As I appreciate the small inner utterances that make for poetry, some may (I hope) appreciate this amusing little poetic speculation.
Fondly, on the second day of 2021
Arlene
PS
If there are words you don’t know the meaning of, just write me.  I know there are many out there for whom English is not a first language.  It’s always good to keep a dictionary handy.
         The ****** Self
Is it in
The eyes, the skin,
The hormones, mind, the veiled nerves,
The attitude or aptitude’s genetic drives?
What is it most that serves
To makes it good, bad;
Person super duper glad?
Do dreams reveal what days congeal,
Conceal with facets still in store
To show you clearly what you are?
Without a doubt
Freud’s ‘outing’ of his insight,
Onslaught on an uptight world,
Was right.  
Perhaps not wholly, but more than a bit.
Postscript:
These small verses,
But a dabbler’s analyses,
Came this caffeinated morning  
Without warning
Like the magic elf that is our ***’s self.
The mornings lift not deft
But even so,
Its gift.

The ****** Self 1.2.2021 A Sense Of The Ridiculous II; Circling Round Exerience; Arlene Nover

It’s Twenty Hundred Twenty-One!


Well, son-of-a gun, it’s
Twenty hundred twenty-one!
What’s in a name and what is time?
Its only sign: change ongoing!
Ceaseless, endless, unabating,
Unrelieved, perpetual,
Indestructible, immutable;
Part wave, vibration, particle,
In patterns unpredictable;
Each a transient, sneaking by invisibly:
A birth, a death and in-between;
That decal time that we call Time;
Its silent signal, signal siren unavoidably agreed upon.
The end!
Year gone!
Here, hopefully a hearty, helpful, healthful  friend:
Year twenty hundred twenty-one!

It’s Twenty Hundred Twenty-One 1.1.2021 Our Times, Our Culture II; Circling Round Time II; Circling Round Everything II; Arlene Nover Corwin

What Is Bliss?

I have known happiness;
But bliss? I’ve not known,
Often wondering how, what this bliss kiss is.  
Pondering, oft meditating with success
I’ve met the qualities of inner peace,
Knowledge, love and happiness.
But bliss? Supposedly,
The highest state of joy and glory:
Blessedness benign, divine,
Coming from the source of sources
(choose your name.)
Force of forces having in its essence
Attributes that shower power
Hidden from, mysterious
To each of us.

Postulated, taking shape and form
As all on earth and every faith.
It is a mystery: its signs and causes
Working from its pre-formed laws.
Nonetheless,
It doesn’t stop one wondering thus:
What in heaven’s name is bliss?
And how to get it.
Some suggestion? Be my guest!

What Is Bliss? 12.27.2020 God Book II; A Sense Of The Ridiculous II; To The Child Mystic II; Arlene Nover Corwin

Have A Merry…

My first reaction was a ‘Merry’…
Going on from there to ‘cheery’;
Then came leer, and then a ‘dreary’.
Finally a feeling wary,
Underlying yuletide ruined
By dollar, euro, kronor, coin.

Later on, and not too soon
I turn to have a Merry Xmas,
Start to join the friendly masses.
Who am I to analyse!
Darting to a love-filled heart.
I leave behind the gifts and mart,
Impart good cheer,
And wish the world a grand New Year!

Have A Merry…12.21.2020 Our Times, Our Culture II; Arlene Nover Corwin

Christmas  Face

Looked once again
At the face in the pane.
Lines up, down, long, short.  
More than or…more than before.
Is the mirror telling lies?
Does the looking glass disguise?
Beastly age upon the face
Like an old and rotting carcass.

Rubbed, scrubbed clean in the tub,
With Christmas near, a new New Year,
It needs some makeup.
Careful not to fake,
I thereupon take up the day
Smile away,
And leave the Christmas face to stay.

Christmas Face 12.22.2020 Circling Round Vanities II; Ageing; Wrinkling;  Circling Round Experience; arlene Nover Corwin

The Best Thing  I Know

The best thing I know
Is to scribble down longings, life’s wrongings,
Love’s singing,  its stinging…
By letting the mind re-examine itself;
Watching world going by while in bed,
At its head, sitting silently gathering info
On news fact and mail,
Nailing knowledge on some tricky wiki- or so.

Christmas will be here in only some days,
A new year announcing a new phase
Of conflicts world-wide and world round;
Science will stumble upon some new ground
It has searched for for years,  
Praised and surprised, encircled by cheers.                                    
Fashions and trends, starts and ends will go on.
I will write into night seeking thoughts to dig into;
Unknown and new, cued by visualisation:
Thoughts to set words (not set worlds) afire,
Freed from the mire
                             of frazzled cliche.

The best thing I know
Is to grow through an intellect
Coupled
With Mac so fair,
Happy it’s there.
We’re a pair.
The Best Thing I Know 12.19.2020 The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative  II; Arlene Nover Corwin

Cosmic Coordination.  

(4 years later)
Meter righted, verbs re-chosen, rhymes clearer, form tightened, economized and easier to read;
even message and its nuance altered
 
Moment ‘now’ can never come again,
Not poetry, not inspiration;
Angle, viewing never contain the  prefix re- (again).
Moments have a nano-difference, nano-variation -
Two sided coins
Joined by rows of nows.
 
Moments have no measure,
No more import one the other –
Value too.
Does sitting on the loo
Have more significance than any other thing you do?
Same dance, same chance, just nuance new.
 
