after Because I could not stop for Death, by Emily Dickinson
Because I would not stop for Death,
he kindly stopped for me.
A wilted bouquet in one hand—
a reminder of life's mortality.
We began to walk—he knew no haste—
side by side, as we always were.
In silence, no sympathies were spoken,
as he knew I often preferred.
We passed the house where I once strove
to play and know no sorrow.
We passed a creek whisking ashes downstream—
something I was hesitant to let it borrow.
Or, rather, it passed us—
the mist in the air quivering with a dog's final breath—
for only I began to falter
on our beaten and lonely path.
We paused before some foothills that seemed
serene, yet all too demanding.
The soon-to-be graves were scarcely visible here—
urns in my arms notwithstanding.
Since then, it has been decades, and yet
it still feels shorter than the day
Death first took my warm hand in his own
and his comforting coldness became mine for eternity.
Forget about it
Don’t think about it
It’s not important
Put it out of your mind
Things I have been told
Advice for the lovelorn
The bereaved
The broken hearted
The lonely
Your love has gone away forever
They have left you behind
They have stopped you in your tracks
Well meaning friends
Want you to forget them
Get on with your life
But the hole in your heart
Is too big to fill
With sympathies
Cannot sense the time
There's no need to report
And nothing's left to find
For the days are now too short
No one did remain
To see the final act
The author went insane
When his Face book page was hacked
Curtains have come down
No encore has been called
No refunds will be found
Since the ticket sales had stalled
Actresses have cried
They're quickly unemployed
No sympathies supplied
For the careers destroyed
Doors have been boarded
The streets are empty now
Old flyers are hoarded
Though not worth much anymore
History will fade
From this old part of the town
Mem'ries been waylaid
Since Broadway had been shut down
Catching Moon Sighs
From time to time
as clouds pass
— those plumpted puffs —
touring by
…Out
from behind them
a
Night’s lit
Blink!
will occur
for:
T’is our
Moon sighing
at Time’s insistent nudges
to fleet on by
And at which overseeing Venus
winks her sympathies…
(c) s.y. eslinger6/2024
Such a pity you can’t be happy any longer than a day.
You have my sympathies, for the sadness you never say.
You have every right to speak rather than lock your feelings away.
It is with great sadness we say goodbye.
To a truly smashing real good guy.
His name is Mike Parke who was our boss
The whole of 202 now feel lost.
He leaves behind his good lady.
The one we know simply as Kady.
Our sympathies are really with you.
From all the guys and girls from 202.
Mike you were a quality bloke.
And this sad news made us all choke.
Soldiers and Friends all alike
Wish to say farewell Mike.
As a technician you were a card
Your first lines were really hard
As a boss you were the best
Now you can be laid to rest.
It eventually comes to an end
When we have to say goodbye to a dear friend
You will be missed by one and all
Until we meet at heavens ball
Uncaptured sympathies
From the lost departed
No turning back
All plans are thwarted
Revelations and tears
Washed away with the rain
Forgotten tragedies
Unspoken in vain
Here I am a castaway
On a passengerless ship
Thanks for the freedom
No longer your whip
Every small sore is numbing pain
As if morning can't see the rain
Every small touch on your light skin
Makes the world like it stops to spin
Teardrops can't mend your heart's sorrow
As if night has no tomorrow
The days are counted like a few
May God still give you lots of new
For my mother who currently and coincidentally suffers from breast cancer and undergoes chemotherapy. I may not be that financially stable to help because of my condition and we had some differences before, but may this poem find you a morning sunshine and a holding rail. Thanks to my sister In law Christy and my brother Marvin and all who extend their sympathies
December 1, 2023
Through arches of time, a corridor unfolds,
A door swings wide, and history it holds.
A nameless procession, a river that streams,
Each soul a droplet, in the flow of dreams.
Little self-denials, threads of gold so fine,
Honesties, sympathies, a silent design.
In the pattern of life, a tapestry we weave,
Nameless acts of kindness, in God's gaze, they cleave.
