Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Alyssa Underwood Sep 2017
There is little in this world that consistently causes our hearts more pain or which produces in us more need for forgiveness than rejection, especially from those whom it has cost us so much to love. It is universal anathema to the soul, and much of our lives can be unconsciously governed by the fear of it. So we find ourselves naturally asking, "Joy in the midst of rejection? Is that even possible?" Oh, yes! Not only possible but commanded of us who are believers in Christ. And not only commanded of us but ready to be gloriously bestowed on us like the most precious of pearls.

It's in the season of greatest rejection that we enter the season of greatest opportunity to discover the fullness of God's joy by discovering the fullness of His own heart. Walking in intimacy with Jesus through this searing pain may be one of the most priceless privileges of grace granted to us on this earth, for it opens up one of the widest doors for us to enter into the fellowship of sharing in His sufferings, and there is no more obvious chance to die to ourselves and live for Christ than in that holy communion of suffering with Him.

It's there that we're most able to clearly see Him and best prepared to clearly reflect Him, and it's then that we're empowered to live our lives here on earth from the very throne room of heaven, seated in the resurrected presence of our Bridegroom, where the joy always runs full and over. So our deepest heartaches will turn to deepest joys when we embrace them for the sake of Christ, to gain Him and be found in Him, to know Him in intimate detail through excruciatingly sweet experience. We will discover that the Lord entrusts the most luscious of blessings and the rarest of secrets to the most desperate and thirsty of souls, and that He delights to place the loveliest of wings on the lowliest of worms.

The gifts of myrrh's sorrow which the Father pours into the vessels of our lives are poured first into the hands of His own Son and flow through His nail-pierced scars before they ever touch us. And as we choose to graciously receive them as such, we are filled up with Him and enabled to pour Him out into the lives of others, even those who continually scorn and despise us.

The gift (yes, gift) of rejection is the high privilege of being asked by our Commander to become His flag bearer, receiving the esteemed honor of marching beside Him at the center of the front line, into the heat of the battle and into the face of the "enemy" (the rejecter), armed with no gun and carrying only His banner of love over our head for all to see. It's a sacred invitation into a certain death for the sake of knowing His love more intimately and for the service of displaying it more gloriously.

And if tempted to refuse the privilege, let us remember these two things: this life is so much more freely, joyfully lived when we have finally learned to count ourselves dead to it and alive to Christ, and the flow of His agape love through us will only be as strong as what it costs us to demonstrate it. The greater the cost, the purer the love; the purer the love, the more we are made like Him; the more we are made like Him, the more attuned we will be to His own heart's breaking and to our own breaking of it.

Oh, that we might be purged of ever thinking again that our neglecting of His love does not matter to Him! May He cause our hearts to break and break until we see how much it does! May we know the world's rejection again and again until we are finally scoured clean of our own despicable tendency to reject Him in favor of all our worldly playthings! No lover has ever endured more rejection than our Lover at our own hands and by our own hearts. And no lover continues to love through rejection with the determination and desire, suffering and sacrifice, tenderness and tenacity of our own Bridegroom. Can we not endure whatever He has called us to suffer for Him? Can we not allow it to drive us more fervently to His heart?... Lord, capture us by Your mighty hand and consume us by Your mighty flame, and may we pant and pine only for You, for Your love sets us free to dance in the midst of the fire!

How humbling, mystifying and worship-evoking it is to realize that the One we have so grievously rejected is the same One Who so perfectly understands and longs to comfort our own heart's grief when we are rejected. And to not run to Him now for that fellowship of healing would be to reject Him all over again and to break His heart once more. What could hurt Him more than our stubborn resistance to share in both His sufferings and His comfort when there is so much joy and intimacy waiting to be had with Him? Whatever ache our own heart knows, however deep and scathing, it cannot compare to the ache of His own heart when we let anything pull us away from Him, for He is rightly EVERYTHING to us—Father, Husband, Lover, Best Friend, Brother, Confidante, Kindred Spirit, Counselor, Nurturer, Rescuer, Healer, Hero... Behind the pain of every rejection is a legitimate need or desire that He is waiting to fill in us, and we have to let Him get to it by dying to our fleshly ones.

Or do we suppose that we might ever find true and lasting joy apart from dying to ourselves and abiding in Him when He died so that we might fully live in the joy of that abiding? No, true joy will only follow abiding; abiding and dying walk hand in hand, and rejection throws open the door for all three. Man's rejection is central to God's wooing, for it shatters our false expectations of human love and stirs in our hearts the longing for a perfect one. So let us not shrink back fearfully from that which can do us such good and teach us to love as Christ has loved us. With renewed passion, let us ask Him to wrap every affection of our hearts more tightly around Him that every desire might be united with His own and that we might learn to love in a way that sets our lives and the world around us ablaze!

To be despised and rejected and, still, to love—that is the ultimate triumph of Christ in our hearts, for we are never more like Him, never more full of Him, never more surrendered to His heart and His work than when He pours out His love through us to those who will not love us back. When we can stand in the face of bitter, cutting words, contemptuous looks and shaming mockery and still love fiercely but with a gentle and quiet spirit, we will know without doubt that it is His Spirit moving gloriously through us... Lord Jesus, Who so willingly floods our hearts with Your most precious gift, Yourself (and You are Love!), teach us to ever know You more and to rely fully on the love You have for us and ARE for us in infinite supply. Teach us to feast on the abundance of that love, and let it flow freely out of us to the ones who would reject, scorn, mock and hate us, so that they too might one day taste and be consumed by Your perfect love which drives out all fear—Your infinite, immeasurable love which heals all wounds and fills all emptiness and gives meaning to all of our pain. You alone, O LORD, are able to truly and purely love through rejection, but You live gloriously in us, so unleash Your mighty waters through us. Your love is everything, for You are Everything!...

Our all-sufficient Bridegroom is able to work His agape love most perfectly in us when that love poured out to another is not ever reciprocated, for it forces us to finally let Him fill us with Himself alone and to rely completely on His love instead of on the love of another to meet our heart's deepest hunger. The need for His filling IS our deepest hunger, and so our soul comes most alive not when it is loved by our fellow man but when it receives and pours out Jesus' love to our fellow man, expecting nothing in return but more of Him. Thus His love is made complete in us whether they ever love us back or not, and the fear of their rejection is eventually driven out by His perfect and perfecting love.

Even if love is never returned...never even received...it is never in vain, for "love never fails." To love someone, though we mean nothing to them, may seem too cruel a burden for the heart to bear, but the only thing worse than not being loved is to not love, and so the greatest tragedy of love spurned or lost would be to stop loving. For to cease loving that which causes us pain would be to let the pain win, but for as long as we love, really love with Christ's own heart, no matter what else happens, we win.

Love without pain remains unproven and, therefore, is meaningless, but love through pain invokes nothing less than the miraculous and inspires even the incredulous. The purer one's love, the more pain it causes when it is rejected, but only continued love can redeem the pain of loving, and only a perfect Love can heal love's scalding wound; the more scalding the wound, the better primed it is to receive that perfect Love fully into it.

There is great romance to be found in unrequited love that keeps loving, though it is beyond any human emotion or fleshly capacity or mortal understanding. It is a most sacred mystery which cannot be grasped with the head or even the heart but only with the spirit, for it is a love whose connection to Christ remains unsevered. There is perhaps no intimacy to compare to it, for it drives us to Him like nothing else will. It is a love whose longing for the other gives us the greatest insight into God's own aching longing for us. Only when it has cost us everything to keep loving do we begin to understand the smallest fraction of the wildly extravagant love Christ has for us or of the brutally scandalous pain which it has cost Him, and it will leave us in utter awe of Him and in love with Him like we have never been before.

As our focus is turned more and more toward His love for us and toward all of our previous rejecting of it, we will come to clearly see that agape love and rejection have everything to do with the the hearts of the lover and the rejecter and nothing to do with what the beloved and the rejected have done or deserve. For obviously we have done nothing to deserve God's love and He has nothing to deserve our rejection, yet He never stops loving us and we keep rejecting Him in ways we can't even comprehend. No one has ever known more rejection than the only One Who is completely worthy of love. Every time we sin we reject Him in favor of something else, but still He loves us without fail and without end. He loves us because He is love and because He has chosen to set His love on us. We are absolutely and irrevocably loved and accepted in Christ Jesus, and nothing and no one can ever change or mar that love. Our identity is completely secure in Him simply because of Who He is and who He says we are to Him.

Therefore no amount nor depth of rejection by anyone changes anything about who we are in Christ or our worth to Him. We do not need any man's love or acceptance to validate our worth, for it has already been established in the heavenly realms by the only One Whose verdict carries any real and lasting weight. We are significant and precious and holy to God regardless of what anyone else thinks of us or says of us or does to us. What has their rejection got to do with us? Nothing, for we are His! We are chosen and we are beloved! And so we are freed from the fear of rejection when we see that it cannot define us or taint us in the sight of the only One Whose opinion or judgment matters. It's a glorious thing to finally care what no man thinks of us, only the Master, for then we begin to be free to love all men as He loves them and to pray with deepest sincerity, humility and fervor even for those who spitefully reject us.

And even for that one who has hurt us most deeply, who has crushed our heart and thrown us to the wind like chaff without so much as a glance back, we will pray, no longer with only a slight and distant hope that he would return to us but now with a passionate desire to see the prodigal return to the heart of the Father. We will pray, not with a focus on life with him but with a focus on life for him. We will pray for a total and glorious restoration of his life to Christ, even if we will never be there beside him to share in the fellowship and joy of his homecoming, even if we will never get to experience up close in this life the thrill of seeing the Lord make something beautiful yet of his ashes. And this may be the hardest and truest test of our love for him—this painful sacrifice of desiring his absolute best apart from us. It is a wrenching blow to our pride and to our will (not to mention our codependence), for we had so longed to play the Muse and to awaken that beauty in him. So we know we could never yearn or pray for this out of our own strength or wisdom; it is simply too painful to our flesh. We must be led into it and through every delicate step of it by our loving Redeemer, our Bridegroom, as if He were leading us out under a canopy of the starry host and into the most intricate and intimate of moonlit dances. And so we begin to pray and to dance...

But even wrapped in Jesus' arms we are clumsy, stumbling miserably over our own feet. The music is perplexingly unfamiliar and the steps wildly unpredictable, and our toes feel terribly pinched in these new shoes. Maybe this dance is just too hard for us. Maybe we are not yet ready. Maybe we should sit it out for now and try again later when our shoes are a little more broken in or when our heart is a little less broken apart. So we pull away...

But He tenderly beckons us back: Dear and beloved bride, broken-but-beautiful one whom I have made My own, do not push Me away now, not after I have brought you so far. I have many more secrets to share with you and so much more to show you of Myself. But you are not letting Me lead this dance, beloved. Why are you so rigid in My embrace? Why so worried over the next steps? Let go of everything and abandon yourself to My love. Enjoy Me...Follow Me...Lean into Me...Keep watching My face...Let Me move you however I desire us to go...Trust Me...Love Me. Shall we dance, then?

Yes, we shall and we do! As He draws us into Himself, into the prayer of His heart and the dance of His Spirit, and as we give ourself over completely to the impulse of His leading, the details of our words and the precision of our steps give way to the desire and passion of His will, and the pulsating of our heart swirls to the rhythm of His own. The further He pulls us into union with Himself, the more we find ourselves desiring this same intimacy-with-Him for the very one who has so badly hurt us, for we see how badly he himself is hurting without it. We realize now that his running away from us and toward another is just as much a reflection of his insatiable yet misunderstood craving for God as was all of our running toward our own idols (including him). Our soul aches for his redemption and his healing and for his lost sheep's heart to be brought out of darkness and into the marvelous light that shines from Jesus' face, that he might truly know the pleasure of knowing the One Whose pleasure he was created for.

Somehow, through this heightened and mysterious intimacy of prayer for him, we are now discovering a strange and new kind of intimacy with this very one whose intimacy had so often given us the slip, this one whom we had so long loved and lived with but failed to uncover at all, and the fresh wind of it drives us even deeper into the ache of God's own heart for him and for us. It is at the center of that ache that we are finally able to let go of the hurt and the man and leave the matter entirely in God's hands, understanding that the Shepherd's aching heart knows fully all whom He has chosen and will never stop dealing with or seeking after any of His own sheep. And so...


