The supply of love will never exceed the demand, but it should.
TO BEGIN WITH
When someone asks me how long it took me to write a particular poem, like, for one, this "sunset" poem below, I ask what is the date indicated below the poem. And even if I used up only minutes to commit the words to paper, I add the life I've lived to the point of writing and give that as my answer.
I say my poems of ten years ago are very different from the ones I write today. The work I do tomorrow could be miles apart from that done yesterday. My feelings when I wrote a particular poem may not be the same feelings I feel today.
No one can judge any poem. Any poetry cannot be judged against those poets who have gone before or even its contemporaries. Because the poet is the poem. No one can judge what the poet felt at that moment. No one can safely tell what the poems should be or should have been, because it was the writer who lived in them... they are their feelings and experiences and must stand as such.
If you read a poem of mine and identify with it, then the poem becomes your experience. You will live it your own way - read into it something I probably never meant to say. That's how it should be.
Writing poetry is never a competition. It will always be an experience.
this is a september sunset
but grey clouds are cheating us of the stars
I mark this spot on my calendar
this 28th day of september that you’re not
around
like days in roadway inn
like nights on madelaine’s place
I circle it in red
so next year I can remember
laugh and say I over-dramatized your absence
I am alone in this stormy island
hundreds of miles away from anything
I can call home
do you know what cebu means?
it means “change everything… but us”
I know it’s corny, yeah, it is
but as corny as it sounds
you know it’s true
and longing hearts were always
like that
sitting here at the airport
felt like I’m the best-selling author
of nights in rodanthe
just thinking, wishing, just that
wanting to write, but like you
absent were paper and pens
if I could tell you one thing
this lonesome september night
I’ll say it as loving as I can
don’t wait for love
but do attend to it when it comes
(September 2007)
TO BEGIN WITH
When someone asks me how long it took me to write a particular poem, like, for one, this "sunset" poem below, I ask what is the date indicated below the poem. And even if I used up only minutes to commit the words to paper, I add the life I've lived to the point of writing and give that as my answer.
I say my poems of ten years ago are very different from the ones I write today. The work I do tomorrow could be miles apart from that done yesterday. My feelings when I wrote a particular poem may not be the same feelings I feel today.
No one can judge any poem. Any poetry cannot be judged against those poets who have gone before or even its contemporaries. Because the poet is the poem. No one can judge what the poet felt at that moment. No one can safely tell what the poems should be or should have been, because it was the writer who lived in them... they are their feelings and experiences and must stand as such.
If you read a poem of mine and identify with it, then the poem becomes your experience. You will live it your own way - read into it something I probably never meant to say. That's how it should be.
Writing poetry is never a competition. It will always be an experience.
ON LOVE
For years, in an attempt to define or redefine love, I’ve filled whole books. I’ve said that “love is knowing when to be quiet, even when it hurts,” that it is “like the washing of waves,” and “anything that’s done with love is done with care.” I love, and therefore I am is too simple. That I write so much on love must mean it is important to me.
It may be that we have used the word love too often that its meaning has become obscured. The dictionary tells us that love is (1) the profoundly tender or passionate affection for a person of the opposite sex; (2) a feeling of warm personal attachment or deep affection, as for a parent, child, or sometimes to a friend; (3) a person toward whom love is felt; beloved person, sweetheart; (4) affectionate concern for the well-being of others; (5) strong predilection or liking for anything; (6) the object or thing so liked; and finally, (7) the benevolent affection of God for his creatures, or the reverent affection due God for them. This is how the world has made and mentioned love all these times. Despite the world’s many definitions, love is both more and less than the descriptions of those who do our thinking for us.
Here on earth, the supply of love will never exceed the demand, but it should. There are people who wanted, needed love but the one they expect to give it to them doesn’t, thus they say “love is inexistent.” There are people who have a lot of love to give, but the one they wanted to give it to rejects it, thus they say “love is an illusion.” There are people who didn’t want or need any love, and consequently doesn’t give any love, thus they say “love is being selfish.” And finally there are people who have been hurt too many times, in not getting what they want, and are just confused about love and loving, thus they say “we cannot define love.”
In knowing love, one must have a lot of patience. Particularly, patience in his or her own self. Time will come when we will know love, we just have to wait. Different people needed different durations, we’re that unique. We also must have a lot of hope. In a crazy, bluffy world we live in, it’s really very easy to give up on love and say, “ahhh… I just don’t know what love is” or “I don’t know if love will ever find me.” And a lot of faith. For who is best to define love than He who is love. We just have to believe. If not, then there’s nothing any One can do, and we’ll never find ourselves coming out from the mudpit of confusion we are in.
It is our choice whether to believe love or not. Anyway, it was Love Himself Who gave us all the freedom to choose.
Love has been defined; not by the intellectual geniuses the world knows or has known. And it is being defined every day; sometimes love’s definition is right smack in our face, we just don’t want to accept it and believe it.
Oh, and by the way, here is what Scripture has to say on love:
I may speak in different languages of men or even angels, but if I don’t have love, then I am only a noisy bell or a ringing cymbal. I may have the gift of prophecy; I may understand all the secret things of God and know everything; and I may have faith so great that I can move mountains. But even with all these things, if I don’t have love, then I am nothing. I may give everything I have to feed people, and I may even give my body as an offering to be burned, but I gain nothing by doing these things if I don’t have love.
Love is patient, and love is kind. Love is not jealous, it does not boast, and it is not proud. Love is not rude, love is not selfish, and love does not become angry easily. Love does not remember wrongs done against it.
Love is not happy with evil, but love is happy with the truth. Love patiently accepts all things. Love always trusts, always hopes, and always continues strong.
