poem, you have a poem
But do we have Poetry?
poem by Shalom Freedman
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Who You Are To Me
if you read these lines this morning
these lines that miss you
these lines that say i love you
these lines are dying to touch you
to hug and kiss you
these lines that know every inch of you
if you read these lines well enough
then you know who i am
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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If You Read These Lines This Morning
if you read these lines this morning
these lines that miss you
these lines that say i love you
these lines that are dying to touch you
to hug and kiss you
these lines that know every inch of you
if you read these lines well enough
then you know who i am
i, who is nothing to you.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Interactive
I write some lines and you read each word
A word excites you and you take it up to
Seed your fields where you grow your own
Shrubbery of words with tendrils climbing
I look at your garden of words and there is
This word growing into a flower attracting
Me I pick it up this sensual flower and I
Seed it in the lines of my mind now another
Bunch of words like ripe grapes I take one
Swallow it and savor the taste of its sweetness
More lines of words in my throat sliding
Through the lining of my esophagus so smooth
Going straight inside the veins leading to my heart
Sweet, so sweet I could have written the usual
Lines of “ I love you, I miss you” but I couldn’t
There is this roadblock, this writer’s block
The lines stopped, the words are stunted
I stutter, I retreat to my eyes, to see
The face of this woman I love, her eyes
Are gentle, she smiles at me, and waits
For this beautiful silence that gives her life
You stand there, looking for a hint, another
Word to seed the lines waiting to be written.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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The Poem I Am Writing Now
The poem I am writing now
does not know if it will be finished
it does not even know if it will be a poem -
it is slowly appearing line by line
and making its own meaning on the page-
Is it worth anything?
will anyone care?
I don't know -
The poem I am writing now
is just these lines
and these lines like all lines
are only small words
in a vast universe
that has long lived
and will probably longer live
without them.
Why then write these words now?
The poem I am writing now is saying,
'I am here now'.
But why should this mean anything to anyone else?
The poem I have written here
is not the poem I would have posted here
It is only the poem I am finishing now
a poem without great love or belief in itself.
The poem I am writing now
is written.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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