                        We release to Him with a heart of trust
                        This one whom we love and always must
                        We can let go the man and rest because
                        It's out of our hands and always was



But the dance, like the feast, goes on and on, and the more we dance and the more we feast, the more we heal. Our Bridegroom wounds us by His own providence but washes our wounds with His faithfulness and binds them up with His love. The wounds and their healing make us beautiful to Him. They teach us to know Him, to hunger for Him, to enjoy Him and to please Him. And they get us perfectly ready for that most glorious of dances and that most joyous of feasts which are still to come but, perhaps, much closer than we might dare to imagine. It is time to awaken, dear bride of Christ, and to break in our dancing shoes!
~~~


"And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus. There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. We love because He first loved us."
~ 1 John 4:16-19

"And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us."
~ Romans 5:2b-5

"As you come to Him, the living Stone—rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to Him— you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ."
~ 1 Peter 2:4-5

"He was despised and rejected by mankind,
    a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.
Like one from whom people hide their faces
    He was despised, and we held Him in low esteem.
Surely He took up our pain
    and bore our suffering,
yet we considered him punished by God,
    stricken by Him, and afflicted.
But He was pierced for our transgressions,
    He was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on Him,
    and by His wounds we are healed."
~ Isaiah 53:3-5

"But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things... I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in His sufferings, becoming like Him in His death..."
~ Philippians 3:7-8a,10

"But He said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."
~ 2 Corinthians 12:9-10

"For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ."
~ 2 Corinthians 1:5

"'Blessed are you who hunger now,
    for you will be satisfied.
Blessed are you who weep now,
    for you will laugh.
Blessed are you when people hate you,
    when they exclude you and insult you
    and reject your name as evil,
        because of the Son of Man.
Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, because great is your reward in heaven. For that is how their ancestors treated the prophets...But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you...Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.'"
~ Luke 6:21-23,27-28,36

"Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always strive to do what is good for each other and for everyone else. Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus."
~ 1 Thessalonians 5:15-18

"You make known to me the path of life;
    You will fill me with joy in Your presence,
    with eternal pleasures at Your right hand."
~ Psalm 16:11

"I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen."
~ Ephesians 3:16-21

~~~
It is full winter now:  the trees are bare,
Save where the cattle huddle from the cold
Beneath the pine, for it doth never wear
The autumn’s gaudy livery whose gold
Her jealous brother pilfers, but is true
To the green doublet; bitter is the wind, as though it blew

From Saturn’s cave; a few thin wisps of hay
Lie on the sharp black hedges, where the wain
Dragged the sweet pillage of a summer’s day
From the low meadows up the narrow lane;
Upon the half-thawed snow the bleating sheep
Press close against the hurdles, and the shivering house-dogs creep

From the shut stable to the frozen stream
And back again disconsolate, and miss
The bawling shepherds and the noisy team;
And overhead in circling listlessness
The cawing rooks whirl round the frosted stack,
Or crowd the dripping boughs; and in the fen the ice-pools crack

Where the gaunt bittern stalks among the reeds
And ***** his wings, and stretches back his neck,
And hoots to see the moon; across the meads
Limps the poor frightened hare, a little speck;
And a stray seamew with its fretful cry
Flits like a sudden drift of snow against the dull grey sky.

Full winter:  and the ***** goodman brings
His load of ******* from the chilly byre,
And stamps his feet upon the hearth, and flings
The sappy billets on the waning fire,
And laughs to see the sudden lightening scare
His children at their play, and yet,—the spring is in the air;

Already the slim crocus stirs the snow,
And soon yon blanched fields will bloom again
With nodding cowslips for some lad to mow,
For with the first warm kisses of the rain
The winter’s icy sorrow breaks to tears,
And the brown thrushes mate, and with bright eyes the rabbit peers

From the dark warren where the fir-cones lie,
And treads one snowdrop under foot, and runs
Over the mossy knoll, and blackbirds fly
Across our path at evening, and the suns
Stay longer with us; ah! how good to see
Grass-girdled spring in all her joy of laughing greenery

Dance through the hedges till the early rose,
(That sweet repentance of the thorny briar!)
Burst from its sheathed emerald and disclose
The little quivering disk of golden fire
Which the bees know so well, for with it come
Pale boy’s-love, sops-in-wine, and daffadillies all in bloom.

Then up and down the field the sower goes,
While close behind the laughing younker scares
With shrilly whoop the black and thievish crows,
And then the chestnut-tree its glory wears,
And on the grass the creamy blossom falls
In odorous excess, and faint half-whispered madrigals

Steal from the bluebells’ nodding carillons
Each breezy morn, and then white jessamine,
That star of its own heaven, snap-dragons
With lolling crimson tongues, and eglantine
In dusty velvets clad usurp the bed
And woodland empery, and when the lingering rose hath shed

Red leaf by leaf its folded panoply,
And pansies closed their purple-lidded eyes,
Chrysanthemums from gilded argosy
Unload their gaudy scentless merchandise,
And violets getting overbold withdraw
From their shy nooks, and scarlet berries dot the leafless haw.

O happy field! and O thrice happy tree!
Soon will your queen in daisy-flowered smock
And crown of flower-de-luce trip down the lea,
Soon will the lazy shepherds drive their flock
Back to the pasture by the pool, and soon
Through the green leaves will float the hum of murmuring bees at noon.

Soon will the glade be bright with bellamour,
The flower which wantons love, and those sweet nuns
Vale-lilies in their snowy vestiture
Will tell their beaded pearls, and carnations
With mitred dusky leaves will scent the wind,
And straggling traveller’s-joy each hedge with yellow stars will bind.

Dear bride of Nature and most bounteous spring,
That canst give increase to the sweet-breath’d kine,
And to the kid its little horns, and bring
The soft and silky blossoms to the vine,
Where is that old nepenthe which of yore
Man got from poppy root and glossy-berried mandragore!

There was a time when any common bird
Could make me sing in unison, a time
When all the strings of boyish life were stirred
To quick response or more melodious rhyme
By every forest idyll;—do I change?
Or rather doth some evil thing through thy fair pleasaunce range?

Nay, nay, thou art the same:  ’tis I who seek
To vex with sighs thy simple solitude,
And because fruitless tears bedew my cheek
Would have thee weep with me in brotherhood;
Fool! shall each wronged and restless spirit dare
To taint such wine with the salt poison of own despair!

Thou art the same:  ’tis I whose wretched soul
Takes discontent to be its paramour,
And gives its kingdom to the rude control
Of what should be its servitor,—for sure
Wisdom is somewhere, though the stormy sea
Contain it not, and the huge deep answer ‘’Tis not in me.’

To burn with one clear flame, to stand *****
In natural honour, not to bend the knee
In profitless prostrations whose effect
Is by itself condemned, what alchemy
Can teach me this? what herb Medea brewed
Will bring the unexultant peace of essence not subdued?

The minor chord which ends the harmony,
And for its answering brother waits in vain
Sobbing for incompleted melody,
Dies a swan’s death; but I the heir of pain,
A silent Memnon with blank lidless eyes,
Wait for the light and music of those suns which never rise.

The quenched-out torch, the lonely cypress-gloom,
The little dust stored in the narrow urn,
The gentle XAIPE of the Attic tomb,—
Were not these better far than to return
To my old fitful restless malady,
Or spend my days within the voiceless cave of misery?

Nay! for perchance that poppy-crowned god
Is like the watcher by a sick man’s bed
Who talks of sleep but gives it not; his rod
Hath lost its virtue, and, when all is said,
Death is too rude, too obvious a key
To solve one single secret in a life’s philosophy.

And Love! that noble madness, whose august
And inextinguishable might can slay
The soul with honeyed drugs,—alas! I must
From such sweet ruin play the runaway,
Although too constant memory never can
Forget the arched splendour of those brows Olympian

Which for a little season made my youth
So soft a swoon of exquisite indolence
That all the chiding of more prudent Truth
Seemed the thin voice of jealousy,—O hence
Thou huntress deadlier than Artemis!
Go seek some other quarry! for of thy too perilous bliss.

My lips have drunk enough,—no more, no more,—
Though Love himself should turn his gilded prow
Back to the troubled waters of this shore
Where I am wrecked and stranded, even now
The chariot wheels of passion sweep too near,
Hence!  Hence!  I pass unto a life more barren, more austere.

More barren—ay, those arms will never lean
Down through the trellised vines and draw my soul
In sweet reluctance through the tangled green;
Some other head must wear that aureole,
For I am hers who loves not any man
Whose white and stainless ***** bears the sign Gorgonian.

Let Venus go and chuck her dainty page,
And kiss his mouth, and toss his curly hair,
With net and spear and hunting equipage
Let young Adonis to his tryst repair,
But me her fond and subtle-fashioned spell
Delights no more, though I could win her dearest citadel.

Ay, though I were that laughing shepherd boy
Who from Mount Ida saw the little cloud
Pass over Tenedos and lofty Troy
And knew the coming of the Queen, and bowed
In wonder at her feet, not for the sake
Of a new Helen would I bid her hand the apple take.

Then rise supreme Athena argent-limbed!
And, if my lips be musicless, inspire
At least my life:  was not thy glory hymned
By One who gave to thee his sword and lyre
Like AEschylos at well-fought Marathon,
And died to show that Milton’s England still could bear a son!

And yet I cannot tread the Portico
And live without desire, fear and pain,
Or nurture that wise calm which long ago
The grave Athenian master taught to men,
Self-poised, self-centred, and self-comforted,
To watch the world’s vain phantasies go by with unbowed head.

Alas! that serene brow, those eloquent lips,
Those eyes that mirrored all eternity,
Rest in their own Colonos, an eclipse
Hath come on Wisdom, and Mnemosyne
Is childless; in the night which she had made
For lofty secure flight Athena’s owl itself hath strayed.

Nor much with Science do I care to climb,
Although by strange and subtle witchery
She drew the moon from heaven:  the Muse Time
Unrolls her gorgeous-coloured tapestry
To no less eager eyes; often indeed
In the great epic of Polymnia’s scroll I love to read

How Asia sent her myriad hosts to war
Against a little town, and panoplied
In gilded mail with jewelled scimitar,
White-shielded, purple-crested, rode the Mede
Between the waving poplars and the sea
Which men call Artemisium, till he saw Thermopylae

Its steep ravine spanned by a narrow wall,
And on the nearer side a little brood
Of careless lions holding festival!
And stood amazed at such hardihood,
And pitched his tent upon the reedy shore,
And stayed two days to wonder, and then crept at midnight o’er

Some unfrequented height, and coming down
The autumn forests treacherously slew
What Sparta held most dear and was the crown
Of far Eurotas, and passed on, nor knew
How God had staked an evil net for him
In the small bay at Salamis,—and yet, the page grows dim,

Its cadenced Greek delights me not, I feel
With such a goodly time too out of tune
To love it much:  for like the Dial’s wheel
That from its blinded darkness strikes the noon
Yet never sees the sun, so do my eyes
Restlessly follow that which from my cheated vision flies.

O for one grand unselfish simple life
To teach us what is Wisdom! speak ye hills
Of lone Helvellyn, for this note of strife
Shunned your untroubled crags and crystal rills,
Where is that Spirit which living blamelessly
Yet dared to kiss the smitten mouth of his own century!

Speak ye Rydalian laurels! where is he
Whose gentle head ye sheltered, that pure soul
Whose gracious days of uncrowned majesty
Through lowliest conduct touched the lofty goal
Where love and duty mingle!  Him at least
The most high Laws were glad of, he had sat at Wisdom’s feast;

But we are Learning’s changelings, know by rote
The clarion watchword of each Grecian school
And follow none, the flawless sword which smote
The pagan Hydra is an effete tool
Which we ourselves have blunted, what man now
Shall scale the august ancient heights and to old Reverence bow?

One such indeed I saw, but, Ichabod!
Gone is that last dear son of Italy,
Who being man died for the sake of God,
And whose unrisen bones sleep peacefully,
O guard him, guard him well, my Giotto’s tower,
Thou marble lily of the lily town! let not the lour

Of the rude tempest vex his slumber, or
The Arno with its tawny troubled gold
O’er-leap its marge, no mightier conqueror
Clomb the high Capitol in the days of old
When Rome was indeed Rome, for Liberty
Walked like a bride beside him, at which sight pale Mystery

Fled shrieking to her farthest sombrest cell
With an old man who grabbled rusty keys,
Fled shuddering, for that immemorial knell
With which oblivion buries dynasties
Swept like a wounded eagle on the blast,
As to the holy heart of Rome the great triumvir passed.

He knew the holiest heart and heights of Rome,
He drave the base wolf from the lion’s lair,
And now lies dead by that empyreal dome
Which overtops Valdarno hung in air
By Brunelleschi—O Melpomene
Breathe through thy melancholy pipe thy sweetest threnody!

Breathe through the tragic stops such melodies
That Joy’s self may grow jealous, and the Nine
Forget awhile their discreet emperies,
Mourning for him who on Rome’s lordliest shrine
Lit for men’s lives the light of Marathon,
And bare to sun-forgotten fields the fire of the sun!

