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Found this on a comment board today:


The morning dawned clear and bright, and Gandalf rose early to walk along the terraces and slopes above the loud-flowing Bruinen. The rising sun shone pale and wan through the silver mist, and the webs of the spiders glistened among the trees. On a small bench beside the path he came upon Elrond, who rose to greet him.

“Fine is the morning and fortunate the meeting, O Mithrandir! Long have I sat here contemplating the paths that lie before us, and now find myself in need of sustenance. I have in my cool-rooms a hoard of stone-fruits from Gondolin, which I would gladly share with you.”

“Many years has it been,” replied Gandalf, “since I have tasted the stone-fruits of Gondolin. They grow now but sparsely among the fallen stones of that once fair city.”

Elrond rose and led the way to his cool-rooms, which stood in a shadowed corner of the Last Homely House, sheltered from the sunlight by the high walls of the building around them. There he kept many foods from all over Middle-Earth, cooled by great blocks of ice carried down from the Misty mountains.

The thick stone door of the cool-rooms stood ajar. Elrond and Gandalf entered to find Pippin seated on a wooden chest, wiping his mouth with his handkerchief. Beside him lay a small pile of fruit-stones, the last traces of golden flesh still clinging to them.

“Hullo, Gandalf! Hullo, Elrond! I just popped in here for a little something to eat. It’s a long time yet to breakfast, and waiting is hungry work, as my gaffer always says.”

Elrond stood still within the doorway, but Gandalf strode forward. “Gluttonous fool of a Took! You have eaten the stone-fruits of Gondolin, which we had preserved in the cool-room for our breakfast!”

“Forgive me,” cried the hobbit, cringing before the wizard’s wrath. “They were so sweet and so cold that I could hardly resist them!”


Points if you get the originating reference. :)

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He floats into my life
like a cloud
and out like a rainstorm
Slithers into it like a snake
that wraps around my thigh
Always there, never there
Like a star I can't pinpoint
from one night to the next
He's beautiful, so beautiful
Smiling and sullen
Mean and teasing sweet
Pale as moonlight,
baked hot and brown
Eyes clear ocean,
forest shadow,
dark midnight,
and warm whiskey amber
He wraps his arms around me
He whispers things in my ear
He's cruel, he's kind
He listens to me when no one else can
when no one else will
He loves me
but doesn't care about me
He comes and goes
He comes and he goes
His voice is air
from a distant country
where my feet are not standing
even though they touch the ground
He's my prince
and my demon
the only one I can count on
and I can't count on him at all


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Tip: Again, to get the best effect, you have to read it aloud.  Swing into the rhythm.

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if up's the word ;and a world grows greener
minute by second and most by more--
if death is the loser and life is the winner
(and beggars are rich but misers are poor)
--let's touch the sky :
                                  with a to and a fro
(and a here there where)and away we go

in even the laziest creature among us
a wisdom no knoledge can kill is astir--
now dull eyes are keen and now keen eyes are keener
(for young is the year,for young is the year)
--let's touch the sky :
                                  with a great(and a gay
and a steep)deep rush through amazing day

it's brains without hearts have set saint against sinner;
put gain over gladness and joy under care--
let's do as an earth which can never do wrong does
(minute by second and most by more)
--let's touch the sky :
                                  with a strange(and a true)
and a climbing fall into far near blue

if beggars are rich(and a robin will sing his
robin a song)but misers are poor--
let's love until noone could quite be(and young is
the year,dear)as living as i'm and as you're
--let's touch the sky :
                                  with a you and a me
and an every(who's any who's some)one who's we

-- e.e. cummings

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I just...wow.
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The song is part of this, so you know.

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Scream
by Serai


You’re my silence.
You stop my mouth.
The words want to find you,
but because of you
I can’t let them out.
They batter at my skull,
crying to be set free.
I keep them caged,
safe, where their wings
won’t shatter the balance
we’ve achieved. Forget
the sound of words,
your eyes tell me. Stay
here in the darkness
with me. And I want to
disappear, stilled like a cry.

You’re my silence,
I’m your scream.

Silence me.

