The Faeries -William Allingham

Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
We daren’t go a-hunting
For fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk,
Trooping all together;
Green jacket, red cap,
And white owl’s feather!

Down along the rocky shore
Some make their home,
They live on crispy pancakes
Of yellow tide-foam;
Some in the reeds
Of the black mountain lake,
With frogs for their watch-dogs,
All night awake.

High on the hill-top
The old King sits;
He is now so old and gray
He ‘s nigh lost his wits.
With a bridge of white mist
Columbkill he crosses,
On his stately journeys
From Slieveleague to Rosses;
Or going up with music
On cold starry nights
To sup with the Queen
Of the gay Northern Lights.

They stole little Bridget
For seven years long;
When she came down again
Her friends were all gone.
They took her lightly back,
Between the night and morrow,
They thought that she was fast asleep,
But she was dead with sorrow.
They have kept her ever since
Deep within the lake,
On a bed of flag-leaves,
Watching till she wake.

By the craggy hill-side,
Through the mosses bare,
They have planted thorn-trees
For pleasure here and there.
If any man so daring
As dig them up in spite,
He shall find their sharpest thorns
In his bed at night.

Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
We daren’t go a-hunting
For fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk,
Trooping all together;
Green jacket, red cap,
And white owl’s feather!

The Stolen Child - W.B. Yeats

vliegen

One said to me tonight or was it day 
or was it the passage between the two, 
“It’s hard to remember, crossing time zones,
the structure of the hours you left behind.
Are they sleeping or are they eating sweets,
and are they wanting me to phone them now?”
“In the face of technological fact,
even the most seasoned traveler feels
the baffled sense that nowhere else exists.”
“It’s the moving resistance of the air
as you hurtle too fast against the hours
that stuns the cells and tissues of the brain.”
“The dry cabin air, the cramped rows of seats,
the steward passing pillows, pouring drinks,
and the sudden ridges of turbulence. . .”
“Oh yes, the crossing is always a trial,
despite precautions: drink water, don’t smoke,
and take measured doses of midday sun,
whether an ordinary business flight
or a prayer at a pleasure altar. . .
for moments or hours the earth out of sight,
the white cumuli dreaming there below,
warm fronts and cold fronts streaming through the sky,
the mesmerizing rose-and-purple glow.”
"So did you leave your home à contrecoeur?
Did you leave a life? Did you leave a love?
Are you out here looking for another?
Some want so much to cross, to go away,
somewhere anywhere & begin again,
others can’t endure the separation. . .”
One night, the skyline as I left New York
was a garden of neon flowerbursts--
the celebration of a history.

                             Sarah Arvio - flying 

urbexen

THE DOOR
By Miroslav Holub

Go and open the door.
Maybe outside there’s
A tree, or a wood,
A garden,
Or a magic city.
Go and open the door.
Maybe a dog’s rummaging,
Maybe you’ll see a face,
or an eye,
or the picture
of a picture.
Go and open the door,
If there’s a fog
It will clear.
Go and open the door.
Even if there’s only
The darkness ticking,
Even if there’s only
The hollow wind,
even if
nothing
is there,
go and open the door.
at least
there’ll be
a draught.

sneeuw

Rainer Maria Rilke 
"Vielleicht sind alle Drachen unseres Lebens Prinzessinnen, die nur darauf warten, uns einmal schön und mutig zu sehen. Vielleicht ist alles Schreckliche im Grunde das Hilflose, das von uns Hilfe will."

being

Silent comrade of the distances,
Know that space dilates with your own breath;
ring out, as a bell into the Earth
from the dark rafters of its own high place-

then watch what feeds on you grow strong again.
learn the transformations through and through:
what in your life has most tormented you?
If the water’s sour, turn it into wine.

Our senses cannot fathom this night, so
Be the meaning of their strange encounter;
at their crossing, be the radiant centre.

And should the world itself forget your name
Say this to the still earth: I flow.
Say this to the quick stream: I am.

-Don Paterson-

Nachtzwaluw

Gedoemde vogel, wachter van de nacht,
die onverdroten durf en duister eert,
bij nacht en ontij langs de bosrand scheert,
bewaar mij voor uw ratelende klacht,

die onweerlegbaar ramp en onheil brengt.
Gij geitenmelker, paduil, ratelaar,
gij duivelsbode, trol en tovenaar,
die onbeschaamd uw helse jongen drenkt

met vette melk van heideschaap of geit,
laat nimmer uw ontwijde lokroep horen,
als ik des nachts, verdwaald in uur en tijd,

de paden zoek langs het reeds rijpend koren,
opdat ik wanklank en verraad vermijd,
want in uw roep ging menig mens verloren.

                      -Frans Hoppenbrouwers- 

“They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself.” 