O guard him, guard him well, my Giotto’s tower!
Let some young Florentine each eventide
Bring coronals of that enchanted flower
Which the dim woods of Vallombrosa hide,
And deck the marble tomb wherein he lies
Whose soul is as some mighty orb unseen of mortal eyes;

Some mighty orb whose cycled wanderings,
Being tempest-driven to the farthest rim
Where Chaos meets Creation and the wings
Of the eternal chanting Cherubim
Are pavilioned on Nothing, passed away
Into a moonless void,—and yet, though he is dust and clay,

He is not dead, the immemorial Fates
Forbid it, and the closing shears refrain.
Lift up your heads ye everlasting gates!
Ye argent clarions, sound a loftier strain
For the vile thing he hated lurks within
Its sombre house, alone with God and memories of sin.

Still what avails it that she sought her cave
That murderous mother of red harlotries?
At Munich on the marble architrave
The Grecian boys die smiling, but the seas
Which wash AEgina fret in loneliness
Not mirroring their beauty; so our lives grow colourless

For lack of our ideals, if one star
Flame torch-like in the heavens the unjust
Swift daylight kills it, and no trump of war
Can wake to passionate voice the silent dust
Which was Mazzini once! rich Niobe
For all her stony sorrows hath her sons; but Italy,

What Easter Day shall make her children rise,
Who were not Gods yet suffered? what sure feet
Shall find their grave-clothes folded? what clear eyes
Shall see them ******?  O it were meet
To roll the stone from off the sepulchre
And kiss the bleeding roses of their wounds, in love of her,

Our Italy! our mother visible!
Most blessed among nations and most sad,
For whose dear sake the young Calabrian fell
That day at Aspromonte and was glad
That in an age when God was bought and sold
One man could die for Liberty! but we, burnt out and cold,

See Honour smitten on the cheek and gyves
Bind the sweet feet of Mercy:  Poverty
Creeps through our sunless lanes and with sharp knives
Cuts the warm throats of children stealthily,
And no word said:- O we are wretched men
Unworthy of our great inheritance! where is the pen

Of austere Milton? where the mighty sword
Which slew its master righteously? the years
Have lost their ancient leader, and no word
Breaks from the voiceless tripod on our ears:
While as a ruined mother in some spasm
Bears a base child and loathes it, so our best enthusiasm

Genders unlawful children, Anarchy
Freedom’s own Judas, the vile prodigal
Licence who steals the gold of Liberty
And yet has nothing, Ignorance the real
One Fraticide since Cain, Envy the asp
That stings itself to anguish, Avarice whose palsied grasp

Is in its extent stiffened, moneyed Greed
For whose dull appetite men waste away
Amid the whirr of wheels and are the seed
Of things which slay their sower, these each day
Sees rife in England, and the gentle feet
Of Beauty tread no more the stones of each unlovely street.

What even Cromwell spared is desecrated
By **** and worm, left to the stormy play
Of wind and beating snow, or renovated
By more destructful hands:  Time’s worst decay
Will wreathe its ruins with some loveliness,
But these new Vandals can but make a rain-proof barrenness.

Where is that Art which bade the Angels sing
Through Lincoln’s lofty choir, till the air
Seems from such marble harmonies to ring
With sweeter song than common lips can dare
To draw from actual reed? ah! where is now
The cunning hand which made the flowering hawthorn branches bow

For Southwell’s arch, and carved the House of One
Who loved the lilies of the field with all
Our dearest English flowers? the same sun
Rises for us:  the seasons natural
Weave the same tapestry of green and grey:
The unchanged hills are with us:  but that Spirit hath passed away.

And yet perchance it may be better so,
For Tyranny is an incestuous Queen,
****** her brother is her bedfellow,
And the Plague chambers with her:  in obscene
And ****** paths her treacherous feet are set;
Better the empty desert and a soul inviolate!

For gentle brotherhood, the harmony
Of living in the healthful air, the swift
Clean beauty of strong limbs when men are free
And women chaste, these are the things which lift
Our souls up more than even Agnolo’s
Gaunt blinded Sibyl poring o’er the scroll of human woes,

Or Titian’s little maiden on the stair
White as her own sweet lily and as tall,
Or Mona Lisa smiling through her hair,—
Ah! somehow life is bigger after all
Than any painted angel, could we see
The God that is within us!  The old Greek serenity

Which curbs the passion of that
Alyssa Underwood Jul 2016
Jesus entrusts
the most luscious of
blessings and the rarest of
secrets to the most desperate and
thirsty of souls, for He delights to place
the loveliest of wings on the lowliest of worms
"You make known to me the path of life;
    You will fill me with joy in Your presence,
    with eternal pleasures at Your right hand."
~ Psalm 16:11

