Personified: Volume 2

By Willy Thorn

A collection of classic rhyming poetry built around the concept of personification; giving life, form, voice & breath to virtues & philosophical concepts.

Pieces include — the Fertile Ground of the Unknown & Frustration as a Wasteland; Traveling thru the Valley of Fear; Love’s Leap & the Landfall of Faith; Hope as Strong Liquor; the Circle of Worry; How Time is Always Fresh; Being Prisoner to Pain; the Future as a Friend; Belligerent Courage & Carving Will; Keeping Reins Tight on Hope; Uncertainty like Wolves; the Shield of Faith; Pain as the Greatest Teacher & more.

Includes 32 individual poems, accompanied by allegorical art work from Odilon Redon William Blake, Georgette Agutte, William Adams, Utagawa Kuniyoshi, Maerten van Heemskerck & Leonardo da Vinci.

Includes quotes from:
C. S. Lewis
Rumi
Jim Morrison
Khalil Gibran
Charles Bukowski
Joseph Campbell
J.K. Rowling
Margaret Atwood
Deepak Chopra
Oscar Munoz
Richard Paul Evans
Psalm 23:4
Jack Canfield
George R.R. Martin
Miguel de Cervantes
Hunter S. Thompson
William Shakespeare
Rosa Parks
a Japanese proverb
Robert Frost
Soren Kierkegaard
Chinese proverb
Pema Chödrön
Ruth Gendler
Richard Eberhart
Enoch Arnold Bennett
Ernest Hemingway
James Ellroy
Ephesians 6:16
George MacDonald
James Russell Lowell
Anton Chekhov
Plato
Mahatma Gandhi
Marcus Tullius
Martin Luther
George W. Bush
J.R.R. Tolkien
Madeleine L’Engle
Elbert Hubbard
Michelangelo
Robert Hillyer
Kenji Miyazawa
Matshona Dhliwayo
George Bernard Shaw
Marco Aurelio Antonino
John Lennon
Fernando Pessoa
Victor Hugo
John Green
Jackson Pearce
John Sterling
Barbara Lazear Ascher
Julius Caesar
Jim Rohn
Wm. Paul Young
Emily Dickinson
George Orwell
Raymond Reddington
Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach
Mary Tyler Moore
Maxime Lagacé
Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Charlie Chaplin
Don Ingall
Woody Hayes
Rabindranath Tagore
Arnold Schwarzenegger
A.W. Tozer
Lao Tzu
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Henry Ward Beecher
John Keats
Carl Jung
Robert Gary Lee
David Richo
Frida Kahlo
Lionel Trilling
Marilyn Manson
Coretta Scott King
James Baldwin

• Language: English
• Publisher: Willy Thorn
• Release date: Dec 26, 2020
• ISBN: 9781005521295

Willy Thorn

Willy Thorn is a communications expert & artistic renaissance man. He is a journalist & copywriter, teacher, author & artist.He has lived many places, beginning with Milwaukee & Rome & Minnesota & central Wisconsin. Among his other homes are Washington DC & Baltimore, Chicago & the Twin Cities, St. Francis South Dakota, the Bay Area & Shanghai. He currently lives & works in Bangkok.Thorn has a Masters Degree in Journalism & has spent time as a Capitol Hill reporter & wire editor, sports writer, political columnist & arts critic. Other media endeavors include public relations campaigns, magazine feature writing, ghostwritten biographies & time on the radio – as a DJ & on-air host, play-by-play sports announcer & music promoter.He has spent nearly a decade as a language specialist for Craft Worldwide & as a copywriter & creative for McCann Worldgroup. He currently works as senior copywriter at Quo Global branding agency in Bangkok.He has won awards at Cannes Lions & been recognized for sports writing & political columns, magazine features, theatre scripts, religious publications & photography.Thorn is also a photographer & classical oil painter, trained thru the Corcoran Gallery in Washington DC. His artistic c.v. includes photography gallery shows; sculpting in Mamallapuram, India; concrete statuary at Wat Xieng Mouane, in Luang Prabang, Laos; and flower petal mosaics in Cagli, Italy.He is a Buddhist meditation instructor; trained thru Thailand’s renowned Willpower Institute. And he was even the rare foreigner to complete the entire six month course in spoken & written Thai. He currently sits as an advisor on the institute’s English Foreign Language subcommittee – where he translates books, helps develop outreach programs & occasionally lectures.He is the author of more than 3o full-length books & plays & proudly notes a Master’s Degree from Marquette University & books in both Washington's Library of Congress & the Vatican Archives in Rome.His catalog is varied & he has written extensively about a number of subjects — including sports, politics, religion, Buddhist philosophy & Asian history & art. One of his largest endeavors was documenting & cataloguing several hundred temples in Bangkok, Ayutthaya, Yangon, Vientiane & Kuala Lumpur.His catalog is available thru the following distributors: Amazon // Apple iBooks // Android Aldiko // Barnes & Noble // Sony // & Smashwords.His Milwaukee-centric column of sports poetry & prose — 'Run of tha Mil' — can be found at Milticket.blogspot.com

