Long Partings Poems
Long Partings Poems. Below are the most popular long Partings by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Partings poems by poem length and keyword.
—The Heart’s Wandering—
I went abroad to trace thee.
But the first step faltered—
for the heart had already begun
to trace me.
The heart keeps maps
of places the earth has never known.
Thus we wander, it and I,
through hedges that refuse a road.
Fields lie mute beneath the wind.
Each step invents
a further absence.
I questioned dusk—
ancient registrar of partings—
whether thy shadow crossed its amber courts.
It answered with crows.
Yet once—
within the skull’s dim firmament—
a brightness tore the dark:
A ladder of fire
rose through the mind.
Each rung remembered thee.
I climbed.
But heaven refused its grammar.
Then grief struck iron—
and rhyme, compelled by pain, declared:
Return, return—where’er thou art concealed,
For night grows vast, and solitude unhealed.
The echo faded.
Grass bent.
Clouds deliberated.
Stars convened their patient parliament.
And then the thought—
slow, terrible, luminous—
descended:
Perhaps it was never I who sought thee,
but thou who placed the map within my heart.
Beloved—
thy habitation I know not.
Yet I carry a small compass of bone;
its needle trembles, turning always
toward the place where thou art not.
Still it leads.
And I begin to see:
Each step was learning
the absence that would draw it.
So long as breath inhabits this mortal province
my heart proceeds—
not toward a place,
but along the path
thy absence has already drawn.
I will never be ready even though you signal your leaving
I foolishly keep the bright days since so much yet needs sharing
of long partings after our intense then rare meetings
of wild childhood stories and unfathomable blur future waiting
nowhere we could ever imagine even truly existing.
The beauty of the freely crystalized future has then come true
with your unchanging care and simple soul in skillful gesture of true blue.
You know I love you so much even in my silence
I know you’re now gone, but forever unforgotten,
Wishing you were here, silently cheer our encounters often
even if I know much of your pain and sometimes helplessness stands
in the face of bitter destiny, we all struggle to walk away, to just be gone.
But we can’t lie that time to bodily part will come anon, perhaps this afternoon breeze
just in time to forget our worries, but to thankfully remember our sweet memories
of how much I love you…
And I will always do
in the deep ocean of true blue.
(28 October 2022)
If I were immortal I’d wish to be
An Earth angel who sets those in chains free
I’d enter every evil person’s heart
Putting a stop to wars before they start.
If I were immortal no one would weep
I’d spread happiness whilst the broken sleep
I accept partings come in silent grief
And would affirm that grief is a relief.
I would aim to be a blessed precious lamb
Bringing joys to the brotherhood of man
Or a shepherdess with a magic crook
Keeping folk in order with just one look.
I’d see that birds were content in a tree
Chirping away happily constantly
That they’d soar o’er sky of infinite girth
Where nothing’s heard between Heaven and Earth.
I'd be a singer upon the world's stage
Singing songs heard from cradle to the grave
Songs of love they'd be and a comfort too
To all who'd find me worth listening to.
Melodies immortal the same as me
Forever in the book named history.
You will untie knots from your chain, with trembling hands whistling in the wind,
And you will be unstrung, in turn, from someone's necklace, like an exiled pearl.
Often, partings dress in mute garments, sleeping in the shelter of silence,
Other times, you'll be the silent saint, and your answer is the void left behind.
Sometimes time insists on washing the shores of your weary hearts,
And it will find you at the hour when the moon advances its circle, asking whose farewell it was.
Perhaps you will never know, but there is a quietude in leaving the unresolved in shadow,
A premonition in every knot left untied, an ecosystem regenerating itself.
No, partings are not rocky lands that desertify our spirit,
They are just chrysalides where butterflies ready themselves for another bloom.
In the concealment of each chapter's end, new characters prepare to enter the stage,
And every denouement brings you closer to the dawn of another beginning – a new odyssey pursuing its course.
Perhaps now you cannot see, for the veil of melancholy is thick and challenging to pierce,
But through the fine thread, the warp of another tomorrow is woven, in understandings beyond us.
And there will come a time, maybe when leaves arrange themselves differently on the branch,
And you will understand the hidden adventure, the weave of wisdom where every loss was, in fact, a gain.
In the epilogue of each person with whom you no longer speak, with whom you no longer walk,
There lies a prologue where different steps are set to be made,
And each residue of soul you leave behind, small or large,
Is fertilizer for the future territories of your heart that await conquest.
On the long road, inlaid with the gathered smiles and sadnesses,
You are the artisan of a journey ever-forming, until,
In the sparkle of moments, you will see – every departure, every union,
All... were not merely steps, but were dances in the grand ball of your existence.
Hell-and-gone, my dreams are the bane of angels
Crimped with light, yet ceded to swim in shadows
Darkened wings that tremble with aching portent
Yesterday's heaven
I'm the fool that wandered the Van Gogh grasses
Just a jest, with love made there in the meadow
Callow flesh, thus burning for more than sunlight
Merging in madness
Bright and light, on toe-shoes a girl came dancing
How she twirled, with tempo to set my heartbeats
Dark desires through waterfalls and the moonlight
Joined at the marrow
Life did cleave us, bound to a course its choosing
Washed and swept by fates to a distant shoreline
Breaths and death left nothing to us but distance
Partings, unspoken
'Leave them gone', those angels now softly whisper
Broken dreams are nightmares so left unspoken
Turn your head to sight your eyes on the moment
Wisdom's sweet burgeon.
