I had not visited this place for a while. I was very happy to see that others had not deserted it as I had. I think that one of the reasons for belief in God is poetry. Another is music. For where else can we lose ourselves so completely? By what other means can our hearts soar in such a fashion? For like the musician, the poet steps carefully around reason and draws out from the heart that which makes us human.
The poem we read, however, is not the poem of the poet's heart. That is his alone as what will form in our hearts shall be ours alone. We can only see the words and those words must work their magic in our minds and hearts and draw upon our experiences and our inclinations. In each of us lies a different world of dreams and nightmares, of unrequited hopes and schemes which lie around in our minds like so many discarded, unfinished garments. The words of the poet gathers these remnants of our lives, of what has been and what could have been and fashions things for us that for whatever reasons could not have been. His words form the pattern and we use our fabric to weave our garment. And we fashion our garments with the remnants of our life until it fits who we truly are.
The struggle to put into words what the heart fabricates is a never ending struggle for the poet. Regardless of his adeptness with words, in the end the resulting ink stains are a far cry from what inspired their creation. There is so much lost in the process. That's what this poem is about.
How Great The Loss
How great the loss from poet's heart to pen in hand
Flashes of light, schemes and plots so grand
Begin their arduous journey down that long long road
Along the way valleys of doubt and stones of reality take their toll
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And in the end, epiphanes and empyrean dreams sublime
Twist and turn , bend and toil beneath reason's eye
To become in the end words on paper common and bland
How great the loss from poet's heart to pen in hand!
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For what words can bind or hold rages of the heart
Or chronicle a life void of meaning from finish back to start
Hopes and schemes , visions and dreams, troubles and strife
Are woven into the fabric that in the end is our meager life
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That brief candle of which the fabled Englishman did write
Flickers in the winds of adversity, with no chance in its meager fight
To stave off the relentless darkness that comes upon all man
How great the loss from poet's heart to pen in hand
The French Knight.
-Seen it all, done it all, can't remember most of it-