The instant used for what it is:  a one and only,
Friendly, sunny or tsunami —
It, unique and passing.
Yet not random or haphazard.
Influences, guides that sway –
You need to take them,
Soaking up the many ways.

Remember, be aware,  
You also guide and shape and sway
From where you are, for you have power,
Synchronized with galaxy and star
And all the spheres that ever were.
Coda:
Not to sound too know-it-all, sententious
That’s the way it is!
Cosmic Coordination 12.18.2016/ 12.19.2020 Nature Of & In Reality; Circling Round Reality Arlene  Nover ‘Corwin
sententious
given to moralizing in a pompous or affected manner: he tried to encourage his men with sententious rhetoric.

Abstinence

Not pain exactly
But a longing, plain for me to see;
A need that has no outward symptom -
None.  Not one.
Brain tristesse invisible and humdrum.
What to do? Is one a freak?
That hour, that day, that week one speaks,
One acts, attends to facts;
A seeking through an abstract dance -
Dependence through aloneness.

Publicity? More company?
Eternity perpetuated through some poetry?
Anyway and somehow, one puts pen to paper.
One, two, three, four hours later,
Crossings out, Webster shouting all the time,
Searching for meaning,
Meaning’s teaching, fetching rhyme:
Through growing phrase and sentence.
Abstinence finds absence.

Writing in that playful way,
One knows one’s had a lot to say.
The silence that gave abstinence;
Was abstinence from muteness.
Abstinence 12.18.2020 The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II; Arlene Nover Corwin

You Have Only Yourself

You have
Only yourself to work with;
Bathe, clothe, soothe;
Live in and save.
A self you cannot leave, for
There’s no other
Over which you have a power.

It’s you who breathe,
Must learn to love, forgive -
For you deserve it.
Your achievement
One that chiefly comes intuitively -
Fief, belief that comes from faith,*
Its roots in something beyond earth,
Bequeathed
From some external source,
Its course also discursive,
Non-intrusive yet conclusive.
You only have yourself
Enwreathed with instinct’s highest drive
To do it with
                    and for.
You Have Only Yourself 12.17.2020 Revelations Big & Small; Arlene Nover Corwin

fief;  a person's sphere of operation or control.
discursive; proceeding by argument or reasoning rather than by intuition.

An Urge Is Not A Wish

I have no wish to write.
It is an urge I can’t resist,
And so,
Not only do I not desist -
Not slowing down, but speeding up,
The whole accelerating,
It invigorating,
I encourage this particular urge large!
(syntax queer, I’m aware.
rhyme peculiar, but it’s there!)

An urge more subtle than a wish,
Ranging from the brush to flesh.
I urge you all to keep the wish,
Examine urge.
If good to let it surge,
Become an act that serves,
I wish the very best for you.

An Urge Is Not A Wish 12.11.2020 A Sense Of The Ridiculous II; Arlene Nover Corwin

When I read this to my husband, no, discussed the thank theory, he mentioned a whole list of things I would never think of…sun, nature, family, friends, sky (not in that order) and I realised more than ever, it’s all about priorities and whatever takes first place in your mind and heart.
       I suppose as long as you feel a thanks at all, that is the essential, for so much of life is suffering.

                Thanks

Thanks for the consciousness
Of vitamins
And maintenance
Of health;
Things keeping me alive
At eighty-five.
We will not mention the mistakes
Made out of ignorance
And vanities.
But anyways,
Thanks for the consciousness,
However small,
Of learning concepts:
Words that smell of wrongdoings and weaknesses
That lead to nothing gained
                                          and pain.
Thanks for brain, mind, love,
The mysteries shaped from above
Revealing selves from day to day:
Gifts, middling or developed, held up;
Musicality, culinary, long-time waiting;
Gifts from genes and fate
For which one can’t claim credit.

But with gifts come debit:
Karmic debts that must be paid from insight,
Dis- illusion, self-deceptive strengths and loss
Of will and energy to toss them out,
Swapping every wrong for right.
Thanks for seeing through the scrap, the traps
To late night insights.

Thanks for indispensables at fingertips:
Food, clothes, warmth, which list goes on
An endless on and on:..
The value of philosophy - of having one;
Of having fun, but seeing through it.
Thanks for/to the comfy bed I’m lying on,
The pillowed back support for writing from,
The little knowledge in this bank, this little think tank;
For this writing - Thanks!
And Thanks!
Thanks 3.6.2020/edited 12.8.2020 Pure Nakedness II; Circling Round The Universal; Arlene Nover Corwin

Bass Deluxe: Ron Mathewson

Bass stands against a wall.
A singing, dear, expensive bass
Unused and tall,
Its agoraphobic player on a chair he calls his ‘throne’,
Alone, with daily cigarettes,
Watching TV, living in, on the touring pasts.
Half understanding - just half understanding
How great and talented he was.
Perfect recall, perfect pitch
All he broods about is what he’s done -
What was attained long, long, long, gone.

Life’s contradictions:
Great gifts. great restrictions.
One feels the ache of disappointment:
Talent that resigns from life with that great depot of accomplishment,
Finely filed on disc and film.
Not to be bettered, that bass with its singing-ness.
Like men of genius gifts and neuroses,
Ron’s bass was divine, a mine of nuances,
Shades, silken tones, harmonies endless.
That sensitive ear!  What chords he would hear!
Phrases he’d play on!
A multi-boxed crayon.
He could pluck, he could bow .
Did his intellect know why, what, how?
He just did it!

The box of wine, that pack of smokes.
The emails, phone calls, stockpile of anecdotes;
Remembered peers, recalled remarks,
The names of tunes leaving their marK;
The taste and technique, the recall
Combined, his all.