Book preview

uncertainty

is fertile ground

uncertainty

is fertile

ground

because people

rarely

go

it lies far off

the beaten

path

& it’s wild

& overgrown

uncertainty

can be dangerous

& youll be there

all alone

& it has predators

& poisons

& many are still

unknown

getting there

takes great

investment

& no one knows

what youll need

youll surely

have to innovate

& make do

without & bleed

sacrifice

& losses

are assured

you must guess

& invest

blind

& there are zero

guarantees

of what

you will even

find

youll struggle

& you must adapt

& youre sure to find

things strange

& everything

you leave

behind

will rapidly

age & change

there’s a chance

that you won’t make it

& you may never return

the land may prove

but unfruitful

& you may

take tragic turns

but at least one

thing is certain

out there

in the great

unknown

all is open

fresh

& virgin

& just waiting

to be sewn

freedom

is rich

& abundant

youll never want

for more

the land is fertile

with dreams

& hope

& all of it

will be yours

— to be continued —

Uncertainty by William Adams;

from the book ‘Sacred Allegories’ [pub. 1859]

Adams was a clergyman in the Church of England

who died at the age of just 34 [1814-1848].

At the age of 28 he nearly drowned

& severely damaged his lungs.

By late 1842, he was mostly homebound

& working largely with paper & pen.

Nonetheless, his books of Christian allegory

were incredibly popular in England

— tho nearly all were published

while he was dying.

His most popular works include:

The Shadow of the Cross

The Distant Hills

The Fall of Crœsus

The Old Man's Home

& The King's Messengers

One of Adams’ greatest fans was William Wordsworth.

©ourtesy Getty Research Institute

uncertainty

is a pack of wolves

uncertainty

is a pack

of wolves

somewhere

behind you

on the trail

& as you search

for signs

& bearings

a ghostly awrooooooooooo

starts to wail

the wild beauty

has turned treacherous

& hungry danger

has appeared

& you must move

fast

to stay alive

in this unknown

frightening

frontier

uncertainty

has a distant

edge

& you may find

safe harbor

there

but the fog is thick

& the night’s dark

& there is no

moonlight

to spare

staying

the course

ahead is vital

because

there’s nowhere

left to turn

uncertainty

is awfully vast

& the footing

is rarely

firm

the landscape

mostly runs

downhill

to a stark valley

steep & shear

& uncertainty

drops off

to doubt

& doubt ends

in freefalls of fear

[*. om]

you take a breath

to collect yourself

just for a brief

moment

or two

check for landmarks

directions

& signs

& then comes

that awful

awroooooooooooooooooo

youll have to gamble

on direction

& trust

the course’s turns

& bends

it’s getting

darker

& colder

fast

& in no way

is time

your friend

youre not quite sure

where youre headed

a rough direction;

come what may

but surrender

is not an option

& there’s simply

no other

way

what you imagine

is torturous

the many horrors

have no end

they emerge

& form

before your eyes

& roar

& circle

again again

one thing

is absolutely

certain

& that is what

the wolves

will do

& they will surely

work together

which means

only one

end for you

& if uncertainty

surrounds

you

then there will be

no last escape

the pack

will close in

pacing

slow

growling

& weighing

your final

fate

but maybe youll die

quickly instead

a dark glimmer

that feels like hope

& one wolf

that you do not see

will rise up

& rip out

your throat

or maybe

you will run

forever

with ragged breath

& pounding heart

only to collapse

from exhaustion

& be torn

helplessly

apart

…

uncertainty

is a cold

& cruel

place

& its rough terrain

can leave you

blind

its illusions

quickly

turn deadly

& it constantly

tests

the mind

…

but there up ahead!

you see a path

& it may be one

that runs thru

& you get a dash

of confidence

but then comes

that horrible

awrooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

& now new sounds

grow & fill the air

hard panting growls

& drumming

paws

& you take off

running

for your life

your heart screaming

& beating raw

the terrain

is unfamiliar

& shadows

form

& dance

& play

they materialize

on every side

as you sprint

hard

to get away

it is a rough

dark place

— not knowing

danger

could be

anywhere

all alone

& racing on

headlong

flying

on instincts

& a prayer

crashing painfully

thru the darkness

& withstanding

hard collisions

but when

you are sprinting

for