~ 1st Place ~ in the "Sapphic Stanza With A Jux" Poetry Contest, Craig Cornish, Judge & Sponsor.
I will watch their winged endurance, on the crest of autumn's eve,
without knowing where or distance, but in faith they must believe
As the harsh breath sounds of winter are calling geese to leave
I will hear songs of assurance, gliding low against the breeze
I can hear inherent partings, as they form into a V
And they soothe my doubtful worry, as they fly the crimson sea
Lifting eyes, I follow upward, as they cluster into line
With necks stretched long and southbound, departing with a sigh
With constant proof, year after year, their calling fills my ears
Sent here by the grace of God, in a race against my fear
While their promised songs may sadden me, and tears to eyes will bring
Their steadfast return assures my heart, to believe tomorrow's spring
"Doubt your doubts before you doubt your faith."
______________________________________________________________
I will start with using my hand as a guide
And in the end I will open my eyes that I will decide
I consider to do this with one thing in mind
I will close my eyes and will imagine it blind
With no colors or fractionation of the light
Just plain me and a vision with my hand as my sight
My hair is very coarse and some what fine
What I just described is so benign
I twirl my hair and make it bend
And I will say its very clean not oily on the ends
As I press on my forehead I simply feel a distinct part
I notice from hair to skin it is very different from the start
The simple partings from hair not like skin
I am going to feel with my other hand and begin
The smoothness of my skin like years of water eroding a rough rock surface smooth
Not just that my skin is like home to years of stories like scars and attitude
And when I raise my eyebrows the wrinkles it makes is more so for expression
I did not notice it with certain ideas, thoughts, and emotions
I run my hands down to my eyelids I feel movement of my eyes trying to peek
Eyelids that I have, vibrates with some kind of fear, Why?, that I will seek
Just now as I thought about it a sensation ran through my brain
My eyes is the world to me and that is true and not insane
Myself portrait of me is through my touch for now
But to finish it I will have to open my eyes soon and how
I been in a trance full of so many ideas just with my eyes closed
I run my hand on my nose and lips and I smile who could apposed
The feelings in the tip of my fingers rub on my chin and jaw with care
I do notice roughness of unshaved velcro gripping hair
I skip my ears so I will sneak a feel with my fingers I chose
I notice it is like my nose with cartilage, so I don't suppose
I will now open my eyes that I will use a mirror to see myself
My head is oval shape and my neck is like a stump, please help
My skin is very tan and my eyes are brown with my eyes I see
With all the description with my hands, one sure thing is the same and key
It is the description of measurements that is what my hands and eyes can see me
With a smile I am looking into the mirror and I can describe that I am happy
Myself portrait of me is such a way to get to know myself once more
I will never think it was a waste of time or a bore
I never noticed diamonds in the sky before;
so mindless, let such moments pass me by before.
I never glanced a passing smile upon a face
of utter loveliness; it made me cry before.
I never hearkened such sweet, honeyed voice, so fell
upon the siren spell of Lorelei before
I never felt the brush of lips against my own
that were as soft as wings of butterfly before.
I never gave away the key that would unlock
my to heart be a caravanserai before.
I never suffered dawns sharp, stabbing agony
of partings, sorrow pain that I could die before.
I never knew it possible to soar so high;
and why? For there was not a you and I before.
i have seen the pale horse
unmask your face
color it white
till you blended with him
like a blank stare of the moon
his hooves beat in a heart
where silence now falls
as a gossamery wind
caught my breath
beneath the still of yours
his pace separated our worlds
through the eternal place of his own
your soul temporized within his passage
into partings of darkness
drawn through shades of eyes
that once could blink away fog
yet now lost the ability to do so
under the seal of fate
I have seen the indurated clay
that holds you tight
yet your shadows tramp my mind
as if it were a common street
these vivid memories hook my thoughts
as if fifty bucks could own my soul
curse you, even in death
your immortality still robs
choking me of every breath
my scars harbor your death
i close my eyes to these blocks of mind
your soul still owns...
I resurrect the pale horse, curse him
yet place him higher than the stone walls
or granite that bears your name
and kiss nothingness at your grave
my mind becomes calm again
but my roots remain twisted
beneath the silence of your wind
yet i curse you
and i curse him
the same!
By Phan Tan Hai
Holding his alms bowl, the monk walks on,
his robe stitched from clouds across the sky;
we send him back to the mountain corner—
how many partings in a single life.
Standing, sitting—all for the people,
his chest still aching from blades once struck;
tears flooding the three realms,
Avalokitesvara embodied in his form.
A time he left, burdened with sorrow,
feet weary along both banks of the Ganges;
turning back, he awakened as Minh Trí,
his hair falling like dust along the road.
— For my friend Nguyen Cong Bang,
later a Theravada monk with the Dharma name Minh Tri.