Yet all that one can say
Is that one of the ‘chosen few’
A treasured, master jazz bass player
Lived his last day
On a Thursday, 3rd December, 2020.

Bass Deluxe: Ron Mathewson 12.9.2020 Vaguely About Music II; Birth, Death & In Between III; Special People, Special Occasions; Arlene Nover Corwin

Dear Diary #1

Dear diary,
I’m getting oh so clever.
Washed my hair,
Took a bath and clipped my toenails
Scraped and shaped the cuticles.
Tiny miracles indeed:
Tiny miracles in need.
Tracking down these daily wonders,
Dealing with the ‘going under’
May become a daily task,
Inspire the rascals to desist:
Rascal stiffness and discomfort,
Rascal bother, pain and strain.

Simple rhymes to rule the roost,
Give my warmed-up self a boost;
Easier to jot, oppose the rot of
Mind and hand,
A brand name for the ones who can’t.
Amputees.comPensate.
(Any dot you can create).

Dear Diary12.7.2020 Pure Nakedness II; Arlene Nover Corwin

A twin to the moment of silliness.

One’s Always Aiming At & For Good Art

One’s always aiming at and for good art,
Emotion just a minor part.
One amuses using humor;
One weeps from milk that’s spilt;
If one’s longing tops the theme,
All the same, one wants good art:
Intelligence, truth from the start,
Not smitten by cliches,
For if they must be written
Make sure they’re on purpose, not from weakness.
(Neither smart-*** smart nor cynical
But heart dug in the spiritual)
Readers are not seekers, not in quest…
Nonetheless,
The verb, conjunction, placement careful,
You desire your work, its poetry
The -ality which underlies expression,
Reaching with finesse the chosen few intent on you,
To generate a luminescence,
(Not to speak of essence.)

One’s Always Aiming At & For Good Art 12.2.2020 The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II; Arlene Nover Corwin

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A twin to the moment of silliness.

One’s Always Aiming At & For Good Art

One’s always aiming at and for good art,
Emotion just a minor part.
One amuses using humor;
One weeps from milk that’s spilt;
If one’s longing tops the theme,
All the same, one wants good art:
Intelligence, truth from the start,
Not smitten by cliches,
For if they must be written
Make sure they’re on purpose, not from weakness.
(Neither smart-*** smart nor cynical
But heart dug in the spiritual)
Readers are not seekers, not in quest…
Nonetheless,
The verb, conjunction, placement careful,
You desire your work, its poetry
The -ality which underlies expression,
Reaching with finesse the chosen few intent on you,
To generate a luminescence,
(Not to speak of essence.)

One’s Always Aiming At & For Good Art 12.2.2020 The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II; Arlene Nover Corwin

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A Really Silly Moment

I get so bored when I can’t write.
It feels so wrong when I don’t write.
(Get it?. Write, wrong?) ****! Ding ****!
Among the songs I’ve ever sung
(I am a singer, after all)
The throng that’s hung around
That sound like music in my head,
The syllables that bubble forth,
A babble like a gaggle of slim glossy geese -
(Not the least bit schmalz obese
And definitely not for roasting)
On this shoestring of a playful thread
(Line six to see the rhyme to ‘head’
This poet (me)
Is off to see awful TV.
Anyway I’ve had my ‘fix’
Of perky, quirky tricks today.

A Really Silly Moment 12.1.2020 A Sense Of the Ridiculous II; Arlene Nover Corwin

Although it may look as if I’m carrying on a one-woman campaign, writing poetry about amputation as I occasionally do, I just want to say that as a recent amputee, having gotten a mysterious sepsis (blood poisoning) and going from a ten fingered person to a three whole, three half fingered person, certain situations that I find myself in set off quirky observations which, as a poet I simply cannot resist setting to meter and rhyme.  

            Shampooing

To those of you who’ve never known
An amputee of any sort -
A few bones short,
Shampooing is, well, interesting,
Challenging, to say the least!
The warming bath with bended knees
The bottle squeezed, the soaping in,
The tender skin on scalp and crown,
Just sitting down!
Each step to get those darned hairs clean.

It takes awhile to go that mile,
But afterwards it’s worth it;
A warming and uplifting gift,
The escapade engaging brain:
A training on a very basic yogic plane.  

Shampooing 11.20.2020 A Sense Of the Ridiculous II;

It’s Your Decision

It’s your decision, right or wrong.
You go along without dimensions of an understanding,
Ever standing under instinct.
Moment’s instinct driven by and based in sync-
With genes, upbringing, circumstance:
All of these the dance of life
That will forever lead and follow.

Your decision, every moment.
Your voice, your choice,
You the instrument but not the cause.
Who knows what the sources are?
“It’s in the stars”, as often said.
And yet, what’s in your head
Is there,
The leader/seer,
Atmosphere and backdrop notwithstanding.

It’s your decision, yes and no.
You can decide to let it go
If time is wrong or intuition’s song
Is sensing that the time is wrong.
Impulse in life’s small complexities
Paradoxes.

Is the will free as a bird - or burden?
You decide!

It’s Your Decision 11.29.2020 Nature in & Of Reality; Arlene Nover Corwin

Scribbled this out last evening when I couldn’t think of anything to say.  The first two line came out on pencil.  The sixth and seventh came next.  The rest came together this morning.  A total of three hours, I would think.  Eventually a poem worth the reading.

