poems – Page 5 – Emotional Shadows

How Much Of Our Poetry Is About Us?

Published on April 9, 2018April 9, 2018 by balroop singh43 Comments

How much Life in poetry
When I published my debut book, ‘Sublime Shadows of Life’ my excitement was at cloud nine and I got some copies printed for friends and family and sent them, even to those friends whom I met occasionally or had not met since school days.

One of my friends who had not been in touch with me for a long time rang me up and asked: ‘Are you okay?’

I replied in affirmative and asked why was she asking.

She had a grim tone and said: ‘Is everything going well in your life?’

I laughed loudly at the tone of my fun-loving friend and asked her what was wrong with her.

She told me that she got alarmed at some of my poems, which talked about oppression and dark moments.

Though I had mentioned in the blurb “I, you, he, we and they are universal symbols, which highlight the fact that happiness is not a destination…” but who reads the introduction!

Authors draw inspiration from life and people around them and many of them agree that they do creep into their stories.

Some of my poems do give a peep into my life. I have written about an incident that moved me deeply. Some of my poems are an emotional outburst; some are inspired from the life of my friends but all of them are not about me.

This one is. I hope you would understand who this pearl is.

MY PEARL

Time has stood still
The storm is yet to pass
The descent of night seems eternal
Perplexed, petrified, I wait.

Wait for a new dawn
Wait for a smooth tide
Wait for that lovely flight
Which brings hope!

There was a time
When your hands held mine
The fingers so ensconced
It was hard to distinguish.

Now I hold an empty oyster
The pearl I nurtured is gone
Slipped away, leaving marks
Hard to erase, hard to forget

The purity of my pearl,
The glory of her glow,
Now brightens another world
That mitigates my woe.
© Balroop Singh, 2003

Wendy, a spiritual poet, has shared her thoughts about this topic “I have written poems about defining moments in my life. Although at that time, I may not be aware that I am writing about a moment that I would consider life defining. There have certainly been life defining moments that I did not write about at the time, but a reference to the event came much later in life as a line or stanza in a poem, as with my father’s death when I was 19.

Ritu too has written about life defining moments: “I think one of my most poignant poems about my life was the one I wrote one morning, in 10 minutes, about my journey to become a mother…” She has shared that poem with us:

FROM TWINKLE TO REALITY

Let me take you down that road,
Much travelled through eternity
The journey to become a mum,
From twinkle to reality.

The plans you make at a young age,
Full of gurgles and laughter,
The horror as you realise,
What really does come after!

The fun of trying,
The monthly wait.
The disappointment,
That feeling, you hate…

The years of trying,
Full of hospitals and checks,
The medication taking you over,
You feel like total wrecks…

Then finally, the day comes
That positive is clear
The goal that you were aiming for,
Has suddenly come near.

The months of fascination,
Your changing body grows
The feeling of satisfaction
That only you can know.

Those pain-filled days, or hours
To reach the prize you sought
The feeling of satisfaction
That this little bundle brought.

I gaze at you in wonder
Are you really here?
I’m overwhelmed with happiness
And a tiny bit of fear.

Will I be able to give to you
All you want and need?
As you look at me, wide eyed
Snuggled close while you feed.

Little blessing, sent from God
My heart is filled with joy
I will do all I can for you,
My darling baby boy.

And so the cycle continues
The waits and checks again
We’re gifted with a gorgeous girl
After a little more pain.

My life is here with me right now
Some twinkles from my eyes.
But I’ll never forget those twinkles
That now, do grace the skies…

Dedicated to my wonderful children, recognising the struggles to have them, and remembering my 2 angels lighting the sky at night.
©Ritu Bhathal

Lisa has shared a poignant poem that she wrote during the difficult moments of her divorce.

PRAIRIE PRISON

Here I sit in my Prairie prison
I have known
Great joy and worse sorrow
Here I sit in my home
Longing for more…

The ocean
And mountain peaks calling
I make this prison home
I look out of my window
While the prairie winds blow
Dust in my eye, pebbles in my soul

Here in my prairie prison
I long for my Ocean boy
The one and only
Yet some ties bind and clasp me
Fastening me to a make believe home
Among wheat fields

Can you blame me?
I bore my children in a prairie home
A landscape so flat
It cannot compare
To my wild, sea salt air

Maybe I’ll get there
But now
I gaze out of my prairie window
Where I found great joy
And worse sorrow.
© Lisa Thomson, Aug ‘06

I would be gifting two ebooks of Sublime Shadows Of Life, my debut book to those two readers who write the most poetic answer to all the posts I publish this month – #NationalPoetryMonth. Happy writing!

Thank you for reading this. Please share your valuable reflections, as they are much appreciated.

