I don’t know but there’s something special in poetry that always draws me. I’m not sure if it’s the flowing words or the rhyme or the imagery that pops up in your head or that feeling of being one with it.

Though I’ve always loved poetry, I’ve only read poems of a handful of poets. I used to write some while in school(and have won prizes.. lol :P) and as bi-weekly poetry prompts on twitter. In all these years I saw myself transitioning from full-rhyme poems to haiku. Now, it’s almost 3 years since I’ve written any. It doesn’t come naturally nor do I sit down and try to bring myself in that state of mind.  I simply let it go  :(

I still appreciate poetry though and I love Kahlil Gibran’s works. I’ve read almost all his books. They are very very profound and takes me a while to pause, think and assimilate fully. Apart from his books I have a few random favourites. Here’s a motivational one:

From < https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/51642/invictus >

Invictus

By William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not winced nor cried aloud.

Under the bludgeonings of chance

My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the Horror of the shade,

And yet the menace of the years

Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll,

I am the master of my fate,

I am the captain of my soul.

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Another one:

From < https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46473/if--- >

If—

By Rudyard Kipling

(‘Brother Square-Toes’—Rewards and Fairies)

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,

And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;

If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,

And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

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Some of my other favourites include Robert Frost, Sylvia Plath etc.