     Worth The Reading Time

Much of what one reads about
Is love ignited, unrequited…
Plight, excite, delight: all adjectives that end in -ite,
Narratives that never land;
Unfulfilled and ne’er full-ended.
Searching for someone to love;
Searching for the one true love.

For those inclined to love Divine -
The kind of love a union
With the One its aim and function;
That suffices as the gold; the mine
Of all the gemstones in the world.

Tomes we seek, themes that speak
Of higher things than lips and lust,
That never tire or expire,
But encrusted with a gem unchanging
Are worth the reading time forever.

Worth the Reading Time 11.28.2020 The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II; Circling Round Experience; Circling Round Eros; Love Relationships II; Arlene Nover Corwin

What Takes Time
(when fingers have been amputated)

Buttoning and chopping onions.
(you don’t button onions, natch!)
Throwing ***** and playing catch;
Diverse actions needing oneness:
Three note chord, arpeggio
(If, of course you’ve played piano)
Wiping *** with just a thumb,
Zipping up,
Applying make-up.
Writing with a pen or pencil,
Lifting any large utensil;
Twists of wrists, techniques and muscles
While you’re rustling something up -
Things take time. You learn to cope,
And so,
You learn to take things slowly,
Much more slowly than you used to
When you ab- and mis-used time
By buzzing, cruising ‘round
Quite inexcusably.

Now focussed and enthused,
A strange new way infused,
The will to live renewed,
Things viewed as ordinary now extraordinary.
What takes time with digit gone
May have more than one compensation.
We shall see in years to come.

What Takes Time 11.24..2020 Birth, Death & In Between III; Pure Nakedness II; Arlene Nover Corwin

The World’s Best Lovers

Musing on a thing I know,
A thing I know a thing about,
The trick is not to mention names.
Think: name unknown - the names anon.
The traits are what illuminate;
When it becomes an education:
Theory to academic and didactic;
Not the least bit pornographic
(even graphic, for that matter.)

Mr X climbs into bed with Ms XY.
No sly ardor but good will,
They lie quite still.
A good beginning and an intro.
No big ego runs the show.
Start is slow, no expectations.
With no goal, the ***’ awakens.
One is passive, one is not.

Cool and hot, yin and yang,
One receiver, one with spring.
This can vary in the doing,
Cupid’s arrows, sightless, blind,
Innocence and eros blend.
The tactile governs.
Thigh to thigh, hand on hand,
Eye to eye, and, and, and…and

A motion, whispered groan;
Skin on skin, the moans begin.
Step by step and far from finished,
Visual, olfactory, the beating heart,
The swelling heat, the two best lovers taking part,
A start, an end, two friends united in
Spontaneous combustion
(which they say cannot be found,
but silent causes can resound.)
In any case, all ceased and feasted,
Lovers rise. A second breakfast.
Lovers who have had the most -
Juice and oatmeal, buttered toast…

The World’s Best Lovers 11.21.2020 Circling Round Eros; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

I woke this morning, watched my morning TV, ate breakfast, and outcame this: having been worked on 3-4- hours; refined, more clearly defined, even as I write for sending.

     A New Awakening

For me, each day’s become
A new awakening.
I don’t remember yesterday,
(that, almost literally).
Each day I feel a newly born
Who hasn’t had a day before;
For him or her,
Each day’s events, the weekly sequence that lacks reference:
Wholly fresh and unprocessed.
No programmed habits in the way,

The learned unnecessary.
Every breakfast, lunch and dinner
Informing and a finding
With the force of creativity
Touched by serotonin, dopamine
And filled with oxytocin, which means
Happiness, and with that -ness invention.

Ageing has its benefits.
The days untied, untried,
Duties less a press;
To the better in the dwindling senses, subtle changes;
Fun in what was obligation:
Cooking, laundry, scrubbing, dusting -
All the ordinary musts amusing,
Yesteryear’s mad fusses fusing!
An awakening!  
A new sense-action and a prize
Of unadulterated size!

A New Awakening 11.17.2020 Circling Round Ageing; Pure Nakedness II; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

The Things We Take For Granted

The tastes and that we taste,
The smell and that we smell.
The sight and sights themselves;
The fact of silence, how it feels.
And touch?
Is velvet like our bristly toothbrush?
How asleep we are
Though eyes are open.
Who is it, that real person
Inside you?
And who is you?

The Things We Take for Granted 11.15.2020 A Sense Of The Ridiculous II; Arlene Nover Corwin

Note: I could have called this “Some Things We Take For Granted”, for I well understand the limitless extent of what we do not think about or notice. But as one who has lost the sense of taste and smell, who has had fingers amputated due to sepsis, I know and am beginning to deeply understand the before and after of what it means to 'take for granted'.

The Things We Take For Granted

The tastes and that we taste,
The smell and that we smell.
The sight and sights themselves;
The fact of silence, how it feels.
And touch?
Is velvet like our bristly toothbrush?
How asleep we are
Though eyes are open.
Who is it, that real person
Inside you?
And who is you?

The Things We Take for Granted 11.15.2020 A Sense Of The Ridiculous II; Arlene Nover Corwin

An End To Everything

Driving in the car looking at the trees;
November colors, sparser leaves.
Their stunning, sunning profiles clear;
Tree trunks far or close together;
Defined the birch and pine, the heather,
The whole divine to me.
And yet one sees finality.
Winter sends a different sense.

Seasons brief;
Some bloom, some gloom, flame, flume -
All short.
But lying in my world of thought
I see the tree. the bird, the bee
As formed of start and end - and then,
A start again.

