NaNoWriMo and the written doe bounding

It's November 1st, which means for the next thirty-one days, ordinary people all over tarnation will be tapping and scribbling like mad for NaNoWriMo, the annual, wildly popular project for the umpteen thousand people out there whose life dream is to write a whole novel in one month.  

Are you even remotely tempted?  Me?  Umm, maybe next year.

In honor of all those courageous and hopeful souls who have set out today to pen 1,667 words every single day this month, I offer this bit of inspiration from the brilliant pen of Polish poet Wislawa Szymborska (one of my favorite living poets).


The Joy of Writing

Why does this written doe bound through these written woods?
For a drink of written water from a spring
whose surface will xerox her soft muzzle?
Why does she lift her head; does she hear something?
Perched on four slim legs borrowed from the truth,
she pricks up her ears beneath my fingertips.
Silence - this word also rustles across the page
and parts the boughs
that have sprouted from the word "woods."

Lying in wait, set to pounce on the blank page,
are letters up to no good,
clutches of clauses so subordinate
they'll never let her get away.

Each drop of ink contains a fair supply
of hunters, equipped with squinting eyes behind their sights,
prepared to swarm the sloping pen at any moment,
surround the doe, and slowly aim their guns.

They forget that what's here isn't life.
Other laws, black on white, obtain.
The twinkling of an eye will take as long as I say,
and will, if I wish, divide into tiny eternities,
full of bullets stopped in mid-flight.
Not a thing will ever happen unless I say so.
Without my blessing, not a leaf will fall,
not a blade of grass will bend beneath that little hoof's full stop.

Is there then a world
where I rule absolutely on fate?
A time I bind with chains of signs?
An existence become endless at my bidding?

The joy of writing.
The power of preserving.
Revenge of a mortal hand.

from Poems New and Collected, which I have read cover to cover more than twice.
  

practice resurrection

In celebration of the Resurrection,

it seems a fitting day to gently nudge The Beehive awake again 

from its long winter hibernation

(which was also fitting, but that's a different post). 

And since it's now April, glorious April,

which is National Poetry Month,

 it seems fitting to do so with a poem. 

(As if we needed an excuse for that.)

(Poetry, I mean.)

This one is a favorite.  Do read it. 

It has perhaps the best last line of any poem ever.

Manifesto:  The Mad Farmer Liberation Front
by Wendell Berry

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
vacation with pay. Want more
of everything ready-made. Be afraid
to know your neighbors and to die.

And you will have a window in your head.
Not even your future will be a mystery
any more. Your mind will be punched in a card
and shut away in a little drawer.

When they want you to buy something
they will call you. When they want you
to die for profit they will let you know.
So, friends, every day do something
that won't compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.

Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millenium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.

Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.
Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.

Listen to carrion-- put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.

Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.
Lie down in the shade. Rest your head
in her lap. Swear allegiance
to what is nighest your thoughts.

As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn't go.

Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.


Copyright Wendell Berry

From The Selected Poems of Wendell Berry, which is available from the wonderful folks at Cumberland Books.  If you don't know them, you should.  When was the last time you opened a box of books to find a personal check from the bookstore owner, giving you a discount you didn't even know about?  Yes, this actually happened.  I didn't cash that check-- I felt Mr. Saenz deserved the extra couple of bucks just for being such an honest, godly merchant.  And I figure I got at least two bucks' worth of encouragement out of it.

A poem for November

Pumpkins

Curling vines pearl the earth;

the ancient tribe convenes

in twirly riot

of orange rotundity.

Their solar girth belies

their fragile origins--

light-gilded bees and

gossamer blossoms.

Waxed mirthsome now, they flirt

with anthropology,

bending the narrow rows

of nomenclature.

And He who broods fireballs

to prophesy frost

now calls them from fields

for our festival need--

So sing vine to village!

Come promenade porches, 

come reel the tired hillsides

and strathspey the paths--

Then, carapaces of sunset,

go jig round the nutmeg

and gingerly bow

to piecrust.

copyright 2009 Lynn Bruce

                                   (photos courtesy of Norcal Blogs and Earthbound Farms)

Thanksgiving!

Mercy me, it's in less than a week!

