Abou Ben Adhem

[ismenin]

Young Musician In The Temple After The Service for the Feast of the Tabernacles by Simeon Solomon


Today is Pass on a Poem Day. Who said so? ME! If you have a nice poem, a sad poem, a love poem, a funny poem, a thoughtful poem, that you like - just post it here.

This is mine. It was one of the first I ever learned off by heart. I've loved it ever since. It's by Leigh Hunt.





Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,
And saw, within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom,
An Angel writing in a book of gold:

Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the Presence in the room he said,
"What writest thou?" The Vision raised its head,
And with a look made of all sweet accord
Answered, "The names of those who love the Lord."

"And is mine one?" said Abou. "Nay, not so,"
Replied the Angel. Abou spoke more low,
But cheerly still; and said, "I pray thee, then,
Write me as one who loves his fellow men."

The Angel wrote, and vanished. The next night
It came again with a great wakening light,
And showed the names whom love of God had blessed,
And, lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest!

Comments

[aussiepeach.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, I know that poem! Here is my contribution. I found it on exceptindreams on lj. I'd love to perform this one in public.


Self-Improvement”
Tony Hoagland

Just before she flew off like a swan
to her wealthy parents' summer home,
Bruce's college girlfriend asked him
to improve his expertise at oral sex,
and offered him some technical advice:

Use nothing but his tonguetip
to flick the light switch in his room
on and off a hundred times a day
until he grew fluent at the nuances
of force and latitude.

Imagine him at practice every evening,
more inspired than he ever was at algebra,
beads of sweat sprouting on his brow,
thinking, thirty-seven, thirty-eight,
seeing, in the tunnel vision of his mind's eye,
the quadratic equation of her climax
yield to the logic
of his simple math.

Maybe he unscrewed
the bulb from his apartment ceiling
so that passersby would not believe
a giant firefly was pulsing
its electric abdomen in 13 B.

Maybe, as he stood
two inches from the wall,
in darkness, fogging the old plaster
with his breath, he visualized the future
as a mansion standing on the shore
that he was rowing to
with his tongue's exhausted oar.

Of course, the girlfriend dumped him:
met someone, apres-ski, who,
using nothing but his nose
could identify the vintage of a Cabernet.

Sometimes we are asked
to get good at something we have
no talent for,
or we excel at something we will never
have the opportunity to prove.

Often we ask ourselves
to make absolute sense
out of what just happens,
and in this way, what we are practicing

is suffering,
which everybody practices,
but strangely few of us
grow graceful in.

The climaxes of suffering are complex,
costly, beautiful, but secret.
Bruce never played the light switch again.

So the avenues we walk down,
full of bodies wearing faces,
are full of hidden talent:
enough to make pianos moan,
sidewalks split,
streetlights deliriously flicker.

[ismenin.livejournal.com]

That is delicious. Thank you so much for joining in. Yes, I totally agree - the streets are full of hidden talents. ;D xxx

[mole-caz.livejournal.com]

Oh that has sent shivers through me which often happens if spirit is around me. There wasn't any one as it happens but your poem had the same spiritual effect. Many thanks for sharing. xx

[ismenin.livejournal.com]

You're very welcome, my dear! ;D xxx

[elfellon111.livejournal.com]

Great idea, Issie! Here's my alltime favourite - The Cloud by Percy Bysshe Shelley:


I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers,
From the seas and the streams;
I bear light shade for the leaves when laid
In their noonday dreams.
From my wings are shaken the dews that waken
The sweet buds every one,
When rocked to rest on their mother’s breast,
As she dances about the sun.
I wield the flail of the lashing hail,
And whiten the green plains under,
And then again I dissolve it in rain,
And laugh as I pass in thunder.

I sift the snow on the mountains below,
And their great pines groan aghast;
And all the night ’tis my pillow white,
While I sleep in the arms of the blast.
Sublime on the towers of my skiey bowers,
Lightning my pilot sits,
In a cavern under is fretted the thunder,
It struggles and howls at fits;
Over earth and ocean, with gentle motion,
This pilot is guiding me,
Lured by the love of the genii that move
In the depths of the purple sea;
Over the rills, and the crags, and the hills,
Over the lakes and the plains,
Wherever he dream, under mountain or stream
The Spirit he loves remains;
And I all the while bask in heaven’s blue smile,
Whilst he is dissolving in rains.

The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes,
And his burning plumes outspread,
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack,
When the morning star shines dead,
As on the jag of a mountain crag,
Which an earthquake rocks and swings,
An eagle alit one moment may sit
In the light of its golden wings.
And when sunset may breathe from the lit sea beneath,
Its ardours of rest and of love,
And the crimson pall of eve may fall
From the depth of heaven above,
With wings folded I rest, on mine airy nest,
As still as a brooding dove.

That orbèd maiden with white fire laden,
Whom mortals call the moon,
Glides glimmering o’er my fleece-like floor,
By the midnight breezes strewn;
And wherever the beat of her unseen feet,
Which only the angels hear,
May have broken the woof of my tent’s thin roof,
The stars peep behind her and peer;
And I laugh to see them whirl and flee,
Like a swarm of golden bees,
When I widen the rent in my wind-built tent,
Till the calm rivers, lakes, and seas,
Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high,
Are each paved with the moon and these.

