Memorial to Shakespeare

William Shakespeare died April 23, 1616 at the age of 52.

396 years after his passing his works are as popular as ever.

Some tributes by poets.

 


         To the Memory of My Beloved, The Author, Mr. William 
         Shakespeare, and What He Hath Left Us
         by Ben Jonson (1572-1637 / England)


                    To draw no envy, Shakespeare, on thy name,
                    Am I thus ample to thy book and fame;
                    While I confess thy writings to be such
                    As neither man nor Muse can praise too much.
                    `Tis true, and all men`s suffrage. But these ways
                    Were not the paths I meant unto thy praise;
                    For silliest Ignorance on these may light,
                    Which, when it sounds at best, but echoes right;
                    Or blind Affection, which doth ne`er advance
                    The truth, but gropes and urgeth all by chance;
                    Or crafty Malice might pretend this praise,
                    And think to ruin where it seem`d to raise.
                    These are as some infamous bawd or whore
                    Should praise a matron. What could hurt her more?
                    But thou art proof against them, and, indeed,
                    Above the ill - fortune of them, or the need.
                    I, therefore, will begin. Soul of the age!
                    The applause, delight, the wonder of our stage,
                    My Shakespeare, rise! I will not lodge thee by
                    Chaucer, or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lie
                    A little further, to make thee a room:
                    Thou art a monument without a tomb,
                    And art alive still, while thy book doth live,
                    And we have wits to read, and praise to give.
                    That I not mix thee so, my brain excuses;
                    I mean, with great but disproportion`d Muses.
                    For, if I thought my judgment were of years,
                    I should commit thee, surely, with thy peers.
                    And tell how far thou didst our Lyly outshine,
                    Or sporting Kyd, or Marlowe`s mighty line.
                    And though thou hadst small Latin and less Greek,
                    From thence, to honour thee, I would not seek
                    For names; but call forth thund`ring Aeschylus,
                    Euripides, and Sophocles to us,
                    Paccuvius, Accius, him of Cordova dead
                    To life again, to hear thy buskin tread
                    And shake a stage; or when thy socks were on,
                    Leave thee alone, for the comparison
                    Of all that insolent Greece or haughty Rome
                    Sent forth; or since did from their ashes come.
                    Triumph, my Britain! Thou hast one to show
                    To whom all scenes of Europe homage owe.
                    He was not of an age, but for all time!
                    And all the Muses still were in their prime,
                    When, like Apollo, he came forth to warm
                    Our ears, or, like Mercury, to charm.
                    Nature herself was proud of his designs,
                    And joy`d to wear he dressing of his lines,
                    Which were so richly spun, and woven so fit
                    As, since, she will vouchsafe no other wit.
                    The merry Greek, tart Aristophanes,
                    Neat Terence, witty Plautus, now not please;
                    But antiquated and deserted lie,
                    As they were not of Nature`s family.
                    Yet must I not give Nature all! Thy art,
                    My gentle Shakespeare, must enjoy a part.
                    For though the Poet`s matter Nature be
                    His art doth give the fashion. And that he
                    Who casts to write a living line, must sweat
                    (Such as thine are), and strike the second heat
                    Upon the Muses` anvil, turn the same
                    (And himself with it), that he thinks to frame;
                    Or for the laurel he may gain a scorn!
                    For a good Poet`s made as well as born;
                    And such wert thou! Look how the father`s face
                    Lives in his issue; even so, the race
                    Of Shakespeare`s mind and manners brightly shines
                    In his well - turned and true - filed lines;
                    In each of which he seems to shake a lance
                    As brandish`d at the eyes of Ignorance.
                    Sweet Swan of Avon! what a sight it were
                    To see thee in our water yet appear,
                    And make those flights upon the banks of Thames
                    That so did take Eliza, and our James!
                    But stay, I see thee in the hemisphere
                    Advanc`d, and made a constellation there!
                    Shine forth, thou star of poets, and with rage
                    Or influence, chide, or cheer the drooping stage;
                    Which since thy flight from hence hath mourn`d
                    like night,
                    And despairs day, but for thy volume`s light.





         An Epitaph on the Admirable Dramatic Poet W. Shakespeare
         by John Milton (1608-1674 / England)

          
                    What needs my Shakespeare for his honored bones
                    The labor of an age in piled stones?
                    Or that his hallowed reliques should be hid
                    Under a star-ypointing pyramid?
                    Dear son of Memory, great heir of Fame,
                    What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name?
                    Thou in our wonder and astonishment
                    Hast built thy self a livelong monument.
                    For whilst, to th' shame of slow-endeavoring art,
                    Thy easy numbers flow, and that each heart
                    Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued book
                    Those Delphic lines with deep impression took,
                    Then thou, our fancy of itself bereaving,
                    Dost make us marble with too much conceiving,
                    And so sepulchred in such pomp dost lie
                    That kings for such a tomb would wish to die.

 




              Shakespeare and Milton
              by Walter Savage Landor (1775 - 1864 / England)

                          
                    THE TONGUE of England, that which myriads
                    Have spoken and will speak, were paralyz’d
                    Hereafter, but two mighty men stand forth
                    Above the flight of ages, two alone;
                    One crying out,
                    All nations spoke through me.
                    The other:
                    True; and through this trumpet burst God’s word;
                    The fall of Angels, and the doom
                    First of immortal, then of mortal, Man.
                    Glory! be glory! not to me, to God.







              Shakespeare
              by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882 / United States)

                    A vision as of crowded city streets,
                    With human life in endless overflow;
                    Thunder of thoroughfares; trumpets that blow
                    To battle; clamor, in obscure retreats,
                    Of sailors landed from their anchored fleets;
                    Tolling of bells in turrets, and below
                    Voices of children, and bright flowers that throw
                    O'er garden-walls their intermingled sweets!
                    This vision comes to me when I unfold
                    The volume of the Poet paramount,
                    Whom all the Muses loved, not one alone; --
                    Into his hands they put the lyre of gold,
                    And, crowned with sacred laurel at their fount,
                    Placed him as Musagetes on their throne.






              Shakespeare
              by Matthew Arnold (1822-1888 / England)
                             

                    Others abide our question. Thou art free.
                    We ask and ask--Thou smilest and art still,
                    Out-topping knowledge. For the loftiest hill,
                    Who to the stars uncrowns his majesty,

                    Planting his steadfast footsteps in the sea,
                    Making the heaven of heavens his dwelling-place,
                    Spares but the cloudy border of his base
                    To the foil'd searching of mortality;

                    And thou, who didst the stars and sunbeams know,
                    Self-school'd, self-scann'd, self-honour'd,
                    self-secure,
                    Didst tread on earth unguess'd at.--Better so!

                    All pains the immortal spirit must endure,
                    All weakness which impairs, all griefs which bow,
                    Find their sole speech in that victorious brow

                   



             Shakespear
             by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828 – 1882 / England)


                Dear friend, if there be any bond
                Which friendship wins not much beyond—
                So old and fond, since thought began—
                It may be that whose subtle span
                Binds Shakespear to an English man.





              The Poetry Of Shakespeare
              by George Meredith (1828 - 1909 / England)
                 
                    Picture some Isle smiling green 'mid the
                    white-foaming ocean; -
                    Full of old woods, leafy wisdoms, and frolicsome
                    fays;
                    Passions and pageants; sweet love singing
                    bird-like above it;
                    Life in all shapes, aims, and fates, is there
                    warm'd by one great
                    human heart.





              Shakespeare And Cervantes
              by Robert William Service (1874 - 1958 / Canada)

                Shakespeare And Cervantes
                Obit 23rd April 1616

                Is it not strange that on this common date,
                Two titans of their age, aye of all Time,
                Together should renounce this mortal state,
                And rise like gods, unsullied and sublime?
                Should mutually render up the ghost,
                And hand n hand join Jove's celestial host?

                What wondrous welcome from the scribes on high!
                Homer and Virgil would be waiting there;
                Plato and Aristotle standing nigh;
                Petrarch and Dante greet the peerless pair:
                And as in harmony they make their bow,
                Horace might quip: "Great timing, you'll allow."

                Imagine this transcendant team arrive
                At some hilarious banquet of the gods!
                Their nations battled when they were alive,
                And they were bitter foes - but what's the odd?
                Actor and soldier, happy hand in hand,
                By death close-linked, like loving brothers stand.

                But how diverse! Our Will had gold and gear,
                Chattels and land, the starshine of success;
                The bleak Castilian fought with casque and spear,
                Passing his life in prisons - more or less.
                The Bard of Avon was accounted rich;
                Cervantes often bedded in a ditch.

                Yet when I slough this flesh, if I could meet
                By sweet, fantastic fate one of these two,
                In languorous Elysian retreat,
                Which would I choose? Fair reader, which would you?
                Well, though our William more divinely wrote,
                By gad! the lousy Spaniard has my vote.




 
              Shakespeare's Kingdom
              by Alfred Noyes (1880 – 1958 / England)                       

                    When Shakespeare came to London
                    He met no shouting throngs;
                    He carried in his knapsack
                    A scroll of quiet songs.

                    No proud heraldic trumpet
                    Acclaimed him on his way;
                    Their court and camp have perished;
                    The songs live on for ay.

                    Nobody saw or heard them,
                    But all around him there,
                    Spirits of light and music
                    Went treading the April air.

                    He passed like any pedlar,
                    Yet he had wealth untold.
                    The galleons of th' armada
                    Could not contain his gold.

                    The kings rode on to darkness.
                    In England's conquering hour,
                    Unseen arrived her splendour;
                    Unknown, her conquering power.





              With a Copy of Shakespeare's Sonnets on Leaving College   
              by Alan Seeger (1888 - 1916 / United States)


                With a Copy of Shakespeare's Sonnets on Leaving College
                As one of some fat tillage dispossessed,
                Weighing the yield of these four faded years,
                If any ask what fruit seems loveliest,
                What lasting gold among the garnered ears, --
                Ah, then I'll say what hours I had of thine,
                Therein I reaped Time's richest revenue,
                Read in thy text the sense of David's line,
                Through thee achieved the love that Shakespeare knew.
                Take then his book, laden with mine own love
                As flowers made sweeter by deep-drunken rain,
                That when years sunder and between us move
                Wide waters, and less kindly bonds constrain,
                Thou may'st turn here, dear boy, and reading see
                Some part of what thy friend once felt for thee.

 

--Cat

March 21 -- World Poetry Day

World Poetry Day - Declared by UNESCO to promote the reading, writing, publishing and teaching of poetry on an international level.

On poetry, by poets



Notes on the Art of Poetry
by Dylan Thomas (1914 - 1953)

I could never have dreamt that there were such goings-on
in the world between the covers of books,
such sandstorms and ice blasts of words...
such staggering peace, such enormous laughter,
such and so many blinding bright lights...
splashing all over the pages
in a million bits and pieces
all of which were words, words, words,
and each of which were alive forever
in its own delight and glory and oddity and light.




Ars Poetica
by Archibald MacLeish (1892 – 1982)

A poem should be palpable and mute
As a globed fruit,
Dumb
As old medallions to the thumb,
Silent as the sleeve-worn stone
Of casement ledges where the moss has grown--
A poem should be wordless
As the flight of birds.

A poem should be motionless in time
As the moon climbs,
Leaving, as the moon releases
Twig by twig the night-entangled trees,
Leaving, as the moon behind the winter leaves.
Memory by memory the mind--
A poem should be motionless in time
As the moon climbs.

A poem should be equal to:
Not true.
For all the history of grief
An empty doorway and a maple leaf.
For love
The leaning grasses and two lights above the sea--
A poem should not mean
But be.




Because You Asked about the Line between Prose and Poetry
by Howard Nemerov (1920 – 1991)

Sparrows were feeding in a freezing drizzle
That while you watched turned into pieces of snow
Riding a gradient invisible
From silver aslant to random, white, and slow.
There came a moment that you couldn't tell.
And then they clearly flew instead of fell.




My Life Has Been The Poem
by Henry David Thoreau (1817 - 1862)

My life has been the poem
I would have writ,
But I could not both live
and utter it.




The Poet in the Nursery
by Robert Graves (1895 – 1985)

The youngest poet down the shelves was fumbling
In a dim library, just behind the chair
From which the ancient poet was mum-mumbling
A song about some Lovers at a Fair,
Pulling his long white beard and gently grumbling
That rhymes were beastly things and never there.

And as I groped, the whole time I was thinking
About the tragic poem I’d been writing,...
An old man’s life of beer and whisky drinking,
His years of kidnapping and wicked fighting;
And how at last, into a fever sinking,
Remorsefully he died, his bedclothes biting.

But suddenly I saw the bright green cover
Of a thin pretty book right down below;
I snatched it up and turned the pages over,
To find it full of poetry, and so
Put it down my neck with quick hands like a lover,
And turned to watch if the old man saw it go.

The book was full of funny muddling mazes,
Each rounded off into a lovely song,
And most extraordinary and monstrous phrases
Knotted with rhymes like a slave-driver’s thong.
And metre twisting like a chain of daisies
With great big splendid words a sentence long.

I took the book to bed with me and gloated,
Learning the lines that seemed to sound most grand;
So soon the pretty emerald green was coated
With jam and greasy marks from my hot hand,
While round the nursery for long months there floated
Wonderful words no one could understand.




The Poet's Thought
by Lucy Maud Montgomery (1874 – 1942)

It came to him in rainbow dreams,
Blent with the wisdom of the sages,
Of spirit and of passion born;
In words as lucent as the morn
He prisoned it, and now it gleams
A jewel shining through the ages.




Amateur Poet
by Robert William Service (1874 - 1958)

You see that sheaf of slender books
Upon the topmost shelf,
At which no browser ever looks,
Because they're by . . . myself;
They're neatly bound in navy blue,
But no one ever heeds;
Their print is clear and candid too,
Yet no one ever reads.

Poor wistful books! How much they cost
To me in time and gold!
I count them now as labour lost,
For none I ever sold;
No copy could I give away,
For all my friends would shrink,
And look at me as if to say:
"What waste of printer's ink!"

And as I gaze at them on high,
Although my eyes are sad,
I cannot help but breathe a sigh
To think what joy I had -
What ecstasy as I would seek
To make my rhyme come right,
And find at last the phrase unique
Flash fulgent in my sight.

Maybe that rapture was my gain
Far more than cheap success;
So I'll forget my striving vain,
And blot out bitterness.
Oh records of my radiant youth,
No broken heart I'll rue,
For all my best of love and truth
Is there, alive in you.




To The Stone-Cutters
by Robinson Jeffers (1887 – 1962)

Stone-cutters fighting time with marble, you fore-defeated
Challengers of oblivion
Eat cynical earnings, knowing rock splits, records fall down,
The square-limbed Roman letters
Scale in the thaws, wear in the rain. The poet as well
Builds his monument mockingly:
For man will be blotted out, the blithe earth dies, the brave sun
Die blind, his heart blackening:
Yet stones have stood for a thousand years, and pained thoughts found
The honey peace in old poems.




Epigram
by Samuel Coleridge (1772 – 1834)

Sir, I admit your general rule,
That every poet is a fool,
But you yourself may serve to show it,
That every fool is not a poet.



--Cat

Poets on Books – Part II

Continuing with poetry about books:



The Bibliomaniac's Bride
by Eugene Field [1850 – 1895]

The women-folk are like to books,--
Most pleasing to the eye,
Whereon if anybody looks
He feels disposed to buy.

I hear that many are for sale,--
Those that record no dates,
And such editions as regale
The view with colored plates.

Of every quality and grade
And size they may be found,--
Quite often beautifully made,
As often poorly bound.

Now, as for me, had I my choice,
I'd choose no folio tall,
But some octavo to rejoice
My sight and heart withal,--

As plump and pudgy as a snipe;
Well worth her weight in gold;
Of honest, clean, conspicuous type,
And just the size to hold!

With such a volume for my wife
How should I keep and con!
How like a dream should run my life
Unto its colophon!

Her frontispiece should be more fair
Than any colored plate;
Blooming with health, she would not care
To extra-illustrate.

And in her pages there should be
A wealth of prose and verse,
With now and then a jeu d'esprit,--
But nothing ever worse!

Prose for me when I wished for prose,
Verse when to verse inclined,--
Forever bringing sweet repose
To body, heart, and mind.

Oh, I should bind this priceless prize
In bindings full and fine,
And keep her where no human eyes
Should see her charms, but mine!

With such a fair unique as this
What happiness abounds!
Who--who could paint my rapturous bliss,
My joy unknown to Lowndes!



Bookshelf
by Robert William Service [1874 – 1958]

I like to think that when I fall,
A rain-drop in Death's shoreless sea,
This shelf of books along the wall,
Beside my bed, will mourn for me.

Regard it. . . . Aye, my taste is queer.
Some of my bards you may disdain.
Shakespeare and Milton are not here;
Shelly and Keats you seek in vain.
Wordsworth, Tennyson, Browning too,
Remarkably are not in view.

Who are they? Omar first you see,
With Vine and Rose and Nightingale,
Voicing my pet philosphy
Of Wine and Song. . . . Then Reading Gaol,
Where Fate a gruesome pattern makes,
And dawn-light shudders as it wakes.

The Ancient Mariner is next,
With eerie and terrific text;
The Burns, with pawky human touch -
Poor devil! I have loved him much.
And now a gay quartette behold:
Bret Harte and Eugene Field are here;
And Henly, chanting brave and bold,
And Chesteron, in praise of Beer.

Lastly come valiant Singers three;
To whom this strident Day belongs:
Kipling, to whom I bow the knee,
Masefield, with rugged sailor songs. . . .
And to my lyric troupe I add
With greatful heart - The Shropshire Lad.

Behold my minstrels, just eleven.
For half my life I've loved them well.
And though I have no hope of Heaven,
And more than Highland fear of Hell,
May I be damned if on this shelf
ye find a rhyme I made myself.



His Books
by Robert Southey [1774 – 1843]

My days among the Dead are past;
Around me I behold,
Where'er these casual eyes are cast,
The mighty minds of old:
My never-failing friends are they,
With whom I converse day by day.

With them I take delight in weal
And seek relief in woe;
And while I understand and feel
How much to them I owe,
My cheeks have often been bedew'd
With tears of thoughtful gratitude.

My thoughts are with the Dead; with them
I live in long-past years,
Their virtues love, their faults condemn,
Partake their hopes and fears;
And from their lessons seek and find
Instruction with an humble mind.

My hopes are with the Dead; anon
My place with them will be,
And I with them shall travel on
Through all Futurity;
Yet leaving here a name, I trust,
That will not perish in the dust.



Perhaps the ultimate anti-television/pro books rant, this long piece is from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, 1964

Television
by Roald Dahl [1916 – 1990]

The most important thing we've learned,
So far as children are concerned,
Is never, NEVER, NEVER let
Them near your television set --
Or better still, just don't install
The idiotic thing at all.
In almost every house we've been,
We've watched them gaping at the screen.
They loll and slop and lounge about,
And stare until their eyes pop out.
(Last week in someone's place we saw
A dozen eyeballs on the floor.)
They sit and stare and stare and sit
Until they're hypnotised by it,
Until they're absolutely drunk
With all that shocking ghastly junk.
Oh yes, we know it keeps them still,
They don't climb out the window sill,
They never fight or kick or punch,
They leave you free to cook the lunch
And wash the dishes in the sink --
But did you ever stop to think,
To wonder just exactly what
This does to your beloved tot?
IT ROTS THE SENSE IN THE HEAD!
IT KILLS IMAGINATION DEAD!
IT CLOGS AND CLUTTERS UP THE MIND!
IT MAKES A CHILD SO DULL AND BLIND
HE CAN NO LONGER UNDERSTAND
A FANTASY, A FAIRYLAND!
HIS BRAIN BECOMES AS SOFT AS CHEESE!
HIS POWERS OF THINKING RUST AND FREEZE!
HE CANNOT THINK -- HE ONLY SEES!
'All right!' you'll cry. 'All right!' you'll say,
'But if we take the set away,
What shall we do to entertain
Our darling children? Please explain!'
We'll answer this by asking you,
'What used the darling ones to do?
'How used they keep themselves contented
Before this monster was invented?'
Have you forgotten? Don't you know?
We'll say it very loud and slow:
THEY ... USED ... TO ... READ! They'd READ and READ,
AND READ and READ, and then proceed
To READ some more. Great Scott! Gadzooks!
One half their lives was reading books!
The nursery shelves held books galore!
Books cluttered up the nursery floor!
And in the bedroom, by the bed,
More books were waiting to be read!
Such wondrous, fine, fantastic tales
Of dragons, gypsies, queens, and whales
And treasure isles, and distant shores
Where smugglers rowed with muffled oars,
And pirates wearing purple pants,
And sailing ships and elephants,
And cannibals crouching 'round the pot,
Stirring away at something hot.
(It smells so good, what can it be?
Good gracious, it's Penelope.)
The younger ones had Beatrix Potter
With Mr. Tod, the dirty rotter,
And Squirrel Nutkin, Pigling Bland,
And Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle and-
Just How The Camel Got His Hump,
And How the Monkey Lost His Rump,
And Mr. Toad, and bless my soul,
There's Mr. Rat and Mr. Mole-
Oh, books, what books they used to know,
Those children living long ago!
So please, oh please, we beg, we pray,
Go throw your TV set away,
And in its place you can install
A lovely bookshelf on the wall.
Then fill the shelves with lots of books,
Ignoring all the dirty looks,
The screams and yells, the bites and kicks,
And children hitting you with sticks-
Fear not, because we promise you
That, in about a week or two
Of having nothing else to do,
They'll now begin to feel the need
Of having something to read.
And once they start -- oh boy, oh boy!
You watch the slowly growing joy
That fills their hearts. They'll grow so keen
They'll wonder what they'd ever seen
In that ridiculous machine,
That nauseating, foul, unclean,
Repulsive television screen!
And later, each and every kid
Will love you more for what you did.

--Cat

Poets on Books - Part I

I received an e-book reader for Christmas, and as I reluctantly embrace this new way of reading books, I can't help wondering what the old poets would think about this. Here are some poems about books.



Picture-Books in Winter
by Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894)

Summer fading, winter comes--
Frosty mornings, tingling thumbs,
Window robins, winter rooks,
And the picture story-books.

Water now is turned to stone
Nurse and I can walk upon;
Still we find the flowing brooks
In the picture story-books.

All the pretty things put by,
Wait upon the children's eye,
Sheep and shepherds, trees and crooks,
In the picture story-books.

We may see how all things are
Seas and cities, near and far,
And the flying fairies' looks,
In the picture story-books.

How am I to sing your praise,
Happy chimney-corner days,
Sitting safe in nursery nooks,
Reading picture story-books?



May and the Poets
by James Henry Leigh Hunt (1784-1859)

There is May in books forever;
May will part from Spenser never;
May's in Milton, May's in Prior,
May's in Chaucer, Thomson, Dyer;
May's in all the Italian books:--
She has old and modern nooks,
Where she sleeps with nymphs and elves,
In happy places they call shelves,
And will rise and dress your rooms
With a drapery thick with blooms.
Come, ye rains, then if ye will,
May's at home, and with me still;
But come rather, thou, good weather,
And find us in the fields together.



The Bibliomaniac's Prayer
by Eugene Field (1850-1895)

Keep me, I pray, in wisdom's way
That I may truths eternal seek;
I need protecting care to-day,--
My purse is light, my flesh is weak.
So banish from my erring heart
All baleful appetites and hints
Of Satan's fascinating art,
Of first editions, and of prints.
Direct me in some godly walk
Which leads away from bookish strife,
That I with pious deed and talk
May extra-illustrate my life.
But if, O Lord, it pleaseth Thee
To keep me in temptation's way,
I humbly ask that I may be
Most notably beset to-day;
Let my temptation be a book,
Which I shall purchase, hold, and keep,
Whereon when other men shall look,
They 'll wail to know I got it cheap.
Oh, let it such a volume be
As in rare copperplates abounds,
Large paper, clean, and fair to see,
Uncut, unique, unknown to Lowndes.



My Hundred Books
by Robert Service (1874-1958)

A thousand books my library
Contains;
And all are primed, it seems to me
With brains.
Mine are so few I scratch in thought
My head;
For just a hundred of the lot
I've read.

A hundred books, but of the best,
I can
With wisdom savour and digest
And scan.
Yet when afar from kin and kith
In nooks
Of quietness I'm happy with
Sweet books.

So as nine hundred at me stare
In vain,
My lack I'm wistfully aware
Of brain;
Yet as my leave of living ends,
With looks
Of love I view a hundred friends,
My books.



74. Unto my books so good to turn
by Emily Dickinson (1830–86)

Unto my Books -- so good to turn --
Far ends of tired Days --
It half endears the Abstinence --
And Pain -- is missed -- in Praise --

As Flavors -- cheer Retarded Guests
With Banquettings to be --
So Spices -- stimulate the time
Till my small Library --

It may be Wilderness -- without --
Far feet of failing Men --
But Holiday -- excludes the night --
And it is Bells -- within --

I thank these Kinsmen of the Shelf --
Their Countenances bland
Enamor -- in Prospective --
And satisfy -- obtained --



And Yet The Books
by Czeslaw Milosz (1911-2004)

And yet the books will be there on the shelves, separate beings,
That appeared once, still wet
As shining chestnuts under a tree in autumn,
And, touched, coddled, began to live
In spite of fires on the horizon, castles blown up,
Tribes on the march, planets in motion.
“We are, ” they said, even as their pages
Were being torn out, or a buzzing flame
Licked away their letters. So much more durable
Than we are, whose frail warmth
Cools down with memory, disperses, perishes.
I imagine the earth when I am no more:
Nothing happens, no loss, it’s still a strange pageant,
Women’s dresses, dewy lilacs, a song in the valley.
Yet the books will be there on the shelves, well born,
Derived from people, but also from radiance, heights.



– Cat

Remembrance Day - Thanks All War Vets

Poems about War


Armies in the Fire
by Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894)

The lamps now glitter down the street;
Faintly sound the falling feet;
And the blue even slowly falls
About the garden trees and walls.

Now in the falling of the gloom
The red fire paints the empty room:
And warmly on the roof it looks,
And flickers on the back of books.

Armies march by tower and spire
Of cities blazing, in the fire;
Till as I gaze with staring eyes,
The armies fall, the lustre dies.

Then once again the glow returns;
Again the phantom city burns;
And down the red-hot valley, lo!
The phantom armies marching go!

Blinking embers, tell me true
Where are those armies marching to,
And what the burning city is
That crumbles in your furnaces!




Channel Firing a poem
by Thomas Hardy (1840-1928)

That night your great guns, unawares,
Shook all our coffins as we lay,
And broke the chancel window-squares,
We thought it was the Judgement-day

And sat upright. While drearisome
Arose the howl of wakened hounds:
The mouse let fall the altar-crumb,
The worm drew back into the mounds,

The glebe cow drooled. Till God cried, "No;
It's gunnery practice out at sea
Just as before you went below;
The world is as it used to be:

"All nations striving strong to make
Red war yet redder. Mad as hatters
They do no more for Christés sake
Than you who are helpless in such matters.

"That this is not the judgment-hour
For some of them's a blessed thing,
For if it were they'd have to scour
Hell's floor for so much threatening. . . .

"Ha, ha. It will be warmer when
I blow the trumpet (if indeed
I ever do; for you are men,
And rest eternal sorely need)."

So down we lay again. "I wonder,
Will the world ever saner be,"
Said one, "than when He sent us under
In our indifferent century!"