If you have liked this post, please share it at your favorite social networks.

Balroop Singh.

Emerging from Shadows, Poetry by Balroop Singh

Published on November 25, 2017November 25, 2017 by balroop singh30 Comments

I am delighted to share my blogger friend Cathleen’s wonderful review of my poetry book ‘ Emerging From Shadows.’ I would like to express gratitude for her in-depth analysis of emotions that dominate the poems in this book and the quote she has picked up truly defines the theme that runs through the book.

Cathleen Townsend

Emerging from Shadows is no callow compilation of a lovestruck young adult’s first sonnets. Rather, it’s the reflections of an emotionally mature writer who has faced life’s stings with a determination to grow from them in an honest and healthy way.

This is a verse from my favorite poem in the collection, Sound that Resounds.

“I can no longer remain insignificant

Your harrowing hauteur is oppressive

Forgive me for finding my own avenues

My gratitude goes to my spirit.”

It’s an excellent read for anyone recovering from emotional trauma, especially those who would rather eschew bitterness, and instead be at peace with how they respond to life’s trials.

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#Haiku Life Watchers #Writephoto

Published on August 5, 2017August 6, 2017 by balroop singh27 Comments

watchers

Hanging from the cliff

I could watch the antithesis

Life is powerful.

… …

Mute watchers warbled

Fluttering fervently around me

Stirring hopeful messages.

Thanks to Sue Vincent for an inspiring #photoprompt.

If you have liked these poems, please share it at your favorite social networks.

Thank you for your support. Please share your valuable reflections, they are much appreciated.

How Poetry Makes Us Positive Minded

Published on July 30, 2017April 27, 2018 by balroop singh61 Comments

Positive power of poetry

If you are a poetry lover, you must be familiar with the positive power that a poem can provide us. I have quoted many inspiring lines from the famous poets in one of my earlier posts. ‘If’ by Rudyard Kipling being my favorite.

Poetry soothes the writer as well as the reader.

Recently I stumbled across this gem, an outstanding poem written in 1932. It demonstrates an incredible power to assuage loss and anguish. Though the poet had written it for her friend who could not visit her mother’s grave due to disturbing times, its popular appeal can be judged from the fact that it was read by the father of a young soldier, who had been killed by a bomb in Northen Ireland.

Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am in a thousand winds that blow,
I am the softly falling snow.
I am the gentle showers of rain,
I am the fields of ripening grain.
I am in the morning hush,
I am in the graceful rush
Of beautiful birds in circling flight,
I am the starshine of the night.
I am in the flowers that bloom,
I am in a quiet room.
I am in the birds that sing,
I am in each lovely thing.
Do not stand at my grave and cry,
I am not there. I do not die. – Mary Elizabeth Frye

The poem conjures a thousand images of nature to lift the gloomy mood, which fades away in the wake of so much positivity. Read it twice and you would be transported into a different world.

Those who consider reading or writing a poem a difficult task have probably not been introduced to poetry at an impressionable stage of life when emotions and sensitivities are forming.

It is just like book love; some of us are passionate readers while many people don’t care for a book. I know many persons who have not read a single book in their life. When you try to understand the reasons behind this habit, most of the times you would discover that they had no exposure to reading in their childhood.

“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. So medicine, law, business, engineering… these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love… these are what we stay alive for.” – Walt Whitman

From Rumi to Rudyard Kipling to Maya Angelou, poetry has always evoked images of romanticism, realism and Sufism and we get carried away with those images depending on the phase of our life.

Poetry can convey the emotions most succinctly:

“Love is a smoke and is made with the fume of sighs” – William Shakespeare

A renowned Urdu poet, Mirza Ghalib says, “Love is a river of fire and you have to drown in it to reach it.” Love could perish you, that’s what Ghalib’s quote is trying to convey through just one couplet and he is talking about romantic love. Poetry of earth

Poetry holds the most profound thoughts:

“The poetry of the earth is never dead,” John Keats has compressed all pervading beauty of nature and its subtle sounds just within one line.

Poetry clasps our sweetest and saddest thoughts:

We look before and after,
And pine for what is not:
Our sincerest laughter
With some pain is fraught;
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought. – P.B. Shelley

Poetry carries the wisdom of the world; much can be learnt from it as every aspect of life is depicted through it:

“To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour.” – William Blake

Poetry inspires us to look at the beauty around us:

Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
– Robert Frost

I have picked up those lines of poetry, which are very easy to understand. In vain do we get scared by this splendid genre of literature, which has been called “the crown of literature.”

Have you felt the positive power of poetry?

Thank you for reading this. Please add your valuable reflections, they are much appreciated.

If you have liked this post, please share it at your favorite social networks.

Balroop Singh.