An End To Everything 11.14.2020 Circling Round Nature II; Arlene Nover Corwin

Ego

I am ego.
You cannot survive without me;
I can help you give, by helping give you
Your identity.
I help you know yourself
So, do not **** me off
But know when I am there
Giving orders
When I ought to be sub-ordinate.
I am ego - not I AM.

Ego 11.12.2020 I Is always You Is We; Arlene Nover Corwin

This is a true confessional, part nonsense (as in the genre ‘nonsense poetry) part didactic, meant for those like myself.  🤭😇😅😘🤪 😣 - these emojis representing various aspect pf me, the last called ‘perevering face’.  What fun!

      Learning To Shut Up

How often do you interrupt
Before the other finishes his sentence?
How well do you listen,
Taking in or recollecting
Details and/or essence
Of the other’s presence?
Mea culpa!
That sin mine, wherein
The ego governs;
Two ears  deafened
How embarrassing!
I’m confessing,
But I’m learning,
Earning points in listener’s heaven.
Like a silly pup,
Learning to well,
Shut the h__l up.

Learning To Shut Up 11.11.2020 Circling Round Experience; A Sense Of The Ridiculous; Arlene Nover Corwin

It is November 5, 2020, 3 days after the presidential election.  This is perhaps the most unfamiliar poem I’ve ever been impelled to write.

         Let’s Face It or Perhaps He’ll Never See The Point

Let’s face it,
People do not like the Prez.
When I say ‘prez’
I don’t mean Lester (Young).
It’s hard to give support
With head and heart
To one who seems so nar-
                                         cissistic.

Even weak political emotions
Set in motion bitter potions
Of the toxic kind,
Taken over by a mind aggressive:
One usually meek and pleasant.

But this present president
Evokes an ire
Wired by a man who fits the classic liar.
It’s pathetic one’s own character
Is challenged thus;
Burning like infectious pus,
The psyche’s plus turned to a minus.

Here’s a man who wields great power.
Here is we, who yield to anger
Like a stranger in a field of danger
With our only weapon
Ethics, thought, determination.
Hope born of conviction.

Let’s FaceIt 11.5.2020 Our Times, Our Culture II; Arlene Nover Corwin

It’s not yet tomorrow, the 8th November. But like a child I’m already celebrating it with anticipation.  I’ve no real emotion, rather a quiet gratitude and awareness of life itself.  My eyes see nature differently, I hear and put together sounds in a newly discovered way.  The whole picture of what and who makes up life has taken on a new significance and hue.

   Happy Birthday To Myself

Happy Birthday To Myself!
My outer self, my inner Self!
The body me, the mind-full me.
The trillion cells
That keep me well.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO IT ALL!

Happy Birthday to the mood
That helps to make me feel good.
To fates that brought me where I am;
The virtues, gifts, the blames I claim.

Happy Birthday to the tricks
I’ve learned to use  at this
My new day’s eighty sixth;
Tricks and tips, clues, hints to share,
(One is ever part aware)

And so I send myself this mail
Literally as I am able.
Satisfied that I’ve not died.
With years that morphed
Into an age where I can sing this song:
Happy Birthday To Myself! 🎶
Toodle-loo and Cheers!  So long!  💕

Happy Birthday To Myself 11.8.2020 Birthday Book; Arlene Nover Corwin

At  this time, Wednesday, November 4th, 2020 5pm Swedish time, still glued to the TV, not knowing yet who’s in! This was written in October.

               Self-Doubt

I sometimes wonder, try to picture
Men like Mr Trump, sitting on the ‘loo’ or ‘john’
For really, he is one
                               of us - just human,
Doing what we humans do.

I wonder if he’s ever plain unsure,
Plain insecure.
I wonder if he has self-doubt.
Skeptical about ideas that come to mind,
Understanding that the mind can find
The craziest of thoughts to think.

Myself, I waver, do not savour every Corwin blink.

And here we have men of the hour,
Men with power
Posturing with face, hand, fingers
Giving out their unsound signals;
Accusations unconditional;
Wholesale and total.
Do they never have self-doubt
When I, the lowly writing poet
Try to deepen virtues that I am without?
I, who analyse and question sides unseen?
Seeking ways to harmonise the pieces and the one,
Smooth out the rougher parts
While at the same time being soft at heart,
Broad, kind and well defined,
Wise and well-informed in mind?

Self-confidence dissolves self-doubt.
To recognize, discern the two Is good to do,
Good for you, of value to your future                
And by definition,
Everyone’s.

loo, john are English slang for toilet.
Self-Doubt 10.2.2020 Our Times, Our Culture II; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

On Facebook

Gladdened and astonished
At the countries that are reached
By writing simple verse;
That old and young
Whose native tongue
Is manifestly not the English one,
One’s filled with admiration.

We should all be grateful
If, by easy clicks we set a ball a-rolling,
Sharing, seeing commonality
In all humanity.
My tears, fears theirs or bared,
My hopes, the insights, all I’ve earned
Shared, learned by all the yearning, scared globality.

Wars come and go.
But flows of longing, kindness, information
Are the highest trophies reaching nation
After nation
From this windy, rainy Swedish morn.

Inspired, un-tired and breakfasted,
Looking forward to the Mac,
Face-booking, and the fact
That there will be somebody out there
Somewhere in Antarctica, Australia, Africa or Papua…
Who will be made the happier by stanza,
Or plain utterance .  

