Solway Ford
Wilfred Gibson

He greets you with a smile from friendly eyes;
But never speaks, nor rises from his bed:
Beneath the green night of the sea he lies,
The whole world's waters weighing on his head.

The empty wain made slowly over the sand;
And he, with hands in pockets by the side
Was trudging, deep in dream, the while he scanned
With blue, unseeing eyes the far-off tide:
When, stumbling in a hole, with startled neigh,
His young horse reared, and, snatching at the rein,
He slipped: the wheels crushed on him as he lay;
Then, tilting over him, the lumbering wain
Turned turtle as the plunging beast broke free,
And made for home: and pinioned and half-dead
He lay, and listened to the far-off sea;
And seemed to hear it surging overhead
Already, though 'twas full an hour or more
Until high-tide, when Solway's shining flood
Should sweep the shallow firth from shore to shore.
He felt a salty tingle in his blood;
And seemed to stifle, drowning. Then again,
he knew that he must lie a lingering while
Before the sea might close above his pain,
Although the advancing waves had scarce a mile
To travel, creeping nearer, inch by inch,
With little runs and sallies over the sand.
Cooped in the dark, he felt his body flinch
From each cold wave as it drew nearer hand.
He saw the froth of each oncoming crest;
And felt the tugging of the ebb and flow,
And waves already breaking over his breast;
Though still far-off they murmured, faint and low;
Yet, creeping nearer, inch by inch, and now
He felt the cold drench of the drowning wave,
And the salt cold of lips and brow;
And sank, and sank . . . while still, as in a grave,
In the close dark beneath the crushing cart,
He lay, and listened to the far-off sea.
Wave after wave was knocking at his heart,
And swishing, swishing, swishing carelessly
About the wain -- cool waves that never reached
His cracking lips, to slake his hell-hot thirst . . .
Shrill in his ear a startled barn-owl screeched . . .
He smelt the smell of oil-cake . . . when there burst,
Through the big barn's wide-open door, the sea --
The whole sea sweeping on him with a roar . . .
He clutched a falling rafter, dizzily . . .
Then sank through drowning deeps, to rise no more.

Down, ever down, a hundred years he sank
Through cold green death, ten thousand fathoms deep.
His fiery lips deep draughts of cold sea drank
That filled his body with strange icy sleep,
Until he felt no longer that numb ache,
The dead-weight lifted from his legs at last:
And yet, he gazed with wondering eyes awake
Up the green glassy gloom through which he passed:
And saw, far overhead, the keels of ships
Grow smaller and smaller,dwindling out of sight;
And watched the bubbles rising from his lips;
And silver salmon swimming in green night;
And queer big, golden bream with scarlet fins
And emerald eyes and fiery-flashing tails;
Enormous eels with purple-spotted skins;
And mammoth unknown fish with sapphire scales
That bore down on him with red jaws agape,
Like yawning furnaces of blinding heat;
And when it seemed to him as though escape
From those hell-mouths were hopeless, his bare feet
Touched bottom: and he lay down in his place
Among the dreamless legion of the drowned,
The calm of deeps unsounded on his face,
And calm within his heart; while all around
Upon the midmost ocean's crystal floor
The naked bodies of dead seamen lay,
Dropped, sheer and clean, from hubbub, brawl and roar,
To peace, too deep for any tide to sway.

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

The little waves were lapping round the cart
Already, when they rescued him from death.
Life cannot touch the quiet of his heart
To joy or sorrow, as, with easy breath,
And smiling lips upon his back he lies,
And never speaks, nor rises from his bed;
Gazing through those green glooms with happy eyes,
While gold and sapphire fish swim overhead.

The Appeal
Sir Thomas Wyatt

(An Earnest Suit to his Unkind Mistress,
not to Forsake him)

And wilt thou leave me thus!
Say nay, say nay, for shame!
—To save thee from the blame
Of all my grief and grame.
And wilt thou leave me thus?
Say nay! say nay!

And wilt thou leave me thus,
That hath loved thee so long
In wealth and woe among:
And is thy heart so strong
As for to leave me thus?
Say nay! say nay!

