Natalia’s Resurrection: Sonnet XV

Anon, ere yet his pleasure was aware

Of other presence with him in that place,

A growing murmur in the jubilant air,

With hum of voices gathering apace,

And laughter interchanged, and tones well known,

And steps approaching him familiar--wise,

And names that seemed an echo of his own,

Broke on his musing. Turning in surprise

He saw around him a gay company,

Faces of kinsmen or of friends as near,

But dead or changed or wed: all now in joy,

Such as they showed him once in days more dear

Ere yet his manhood had been touched with pain,

Stood forth to greet him to their hearts again.

Wilfrid Scawen Blunt

Besides the Autumn poets sing

Besides the Autumn poets sing

A few prosaic days

A little this side of the snow

And that side of the Haze—

A few incisive Mornings—

A few Ascetic Eves—

Gone—Mr. Bryant's "Golden Rod"—

And Mr. Thomson's "sheaves."

Still, is the bustle in the Brook—

Sealed are the spicy valves—

Mesmeric fingers softly touch

The Eyes of many Elves—

Perhaps a squirrel may remain—

My sentiments to share—

Grant me, Oh Lord, a sunny mind—

Thy windy will to bear!

Emily Dickinson

When I Have Fears That I May Cease To Be

When I have fears that I may cease to be

Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,

Before high piled books, in charactry,

Hold like rich garners the full-ripen'd grain;

When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face,

Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,

And think that I may never live to trace

Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;

And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,

That I shall never look upon thee more,

Never have relish in the faery power

Of unreflecting love; -- then on the shore

Of the wide world I stand alone, and think

Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink.

John Keats

An Episode

Along a narrow Moorish street

A blue-eyed soldier strode.

(Ah, well-a-day.)

Veiled from her lashes to her feet

She stepped from her abode,

(Ah, lack-a-day.)

Now love may guard a favoured wife

Who leaves the harem door;

(Ah, well-a-day.)

But hungry hearted is her life

When she is one of four.

(Ah, lack-a-day.)

If black eyes glow with sudden fire

And meet warm eyes of blue-

(Ah, well-a-day.)

The old, old story of desire

Repeats itself anew.

(Ah, lack-a-day.)

When bugles blow the soldier flies-

Though bitter tears may fall

(Ah, lack-a-day.)

A Moorish child with blue, blue eyes

Plays in the harem hall.

(Ah, well-a-day.)

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

To a Cyclamen

I COME to visit thee agen,

My little flowerless cyclamen;

To touch the hand, almost to press,

That cheer’d thee in thy loneliness.

What could thy careful guardian find

Of thee in form, of me in mind,

What is there in us rich or rare,

To make us claim a moment’s care?

Unworthy to be so carest,

We are but withering leaves at best.

Walter Savage Landor

Daylight Saving

My answers are inadequate

To those demanding day and date

And ever set a tiny shock

Through strangers asking what's o'clock;

Whose days are spent in whittling rhyme-

What's time to her, or she to Time?

Dorothy Parker

Book Of Proverbs

CALL on the present day and night for nought,

Save what by yesterday was brought.

-----

THE sea is flowing ever,

The land retains it never.

-----

BE stirring, man, while yet the day is clear;

The night when none can work fast Draweth near.

-----

WHEN the heavy-laden sigh,

Deeming help and hope gone by,

Oft, with healing power is heard,

Comfort-fraught, a kindly word.

-----

How vast is mine inheritance, how glorious and sublime!

For time mine own possession is, the land I till is time!

-----

UNWARY saith,--ne'er lived a man more true;

The deepest heart, the highest head he knew,--

"In ev'ry place and time thou'lt find availing

Uprightness, judgment, kindliness unfailing."

-----

THOUGH the bards whom the Orient sun bath bless'd

Are greater than we who dwell in the west,

Yet in hatred of those whom our equals we find.

In this we're not in the least behind.

-----

WOULD we let our envy burst,

Feed its hunger fully first!

To keep our proper place,

We'll show our bristles more;

With hawks men all things chase,

Except the savage boar.

-----

BY those who themselves more bravely have fought

A hero's praise will be joyfully told.

The worth of man can only be taught

By those who have suffer'd both heat and cold.

-----

"WHEREFORE is truth so far from our eyes,

Buried as though in a distant land?"

None at the proper moment are wise!

Could they properly understand,

Truth would appear in her own sweet guise,

Beauteous, gentle, and close at hand.

-----

WHY these inquiries make,

Where charity may flow?

