Trying this on for size.

A reading of the famous poem on Stoicism.

LISTEN HERE

https://on.soundcloud.com/AnCimTAbyrohkKaA7

https://drive.google.com/file/d/18w9bBuyO4i6O-iYxeF84n2AWib-Hc4jV/view?usp=drivesdk

A little silly poem about the simplicity of being a butterfly.

Listen Here : 59 seconds length

Oh, Pretty Butterfly:

Oh, pretty butterfly

You flutter over the same flowers

You visited yesterday

A simple life of unvaried existence

Without showing wear to your psyche

Or perhaps you enjoy

The monotony where your day is planned

And perfected

Never needing help or unsure of your skills

You flutter from flower to flower

To enjoy the buffet in the sunlight

You don’t have a reservation

Or good credit to pay

For the indulgence of food to keep you alive

Your home is where you make it

And not dependent on your good fortune

Or by what side of a line you built your cocoon

So please beautiful butterfly

Take all that you can from the flowers in my garden

As I planted them to entice your colorful wings

To make my day brighter

If I go back through time

Ignore reason and rhyme

And just look at the messes Ive made

It takes only a moment

When I sit, face and own it

Before my smile and calm start to fade

What an ass! What a jerk!

My inner voice cries

Who are you? What are you?

Are you even alive?

What the hell? Are you for real?

How even and why?

I did my best dance

My best try I tried

I gave better than I have received

I’ve seen smiles

Tasted joy. Tasted love from above

Given all to those who did need

Now, my demons are caged.

Locked up far away

Long ago, may they rot where they lay

The havoc they wrought

Has been mended by thought

Deeds, actions, day after day

But the scars on my soul

Faded, withered

Now old

Still burn in the light of the day

https://on.soundcloud.com/zxpyQBYz297EnQwN6

What I need is…

In Contemplation of bisexuality.

By Ronda Slater

I came across this poem while randomly scrolling Reddit Poetry Subs awhile back. 

I really liked the detailed variety the author presented in each “or maybe” contemplation. 

I ended up ordering the book upon seeing this interesting anthology had a plethora of fiction, non fiction, art, and poetry creations by so many bisexual people sharing pieces of their lives.

Cite Source: ~Bi Any Other Name.~ Bisexual people speak out.

Edited by Loraine Hutchins and Lani Kaahumanu

Copyright Alyson Books, 1991.

Here is my reading of this interesting poetry piece : What I need is...

Poem Text

What I need is an angular man with muscles and bones built for thrusting

Or maybe

What I need is a satin-skinned woman with fingers that dance on my body

Or maybe

What I need is a Trojan Horse lover who is really a woman named Helen, in hiding,

Or maybe

What I need is a magical man who grows gardens of herbs and heals with the laying on of his hands

Or maybe

What I need is a lyrical lady with hair down to here whole writes poems and songs about me for a change,

Or maybe

What I need is a sensual socialist androgynous feminist who doesn’t smoke cigarettes

Or maybe

Love is like water

And when you find out you need it, who cares where it comes from,

Or maybe

Everyone is a well just waiting for me to send my ladle down.

audio reading of Enthralled

Enthralled

Teach me to sin—

In love's forbidden ways,

For you can make all passion pure;

The magic lure of your sweet eyes

Each shape of sin makes virtue praise.

Teach me to sin—

Enslave me to your wanton charms,

Crush me in your velvet arms

And make me, make me love you.

Make me fire your blood with new desire,

And make me kiss you—lip and limb,

Till senses reel and pulses swim.

Aye! even if you hate me,

Teach me to sin.

The minister John Watson ― pen-name Ian MacLaren ― wrote a quote often misattributed to Plato:

"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle."

I have always been equally fascinated and devastated by the concept of hidden inner lives and Sonder.

This poem by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer addresses the thought of entire universes of hearts breaking in vacuum, thinly concealed behind passing silent smiles.

It seemed almost crafted to be spoken, so I couldn't resist.

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Hey guys, this is my first time posting here, so don't go too hard on me please :)

English is also not my first language, so apologies for any potential wrong pronunciations.

This poem has been in my head for years now, and somehow it really called to me, so I wanted to share it with you guys. Hope you enjoy!

-Anni

Audio: https://soundgasm.net/u/peace_al/Why-She-Disappeared-Taylor-Swift

Source of the poem: https://genius.com/Taylor-swift-why-she-disappeared-poem-annotated

Lucille Clifton is a celebrated poet who wrote for both the American Civil Rights and gender equality movements, and who knew first hand that issues of disadvantage were never simple.

This poem is one of her less well known, but undeservedly so. It showcases a subtle but no less fierce determination to define, create, and revel in her own self image.

So how could I possibly resist this battle-scarred joy?

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Mary Oliver is a firm favourite poet, not least because of her lifelong personal love of the natural world as a connection to existence and the holy.

My favourite of all her works is one of her less famous — In Blackwater Woods.

It was written in the aftermath of her beloved woodlands having been devastated by fire, and describes not just her confusion at the changes wrought, but also the quiet epiphany that all love contains the promise of loss.

Without renewal, there is no transcendence, and this knowledge gives love meaning.

.

This poem by David Whyte is a beautiful swirl of the bitter and the sweet together, set in memory's amber.

It is so easy to find writings - of varying coherence and vehemence - about love both unrequited or unreturned, and the bulk of these are either wistful daydream or acrimonious fantasy.

However I choose to see all honest love as sacred and deserving of joy, and so could not pass up this rarest benediction.

.

I found each of these poems in "The Collected Poems of Sara Teasdale." They all spoke to me in one way or another and I recorded them a while back. I will link the written words first for those of you who like to read poetry. My recordings will be below.

