PLACES YOU HAVE VISITED ...OR WOULD LIKE TO VISIT
Kakadu National Park....on my bucket list..
Anyone visited???
SD,
Please tell us about the story behind this verse ... it needs explanation ... so many questions ...
SD: Mary Gilmore is the lady on our $10,00 note. She has a wonderful history.
Twila,
After the shearers strike in Queensland in 1891 a group of dissafected unionists decided to set up a new colony or commune in Paraguay. The left Australia around 1893 as I recall, some 500 of them.
Mary Gilmore was part of this exodus. She married but she did not marry the man who she obviously felt for the most. She last saw him in Argentina as I recall and she then returned to Australia with her husband. The verse was written quite some time later in Australia but it is assumed it is directed at this lost love of years ago. Dave Stevenson was his name, stretching the memory a wee bit there.
She became a Dame as we know. There is a book titled Paradise Mislaid . In search of the Australian tribe of Paraguay. Some descendants of this exodus still live there and amidst their Spanish is found Australian words of long ago. An interesting read.
Sadly I was in the area years ago but was unaware of the story. I certainly would have followed it up if I had known.
Take it easy.
SD
On Work
Kahlil Gibran
You work that you may keep pace with the earth and the soul of the earth.
For to be idle is to become a stranger unto the seasons,
and to step out of life's procession, that marches in majesty and proud submission towards the infinite.
When you work you are a flute through whose heart the whispering of the hours turns to music.
Which of you would be a reed, dumb and silent, when all else sings together in unison?
Always you have been told that work is a curse and labour a misfortune.
But I say to you that when you work you fulfil a part of earth's furthest dream, assigned to you when that dream was born,
And in keeping yourself with labour you are in truth loving life,
And to love life through labour is to be intimate with life's inmost secret.
But if you in your pain call birth an affliction and the support of the flesh a curse written upon your brow, then I answer that naught but the sweat of your brow shall wash away that which is written.
You have been told also that life is darkness, and in your weariness you echo what was said by the weary.
And I say that life is indeed darkness save when there is urge,
And all urge is blind save when there is knowledge,
And all knowledge is vain save when there is work,
And all work is empty save when there is love;
And when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, and to one another, and to God.
And what is it to work with love?
It is to weave the cloth with threads drawn from your heart,
even as if your beloved were to wear that cloth.
It is to build a house with affection,
even as if your beloved were to dwell in that house.
It is to sow seeds with tenderness and reap the harvest with joy,
even as if your beloved were to eat the fruit.
It is to charge all things you fashion with a breath of your own spirit,
And to know that all the blessed dead
are standing about you and watching.
Often have I heard you say, as if speaking in sleep, "He who works in marble, and finds the shape of his own soul in the stone, is nobler than he who ploughs the soil.
And he who seizes the rainbow to lay it on a cloth in the likeness of man, is more than he who makes the sandals for our feet."
But I say, not in sleep but in the overwakefulness of noontide, that the wind speaks not more sweetly to the giant oaks than to the least of all the blades of grass;
And he alone is great who turns the voice of the wind into a song made sweeter by his own loving.
Work is love made visible.
And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.
For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man's hunger.
And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distils a poison in the wine.
And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man's ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night.
SD,
Most of the early Children's Poetry referred to historical events - a fascinating look into the social history of this genre.
Many would know that "Ring Around the Rosie" referred to the Black Death of the 17th century, and the posie referred to herbs supposedly used to deflect this plague.
"Mary, Mary Quite Contrary" referred to Bloody Mary; the different flowers representing torture devices.
"The Blind Mice" (again Mary) about three protestant noblemen who conspired against her.
There are two possible explanantions re "Jack and Jill." One - about the beheading of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. The other explanation suggests new measures for drinks to raise taxes.
With traditional Children's Poetry the list goes on and on ...
Also Children's early Fairytales, such as the "Pied Piper of Hamelin," had their genesis in an historical event.
Personally, I find this all very intriguing and of worth-while interest.
I wonder what sort of children's poetry the events of today would bring about, especially Australian politics.
Do you mind Twila. People just want to enjoy the poetry. Would you please start a discussion thread. Please don't be nasty. Try to fit in.
Thank you, SD, for the history behind the poem by Gillmore.
I think that it is always more enriching to find out about poets and the histories of their poetry. Nothing is created in a vacuum.
Thank you Micha for your contributions tonight...
Kahlil Gibran is another one of my favourites.
Gibran is a firm favourite in our family too Robi...do you like Rumi?
This poem was written by Jonathan Wilson-Fuller in 1989. Jonathon was born on 18th July, 1979 so was 9 or 10 when he wrote this poem. He was highly allergic to many things so he lived his young life in great pain, confined indoors and to a very limited diet. I bought his poetry book in 1990 when it was published and this young, beautiful boy remains one of my most favourite poets because his age, intensity, intelligence, subject matters and the time period in which his poems were written all combine to make his poetic giftings deeply profound. I will put up one of his poems each day. Here is the first one:
Will You Please Listen
I've Something To Say
I'm just a child
Of minor years
With childlike faith in life
And immature ideas;
But, please listen,
For there's something I must say.