And wilt thou leave me thus,
That hath given thee my heart
Never for to depart
Neither for pain nor smart:
And wilt thou leave me thus?
Say nay! say nay!

And wilt thou leave me thus,
And have no more pitye
Of him that loveth thee?
Alas, thy cruelty!
And wilt thou leave me thus?
Say nay! say nay!

Heart! We will forget him!
Emily Dickinson

Heart! We will forget him!
You and I — tonight!
You may forget the warmth he gave —
I will forget the light!

When you have done, pray tell me
That I may straight begin!
Haste! lest while you're lagging
I remember him!

The Beggar Maid
Alfred Lord Tennyson

Her arms across her breast she laid;
She was more fair than words can say;
Barefooted came the beggar maid
Before the king Cophetua.
In robe and crown the king stept down,
To meet and greet her on her way;
‘It is no wonder,’ said the lords,
‘She is more beautiful than day.’

As shines the moon in clouded skies,
She in her poor attire was seen;
One praised her ankles, one her eyes,
One her dark hair and lovesome mien.
So sweet a face, such angel grace,
In all that land had never been.
Cophetua sware a royal oath:
‘This beggar maid shall be my queen!’

Have I found the mysterious 'fizzing'?

Thee, Thee, Only Thee
Thomas Moore

The dawning of morn, the daylight's sinking,
The night's long hours still find me thinking
Of thee, thee, only thee.
When friends are met, and goblets crown'd,
And smiles are near, that once enchanted,
Unreach'd by all that sunshine round,
My soul, like some dark spot, is haunted
By thee, thee, only thee.

Whatever in fame's high path could waken
My spirit once, is now forsaken
For thee, thee, only thee.
Like shores, by which some headlong bark
To the ocean hurries, resting never,
Life's scenes go by me, bright or dark,
I know not, heed not, hastening ever
To thee, thee, only thee.

I have not a joy but of thy bringing,
And pain itself seems sweet when springing
From thee, thee, only thee.
Like spells, that nought on earth can break,
Till lips, that know the charm, have spoken,
This heart, howe'er the world may wake
Its grief, its scorn, can but be broken
By thee, thee, only thee.

O, never say that I was false of heart
William Shakespeare

O, never say that I was false of heart,
Though absence seemed my flame to qualify.
As easy might I from my self depart
As from my soul which in thy breast doth lie.
That is my home of love; if I have ranged,
Like him that travels I return again,
Just to the time, not with the time exchanged,
So that myself bring water for my stain.
Never believe though in my nature reigned
All frailties that besiege all kinds of blood,
That it could so preposterously be stained
To leave for nothing all thy sum of good;
For nothing this wide universe I call
Save thou, my rose, in it thou art my all.

To Sleep
William Wordsworth

A flock of sheep that leisurely pass by
One after one; the sound of rain, and bees
Murmuring; the fall of rivers, winds and seas,
Smooth fields, white sheets of water, and pure sky—

I've thought of all by turns, and still I lie
Sleepless; and soon the small birds' melodies
Must hear, first utter'd from my orchard trees,
And the first cuckoo's melancholy cry.

Even thus last night, and two nights more I lay,
And could not win thee, Sleep, by any stealth:
So do not let me wear to-night away.
Without thee what is all the morning's wealth?
Come, blessed barrier between day and day,
Dear mother of fresh thoughts and joyous health!

Stanzas Written in Dejection, Near Naples
Percy Bysshe Shelley

The sun is warm, the sky is clear,
The waves are dancing fast and bright,
Blue isles and snowy mountains wear
The purple noon's transparent might,
The breath of the moist earth is light,
Around its unexpanded buds;
Like many a voice of one delight
The winds, the birds, the ocean floods,
The city's voice itself, is soft like Solitude's.

I see the deep's untrampled floor
With green and purple seaweeds strown;
I see the waves upon the shore,
Like light dissolved in star-showers, thrown:
I sit upon the sands alone,--
The lightning of the noontide ocean
Is flashing round me, and a tone
Arises from its measured motion,
How sweet! did any heart now share in my emotion.

Alas! I have nor hope nor health,
Nor peace within nor calm around,
Nor that content surpassing wealth
The sage in meditation found,
And walked with inward glory crowned--
Nor fame nor power, nor love, nor leisure,
Others I see whom these surround--
Smiling they live, and call life pleasure;--
To me that cup has been dealt in another measure.