In the preceding post about Bunyan's pilgrim poem, I mentioned that at our family's Thanksgiving feast we all take turns reading a little something. This is one of our favorite family traditions. We take our time; each person eventually finds their own moment during natural lulls in conversation to read the little scroll tucked next to their plate. Nothing about this is forced or scheduled -- it always flows quite leisurely and naturally.

We have lots of wonderful memories of snaggle-toothed pilgrims slowly and carefully weading fwom their little scwolls over their pumpkin pie. Nowadays they can make the pie and everything else besides if necessary. But even so, the little scrolls are still ready and waiting at each place setting when we sit down to feast together. For us, Thanksgiving just wouldn't be the same without all these beautiful words and thoughts and praises.

As we take our turns, each person tells something they feel particularly thankful for over the year since we last sat around the Thanksgiving table together. This is always my favorite family mealtime of the whole year. Precious beyond words.

This simple tradition has always been a way for our family to come together at Thanksgiving not just in shared appetite, but also in a common spirit of gratitude. And that is what we remember-- so clearly-- even after our memories of all the food have long since faded.

Our collection of poems and Psalms is posted in our archives here, and I encourage you to enjoy them with us again-- and maybe even print them out for your own family feast.

I am so looking forward to Thanksgiving this year! I hope you are, too.

A Poem That Gets Around

(Which is kind of a funny sort of double entendre, since it's about a pilgrim. On a pilgrimage. "Gets around"-- get it? Oh well, never mind.)

Let's see if I can pack John Bunyan, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Maddy Prior and the Carnival Band (oh, and how about some hobgoblins and foul fiends!) all into one post. Ready?

I shall let Brother Bunyan go first, which is the only proper thing to do, chronologically, deferentially, spiritually, ecumenically, grammatically... oh, sorry. Too many Englishman on this ship there for a minute.

Ahem.
::tap-tap-tap::
We shall begin with a poetry recitation.

To Be A Pilgrim

Who would true valour see,
Let him come hither;
One here will constant be,
Come wind, come weather.

There’s no discouragement
Shall make him once relent
His first avowed intent
To be a pilgrim.

Whoso beset him round
With dismal stories
Do but themselves confound;
His strength the more is.

No lion can him fright,
He’ll with a giant fight,
He will have a right
To be a pilgrim.

Hobgoblin nor foul fiend
Can daunt his spirit,
He knows he at the end
Shall life inherit.

Then fancies fly away,
He’ll fear not what men say,
He’ll labor night and day
To be a pilgrim.

by John Bunyan

Now, this, friends, is a poem that has achieved poetic immortality. First of all, Pilgrim's Progress, from which it is derived, is one of the most widely read books in history. If that weren't enough to make this poem a classic, it most likely would have lived on as a much-beloved hymn. And in the absence of that, it probably still would have emerged somehow or another as a folk song. As it is, it's all three-- the very rare poetic triple threat.

For many years, it's been one of the poems we take turns reading aloud at our family Thanksgiving feast. Justin requested it for recitation this month, freshly enthused by our most recent pass through Pilgrim's Progress, via the brilliant dramatized recording from Orion's Gate, which I cannot recommend highly enough. Every family library should have this recording. It's just basic household equipment in my estimation. My children wore out the tape sets, so we recently replaced them with the new MP3 versions. (Dandy Christmas gift!)

Alrighty then, the music! You'll enjoy this. I think.

English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams adapted this poem for the English Hymnal, setting it to a traditional English folk tune called "Monk's Gate"-- which, as you will see, has proven quite a versatile tune. 

This first video is the full-blown Anglican choir treatment, a cappella.  Love the way those English choristers sing "'gaaainst oll dis-ahh-stahh." You'll never hear vowels like that on this side of the pond!

Do notice that Bunyan's lions, giants, hobgoblins and foul fiends are all tidily banished from the hymn adaptation.  I guess that's supposed to make the lyrics more sacred or something, but of course the very wise Bunyan knew better-- the Good Book is smack full of lions and giants and foul fiends, and we'd best not be forgetting that. 

(I'm not sure what all the train footage is about here. Maybe someone thought locomotive conveyance is an apt modern metaphor for pilgrimage?)



This second version is the wonderful English folksinger Maddy Prior and the Carnival Band taking the Monk's Gate tune back to its roots as a hearty folk tune in the Sussex tradition.  Prior manages to howl all of Bunyan's cast of horrors back into the song, where they belong.