"'Blessed are the poor in spirit,
   for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."'
~ Matthew 5:3

~~~
Undoubtedly he will relent, and turn
From his displeasure; in whose look serene,
When angry most he seemed and most severe,
What else but favour, grace, and mercy, shone?
So spake our father penitent; nor Eve
Felt less remorse: they, forthwith to the place
Repairing where he judged them, prostrate fell
Before him reverent; and both confessed
Humbly their faults, and pardon begged; with tears
Watering the ground, and with their sighs the air
Frequenting, sent from hearts contrite, in sign
Of sorrow unfeigned, and humiliation meek.
Thus they, in lowliest plight, repentant stood
Praying; for from the mercy-seat above
Prevenient grace descending had removed
The stony from their hearts, and made new flesh
Regenerate grow instead; that sighs now breathed
Unutterable; which the Spirit of prayer
Inspired, and winged for Heaven with speedier flight
Than loudest oratory:  Yet their port
Not of mean suitors; nor important less
Seemed their petition, than when the ancient pair
In fables old, less ancient yet than these,
Deucalion and chaste Pyrrha, to restore
The race of mankind drowned, before the shrine
Of Themis stood devout.  To Heaven their prayers
Flew up, nor missed the way, by envious winds
Blown vagabond or frustrate: in they passed
Dimensionless through heavenly doors; then clad
With incense, where the golden altar fumed,
By their great intercessour, came in sight
Before the Father’s throne: them the glad Son
Presenting, thus to intercede began.
See$ Father, what first-fruits on earth are sprung
From thy implanted grace in Man; these sighs
And prayers, which in this golden censer mixed
With incense, I thy priest before thee bring;
Fruits of more pleasing savour, from thy seed
Sown with contrition in his heart, than those
Which, his own hand manuring, all the trees
Of Paradise could have produced, ere fallen
From innocence.  Now therefore, bend thine ear
To supplication; hear his sighs, though mute;
Unskilful with what words to pray, let me
Interpret for him; me, his advocate
And propitiation; all his works on me,
Good, or not good, ingraft; my merit those
Shall perfect, and for these my death shall pay.
Accept me; and, in me, from these receive
The smell of peace toward mankind: let him live
Before thee reconciled, at least his days
Numbered, though sad; till death, his doom, (which I
To mitigate thus plead, not to reverse,)
To better life shall yield him: where with me
All my redeemed may dwell in joy and bliss;
Made one with me, as I with thee am one.
To whom the Father, without cloud, serene.
All thy request for Man, accepted Son,
Obtain; all thy request was my decree:
But, longer in that Paradise to dwell,
The law I gave to Nature him forbids:
Those pure immortal elements, that know,
No gross, no unharmonious mixture foul,
Eject him, tainted now; and purge him off,
As a distemper, gross, to air as gross,
And mortal food; as may dispose him best
For dissolution wrought by sin, that first
Distempered all things, and of incorrupt
Corrupted.  I, at first, with two fair gifts
Created him endowed; with happiness,
And immortality: that fondly lost,
This other served but to eternize woe;
Till I provided death: so death becomes
His final remedy; and, after life,
Tried in sharp tribulation, and refined
By faith and faithful works, to second life,
Waked in the renovation of the just,
Resigns him up with Heaven and Earth renewed.
But let us call to synod all the Blest,
Through Heaven’s wide bounds: from them I will not hide
My judgements; how with mankind I proceed,
As how with peccant Angels late they saw,
And in their state, though firm, stood more confirmed.
He ended, and the Son gave signal high
To the bright minister that watched; he blew
His trumpet, heard in Oreb since perhaps
When God descended, and perhaps once more
To sound at general doom.  The angelick blast
Filled all the regions: from their blisful bowers
Of amarantine shade, fountain or spring,
By the waters of life, where’er they sat
In fellowships of joy, the sons of light
Hasted, resorting to the summons high;
And took their seats; till from his throne supreme
The Almighty thus pronounced his sovran will.
O Sons, like one of us Man is become
To know both good and evil, since his taste
Of that defended fruit; but let him boast
His knowledge of good lost, and evil got;
Happier! had it sufficed him to have known
Good by itself, and evil not at all.
He sorrows now, repents, and prays contrite,
My motions in him; longer than they move,
His heart I know, how variable and vain,
Self-left.  Lest therefore his now bolder hand
Reach also of the tree of life, and eat,
And live for ever, dream at least to live
For ever, to remove him I decree,
And send him from the garden forth to till
The ground whence he was taken, fitter soil.
Michael, this my behest have thou in charge;
Take to thee from among the Cherubim
Thy choice of flaming warriours, lest the Fiend,
Or in behalf of Man, or to invade
Vacant possession, some new trouble raise:
Haste thee, and from the Paradise of God
Without remorse drive out the sinful pair;
From hallowed ground the unholy; and denounce
To them, and to their progeny, from thence
Perpetual banishment.  Yet, lest they faint
At the sad sentence rigorously urged,
(For I behold them softened, and with tears
Bewailing their excess,) all terrour hide.
If patiently thy bidding they obey,
Dismiss them not disconsolate; reveal
To Adam what shall come in future days,
As I shall thee enlighten; intermix
My covenant in the Woman’s seed renewed;
So send them forth, though sorrowing, yet in peace:
And on the east side of the garden place,
Where entrance up from Eden easiest climbs,
Cherubick watch; and of a sword the flame
Wide-waving; all approach far off to fright,
And guard all passage to the tree of life:
Lest Paradise a receptacle prove
To Spirits foul, and all my trees their prey;
With whose stolen fruit Man once more to delude.
He ceased; and the arch-angelick Power prepared
For swift descent; with him the cohort bright
Of watchful Cherubim: four faces each
Had, like a double Janus; all their shape
Spangled with eyes more numerous than those
Of Argus, and more wakeful than to drouse,
Charmed with Arcadian pipe, the pastoral reed
Of Hermes, or his ****** rod.  Mean while,
To re-salute the world with sacred light,
Leucothea waked; and with fresh dews imbalmed
The earth; when Adam and first matron Eve
Had ended now their orisons, and found
Strength added from above; new hope to spring
Out of despair; joy, but with fear yet linked;
Which thus to Eve his welcome words renewed.
Eve, easily my faith admit, that all
The good which we enjoy from Heaven descends;
But, that from us aught should ascend to Heaven
So prevalent as to concern the mind
Of God high-blest, or to incline his will,
Hard to belief may seem; yet this will prayer
Or one short sigh of human breath, upborne
Even to the seat of God.  For since I sought
By prayer the offended Deity to appease;
Kneeled, and before him humbled all my heart;
Methought I saw him placable and mild,
Bending his ear; persuasion in me grew
That I was heard with favour; peace returned
Home to my breast, and to my memory
His promise, that thy seed shall bruise our foe;
Which, then not minded in dismay, yet now
Assures me that the bitterness of death
Is past, and we shall live.  Whence hail to thee,
Eve rightly called, mother of all mankind,
Mother of all things living, since by thee
Man is to live; and all things live for Man.
To whom thus Eve with sad demeanour meek.
Ill-worthy I such title should belong
To me transgressour; who, for thee ordained
A help, became thy snare; to me reproach
Rather belongs, distrust, and all dispraise:
But infinite in pardon was my Judge,
That I, who first brought death on all, am graced
The source of life; next favourable thou,
Who highly thus to entitle me vouchsaf’st,
Far other name deserving.  But the field
To labour calls us, now with sweat imposed,
Though after sleepless night; for see!the morn,
All unconcerned with our unrest, begins
Her rosy progress smiling: let us forth;
I never from thy side henceforth to stray,
Where’er our day’s work lies, though now enjoined
Laborious, till day droop; while here we dwell,
What can be toilsome in these pleasant walks?
Here let us live, though in fallen state, content.
So spake, so wished much humbled Eve; but Fate
Subscribed not:  Nature first gave signs, impressed
On bird, beast, air; air suddenly eclipsed,
After short blush of morn; nigh in her sight
The bird of Jove, stooped from his aery tour,
Two birds of gayest plume before him drove;
Down from a hill the beast that reigns in woods,
First hunter then, pursued a gentle brace,
Goodliest of all the forest, hart and hind;
Direct to the eastern gate was bent their flight.
Adam observed, and with his eye the chase
Pursuing, not unmoved, to Eve thus spake.
O Eve, some further change awaits us nigh,
Which Heaven, by these mute signs in Nature, shows
Forerunners of his purpose; or to warn
Us, haply too secure, of our discharge
From penalty, because from death released
Some days: how long, and what till then our life,
Who knows? or more than this, that we are dust,
And thither must return, and be no more?
Why else this double object in our sight
Of flight pursued in the air, and o’er the ground,
One way the self-same hour? why in the east
Darkness ere day’s mid-course, and morning-light
More orient in yon western cloud, that draws
O’er the blue firmament a radiant white,
And slow descends with something heavenly fraught?
He erred not; for by this the heavenly bands
Down from a sky of jasper lighted now
In Paradise, and on a hill made halt;
A glorious apparition, had not doubt
And carnal fear that day dimmed Adam’s eye.
Not that more glorious, when the Angels met
Jacob in Mahanaim, where he saw
The field pavilioned with his guardians bright;
Nor that, which on the flaming mount appeared
In Dothan, covered with a camp of fire,
Against the Syrian king, who to surprise
One man, assassin-like, had levied war,
War unproclaimed.  The princely Hierarch
In their bright stand there left his Powers, to seise
Possession of the garden; he alone,
To find where Adam sheltered, took his way,
Not unperceived of Adam; who to Eve,
While the great visitant approached, thus spake.
Eve$ now expect great tidings, which perhaps
Of us will soon determine, or impose
New laws to be observed; for I descry,
From yonder blazing cloud that veils the hill,
One of the heavenly host; and, by his gait,
None of the meanest; some great Potentate
Or of the Thrones above; such majesty
Invests him coming! yet not terrible,
That I should fear; nor sociably mild,
As Raphael, that I should much confide;
But solemn and sublime; whom not to offend,
With reverence I must meet, and thou retire.
He ended: and the Arch-Angel soon drew nigh,
Not in his shape celestial, but as man
Clad to meet man; over his lucid arms
A military vest of purple flowed,
Livelier than Meliboean, or the grain
Of Sarra, worn by kings and heroes old
In time of truce; Iris had dipt the woof;
His starry helm unbuckled showed him prime
In manhood where youth ended; by his side,
As in a glistering zodiack, hung the sword,
Satan’s dire dread; and in his hand the spear.
Adam bowed low; he, kingly, from his state
Inclined not, but his coming thus declared.
Adam, Heaven’s high behest no preface needs:
Sufficient that thy prayers are heard; and Death,
Then due by sentence when thou didst transgress,
Defeated of his seisure many days
Given thee of grace; wherein thou mayest repent,
And one bad act with many deeds well done
Mayest cover:  Well may then thy Lord, appeased,
Redeem thee quite from Death’s rapacious claim;
But longer in this Paradise to dwell
Permits not: to remove thee I am come,
And send thee from the garden forth to till
The ground whence thou wast taken, fitter soil.
He added not; for Adam at the news
Heart-struck with chilling gripe of sorrow stood,
That all his senses bound; Eve, who unseen
Yet all had heard, with audible lament
Discovered soon the place of her retire.
O unexpected stroke, worse than of Death!
Must I thus leave thee$ Paradise? thus leave
Thee, native soil! these happy walks and shades,
Fit haunt of Gods? where I had hope to spend,
Quiet though sad, the respite of that day
That must be mortal to us both.  O flowers,
That never will in other climate grow,
My early visitation, and my last
;t even, which I bred up with tender hand
From the first opening bud, and gave ye names!
Who now shall rear ye to the sun, or rank
Your tribes, and water from the ambrosial fount?
Thee lastly, nuptial bower! by me adorned
With what to sight or smell was sweet! from thee
How shall I part, and whither wander down
Into a lower world; to this obscure
And wild? how shall we breathe in other air
Less pure, accustomed to immortal fruits?
Whom thus the Angel interrupted mild.
Lament not, Eve, but patiently resign
What justly thou hast lost, nor set thy heart,
Thus over-fond, on that which is not thine:
Thy going is not lonely; with thee goes
Thy husband; whom to follow thou art bound;
Where he abides, think there thy native soil.
Adam, by this from the cold sudden damp
Recovering, and his scattered spirits returned,
To Michael thus his humble words addressed.
Celestial, whether among the Thrones, or named
Of them the highest; for such of shape may seem
Prince above princes! gently hast thou told
Thy message, which might else in telling wound,
And in performing end us; what besides
Of sorrow, and dejection, and despair,
Our frailty can sustain, thy tidings bring,
Departure from this happy place, our sweet
Recess, and only consolation left
Familiar to our eyes! all places else
Inhospitable appear, and desolate;
Nor knowing us, nor known:  And, if by prayer
Incessant I could hope to change the will
Of Him who all things can, I would not cease
To weary him with my assiduous cries:
But prayer against his absolute decree
No more avails than breath against the wind,
Blown stifling back on him that breathes it forth:
Therefore to his great bidding I submit.
This most afflicts me, that, departing hence,
As from his face I shall be hid, deprived
His blessed countenance:  Here I could frequent
With worship place by place where he vouchsafed
Presence Divine; and to my sons relate,
‘On this mount he appeared; under this tree
‘Stood visible; among these pines his voice
‘I heard; here with him at this fountain talked:
So many grateful altars I would rear
Of grassy turf, and pile up every stone
Of lustre from the brook, in memory,
Or monument to ages; and theron
Offer sweet-smelling gums, and fruits, and flowers:
In yonder nether world where shall I seek
His bright appearances, or foot-step trace?
For though I fled him angry, yet recalled
To life prolonged and promised race, I now
Gladly behold though but his utmost skirts
Of glory; and far off his steps adore.
To whom thus Michael with regard benign.
Adam, thou knowest Heaven his, and all the Earth;
Not this rock only; his Omnipresence fills
Land, sea, and air, and every kind that lives,
Fomented by his virtual power and warmed:
All the earth he gave thee to possess and rule,
No despicable gift; surmise not then
His presence to these narrow bounds confined
Of Paradise, or Eden: this had been
Perhaps thy capital seat, from whence had spread
All generations; and had hither come
From all the ends of the earth, to celebrate
And reverence thee, their great progenitor.
But this pre-eminence thou hast lost, brought down
To dwell on even ground now with thy sons:
Yet doubt not but in valley, and in plain,
God is, as here; and will be found alike
Present; and of his presence many a sign
Still following thee, still compassing thee round
With goodness and paternal love, his face
Express, and of his steps the track divine.
Which that thou mayest believe, and be confirmed
Ere t
Michael R Burch Mar 2020
Come As You Are
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Come as you are, forget appearances!
Is your hair untamable, your part uneven, your bodice unfastened? Never mind.
Come as you are, forget appearances!

Skip with quicksilver steps across the grass.
If your feet glisten with dew, if your anklets slip, if your beaded necklace slides off? Never mind.
Skip with quicksilver steps across the grass.

Do you see the clouds enveloping the sky?
Flocks of cranes erupt from the riverbank, fitful gusts ruffle the fields, anxious cattle tremble in their stalls.
Do you see the clouds enveloping the sky?

You loiter in vain over your toilet lamp; it flickers and dies in the wind.
