Christian000

Nevertheless, I'm delighted that I never did go further with the boy in the poem, delighted even that we lost touch after high school. I've had lots of great boyfriends, great flings, and great, enduring friendships; I'm really pleased that I have at least this one "perfect boy" in my memory. -its very interesting that you happen to cherish this memory so much, maybe even more than most other memories because of the innocence and simple goodness of the relationship. A comment deadsnake made seemed to me very true: that you can taste in this poem the glory of the morning and the beauty of the beloved. If you still plan to do more editing remember these two characteristics. God bless! -Anthony

I do not think this poem is very stylish at all. But it has something going for it. . . I do not yet regret writing it. . .

I am sleepless yet glad Longing and contemplating day and night for You. I wait for You. -for Your patience and mercy- I think of You. -of your sweetness and courage- My fibers ache for You while I lie upon my bed. The fine details of your life I reflect in my heart and in the dark early mornings I remember You. -Your loveliness and virtue daze me.- Forget me not; Draw near to me least the solitude consumes me or the raging darkness closes its jaws around me! Be a intimate companion to me. Hold me up and embrace me least I fall into a cruel snare. Be good to me. Sit with me. Talk with me. Let us share an evening alone together, if not, an eternity, my dearly Beloved Friend.

Thank you for this good commentary

It appears to me that the "love" this poem is talking about is a infatuation that grows into a destructive obsession that disassembles and thwarts a person's life and sense of purpose: "A lost cause and misguided direction just don't add up. Like you and I." This is what I understand from the poem but it also seems there is more to this poem since it never indicates that the substance of the relationship is what is causing this negative impact on the narrator's soul and not some other indirect cause. B+ (at least) I enjoy the beautiful illustration of despair obsessive relationships can have on a person. I totally do not understand the lines " But what is life without pain? An impossible possibility through Christ apparently." Someone please explain. . .

I lift up my harp and breathe in the lilies sweet. I let out a psalm with my soul. I will sing of His heart, His name, and His blood, but first I will sing of His love. I let out a psalm, a psalm to my Spouse, I let out a psalm to my Lord. Let my heart burst and overflow with love as I let out a psalm to my Lord. His love does not waver, neither should mine as I let out a psalm to my Dear. His compassion is sweet, more precious than life; I must let out a psalm to my Dove. His heart! most noble His heart! most humble I should let out a psalm to my Love! His name! a fragrance His name! most sacred Let it be honored as I let out a psalm to my Lord. With His Blood He has bought my love. Forever His, I must let out a psalm, a psalm to my Spouse, I must let out a psalm to my Lord. Let my heart burst and overflow with love as I let out a psalm to my Lord.

-To the Mother of my Love I look up at thy Son and I blush at His sight as He braces my breast with His hand so light. By thy Cross with thee to stay, by thy sorrows all my days; and bear thy pains till I daze so that one day I may sing His praise. O Mary! Let it be! That I may lay beneath His feet with thee, and drink from the sighs that He might offer me, thy Son, Jesus. Melt my heart and make it glow, least I freeze and die bellow, least I never see again the face of thy Son, Jesus. He who's touch has reft and wounded me. He who's sighs have swooned me. He who's kiss will consume me, Thy Son, Jesus. O Mary! Let it be! That I may lay beneath His feet with thee! and drink from the sighs that He might offer me, Thy Son, Jesus.

Kevin, I am in awe at how accurate your criticism is! Although your complements go way to far, what you have said is so accurate that without entering into mystic theology there is very little more to be said about this poem. The poem started as a spontaneous affection that I decided to write down, edit, and post on the web site to inspire readers to seek Christ. It is good to be young and surrendered to Jesus Christ.

Allow good, loving, and merciful Lord that I may live this life entirely and profoundly filled with shame, humiliation, and ridicule, That I may be slighted, forgotten, and disliked, That I may be utterly abandoned by all, or least recognized as the lowest and most disgusting creature on Earth, That I may always carry a black veil of shame over my head, To be forsaken by even your angels and saints as a hopeless thing beyond their pity, Save only that You may be moved with Mercy and Love for me, And only You may see me lovable and utterly beautiful. Because it is true! Truly the angels realize that I am so wicked, lowly, and weak that I am beyond their assistance Truly the angels know only Your Unfathomable Mercy, O Sacred Heart, could reach me! - Only You could heal me! Who but you can touch me and break my shame?! Your Love, and Your Love alone, my Lamb, I hope for! Your Love, and Your Love alone, O God, I desire. Look! Sweet Jesus! You have swooned me! Your Love has wounded me! I am Yours and You are mine. (This poem is centered on the chaste love between Man and the One who has loved him with Immortal, Limitless, Divine, and entirely selfless Love, the love between a soul and his Eternal Spouse. -Christ is the Eternal Spouse of the Church and individually of each soul-)

I find this poem sweet. It is a coming of age poem. The narrator experiences, first hand, other feelings associated with flowers, particularly pain and death. In other words, not just are flowers outlines to the scenery of spring -filled with marriage, joy, hope, and prosperity-, but also the outlines to hospital rooms where families gather to weep, morn, and experience some of the worst pains in their life. Other meanings of flowers are not mentioned in the poem, but normally you would want to reflect the meaning of flowers in your life after reading this poem. -Aren't flowers such ominous things, they follow us through all of our greatest anxieties- graduation, when dating, weddings, birth in the family, death in the family, and every single special occasion; anything that can be associated with stress is often accompanied with flowers to sooth us.

