General Chat

This is one of my favourite sayings, courtesy of Mark Twain:

'The more I know people, the more I love my dog'.

x

I am so delighted at the response ansd some lovely poems, I might print them all and make Album with them

I have noticed that we have all posted poems so I will spend the next hour or so doing some more cleaning and thinking of some good or funny "sayings"

This one is a real favorite from 'A Shopshire Lad'

Along the field as we came by
A year ago,my love and I,
The Aspen over stile and stone
Was talking to itself alone.
'Oh who are these that kiss and pass?
A country lover and his lass;
Two lovers looking to be wed;
And time shall put them both to bed,
But she will lie with earth above,
And he beside another love.

And sure enough beneath the tree
There walks another love with me,
And overhead the aspen heaves
its rainy-sounding silver leaves;
And I spell nothing in their stir,
But now perhaps they speak to her,
And plain for her to understand
They talk about a time at hand
when I shall sleep with clover clad,
And she beside another lad.

One of my very favourites,,,,

THE PEACE OF WILD THINGS

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.


— Wendell Berry

I haven't writen this one Bridget but think it's very apt

Good Luck X

Moving house is the ultimate stress,
Each room is a dump, an absolute mess
With boxes strewn all over the place,
Another day packing unable to face,

Surrendering all that cherished for years,
Enough to drive anyone sadly to tears,
Taking the pictures down from the wall,
The umbrella and hat from the stand in the hall,

The books from the shelves and the family clock,
A bitter experience, a terrible shock,
Farewell to the garden, the plants and the trees,
A new home to go to but not to appease

After this one I am going to turn my comp off! I am not getting on with mmy packing!!!

Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of promises of eternal passion. That is just being "in love" which any of us can convince ourselves we are.

Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident. Your mother and I had it, we had roots that grew towards each other underground, and when all the pretty blossom had fallen from our branches we found that we were one tree and not two.
St. Augustine

If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is forever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
A body of England's, breathing English air,
Washed by the rivers, blessed by sons of home.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven


I remember learning this at school, but I had to look it uo because I could not remeber verse 3 Old age perhaps?

I am sure that I Know a few poems about growing old, do you all remember or partly remember poetry learnt at school, have yu ever written poetry?

Home is the place your heart resides
Home is the place that you decide
Home is the womb that holds the soul
Home is the place where one is whole

Home is the glow you hold in your eye
Home is the emotion that makes you cry
Home is safe and a place of peace
Home is where all strivings cease

Home is protective against the others
Home is full of sisters and brothers
Home is where you find your rest
Home is where you feel your best

Home is a memory that follows your being
Home is a dream for those agreeing
Home is the place where reserves fall
Home is the place you yearn to call

Home is where the family meets
Home is a place of restful retreats
Home is the place you know you’ll be heard
Home is the pace where nothing blurs

Home is all these wonderful things
Home is the place you develop wings
Home is the place that you’ll find one day
Home is the place where your heart will stay

Aisha Patterson

I am so delighted that this thread is having so much attention. I thought that I might get one or two replies but people seem to be having a good time remembering there favourite. I have to do my packing today and realised just how much i have gathered so having to be fairly ruthless. I went to the supermarket and bought some compression bags and so far so good,
I ano am wondering of there are any poems about moving house?? there is todays challenge.
Keep writing it is so uplifting

Hi Bridget and All
I love poetry too and can remember having to learn it 'off by heart'. Robert Louis Stevenson being one of my favourites poets.

One of the first I ever learnt was The Cow from the Child's Garden of Verses book,which i took to bed every night lol


The friendly cow all red and white,
I love with all my heart:
She gives me cream with all her might,
To eat with apple-tart.

She wanders lowing here and there,
And yet she cannot stray,
All in the pleasant open air,
The pleasant light of day;

And blown by all the winds that pass
And wet with all the showers,
She walks among the meadow grass
And eats the meadow flowers

Mau x

elisabeth- thank you for putting From a railway carriage. I can't believe how much I have remember about poetry but this poem was always recited in the rhythm of the train going clackity clack on the rails.-jle

Just a little story about learning a poem many years ago. The teacher was missing so the headmistress, a rotund battleaxe looking woman took over the class and told us to choose a poem and learn it..... One way of looking after a class of 50.