Sara Teasdale's work transcends time. The emotions, the visuals, and the complex simplicity of her words speak to me.

Poetry:

Sand Drift poem

Blue Squills poem

I Am Not Yours poem

Audios:

Sand Drift audio

Blue Squills audio

I Am Not Yours audio

--LittleLadyofT

https://soundgasm.net/u/Babiigirl/Chip-Away

There are no words none that I can write with My eloquent quick wit gun suddenly alludes me cruely I halt my former sprint once blindly overzealous now as happy for the couples as I am selfishly jealous I can love you now I know Cus I loathe your lies Only to shout out mine Now I finally long to go I wince at the wind’s kisses This time with some bone Braving new bounderies Means breakthroughs alone perfect denial meets outcast exiled Carving hearts of stone Is never done all alone

Let us go then, you and I,

When the evening is spread out against the sky...

Reading the first few stanzas.

This is my first post here, let me know if you liked it!

Link: https://soundgasm.net/u/IAReadings/Reading-The-Love-Song-of-J-Alfred-Prufrock-by-T-S-Eliot

I bought this lovely book a while ago called Poems on Nature, a collection introduced by Helen Macdonald and this is the first poem I've recorded from it!

📖 Read here
🎧 Listen here, without sfx
🎧 Listen here, with sfx

Thanks for checking in!

XX,
Missy

This writing piece appeals to me when I'm struggling with writer's block.

I suppose the words were a reminder that not being in the right headspace or feeling a lack of motivation is perfectly fine. Do it when you mean it.

The source to it's original content can be found here at Poets.org

Featured in sifting through the madness for the Word, the line, the way. Charles Bukowski. 

This is my reading of "So you want to be a writer?"

Text

if it doesn't come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don't do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don't do it.
if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don't do it.
if you're doing it for money or
fame,
don't do it.
if you're doing it because you want
women in your bed,
don't do it.
if you have to sit there and
rewrite it again and again,
don't do it.
if it's hard work just thinking about doing it,
don't do it.
if you're trying to write like somebody
else,
forget about it.

if you have to wait for it to roar out of
you,
then wait patiently.
if it never does roar out of you,
do something else.

if you first have to read it to your wife
or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
or your parents or to anybody at all,
you're not ready.

don't be like so many writers,
don't be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don't be dull and boring and
pretentious, don't be consumed with self-
love.
the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to
sleep
over your kind.
don't add to that.
don't do it.
unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don't do it.
unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don't do it.

when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in you.

there is no other way.

and there never was.

[F] This Spring - a poem by James A. Pearson

🎧▶️ Listen to the Audio Here

Short, simple and to the point. Found this one irresistible, had to record.

📚📖 Read the Text Here

Here is my reading! This is the last poem in a collection I’ve been working on called “The Space Between.”

———

I just wanted to tell you that

when you feel a tug on your heart—

that’s me in there

working my magic.

I am still afraid to look up

but each time I do

the moon breathes life back in

and I forget.

I can’t breathe.

So I say

“I can see the trees

and the stars

the moon

a trail of wood

the fire.”

I try a breath again

and I say,

“I smell sunscreen

and ladybugs

water from the creek

and smoke.”

I can hear.

Cicadas.

The resonance swells in my head.

I’m thinking.

Do you remember what it was like

to think when you were eight?

The cicadas buzz further and I’m thinking.

If I look up

will I feel the same as you did?

I remember now.

We are always

waiting on miracles

around

the sound of cicadas.

— by Grace Smith

This has been my favorite love poem forever. I hope you enjoy my reading of it. Here is the poem and here is my reading.

Feedback is always welcome!

xoxo

A poem by New York State Poet and civil rights activist Audre Lorde, written in 1978. It describes the relentless suppression of the marginalised; the vulnerable forced to permanently live in fear of extinction. They are denied the luxuries of spare time and choice, as every decision becomes crucial. Including that of speaking out.

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I felt a resonance with the ongoing inescapable and ambient fear that is the experience of living with anxiety and mood disorders. Acknowledging the privilege and good fortune of my personal circumstances, I chose this as advocacy.

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I didnt realise this poem was so long - so hauntingly beautiful. I hope you like my narration

https://soundgasm.net/u/wordsforthesoul01/Auguries-of-Innocence-by-William-Blake

Auguries of Innocence

BY WILLIAM BLAKE

To see a World in a Grain of Sand 
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower 
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand 
And Eternity in an hour
A Robin Red breast in a Cage 
Puts all Heaven in a Rage 
A Dove house filld with Doves & Pigeons 
Shudders Hell thr' all its regions 
A dog starvd at his Masters Gate 
Predicts the ruin of the State 
A Horse misusd upon the Road 
Calls to Heaven for Human blood 
Each outcry of the hunted Hare 
A fibre from the Brain does tear 
A Skylark wounded in the wing 
A Cherubim does cease to sing 
The Game Cock clipd & armd for fight 
Does the Rising Sun affright 
Every Wolfs & Lions howl 
Raises from Hell a Human Soul 
The wild deer, wandring here & there 
Keeps the Human Soul from Care 
The Lamb misusd breeds Public Strife 
And yet forgives the Butchers knife 
The Bat that flits at close of Eve 
Has left the Brain that wont Believe
The Owl that calls upon the Night 
Speaks the Unbelievers fright
He who shall hurt the little Wren 
Shall never be belovd by Men 
He who the Ox to wrath has movd 
Shall never be by Woman lovd
The wanton Boy that kills the Fly 
Shall feel the Spiders enmity 
He who torments the Chafers Sprite 
Weaves a Bower in endless Night 
The Catterpiller on the Leaf 
Repeats to thee thy Mothers grief 
Kill not the Moth nor Butterfly 
For the Last Judgment draweth nigh Auguries of Innocence