I've had more time to think
Than most children of my age
For I've had to stay inside.
I've not spent endless hours
Playing hide and seek
Or swimming at the beach
Or chasing tadpoles in the creek.
I've also had more reason
To ask
What's happening to our world?
For it is surely only human to ask what causes pain.
I don't see how I'll profit
By waiting till you've trained me,
By gaining adult wisdom
To see things as you do;
For that will only train me
To act the same as you,
And I'm not very happy
With the way you've used my world.
I think that all we children,
Have a right to see some changes
In your use of our inheritance,
For you're robbing us of it!
That's beautiful Robi!
I find that very touching Robi and look forward to reading the others...thank you...
Thank you Robi, such insight. I googled him worth doing so, look forward to tomorrow's poem.
The Road Not Taken
BY ROBERT FROST
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I couldTo where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
I can relate to that poem :)
A Little Night MusicShe sleeps not well when music's strains are stilled;
they lull her, sooth her and soft breathing bring.
Musicians play and shrill sopranos sing
whilst, calmed, she's unaware of anything.
In bed she sleeps - orchestras softly play —
their subdued sound, she says, her fears allay.
The all-night radio gives to her the choice
of sleeping through the viol or the voice.
In still of night, to listeners who're awake,
her snores at times with soft-toned music vie;
a contrapuntal discord form they take
and normal orchestration they deny.
And thus she sleeps, content from night to night,
and claims that music is her great delight.
Shenton
SD
Thanks for sharing this lovely poem with us and your knowledge of the story behind it, yes you give it character of a a real poem as opposed to just a copy and paste.
Yes the history definitely adds true enrichment to the poem.
Jonathan Wilson-Fuller. Written 1988 aged 8 or 9.
Things Do Not Seem Right
As I look at the sight
Of our environmental plight,
I see an environment covered in blight,
I see a world that must use its might
To stop and to save,
To put this planet right.
Oh what a sight!
It just cannot be right,
To see smoke billowing
And the landscape yellowing,
To see us abusing the air we breathe.
Of course it's not right
To just live for now,
Convenience and ease and not make a row.
For
With each aerosol can
We personally strike
A bitter blow,
For its propellant will go
Like a kite,
With its ease not its grace!
And trump like an ace
(Much to our disgrace)
Our ozone lace.
That delicate lace,
So cleverly made,
So carefully laid,
Is that which allows our life to be played,
And on the day
That lace fades away,
With no further chance,
Our planet will die!
Thank you Robi for another inspirational poem from this fine human being...
And another written by Jonathan Wilson-Fuller, 1988 aged 8 or 9:
Lung Cancer
Trees and leaves in boldest green
Are life that must be seen,
There's no animal that can live
In the absence of this green.
And by the play of sun
Its golden Rays upon the leaves
They leave us free to live.
Our very breath of life
Comes from trees' very might
To make our air just right.
In hot and steamy malls
Where trees and vines grow tall,
In halls of rainy forests,
In Nature's factory rests
The essence of this life,
This life as shared by all.
Our planets blood is green
And its lungs are made of trees,
But now we have a problem,
A problem of disease.
The problem of disease,
It stems from greed not need.
It's cancer of the lungs,
A result of money squeeze,
And now we've placed our planet's life
Upon the bottom rung,
Of the dreadful ladder
Of universal strife.
And to try to solve this matter
We must turn and look at life,
Our very way of life.
For we are the disease,
The cancer in our planet's lungs!
CLAUDE MONET'S GARDEN AT GIVERNY
TO DEAR MARI AND MICHA...WISHING YOU GREAT JOY AND HAPPINESS IN YOUR NEW HOME:
MAY ALL YOUR SUNSETS BE AS BEAUTIFUL AS THIS....
I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
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.
FOR MY GRANDSON WHO IS COMING TO SPEND THE WEEKEND WITH ME
Lovely words Fleur and Robi. Very poignant.
Hope your life in your new home is everything you have dreamed of,
Micha and Mari, hugs. 
Thank you very very much Phyl from Mari and I. We are both really tired but relieved that things are going well,but won't be moving in for another two weeks. Hugs back!
Contribution from Mari
ENVY BY MARY LAMB
This rose-tree is not made to bear
The violet blue, nor lily fair,
Nor the sweet mignionet:
And if this tree were discontent,
Or wished to change its natural bent,
It all in vain would fret.
And should it fret, you would suppose
It ne’er had seen its own red rose,
Nor after gentle shower
Had ever smelled its rose’s scent,
Or it could ne’er be discontent
With its own pretty flower.
Like such a blind and senseless tree
As I’ve imagined this to be,
All envious persons are:
With care and culture all may find
Some pretty flower in their own mind,
Some talent that is rare.
THANK YOU FLEUR FOR YOUR SINCERE WISHES. YOU'VE GOT US FOR ANOTHER TWO WEEKS!!