Who will care that your eyelids have not been painted with lamp-black, when your pupils are darker than thunderstorms?
You loiter in vain over your toilet lamp; it flickers and dies in the wind.

Come as you are, forget appearances!
If the wreath lies unwoven, who cares? If the bracelet is unfastened, let it fall. The sky grows dark; it is late.
Come as you are, forget appearances!

Keywords/Tags: Tagore, translation, Bengali, come, forget appearances, hair, bodice, feet, anklet, bracelet, beads, necklace, sky, clouds, cranes, cattle, toilet, lamp, wind, mascara, eyeshadow, mrburdu



These are modern English translations of poems by the great Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), who has been called the "Bard of Bengal" and "the Bengali Shelley." In 1913 Tagore became the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Tagore was also a notable artist, musician and polymath.



The Seashore Gathering
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

On the seashores of endless worlds, earth's children converge.
The infinite sky is motionless, the restless waters boisterous.
On the seashores of endless worlds earth's children gather to dance with joyous cries and pirouettes.
They build sand castles and play with hollow shells.
They weave boats out of withered leaves and laughingly float them out over the vast deep.
Earth's children play gaily on the seashores of endless worlds.
They do not know, yet, how to cast nets or swim.
Divers fish for pearls and merchants sail their ships, while earth's children skip, gather pebbles and scatter them again.
They are unaware of hidden treasures, nor do they know how to cast nets, yet.
The sea surges with laughter, smiling palely on the seashore.
Death-dealing waves sing the children meaningless songs, like a mother lullabying her baby's cradle.
The sea plays with the children, smiling palely on the seashore.
On the seashores of endless worlds earth's children meet.
Tempests roam pathless skies, ships lie wrecked in uncharted waters, death wanders abroad, and still the children play.
On the seashores of endless worlds there is a great gathering of earth's children.



Unfit Gifts
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

At sunrise, I cast my nets into the sea,
dredging up the strangest and most beautiful objects from the depths ...
some radiant like smiles, some glittering like tears, others flushed like brides’ cheeks.
When I returned, staggering under their weight, my love was relaxing in her garden, idly tearing leaves from flowers.
Hesitant, I placed all I had produced at her feet, silently awaiting her verdict.
She glanced down disdainfully, then pouted: "What are these bizarre things? I have no use for them!"
I bowed my head, humiliated, and thought:
"Truly, I did not contend for them; I did not purchase them in the marketplace; they are unfit gifts for her!"
That night I flung them, one by one, into the street, like refuse.
The next morning travelers came, picked them up and carted them off to exotic countries.



This Dog
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

Each morning this dog,
who has become quite attached to me,
sits silently at my feet
until, gently caressing his head,
I acknowledge his company.

This simple recognition gives my companion such joy
he shudders with sheer delight.

Among all languageless creatures
he alone has seen through man entire—
has seen beyond what is good or bad in him
to such a depth he can lay down his life
for the sake of love alone.

Now it is he who shows me the way
through this unfathomable world throbbing with life.

When I see his deep devotion,
his offer of his whole being,
I fail to comprehend ...

How, through sheer instinct,
has he discovered whatever it is that he knows?

With his anxious piteous looks
he cannot communicate his understanding
and yet somehow has succeeded in conveying to me
out of the entire creation
the true loveworthiness of man.



Patience
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

If you refuse to speak, I will fill my heart with your silence and endure it.
I will remain still and wait like the night through its starry vigil
with its head bowed low in patience.

The morning will surely come, the darkness will vanish,
and your voice will pour down in golden streams breaking through the heavens.

Then your words will take wing in songs from each of my birds' nests,
and your melodies will break forth in flowers in all my forest groves.



Gitanjali 35
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been divided by narrow domestic walls;
Where words emerge from the depths of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason has not been lost amid the dreary desert sands of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward into ever-widening thought and action;
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.



Gitanjali 11
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

Leave this vain chanting and singing and counting of beads:
what Entity do you seek in this lonely dark temple with all the doors shut?
Open your eyes and see: God is not here!
He is out there where the tiller tills the hard ground and the paver breaks stones.
He is with them in sun and shower; his garments are filthy with dust.
Shed your immaculate mantle and likewise embrace the dust!
Deliverance? Where is this "deliverance" to be found
when our Master himself has joyfully embraced the bonds of creation; he is bound with us all forever!
Cease your meditations, abandon your petals and incense!
What is the harm if your clothes become stained rags?
Meet him in the toil and the sweat of his brow!



Last Curtain
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

I know the day comes when my eyes close,
when my sight fails,
when life takes its leave in silence
and the last curtain veils my vision.
Yet the stars will still watch by night;
the sun will still rise like before;
the hours will still heave like sea waves
casting up pleasures and pains.
When I consider this end of my earth-life,
the barrier of the moments breaks
and I see by the illumination of death
this world with its careless treasures.
Rare is its lowliest seat,
rare its meanest of lives.
Things I longed for in vain and those I received, let them pass.
Let me but truly possess the things I rejected and overlooked.



Death
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

You who are the final fulfillment of life,
Death, my Death, come and whisper to me!
Day after day I have kept watch for you;
for you I have borne the joys and the pangs of life.
All that I am, all that I have and hope, and all my love
have always flowed toward you in the depths of secrecy.
One final glance from your eyes and my life will be yours forever, your own.
The flowers have been woven and the garland prepared for the bridegroom.
After the wedding the bride must leave her home and meet her lord alone in the solitude of night.



I Cannot Remember My Mother
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I cannot remember my mother,
yet sometimes in the middle of my playing
a melody seemed to hover over my playthings:
some forgotten tune she loved to sing
while rocking my cradle.

I cannot remember my mother,
yet sometimes on an early autumn morning
the smell of the shiuli flowers fills my room
as the scent of the temple’s morning service
wafts over me like my mother’s perfume.

I cannot remember my mother,
yet sometimes still, from my bedroom window,
when I lift my eyes to the heavens’ vast blue canopy
and sense on my face her serene gaze,
I feel her grace has encompassed the sky.

Keywords/Tags: Tagore, Rabindranath Tagore, India, Indian, poet, Bengali, sea, seashore, children, mother, dog, love, lover, patience, curtain, death
I am the monarch of the Sea,
The ruler of the Queen's Navee,--
When at anchor here I ride,
My ***** swells with pride,
And I snap my fingers at a foeman's taunts.


And so do his sisters, and his cousins, and his aunts
His sisters and his cousins!
Whom he reckons by the dozens,
And his aunts!


'I am the lowliest tar
That sails the water.
And you, proud maiden, are
My captain's daughter.'


'Refrain, audacious tar.
Your suit from pressing;
Remember what you are,
And whom addressing.'

For I am called Little Buttercup,--dear Little Buttercup,
Though I never could tell why;
But still I'm called Buttercup,--poor Little Buttercup,
Sweet Little Buttercup I!

Fair moon, to thee I sing
Bright regent of the heavens;
Say, why is every thing
Either at sixes or at sevens!

He is an Englishman!
For he himself has said it,
And it's greatly to his credit
That he is an Englishman.
Lightly come or lightly go:
Though thy heart presage thee woe,
Vales and many a wasted sun,
Oread let thy laughter run,
Till the irreverent mountain air
Ripple all thy flying hair.

Lightly, lightly -- - ever so:
Clouds that wrap the vales below
At the hour of evenstar
Lowliest attendants are;
Love and laughter song-confessed
When the heart is heaviest.
Milton! thou should’st be living at this hour:
England hath need of thee: she is a fen
Of stagnant waters: altar, sword, and pen,
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower,
Have forfeited their ancient English dower
Of inward happiness. We are selfish men;
Oh! raise us up, return to us again;
And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power.
Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart:
Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea:
Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free,
So didst thou travel on life’s common way,
In cheerful godliness; and yet thy heart
The lowliest duties on herself did lay.
Michael R Burch Mar 2020
Patience
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

If you refuse to speak, I will fill my heart with your silence and endure it.
I will remain still and wait like the night through its starry vigil
with its head bent low in patience.

The morning will surely come, the darkness will vanish,
and your voice will pour down in golden streams breaking through the heavens.
Then your words will take wing in songs from every one of my birds' nests,
and your melodies will break forth in flowers in all my forest groves.

Keywords/Tags: Tagore, translation, Hindi, patience, heart, silence, night, vigil, morning, voice, golden, streams, heavens, songs, birds, melodies, songs, jubilation, flowers, forest groves, mrburdu

These are modern English translations of poems by the great Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), who has been called the "Bard of Bengal" and "the Bengali Shelley." In 1913 Tagore became the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Tagore was also a notable artist, musician and polymath.

The Seashore Gathering
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

On the seashores of endless worlds, earth's children converge.
The infinite sky is motionless, the restless waters boisterous.
On the seashores of endless worlds earth's children gather to dance with joyous cries and pirouettes.
They build sand castles and play with hollow shells.
They weave boats out of withered leaves and laughingly float them out over the vast deep.
Earth's children play gaily on the seashores of endless worlds.
They do not know, yet, how to cast nets or swim.
Divers fish for pearls and merchants sail their ships, while earth's children skip, gather pebbles and scatter them again.
They are unaware of hidden treasures, nor do they know how to cast nets, yet.
The sea surges with laughter, smiling palely on the seashore.
Death-dealing waves sing the children meaningless songs, like a mother lullabying her baby's cradle.
The sea plays with the children, smiling palely on the seashore.
On the seashores of endless worlds earth's children meet.
Tempests roam pathless skies, ships lie wrecked in uncharted waters, death wanders abroad, and still the children play.
On the seashores of endless worlds there is a great gathering of earth's children.



Come As You Are
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

Come as you are, forget appearances!
Is your hair untamable, your part uneven, your bodice unfastened? Never mind.
Come as you are, forget appearances!

Skip with quicksilver steps across the grass.
If your feet glisten with dew, if your anklets slip, if your beaded necklace slides off? Never mind.
Skip with quicksilver steps across the grass.

Do you see the clouds enveloping the sky?
Flocks of cranes erupt from the riverbank, fitful gusts ruffle the fields, anxious cattle tremble in their stalls.
Do you see the clouds enveloping the sky?

You loiter in vain over your toilet lamp; it flickers and dies in the wind.
Who will care that your eyelids have not been painted with lamp-black, when your pupils are darker than thunderstorms?
You loiter in vain over your toilet lamp; it flickers and dies in the wind.

Come as you are, forget appearances!
If the wreath lies unwoven, who cares? If the bracelet is unfastened, let it fall. The sky grows dark; it is late.
Come as you are, forget appearances!



Unfit Gifts
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

At sunrise, I cast my nets into the sea,
dredging up the strangest and most beautiful objects from the depths ...
some radiant like smiles, some glittering like tears, others flushed like brides’ cheeks.
When I returned, staggering under their weight, my love was relaxing in her garden, idly tearing leaves from flowers.
Hesitant, I placed all I had produced at her feet, silently awaiting her verdict.
She glanced down disdainfully, then pouted: "What are these bizarre things? I have no use for them!"
I bowed my head, humiliated, and thought:
"Truly, I did not contend for them; I did not purchase them in the marketplace; they are unfit gifts for her!"
That night I flung them, one by one, into the street, like refuse.
The next morning travelers came, picked them up and carted them off to exotic countries.



This Dog
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

Each morning this dog,
who has become quite attached to me,
sits silently at my feet
until, gently caressing his head,
I acknowledge his company.

This simple recognition gives my companion such joy
he shudders with sheer delight.

Among all languageless creatures
he alone has seen through man entire—
has seen beyond what is good or bad in him
to such a depth he can lay down his life
for the sake of love alone.

Now it is he who shows me the way
through this unfathomable world throbbing with life.

When I see his deep devotion,
his offer of his whole being,
I fail to comprehend ...

How, through sheer instinct,
has he discovered whatever it is that he knows?

With his anxious piteous looks
he cannot communicate his understanding
and yet somehow has succeeded in conveying to me
out of the entire creation
the true loveworthiness of man.



Gitanjali 35
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been divided by narrow domestic walls;
Where words emerge from the depths of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason has not been lost amid the dreary desert sands of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward into ever-widening thought and action;
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.



Gitanjali 11
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

Leave this vain chanting and singing and counting of beads:
what Entity do you seek in this lonely dark temple with all the doors shut?
Open your eyes and see: God is not here!
He is out there where the tiller tills the hard ground and the paver breaks stones.
He is with them in sun and shower; his garments are filthy with dust.
Shed your immaculate mantle and like him embrace the dust!
Deliverance? Where is this "deliverance" to be found
when our Master himself has joyfully embraced the bonds of creation; he is bound with us all forever!
Cease your meditations, abandon your petals and incense!
What is the harm if your clothes become stained rags?
Meet him in the toil and the sweat of his brow!



Last Curtain
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

I know the day comes when my eyes close,
when my sight fails,
when life takes its leave in silence
and the last curtain veils my vision.
Yet the stars will still watch by night;
the sun will still rise like before;
the hours will still heave like sea waves
casting up pleasures and pains.
When I consider this end of my earth-life,
the barrier of the moments breaks
and I see by the illumination of death
this world with its careless treasures.
Rare is its lowliest seat,
rare its meanest of lives.
Things I longed for in vain and those I received, let them pass.
