ladylinda
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June
Jun 6, 2014 9:20:18 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 6, 2014 9:20:18 GMT -5
SONG
William Stanley Braithwaite
I went down the ways of the roses this noon, The birds were in tune with the infinite skies, And all my heart sang, "It is June, it is June," And all my soul teemed with the lovely sur-prise, As I went down the ways of the roses this noon.
And into my garden the shades bade them come, The wayfaring dreams that came forth of the sun: "Come, rest," said the roses, "ere further ye roam;" "Be my guests" said my heart, "till the day it be done," As into my garden the shades bade them come.
O long the dreams tarried within that sweet place, And unto my heart and the roses they told, How on their long travel they met with a face All clouded with hair of the sun's fairest gold -- And my heart and the roses sighed in the sweet place.
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June
Jun 6, 2014 10:03:25 GMT -5
Post by beth on Jun 6, 2014 10:03:25 GMT -5
Both the Riley and the Payne are delightful.
I like Riley in small doses. This one is especially good.
"Knee Deep in June" ... wonderful title!
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 6, 2014 11:06:32 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 6, 2014 11:06:32 GMT -5
Thanks, Beth. Yes, sometimes I like to post slightly unusual types of poem!
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 7, 2014 8:16:18 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 7, 2014 8:16:18 GMT -5
To a June Rose
Austin Dobson
O royal Rose! the Roman dress’d His feast with thee; thy petals press’d Augustan brows; thine odour fine, Mix’d thee with three-times mingled wines, Lent the long Thracian draught its zest.
What marvel then, if host and guest, By song, by Joy, by Thee caress’d, Half trembled on the half-divine O royal Rose!
And yet – and yet – I love thee best In our old gardens of the West, Whether about my thatch thou twine, Or Hers, that brown-eyed maid of mine Who lulls thee on her lawny breast O royal Rose!
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 7, 2014 8:16:43 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 7, 2014 8:16:43 GMT -5
June
William Morris
O June, o June, that we desirèd so, Across the river thy soft breezes blow, Sweet with the scent of beanfields far away, Above our heads rustle the aspens gray, Calm is the sky with harmless clouds beset, No thoughts of storm the morning vexes yet.
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 7, 2014 8:20:07 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 7, 2014 8:20:07 GMT -5
Days of June 1941
George Seferis
The new moon rose over Alexandria Holding the old one in her arms And we on our way towards the gate of the sun In the night of the heart. Three friends..
We sought in our youth the metamorphosis With desires that flashed like big fishes In seas that suddenly shrunk: We used to believe in the omnipotence of the body, And now the new moon has risen in embrace With the old moon, and the beautiful island lies Wounded and bleeding, the calm island, the strong, the innocent, And the bodies like broken branches And like roots torn from the ground. Our thirst The statue of a horseman At the dark gate of the sun Does not know what to ask for; stands upon guard In exile hereabouts Near to the burial place of Alexander
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 8, 2014 7:16:47 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 8, 2014 7:16:47 GMT -5
Not just about June but each month of the year including it!
The Poet’s Calendar
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
January
Janus am I; oldest of potentates; Forward I look, and backward, and below I count, as god of avenues and gates, The years that through my portals come and go. I block the roads, and drift the fields with snow; I chase the wild-fowl from the frozen fen; My frosts congeal the rivers in their flow, My fires light up the hearths and hearts of men.
February
I am lustration, and the sea is mine! I wash the sands and headlands with my tide; My brow is crowned with branches of the pine; Before my chariot-wheels the fishes glide. By me all things unclean are purified, By me the souls of men washed white again; E'en the unlovely tombs of those who died Without a dirge, I cleanse from every stain.
March
I Martius am! Once first, and now the third! To lead the Year was my appointed place; A mortal dispossessed me by a word, And set there Janus with the double face. Hence I make war on all the human race; I shake the cities with my hurricanes; I flood the rivers and their banks efface, And drown the farms and hamlets with my rains.
April
I open wide the portals of the Spring To welcome the procession of the flowers, With their gay banners, and the birds that sing Their song of songs from their aerial towers. I soften with my sunshine and my showers The heart of earth; with thoughts of love I glide Into the hearts of men; and with the Hours Upon the Bull with wreathed horns I ride.
