“And in despair I bowed my head; “There is no peace on earth,” I said; “For hate is strong, And mocks the song Of peace on earth, good-will to men!” Then pealed the bells more loud and deep: “God is not dead, nor doth he sleep! The Wrong shall fail, the Right prevail, With peace on earth, good-will to men!” ― Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Continue reading the village at christmas
Ah! sunflower, weary of time, Who countest the steps of the sun, Seeking after that sweet golden clime Where the traveller’s journey is done; Where the youth pined away with desire, And the pale virgin shrouded in snow, Arise from their graves and aspire; Where my sunflower wishes to go. William Blake, 1757 – 1827 Continue reading Ah! Sunflower, by William Blake
by Maya Angelou We, unaccustomed to courage exiles from delight live coiled in shells of loneliness until love leaves its high holy temple and comes into our sight to liberate us into life. Love arrives and in its train come ecstasies old memories of pleasure ancient histories of pain. Yet if we are bold, love strikes away the chains of fear from our souls. We … Continue reading On Love | Maya Angelou
Those Winter Sundays by Robert Hayden Sundays too my father got up early And put his clothes on in the blueback cold, then with cracked hands that ached from labor in the weekday weather made banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him. I’d wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking. When the rooms were warm, he’d call, and slowly I would rise and … Continue reading Poets On Sunday | Robert Hayden
“There is a place where the sidewalk ends And before the street begins, And there the grass grows soft and white, And there the sun burns crimson bright, And there the moon-bird rests from his flight To cool in the peppermint wind. Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black And the dark street winds and bends. Past the pits where the asphalt … Continue reading Poets On Sunday | Shel Silverstein
In The Seven Woods I have heard the pigeons of the Seven Woods Make their faint thunder, and the garden bees Hum in the lime-tree flowers; and put away The unavailing outcries and the old bitterness That empty the heart. I have forgot awhile Tara uprooted, and new commonness Upon the throne and crying about the streets And hanging its paper flowers from post to … Continue reading Wild Flowers Of August
I shot an arrow into the air, It fell to earth, I know not where; For, so swiftly it flew, the sight Could not follow it in its flight. I breathed a song into the air, It fell to earth, I know not where; For who has sight so keen and strong, That it can follow the flight of song? Long, long afterwards, in an … Continue reading The Arrow and the Song | Longfellow
To-Day So here hath been dawning Another blue day; Think will thou let it Slip useless away? Out of Eternity This new day is born. Into Eternity At night will return. Behold it aforetime No eye never did So soon it forever From all eyes is hid. Here hath been dawning Another blue day; Think, will thou let it Slip useless away? by Thomas Carlyle … Continue reading Poets On Sunday: Thomas Carlyle
from: LEONARD WOOLF: A BIOGRAPHY by Victoria Glendinning There was a poem called “Luriana Lurilee” which meant something to them both – Leonard quoted a stanza from it in Growing, and Virginia in To the Lighthouse. It conveys the spirit of the private Garden of Eden inhabited by Leonard and Virginia when all was well. Luriana, Lurilee by Charles Isaac Elton Come out and climb … Continue reading Luriana, Lurilee
The Enkindled Spring by D. H. Lawrence This spring as it comes bursts up in bonfires green, Wild puffing of emerald trees, and flame-filled bushes, Thorn-blossom lifting in wreaths of smoke between Where the wood fumes up and the watery, flickering rushes. I am amazed at this spring, this conflagration Of green fires lit on the soil of the earth, this blaze Of growing, and … Continue reading Poets on Sunday: D.H. Lawrence
from ‘THE TESTING-TREE’ In the recurring dream my mother stands in her bridal gown under the burning lilac, with Bernard Shaw and Bertie Russell kissing her hands, the house behind her is in ruins; she is wearing an owl’s face and makes barking noises. Her minatory finger points. I pass through the cardboard doorway askew in the field and peer down a well where an … Continue reading A Bit Of Kunitz
A BLESSING FOR SUNDAY The following was part of a speech given by Tolkien in Holland, “organized by a Rottendam bookseller“, the spring of 1958; Tolkien made a lively speech in English interspersed with Dutch and Elvish. It was in part a parody of Bilbo’s party speech at the beginning of The Lord of the Rings, and it concluded with Tolkien recalling ‘that it is … Continue reading the ‘Hobbit Dinner’ speech
Tolkien was heavily influenced by the Viking Sagas, and Old Norse, and both these excerpts from his poems speak to that heritage within the words. [ Photo’s: August 9th, 2009, Grey County ] GOBLIN FEET I am off down the road Where the fairy lanterns glowed And the little pretty flittermice are flying: A slender band of grey It runs creepily away And the hedges … Continue reading Poets on Sunday: TOLKIEN
The Temenos Journal 