On Facebook 11.2.2020 Our Times, Our Culture II; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

Maturity

What was one thinking then?
What was one thinking when
One did the darnedest things
Ringing of naivité.
Or did not do things of substance;
Choices based on ignorance
And make-up’s many-sidedness.

Looking back today
They seemed so brainless,
Some foolhardy, irresponsible and thoughtless.
“How could I?”  And why, you sigh -
Tear-filled eyes the only prize.

Sizing up with clearer powers,
Time has passed, transgressions paid.
New sown flowers replaced errors.
Karma’s laws have laid the end
With just results: some good, some pained.

That’s what growth is all about -
With rings on trees the perfect symbol;
Narrow, wide, but growing still;
Even now (the adjective)
In silence and tranquility (the noun)

The coming of maturity,
The blossoming sagacity.
One hopes and prays
It comes and stays
Through lasting days
           of wine and roses.

Maturity 11.1.2020 Circling Round Ageing; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

This is the opposite side of the coin to “Everything We Do” (Facebook or Wordpress site)

        The Bad, The Harmful & The Worthless

The nail biting, smoking, drinking,
Mind cliches, the one that ******* -
All the zillion daily habits
Which, like rabid dogs are glitches
Which are setbacks which push back
The forward ****** of progress,
The kind of life meant for the best:
Life happiness!

Repetition may be key
To all achievement.
But like energy's great powers;
Sources that house forces
Dour, sour on the hour;
Positive & negative;
Latent, inherent, permanent
(Reference: atoms vis á vis the bomb.
Doesn't that just make you numb?)

Tips and hints: Pointing nose in the direction of,
You guessed it: truth and fact;
Learn to act with light and love,
Convert the covert negative
To merit, benefit and giving;
Good for all and plain overt.

The Bad, The Harmful & The Worthless;10.31.2020 Circling Round Reality; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

Everything You Do

Everything accomplished needed repetition.
Repetition means rehearsal;
No reversal till you get it perfect.
Practice and continuation
Flexibly reflected, flaws corrected;
All dissected till you’ve got it right.

Playing, praying, cooking  training,
You’ve a will and brain
To shape it all from large to small,
From simple to precision’s detail.

Everything needs doing over
To deliver what it’s meant to be.
Nothing’s fault-free, all agree.
But all activity has aim
Combined with spontaneity.

Repetition is an art,
Discipline a healthy part;
Continuance the dart and cart
Which thrown and borne
Brings start to what we’ve learnt
To call accomplishment.

Everything You Do 10.29.2020 Definitely Didactic II; Circling Round Experience; I Is Always You Is We; Arlene Nover Corwin

When a poem comes out from head and hand in twenty minutes, one is suspicious, almost sure it will be returned to for revision and correction - often re-creation.      
So far, thirty minutes and adjustments later this head-to-hand is still content.
        
        The Right Attitude

Sinatra had ‘the world on a string’.
Some have the world on their shoulders,
Walking ‘round a wounded Atlas.
What attitude
Can turn an Atlas tuned to self essential?
One which takes the stance
That though life’s no dance,
We cannot “change the thing we can’t control”
But view it holy in its whole,
Defined, refined by character and rectitude
Which spreads its finite wavelengths
Without damage to the soul of strength.

The Right Attitude 10.25.2020 Circling Round Reality; Arlene Nover Corwin

I’ve Got The World On A String Lyrics;Ted Koehler Music; Harold Arlen
*Serenity Prayer; Reinhold Niebhr (often used by Alcoholics Anonymous)

I have been drawn many years - by instinct or some gene - to the relationship of the chemical workings in our body to the working in the body/mind.  Never having consciously thought about this, I I noticed only this morning while watching a young lady who’d written a book about admiration and its effect on the body/mind that I’d been writing about that in poetical form for perhaps 40 years.  Below, one of the latest, (yesterday, in fact) is one.


      Talking To The Brain

I sometimes take the initiative
Taking, talking to the brain,
As if it were a representative
Of good and God, silent, present.

With no answers, no response,
I know each synapse is no dunce,
Transmitting neurons no morons
But batteried intelligence.
I’ve no solutions, but It has: Brain jazz!
And so I trust, with each new thought,
Each new idea, impulse or not
That something in the mono-ation’s conversation
Is productive, non-destructive.

With analysis, this mono-business
Is an enterprise filled with surprises;
Answers come each in their kind,
Blindly showing up in weeks, months, days
In ways I scarcely recognize:

Answers to a thought once prized,
I do not intellectualize
But go on with the one-on-one,
Knowing that it’s being processed
By some clever chemi-physic-sist
Up in-the-skies.

Talking To The Brain II 10.22.2020 The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II;  Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

Talking To The Brain

I sometimes take the initiative
Taking, talking to the brain,
As if it were a representative
Of good and God, silent, present.

With no answers, no response,
I know each synapse is no dunce,
Transmitting neurons no morons
But batteried intelligence.
I’ve no solutions, but It has: Brain jazz!
And so I trust, with each new thought,
Each new idea, impulse or not
That something in the mono-ation’s conversation
Is productive, non-destructive.

With analysis, this mono-business
Is an enterprise filled with surprises;
Answers come each in their kind,
Blindly showing up in weeks, months, days
In ways I scarcely recognize:

Answers to a thought once prized,
I do not intellectualize
But go on with the one-on-one,
Knowing that it’s being processed
By some clever chemi-physicist
Up in-the-skies.