And, if you're up for a third, this is a fellow doing a mighty fine job of it on an organ.



Amazing how different one tune can sound performed in different ways! And how different the poem feels in the two vocal settings, don't you think?

So, which setting do you think best suits the poem-- the pious atmosphere of the hymn version, or the hearty peasant tone of the folk song?

partying poets, take a bow!

The Beehive Poetry Ceilidh was quite festive! A big thank you to all of you who stepped up on the Beehive stage and shared a few verses. I feel quite well-regaled, don't you all?

More than half the poems posted for the Ceilidh were original works! Love it! I had hoped we'd get an original or two, but half? Really? You people are fantastic. And all your poems are, too.

And never fear, if you're still tinkering with tropes out there-- I'm already getting buzzed for Ceilidh II!

So some of you probably noticed that it's been over a week since I said I was going to post some poems. Well, I decided to keep the Ceilidh linky up top for a week so your poems could have center stage. Now then, I'm just itching to post a few, namely some Wendell Berry poems that I've been befriending this year. Up shortly.

Thanks again to all the partying poets out there! The Beehive has the best readers in all of blogdom, I'm just sure of it. Keep your anthologies open and your pencils humming!

Beehive Poetry Ceilidh I

Let the festival begin! The more the merrier!

Here's what to do: simply post a poem on your blog. It can be original or a favorite by another poet. Then come back to The Beehive and give Mr. Linky, below, the link to your poem post on your blog (not the link to your main blog page).

If you prefer, you may share your poem in the comments to this post.

Funnity fun!

ps. For those of you who wanted to know, ceilidh is pronounced KAY-lee.

If you give a muse a waffle...

Einstein has now left the building.  He was a fun guest for a fortnight, was he not?  But my brain, which is by no means the same variety of cauliflower as Albert's, has a fickle appetite. 

Which brings us to waffles.  No, really, it does.  Anyone knows that good waffles have the power to reform a person's point of view.  But only the Wise Ones, those venerable souls robed in floury aprons of splendor, know that the Belgian variety, when the planets align and the vanilla is just right, possess powers that surpass even advanced rhetoric and bribery.  Particularly when fresh whipped cream is invoked. 

Deep down inside, you know I speak truth. 

So it makes perfect sense that when it comes to the navigational drift of The Beehive, much depends upon breakfast.

Just so, this particular morning, Justin rather brilliantly buried his waffles under the last of yesterday's pears -- a basket of Boscs stewed into a state of ecstacy with cardamom, ginger and little maple syrup.  I could not bear letting those pears forever fade from my existence without my fond adieu, so I stole a hefty forkful.  (You would have done the same.)  And whilst I was in the midst of all that mellow fruitfulness, my muses woke from their semi-permanent nap to mutter a flash of something dimly mimicking inspiration. 

In short, they declared that a dozen Einsteinisms were pleasant enough as an appetizer or tailgating sort of snack, but what they now desire is a whole platter of words more akin to those delectable pears atop Justin's waffles.  Something aromatic and spicy with a little crunch underneath.  Something poetic. 

Even drowsy muses have power to enthuse, apparently.  Because I now have a Novemberish sort of rumbling to host a Poetry Ceilidh here on the Beehive next week. 

(A ceilidh, you ask?  It's a Gaelic word that means party -- but a particular sort of party.  One where everyone present contributes to the entertainment.  Scots are not exactly known for being wallflowers.) 

So here's the plan, aspiring Beehive Bards.  I shall post several poems next week.  And you?  Well, just pick a poem you like, or better yet, pen one yourself.  I may just do a bit of both. 

I'll post a Mr. Linky late Friday night.  Then you can post a poem on your blog and link back to it here, or if you aren't a bloggity bloggerson, you can post your poems here in the comments. 

And if your pencil balks, maybe your muses just need a happy breakfast.

