Do Not Stand on my Grave and Weep
Mary Elizabeth Frye
Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning's hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry;
I am not there. I did not die.
Tie Your Heart at Night to Mine ~ Pablo Neruda
Tie Your Heart at Night to Mine
Pablo Neruda
Tie your heart at night to mine, love,
and both will defeat the darkness
like twin drums beating in the forest
against the heavy wall of wet leaves.
Night crossing: black coal of dream
that cuts the thread of earthly orbs
with the punctuality of a headlong train
that pulls cold stone and shadow endlessly.
Love, because of it, tie me to a purer movement,
to the grip on life that beats in your breast,
with the wings of a submerged swan,
So that our dream might reply
to the sky’s questioning stars
with one key, one door closed to shadow.
A Golden Day ~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox
A Golden Day
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
The subtle beauty of this day
Hangs o'er me like a fairy spell,
And care and grief have flown away,
And every breeze sings, "all is well."
I ask, "Holds earth or sin, or woe?"
My heart replies, "I do not know."
Nay! all we know, or feel, my heart,
Today is joy undimmed, complete;
In tears or pain we have no part;
The act of breathing is so sweet,
We care no higher joy to name.
What reck we now of wealth or fame?
The past--what matters it to me?
The pain it gave has passed away.
The future--that I cannot see!
I care for nothing save today--
This is a respite from all care,
And trouble flies--I know not where.
Go on, oh noisy, restless life!
Pass by, oh, feet that seek for heights!
I have no part in aught of strife;
I do not want your vain delights.
The day wraps round me like a spell
And every breeze sings, "All is well."
Wisdom ~ Sara Teasdale
Wisdom
Sara Teasdale
It was a night of early spring,The winter-sleep was scarcely broken;Around us shadows and the windListened for what was never spoken.
Though half a score of years are gone,Spring comes as sharply now as then—But if we had it all to doIt would be done the same again.
It was a spring that never came;But we have lived enough to knowThat what we never have, remains;It is the things we have that go.
The Enduring ~ John Gould Fletcher
The Enduring
John Gould Fletcher
If the autumn ended
Ere the birds flew southward,
If in the cold with weary throats
They vainly strove to sing,
Winter would be eternal;
Leaf and bush and blossom
Would never once more riotIn the spring.
If remembrance ended
When life and love are gathered,
If the world were not livingLong after one is gone,
Song would not ring, nor sorrow
Stand at the door in evening;
Life would vanish and slacken,
Men would be changed to stone.
But there will be autumn's bounty
Dropping upon our weariness,
There will be hopes unspoken
And joys to haunt us still;
There will be dawn and sunset
Though we have cast the world away,
And the leaves dancingOver the hill.
Today’s Reflection: Joy of Living
If you enjoy living, it is not difficult to keep the sense of wonder. ~ Ray Bradbury
Enjoy My New Page: Quotes for the Tough Times
The Oak ~ Tennyson
The Oak
Alfred Tennyson
Live thy life,
Young and old,
Like yon oak,
Bright in spring,
Living gold;
Summer-rich
Then, and then
Autumn-changed
Soberer-hued
Gold again.
All his leaves
Fall'n at length
Look, he stands,
Trunk and bough
Naked strength.
Summer Dreams ~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Summer Dreams
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
When the Summer sun is shining,
And the green things push and grow,
Oft my heart runs over measure,
With its flowing fount of pleasure,
As I feel the sea winds blow;
Ah, then life is good, I know.
And I think of sweet birds building,
And of children fair and free;
And of glowing sun-kissed meadows,
And of tender twilight shadows,
And of boats upon the sea.
Oh, then life seems good to me!
Then unbidden and unwanted,
Come the darker, sadder sights;
City shop and stifling alley,
Where misfortune’s children rally;
And the hot crime-breeding nights,
And the dearth of God’s delights.
And I think of narrow prisons
Where unhappy songbirds dwell,
And of cruel pens and cages
Where some captured wild thing rages
Like a madman in his cell,
In the Zoo, the wild beasts’ hell.
And I long to lift the burden
Of man’s selfishness and sin;
And to open wide earth’s treasures
Of God’s storehouse, full of pleasures,
For my dumb and human kin,
And to ask the whole world in.
Worth While ~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Worth While
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
It is easy enough to be pleasant
When life flows by like a song,
But the man worth while is the one who will smile
When everything goes dead wrong.
For the test of the heart is trouble,
And it always comes with the years,
And the smile that is worth the praises of earth
Is the smile that shines through tears.
It is easy enough to be prudent
When nothing tempts you to stray,
When without or within no voice of sin
Is luring your soul away;
But it’s only a negative virtue
Until it is tried by fire,
And the life that is worth the honour on earth
Is the one that resists desire.
p. 2By the cynic, the sad, the fallen,
Who had no strength for the strife,
The world’s highway is cumbered to-day—
They make up the sum of life;
But the virtue that conquers passion,
And the sorrow that hides in a smile—
It is these that are worth the homage on earth,
For we find them but once in a while.
The Human Seasons ~ John Keats
The Human Seasons
John Keats
Four Seasons fill the measure of the year;
There are four seasons in the mind of man:
He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear
Takes in all beauty with an easy span:
He has his Summer, when luxuriously
Spring’s honied cud of youthful thought he loves
To ruminate, and by such dreaming high
Is nearest unto heaven: quiet coves
His soul has in its Autumn, when his wings
He furleth close; contented so to look
On mists in idleness—to let fair things
Pass by unheeded as a threshold brook.
He has his Winter too of pale misfeature,
Or else he would forego his mortal nature.