Today's poet

[Stevie]

Hey if your out there Stevie, happy birthday! hope its a good one! )

Thanks Freckle - belatedly It was a good one.

Here's a poem for this morning, when the sun came too late for the weekend, but plenty early enough to drag me out of bed.

THE SUN RISING
by John Donne

BUSY old fool, unruly Sun,
Why dost thou thus,
Through windows, and through curtains, call on us ?
Must to thy motions lovers' seasons run ?
Saucy pedantic wretch, go chide
Late school-boys and sour prentices,
Go tell court-huntsmen that the king will ride,
Call country ants to harvest offices ;
Love, all alike, no season knows nor clime,
Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.

Thy beams so reverend, and strong
Why shouldst thou think ?
I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink,
But that I would not lose her sight so long.
If her eyes have not blinded thine,
Look, and to-morrow late tell me,
Whether both th' Indias of spice and mine
Be where thou left'st them, or lie here with me.
Ask for those kings whom thou saw'st yesterday,
And thou shalt hear, "All here in one bed lay."

She's all states, and all princes I ;
Nothing else is ;
Princes do but play us ; compared to this,
All honour's mimic, all wealth alchemy.
Thou, Sun, art half as happy as we,
In that the world's contracted thus ;
Thine age asks ease, and since thy duties be
To warm the world, that's done in warming us.
Shine here to us, and thou art everywhere ;
This bed thy center is, these walls thy sphere.

[ZootHornRollo]

rather splendid I thought:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environmen...-lake-district

Freckle, you seem to be a Margaret Atwood fan ... have you read Oryx & Crake? Great book, very sad and scary.

[Stevie]

rather splendid I thought:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environmen...-lake-district

Yes, makes you want to be there. I liked these lines in particular

"little tarns reflected white clouds and azure skies like shining mirror shards sunk in the grass."

"to the north-east Dalehead and Robinson stretched out like steeplechasers galloping in the sun."

[Harry H Howgill]

rather splendid I thought:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environmen...-lake-district

Freckle, you seem to be a Margaret Atwood fan ... have you read Oryx & Crake? Great book, very sad and scary.

Tony Greenbank, the writer of the Lakes Country Diaries for the Guardian is coming along to the Simon Armitage gig we are organising at Dufton on the 15th of July.

So you never know, the Fell Poets might end up getting a mention one day :-)

[Harry H Howgill]

Yes, makes you want to be there. I liked these lines in particular

"little tarns reflected white clouds and azure skies like shining mirror shards sunk in the grass."

"to the north-east Dalehead and Robinson stretched out like steeplechasers galloping in the sun."

Some of his Country Diary pecies give wonderful images of the Lakes. He is a class writer.

[Derby Tup]

slightly drunk Stef F
totters back from Royal Oak
'I'm on holiday!'

[freckle]

slightly drunk Stef F
totters back from Royal Oak
'I'm on holiday!'

Aw I like this...a lot! how cute! :-)

[freckle]

rather splendid I thought:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environmen...-lake-district

Freckle, you seem to be a Margaret Atwood fan ... have you read Oryx & Crake? Great book, very sad and scary.

Thanks for this Zoot...I really enjoyed this and am looking forward to meeting the author in the flesh at the armitage gig....Oh and Atwood, funnily enough I haven't read that book although I have heard of it...i need to read more novels but just don't seem to have the attention span at the minute, however its on my to do list! :-)

[Mountain Goatess]

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.

Charlotte Bronte

[freckle]

This is a Photograph of Me

It was taken some time ago
At first it seems to be
a smeared
print: blurred lines and grey flecks
blended with the paper;

then, as you scan
it, you can see something in the left-hand corner
a thing that is like a branch: part of a tree
(balsam or spruce) emerging
and, to the right, halfway up
what ought to be a gentle
slope, a small frame house.

In the background there is a lake,
and beyond that, some low hills.

(The photograph was taken
the day after I drowned.

I am in the lake, in the center
of the picture, just under the surface.

It is difficult to say where
precisely, or to say
how large or how small I am:
the effect of water
on light is a distortion.

but if you look long enough
eventually
you will see me.)

Margaret Atwood