Saturday, July 29, 2017
Your Broken Hallelujah
We all have experienced a broken hallelujah at some point in our lives. It didn’t have to be about a religious awakening but it felt like one. That point in your life when something you strongly believed in shattered and you were left with broken pieces to try to put back together or find some sense among the shambles. It doesn’t have to be written in the form of the original broken hallelujah (although mine is)... just show us your broken pieces...give us your broken hallelujah.
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I once believe that god was real
ReplyDeleteknew every thing that i did feel
How could I know the words were meant to fool ya
in joyous love i spread his story
of his agony and glory
and cried out hallelujah
Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
We’d raise the goblet in a toast
To Father, Son and Holy Ghost
Although they never really knew ya
Eat the bread and drink the wine
Forgiveness was yours and mine
We sang out hallelujah
Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
then one day I found the truth
not the fairy tales of my youth
Into the web of deceit they drew ya
there was no god or heaven above
No unconditional love
I cried out hallelujah
Hallelujah Hallelujah Hallelujah hallelujah
In the eye death i did stare
She said take it to the lord in prayer
Don’t let the devil rule ya
She prayed for me every day
Blindly I tried to find the way
I could not hear the hallelujah
Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
A vision danced before my eyes
Promised me he’d tell no lies
Don’t let the promises unkept undo ya
I’ll lead you down the path of right
From the day into the night
As we sing out our own hallelujah
Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
He took my hand and lay me down
Upon a bed or thorny crowns
Said the world did abuse ya
When I began to bleed
He planted his unholy seed
His own broken hallelujah
Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
It echoes in the darkened halls
Where a voice of confusion calls
The cross is cracked the nails exude ya
I lift the veil to find the words
But it’s only emptiness I heard
And I sing out my broken hallelujah
Hallelujah Halle lu jah Hal le lu jah Hall e lu jah
okay I am not going to delete it again. can't believe I missed that typo but the first line should be...
DeleteI once believed that God was real... sigh...
DeleteThis is a very dramatic time in your life. This should be put to music!!! Even though my feelings on the subject are opposite I still love your poem, I love how you ended it with the broken Hallelujahs. Very unique and pointed. I read it over several times and I will read it again to Paul. I will bet that it is just as dramatic aloud as it was in my head. And I want to thank you for posting the prompt so early. It was a real satisfying way to start my Sunday!!!
lol! the poem/song is set to the original Hallelujah so there is already a tune with it. The point isn't whether you agree or disagree with my feelings but how the poem or if the poem even made you feel or think or .... I get the feeling you really didn't understand it and that is okay! you should just say that though. thanks for commenting. And why is there a huge!!!!! space between the top of the message and your post is way at the bottom? For awhile I thought you had left me a blank message.
DeletePowerful poem indeed!. Belief is a difficult thing to deal with when it is as you say, broken. An interesting subject and I will have to bring my own o the table as it evolves in my own mind.
DeleteI get it now. I don't understand the huge space between the top of the beginning and the actual comment either. lmbo!! Like Tasha said it is a very powerful poem
Deletewhen I was sixty
ReplyDeleteI thought I still had time
to go back to school
major in psychology
perhaps to do research
on schizophrenia or Downs
I worked so very hard
got A's and B's on my card
I hallelujahed and hoorawed
patted myself on the back
illness struck, I had to slack
and time was not on my side
seasons came and seasons went
I was back in school
this time it was a math course
called Statistics
I failed and failed and failed
No more Hallelujah, no more hoorah
I was in a rut, gained 20 pounds
depression, headaches followed
so close to my degree
and yet
I quit
It wasn't fun anymore
it felt more like a chore
my Hall-e-lu-jah was broken...
I was just talking with someone of how life gets in the way of the best made plans. Your dreams were shattered and I do give you credit for trying to go back and pick up where life tore them apart only to find the time had passed and you were not able to mend the broken hallelujah.
DeleteBeautiful story, though sad. However they must be sad or they wouldn't be broken, eh? Thanks for sharing. I'm still working on mine.
DeleteBonnie, Linda, Victoria, please note I posted a poem by our friend Paul Fowler on the previous prompt because he asked me to and it is a nice one too. Plus I didn't have any comments on mine at all, nor on the previous one except for Linda. Not to complain however I do appreciate it when people do and I try to comment on everyone else's. Just sayin'...
ReplyDeletewhen you post so late they are often missed as we are moving on to the next prompt. perhaps if you posted on the post announcing the prompt that yours is up we would see it as we would be notified that you posted. that way you won't be frustrated waiting for people to backtrack to find your poem and you will get comments without having to ask. just a thought.
DeleteI did go back and comment. I had missed Paul's also. I do try to comment on everyone's but as Bonnie said when the week gets late I sometimes miss some. However, I have posted late, mentioned on the next week's FB post, mention on the later post here and still ended up with very few or no comments on my late poem.
DeleteSome weeks I just can't comment. My mind isn't working that way.
DeleteThanks, all. I try to go back and check old pages myself and comment, though I'm not as knowledgeable as Victoria, whose comments I often find helpful so I especially appreciate them.
