Let Me Be the Bandage for Your Bleeding: Poems About the Importance of Friendship
Posted: Thursday, August 11, 2011
by Nicholas Gordon
http://www.poemsforfree.com
FRIENDS IN HIGH SCHOOL ARE FOREVER YOUNG
Friends in high school are forever young.
Unchanged, they're where you always will belong.
The crowd is never gone, the pleasure stays,
The music of the moment always plays,
The time remains a field of wistful grace
To which you may return from anyplace.
Of course, you may still know them later on
When you are someone else and years have run;
And you may love them dearly, and they you,
But time must make their friendship something new.
Meanwhile, flourishing within your heart
There is a whole, of which you were a part:
A group of friends, one in love and pain,
In whom your longing comes alive again.
May our friendship last forever;
May I sail upon your sea.
May we go through life together;
May there always be a "we."
May I be your endless sky;
May you breathe my gentle air.
May you never wonder why
Each time you look for me, I'm there.
May we be for each a smile
Like the warm, life-giving sun;
Yet when we're in pain awhile,
May our suffering be one.
May we share our special days,
The happiness of one for two;
And if we must go separate ways,
Let my love remain with you.
I SOMETIMES THINK THAT I COULD BE ALONE
I sometimes think that I could be alone:
Really alone, with neither God nor friends.
The people near me then might well be stone:
Just faces on a frieze that never ends.
And I would travel in my mind towards death,
A world within a world sealed like a tomb.
My thoughts would be as silent as my breath,
And, like my breath, expire at my doom.
Such thoughts would make me shudder, were not you
A world where I may enter and find rest.
A rock gives way within, and I walk through
To be in laughing eyes a welcome guest.
Thank God I have you, friend, that I might stay
And be as I could be no other way.
IT'S BEEN SO GOOD TO HAVE YOU AS A FRIEND
It's been so good to have you as a friend:
As sweet and rich as honey-colored sun
Slanting steep across a summer lawn,
Gilding life with all that love can lend.
And now that you yourself have griefs to tend,
I want to be the strong and caring one
To count to you the lovely things you've done
Until these troubles pass and sorrows end.
You are so beautiful in form and soul
That you bring happiness to all you're near:
Just as a sea rose, flowering in mist,
Makes a paradise of some bleak shoal,
Turning truth to something far more clear,
No pain unsoothed or rain-swept cheek unkissed.
JUST AS A WAVE IS LIFTED BY THE SHORE
Just as a wave is lifted by the shore,
Then breaks across the slowly rising sand,
So as I watch you weep my feelings pour
Across the wash of what I understand.
I wish I could just take you in my arms
And all your pain could melt into my chest,
And all the violence of passing storms
Could pass through me and finally come to rest.
No words can set things right or presence lend
A miracle to light your darkened way,
But there is solace in a loving friend
And comfort in what I don't have to say.
Whatever circumstance you cannot bear,
Just turn to me, and you will find me there.
LET ME BE THE BANDAGE FOR YOUR BLEEDING
Let me be the bandage for your bleeding;
Let me be the ocean for your tears.
Let me be the secret of your healing;
Let me be the song to still your fears.
Love isn't love that cannot love in darkness,
Nor is it love that turns away from pain;
Nor would I love would I not hold your sadness
And with my love your love of life sustain.
So do not think your malady a burden,
And do not think my willingness deceit.
Just let your sorrow flow into my garden,
And I will share with you the harvest sweet.
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