And many a skeleton shook his head.
"Instead of preaching forty year,"
My neighbour Parson Thirdly said,
"I wish I had stuck to pipes and beer."

Again the guns disturbed the hour,
Roaring their readiness to avenge,
As far inland as Stourton Tower,
And Camelot, and starlit Stonehenge.



Dover Beach
by Matthew Arnold (1822-1888)

The sea is calm tonight.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Ægæan, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.

The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.

Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.



Goliath and David
(For D.C.T., killed at Fricourt, March 1916)
Robert Graves (1895-1985)

Once an earlier David took
Smooth pebbles from a brook:
Out between the lines he went
To that one-sided tournament,
A shepherd boy who stood out fine
And young to fight a Philistine
Clad all in brazen mail. He swears
That he's killed lions, he's killed bears,
And those that scorn the God of Zion
Shall perish so like bear or lion.
But . . . the historian of that fight
Had not the heart to tell it right.

Striding within javelin range
Goliath marvels at this strange
Goodly-faced boy so proud of strength.
David's clear eye measures the length;
With hand thrust back, he cramps one knee,
Poises a moment thoughtfully,
And hurls with a long vengeful swing.
The pebble, humming from the sling
Like a wild bee, flies a sure line
For the forehead of the Philistine;
Then . . . but there comes a brazen clink.
And quicker than a man can think
Goliath's shield parries each cast.
Clang! clang! and clang! was David's last.
Scorn blazes in the Giant's eye,
Towering unhurt six cubit's high.
Says foolish David, 'Damn your shield!
And damn my sling! but I'll not yield.'

He takes his staff of Mamre oak,
A knotted shepherd-staff that's broke
The skull of many a wolf and fox
Come filching lambs from Jesse's flocks.
Loud laughs Goliath, and that laugh
Can scatter chariots like blown chaff
To rout: but David, calm and brave,
Holds his ground, for God will save.
Steel crosses wood, a flash, and oh!
Shame for Beauty's overthrow!
(God's eyes are dim, His ears are shut.)
One cruel backhand sabre cut --
'I'm hit! I'm killed!' young David cries,
Throws blindly foward, chokes . . . and dies.
And look, spike-helmeted, grey, grim,
Goliath straddles over him.



1914 II - Safety
by Rupert Brooke (1887-1915)

Dear! of all happy in the hour, most blest
He who has found our hid security,
Assured in the dark tides of the world that rest,
And heard our word, "Who is so safe as we?"
We have found safety with all things undying,
The winds, and morning, tears of men and mirth,
The deep night, and birds singing, and clouds flying,
And sleep, and freedom, and the autumnal earth.

We have built a house that is not for Time's throwing.
We have gained a peace unshaken by pain for ever.
War knows no power. Safe shall be my going,
Secretly armed against all death's endeavour;
Safe though all safety's lost; safe where men fall;
And if these poor limbs die, safest of all.


Beautiful song







--Cat

Lilies

Consider The Lilies Of The Field
by Christina Georgina Rossetti
1830-1894,

Flowers preach to us if we will hear:—
The rose saith in the dewy morn:
I am most fair;
Yet all my loveliness is born
Upon a thorn.
The poppy saith amid the corn:
Let but my scarlet head appear
And I am held in scorn;
Yet juice of subtle virtue lies
Within my cup of curious dyes.
The lilies say: Behold how we
Preach without words of purity.
The violets whisper from the shade
Which their own leaves have made:
Men scent our fragrance on the air,
Yet take no heed
Of humble lessons we would read.
But not alone the fairest flowers:
The merest grass
Along the roadside where we pass,
Lichen and moss and sturdy weed,
Tell of His love who sends the dew,
The rain and sunshine too,
To nourish one small seed.



Dreams
by Emma Lazarus
1849-1887

A dream of lilies: all the blooming earth,
A garden full of fairies and of flowers;
Its only music the glad cry of mirth,
While the warm sun weaves golden-tissued hours;
Hope a bright angel, beautiful and true
As Truth herself, and life a lovely toy,
Which ne'er will weary us, ne'er break, a new
Eternal source of pleasure and of joy.

A dream of roses: vision of Loves tree,
Of beauty and of madness, and as bright
As naught on earth save only dreams can be,
Made fair and odorous with flower and light;
A dream that Love is strong to outlast Time,

That hearts are stronger than forgetfulness,
The slippery sand than changeful waves that climb,
The wind-blown foam than mighty waters' stress.

A dream of laurels: after much is gone,
Much buried, much lamented, much forgot,
With what remains to do and what is done,
With what yet is, and what, alas! is not,
Man dreams a dream of laurel and of bays,
A dream of crowns and guerdons and rewards,
Wherein sounds sweet the hollow voice of praise,
And bright appears the wreath that it awards.

A dream of poppies, sad and true as Truth,—
That all these dreams were dreams of vanity;
And full of bitter penitence and ruth,
In his last dream, man deems 'twere good to die;
And weeping o'er the visions vain of yore,
In the sad vigils he doth nightly keep,
He dreams it may be good to dream no more,
And life has nothing like Death's dreamless sleep.



Lilies Without, Lilies Within
by George Wither
1588-1667

Can I think the Guide of Heaven
Hath so beautifully given
Outward features, 'cause He meant
To have made less excellent
Your divine part? Or suppose
Beauty, goodness doth oppose;
Like those fools, who do despair
To find any, good and fair?
Rather there I seek a mind
Most excelling, where I find
God hath to the body lent
Most-beseeming ornament,
And I do believe it true,
That, as we the body view
Nearer to perfection grow;
So, the soul herself doth show:
Other more and more excelling
In her powers; as in her dwelling.



The Lily and the Bee
by Henry Lawson
1867-1922, written in 1908

I looked upon the lilies
When the morning sun was low,
And the sun shone through a lily
With a softened honey glow.
A spot was in the lily
That moved incessantly,
And when I looked into the cup
I saw a morning bee.
“Consider the lilies!”
But, it occurs to me,
Does any one consider
The lily and the bee?

The lily stands for beauty,
Use, purity, and trust,
It does a four-fold duty,
As all good mortals must.
Its whiteness is to teach us,
Its faith to set us free,
Its beauty is to cheer us,
And its wealth is for the bee.

“Consider the lilies!”
But, it occurs to me,
Does any one consider
The lily and the bee?



Too soon so fair, fair lilies
by Augusta Davies Webster
1837-1894, written in 1875

Too soon so fair, fair lilies;
To bloom is then to wane;
The folded bud has still
To-morrow at its will;
Blown flowers can never blow again.

Too soon so bright, bright noontide;
The sun that now is high
Will henceforth only sink
Towards the western brink;
Day that's at prime begins to die.

Too soon so rich, ripe summer,
For autumn tracks thee fast;
Lo, death-marks on the leaf!
Sweet summer, and my grief;
For summer come is summer past.

Too soon, too soon, lost summer;
Some hours and thou art o'er.
Ah! death is part of birth:
Summer leaves not the earth,
But last year's summer lives no more.



To Ken, RIP

--Cat

Lilacs

It's May, and the lilac bushes outside my window are ready to burst into fragrant bloom.






I, Who Fade With The Lilacs
William Griffith (1876-1936)

I, who fade with the lilacs
And with the roses fade,
Am sharing this hour with them
Conferring in the shade.

Life has not left the wonder
With which it first began
To make Pierrot a poet,
In making him a man.

It has not made a rainbow,
In all the sorry years,
But was a sailing glory
Upon a sea of tears.

Somehow life leaves one stranded
On shores too near or far,
Hitching, forever hitching
Ships—shallops to a star.


My Litany
Patience Worth (1883-1937)

When the lilacs lie upon the rosy West, with
The hallowed sun o'erspread upon their plumes,
And the swallow, circling swings unto the eaves,
And the late fields still send up
The scent of fresh cutting;
When the first wick is lit in the valley,
And the smoke threads from the chimney's pit;
When my feet wend through the homeward path—
There is my Cathedral!
Before the Earth stirs her men to wake,
When the coolness of Night's lips still press
The hillocks, and the head of Night
Still reclines upon the valley's bosom;
When the morning star stands guard,
And the angels seem watchful—near,
There is my Prayer!
When the Night is sleeping, and the sky
Is pitchy dark; when there is no sound
Save the chatter of the nestlings,
And the stir of some weary beast;
When Earth hath forgot—
There is my Amen.


Lilacs
Virna Sheard (1865-1943)

In lonely gardens deserted--unseen--
Oh! lovely lilacs of purple and white,
You are dipping down through a mist of green;
For the morning sun's delight.
And the velvet bee, all belted with black,
Drinks deep of the wine which your flagons hold,
Clings close to your plumes while he fills his pack
With a load of burnished gold.

You hide the fences with blossoms of snow,
And sweeten the shade of castle towers;
Over low, grey gables you brightly blow,
Like amethysts turned to flowers.
The tramp on the highway--ragged and bold--
Wears you close to his heart with jaunty air;
You rest in my lady's girdle of gold,
And are held against her hair.

In God's own acre your tender flowers,
Bend down to the grasses and seem to sigh
For those who count time no more by hours--
Whose summers have all passed by--
But at eventide the south wind will sing,
Like a gentle priest who chanteth a prayer;
And thy purple censers he'll set a-swing,
To perfume the twilight air.


A Song of the Lilac
Louise Imogen Guiney (1861 - 1920)

Above the wall that's broken,
And from the coppice thinned,
So sacred and so sweet
The lilac in the wind!
And when by night the May wind blows
The lilac-blooms apart,
The memory of his first love
Is shaken on his heart.

In tears it long was buried,
And trances wrapt it round;
O how they wake it now,
The fragrance and the sound!
For when by night the May wind blows
The lilac-blooms apart,
The memory of his first love
Is shaken on his heart.


Now The Lilac Tree’s In Bud
Bliss Carman (1861 - 1929)

Now the lilac tree's in bud,
And the morning birds are loud.
Now a stirring in the blood
Moves the heart of every crowd.
Word has gone abroad somewhere
Of a great impending change.
There's a message in the air
Of an import glad and strange.
Not an idler in the street,
But is better off to-day.
Not a traveller you meet,
But has something wise to say.
Now there's not a road too long,
Not a day that is not good,
Not a mile but hears a song
Lifted from the misty wood.
Down along the Silvermine
That's the blackbird's cheerful note!
You can see him flash and shine
With the scarlet on his coat.
Now the winds are soft with rain,
And the twilight has a spell,
Who from gladness could refrain
Or with olden sorrows dwell?


--Cat

April 21 -- Charlotte Bronte

Charlotte Brontë April 21, 1816 – March 31, 1855

English novelist and poet Charlotte Bronte was born in Yorkshire, the third of six children. Her two older sisters died of tuberculosis at ages 10 and 12. The surviving siblings, Charlotte, brother Branwell, and sisters Emily and Anne, spent their childhood roaming the wild moors and writing detailed epics about imaginary kingdoms.

During her twenties, Charlotte worked as a governess, one of the few professions available at the time for educated women, a condition she decried in her writing. In 1846, she and her sisters published a collection of poetry under the assumed names of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell, both to avoid publicity, and because women writers were treated with disdain.

Charlotte's novel Jane Eyre, published in 1847 under her pseudonym Currer Bell, brought her great success and has become a standard of English literature. Jane Eyre chronicled the life of a new strain of heroine for the time, strong, confident, and self-reliant, and marked the beginnings of feminism in literature.

In an eight month span during 1848-1849, tuberculosis claimed the lives of Branwell, Emily, and Anne, respectively aged 31, 30, 29. Five years later, Charlotte married and became pregnant. Her health quickly deteriorated, and she died, also of tuberculosis, along with her unborn child, March 31, 1855. She was 38.

After the publication of Jane Eyre, Charlotte no longer wrote poetry, choosing to concentrate on prose.


Some poems by Charlotte Bronte:


Speak Of The North! A Lonely Moor

Speak of the North! A lonely moor
Silent and dark and tractless swells,
The waves of some wild streamlet pour
Hurriedly through its ferny dells.

Profoundly still the twilight air,
Lifeless the landscape; so we deem
Till like a phantom gliding near
A stag bends down to drink the stream.

And far away a mountain zone,
A cold, white waste of snow-drifts lies,
And one star, large and soft and lone,
Silently lights the unclouded skies.


On The Death Of Anne Bronte

There's little joy in life for me,
And little terror in the grave;
I've lived the parting hour to see
Of one I would have died to save.

Calmly to watch the failing breath,
Wishing each sigh might be the last;
Longing to see the shade of death
O'er those beloved features cast;

The cloud, the stillness that must part
The darling of my life from me;
And then to thank God from my heart,
To thank him well and fervently;

Although I knew that we had lost
The hope and glory of our life;
And now, benighted, tempest-tossed,
Must bear alone the weary strife.


Life

Life, believe, is not a dream
So dark as sages say;
Oft a little morning rain
Foretells a pleasant day.
Sometimes there are clouds of gloom,
But these are transient all;
If the shower will make the roses bloom,
O why lament its fall ?

Rapidly, merrily,
Life's sunny hours flit by,
Gratefully, cheerily,
Enjoy them as they fly !

What though Death at times steps in
And calls our Best away ?
What though sorrow seems to win,
O'er hope, a heavy sway ?
Yet hope again elastic springs,
Unconquered, though she fell;
Still buoyant are her golden wings,
Still strong to bear us well.
Manfully, fearlessly,
The day of trial bear,
For gloriously, victoriously,
Can courage quell despair !


Evening Solace

The human heart has hidden treasures,
In secret kept, in silence sealed;­
The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures,
Whose charms were broken if revealed.
And days may pass in gay confusion,
And nights in rosy riot fly,
While, lost in Fame's or Wealth's illusion,
The memory of the Past may die.

But, there are hours of lonely musing,
Such as in evening silence come,
When, soft as birds their pinions closing,
The heart's best feelings gather home.
Then in our souls there seems to languish
A tender grief that is not woe;
And thoughts that once wrung groans of anguish,
Now cause but some mild tears to flow.

And feelings, once as strong as passions,
Float softly back-­a faded dream;
Our own sharp griefs and wild sensations,
The tale of others' sufferings seem.
Oh! when the heart is freshly bleeding,
How longs it for that time to be,
When, through the mist of years receding,
Its woes but live in reverie !

And it can dwell on moonlight glimmer,
On evening shade and loneliness;
And, while the sky grows dim and dimmer,
Feel no untold and strange distress­
Only a deeper impulse given
By lonely hour and darkened room,
To solemn thoughts that soar to heaven,
Seeking a life and world to come.


Parting

There's no use in weeping,
Though we are condemned to part:
There's such a thing as keeping
A remembrance in one's heart:

There's such a thing as dwelling
On the thought ourselves have nurs'd,
And with scorn and courage telling
The world to do its worst.

We'll not let its follies grieve us,
We'll just take them as they come;
And then every day will leave us
A merry laugh for home.

When we've left each friend and brother,
When we're parted wide and far,
We will think of one another,
As even better than we are.

Every glorious sight above us,
Every pleasant sight beneath,
We'll connect with those that love us,
Whom we truly love till death !

In the evening, when we're sitting
By the fire perchance alone,
Then shall heart with warm heart meeting,
Give responsive tone for tone.

We can burst the bonds which chain us,
Which cold human hands have wrought,
And where none shall dare restrain us
We can meet again, in thought.

So there's no use in weeping,
Bear a cheerful spirit still;
Never doubt that Fate is keeping
Future good for present ill !


Regret

Long ago I wished to leave
"The house where I was born;"
Long ago I used to grieve,
My home seemed so forlorn.
In other years, its silent rooms
Were filled with haunting fears;
Now, their very memory comes
O'ercharged with tender tears.

Life and marriage I have known,
Things once deemed so bright;
Now, how utterly is flown
Every ray of light!
'Mid the unknown sea of life
I no blest isle have found;
At last, through all its wild wave's strife,
My bark is homeward bound.

Farewell, dark and rolling deep!
Farewell, foreign shore!
Open, in unclouded sweep,
Thou glorious realm before!
Yet, though I had safely pass'd
That weary, vexed main,
One loved voice, through surge and blast,
Could call me back again.

Though the soul's bright morning rose
O'er Paradise for me,
William! even from Heaven's repose
I'd turn, invoked by thee!
Storm nor surge should e'er arrest
My soul, exulting then:
All my heaven was once thy breast,
Would it were mine again!


Quotes by Charlotte Bronte:

A ruffled mind makes a restless pillow.

Cheerfulness, it would appear, is a matter which depends fully as much on the state of things within, as on the state of things without and around us.

I try to avoid looking backward and keep looking upward.


--Cat