Under varied names, we worship the divine,
Yet in the nameless Absolute, truth we define.
To see the self in the vast, formless sea,
Knowledge of the nameless, the key to be free.
This Ecstasy's review, enchantment's embrace,
A nameless rapture, where time and space erase.
Without celestial mail, audacious we tread,
Within the veil, where mysteries are spread.
The mass worries into nameless graves,
While unselfish souls forget themselves to save.
In immortality, their essence weaves,
A tapestry of love, where eternity cleaves.
my sympathies aren’t born of grace
like in the way of the benevolent heiress who,
ever-so-delicately, extends cupped hands
to feed the twittering songbirds
perched on her windowsill
it comes from a far more wretched place,
emerging so unsightly, it almost contradicts
the inherent virtue of the word
because it isn’t fueled by love or fortune,
but by every instance unaccounted for
in which i should’ve felt the same pity
for myself
my sympathy is abundant and involuntary
as though in response to constant overflow
and extends much further than hungry birds
or grieving friends
it reaches all the way out to lone, discarded cans
that didn’t quite make it to the trash bin,
and to the virtual strangers that walk past,
their defeats and quandaries overheard,
and to every unfortunate soul between,
under the sole condition that
they don’t share a brain with me
For a couple of weeks
the phone calls and cards
expressed sympathies
As suddenly as death itself
they stopped
For the next year or so
things reminded me of her
A favorite song on the radio
Someone would cook a dish she liked
Now I only remember her twice a year
On her birthday I tweet she would’ve been 104
Happy Birthday in Heaven mother
do they have birthdays in Heaven
On the anniversary of her death
I post how I miss her
quickly scrolling to the next newsfeed
Oh look… tiny goats.
To forgive is to forget
Even if the perpetrator has no regret
Patience is a virtue for one with might
A merciless executioner with bloody footprints in sight
Another love, Another string
A dirty little heart is all I have to win
No sympathies, No regrets
I forgive every word you said
My woes are my lover
A connection with the lost sunflower is all I hold
As wait for you with all my desire
A bloody executioner is all I admire
*** Poetry Ineffable ***
Today I happened to have come upon
a young woman reading her poetry
in a foreign language that I do not know,
but in her softened, intimate tone
her spoken poem
pulled at my imagination,
and strained forth sympathies,
which her voice stirred in my heart —
her phrases sometimes sounded with hesitation
that could be interpreted as bordering
on a tearful confession
…or a cached tale from her experience
intended to share a precautionary warning
that haunts
through its hushed, gentle telling
all best kept in poetry’s deep well,
in that rising music
of composed syllables, to affect
like jewels lustrous
even in beams of subtle light —
quite understood
beyond the particular
words chosen.
——————————————————————————————————————-
(c) sally young eslinger 6/2023
Thanks be to God
Bite then, a piece off my flesh,
And quench on the gushing pints of red.
Sink deep your incisors, and dig for what little remains;
Yank! with great hunger and break the skin like a dog to a rag.
Trust my wounds—
Here, payback and karma do not visit.
Peel a sheet from the cut on the back of my neck, to my back, to the heels of my bare feet,
But do not disturb the knives in my spine.
Pay no breath to the broken bones that pierce,
And feel not guilt for ones that break on your bite.
Grind them into powder and spice your ego!
Your hunger is not yours, grub on my growl and fill your gut.
Slang your blades and tattoo more wounds atop the scars you find.
There are no patterns nor mosaics nor cascades to obey.
But if you wish, unlike those before you, be an artist with it—
Draw to your heart’s desires.
Pay no apologies.
Pick and pull at the scabs that may protest,
Offer no sympathies and believe no tears,
Because what is a friend, if not what kills you for better ones.
When dawns your own world, when
From another's blank horizon
Rises your brother's habitation
Can it be overlooked then?
Stretching with the sympathies
Out from coldness of craters
Approached are the Maker's
Fixed sensibilities.
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