Talking To The Brain 10.22.2020 The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II;  Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

The CPS or Cordial Praise  Society

We who write, responding kindly,
Are the humble members of
The Cordial Praise Society’s
Appreciation of what others say,
Each in his way, (and naturally, her way as well.)
We do not try to sell ourselves,
And if we’re liked or even loved,
Get or give approval,
We are strengthened to the depths,
Feeling whole.

With no razzmatazz,
Let’s call ourselves the CPS
The Cordial Praise Society
Who push each other to the sky.
Not asking why,
We know it is the best and only thing to do.

The CPS or Cordial Praise Society 10.21.2020 the Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II; Arlene Nover Corwin

I Do Not Read, I Write

I do not read, I write!
It’s like the principle of jazz:
A theme expanded single-handed
With no benefit in sight.
And with no benefit in sight
I carry on this inborn rite
With pronoun “i” seemingly right.

Not egotistical
But leaning towards the universal,
For we all are “I” behind the eye,
Its goal, the “i” up in the sky,
And  what I write mid-day or night
Comes from a seeded, seeding thought
So pressing it demands first place,
Computer space
All but ignoring those who think,
Getting their peace by pen and ink.

Others do what they do do:
Jogging, menu-ing or chewing
It’s the inward pleasured *******
Pushing unavoidably
As recreation, situation notwithstanding.

Thus I write but do not read!
(i lie, but need to boast)
Of course I read the most I can,
Loving the words of child and man)

It’s just that sitting in this sun,
Pen, paper handy, gives one
Stimulation, motivation, means and - fun.

I Do Not Read, I Write 10.18.2020 A Sense Of The Ridiculous II; Arlene Nover Corwin

Forever Counting (Words to Ponder)

Carbohydrates, calories, vitamins  & minerals,
Week workdays, holidays,
Tax returned and money earned;
Last summer’s weather, winter too…
The list of what you count depends on you -
But count you do, counting on the life you lead
And what you need.
What is the meaning of it all?
The fact of calculating, tallying
Tied to each and every errand.

We say, “It/he/she doesn’t count!”
Translated: it’s of no importance,
Has no meaning or significance.
It’s like saying matter is not/does not matter.
So many layered words turn in upon themselves
To even up the oxymoron,
Or more, add up to paradox?

We count on, count upon,
Count someone in,
Count something out.
What the heck’s this all about?
I count on you to think this out.
Engrossing as it is.

Count Basie!

Forever Counting (Words to Ponder) 10.17.2020 The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II; Arlene Nover Corwin

The Whole Trinity

We are a brain that has a body,
And a soul that has a brain:
A trinity, foreordained; pre-destined
With design and specificity, tendency
Both dark and light.
What a mixtur-ed mystery!

The most of fixtures:
Cells like batteries,
Organs, hormones, anti-bodies,
Arteries and veins through which red liquid runs
To carry precious oxygen to all the tissues in the body.

What a list to get the gist of!
So encyclopaedic, google doesn’t stand a chance.

Even synapses connecting all the billion bits of detail:
Nerve cells with a tiny gap where particles can mingle.

We are a brain that has a body,
And a soul that has and is the whole,
Examining which you’’ll
Comprehend.

The Whole Trinity 10.18.2020 Nature Of & In Reality; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

Just Plain Old Words

No metaphors, just plain old words:
A bunch to delve, dive into
For contentment’s sake,
Rummaging for further knowledge,
Contemplating, taking
Into cells which in themselves
Have not a gauge
But are a gauge in which to
Fit a language
Which, by some unworldly process,
Influences what we are, what we become
As hours pass,
Floundering and pondering;
Wond’ring at their wondrousness.

Metaphors and other symbols;
Explicating parables;
Simple, concrete; toys to play with,
Stay with day to day
Until their meanings stick.

The mystery
Is how the words,
Compiled, piled up and side by side
Get to be our poetry.
Inscrutably a mystery,
Verily!

It’s easy to believe, receive,
The starting point was Word,
A sound  whose purpose was to spread,
Promote, communicate with,
Circulate mankind.

That he’s not always kind
Is yet another theme
For other times
In other poems
With words in herds
Or one or two
From folk like me to folk like you.

Just Plain Old Words 10.17.2020 The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditating II; Arlene Nover Corwin

You’re Not Alone
                      
You’re down.
Unhappy as a clown
With painted mouth and painted eyes:
A main disguise.
Inside you’re isolated, insulated,
Loveproof, heatproof and cocooned,
Marooned.  Then ****,  
The roof falls in, you’re introduced.
From being ‘down’
You’re not alone.
Propped up and bolstered,
Heartened, fortified and reassured;

I need not say what, where or how.
Certainly not even who.
The thing of import is the ‘that’.
‘That’ you, besotted, mad about
A club,  a hobby, a religion. Stuck
On something you can shout out loud about.
You’ve learned, have known
One need not be alone, not great, not clever.
There is always some one thing to focus on:
Aloneness gone.
Forever.

You’re Not Alone 10.15.2020 Love Relationships II; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

Yesterday: your Birth Day!
Not just  'birthday', automatic as a ****,
But Birth Day: Such two words!
Important!  No, essential!
Referential, consequential!
Did not forget.
I hurt my foot, so didn't write,
It hurt all hours, day and night!
But here I am, in bed, inspired,
Caffeinated and un-tired,
Thinking lovingly about
Dear gifted Frederick inside out,
And wishing, hoping for the best:
Rest, blessed and lifelong:
*****, bass & muscles strong,
Knowing that you are among
The  smartest and most seeking of the throng.
With all my loving-est of song,🙏✍️🎹🎼🎤
Arlene (and Kent, of course)

Questions, Insights In the Night

This election: eighty-six:
Next election: I’ll be ninety.
If I’m there, how will it be?
The issues, climes, economy?
Shot to hell each plant and tree?
Arctic icebergs flowing, dry?
Bird-less, fish-less, mammal-free?
Wormy things confirming that
The rings around the trees don’t grow,
No longer show, for as you know,
“The wages of sin is death” for all.