May
Hark! The sea-faring wild-fowl loud proclaim My coming, and the swarming of the bees. These are my heralds, and behold! my name Is written in blossoms on the hawthorn-trees. I tell the mariner when to sail the seas; I waft o'er all the land from far away The breath and bloom of the Hesperides, My birthplace. I am Maia. I am May.
June
Mine is the Month of Roses; yes, and mine The Month of Marriages! All pleasant sights And scents, the fragrance of the blossoming vine, The foliage of the valleys and the heights. Mine are the longest days, the loveliest nights; The mower's scythe makes music to my ear; I am the mother of all dear delights; I am the fairest daughter of the year.
July
My emblem is the Lion, and I breathe The breath of Libyan deserts o'er the land; My sickle as a sabre I unsheathe, And bent before me the pale harvests stand. The lakes and rivers shrink at my command, And there is thirst and fever in the air; The sky is changed to brass, the earth to sand; I am the Emperor whose name I bear.
August
The Emperor Octavian, called the August, I being his favorite, bestowed his name Upon me, and I hold it still in trust, In memory of him and of his fame. I am the Virgin, and my vestal flame Burns less intensely than the Lion's rage; Sheaves are my only garlands, and I claim The golden Harvests as my heritage.
September
I bear the Scales, where hang in equipoise The night and day; and whenunto my lips I put my trumpet, with its stress and noise Fly the white clouds like tattered sails of ships; The tree-tops lash the air with sounding whips; Southward the clamorous sea-fowl wing their flight; The hedges are all red with haws and hips, The Hunter's Moon reigns empress of the night.
October
My ornaments are fruits; my garments leaves, Woven like cloth of gold, and crimson dyed; I do no boast the harvesting of sheaves, O'er orchards and o'er vineyards I preside. Though on the frigid Scorpion I ride, The dreamy air is full, and overflows With tender memories of the summer-tide, And mingled voices of the doves and crows.
November
The Centaur, Sagittarius, am I, Born of Ixion's and the cloud's embrace; With sounding hoofs across the earth I fly, A steed Thessalian with a human face. Sharp winds the arrows are with which I chase The leaves, half dead already with affright; I shroud myself in gloom; and to the race Of mortals bring nor comfort nor delight.
December
Riding upon the Goat, with snow-white hair, I come, the last of all. This crown of mine Is of the holly; in my hand I bear The thyrsus, tipped with fragrant cones of pine. I celebrate the birth of the Divine, And the return of the Saturnian reign;-- My songs are carols sung at every shrine, Proclaiming "Peace on earth, good will to men."
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 8, 2014 7:17:31 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 8, 2014 7:17:31 GMT -5
Two Months
Rudyard Kipling
June
No hope, no change! The clouds have shut us in, And through the cloud the sullen Sun strikes down Full on the bosom of the tortured Town, Till Night falls heavy as remembered sin That will not suffer sleep or thought of ease, And, hour on hour, the dry-eyed Moon in spite Glares through the haze and mocks with watery light The torment of the uncomplaining trees. Far off, the Thunder bellows her despair To echoing Earth, thrice parched. The lightnings fly In vain. No help the heaped-up clouds afford, But wearier weight of burdened, burning air. What truce with Dawn? Look, from the aching sky, Day stalks, a tyrant with a flaming sword!
September
At dawn there was a murmur in the trees, A ripple on the tank, and in the air Presage of coming coolness -- everywhere A voice of prophecy upon the breeze. Up leapt the Sun and smote the dust to gold, And strove to parch anew the heedless land, All impotently, as a King grown old Wars for the Empire crumbling 'neath his hand. One after one the lotos-petals fell, Beneath the onslaught of the rebel year, In mutiny against a furious sky; And far-off Winter whispered: -- "It is well! "Hot Summer dies. Behold your help is near, "For when men's need is sorest, then come I."
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 8, 2014 7:19:42 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 8, 2014 7:19:42 GMT -5
Another Way of Love
Robert Browning
I.
June was not over Though past the fall, And the best of her roses Had yet to blow, When a man I know (But shall not discover, Since ears are dull, And time discloses) Turned him and said with a man's true air, Half sighing a smile in a yawn, as 'twere,--- ``If I tire of your June, will she greatly care?''
II.
Well, dear, in-doors with you! True! serene deadness Tries a man's temper. What's in the blossom June wears on her bosom? Can it clear scores with you? Sweetness and redness. _Eadem semper!_ Go, let me care for it greatly or slightly! If June mend her bower now, your hand left unsightly By plucking the roses,---my June will do rightly.
III.
And after, for pastime, If June be refulgent With flowers in completeness, All petals, no prickles, Delicious as trickles Of wine poured at mass-time,--- And choose One indulgent To redness and sweetness: Or if, with experience of man and of spider, June use my June-lightning, the strong insect-ridder, And stop the fresh film-work,---why, June will consider.
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 9, 2014 10:48:38 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 9, 2014 10:48:38 GMT -5
‘Summer has two Beginnings’
Emily Dickinson
Summer has two Beginnings -- Beginning once in June -- Beginning in October Affectingly again --
Without, perhaps, the Riot But graphicker for Grace -- As finer is a going Than a remaining Face --
Departing then -- forever -- Forever -- until May -- Forever is deciduous Except to those who die --
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 9, 2014 10:49:07 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 9, 2014 10:49:07 GMT -5
Summer Prelude
Eileen Haggitt
Birds, mating over, are busy on small domestic matters; The air is full of the soft sound of feather, Feather upon feather, flying from sunlight to shadow. Under the bridge the full flowing water eddies and ebbs Till the white pebbles chatter together, talking of small spring matters. In this green world a boy lingers Watching complacent trout poised between the currents. He has come from school, where, in a grey room, He has watched spring clouds hurry across the patch of blue Framed by a window. He has heard the sudden hum of a bee Interrupt the master’s ‘Quae’s’ and ‘Quod’s’; And Caesar’s terse commentary on the Gallic War, Mocked by a cuckoo in the distant woods; And all the while the sunlight has crept round the walls, And swallows have jostled in the eaves for houseroom. School over, he has fled the place Plunged deeply into meadow grass, disturbing butterflies, Found in the hawthorns a new nest, and felt The warm eggs in the feathered cup, Lived a little space, and then turned homeward.
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 9, 2014 10:49:33 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 9, 2014 10:49:33 GMT -5
There Will Be Summers
David Morton
You who take up the cross of this old crime, The wage of sin that never was your sin, And mount this stony hill that is your time, Leaving the broad, green lands you loitered in, And leaving there your youth, your love, your joy, In the name of sweeter nights and days that lie Beyond this darkness, where some girl and boy Will walk these ways beneath a later sky.
Think how, in that grave summer yet to come, Two will go there, whose names you never heard, Their cool hands linked, their lips too strangely dumb For any language but a choking word, And come on sudden sweetness in that air, On joy, on love, put by and waiting there.
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 10, 2014 8:08:28 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 10, 2014 8:08:28 GMT -5
Emblems of Summer
Edward Shanks
Come, baby, and you, younger baby, come, The nuts are in the hedge, the trees are full, The blackberries are rip, there may be some Mushrooms for us in the next field to pull Out of their fairy-rings, dusky and green, And then we’ll go into the wood and find Lying ungathered on their bed of clean, Moist leaves, the beech-nuts with their prickly rind. Come, baby, and you, younger baby, too, You emblems of my summer, come with me And I will give the summer’s fruits to you, Gathered by us from field and bush and tree. Your spring makes now my summer, therefore come With me whom fading spring so long made dumb.
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 10, 2014 8:08:53 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 10, 2014 8:08:53 GMT -5
‘The dizzy summer calf...’
Norman McCaig
The dizzy summer calf, hen chasing sparrow, bristle of grass, the tilted grids of wagons, the posing mare in a violet tent of shadow – sun burns on these; his fiery light is steep, and the day halts and pants between step and step.
No water in this quilted country dances or shivers in cool shocks in pools of limestone or melts the fiery flakes with bubble flounces or echoes birches with its shaggy fall, but in green pools holds its own funeral.
No music now but colour, green on green; breathless in light the wind has lost its voice; no thrust to string the moment on a tune, And cuckoo sounds his horn no longer from his castle of shadow in the summer dream.
The puff of heat balled in my dancing eye bows like a hazel twig above desire of crisping sand and dowses for the sea, and while a furnace moment halts and hangs I am where water walks and wind sings.
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ladylinda
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June
Jun 10, 2014 8:09:42 GMT -5
Post by ladylinda on Jun 10, 2014 8:09:42 GMT -5
The Catch
Simon Armitage
Forget the long, smouldering afternoon. It is
this moment when the ball scoots off the edge
of the bat, upwards, backwards, falling seemingly
beyond him yet he reaches and picks it
out of its loop like
an apple from a branch, the first of the season.
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