Poetics: 100 Bottles

Bottles by Borg de Nobel / http://borgeous.wordpress.com / used with permission /

100 Bottles

When young we sang
100 Bottles of Beer on the Wall
with all the windows open in
the church camp bus.

      It didn't shock Jesus, who was
   known to have enjoyed wine
in his time.

Still young I had
100 hangovers against my will
even with best intentions to
have just two drinks.

   It didn't shock Mama, who had
      grown as co-dependent
with my dad. 

Less young I said
100 times The Serenity Prayer
with twenty others struggling for
sober freedom.

It didn't shock Mozart, who was
   bone, breath, higher power
      for my soul.



Written for Poetics — Borg de Nobel  — at dVerse Poets. Our host, Claudia Schoenfeld, writes:

The cool thing about twitter is, that you constantly stumble upon lots of interesting people. A while ago, I found Borg de Nobel, a dutch painter in the twitter stream, checked her website and thought it would be cool to invite her to the pub with some of her paintings and have us write poems, inspired by her artwork.

I loved each of the paintings for this prompt, but the one with the bottles spoke to me. Thanks to Claudia for introducing us to Borg de Nobel, and for her great idea.

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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart born this day

I immersed myself in Mozart's music in my first year of sobriety. With his music, and reading everything our library offered on Zen, my soul began the healing process. I honor his birthday each January 27 with reverence and gratitude.

Salieri gets a look at some original compositions of Mozart, shown to him by Mozart's wife. And he is simply astounded. A brilliant scene from a Best Picture Winner.
(Scene description by LazyLightning66, who posted this - one of my favorite movie scenes - at YouTube.)

Mozart at Greenbelt
for Niki and Sarah

We lie upon the grass on God's good earth
and listen to the Requiem's intense,
long, love-laden keening, calling forth
echoes of Eden, blessing every sense
with brimming blisses, every death with birth,
until all passion passes into praise.

I bless the winding paths that brought us here,
I bless this day, distinct amidst our days,
I bless the light, the music-laden air,
I bless the interweaving of our ways,
the lifting of the burdens that we bear,
I bless the broken body that we share

Sanctus the heart, Sanctus the spirit cries,
Sanctus the flesh in every touch replies

© Malcolm Guite

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