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Post by dvg on Oct 30, 2021 15:28:08 GMT -5
I knew her for a little ghost That in my garden walked; The wall is high—higher than most— And the green gate was locked.
And yet I did not think of that Till after she was gone— I knew her by the broad white hat, All ruffled, she had on.
By the dear ruffles round her feet, By her small hands that hung In their lace mitts, austere and sweet, Her gown's white folds among.
I watched to see if she would stay, What she would do—and oh! She looked as if she liked the way I let my garden grow!
She bent above my favourite mint With conscious garden grace, She smiled and smiled—there was no hint Of sadness in her face.
She held her gown on either side To let her slippers show, And up the walk she went with pride, The way great ladies go.
And where the wall is built in new And is of ivy bare She paused—then opened and passed through A gate that once was there
~ Edna St. Vincent Millay
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Post by gj on Nov 7, 2021 8:50:39 GMT -5
A prose poem by horror writer Clark Ashton Smith, a friend of H.P. Lovecraft.
The Devil-Flower
In a basin of porphyry, at the summit of a pillar of serpentine, the thing has existed from primeval time, in the garden of the kings that rule an equatorial realm of the planet Saturn. With black foliage, fine and intricate as the web of some enormous spider; with petals of livid rose, and purple like the purple of putrefying flesh; and a stem rising like a swart and hairy wrist from a bulb so old, so encrusted with the growth of centuries that it resembles an urn of stone, the monstrous flower holds dominion over all the garden. In this flower, from the years of oldest legend, an evil demon has dwelt- a demon whose name and whose nativity are known to the superior magicians and mysteriarchs of the kingdom, but to none other. Over the half-animate flowers, the ophidian orchids that coil and sting, the bat-like lilies that open their ribbèd petals by night, and fasten with tiny yellow teeth on the bodies of sleeping dragonflies; the carnivorous cacti that yawn with green lips beneath their beards of poisonous yellow prickles; the plants that palpitate like hearts, the blossoms that pant with a breath of poisonous perfume - over all these, the Flower-Devil is supreme, in its malign immortality, and evil, perverse intelligence- inciting them to strange maleficence, fantastic mischief, even to acts of rebellion against the gardeners, who proceed about their duties with wariness and trepidation, since more than one of them has been bitten, even unto death, by some vicious and venefic flower. In places, the garden has run wild from lack of care on the part of the fearful gardeners, and has become a monstrous tangle of serpentine creepers, and hydra-headed plants, convolved and inter-writhing in lethal hate or venomous love, and horrible as a rout of wrangling vipers and pythons.
And, like his innumerable ancestors before him, the king dares not destroy the Flower, for fear that the devil, driven from its habitation, might seek a new home, and enter into the brain or body of one of the king's subjects- or even the heart of his fairest and gentlest, and most beloved queen!
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Post by dvg on Dec 3, 2021 11:04:57 GMT -5
When reeds are dead and a straw to thatch the marshes, And feathered pampas-grass rides into the wind Like aged warriors westward, tragic, thinned Of half their tribe, and over the flattened rushes, Stripped of its secret, open, stark and bleak, Blackens afar the half-forgotten creek,- Then leans on me the weight of the year, and crushes My heart. I know that Beauty must ail and die, And will be born again,-but ah, to see Beauty stiffened, staring up at the sky! Oh, Autumn! Autumn!-What is the Spring to me?
~ Edna St. Vincent Millay dvg
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Post by dvg on Mar 16, 2022 12:42:32 GMT -5
O Winter! I'd live that life of thine, With a frosty brow and an icicle tongue, And never a song my whole life long, - Were such delicious burial mine! To die and be buried, and so remain A wandering brook in April's train, Fixing my dying eyes for aye On the dawning brows of maiden May.
~ George Meredith
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Post by dvg on Mar 24, 2022 11:52:33 GMT -5
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 waves in glee: A poet could not but be 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.
~ William Wordsworth dvg
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Post by dvg on May 2, 2022 13:30:37 GMT -5
“Hope” is the thing with feathers - That perches in the soul - And sings the tune without the words And never stops - at all -
And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard - And sore must be the storm - That could abash the little Bird That kept so many warm -
I’ve heard it in the chillest land - And on the strangest Sea - Yet - never - in Extremity, It asked a crumb - of me.
~Emily Dickinson
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Post by dvg on May 29, 2022 5:45:50 GMT -5
She walks in beauty, like the night Of cloudless climes and starry skies; And all that's best of dark and bright Meet in her aspect and her eyes Thus mellow'd to that tender light Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
One shade the more, one ray the less, Had half impair'd the nameless grace Which waves in every raven tress, Or softly lightens o'er her face; Where thoughts serenely sweet express How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.
And on that cheek, and o'er that brow, So soft, so calm, yet eloquent, The smiles that win, the tints that glow, But tell of days in goodness spent, A mind at peace with all below, A heart whose love is innocent!
~Lord Byron dvg
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Post by dvg on Jul 10, 2022 21:16:51 GMT -5
Listen: there was once a king sitting on his throne.
Around Him stood great and wonderfully beautiful columns ornamented with ivory, bearing the banners of the king with great honour.
Then it pleased the king to raise a small feather from the ground, and he commanded it to fly.
The feather flew, not because of anything in itself but because the air bore it along.
Thus am I, a feather on the breath of God.
~Hildegard of Bingen dvg
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