On the 28th of February, even thought I am quite a fan of winter, I woke of with thoughts of warm days on my mind. I have a few poetry websites I check in on and this was on the Poem-A-Day site. How suitable to my morning waking.

On the Grasshopper and Cricket
John Keats, 1795 - 1821

The poetry of earth is never dead:
When all the birds are faint with the hot sun,
And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run
From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead;
That is the Grasshopper’s—he takes the lead
In summer luxury,—he has never done
With his delights; for when tired out with fun
He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed.
The poetry of earth is ceasing never:
On a lone winter evening, when the frost
Has wrought a silence, from the stove there shrills
The Cricket’s song, in warmth increasing ever,
And seems to one in drowsiness half lost,
The Grasshopper’s among some grassy hills.

I love that one. "The poetry of earth is ceasing never." This poem is considered an example of JK's juvenile work, but who cares. Another of his very early ones gets us back to winter, though we now can be thankful it's not still December. I remember a prof saying that a critic ridiculed Keats in general, and attacked the ungrammaticalness of "The feel of not to feel it," which is my favorite part of the poem.

In drear nighted December
John Keats, 1795 - 1821

In drear nighted December,
Too happy, happy tree,
Thy branches ne’er remember
Their green felicity—
The north cannot undo them
With a sleety whistle through them
Nor frozen thawings glue them
From budding at the prime.

In drear-nighted December,
Too happy, happy brook,
Thy bubblings ne’er remember
Apollo’s summer look;
But with a sweet forgetting,
They stay their crystal fretting,
Never, never petting
About the frozen time.

Ah! would ‘twere so with many
A gentle girl and boy—
But were there ever any
Writh’d not of passed joy?
The feel of not to feel it,
When there is none to heal it
Nor numbed sense to steel it,
Was never said in rhyme.

Oh Saffron, I do feel for you and hope you don't miss your friend too much.

I remember when I left a place of work - they were closing down our office, so we were all being dispersed. It was distressing because, although I knew we women would stay in touch, I really knew the men would not be able to stay because.....well...it wouldn't be proper.

I have recently discovered that a few of my books of poetry had gotten wet at some point in the past year or so. I don't know if it was a plant placed on the shelf near by that leaked, or maybe it happened during a fury of rearranging my living space, or an open window during a summer rain. One night last week when I woke at 2am I pulled Mary Oliver's Why I Wake Early off the shelve for comfort; it seemed the right book. I opened it and got a nose full of mold spores. The pages were rippled with dark dusty smudges on the pages. When I took off the dust cover I realized the actual cover had begun to decompose. I tore off the covers and wiped off as much of the dusty mold as I could. I've been reading through it all week, reluctant to toss the book, as I know I should - it's a hazard to one so afflicted with allergies as I am. While reading this morning I found the perfect poem for a Sunday. I have mixed feelings about Mary Oliver's poetry. What I love and does resonant with me is her careful study and observation of nature that shows up in her poetry.

Mindful
by Mary Oliver

Every day
I see or hear
something
that more or less

kills me
with delight,
that leaves me
like a needle

in the haystack
of light.
It was what I was born for -
to look, to listen,

to lose myself
inside this soft world -
to instruct myself
over and over

in joy,
and acclamation.
Nor am I talking
about the exceptional,

the fearful, the dreadful,
the very extravagant -
but of the ordinary,
the common, the very drab,

the daily presentations.
Oh, good scholar,
I say to myself,
how can you help

but grow wise
with such teachings
as these -
the untrimmable light

of the world,
the ocean's shine,
the prayers that are made
out of grass?

Penelope wrote:Oh Saffron, I do feel for you and hope you don't miss your friend too much.

I remember when I left a place of work - they were closing down our office, so we were all being dispersed. It was distressing because, although I knew we women would stay in touch, I really knew the men would not be able to stay because.....well...it wouldn't be proper.

That is too bad, about the men. What's going on there, do you think?

DWill:

That is too bad, about the men. What's going on there, do you think?