I bind the sun’s throne with a burning zone,
And the moon’s with a girdle of pearl;
The volcanoes are dim, and the stars reel and swim,
When the whirlwinds my banner unfurl.
From cape to cape, with a bridge-like shape,
Over a torrent sea,
Sunbeam-proof, I hang like a roof,
The mountains its columns be.
The triumphal arch through which I march
With hurricane, fire, and snow,
When the powers of the air are chained to my chair,
Is the million-coloured bow;
The sphere-fire above its soft colours wove,
While the moist earth was laughing below.

I am the daughter of earth and water,
And the nursling of the sky;
I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores;
I change, but I cannot die.
For after the rain when with never a stain,
The pavilion of heaven is bare,
And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams,
Build up the blue dome of air,
I silently laugh at my own cenotaph,
And out of the caverns of rain,
Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb,
I arise and unbuild it again.



I especially like that last stanza....

*hugs*

[ismenin.livejournal.com]

Aw, lovely! I adore Shelley. The last stanza is particularly moving, is it not? I learned his Adonais (on the death of Keats) off by heart and that's a LONG poem. I still remember a good bit of it although it's over 50 years since then. And Arethusa, and Oooo, lots more! :D Thank you for joining in, my love. :D xxx

[pattilovesviggo.livejournal.com]

I like DH Lawrence, and found this one to pass on, it made me smile!

Beautiful Old Age

It ought to be lovely to be old
to be full of the peace that comes of experience
and wrinkled ripe fulfilment.

The wrinkled smile of completeness that follows a life
lived undaunted and unsoured with accepted lies
they would ripen like apples, and be scented like pippins
in their old age.

Soothing, old people should be, like apples
when one is tired of love.
Fragrant like yellowing leaves, and dim with the soft
stillness and satisfaction of autumn.

And a girl should say:
It must be wonderful to live and grow old.
Look at my mother, how rich and still she is! -

And a young man should think: By Jove
my father has faced all weathers, but it's been a life!

DH Lawrence

[ismenin.livejournal.com]

Ha! Soothing, fragrant, yellow and dim. That's me! Just kidding. I like Lawrence, too, and that's a great poem, isn't it? Huggles. ;D xxx

[itstonedme.livejournal.com]

Pass on a Poem Day is a wonderful idea!

Back in grade school, when we were only 9 or 10, a crusty but stately older English teacher taught us Abou Ben Adhem as part of a choral speaking exercise which we recited in a local competition. (Do children even do this anymore? What a shame.) Thank you for posting it because I have now saved it for posterity.

In return, I have posted Earle Birney's David which was much too long to leave in your comments. But it is one that has stayed with me from the first time I read it in high school.

[ismenin.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much for joining in. I told you on your lj that I loved the poem. It is so interesting to see what people choose, isn't it? Mine is by no means my fave poem, but I do think it says something to today's reader. :D xxx

[mother2012.livejournal.com]

That has always been one of my very favorites!! I remember myself visualizing that angel sitting at the foot of my bed!

The following has also been a favorite that has followed me through my life, though the book I got it from has been long gone. It was titled "Lyrics from the Chinese" and was owned by my grandfather, so I guess it's been around awhile. Thanks to this post, I looked it up and there it is: the whole book of poems!

This one always stuck with me, but they are all worth reading.

Written 675 B.C.

'Is there anything whereof it may be said, 'See, this is new?' it hath been already of old time, which was before us.'

I would have gone to my lord in his need,
Have galloped there all the way,
But this is a matter concerns the State,
And I, being a woman, must stay.

I watched them leaving the palace yard,
In carriage and robe of state.
I would have gone by the hills and the fords;
I know they will come too late.

I may walk in the garden and gather
Lilies of mother-of-pearl.
I had a plan would have saved the State.
–But mine are the thoughts of a girl.

The Elder Statesmen sit on the mats,
And wrangle through half the day;
A hundred plans they have drafted and dropped,
And mine was the only way.

[ismenin.livejournal.com]

I had a plan would have saved the State.
– But mine are the thoughts of a girl.

This is still true in some places all those hundreds of years later, is it not? A very thought-provoking poem. Thanks so much for sharing. :D xxx

[arabia764.livejournal.com]

I'll admit it, I don't *get* poetry but I always liked this....

Please Mrs Butler

Please Mrs Butler
This boy Derek Drew
Keeps copying my work, Miss.
What shall I do?

Go and sit in the hall, dear.
Go and sit in the sink.
Take your books on the roof, my lamb.
Do whatever you think.

Please Mrs Butler
This boy Derek Drew
Keeps taking my rubber, Miss.
What shall I do?

Keep it in your hand, dear.
Hide it up your vest.
Swallow it if you like, love.
Do what you think best.

Please Mrs Butler
This boy Derek Drew
Keeps calling me rude names, Miss.
What shall I do?

Lock yourself in the cupboard, dear.
Run away to sea.
Do whatever you can, my flower.
But don't ask me!

Allan Ahlberg

[ismenin.livejournal.com]

That so reminds me of school, when the teacher was the fount of all knowledge, and applied to at every opportunity. Mine was one Mr Rees, and my conversation, at age 9, was larded with "but, Sir said" as if he were God speaking. He wasn't. Pity. Thanks so much for joining in! :D xxx

[http://users.livejournal.com/saura_/]

I don't have a poem to share, but I truly loved yours!

[ismenin.livejournal.com]

Thank you my love. I do, too - love it I mean. No person can say to me he/she loves any God, if he/she doesn't love his fellow beings. Fact of life. :D xxx