Our children, who art on earth

[PrinceMyshkin]

Our children, who art on earth
to help us reach the light
of our humanity,

hallowed be thy bones,
thy hearts and minds,
may thy needs be met, especially thy need for love.

Give us each day thy carefree smiles,
thy wide-eyed questions
about everything.

Trust us that we have your best interests at heart
and forgive us our lapses
into infantile adulthood

as we forgive the world
for being less than you deserve.

[qimissung]

Wow! This is the kind of poem, Prince, that everyone wishes they had written!

[Virgil]

Hehe, I like the poem Prince, certainly thematically, I agree. Have you read Hemingway's version of something similar? I think it's in his short story "A Clean Well Lighted Place. Unfortunately Hemingway's short short stories are not electronically on the internet.

Opps, edit, there is A Clean Well Lighted Place on the internet. Here's that passage:


"Good night," the other said. Turning off the electric light he continued the conversation with himself, It was the light of course but it is necessary that the place be clean and pleasant. You do not want music. Certainly you do not want music. Nor can you stand before a bar with dignity although that is all that isprovided for these hours. What did he fear? It was not a fear ordread, It was a nothing that he knew too well. It was all anothing and a man was a nothing too. It was only that and light was all it needed and a certain cleanness and order. Some lived init and never felt it but he knew it all was nada y pues nada y naday pues nada. Our nada who art in nada, nada be thy name thy kingdom nada thy will be nada in nada as it is in nada. Give usthis nada our daily nada and nada us our nada as we nada our nadas and nada us not into nada but deliver us from nada; pues nada. Hail nothing full of nothing, nothing is with thee. He smiled and stood before a bar with a shining steam pressure coffee machine.
http://www.mrbauld.com/hemclean.html

I think I like yours (Prince) better. ;)

[PrinceMyshkin]

Wow! This is the kind of poem, Prince, that everyone wishes they had written!

Umm, well, before somebody outs me, let me confess that someone else DID write it (Matthew 6:9-13); I merely changed some of the words!

[PrinceMyshkin]

Hehe, I like the poem Prince, certainly thematically, I agree. Have you read Hemingway's version of something similar? I think it's in his short story "A Clean Well Lighted Place. Unfortunately Hemingway's short short stories are not electronically on the internet.

Opps, edit, there is A Clean Well Lighted Place on the internet. Here's that passage:


http://www.mrbauld.com/hemclean.html

I think I like yours (Prince) better. ;)

There's a big difference, surely, in that Hemingway's version is bitterly cynical. Does anyone still read Hemingway, do you think, with that sense of wonder with which one once read him? It all seems so mannered now, virtually crying out to be parodied - or is it already something of a self-parody?

[Virgil]

I read Hemingway's short stories. I've come to agree that his novels are over rated, and some of them outright poor. But his short stories really do hold up. No question he is easy to parody, but he did strive to find a clean, lean style. In fact his prose reminds me of your poetry. Perhaps what I mean to say there is that both of you strive to say something that may be complex simply, clearly, effortlessly, succinctly, and smoothly.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Wow! I'm IMMENSELY flattered by:


his prose reminds me of your poetry. Perhaps what I mean to say there is that both of you strive to say something that may be complex simply, clearly, effortlessly, succinctly, and smoothly.

but since I can always find something to worry about, the comparison evokes my fear that I might one day fall victim to my own poetic mannerisms - if indeed I haven't already done so! But you're very much on target in identifying what I aim to do and how I try to do it.

[qimissung]

Perhaps what I mean to say there is that both of you strive to say something that may be complex simply, clearly, effortlessly, succinctly, and smoothly.

Very well said, Virgil, and I agree, concerning both Prince and Hemingway.

And Prince, I have to say that I did recognize the "Our Father" prayer; still, your poem is prayerful in its' hopes and wishes for benighted mankind, and it is the kind of thing about which I think "I wsh I had written that."

[firefangled]

A beautifully worded sentiment built on the original foundation. More grounded that the original I would add, as seems your intention.

The thing that is consistently present in your poetry is an amazing dignification of the child and our responsibility as parents and adults to honor their infinite posibilities in what we do.

Your children and grandchildren are most fortunate for this.

[PrinceMyshkin]

A beautifully worded sentiment built on the original foundation. More grounded that the original I would add, as seems your intention.

The thing that is consistently present in your poetry is an amazing dignification of the child and our responsibility as parents and adults to honor their infinite posibilities in what we do.

Your children and grandchildren are most fortunate for this.

Many thanks for that, especially in view of this privately communicated opinion by a sometime contributor here, a person of high and rigorous standards:


I like it....it's a little kitschy...it veers a little toward greeting card poetry...but I do like it.

Although I know what I mean when I characterize something as kitsch or kitschy, I thought to look it up:


something of tawdry design, appearance or content created to appeal to popular or undiscriminating taste...

Now I doubt that my friend meant it exactly that way - especially not the accusation of calculation - but 1) I'm always looking over my own shoulder as I write to ensure as much as possible that I'm not sucking up to my would-be audience, and 2) isn't it a sad comment on contemporary sensibility that to speak with open-hearted even if naive sincerity should evoke suspicions of kitschiness and/or greeting card mawkishness!

My grandchildren: with what I know to be a bit of poetic license or floridness, I refer to them as my bonfires against the night! Gabriel, Hella, Lucy, Sapphire and Mahalia-called-Meieli...

[Makai]

I adore Kitschy things but I don't see that in your poem at all Prince, I see love and hear a reminder to love, especially the children.

[qimissung]

H-m-m-. I'd hardly call it kitschy or mawkish.

[kiz_paws]

Our children, who art on earth
to help us reach the light
of our humanity,
hallowed be thy bones,
thy hearts and minds,
may thy needs be met, especially thy need for love.

Give us each day thy carefree smiles,
thy wide-eyed questions
about everything.
Trust us that we have your best interests at heart
and forgive us our lapses
into infantile adulthood
as we forgive the world
for being less than you deserve.
Beautiful. :nod:
You have such good ideas, Jer, keep 'em coming!

[PrinceMyshkin]

Beautiful. :nod:
You have such good ideas, Jer, keep 'em coming!

I wonder if you have a clue, a vague suspicion, the tiniest iota of an idea how much this in particular and your many other appreciative comments mean to me?

[kiz_paws]

I wonder if you have a clue, a vague suspicion, the tiniest iota of an idea how much this in particular and your many other appreciative comments mean to me?
Awww, that's sweet. :blush:
LitNet is fortunate to house you, and a handful of others, who enrich our day with a well-penned thought in the form of a poem. It almost connects hearts when a reader views the words of a poet. No, it DOES connect hearts.

Thank you, my friend.
~K♥zzo