Happy Friday!

I hope everyone has some good plans for the weekend. We have a quiet weekend planned where I’m hoping to get loads of reading done and catch up on some chores.

My chosen poem today is by the poet and essayist Danusha Lameris (1971).

Small Kindnesses

I've been thinking about the way, when you walk
down a crowded aisle, people pull in their legs
to let you by. Or how strangers still say "bless you"
when someone sneezes, a leftover
from the Bubonic plague. "Don't die," we are saying.
And sometimes, when you spill lemons
from your grocery bag, someone else will help you
pick them up. Mostly, we don't want to harm each other. 
We want to be handed our cup of coffee hot,
and to say thank you to the person handing it. To smile
at them and for them to smile back. For the waitress
to call us honey when she sets down the bowl of clam
chowder,
and for the driver in the red pick-up truck to let is pass. 
We have so little of each other, now. So far
from tribe and fire. Only these brief moments of exchange. 
What if they are the true dwelling of the holy, these
fleeting temples we make together when we say, "Here,
have my seat," "Go ahead - you first," "I like your hat."

Danusha Lameris

Happy Reading

Etsy

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Happy Friday!

I am really not happy with the lack of sunshine we have been having and I long for some proper Summer weather. Due to this I have chosen a poem named Summer.

This poem is by John Clare (1793-1864) who was an English poet who celebrated the English countryside in his poetry.

Summer

Come we to the summer, to the summer we will come,
For the woods are full of bluebells and the hedges full of 
bloom.
And the crow is on the oak a -building of her nest,
And love is burning diamonds in my true lover's breast;
She sits beneath the whitethorn a-plaiting of her hair,
And I will to my true lover with a fond request repair;
I will look upon her face, I will in her beauty rest,
And lay my aching weariness upon her lovely breast.

The clock-a-clay is creeping on the open bloom of May, 
The merry bee is trampling the pinky threads all day,
And the chaffinch it is brooding on its grey mossy nest
In the whitethorn bush where I will lean upon my lover's
breast;
I'll lean upon her breast and I'll whisper in her ear
That I cannot get a wink o'sleep for thinking of my dear;
I hunger at my meat and I daily fade away
Like the hedge rose that is broken in the heat of the day. 

John Clare

Happy Reading

Etsy

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Happy Friday!

I’ve had a day full of reading and it has been wonderful and long overdue.

My chosen poem this week is by the Scottish novelist, essayist, poet and travel writer Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894).

The Swing

How do you like to go up in a swing,
Up in the air so blue?
Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing
Ever a child can do!

Up in the air and over the wall,
Till I can see so wide,
Rivers and trees and cattle and all
Over the countryside -

Till I look down on the garden green,
Down on the roof so brown -
Up in the air I go flying again,
Up in the air and down!

Robert Louis Stevenson

Happy Reading

Etsy

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Happy Friday!

I have had a lovely day today spending time with family and friends.

My chosen poem today is by the American poet Mary Oliver (1935-2019).

The Summer Day

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean -
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand, 
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and 
down -
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated
eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her 
face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away. 
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the 
fields,
which is what I have been doing all day. 
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

Mary Oliver

Happy Reading

Etsy

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Happy Friday!

My chosen poem for today is actually more of a prayer but I think it is beautiful and worth sharing.

Chief Yellow Lark (c.1850-1915) was a Sioux Indian Chief in the late 19th century. He translated several Sioux prayers into English.

Great Spirit Prayer

Oh, Great Spirit,
Whose voice I hear in the winds
and whose breath gives life to all the world. 
Hear me! I need your strength and wisdom.
Let me walk in beauty, and make my eyes
ever hold the red and purple sunset.
Make my hands respect the things you have made
and my ears sharp to hear your voice. 
Make me wise so that I may understand
the things you have taught my people.
Let me learn the lessons you have hidden
in every leaf and rock. 

Help me remain calm and strong in the 
face of all that comes towards me.
Help me find compassion without
empathy overwhelming me.
I seek strength, not to be greater than my brother,
but to fight my greatest enemy: myself.
Make me always ready to come to you
with clean hands and straight eyes.
So when life fades, as the fading sunset,
my spirit may come to you without shame. 

Chief Yellow Lark

Happy Reading

Etsy

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Happy Friday!

I hope everyone has some fab plans for the weekend. I am very close to finishing one book so I am hoping to get that finished and start a new one.

My chosen poem this week is by the English poet, polemicist, and civil servant John Milton (1608-1674).

May Morning

Now the bright morning Star, Dayes harbinger,
Comes dancing from the East, and leads with her
The Flowry May, who from her green lap throws
The yellow Cowslip, and the pale Primrose.
Hail bounteous May that dost inspire
Mirth and youth, and warm desire, 
Woods and Groves, are of thy blessing. 
Hill and Dale, doth boast thy blessing. 
Thus we salute thee with our early Song, 
And welcome thee, and wish thee long. 

John Milton

Happy Reading

Etsy

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Happy Friday!

I hope everyone has some exciting plans for the weekend.

My chosen poem for this week is by the American poet Billy Collins (1941).

Today

If ever there were a spring day so perfect,
so uplifted by a warm intermittent breeze

that it made you want to throw 
open all the windows in the house

and unlatch the door to the canary's cage,
indeed, rip the little door from its jamb,

a day when the cool brick paths
and the garden bursting with peonies

seemed so etched in sunlight
that you felt like taking

a hammer to the glass paperweight
on the living room end table,

releasing the inhabitants
from their snow-covered cottage

so they could walk out,
holding hands and squinting

into this larger dome of blue and white,
well, today is just that kind of day. 

Billy Collins

Happy Reading

Etsy

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Happy Friday!

I hope everyone has some good plans for the weekend.

My chosen poem for the week is by Edith Nesbit (1858-1924).

Gratitude

I found a starving cat in the street:
It cried for food and a place by the fire.
I carried it home, and I strove to meet
The claims of its desire.

And since its desire was a little fish,
A little hay and a little milk,
I gave it cream in a silver dish
And a basket lined with silk.

And when we came to the grateful pause
When it should have fawned on the hand that fed,
It turned to a devil all teeth and claws,
Scratched me and bit me and fled.

To pay for the fish and the milk and the hay
With a purr had been an easy task:
But its hate and my blood were required to pay
For the gifts that it did not ask. 

Edith Nesbit

Happy Reading

Etsy

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Happy Friday!

I hope you all have some good books planned for the weekend.

My chosen poem for today is by the English poet and author Marguerite Antonia Radclyffe Hall (1880-19430). Hall is best known for her novel The Well of Loneliness.

On the Hill-Side

A Memory

You lay so still in the sunshine,
So still in that hot sweet hour -
That the timid things of the forest land
Came close; a butterfly lit on your head, 
Mistaking it for a flower. 

You scarecly breathed in your slumber,
So dreamless it was, so deep -
While the warm air stirred in my veins like wine,
The air that had blown through a jasmine vine,
But you slept-and I let you sleep. 

Radclyffe Hall

Happy Reading

Etsy

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Happy Friday!

I hope you all have some fab plans for the weekend. I’m hoping to get some reading done this weekend as I haven’t managed much this week.

My chosen poem this week is by the British writer of poetry and prose Philip Edward Thomas (1878-1917).

Tall Nettles

Tall nettles cover up, as they have done
These many springs, the rusty harrow, the plough
Long worn out, and the roller made of stone:
Only the elm butt tops the nettles now.
This corner of the farmyard I like most:
As well as any bloom upon a flower
I like the dust on the nettles, never lost
Except to prove the sweetness of a shower. 

Philip Edward Thomas

Happy Reading

Etsy

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