Let me but truly possess the things I rejected and overlooked.



Death
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

You who are the final fulfillment of life,
Death, my Death, come and whisper to me!
Day after day I have kept watch for you;
for you I have borne the joys and the pangs of life.
All that I am, all that I have and hope, and all my love
have always flowed toward you in the depths of secrecy.
One final glance from your eyes and my life will be yours forever, your own.
The flowers have been woven and the garland prepared for the bridegroom.
After the wedding the bride must leave her home and meet her lord alone in the solitude of night.



I Cannot Remember My Mother
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I cannot remember my mother,
yet sometimes in the middle of my playing
a melody seemed to hover over my playthings:
some forgotten tune she loved to sing
while rocking my cradle.

I cannot remember my mother,
yet sometimes on an early autumn morning
the smell of the shiuli flowers fills my room
as the scent of the temple’s morning service
wafts over me like my mother’s perfume.

I cannot remember my mother,
yet sometimes still, from my bedroom window,
when I lift my eyes to the heavens’ vast blue canopy
and sense on my face her serene gaze,
I feel her grace has encompassed the sky.

Keywords/Tags: Tagore, Rabindranath Tagore, India, Indian, poet, Bengali, sea, seashore, children, mother, dog, love, lover, patience, curtain, death
the curling smoke
from warming fires
rise into the slate
gray sky of the
Beqaa Valley

sheaves of
rising prayers
expire in twisted plumes
dissipating into the
gloom of an ever
looming winter
overcast

refugees from
the Arab Spring's
uncivil wars
gather for warmth
around waning embers,
smoldering in the underbelly
of the lowliest bottom of rusted
steel drums, tended
with scavenged debris
some thought better
suited to fortify the
faltering hovels of
last resort

the fires
join us in
communal rings
straining the
tenuous links of
brotherhood, the
politics of men
assiduously tear
asunder

we count ourselves
among the fortunate,
blessed exiles recused
from the acrimony
of desecrated cities,
welcoming the
residencies of
bewailing lullabies
of colic infants, the
searing hunger of
stunted children and the
incomprehensible babble
the elderly eloquently
speak in tongues
of a desperate
exasperation

our nagging impotence
swaddle us in ambivalent
inabilities to master circumstances
profanely denigrating our humanity

privation is
our daily bread
the bitter manna
feasting on the
animosity the banquet
of rancor generously
prepares for
peace starved
pilgrims

in these
refugee camps
the cold cuts deeper
hunger pangs
grow sharper

our blighted dignity,
vanished livelihoods,
and the presence of
recently interred
loved ones trudge
through our mean
encampment as
fully enfranchised
citizens in our
distressed
kingdom

what was lost can
never be recovered
our homeland leveled
yet doors still stand open
silently pleading all
to cross a new
threshold

the full restoration
of our hope,
the reconstitution
of our flagging
humanity, the
spark of the
holy spirit
willfully uniting us
in the salvation
of reconciliation
is nigh

we are
the divine children
stoking the embers
tending the fire
that light pathways
through the cold
darkness of a
broken world

Oh come
Emmanuel,
dwell among us
Oh come
Emmanuel
ransom once
again the
poor captives
of Israel….

Selah

Music Selection:
L'Accorche-Choeur, Ensemble vocal Fribourg
Veni Veni Emmanuel

Everywhere
Christmas
2013
jbm
Blessed Christmastide Greetings
to all beloved HP friends
peace and prayers
to all
love, jimmy
Hal Loyd Denton Nov 2011
America’s Soul
Through the means of a company trying to appeal to your emotions to make a sale as I watched this
Pass before me I wasn’t taking in the foreground but what it depicted in the background a realness a
Testimony of truth was flowing at flood stage images bathed in purist knowing about place and the stalwart
Ideals that make up a fabric so rich and full family’s not just empty see through nothing really there pay
No mind but you and I our successes our failures caught in the back drop of mountains and deserts and
In a song an anthem a coursing river but one of a unique part of the world’s humanity identified by red
White and blue builder’s fighter’s lovers of freedom that didn’t come by dreamers alone yes they
Dreamed but then they infused blood and sinew muscle onto this lifeless skeleton their efforts are
Attested to by the sacred graves the head stones don’t tell the story of hardship sacrifice on battlefields
Domestic and hostile bone weary against all odds at times feeling all alone and there were those times
This was true but it was always known you were part of a great brotherhood and sisterhood though far
Apart in the physical sense never the less a great spiritual dynamism bonded you together at the
Farthest and narrowest stretching point steel was without equal in its intent and its effort the lowliest to
The mightiest carried the same strain of a heroic undertaking and inwardly looked the same and truly
Were the same there wasn’t class or rank just Americans pushing this grand experiment to its most
Glory filled conclusion and then at lands end the heart would be engaged to its fullest with hands that
Reached around the globe to any that were threatened or abused fear not our brothers we will lend
To you are strength and all of our resources fulfilling a moral duty to those who are less fortunate we
Have fought and achieved and the natural result will be a mobilized caring that endures through all of
Our history making a stronger unified self governing people the envy of the world not through cheap
Pride but the foundational excellence will give the challenge don’t settle for less don’t be reduced to
Settling for anything but the best monuments are built by many tyrants but let the people build them
From the costliest material and they will endure all generations it will push back ignorance send
Down lighting striking fear in those with ill will and promote the human spirit they will peer down from
Lofty heights undisturbed by petty squabbles those that contend for illustrious beacons forged and
Sprayed out from hammer an anvil in the dark nightly skies of heaven performing and making a sculptured treasure
That speaks truth and creates the sensation of a glory that rests on a people like no other that have
Touched the fringes of utopia with just enough realism to keep you grounded and not allow you to
Totter and fall back under false hood that causes the cycle to start all over again of being a slave instead
Of being free
Clare Jan 2015
I looked down a high cliff
at a restless ocean below,
I climbed the proud mountains
crowned with lofty clouds,
I reached the serene jungles
sitting in silent pride,
I did not find it...
I visited the richest nawabs
in their castles and towers,
I ate with the lowliest creatures
whom language didn't own,
I met the right-hands and mouths
of Gods we know from pages,
yet, I didn't find it...
At last, lost in thought
I walked by a crowd
Some in white, some in black, some in uniform.
All turned to a majestic but still figure
In an honored embrace of the Tricolour
Twenty-one guns and croaking crows later
I heard a little girl's cry -
"Keta 9GR ko ** ke hoena" - ** ** **
The tears never ceased,
The roar never stopped
With faltering steps, the brave-heart...
There.
I found it,I found inspiration.

(Refer to the notes)
** ke hoena - ** ** ** (was he or was he not - he was was was) is the battle cry of the Gorkha regiment of the Indian Army to honour the martyred soldiers.
This piece is inspired by the final salute an 11-year old gave to her martyred father - "keta 9 GR ko ** ke hoena" (was this boy/youth from 9 GR or not, GR refering to Gorkha Regiment)
For more - (http://on.fb.me/1DdQriw)
O Thou, the Nymph with placid eye !
O seldom found, yet ever nigh !
Receive my temperate vow :
Not all the storms that shake the pole
Can e'er disturb thy halcyon soul,
And smooth unalter'd brow.

O come, in simplst vest array'd,
With all thy sober cheer display'd

To bless my longing sight ;
Thy mien compos'd, thy even pace,
Thy meek regard, thy matron grace,
And chaste subdued delight.

No more by varying passions beat,
O gently guide my pilgrim feet
To find thy hermit cell ;
Where in some pure and equal sky
Beneath thy soft indulgent eye
Thy modest virtues dwell.

Simplicity in Attic vest,
And Innocence with candid breast,
And clear undaunted eye ;
And Hope, who points to distant years,
Fair opening through this vale of tears
A vista to the sky.

There Health, thro' whose calm ***** glide
The temperate joys in even tide,
That rarely ebb or flow ;
And Patience there, thy sister meek,
Presents her mild, unvarying cheek
To meet the offer'd blow.

Her influence taught the Phrygian sage
A tyrant master's wanton rage
With settled smiles to meet ;
Inur'd to toil and bitter bread
He bow'd his meek submitted head,
And kiss'd thy sainted feet.

But thou, oh Nymph retir'd and coy !
In what brown hamlet dost thou joy
To tell thy simple tale ;

The lowliest children of the ground,
Moss rose, and violet, blossom round,
And lily of the vale.

O say what soft propitious hour
I best may chuse to hail thy power,
And court thy gentle sway ?
When Autumn, friendly to the Muse,
Shall thy own modest tints diffuse,
And shed thy milder day.

When Eve, her dewy star beneath,
Thy balmy spirit loves to breathe,
And every storm is laid ;
If such an hour was e'er thy choice,
Oft let me hear thy soothing voice
Low whispering thro' the shade.
1626

No Life can pompless pass away—
The lowliest career
To the same Pageant wends its way
As that exalted here—

How cordial is the mystery!
The hospitable Pall
A “this way” beckons spaciously—
A Miracle for all!
Deep May 2019
The 'gyre' hints arrival-
Twenty centuries making room
For a new epoch,
I’m a modern bird now,
I may sound haphazard, troublesome, and brooding
unimportant topic for hours,
It's up to you to lend ear or not;

I was a winged rooster confined to land only,
Now I’ve become a 'hawk', with knowledge of flight
perhaps power too,
Seeing the world from far above
Envisioned me a seer sight;
I see the world functioning; the lowliest on top,
the best in daze, and mediocre relishing mediocrity,
One or two good men wasting
life in poetry which none cares.
Oblivious armed men guard the periphery;
White termites gnaw the door at the Centre.

At this height, all seem different,
I can’t relate with my earlier self;
My knowledge seems nothing but
a frail sound in a vacuum.
When I became 'conscious'-
My dreams stopped being dreams—
My thoughts were invaded daily—
Life evolved in million years—
'God is dead', the universe all naked.
We’re the supreme, the Satan both;
Busy in triumphing Desires.
Converging all— blazed my beliefs.

We’ve progressed too much, portends
trembling of the earth
And smoke eclipsing the sun.
'Death I breathe',
War looms again,
Life is traded in forfeited currency.

I see the world functioning,
I know one or two tricks too to cheat,
To assault, to ****, to loot.
I can foresee the end—
Its good to die starving then
Fly in the proximity of land.
gyre; comes from WB Yeats,
Hawk; Ted Hughes (Hawk Roosting)
Freud's term - Conscious, Nietzsche's quote 'God is dead'
Milton! thou shouldst be living at this hour:
  England hath need of thee: she is a fen
  Of stagnant waters: altar, sword, and pen,
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower,
Have forfeited their ancient English dower
  Of inward happiness. We are selfish men;
  O raise us up, return to us again,
And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power!
Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart;
  Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea:
  Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free,
  So didst thou travel on life’s common way,
In cheerful godliness; and yet thy heart
  The lowliest duties on herself did lay.
vhcgjhf Jul 2015
Jailed with all the other squawking birds
confined, it never flew and barely grew
& never knew the mimicry of words

sanguine, foul molting cockatoo in the corner
lowered, bloodied, the lowliest in a pecking order
his owner's a loner, a collector of tinged newsprint
entombed in brick & mortar - nomad minus footprint

and his birds, perched across wooden dowels
proceeded to empty their millet'd bowels
onto sheets of unfinished poetry
correctivewhiteoutmisery

so, he, being miserly, wouldn't shell out the reader's fee
to the greedy posthumous publishing company, yet
another relic in a mortuary of literacy

he was just another faceless, bearded bard
and with the old coffee grounds
he would discard
piling mounds of compost, broken bound
his compositions decomposing in the attic
warbling hiss, winding tape spool. ghosts
searching for signals amongst the static

he awaited revision of his works
ill, amidst the scattered ruins
red ink, gold leaf & carets^


he, impetuous, slumped further into his doldrums
though, all public grievances were withdrawn
crass, he prattled on to his dolorous birds
still oblivious to his defunct words

He lied dormant, comatose
in the 3rd degree infirmary

there was once a pretty lass
who could exhume the pristine
glass contents of his tinsel'd tomb
His malady, he once named Gamine
lived in a stretched-white canvas room
she eyed his burnt pile of vile-dirge verse
as mayflys & junebugs, & smoggy dirigibles
fluttered gently out of her empty purse

she grew on him like a cancer
for she was God's embellishment
pallid and perfect, and he cursed
her love as it ebbed and flowed
her aureole glowed, safely stowed
in an airship's overhead compartment

she was flying home for
there was no other answer
thepoeticwit Aug 2021
My eyes have encompassed all the world
Surveying its glory and splendour
Civilisations advance
Society cultivating cultures
Technology, created and innovated
By human beings being knowledgeable
Expanding capacity, capital, territory
In terror, losing identity
Working, moving, breathing
They cry

“Worthy!”
But is this worthy?

My eyes have encompassed all the earth
Surveying her beauty, her majesty
Mountains, hills, and forests of lush green
Beasts and creatures of all shapes and sizes
Oceans, seas, rivers, clear blue sky
They all seem to cry

“Worthy!”
Is there more to this?

My eyes gaze into the heavens
Pondering all their mysteries
Planets, systems, billions of stars
Galaxies upon galaxies lightyears afar

And I hear in the distance
Echoes of angels and heavenly hosts
Thrones, dominions, powers, rulers
Saints and elders around a radiant throne

They all cry
“Worthy!”

I bow my head in awe
And in silence reflected
What the measure of a man is worth
In the grand scheme of things
Where one exists amidst seven billion
Working tirelessly to no end
Amid a vast and glorious creation
Which will all draw to an end

Am I worthy?

And I hear in the distance
The one called Worthy seated on the throne
Calls out to me

“From the dust have I fashioned you
Formed you into My image
From the lowliest estate have I given you
Heavenly heritage
My child
Once an outsider, an enemy
have I bought you with my shed blood.

You are made worthy
For I am Worthy
As with all who are Mine.

So define not your worth on futile things
Or others who lack the clarity to see
You are worthy
As I am Worthy

Worry not your worth
Which is found only
in Me”.
On the worth we place on the world, and on ourselves.
Paul M Chafer Apr 2014
Was life truly; ever so sweet,
As in the sun-worshipped, One World,
Beneath feathery banners, all unfurled,
Celebrated rhythm of the Mexica beat,
Applauding the gods with dancing feet,
While eagerly anticipating the final breath,
Of the honoured warrior’s, flowery death.

Lost ancient world, carved in stone,
Temples and plaza’s of grandiose plan,
Before the great pyramid of Tenochtitlan,
From lowliest slave to the highest throne,
Gathered before gods to whom they atone,
With obsidian blade priests begin the flood,
Of a sacrificial ceremony sealed with blood.

But do not weep for the ritually slain,
Or condemn this misunderstood race,
This culture both in and out of place,
Who flourished before interference from Spain;
Immoral inquisitions wielding torture and pain,
Led by Cortez’s murderous gold greed,
Condoned by religion’s, fanatical need.

A pyrrhic victory for invading Spanish-whites,
Conquistadors, who murdered, pillaged and *****,
A savage slaughter that not even children escaped,
Brave Mexica vanquished in the one sided fights,
A nation revelling no more during hot sultry nights,