Our desks were the double type so each 'double'had to learn the same poem. We chose a 4x4 lined verse as it looked the shortest. I can't remember what the poem was about but the last word was 'chemise'. As we had never seen the word as 10 year olds we decided the nearest word was 'chemist' so thats what we said.

Towards the end of the lesson the headmistress chose various people to stand up and recite, and horror of horrors she chose my friend, thankfully not me. My friend duly recited it all until she got to this last word which she went on to pronounce as Chemist. The headmistress screamed 'what!!?' so we both said apologetically that we didn't know how to pronounce chemise.

In our endeavour to learn the poem we hadn't read what it was about. It turns out that the author was saying how awful it would be to be left in the garden with no clothes...and not even a chemise (vest).I presume somewhere there would be the word 'freeze' to rhyme with chemise but as children we didn't understand.

.....perhaps the headmistress may have thought afterwards that learning poetry wasn't such a good idea.....but I never forgot chemise-jle

From a Railway Carriage
by Robert Louis Stevenson

Faster than fairies, faster than witches,
Bridges and houses, hedges and ditches;
And charging along like troops in a battle
All through the meadows the horses and cattle:
All of the sights of the hill and the plain
Fly as thick as driving rain;
And ever again, in the wink of an eye,
Painted stations whistle by.
Here is a child who clambers and scrambles,
All by himself and gathering brambles;
Here is a tramp who stands and gazes;
And here is the green for stringing the daisies!
Here is a cart runaway in the road
Lumping along with man and load;
And here is a mill, and there is a river:
Each a glimpse and gone forever!

Janet,

Thank you for reminding me of 'The Land of Counterpane' - brings back happy memories of school days.

There are many RLS on http://www.lone-star.net/mall/literature/rls/childs-garden-of-verses.htm

I was so pleased to find the Railway Carriage poem - another favourite.

Elisabeth

There is a program on radio 4 I think, quite late at night when poetry is read. The choice comes from listeners who have favourites or like me earlier on, asking for help in resurrecting a poem from years ago. Its not just the poems I like but the stories of how they came to be.

I remember being told about Robert Louis Stevenson being a sickly child who spent a lot of time in bed which inspired him to write about the 'Land of Counterpane'....I guess most children nowadays wouldn't even know what a counterpane was. ..........I might just seek it out ...jle

What lovely poems 'SpanishEyes' epecially the first one, I love poetrry and will post another one later to see what you all think?!

Last posting of the day!!! I must go and get some sleep, lots to do tommorow as I need to buy some big boxes which I can put much of my things in and keep in the car to drive back to Spain. Oh I can't wait.
Hope you al remeber this my sister andI learnt this one at Primary School and NO i am not going to say how many years ago that was.

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced, but they
Out-did the sparkling leaves in glee;
A poet could not be but gay,
In such a jocund company!
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
Wordsworth


night night

I can't remember who wrote this but I think it is beautiful I will have to google and see who wrote it unless some one on here knows?

If questioning would make us wise
No eyes would ever gaze in eyes;
If all our tale were told in speech
No mouths would wander each to each.

Were spirits free from mortal mesh
And love not bound in hearts of flesh
No aching breasts would yearn to meet
And find their ecstasy complete.

For who is there that lives and knows
The secret powers by which he grows?
Were knowledge all, what were our need
To thrill and faint and sweetly bleed?.

Then seek not, sweet, the "If" and "Why"
I love you now until I die.
For I must love because I live
And life in me is what you give.

Yes it was christopher ???

Janet
maybe tomorrow you will be able to add another favourite poem.
I was not at all sure that anyone would take any notice when I put the first post up so I am delighted that we have had some respones. I wil put an other poem on soon.

choccy - I have been busy helping a friend with their family tree this afternoon and I decided to take a look before logging off. Thank you so much for the poem. It is still making me smile fifty years later!. I could only remember some of the first few lines with a few dah di dahs. jle