Nominated by UN as the best Poem of 2006 - Written by an African Kid
When I born, I black
When I grow up, I black
When I go in Sun, I black
When I scared, I black
When I sick, I black
And when I die, I still black
And you white fellow
When you born, you pink
When you grow up, you white
When you go in sun, you red
When you cold, you blue
When you scared, you yellow
When you sick, you green
And when you die, you grey
And you calling me colored??
CROSSING THE BAR
Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,
But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;
For though from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar.
Tennyson
My Country
The love of field and coppice,
Of green and shaded lanes.
Of ordered woods and gardens
Is running in your veins,
Strong love of grey-blue distance
Brown streams and soft dim skies
I know but cannot share it,
My love is otherwise.
I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror -
The wide brown land for me!
A stark white ring-barked forest
All tragic to the moon,
The sapphire-misted mountains,
The hot gold hush of noon.
Green tangle of the brushes,
Where lithe lianas coil,
And orchids deck the tree-tops
And ferns the warm dark soil.
Core of my heart, my country!
Her pitiless blue sky,
When sick at heart, around us,
We see the cattle die -
But then the grey clouds gather,
And we can bless again
The drumming of an army,
The steady, soaking rain.
Core of my heart, my country!
Land of the Rainbow Gold,
For flood and fire and famine,
She pays us back threefold -
Over the thirsty paddocks,
Watch, after many days,
The filmy veil of greenness
That thickens as we gaze.
An opal-hearted country,
A wilful, lavish land -
All you who have not loved her,
You will not understand -
Though earth holds many splendours,
Wherever I may die,
I know to what brown country
My homing thoughts will fly.
by-Dorothea-Mackellar
Contribution from Mari
Love’s Philosophy
The fountains mingle with the river
And the rivers with the ocean,
The winds of heaven mix for ever
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In one spirit meet and mingle.
Why not I with thine?
See the mountains kiss high heaven
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister-flower would be forgiven
If it disdained its brother;
And the sunlight clasps the earth
And the moonbeams kiss the sea:
What is all this sweet work worth
If thou kiss not me?
Shelley
POETRY IN MOTION
These are the pages for one foot in the grave,
Remove it now and go to a rave.
Pick up a man
and do what you can
We don't expect miracles at your age.
There was a young lady named Bright
who traveled much faster than light.
She set out one day
in a relative way,
and came back the previous night.
There was a young lady of Niger
who smiled as she rode on a tiger;
They returned from the ride
with the lady inside,
and the smile on the face of the tiger.
There was a young man from Savannah
Who died in a curious manner:
He whittled a hole
In a telephone pole
And electrified his banana.
keep em coming davey,
I was on leave in a bar room, when a sailor come up to me and said,
You will only have one mother' why don't you write home to her now,
You will never have another" Tomorrow you may be dead.
What a touching poem that is
Thank you for sharing it with us Seth
Deep in my soul there maybe other sad and touching poems,
If only I could remember.....
I know there was a sad one about a soldier coming home on leave,
Or was it the wife coming home on leave? anyway it was very sad.
War Debts (extracts)
by Lance Bombardier Stephen North
You wonder how they miss you to be honest, throwing stuff over the walls. But they do miss you most of the time. One of my mates, he got hit, though, I say hit, by a shower of Afghan fingers. Suicide bomber, in the road outside. Normally the alarm gets you first but even then you’ll be wow, wow, something is real…
Surreal if I’m honest with you. Surreal when I’m back at home.
The ease. The slow pace.
In subway, for instance. Cucumbers. Tomatoes. You think: Get it done, so everyone can go! Just come on!
Then you leave and the road works are everywhere with nothing moving. And rain pattering down and clouds covering the stars.
The war debts will come out then. You think: My weapon. Where is my weapon? And you look for it. You did everything with your weapon and urgh. You miss it. Nobody understands. You miss it. You went to the toilet with it. And the shower with it. You went running with it. You did everything with it. If you had a doss bag, you kept it close as you could, or in your doss bag sort of.
It’s trust, you see, you have to trust your weapon. It’s individual.
I’m Stephen North. Lance Bombardier Stephen North.
......
Fleur:- Robi:- Mari:-Micha:-Seth:-Pete:-
Such beautiful words on this page alone. I am keeping many of them.
You're more than welcome Phyl and thank you for reading. Over the past year I have been giving a couple of hours a week to read poetry to patients of a cancer facility. Because I'm going to be busy over the next few weeks and may not be able to see them a lot...I thought this idea up..so they can enlarge and read on computers. So far they're enjoying it!!
Somehow we missed each other,
Passed each other by unknowing;
I who sought you, you who sought me,
With hearts that throbbed for hopes and fears,
Passed each other in the early going,
Missed each other in the early years,
Somehow we missed each other,
We two poor bankrupt souls, sowing
A harvest that we recked not off;
Now, others sorrows' claim our tears,
Others call us in our later going,
Others hold us in our later years.
Dame Mary Gilmore. Quite a story behind this verse.