A lost civilization weeping for countless lost lives,
And yet, and yet . . . Mexica spirit; forever survives.

©Paul Chafer 2014
Dedicated to and inspired by Gary Jennings, author of the novel 'Aztec'. Sadly, Gary is no longer with us,  his book enlightend me about Aztec culture, which I had wrongly thought dark and brutal. Nothing could be further from the truth. There were dark aspects that we would frown upon today, but 500 years ago, far darker things were happening in Europe sanctified by the Church, so don't judge: learn.
Michael R Burch Mar 2020
Gitanjali 11
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Leave this vain chanting and singing and counting of beads:
what Entity do you seek in this lonely dark temple with all the doors shut?
Open your eyes and see: God is not here!
He is out there, where the tiller tills the hard ground and the paver breaks stones.
He is with them in sun and shower; his garments are filthy with dust.
Shed your immaculate mantle and likewise embrace the dust!
Deliverance? Where is this "deliverance" to be found
when our Master himself has joyfully embraced the bonds of creation; he is bound with us all forever!
Cease your meditations, abandon your petals and incense!
What is the harm if your clothes become stained rags?
Meet him in the toil and the sweat of his brow!

Keywords/Tags: Tagore, translation, Hindi, vain, worship, entity, God, temple, chanting, singing, counting, beads, petals, incense, meditations, tiller, paver, dust, rags, sweat, toil, mrburdu



These are modern English translations of poems by the great Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), who has been called the "Bard of Bengal" and "the Bengali Shelley." In 1913 Tagore became the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Tagore was also a notable artist, musician and polymath.

The Seashore Gathering
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

On the seashores of endless worlds, earth's children converge.
The infinite sky is motionless, the restless waters boisterous.
On the seashores of endless worlds earth's children gather to dance with joyous cries and pirouettes.
They build sand castles and play with hollow shells.
They weave boats out of withered leaves and laughingly float them out over the vast deep.
Earth's children play gaily on the seashores of endless worlds.
They do not know, yet, how to cast nets or swim.
Divers fish for pearls and merchants sail their ships, while earth's children skip, gather pebbles and scatter them again.
They are unaware of hidden treasures, nor do they know how to cast nets, yet.
The sea surges with laughter, smiling palely on the seashore.
Death-dealing waves sing the children meaningless songs, like a mother lullabying her baby's cradle.
The sea plays with the children, smiling palely on the seashore.
On the seashores of endless worlds earth's children meet.
Tempests roam pathless skies, ships lie wrecked in uncharted waters, death wanders abroad, and still the children play.
On the seashores of endless worlds there is a great gathering of earth's children.



Come As You Are
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

Come as you are, forget appearances!
Is your hair untamable, your part uneven, your bodice unfastened? Never mind.
Come as you are, forget appearances!

Skip with quicksilver steps across the grass.
If your feet glisten with dew, if your anklets slip, if your beaded necklace slides off? Never mind.
Skip with quicksilver steps across the grass.

Do you see the clouds enveloping the sky?
Flocks of cranes erupt from the riverbank, fitful gusts ruffle the fields, anxious cattle tremble in their stalls.
Do you see the clouds enveloping the sky?

You loiter in vain over your toilet lamp; it flickers and dies in the wind.
Who will care that your eyelids have not been painted with lamp-black, when your pupils are darker than thunderstorms?
You loiter in vain over your toilet lamp; it flickers and dies in the wind.

Come as you are, forget appearances!
If the wreath lies unwoven, who cares? If the bracelet is unfastened, let it fall. The sky grows dark; it is late.
Come as you are, forget appearances!



Unfit Gifts
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

At sunrise, I cast my nets into the sea,
dredging up the strangest and most beautiful objects from the depths ...
some radiant like smiles, some glittering like tears, others flushed like brides’ cheeks.
When I returned, staggering under their weight, my love was relaxing in her garden, idly tearing leaves from flowers.
Hesitant, I placed all I had produced at her feet, silently awaiting her verdict.
She glanced down disdainfully, then pouted: "What are these bizarre things? I have no use for them!"
I bowed my head, humiliated, and thought:
"Truly, I did not contend for them; I did not purchase them in the marketplace; they are unfit gifts for her!"
That night I flung them, one by one, into the street, like refuse.
The next morning travelers came, picked them up and carted them off to exotic countries.



This Dog
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

Each morning this dog,
who has become quite attached to me,
sits silently at my feet
until, gently caressing his head,
I acknowledge his company.

This simple recognition gives my companion such joy
he shudders with sheer delight.

Among all languageless creatures
he alone has seen through man entire—
has seen beyond what is good or bad in him
to such a depth he can lay down his life
for the sake of love alone.

Now it is he who shows me the way
through this unfathomable world throbbing with life.

When I see his deep devotion,
his offer of his whole being,
I fail to comprehend ...

How, through sheer instinct,
has he discovered whatever it is that he knows?

With his anxious piteous looks
he cannot communicate his understanding
and yet somehow has succeeded in conveying to me
out of the entire creation
the true loveworthiness of man.



Patience
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

If you refuse to speak, I will fill my heart with your silence and endure it.
I will remain still and wait like the night through its starry vigil
with its head bowed low in patience.

The morning will surely come, the darkness will vanish,
and your voice will pour down in golden streams breaking through the heavens.

Then your words will take wing in songs from each of my birds' nests,
and your melodies will break forth in flowers in all my forest groves.



Last Curtain
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

I know the day comes when my eyes close,
when my sight fails,
when life takes its leave in silence
and the last curtain veils my vision.
Yet the stars will still watch by night;
the sun will still rise like before;
the hours will still heave like sea waves
casting up pleasures and pains.
When I consider this end of my earth-life,
the barrier of the moments breaks
and I see by the illumination of death
this world with its careless treasures.
Rare is its lowliest seat,
rare its meanest of lives.
Things I longed for in vain and those I received, let them pass.
Let me but truly possess the things I rejected and overlooked.



Death
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

You who are the final fulfillment of life,
Death, my Death, come and whisper to me!
Day after day I have kept watch for you;
for you I have borne the joys and the pangs of life.
All that I am, all that I have and hope, and all my love
have always flowed toward you in the depths of secrecy.
One final glance from your eyes and my life will be yours forever, your own.
The flowers have been woven and the garland prepared for the bridegroom.
After the wedding the bride must leave her home and meet her lord alone in the solitude of night.



I Cannot Remember My Mother
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I cannot remember my mother,
yet sometimes in the middle of my playing
a melody seemed to hover over my playthings:
some forgotten tune she loved to sing
while rocking my cradle.

I cannot remember my mother,
yet sometimes on an early autumn morning
the smell of the shiuli flowers fills my room
as the scent of the temple’s morning service
wafts over me like my mother’s perfume.

I cannot remember my mother,
yet sometimes still, from my bedroom window,
when I lift my eyes to the heavens’ vast blue canopy
and sense on my face her serene gaze,
I feel her grace has encompassed the sky.



Gitanjali 35
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been divided by narrow domestic walls;
Where words emerge from the depths of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason has not been lost amid the dreary desert sands of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward into ever-widening thought and action;
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.



Gitanjali 11
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

Leave this vain chanting and singing and counting of beads:
what Entity do you seek in this lonely dark temple with all the doors shut?
Open your eyes and see: God is not here!
He is out there where the tiller tills the hard ground and the paver breaks stones.
He is with them in sun and shower; his garments are filthy with dust.
Shed your immaculate mantle and likewise embrace the dust!
Deliverance? Where is this "deliverance" to be found
when our Master himself has joyfully embraced the bonds of creation; he is bound with us all forever!
Cease your meditations, abandon your petals and incense!
What is the harm if your clothes become stained rags?
Meet him in the toil and the sweat of his brow!

Keywords/Tags: Tagore, Rabindranath Tagore, India, Indian, poet, Bengali, sea, seashore, children, mother, dog, love, lover, patience, curtain, death
Billy White Mar 2016
Jailed with all the other squawking birds
confined, it never flew and barely grew
& never knew the mimicry of words

sanguine, foul molting cockatoo in the corner
lowered, bloodied, the lowliest in a pecking order
his owner's a loner, a collector of tinged newsprint
entombed in brick & mortar - nomad minus footprint

and his birds, perched across wooden dowels
proceeded to empty their millet'd bowels
onto sheets of unfinished poetry
correctivewhiteoutmisery

so, he, being miserly, wouldn't shell out the reader's fee
to the greedy posthumous publishing company, yet
another relic in a mortuary of literacy

he was just another faceless, bearded bard
and with the old coffee grounds
he would discard
piling mounds of compost, broken bound
his compositions decomposing in the attic
warbling hiss, winding tape spool. ghosts
searching for signals amongst the static

he awaited revision of his works
ill, amidst the scattered ruins
red ink, gold leaf & carets^


he, impetuous, slumped further into his doldrums
though, all public grievances were withdrawn
crass, he prattled on to his dolorous birds
still oblivious to his defunct words

He lied dormant, comatose
in the 3rd degree infirmary

there was once a pretty lass
who could exhume the pristine
glass contents of his tinsel'd tomb
His malady, he once named Gamine
lived in a stretched-white canvas room
she eyed his burnt pile of vile-dirge verse
as mayflys & junebugs, & smoggy dirigibles
fluttered gently out of her empty purse

she grew on him like a cancer
for she was God's embellishment
pallid and perfect, and he cursed
her love as it ebbed and flowed
her aureole glowed, safely stowed
in an airship's overhead compartment

she was flying home for
there was no other answer
J Arturo Aug 2014
ok so
what I was trying to say a month ago
that Lima of six million citizens is interest worthy uniquely for
it is (I have travelled significantly and) maybe yes likely the only city I've known
raised completely on a foundation of sand and
god, does it draw the mind to find something so much built
from grey-brown particles dust and quite really dirt look
beneath three cathedrals no joke it's
formica silica a bit of gypsum maybe.
regardless an earthquaking silty stiffness lies below.

and yes maybe I've been forced to love this city because
for whatever reason in my capacity made bad choices and I
have— no, have been made to
come to this city as the only enclave
the FBI won't pull me from.

but regardless I once said four years ago that I could
learn to love anyone, given the
willpower faith and motivation and
******* already I may love this
city I may love the way it always fog and evening rains but
the precocious days when sunshine comes are
unexpectedly– even possibly–
brighter than the days once were in Santa Fe.

Because the world has her Paris and her Seinne, her
London, and her Thames,
and her
New Amsterdam and old and Guineas new (and both) but when
You put a cornerstone down on lowliest ground, stack stones there only trying to–

one must respect a faith in what
shouldn't ever have happened.


Because Lima in growing to love and love can
Bring up tears but maybe you
start to glimpse at the heart of someone, after these years see that
Babylon dried the Tigris and
Shanghai may as well be the Yangzee but
Lima is a
peasant town, built from nothing,
while human we

cart in over tonnage vegetables and quartered meat
to eat, and eat– we
need to live to live we eat...

and from the Mirador De San Cristobal a striking view of where we sleep:
Lima six million bodies row on row.
What was once desert here we will decompose
and with craven frames prompt trees to grow.

There is more soil here than ever in
the geologic predestiny of the place and
Hell it could be three years even before
the Holy Bomb does come to
wipe clean leave stones of the
"human race" but this–
this city will do what cities do chew
up our radiated bodies all
criminal convictions forgiven each
soul I guess heaven, revelations, to
start a new.

This city is a desert I choose to live here
because when I die these trees will
(having no choice)
Exhume my body these
trees will grow where trees don't go and
from my remains make soil make
sand make earth make

If I must die childless I
can at least saturate the sand
in Lima, can at least,
serve conduit for something new.
maybe unfinished
He was joy.

He was not just a baby born on a manger
born of a ****** and a carpenter.

He was joy.

He left His throne
embrace the lowliest of the lowliest
celebrated by shepherds whose identities matter not.

He was joy.

The angels declared, He'll bring goodnews
of which people will be saved from generations to generations and they will be filled with joy.

He was joy.

And an army of Angels exclaimed, "Glory to the Highest!"

Oh, what a joy He hath bring
for He is the Lord and King
His birth, a joy to all
Forever, I'll indeed treasure!
Michael R Burch Mar 2020
Last Curtain
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I know the day comes when my eyes close,
when my sight fails,
when life takes its leave in silence
and the last curtain veils my vision.
Yet the stars will still watch by night;
the sun will still rise like before;
the hours will still heave like sea waves
casting up pleasures and pains.
When I consider this end of my earth-life,
the barrier of the moments breaks
and I see by the illumination of death
this world with its careless treasures.
Rare is its lowliest seat,
rare its meanest of lives.
Things I longed for in vain and those I received, let them pass.
Let me but truly possess the things I rejected and overlooked.

Keywords/Tags: Tagore, translation, Hindi, last, curtain, death, eyes, close, sight, vision, night, stars, sun, sea, waves, illumination, treasures, mrburdu
LJW Jul 2013
Is obviously unsolved to this day.
Is a heavy blizzard subject to drought.
Is a crater in the ground launched into space.
Is the lowliest temperature in a dance hall fire.
Is said to help stem the spread of ceasing to exist.

Critics call it the finest film ever made.

by Rose Linke
This poem is written by Rose Linke
Tyler King Nov 2014
My generation is sick
Rotting inside long before the expiration date
Walking around like the dead men they saw on TV
Looking for God
Between the lines of a ****** romance novel
With some protagonist who teaches them that your life only matters
If somebody loves you
And dies a martyr
Or in some silver haired, silver tongued figure
Spewing second-hand reassurances that their anger is justified
And their voices will be heard
And a return to traditional values is coming
An open palm in the air, while the other itches to drop the bomb
Or on a tiny screen injecting radiation sickness directly to their brains
Mesmerized by idols dancing like marionettes on vile strings
Spewing filth and mindless drivel
Taught that ignorance is trending