*  *  *  *  *

In the meantime, while your pears are stewing perhaps, here's a bit of verbal glory to appease the rumbling --Sarah Clarkson, whose blog is a fine blend of brains and beauty, offers up praise in her gorgeous, poetic prose.  What a gift this young lady has and is.

invisible things

To David, About His Education

The world is full of mostly invisible things,
And there is no way but putting the mind's eye,
Or its nose, in a book, to find them out,
Things like the square root of Everest
Or how many times Byron goes into Texas,
Or whether the law of the excluded middle
Applies west of the Rockies. For these
And the like reasons, you have to go to school
And study books and listen to what you are told,
And sometimes try to remember. Though I don't know
What you will do with the mean annual rainfall
On Plato's Republic, or the calorie content
Of the Diet of Worms, such things are said to be
Good for you, and you will have to learn them
In order to become one of the grown-ups
Who sees invisible things neither steadily nor whole,
But keeps gravely the grand confusion of the world
Under his hat, which is where it belongs,
And teaches small children to do this in their turn.

by Howard Nemerov
former Poet Laureate of the United States



(Those last four lines just knock me out.)

a poem for spring break

.
This is how I feel today.


The Thought of Something Else
by Wendell Berry


1.
A spring wind blowing
the smell of the ground
through the intersections of traffic,
the mind turns, seeks a new
nativity—another place,
simpler, less weighted
by what has already been.

Another place!
it’s enough to grieve me—
that old dream of going,
of becoming a better man
just by getting up and going
to a better place.

2.
The mystery. The old
unaccountable unfolding.
The iron trees in the park
suddenly remember forests.
It becomes possible to think of going

3.
—a place where thought
can take its shape
as quietly in the mind
as water in a pitcher,
or a man can be
safely without thought
—see the day begin
and lean back,
a simple wakefulness filling
perfectly
the spaces among the leaves.


from Collected Poems of Wendell Berry
which I am enjoying immensely, slowly, one poem at a time.

(Available, incidentally, along with all of Berry's books, from the good folks at Cumberland Books who provide a wealth of good and noble and praiseworthy things for us to think upon, and who have inspiring integrity... for example, they enclosed a handwritten check for a couple of bucks in my last order because one of the books I ordered was on discount for folks who were participating in the group reading going on at the Dominion Family blog, and I guess they just figured that was why I was buying it... which it was, but I hadn't mentioned that because I don't mind paying a couple of dollars more when I buy from a Christian family business. Because of that, I didn't cash the check, but the gesture says a lot about how they treat their customers.) .

spud shares a poem

.
...which he would like you to read aloud, seeing as how it is meant to be heard, and seeing as how this one is particularly hummish when heard aloud. We recommend a sort of sleepy, drowsy interpretation, taking your sweet time, because Milne was a sonic genius and we think you'll agree when you read this aloud in a slow, sleepy, drowsy voice. But you do what you like.


Water Lilies
by A. A. Milne


Where the water-lilies go
To and fro,
Rocking in the ripples of the water,
Lazy on a leaf lies the Lake King's daughter,
And the faint winds shake her.
Who will come and take her?
I will! I will!
Keep still! Keep still!
Sleeping on a leaf lies the Lake King's daughter. . .
Then the wind comes skipping
To the lilies on the water;
And the kind winds wake her.
Now who will take her?
With a laugh she is slipping
Through the lilies on the water.
Wait! Wait!
Too late, too late!
Only the water-lilies go
To and fro,
Dipping, dipping,
To the ripples of the water.

.

precisely

"Poets don’t draw. They unravel their handwriting and then tie it up again, but differently."

— Jean Cocteau

adventicipations

.

Mary's Song

Blue homespun and the bend of my breast
keep warm this small hot naked star
fallen to my arms. (Rest . . .
you who have had so far to come.)
Now nearness satisfies
the body of God sweetly. Quiet he lies
whose vigor hurled a universe. He sleeps
whose eyelids have not closed before.

His breath (so slight it seems
no breath at all) once ruffled the dark deeps
to sprout a world. Charmed by doves' voices,
the whisper of straw, he dreams,
hearing no music from his other spheres.
Breath, mouth, ears, eyes,
he is curtailed who overflowed all skies,
all years. Older than eternity, now he
is new. Now native to earth as I am, nailed
to my poor planet, caught
that I might be free, blind in my womb
to know my darkness ended,
brought to this birth for me to be new-born,
and for him to see me mended,
I must see him torn.

by Luci Shaw
from Accompanied by Angels: Poems of the Incarnation
.

adventicipations

.

Open

John 20:19, 26


Doubt padlocked one door and
Memory put her back to the other.
Still the damp draught seeped in, though
Fear chinked all the cracks and
Blindness boarded up the window.
In the darkness that was left
Defeat crouched, shivering,
in his cold corner.