Cast in the flood thy cake,--

Its eater, who will know?

-----

ONCE when I a spider had kill'd,

Then methought: wast right or wrong?

That we both to these times should belong,

This had God in His goodness willed.

-----

MOTLEY this congregation is, for, lo!

At the communion kneel both friend and foe.

-----

IF the country I'm to show,

Thou must on the housetop go.

-----

A MAN with households twain

Ne'er finds attention meet,

A house wherein two women reign

Is ne'er kept clean and neat.

-----

BLESS, thou dread Creator,

Bless this humble fane;

Man may build them greater,--

More they'll not contain.

-----

LET this house's glory rise,

Handed to far ages down,

And the son his honour prize.

As the father his renown.

-----

O'ER the Mediterranean sea

Proudly hath the Orient sprung;

Who loves Hafis and knows him, he

Knows what Caldron hath sung.

-----

IF the ass that bore the Saviour

Were to Mecca driven, he

Would not alter, but would be

Still an ass in his behavior.

-----

THE flood of passion storms with fruitless strife

'Gainst the unvanquished solid land.--

It throws poetic pearls upon the strand,

And thus is gain'd the prize of life.

-----

WHEN so many minstrels there are,

How it pains me, alas, to know it!

Who from the earth drives poetry far?

Who but the poet!

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Appeal

Daphnis dearest, wherefore weave me

Webs of lies lest truth should grieve me?

I could pardon much, believe me:

Dower me, Daphnis, or bereave me,

Kiss me, kill me, love me, leave me,--

Damn me, dear, but don't deceive me!

Edith Nesbit

Safe

My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular.

Adlai E. Stevenson Jr.

Do not be bullied

Voices that loud are always meant to bully. Do not be bullied. Acts of bravery don't always take place on battlefields. They can take place in your heart, when you have the courage to honor your character, your intellect, your inclinations, and, yes your soul by listening to its clean, clear voice of direction instead of following the muddied messages of a timid world.

Anna Quindlen

Medicine

Love is a medicine for the sickness of the world; a prescription often given, too rarely taken.

Karl Menninger

Bad intent

A truth that's told with bad intent,
Beats all the lies you can invent.

William Blake

Love rules

Love rules the court, the camp, the grove,

And men below, and saints above:

For love is heaven, and heaven is love.

Sir Walter Scott

The easiest books

The easiest books are generally the best; for whatever author is obscure and difficult in his own language, certainly does not think clearly.

Philip Dormer Stanhope

Life

Life is one long process of getting tired.

Samuel Butler

Distress

Even if it is to be, what end do you serve by running to distress?

Seneca

Acquainted with the Night

I have been one acquainted with the night.

I have walked out in rain—and back in rain.

I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.

I have passed by the watchman on his beat

And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet

When far away an interrupted cry

Came over houses from another street,

But not to call me back or say good-bye;

And further still at an unearthly height,

One luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right

I have been one acquainted with the night.

Robert Frost

Book Of Parables - From Heaven There Fell Upon The Foaming Wave

From Heaven there fell upon the foaming wave

A timid drop; the flood with anger roared,--

But God, its modest boldness to reward,

Strength to the drop and firm endurance gave.

Its form the mussel captive took,

And to its lasting glory and renown,

The pearl now glistens in our monarch's crown,

With gentle gleam and loving look.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Comment

Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song,

A medley of extemporanea;

And love is a thing that can never go wrong;

And I am Marie of Roumania.

Dorothy Parker

Time to Be Wise

YES; I write verses now and then,

But blunt and flaccid is my pen,

No longer talk’d of by young men

As rather clever;

In the last quarter are my eyes,

You see it by their form and size;

Is it not time then to be wise?

Or now or never.

Fairest that ever sprang from Eve!

While Time allows the short reprieve,

Just look at me! would you believe

’T was once a lover?

I cannot clear the five-bar gate;

But, trying first its timber’s state,

Climb stiffly up, take breath, and wait

To trundle over.

Through gallopade I cannot swing

The entangling blooms of Beauty’s spring:

I cannot say the tender thing,

Be ’t true or false,

And am beginning to opine

Those girls are only half divine

Whose waists yon wicked boys entwine

In giddy waltz.

I fear that arm above that shoulder;

I wish them wiser, graver, older,

Sedater, and no harm if colder,

And panting less.

Ah! people were not half so wild

In former days, when, starchly mild,

Upon her high-heel’d Essex smil’d

The brave Queen Bess.

Walter Savage Landor