In four years will T have been faithful?
Told the truth, kept promises?
Done what he can?
Not been T promiscuous,
‘Grab the *****’ need all gone?
By ninety will there be a woman
Who will run and who can win?
Will Fun old Grump be loony binned?

Gun old Frump? Nano Cramp? Run old Chimp?
Will any win?
Be seen, be heard November third?

I hope I’ll be here for my duty:
‘Fake news’ outed for its hype,
Typing out my poetry,
Garden snails on my board;
Growing foodstuffs for the good;
Success and progress,
Conquered virus,
Plumbed black holes,
Nature whole;
Ego friendly, free of worry…

Four more years until next vote:
Will I laugh, will I gloat?
Find a way to play out life’s allotted,
Unsought, final day?
These, one giant question/insight
In the middle of last night.

Questions, Insights In The Night 10.12.2020 Circling Round Reality; A Sense Of The Ridiculous II; Arlene Nover Corwin

Day Of The Nobel Prize
             (October 8, 2020)

My poetry: No Nobel Prize,
No metaphors, few images;
Just plain old pragmatism
Made of rhyme and meter,
Themes that speak to those that need them,
Underlying or spotlighting
What is, mostly under-stressed by common folk,
Or spoken in their honoring
A local past or now or
Beauty or complaint or pain, for
Poetry is road; a world
Which is or is not typically unfurled.
Rhythm’s pattern flow its own,
A beat repeated lyrical,
Graceful, elegant, worth hearing,
Moving to, for, from the soul,
Every poem worth Nobel.

Day Of The Nobel Prize 10.8.2020 Our Times, Our Culture II; The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II; Arlene Nover Corwin

Confession To A Body

Body, you’ve been kind to me.
I’m not sure I’ve been kind back,
Complex the weaknesses which don’t perplex
Because of ignorance and vanity
And all those failings we abhor,
But still ignore.

When skin & bones, the organs, cells
Rebel because they don’t feel well…
Poor body!. While we are busy messing round,
You carry on by blessing all we do and more.
You’ve been a store of energy,
Instinct, tuition in each cell.
And now you do not feel too well:

Pains in the back, the sides, the middle.
Pains a riddle, piddling round, a joke that’s not a joke;
That pokes around in secret parts,
Yokes deficits to circulating heart
Which pumps its longing to survive
Because it knows the price, how nice to live,
The drive primeval.

Partnering with brain, it thinks,
“There’s so much left to do…”
And we, rewarded in abundance,
Know it’s true.

Confessions To A Body 10.7.2020 Pure Nakedness II; Circling Round Ageing; Circling Round Experience;

And When Do You Write?
             (a morning thought)

Assuming that we want to grow,
Each, every one of us with much to say
With wish to make some headway, be successful,
Thoughts, ideas original -
Inspiring for others;
Considering that we’re friends and brothers;

This considered, I’ll begin
By stating that I write in morning,
Topping off between, whenever
Circumstance or whim pops in unasked for.
Breakfast is the draw for me.
A time to munch and watch and see,
For TV’s in the room with me.
Blood sugar raised,
The brain takes in a pregnant phrase
Charged with stimulation,
Even modest revelation.

But you?  
When do you do when you do do?
Just a query,
Interested as I am in creation, creativity,
Body, mind relation; a concern instinctive -
Born of intuition, intellect and love.

And When Do You Write? 10.6.2020
The Processes: Creative, Thinking, Meditative II; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

Self-Doubt

I sometimes wonder, try to picture
Men like Mr Trump, sitting on the ‘loo’ or ‘john’
For really, he is one
                               of us - just human,
Doing what we humans do.
I wonder he’s ever plain unsure,
Plain insecure.
I wonder if he has self-doubt.

Sceptical about ideas that come to mind,
Understanding that the mind can find
The craziest of thoughts to think.
Myself, I waver, do not savour every Corwin blink.

And here we have men of the hour,
Men with power
Postures, faces, hands and fingers
Giving out their unsound signals,
Accusations unconditional, wholesale and total.
Do they never have self-doubt,
When I the lowly writing poet
Try to deepen virtues that I am without?
Analyse and question
Layers, sides unseen?
Look for ways to harmonise the pieces and the one,?
Smooth out the rougher parts
While at the same time being soft at heart,
Broad and kind, well defined
Wise and well-informed in mind?

Self-confidence has bits that disavow self doubt.
To learn to recognise, discern the two
Is good to do,
Of value to
Your future
And by definition,
Everyone’s.

loo, john are English slang for toilet.
Self-Doubt 10.2.2020 Our Times, Our Culture II; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

Older ******

Love life can smoulder still
When you get older, till
The gasp and sigh die out,
Expiring total.

Where tenderness lives
Carnal knowledge survives.
Where love and affection survive,
A good love life will thrive.

The union of two
That is moving and true
Has a life of its own,
Not on loan but a power of staying,
Of carrying on.
Tenderness leaves out the hinder of ending.

While there are pauses and fadings away,
Touchings and strokings are blessings
That not only grow and develop, but stay
Till the ecstasy in its finality must die away.

Older ****** 10.1.2020 Circling Round Eros II; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin