Love's Labor Lost--Broverbs for Valentine's Day

Love's Labor Lost?
(Broverbs for Valentine's Day)
    
We can sit and scribe our verses
From now until we die,
But who, if asked to read them,
Will find a reason why?
 
We can sow our seeds of wisdom--
And weep, that all our toil
Was wasted, since the seedings
Were all on barren soil.
 
We can spend our waking lifetimes
In struggles, pay the cost
From what we left neglected,
Yet see our labors lost.
 
We can teach and we can nurture;
We can fuss, as carers must.
We can build, with patience, structures--
And see them turn to dust.
  
****** 
  
So when we're in the twilight,
With darkness drawing near,
We then might slow from slaving
And pause to shed a tear.
  
But then it's time to wipe it
And wistfully to smile,
For if, with heart, we labored,
It was surely worth our while.
 
And if some satisfaction,
Some pleasure in the task,
For a year or for an instant,
Was ours--what's left to ask?
 
Let's leave what's past to others,
And what's to come to fate.
The present time is precious
And not for waste in hate.
  
****** 
  
There's joy in our creations,
However small they be.
We bring them through gestations
And then we set them free.
 
Like children, they may flourish.
Like seedlings, they may die.
How many are our hatchlings--
How few will live to fly?
 
We seek for recognition.
A smidgen should suffice.
We warm our hands with praises--
For soon, we'll meet with ice.
  
Our children may be stolen.
With broken hearts, we cry.
But if we know they're tended,
With souls content, we die.
  
******
  
We labor for the joy of it.
We labor for our bread.
We labor for the smile we get,
From duty and from dread.
  
And when we shirk our labor,
We're often in torment.
Some say they live for pleasure,
Yet rarely are content.
  
Our lives are often muddles.
What hubris, then, to say
It's pleasure, love or duty
Or work that clears the way.
 
We can live for just this instant;
We can live for what we lost;
We can live to build the future.
In each, there's always cost.
  
******
 
And those, who're truly humble,
Of their virtues, might be proud,
But equally, of those failings
That they rarely speak of loud.
 
For those, who see no failings
In themselves, are surely blind,
And those, who see them clearest,
Are souls of deepest mind.
 
A vice that's partly conquered
Is like a foe defeated;
It's best to leave it extant,
Lest hubris be repeated.
  
The greatest pride of humans,
We're told, is that of pride.
Yet pride, in honest labor,
Is a lion each can ride.

****** 
 
In all things, there's a balance;
There's yang that waits in yin.
Too little--and we're tortured;
Too much--and we're in sin.
    
What's savored best at leisure
Is rarely sensed in haste.
Who never knows of hunger,
Can scarcely know of taste.

So too, a length of failure
Lends flavor to success.
And each is best, not scanty
But neither in excess.
   
Let's take what we are given--
And that, with gratitude.
Why pine for what was owed us?
We owe, in plenitude.
 
2016 February 14th, Sun.
Brooklyn, New York
   

Broverbs of Pain

Broverbs of Pain

How red the wind-tossed roses blow,
How sharp, their curving thorns!
And just as red, the blood will flow
From thumbs of eager hands.

How beautiful she does appear
To those who yearn for her!
What misery, they do not know,
That yearning might confer!

******

How beautiful, that song of love
That’s sung in soundless tones.
How silently that river flows
That runs so swift and deep.

******

How tender is the heart of love,
How hard, the one of hate.
And in-between is callousness—
That leaves us to our fate.

******
 
Who murders, knows what he has done
And all his life repents,
Unless he’s blinded by that fog
That makes of Earth a hell.

 ******

Though pleasures might be shallow, short,
While pain is deep and long,
There’s joy that’s true that melds with woe
And so gives rise to song.

******

As sculptures, paintings get their depth
From shadows more than light,
So also we are deepened more
By pain than by delight.

******
   
Look not to me for happiness,
But only more of grief.
Of all the happiness you’ve earned,
I might be called the thief.

******

I met a man in a hopeless state—
Or so it seemed to be.
Yet when I greeted him, he smiled
And kindly looked on me.

******

There’s comfort in a misery
To which we are accustomed,
But newer woes can startle us
And shatter our repose.

******
 
We yearn for things we cannot get,
Neglecting what we had.
And some of us, on knowing this,
Might even feel regret.