Then Jesus came
(all the doors being shut)
and stood among them.


~Luci Shaw
from Accompanied by Angels - Poems of the Incarnation

.

A Psalm of Life

"If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
but make allowance for their doubting too..."

My high school friends had warned me that while loopily winding one's way out of anaesthesia from getting one's wisdom teeth removed, one is at risk of telling one's mother things one didn't mean to. You know, things. Apparently I didn't have a lot of things to tell, because there I was in that purportedly risky moment quoting to my rather astonished mother every single line of the marvellous poem If by Rudyard Kipling. Mother was even more surprised to learn that it had been laying dormant in the dark corners of my brain since fourth grade.

Mrs. Presley, my fourth grade teacher, was an old timer who firmly believed in the virtues of memory work. It was a constant in her classroom. Incredibly, I still remember almost everything I memorized at her behest, including the 100th Psalm and Noche de Paz (Silent Night in Spanish).

Just goes to show that what you feed to a young mind really does matter.

Spuddy Buddy is now in fourth grade, and we have been doing a lot of recitation work together this fall. In addition to some carefully selected poems, we are also memorizing the first chapter of John together over this school year. And we'll soon be getting that beloved 100th Psalm ready for reciting with the family at Thanksgiving dinner.

It was the legendary teacher Jack Cody -- Texas State Teacher of the Year in 2000 and my very dear lifelong friend and mentor -- who handed me an intoxicatingly aromatic mimeographed copy of A Psalm of Life by Longfellow for memorization. He gave our high school literature class such a stirring recitation of it that it is still his voice I hear in my head when I read it or even just think of the stanzas. This poem has been a fixture in my thought world ever since, and as such it has served me well. Different stanzas have floated to the top of my thoughts at different times, granting wisdom proper to the moment.

For instance, Mr. Cody could not have foreseen that the seventeen year old girl in the second row would someday lean into that second stanza while battling cancer thirty years later, would pause over this phrase and that one while grinding through the rugged detox from the pain meds, would huff through the last stanza over and over during the frustrating months of physical rehab that followed.

And therein lies the virtue of memorization: it allows you to meditate on a feast of ideas and beauty at will, to chew on a great thought many times over the course of a lifetime -- a lifetime so busy that you might never come across that poem on a page again, but once it becomes part of the furniture of your mind it is always available to you at any moment. Memorization populates your thought life with wise voices that will speak to you in both moments of need and moments of abundance.

I see now that it was a gift. When my father sat there with the Psalms open in his lap and had me recite whole chapters, when Mrs. Presley has us stand and chant Kipling together each morning till we had it down cold, when Mr. Cody took the time to read Longfellow and Dickinson aloud to us during precious class time... it was a gift. It was definitely something they could have just skipped. At the time, to me, it just looked like work. But can you see? It was really an act of love.


A Psalm of Life
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882)

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.

Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us farther than to-day.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act, act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God o'erhead!

Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;

Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.

.

Hum.

q. shenaynay

.

Let's say I were to suddenly appear from behind a gorsebush and say rather stuffily, "Ah! A mild spring zephyr!" How many of you would automatically think of Owl? Well, just so.

.

Because it was in fact a mild spring zephyr that just blew our front door wide open. Just like that. I mean, I was sitting here rather Owlishly minding my very own business, keeping my adrenaline very much under proper control, dontchaknow, when suddenly the wind just invited itself in. Just like that. Blew open the door with both proverbial and literal gusto, as well as a flourishy swoosh of tiny green leaves. Announced itself downright Tiggerishly, I must say.

.

And suddenly the atmosphere of the house was different, swirling as it was in fresh, green-smelling spring air. And tiny green leafy stuff that I will have to sweep up. Sometime. Maybe later. Because right now, I'm afraid I must do something about all this mild spring zephyrish air that is suddenly in my lungs.

.

Hum. Hum ditty dum. Now I don't want to do anything today. My head is full of fluff and it won't proceedcake any further than thoughts of a blanket and a book and a sandwich.

.

Whatever will I do about that?

.

"You never can tell with bees."

. ..

.

Hum for a Blustery Day

.

