Weekly Poems: A Poem About Inflation and More
Posted: Thursday, April 23, 2009
by Nicholas Gordon
http://www.poemsforfree.com
AH, THE TEMPTATION
Ah, the temptation
When one can print money
To print it and print it --
As much as one needs!
Ah, for one moment
The outlook is sunny:
Wealth is restored!
The project succeeds!
People are working,
Beginning to spend;
Credit is flowing,
The market is pleased;
Banks once again
Have money to lend;
One has a sense
That the moment was seized.
Can never be something:
Money just printed
Was not bought or sold.
There was no exchange
Of one thing for one thing:
Something produced,
Like laughter or gold.
And so we've increased
Our money without
Increasing the value
Of what it can buy.
The outcome must be
Without any doubt,
According to laws
Of demand and supply.
When there is more money
In relation to things,
Prices will rise
In response to demand.
Since just-printed wealth
No exchange for goods brings,
The goods stay the same
As the dollars expand.
Prices rise quickly,
Leaving us nothing
More than we had
When we first began.
And so we learn nothing
Can never be something
The hard way -- again --
As we sink in the sand.
TO GRADUATE IS LIKE A CROW
To graduate is like a crow
Flying up into a tree.
Once he gets there he can see
All the children down below.
To graduate is like a ewe
Climbing up a rocky hill.
Up and up she goes until
She's at the top and sees the view.
To graduate is like a frog
Hopping up from stair to stair.
He doesn't know until he's there
How high he is above the bog.
Up and up and up we go
From grade to grade, from hop to hop.
Why do we hop all the way to the top?
When we get there, we will know.
THE TEDIUM, THE FLATNESS OF ONE'S LONGING
The tedium, the flatness of one's longing,
When kisses are formalities and sex routine,
Is love, the kind that lasts,
The soil in which one plants a life
That it may grow.
Time is needed, time for roots and leaves,
Days of sun, nights of yearning, years of seasoning,
Cold winds and summer rain.
Here rules matter, and discipline.
Here loyalty matters, and fidelity, truth, compassion.
Here self-sacrifice trumps self-pity,
And one finds pleasure in the pleasure of others.
Yes, ecstasy ebbs and flows,
But joy is a pedal tone.
One knows this is love by the music,
By the grace, by the goodness,
By the tedium, the flatness of one's longing.
CLOSE YOUR EYES AND WISH FOR THE ONE THING
Close your eyes and wish for the one thing
You cannot do without, and when you do,
Near your heart you'll find it, always there,
Treasure that is dear but not so rare,
Held in the mesh that all your dreams flow through.
In truth, no gift more happiness can bring,
And so this day I give my love to you.
FATHER'S DAY WITHOUT YOU IS LIKE MUSIC
Father's Day without you is like music
Muted by a distance undisturbed.
It is so faint I cannot tell the feeling,
Though I myself am gripped with pensive sorrow.
I listen all the more for what I cannot
Hear, and you are somewhere close beside me.
"It's joy!" you say, and then I nod, unbending,
Listening still while weeping like fine rain.
Yes, it's joy, and you again are with me.
I turn to you, and I am in your arms.
The music is a rhapsody around me,
And I am safe again and free to cry.
It is so beautiful, I cannot stand it,
I am a torrent, shaking in my gladness,
And you recede, as distant as the music,
Smiling dimly far across the plain.
"Please, please!" I say, yet know that what I'm asking
No longer is. Your day will come and go,
And I will crave and fear its restless turning
Because my happiness must be my pain.
GIFTS ARE NOT SO SIMPLY FOR THE TAKING
Gifts are not so simply for the taking.
A gift of love comes freighted with a soul.
Blessed are those who take the offer whole,
Rewarded with a life well worth embracing.
Intimacy's a gift requiring reshaping
Each to play a symbiotic role,
Life exchanging, changing lead to gold,
A mystic one of two now in the making.
Now one knows the other is for certain,
Dependent without fears, without regrets;
Knows that someone sees one as a gift;
Embraces the wizard hid behind the curtain;
Needs to be needed, for what one gives one gets;
Needs to need, for one need not endless drift
Alone as passion rises and then sets.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MOTHER
Happy birthday, Mother,
Even though you might prefer
Life without these markers,
Each too public to defer.
Now that you are fifty,
Sing to us your own sweet song,
That we might celebrate your life,
Rejoicing all night long.
Each of us has love to bring,
Each a special song to sing,
To lose your heart among.
This Article has been viewed 972 times. (Not updated in real-time.)
No comments yet.We want your comments! If you can read this, you don't have javascript enabled, so you can't use this comment system. Please enable javascript.