                      Philip Larkin 

altijddoor

' leven, zoele omsomberde even inschitterende,
in de luchten, de regene, de zachtstrijkgevederde,
o leven het gevende altijddoor stillende,
o leven dat toch schijnt het altijddoor willende,
het inzwevend kameren, het volop verlichtende
de wegen, waarlangs gaat het eenzaam uitzwichtende,
klaar, nimmer droomende oogenbewegen,
armstrekkend leven, hoofdomvattend, kussend zoo dichtbij
aanziend tegen
de wakkere oogen, o schijnend, soms flikkerend, soms even roode
maar durend omsomberde, ook zonder noode '.

- Gorter / Verzen

Spring - a poem

Spring 

Edna St. Vincent Millay

To what purpose, April, do you return again?
Beauty is not enough.
You can no longer quiet me with the redness
Of little leaves opening stickily.
I know what I know.
The sun is hot on my neck as I observe
The spikes of the crocus.
The smell of the earth is good.
It is apparent that there is no death.
But what does that signify?
Not only under ground are the brains of men
Eaten by maggots,
Life in itself
Is nothing,
An empty cup, a flight of uncarpeted stairs.
It is not enough that yearly, down this hill,
April
Comes like an idiot, babbling and strewing flowers.

reading poetry

as the snow fell 

Rg Gregory

the children played games
getting from here
to where the truth was
without touching a flake

needless to say
the only ones who got there
were liars

but while the honest ones
shrank back from
the touch of snow
the liars
were where the truth was

Black Cat

Black Cat

A ghost, though invisible, still is like a place
your sight can knock on, echoing; but here
within this thick black pelt, your strongest gaze
will be absorbed and utterly disappear:

just as a raving madman, when nothing else
can ease him, charges into his dark night
howling, pounds on the padded wall, and feels
the rage being taken in and pacified.

She seems to hide all looks that have ever fallen
into her, so that, like an audience,
she can look them over, menacing and sullen,
and curl to sleep with them. But all at once

as if awakened, she turns her face to yours;
and with a shock, you see yourself, tiny,
inside the golden amber of her eyeballs
suspended, like a prehistoric fly.

Rainer Maria Rilke

Gray sail against the sky,
Gray butterfly!
Have you a dream for going.
Or are you the blind wind's blowing?
~Dana Burnet, "A Sail at Twilight"

the sea

A Sea Dirge
by Lewis Carroll

THERE are certain things - as, a spider, a ghost,
The income-tax, gout, an umbrella for three -
That I hate, but the thing that I hate the most
Is a thing they call the Sea.

Pour some salt water over the floor -
Ugly I'm sure you'll allow it to be:
Suppose it extended a mile or more,
THAT'S very like the Sea.

Beat a dog till it howls outright -
Cruel, but all very well for a spree:
Suppose that he did so day and night,
THAT would be like the Sea.

I had a vision of nursery-maids;
Tens of thousands passed by me -
All leading children with wooden spades,
And this was by the Sea.

Who invented those spades of wood?
Who was it cut them out of the tree?
None, I think, but an idiot could -
Or one that loved the Sea.

It is pleasant and dreamy, no doubt, to float
With 'thoughts as boundless, and souls as free':
But, suppose you are very unwell in the boat,
How do you like the Sea?

There is an insect that people avoid
(Whence is derived the verb 'to flee').
Where have you been by it most annoyed?
In lodgings by the Sea.

If you like your coffee with sand for dregs,
A decided hint of salt in your tea,
And a fishy taste in the very eggs -
By all means choose the Sea.

And if, with these dainties to drink and eat,
You prefer not a vestige of grass or tree,
And a chronic state of wet in your feet,
Then - I recommend the Sea.

For I have friends who dwell by the coast -
Pleasant friends they are to me!
It is when I am with them I wonder most
That anyone likes the Sea.

They take me a walk: though tired and stiff,
To climb the heights I madly agree;
And, after a tumble or so from the cliff,
They kindly suggest the Sea.

I try the rocks, and I think it cool
That they laugh with such an excess of glee,
As I heavily slip into every pool
That skirts the cold cold Sea.