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Chapter 24 of High Contrast
Chapter 25
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The King Stag leaps
over mountains
avatar of the wind
and lover of the leaves
in his eyes the reflection
of secret waters
a spring of mystery
soundlessly treading
the bridal earth
the pines' final bed

the King Stag changes
from moment to moment
now shy and tender
now fierce and regal
glimpsed for a moment
within his city of branches

almost invisible
almost invisible

gone

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Copyright © 1999

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darkness
    stars
        the water loud in my ears

  him diving
      plumbing the depths

and me swimming
          swimming in his mouth

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She was very old, our old dame,
Our cat, 17, Meiko was her name.
On Friday she was not herself at all.
She lay, her face turned to the wall
Silent and subdued
Saturday, she did not touch her food.
On Sunday she paced back and forth
Across the bedroom floor
And did not brush our leg or purr
Or make a sound. We petted her
And she seemed very far away.
We knelt by the bed where she lay
And felt desolate and sad
And told her, Good cat, good cat
And then this delicate creature
Of an affectionate nature
Had to be carried outside
And taken for a short melancholy ride
To the vet's office where with gentle affection
She was given the merciful injection
As we stroked her and said,
"Good cat. Good cat." And she lay down her head
On our lap
And took her nap.

We miss her gentleness and grace,
The little eyes, the solemn face,
The tail flicking where she lay
In a square of sun on a summer day.
It's childish, to feel such grief
For an animal whose life is brief.

And if it is foolish, so it be.
She was good company,
And we miss that gift
Of cat affection while she lived.
Her sweet civility.
A cat has not much utility
But beauty is beauty: that's
Why the Lord created cats.
We miss our cat of 17 years
And if you'll sit down by my side
I'll scratch you up behind your ears
Until you are well satisfied
And then bring you a plate of fish
And figs and dates fresh off the tree
Or any treat that you may wish,
In our old cat's sweet memory.

Lullaby little cat, wherever you're at
May you lie in the sun and be loved by someone
May you curl up and rest, with a quilt for a nest
May you run, may you leap, and be young in your sleep.


-- Garrison Keillor

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Smokey the Bear heads
into the autumn woods
with a red can of gasoline
and a box of wooden matches.

His ranger's hat is cocked
at a disturbing angle.

His brown fur gleams
under the high sun
as his paws, the size
of catcher's mitts,
crackle into the distance.

He is sick of dispensing
warnings to the careless,
the half-wit camper,
the dumbbell hiker.

He is going to show them
how a professional does it.


-- Billy Collins

Gacked from ink_gypsy and mews1945, that poetry thing that's going around. I no good at this "pick just one" thing, so I'm going to post more than once. Here's my first one.

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My heart trembles like a poor leaf.
The planets whirl in my dreams.
The stars press against my window.
I rotate in my sleep.
My bed is a warm planet.


-- Marvin Mercer
P.S. 153, Fifth Grade, Harlem
New York City, NY (1981)

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This was the epigraph to the first chapter of Carl Sagan's novel Contact.

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Today's Writer's Block question:


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Praan - Gary Schyman

Featuring the glorious voice of Palbasha Siddique


Adapted from a poem by Rabindranath Tagore. Here is a translation:


The same stream of life that runs through my veins night and day
runs through the world and dances in rhythmic measures.

It is the same life that shoots in joy through the dust of the earth
in numberless blades of grass
and breaks into tumultuous waves of leaves and flowers.

It is the same life that is rocked in the ocean-cradle of birth
and of death, in ebb and in flow.

I feel my limbs are made glorious by the touch of this world of life.
And my pride is from the life-throb of ages dancing in my blood this moment.



This song never fails to fill my heart and lift my spirits. The video images are a great match to the lyrics.

The kinds of emotions that deeply religious people feel in their temples and synagogues, I feel in nature. Walking among redwoods; gazing at mountains; tasting the spray of the ocean and dancing on the sand; marveling at birds and butterflies, snakes and coyotes, bears and wolves; working the soil and loving the plants in my garden - these experiences fill me with intense spiritual rapture. My religious feelings and emotions are deeply tied to what Carl Sagan called "the numinous" - the experience of the natural world and the universe as inherently sacred in and of itself. My gods do not live outside or above the world; they are the world. I see the Earth as my mother in a very literal sense, and feel myself her daughter just as much as I am my human mother's daughter. This song embodies all of that for me, and much more, because besides expressing thoughts and words, music itself contains a dimension of emotion and insight whose currents and patterns can never be wholly translated but only felt, a river within which the soul swims towards the ocean of the universe.