******
   
When it’s cold and gray and raining,
In the dreary winter climes,
We remember then the sunshine
And the warmth of bygone times.
 
When the sun is high and blazing,
In the heated tropic zone,
We have dreams of clouds and rain then—
And of winters we have known.

2016 January 8th, Fri., 8:30-9:30 pm
David H. Koch Theater, Lincoln Center
Columbus Avenue and 63rd Street
New York, New York
(added later in Brooklyn: 4th quatrain 
and 3rd, 4th & 5th quatrains from end)
  

a big fat ingrate, giving the finger to the notorious multi-
-billionaire David H. Koch, in the theater named after him
at the Lincoln Center, New York City, 2016 January 8th
(Click on the image for a slightly better view of the degenerate,
and then click on the white X at the top right of the black
background to return to this post.)

  

Yet More Broverbs

   
Yet More Broverbs 

Rat looking through knothole

                           
                                  

When all the light has faded from the sky,
And all the sparkle from the children’s eyes,
Then in the darkness, one may mutter, “Why?”
And know the answers will be more of lies.

How many ways there are to make us slaves,
How few the paths that lead to liberty!
How quickly roads can slope towards defeat,
How long, how steep, the climb to victory!

The truth is seen, by those who care to see.
And having seen, we try to see again.
But in the fog of lies, we still may doubt,
And though we seek, our search is oft in vain.

We look for light, the hopeful light of dawn,
But all we see are meteors that streak.
And when the moon arises, then we bay,
And think this is the sun for which we seek.

Towards mirages, seen as heart’s desires,
We make our journeys, leaving that behind,
Whose waters slake the thirsts and quench the fires
That plague the body and inflame the mind.

Whenever man or deed or enterprise
Is magnified, a dwarfing, then expect.
Wherever you may hear the title, “great”,
There, you’ll find the loss of true respect.

Beware the "uplift" that can ruin our lives,
That forces us to do as others bid.
Let each be free to walk his chosen path,
And be, forever, of these lashings rid.

The stated aims are “noble”, yet you see
The worst of all that’s “vulgar” in the rush.
And so it’s been with all nobility.
The ones who climb, do this on those they crush.

Our schools are built as factories, in which
We train our children to be slaves – or sly.
So some will rise to be our masters, while
The rest will serve – and rarely question why.

We rob our children of their innocence.
We make them gallop, curb their dawdling ways.
We stupefy them with our clever games
And make a hell of all their dwindling days.

The schools reward the liars and the cheats.
They punish diligence and questioning.
And so we ready children for the road
That lies ahead, with gilt that's glittering.

The parents toil to buy the newest toys
For kids who work to shop for gizmos more.
And so it is – that many girls and boys
Are dumber now than those who went before.

It's cheaper, yes, to hire an immigrant
Who lacks his papers, or a child at school.
And so, "There's jobs." we say, "Go out and work!"
We call the jobless one "a lazy fool".

The horse that pulls may still be ridden on.
And so it is with all our working ones.
Their proper role was once to just produce,
But now, they buy – and so, the engine runs.

How elegant the setting on the table,
How heavenly, the servings on the plates!
But who dare look for all the sweat and gore
Of men who mined and beasts that met their fates?

How easily our virtues past are turned
To vices by our lords for power’s sake.
We do what we are told is right, but then
We realize it’s wrong – and our mistake.

But only rarely does this happen when
We still could act to free ourselves from chains.
It's only later, though it still is rare,
That wisdom comes – while servitude remains.

How easily our vices old are tapped,
As vices new are fashioned in their turn.
And so we are, by vice and virtue, trapped.
Our Neros fiddle, while our children burn.

How glorious, the castles built above!
For wealth and power, lords on high compete.
They dine on labor, even drink of love.
But all the workers taste is harsh defeat.

A man may see a boulder or a tree.
Another sees, in each of them, much more.
There’s sight – and that which reaches deep within
To see what is and what was there before.

We live in just the present instant, yet
We know our trails, as snails may know their slime.
And once or twice a lifetime, each may glimpse
What comes, by peering through the fence of time.

We chatter and we chatter till we die,
And yet, there is a silent one within.
It sees the truth as we pursue the lie,
And tries to warn us of the price of sin.

2014 March 12, Wed.
Brooklyn, New York