Divina Comedia de Dante Alighieri

On a Dream

by John Keats
(1795-1821)
As Hermes once took to his feathers light
When lulled Argus, baffled, swoon'd and slept,
So on a Delphic reed my idle spright
So play'd, so charm'd, so conquer'd, so bereft
The dragon-world of all its hundred eyes,
And, seeing it asleep, so fled away:
Not to pure Ida with its snow-cold skies,
Nor unto Tempe where Jove griev'd a day;
But to that second circle of sad hell,
Where 'mid the gust, the whirlwind, and the flaw
Of rain and hail-stones, lovers need not tell
Their sorrows. Pale were the sweet lips I saw,
Pale were the lips I kiss'd, and fair the form
I floated with, about that melancholy storm.

full moon rising

The Cat And The Moon - William Butler Yeats


The cat went here and there
And the moon spun round like a top,
And the nearest kin of the moon,
The creeping cat, looked up.
Black Minnaloushe stared at the moon,
For, wander and wail as he would,
The pure cold light in the sky
Troubled his animal blood.
Minnaloushe runs in the grass
Lifting his delicate feet.
Do you dance, Minnaloushe, do you dance?
When two close kindred meet.
What better than call a dance?
Maybe the moon may learn,
Tired of that courtly fashion,
A new dance turn.
Minnaloushe creeps through the grass
From moonlit place to place,
The sacred moon overhead
Has taken a new phase.
Does Minnaloushe know that his pupils
Will pass from change to change,
And that from round to crescent,
From crescent to round they range?
Minnaloushe creeps through the grass
Alone, important and wise,
And lifts to the changing moon
His changing eyes.

fotograferen tegen de zon in

WILD GEESE

You do not have to be good,

You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting,

You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile, the world goes on,

Meanwhile, the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes,

Over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers,

Meanwhile, the wild geese, high in the clean blue air are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

The world offers itself to your imagination.

Calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting,

Over and over announcing your place in the family of things.

Mary Oliver

10.10.10

Herbsttag

Herr: es ist Zeit. Der Sommer war sehr groß.
Leg deinen Schatten auf die Sonnenuhren,
und auf den Fluren laß die Winde los.

Befiehl den letzten Früchten voll zu sein;
gieb ihnen noch zwei südlichere Tage,
dränge sie zur Vollendung hin und jage
die letzte Süße in den schweren Wein.

Wer jetzt kein Haus hat, baut sich keines mehr.
Wer jetzt allein ist, wird es lange bleiben,
wird wachen, lesen, lange Briefe schreiben
und wird in den Alleen hin und her
unruhig wandern, wenn die Blätter treiben.

Aus: Das Buch der Bilder

afterglow

The Afterglow.

After the glow of the noonday sun,
After the day its course has run,
After the glare and bustle and heat,
There comes a peace that is calm and sweet.
The fiery sun sinks low to rest,
Mid flaming clouds, far in the west:
Then softly, gently, stealing slow,
Comes on the golden after glow.

The soft and mellow beams of light
Stem for awhile the flood of night,
And tiny stars, like brilliant gems,
Deep-set in golden diadems,
In dazzling beauty, twinkle so
And blend in the gleam of the afterglow.

Farewell to tiresome toil and care.
All nature kneels in silent prayer,
While the soft rays dimmer, dimmer grow
In the mellow, roseate, afterglow.

As I idly sit in the waning light
And watch the silent, star-lit night,
As she trails her sparkling, sable shroud
O,er the edge of the rosy, tinted cloud,
It seems from my heart the burdens roll,
And a calm, sweet peace steals o'er my soul.

May the passions of men like the heat of the sun
Be cooled and calmed e'er their course is run.
As they sink to rest and fade and go,
May they leave a peaceful afterglow.

Like the light in the west when the sun has set,
Sweet memories linger and cheer us yet.
No fiery passion the heart then feels,
But roseate joy thru our being steals,
And a deeper holier, joy we know
As we feel in our souls the afterglow.
The strongest emotion of pleasure will bring
Some feeling of pain, some grief, some sting.
Mourn not past joys as we see them go,
For there yet remains the afterglow.

__Gertrude Crumb Harman

onderwaterfotografie

"I wonder how it all got started, this business
about seeing your life flash before your eyes
while you drown, as if panic, or the act of submergence,
could startle time into such compression, crushing
decades in the vice of your desperate, final seconds.

After falling off a steamship or being swept away
in a rush of floodwaters, wouldn't you hope
for a more leisurely review, an invisible hand
turning the pages of an album of photographs-
you up on a pony or blowing out candles in a conic hat.

How about a short animated film, a slide presentation?
Your life expressed in an essay, or in one model photograph?
Wouldn't any form be better than this sudden flash?
Your whole existence going off in your face
in an eyebrow-singeing explosion of biography-
nothing like the three large volumes you envisioned.

Survivors would have us believe in a brilliance
here, some bolt of truth forking across the water,
an ultimate Light before all the lights go out,
dawning on you with all its megalithic tonnage.
But if something does flash before your eyes
as you go under, it will probably be a fish,

a quick blur of curved silver darting away,
having nothing to do with your life or your death.
The tide will take you, or the lake will accept it all
as you sink toward the weedy disarray of the bottom,
leaving behind what you have already forgotten,
the surface, now overrun with the high travel of clouds"

Billy Collins - the art of drowning