Hum dum dum ditty dum

Hum dum dum

Oh the wind is lashing lustily

And the trees are thrashing thrustily

And the leaves are rustling gustily

So it's rather safe to say

That it seems that it may turn out to be

It feels that it will undoubtedly

It looks like a rather blustery day, today

It sounds that it may turn out to be

Feels that it will undoubtedly

Looks like a rather blustery day today.

.

Winnie-ther-Pooh

(okay, it was actually A.A. Milne.)

Awake, My Soul

Awake my soul, in joyful lays,
And sing thy great Redeemer's praise;
He justly claims a song from me!
His loving kindness, oh how free!

He saw me ruined by the fall,
But loved me notwithstanding all;
He saved me from my lost estate,
His loving kindness, oh how great!

Though num'rous hosts of mighty foes,
Though earth and hell my way oppose,
He safely leads my soul along,
His loving kindness, oh how strong!

When trouble, like a gloomy cloud,
Has gathered thick, and thundered loud,
He near my soul has always stood;
His loving kindness, oh how good!

Often I feel my sinful heart
Prone from my Jesus to depart;
But though I have Him oft forgot,
His loving kindness changes not.

Soon I shall pass the gloomy vale,
Soon all my mortal pow'rs must fail.
O! may my last expiring breath
His loving kindness sing in death!

Then let me mount and soar away
To that bright land of endless day,
And sing, with rapture and surprise,
His loving kindness in the skies.


--Samuel Medley, 1738-1799

Washington's Birthday Eve

~q. shenaynay

We are big fans of George Washington here at the Beehive, and rather fond of Ogden Nash, too. And since my dear daddy shares his birthday with Washington (February 22), and since Nash is just about his favorite poet, it seems only fitting to post the following right this minute, before the clock tolls midnight.

As with so many of Nash's fantastically quirky poems, we find it helps to read this one with the voices of Rocky and Bulwinkle firmly fixed in your head. You could even let them alternate stanzas just to be fair about it and all.


Washington's Birthday Eve

George Washington was a gentleman,
A soldier and a scholar;
He crossed the Delaware with a boat,
The Potomac, with a dollar.
The British faced him full of joy,
And departed full of sorrow;
George Washington was a gentleman.
His birthday is tomorrow.

When approached by fellow patriots,
And asked for his opinion,
He spoke in accents clear and bold,
And, probably, Virginian.
His winter home at Valley Froge
Was underheated, rather.
He possessed a sturdy Roman nose,
And became his country's father.

His army was a hungry horde,
Ill-armed, worse-clad Colonials;
He was our leading President,
And discouraged ceremonials.
His portrait on our postage stamps,
It does him less than justice;
He was much respected by his wife,
The former Mrs. Custis.

He routed George's scarlet coats;
(Though oft by Congress hindered)
When they fortified the leeward side,
He slashed them from the windward.
He built and launched our Ship of State,
He brought it safe to harbor;
He wore no beard upon his chin,
Thanks to his faithful barber.

George Washington was a gentleman,
His birthday is tomorrow.
He filled his country's friends with joy,
His country's foes, with sorrow.
And so my dears, his grateful land
In robes of glory clad him.
George Washington was a gentleman.
I'm glad his parents had him.

~Ogden Nash

Valentine

My heart has made its mind up
And I'm afraid it's you.
Whatever you've got lined up
My heart has made its mind up
And if you can't be signed up
This year, next year will do.
My heart has made its mind up,
And I'm afraid it's you.

--Wendy Cope

As Iron on Iron

q. shenaynay

I gave Fa a volume of Luci Shaw's poetry for Christmas, which I waited till the last minute to wrap -- I knew I would have a hard time sneaking it back from her once she had read the first two or three of these luminous poems. This one was an immediate favorite for me.


As Iron on Iron

Walking this morning, I began to think
how everything wears its other down. How
this sidewalk smoothes my rubber soles.
How stomachs slick their food, waves
burnish shattered bottles to sea glass,
how a prevailing wind shapes trees
and bends them to its gusting will.

How calm weather soothes an impatient sea.
A panther, crated for the zoo, will pace
her pattern in her cage. Today my open window
carves the sunlight to a square that warms
the rug. God tools me like a strip of buckskin.
My silence wears your chatter like a suit;
your charity unravels my reproach. You
shape me, and I shape you, and all our kindred
work to shape us into who they wish we were.


~Luci Shaw