Love never ends. There are gifts of prophecy, but they will be ended. There are gifts of speaking in different kinds of languages, but those gifts will end. There is the gift of knowledge, but it will be ended. These things will end, because this knowledge and these prophecies we have are not complete. But when perfection comes, the things that are not complete will end.
When I was a child, I talked like a child; I thought like a child; I made plans like a child. When I became a man, I stopped those childish ways. It is the same with us. Now we see like we are looking into a dark mirror. But at that time, in the future, we shall see clearly. Now I know only a part. But at that time I will know fully, like God has known me.
For years, in an attempt to define or redefine love, I’ve filled whole books. I’ve said that “love is knowing when to be quiet, even when it hurts,” that it is “like the washing of waves,” and “anything that’s done with love is done with care.” I love, and therefore I am is too simple. That I write so much on love must mean it is important to me.
It may be that we have used the word love too often that its meaning has become obscured. The dictionary tells us that love is (1) the profoundly tender or passionate affection for a person of the opposite sex; (2) a feeling of warm personal attachment or deep affection, as for a parent, child, or sometimes to a friend; (3) a person toward whom love is felt; beloved person, sweetheart; (4) affectionate concern for the well-being of others; (5) strong predilection or liking for anything; (6) the object or thing so liked; and finally, (7) the benevolent affection of God for his creatures, or the reverent affection due God for them. This is how the world has made and mentioned love all these times. Despite the world’s many definitions, love is both more and less than the descriptions of those who do our thinking for us.
Here on earth, the supply of love will never exceed the demand, but it should. There are people who wanted, needed love but the one they expect to give it to them doesn’t, thus they say “love is inexistent.” There are people who have a lot of love to give, but the one they wanted to give it to rejects it, thus they say “love is an illusion.” There are people who didn’t want or need any love, and consequently doesn’t give any love, thus they say “love is being selfish.” And finally there are people who have been hurt too many times, in not getting what they want, and are just confused about love and loving, thus they say “we cannot define love.”
In knowing love, one must have a lot of patience. Particularly, patience in his or her own self. Time will come when we will know love, we just have to wait. Different people needed different durations, we’re that unique. We also must have a lot of hope. In a crazy, bluffy world we live in, it’s really very easy to give up on love and say, “ahhh… I just don’t know what love is” or “I don’t know if love will ever find me.” And a lot of faith. For who is best to define love than He who is love. We just have to believe. If not, then there’s nothing any One can do, and we’ll never find ourselves coming out from the mudpit of confusion we are in.
It is our choice whether to believe love or not. Anyway, it was Love Himself Who gave us all the freedom to choose.
Love has been defined; not by the intellectual geniuses the world knows or has known. And it is being defined every day; sometimes love’s definition is right smack in our face, we just don’t want to accept it and believe it.
Oh, and by the way, here is what Scripture has to say on love:
I may speak in different languages of men or even angels, but if I don’t have love, then I am only a noisy bell or a ringing cymbal. I may have the gift of prophecy; I may understand all the secret things of God and know everything; and I may have faith so great that I can move mountains. But even with all these things, if I don’t have love, then I am nothing. I may give everything I have to feed people, and I may even give my body as an offering to be burned, but I gain nothing by doing these things if I don’t have love.
Love is patient, and love is kind. Love is not jealous, it does not boast, and it is not proud. Love is not rude, love is not selfish, and love does not become angry easily. Love does not remember wrongs done against it.
Love is not happy with evil, but love is happy with the truth. Love patiently accepts all things. Love always trusts, always hopes, and always continues strong.
Love never ends. There are gifts of prophecy, but they will be ended. There are gifts of speaking in different kinds of languages, but those gifts will end. There is the gift of knowledge, but it will be ended. These things will end, because this knowledge and these prophecies we have are not complete. But when perfection comes, the things that are not complete will end.
When I was a child, I talked like a child; I thought like a child; I made plans like a child. When I became a man, I stopped those childish ways. It is the same with us. Now we see like we are looking into a dark mirror. But at that time, in the future, we shall see clearly. Now I know only a part. But at that time I will know fully, like God has known me.
So these three things continue: faith, hope, and love. And the greatest of these is love.
Random Thoughts
Never take a poet literally. What we write is only as important as you make it and as it applies to you.
Poets shouldn’t try to change the world. It is enough to change a mind or two and try to make a good day better.
None of us is so rich and influential that we cannot be further enriched by love.
Poem of the Week
SUNSET, CEBU, NICHOLAS SPARKS AND POETRY
by Raymund Tamayo
this is a september sunset
but grey clouds are cheating us of the stars
I mark this spot on my calendar
this 28th day of september that you’re not
around
like days in roadway inn
like nights on madelaine’s place
I circle it in red
so next year I can remember
laugh and say I over-dramatized your absence
I am alone in this stormy island
hundreds of miles away from anything
I can call home
do you know what cebu means?
it means “change everything… but us”
I know it’s corny, yeah, it is
but as corny as it sounds
you know it’s true
and longing hearts were always
like that
sitting here at the airport
felt like I’m the best-selling author
of nights in rodanthe
just thinking, wishing, just that
wanting to write, but like you
absent were paper and pens
if I could tell you one thing
this lonesome september night
I’ll say it as loving as I can
don’t wait for love
but do attend to it when it comes
(September 2007)
AND FINALLY
September is coming, and still there seemed to be no end in sight for this pandemic. I know, it's getting harder and harder to keep ourselves inspired. Let's not give up. Let's hold on as long as we can. Always take care and Sleep Warm.
Thanks for stopping by - see you when I see you.
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