Taught to hate by the hollow blonde shell of some Ubermensch
Recording himself vomiting obscenities for their amusement
Looking for God
Everywhere except the ******* heavens
Where shooting stars and celestial bodies
Pass endlessly through their periphery
Ignored, leaving a generation of wishes unfufilled
Buried under glittering detritus
Rotting to be accepted
Rotting to be trendy
Rotting while their parents give them the world
And they can't be bothered to glance upwards
Squandering fortunes on popular hedonism
Awash in a narcissistic sea
Where the lowliest wretch can gain more disciples than Jesus Christ
A generation of men
Devolved to beasts
Who will pounce at the smallest hint of exposed flesh
And cry out injustice because the prey asked to be devoured
Who will equate chivalry with chemical imbalance
Tattooing false hearts on their sleeves
On their knees begging to be loved
& A generation of women
Content to be objectified
And content to objectify themselves
Hearts bleeding for the plights of the lowly
& beautifully, blissfully blind to their own
The harlots & the sinners
Projected larger than life into the subconscious of
Children with no larger ambition
To sacrifice themselves, and be reborn a cheap photo copy
Full of style and confidence, and devoid of essence
Angels that burn like neon lights
Extinguished quickly, to lie dark and dormant forever
Hell is full to bursting
With all the souls sold for social media
& a forged prescription for Adderall
The madmen are the brave ones
Howling at the sky
That none of this means anything
And none of it is okay
Howling for some ******* reason
Howling for some ******* peace
Howling because nothing else makes any ******* sense
Our society's ship is anchored
And still the current drags us back
Endlessly, and forward again
Repeating history
And our Captain is dead, we've murdered Him ourselves
And of his flesh we made a feast
Of praise and adoration
For the blind, the deaf, & the decaying
And there will be no bleeding hearts
And there will be no expanded minds
And there will be no saviors
And there will be no promised tomorrow
The once glorious future is a funeral pyre
Our ancestral utopia is a ruin
Spray pained red white & blue
Littered with the corpses of the ones who died believing
There's nowhere left to conquer
There's nowhere left to run
There's no room in this Hell
& There's no room in the next
Only the madmen remain
Howling at the sky
Asking God where the **** he's gone
And the heavens shall remain silent
All criticism
Comes from the illusion of bravery,
From the pedestal
On which the lowliest men sit highest.

All criticism
Is someone’s projected false confidence,
From the pedestal
Upon which those who can do no wrong fall.

All criticism
Is a descent to egomania,
From the pedestal
Above small specks of blinding delusion.

All criticism
Derived from eyes whose lenses are mirrors,
From the pedestal
Elevated by its isolation.
Blogging at www.insightshurt.com
Buy “Insights Hurt: Bringing Healing Thoughts To Life” at store.bookbaby.com/book/insights-hurt
PJ Poesy Mar 2016
Higher animals than ourselves exist, but they cannot breathe our air and they don't come here for that very reason. They do however keep watch and when needed influence our development. Not everything happens for good reason though, and there are certain processes at hand which will ultimately lead to our extinction. With that will be extinct the idea of God or Gods and heaven and hell and all things man made, except for compassion, which is what the higher beings want and are trying to understand. Evolution has always been controlled by them. They have that set of "buttons." We do not. Really, these are not "buttons" at all but something so foreign to the human mind's conceiving, it is simply better relayed to you as "buttons," or "dials," or "switches," if you will. When the "grand machine, extreme and eventual conclusive computer, infinite circuitry board," have you, is complete which the higher ones are fabricating, the time will have come for pain and sorrow to end and with that will end the existence of earth. These things only exist here, as only the animals of this earth own nervous systems and neurological capacities. The higher ones do not. This is why they are void of compassion and seek to understand it. So I implore you for the safety of our race, the human one all inclusive, and even extended to the lower and lowliest creatures, do practice compassion. For until the higher ones are convinced of its good use, there is no hope. And hope is integral for understanding compassion and ultimately essential for us all. Including the higher ones.
With this I hope to instigate a slight philosophical change. Perhaps it may even reach some hopeful electorates.
Anecandu Dec 2014
Remember this moment and hallow it my love
that time taketh it not away. Dote each second of its
serendipity, as fleeting as the close of day.
Regale me with all affection, that even in its conception,
It is our greatest reward.
With mired pity I slave in simplicity as its lowliest steward.

Its height is unassailable,
as a castle built on Moats as foundations, each stone requiring
the strength of nations, to shake.
Yet still I quake,
Trembling with bated tongue in your royal presence.  
A  fright of such magnificence,
To offer
               my fickle heart
                                           as a stepping stone,

To the gates of happiness, My gilded tongue to shoot bolts
of compliment that fall as natures mist in its decent.
But If I am but a mere feather, in thy velvet cap
My duty would not stop.

Till we dance as leaves of grass on a heather.
NeroameeAlucard Mar 2016
When I'm happy
Nothing can go too bad
It's like I've got sunshine all wrapped up
In a brown paper bag

But when I'm down
I feel broken into splinters and pieces
Of **** that's not even worthy of the lowliest of dung beetles

It's a weird emotional map for me
Everyday either a rising hill or yet another deep valley
But I've cruised through both, not through
Perseverance but through faith
It wasn't easy believing, but that and my family helped keep me straight
Ryan Galloway May 2014
O eternal father,
I lift my weary eyes to you, for you are the sustainer of my soul.
I come before you with the dirt of the ground permeating my clothes,
Yet you love me.
You accept me as one of your own
And allow me to approach the throne
Of you, my father.
It is truly an act of grace
For me, the worst of sinners, to enter this place.
The Holy of Holy's, where priests would get struck down
And their bodies pulled out by a rope,
And I am able to sit here and revel in your presence.
If eternity is a magnification of this
Then I can't comprehend how my soul will contain the joy
Of sitting with you as a child with his father
Listening to his booming voice
As we grow up we see our fathers as superheroes
Which is an understatement for you
You first allowed us to rebel
And then sacrificed part of yourself
To right our wrong
How could I ever deserve this.
How could I, the lowliest of creation
Deserve a relationship
With you, almighty God
I pray
That I will never allow this salvation to waste
In the grave
For you are the resurrection
I am so susceptible to the strikes of man
And would turn a blind eye to the glory I know
For the chase of the vain lust of the world
Lord, slay this part of me
As you laid your son on that cross in my stead
Don't allow me to go a day without reminding me of the sacrifice that was made
To pay
The debt that I made
In my rebellion to you
I worship you, the great I Am,
For in you I find the provider of my soul.
Inspired by the Puritan prayers
Chabadtzke May 2020
The streets are deserted; the cars are done beeping
It is silent, apart from the willow tree's weeping
And even old Mr. McRoger is sleeping.

            (Mr. McRoger, I'm sure you have guessed,
            Is a make-believe man who does not like to rest.

            Although, when he finally does get to bed,
            His sleep is so deep you'd have thought he was dead!

            ...You'd have thought so,
                     if not for the sound of his snoring
            which some of his neighbors have trouble ignoring.
            But back to our story, before it gets boring)

Not one suicidal remains on the bridge!
Not one midnight snacker is left in the fridge!
All are asleep on this side of the lake.
And if all are asleep ...

                            ... why are YOU still awake?

It is dark, which surely you know means it's night
And the thing to be done is to put out the light
And if the thing to be done's not the thing that you do
Then SOMETHING inside must be bothering you!

You're much too mature
and clever, I'm sure
        To be frightened of monsters
and things that might **** you

You're not old enough
to be stressed about stuff
        Such as taxes, and how much
the grocery might bill you

SO ...

If it's dark and it's night and your age isn't three
And you don't pay for food cause you get it for free
Then there's only one thing it can possibly be

You, my friend, must be the sort of young lad
Who can't fall asleep cause he's simply too sad.

I know how you're feeling; I've seen it before
You feel like you just can't go on anymore

You've sunken so deep and you've fallen so low
That you think,
            "Just how low can I possibly go?
            Of all the lows, this one's the lowliest spot.
            Can I go any lower? Why, no, I cannot."

Well, I'm here to tell you, you can and you will!
In just a few days you will sink lower still!
And lower and lower and lower UNTIL...
THIS low will seem like the top of a hill!

UNLESS ...

Things COULD get better.
They COULD, but they WON'T.
They could and they should and they would,
                               but they DON'T.

SO ...

Since you must be exhausted
from digging that deep,
You may as well
just go to sleep.
God's Oracle Apr 2020
My Lord Son Of the Almighty Creator God the Father, I ask with sincere and repentant soul to move on with a drastic  change to be done in my Lifestyle and what I personally struggle with every day the sins I have committed and the damage I done to others by my insolence and ignorant heart by me judging others at times, lying, cursing, forgetting to be grateful, not practicing what I preach, violent, sinning against my body, avoiding prayer, knowing the Word the Truth and NOT being obedient trading my happiness and relationship with God by instead indulging in the pleasures of the flesh...I come Glorious Lord Jesus who sit in the Everlasting Throne Of Pureness, Justice, Honor and Perfection by the right Hand Of the Almighty Father the Creator Of all and all that has ever been will and forever be known or unknown Physical, Spirit or Eternal. I call in distress and with much fear and trembling because I know I must detach myself from my sinful ways, stop giving in to do the same things I have allowed to accommodate and justify knowing that am being convicted by the Holy Spirit to NOT do I still give in and disregard it and commit yet over and over again... as if I use God's  name his word and share with others that I am spiritually awake, aware, and I profess to them such an elaborate unique and masterfully crafted deception but yet has Truth mixed with lies what I have lived and truly have experienced in a physical or mental and even spiritual way and what I have changed and imagined or somehow fabricated to fit and be more interesting or mind blowing to sound supernatural and ethereal to them involving a slight manipulation of reality blending my overactive imagination with reality nevertheless even I being deceived by my own self of  what my relationship with the Holy Spirit is like how I relate it to others and how it truly is in their eyes how it's in my eyes and how God sees it and how he wants me to be. My Beloved Lord Jesus My Reedemer my King and The Only Perfect Man, The Word made in Flesh, Son Of God, Lamb Of God, The Way, The Truth the Life, Prince Of Peace, Lord Of Lord's,  King Of Kings Who became the Lowliest Servant, Perfect in all ways, Holy and Righteous, God's  only begotten Son who came to absolve all Mankinds Sin by taking the sin of all Man, Woman and Child of Today, Yesterday and Since The beginning of the World...I am humbly requesting Help me truly Live more for you, devote my Time more in your Word, Persue the things NOT of this World the things that which you want me to persue and live for create a way for me to have a more disciplined, holy, seek first you in all matters, resorting to prayer more, taking walks while thanking you for your love, mercy, forgiveness, faithfulness, pure, perfect, miraculous, righteous, everlasting grace and immortal truth that will forevermore from now till infinity be always a word that is the only way, the only truth and will remain in humanity collective soul and heart and immortal spirit indefinitely...for this World and this Heaven shall pass but there will be a New Heaven and a New Earth that will be Paradise Once Again for he has promised that the ones faithful to him the ones written in the Book Of Life the ones who choose to live profess and fear the name of the Lord and tell others show them the scriptures and love God first put him first and constantly feed their Spirit and starve their flesh ...repent as often as possible, love others like thyself, choose daily to purge themselves of the carnal pleasures of the flesh, believe without NO DOUBT that Jesus Is The Son Of God,  Came to Live, Choose To Die On The Cross for All Our Sin from the time when it got introduced to the World thru the Ancient Serpent "The Devil" till the time when Jesus Christ comes back and everyone who was is and is to come live, choose what they decide to follow, The Lord Or The World and finally die and be sent to Sheol till The Great White Judgement Day when it arrives and every deed of every person from every nation from Male to Female from Jew to Gentile will be there present in the presence of God, Jesus & The Holy Spirit and all his Heavenly Host will stand to face the Judge Of Every Soul from the first created to the last one to be created to live and pass on to the afterlife God Almighty will separate the righteous from the wicked will show you from your first offense "sin" committed by YOU to the very last ONE it is committed by the same person it is either washed by the blood of Jesus by living for him praying to him reading his word, putting it into practice, listening to the still, serene, peaceful, gentle and holy word from the Holy Spirit allowing it to slowly change you transform you and open up a channel from Us and Christ developing a relationship with Him because only they him we are redeemed, glorified and saved from the grips of Hell itself..."For Whosoever Calls In The Name Of The Lord Shall Be Saved" this requires Faith and Denying the World, Our Fleshly Desires, Doing Good always, Recognizing your sin and asking for forgiveness with intention to change by asking for strength and courage in times of trial and tribulation, trusting God and learning on him for council NOT your own understanding for we are weak, sinful and choose pleasure and comfort and ease succumbing to our Fleshly Desires to gratify what is here today but die tomorrow many times we do evil in the eyes of God knowing that it is wrong but we do it anyway to instantly gratify our minds, bodies and souls with a temporary pleasure at that moment in time and over time becomes a habit that grows with repetition feeding the flesh but hurting the spirit.  Lastly I want to give it to God in this prayer to aid me change the sinful things I struggle with daily, please grant me your mercy when I fall short in serving you, when I sin against others, myself and you I know you have NOT given up on me Lord therefore I NEVER wanna give up on you Lord. Thank you for guarding my Family, Friends and Aquaintances. I give you thanks for your love, mercy, forgiveness, grace, peace, faithfulness and holiness. Teach me how to pray for others more, to proclaim blessings and healing for them and their lives, help me fix my eyes more on Jesus, help me walk with integrity and truth, help me understand the bible the way you want me to and not just read it but put it into practice little by little incorporating it into my Life and Lord heal my relationship with my Family. Allow me to grow daily spiritually in truth and please I beg you to allow me to get closer to you. Heal me Lord in Mind, Soul and Spirit and please forgive your servant for my failures past, present and future. Thank You...in Jesus Name...Amen!
God Reigns Supreme Now and Forever.

— The End —