DeleteI believed really
ReplyDeleteit made so much sense to me
where did I go wrong
and that is the essence of it all. you said what I tried to convey in fewer words. well done!
DeleteShort, sweet, and to the poitn! Good job.
Deleteyou did really well!!! In a few short words you said a lot!!
DeleteIt came down to this
ReplyDeleteI took off all my clothes
and jumped into
the deepest
crevice in the stream
it was baptism by
immersion in
water or
flesh and the flesh was
more than I could handle
or so I thought
innocence
lasting only until
I broke to the surface
saw that they all
held aloft
twisted escutcheons
broken hallelujahs
charred offerings
naked host
I'd only come for
the refreshments and the
sanctuary
with a hint
of absolution
you knocked me back on my heels with this one Tad. the imagery is compelling and poignant. awesome write! but then yours always are awesome.
DeletePowerful poem with interesting imagery.
DeleteYes, I love the imagery as well as the thought provoking ending.
DeleteCaterpillar to Butterfly
ReplyDeleteI thought I meant it when I said
until death do us part, I knew,
I was so sure I never would
desert my vows or marriage bed
and yet, and yet, alas I did.
I was so sure I could hold on
I could be strong, I could be yes
myself and his and theirs all one,
until I came apart and then.
my dream of yes was shattered quite.
The breaking point came slowly yet
so surely that I did not see,
I did not know it for its edge
and when I came to see it then
I was already at the end.
My heart broke oh, it shattered quite
for there was noting left to do
but leave behind all that I was,
all I had been, and then become
the one that I was born to be.
I did not know until I knew
that I had been awaiting me
my birth was out of death and I
left my old self to learn to fly
and left the shattered self to die.
sadly this could fit just about everyone of us here. you captured the pain of lost love wonderfully
DeleteI have done my best to post earlier and hope that my fiends will comment.
ReplyDeleteI like this a lot. It captures a state of mind and a life not according to plan that hits home. I wonder if it could be a little tighter. It seems that sometimes you sort of say the same thing twice. The great thing about revising a poem is that you keep the earlier draft, so if a revision doesn't work, you can go back to it.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, and this is probably a dumb idea, but sometimes dumb ideas can lead somewhere as well as good ideas, what would happen if you kept the basic structure of the poem, the five stanzas, each another step in the transformation, but made each stanza four instead of five?
And by saying the same thing twice, I don't mean deliberate repetition like "and yet, and yet," which I find very effective.
DeleteHow is this?
DeleteCaterpillar to Butterfly
I thought I meant it when I said
until death do us part, I knew,
I was so sure I never would
desert my vows or marriage bed
and yet, and yet, alas I did.
I was so sure I could hold on
I could be strong, I could be yes
myself and his and theirs all one,
until I came apart and then.
my dream of yes was shattered quite.
The breaking point came slowly so
I did not know until I knew
that I had been awaiting me
my birth was out of death and I
rose from that death to learn to fly
and left the shattered self to die.
It made more sense to collapse the stanzas into each other and I ended up with four, of four lines. Tell me what you think? I think the first one is more dramatic however, the second one works too....
Deleteyou certainly did capture the feeling of lost love. I am sure that artists and writers all experience such things. It is a beautiful poem. both versions. I liked the and yet and yet.
DeleteI think it's much stronger.
DeleteOkay, I tried to do this without parodying the song, but I just couldn't do it. When I gave in to the rhythm of the song, it came easy. Meant to be funny but some of it didn't come out that way. LOL.
ReplyDeleteI've always knew that I would die
But to tell the truth and not a lie
I hate that I am getting old, I do, yes.
It goes like this
at sixty six.
The minor fall, the broken hip
The baffled soul denying "I'm not old yet."
I'm not old yet. I'm not old yet.
I'm not old yet. I'm not old yet.
My body's strong, I showed as proof
I still could climb up on the roof
Still can play a game, match set,
Still can hike the mountain trail,
Still can win and rarely fail
And from my lips I say that I'm not old yet.
I'm not old yet. I'm not old yet.
I'm not old yet. I'm not old yet.
I've not been in this place before
Where I can't get up off the floor,
or drink so much that I regret
I never thought that I'd get old
although I knew, and had been told
and now I'm cold and still say I'm not old yet.
I'm not old yet. I'm not old yet.
I'm not old yet. I'm not old yet.
You're not old. You're still running that East Tennessee Ring Dang Doo and beating people up.
DeleteI love it! love it! love it! lmbo!!!
DeleteVery cute and nicely done.
DeleteLike Bonnie, I LOVE IT!!!!!
DeleteOur friend Paul Fowler asked me to post this for him. It is his response to Bonnie's Prompt.
ReplyDeleteBONES
my hallelujah turned to hell
as anyone who looked in my eyes could tell.
my mind and body were very unwell
still remember her smell.
Paul Fowler
A lot said in very few words. Good job.
Deleteyes, I totally understand and I know who you're talking about
Deletepowerful write my friend.
Delete