Today I saw flowers. Flowers of little colors but little shame. Flower whose pricks and hums echo. A dove of flowers in its own season; A dove I will never see. Flowers in warm water I saw today. Flowers that do not smell like flowers. Flowers till today were not not meant to be serene. Flowers till today were not flowers. Flowers of rancor I wish uncommon. For me, I wish apathy. But today relief will not come. Today I was not seen half-dead. Today, I saw flowers. I wrote this sometime Sophomore year (last year) over the death of my little baby brother five years ago.

PLEASE don't feel embarrassed!! Actually, when I went to see who commented my poems I noticed that you also read and commented all the others in the WHOLE FORUM; not just that but you did this at 1-am, what could I (or you) expect :lo: Sometimes, I write papers for school early in the morning that I feel at the time to be utter genius. I walk into school, expecting my due praise, with my head held high despite the weakness in my neck and hand into my teacher's hand some of the worst work I ever put on decent paper. Sometimes I open a book to read some poetry, read one poem, then immediately close the book to take a casual nap knowing I did not understand a single line I read. And not caring either. We can not be at our best all the time. Sadly only once in our life will we reach our pinnacle(by definition of what a pinnacle is), for the rest of our life we must settle for our best effort. Lately I have been preparing for the SAT lit exam, I read this one modern poem (written in the 1930s) and after analyzing to my deepest satisfaction I answered the questions and went to check my answers. Somehow I managed to answer all 8 multiple choice questions wrong (when I have 1/5 chance to guess a question right). That day I learned that modern poetry and classical poetry emphasis very different themes. While classical poetry (if not directly addressed) often alludes implications to more universal themes-love, youth, death, unrequited love, nature, etc- modern poetry often does no such thing (focusing more on current issues like industrialization, immigration, identity and culture, sexuality, human rights etc. . . often times without recognition of even one universal themes. Modern poets are more likely to use the literal meaning (or new meaning) of words while recognizing more the intricate interrelationships of groups in society. -Sometimes even just a inkling of knowledge can upset the efforts of great ability. If not the hundredth time, Kevin, thank you for your time and effort.

For all the pros out there- I know you all are wondering why I put so much excessive emphasis on the second line and not so much on the second to last: not just is it italicized and exclaimed, but also it has that "extra" part, "with my eyes" (all the lines in the poem are 4 and 9 syllables except the second line- it stand out completely-, yet it could just be written as "I lie to you!" which has 4 syllables). I have two reasons: 1.) "with my eyes" explains that the narrator even denies his feelings in his body language. 2.) "with my eyes" is better describing a personal relationship I have with someone which is almost entirely based on body language. This is crucial news to the narrator's love; and it burns him to deny his love something that he wishes to hear so direly (remember the conflict in the narrator, the part of him that wants to tell his love is narrating this poem in his head because he can not tell him the truth for reasons undisclosed -at least not completely- by the narrator). I write the poem in the context of this relationship. At this point, I will admit that I am also the narrator. - I did not want to admit it at first because I did not want to undermined the validity of the poem by letting the audience know that I wrote the poem in a context they could never read and fully understand. Also you might ask "why put emphasis on the second and not the second to last?"- "they are both the short comings of the narrator to his love, why doesn't the narrator treat them both with the same pain?" 1) The narrator does not want to over scrutinize the particular reasons why he repents so much. remember this poem is narrated in his head; also his list of repentance and the reason why he repents are placed side-by-side. he does not want to even think or hint for a slit second the opposite (that lying may not be worth the sacrifice) so he jets over(the dash after the sorrows) to the ultimate reason why he repents for his lies (his "O Dear so dear") which he further emphasis by putting extra space in-between the words of the last line. The last "unknown" in the poem- I mentioned the importance of the lines where he list his repentance and said that they are more focused on the fact that he does repent, then why don't I put an exclamation point at the end of this line? 1.) again, this is referenced just slightly out of context. The narrator, while he is preoccupied more with his love then with himself when he says "Yet do not fret!!", he doubts that he really cares for his spiritual/emotional/mental condition by feeling unsure whether or not it is appropriate to emphasis "For I repent" as if his love really wants to hear this. again, this ties into my personality and many factors that you could only recognize if you actually knew me and my relationship with this person.

This poem is very paradoxical (in fact it is the most so I ever written until I vex-up my other poem on Death).

You hit the target Kevin. The narrator does not tell his love how dearly he loves him nor just how much pain he goes through in life; yet he does this out of love. Because he feels guilty for denying him from his feels we can assume that his love also loves him to an extent. He loves him so much that he would keep him entirely from himself to protect him from something undisclosed ---notice that the narrator puts two exclamation points after "fret" and nothing after were he mentions his sufferings; the narrator is much more occupied with his love's possible pain then with his actual pain. also he list is pains not to feel sympathy for himself but to emphasis that he does repent--- but probably from his "sorrows" or whatever he associates with it. Notice also that the poem is in the present tense, so love which is mentioned in the poem is still disclosed- the poem itself is an omission (I wrote the entire poem in [] but I forgot to put them on when I typed it on the cite). The first line is exclamated for the bitter irony and pain of loving someone so dearly yet he may not recognize himself as his "O Dear so dear"- if he actually said it. The narrator is telling himself that it is ok that he denies his most dearest of dears because he makes up for every moment not being with him with his own deep sufferings.