Well, we women could arrange a get together in a pub now and again. But you couldn't meet a man in a pub.....it would seem like a dangerous liaison.

Anyway, I just remember that where we had been colleagues who really liked and enjoyed one another's company.....when it didn't happen to be a work situation....it just didn't seem right. I don't think I would have liked my husband to be going out to meet a female ex-colleague for drinks, whereas I don't mind in the least when he meets the men he worked with. He would certainly not have been pleased if the position was reversed either.

I used to love this song from the musical 'Flower Drum Song' - and I still love it:-

Now that we're going to be married,
I keep imagining things,
Things that can happen to people,
When they are wearing gold rings:

Being together each morning,
Sharing our coffee and toast.
That's only one of the pictures.
Here's what I picture most.

Sunday, sweet Sunday,
With nothing to do,
Lazy and lovely,
My one day with you.

Hazy and happy,
We'll drift through the day,
Dreaming the hours away.

While all the funny papers lie or fly around the place
I will try my kisses on your funny face.

Dozing, then waking,
On Sunday you'll see...
On...ly... me!

Sunday, sweet Sunday,
On Sunday you'll see...
On...ly... me!

Good day to everyone. I have a fun reason to post this Robert Frost, besides it being one of my all time favorite poems. One of my passwords at work is due to expire and so it is time for me to make up a new one. A trick I use to help me create a password as well as to remember it after, is to find a way to create a sentence with the letters and numbers. So there I am at my desk playing around with 4= for, B= be, 8= infinity (you figure out why), etc to come up with yet another dumb sentence to use as my password, when aha, it occurred to me to use lines from poetry! Well, actually I think I looked up to see the poem that I have posted up in my cubical - the Robert Frost that follows.

The Pasture
By Robert Frost
I'm going out to clean the pasture spring;
I'll only stop to rake the leaves away
(And wait to watch the water clear, I may):
I sha'n't be gone long.—You come too.

I'm going out to fetch the little calf
That's standing by the mother. It's so young,
It totters when she licks it with her tongue.
I sha'n't be gone long.—You come too.

I can't give away everything but - Ucm2! Fun, right? I am making dinner and sipping a glass of wine as I am posting (queen of multitasking, to my own detriment, I think and maybe yours too tonight). As I was composing my post I had a side thought - William Carlos Williams - another favorite poet of mine - This is Just to Say, in my mind it is a perfect fit to the Frost and another great candidate for passwords.

This Is Just To Say
William Carlos Williams, 1883 - 1963

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold

4gvMss&s32 - Either I am on to something or I'm off my rocker. Before I close, anyone have a guess or a feel for why these poems are paired in my mine? I am asking because I want to see if they evoke a similar something in another person as they do for me.

How much wine??

DWill wrote:How much wine??

Enough to come up with 4gvMss&s32 and to find a compelling connection between the Frost and the Williams poems

Nope, I can't get the connection - but I do like both poems - as both are quite rural, countryside genre..

They reminded me a bit of this favourite Edward Thomas poem:-

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.

As for passwords - they are a nightmare for me - I have four which I use all the time.....except that they want numbers and characters - and then I just throw my laptop up into the air and swear......


Joke:

Today I opened a new email account, I always use the same password: "cabbage". It's easy to remember. But it seems the computer had other plans...


Please enter your new password:

"cabbage"

Sorry, the password must be more than 8 characters.

"boiled cabbage"

Sorry, the password must contain 1 numerical character.

"1 boiled cabbage"

Sorry, the password cannot have blank spaces.

"50bloodyboiledcabbages"

Sorry, the password must contain at least one upper case character.

"50BLOODYboiledcabbages"

Sorry, the password cannot use more than one upper case character consecutively.

"50BloodyBoiledCabbagesShovedUpYourArse,
IfYouDon'tGiveMeAccessnow”

Sorry, the password cannot contain punctuation.

“ReallyPissedOff50BloodyBoiledCabbagesShovedUpYourArseIf
YouDontGiveMeAccessnow”

Sorry, that password is already in use.