Yet now despair itself is mild,
Even as the winds and waters are;
I could lie down like a tired child,
And weep away the life of care
Which I have born and yet must bear,
Till death like sleep might steal on me,
And I might feel in the warm air
My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea
Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony.

All for Love
Lord Byron

O talk not to me of a name great in story;
The days of our youth are the days of our glory;
And the myrtle and ivy of sweet two-and-twenty
Are worth all your laurels, though ever so plenty.

What are garlands and crowns to the brow that is wrinkled?
'Tis but as a dead flower with May-dew besprinkled:
Then away with all such from the head that is hoary -
What care I for the wreaths that can only give glory?

O Fame! if I e'er took delight in thy praises,
'Twas less for the sake of thy high-sounding phrases,
Than to see the bright eyes of the dear one discover
She thought that I was not unworthy to love her.

There chiefly I sought thee, there only I found thee;
Her glance was the best of the rays that surround thee;
When it sparkled o'er aught that was bright in my story,
I knew it was love, and I felt it was glory.

Gift Of Sight
Robert Graves

I had long known the diverse tastes of the wood,
Each leaf, each bark, rank earth from every hollow;
Knew the smell of bird's breath and of bat's wing;
Yet sight I lacked: until you stole upon me,
Touching my eyelids with light finger-tips.
The trees blazed out, their colours whirled together,
Nor ever before had I been aware of sky.

Desire
D H Lawrence

Ah, in the past, towards rare individuals
I have felt the pull of desire:
Oh come, come nearer, come into touch!
Come physically nearer, be flesh to my flesh -

But say little, oh say little,
and afterwards, leave me alone.
Keep your aloneness, leave me my aloneness. -
I used to say this, in the past - but now no more.
It has always been a failure.
They have always insisted on love
and on talking about it
and on the me-and-thee and what we meant to each other.

So now I have no desire any more
Except to be left, in the last resort, alone, quite alone.

Did Not
Thomas Moore

'Twas a new feeling - something more
Than we had dared to own before,
Which then we hid not;
We saw it in each other's eye,
And wished, in every half-breathed sigh,
To speak, but did not.

She felt my lips' impassioned touch -
'Twas the first time I dared so much,
And yet she chid not;
But whispered o'er my burning brow,
'Oh, do you doubt I love you now?'
Sweet soul! I did not.

Warmly I felt her bosom thrill,
I pressed it closer, closer still,
Though gently bid not;
Till - oh! the world hath seldom heard
Of lovers, who so nearly erred,
And yet, who did not.

To My Daughter
Stephen Spender

Bright clasp of her whole hand around my finger,
My daughter, as we walk together now,
All my life I'll feel a ring invisibly
Circle this bone with shining: when she is grown
Far from today as her eyes are far already.

Yeh! The old Celica sailed through her
MOT this morning. I love her!

High Waving Heather
Emily Brontë

High waving heather, 'neath stormy blasts bending,
Midnight and moonlight and bright shining stars;
Darkness and glory rejoicingly blending,
Earth rising to heaven and heaven descending,
Man's spirit away from its drear dungeon sending,
Bursting the fetters and breaking the bars.

All down the mountain sides, wild forest lending
One mighty voice to the life-giving wind;
Rivers their banks in the jubilee rending,
Fast through the valleys a reckless course wending,
Wider and deeper their waters extending,
Leaving a desolate desert behind.

Shining and lowering and swelling and dying,
Changing for ever from midnight to noon;
Roaring like thunder, like soft music sighing,
Shadows on shadows advancing and flying,
Lightning-bright flashes the deep gloom defying,
Coming as swiftly and fading as soon.

My ladyboys are almost fully grown.

The last pit ponies, Wheldale colliery, 1972.

The Ponies
Wilfred Gibson

During the strike, the ponies were brought up
From their snug stables, some three hundred feet
Below the surface - up the pit's main shaft
Shot one by one into the light of day;
And as each stepped, bewildered, from the cage,
He stood among his fellows, shivering,
In the unaccustomed freshness of free air,
His dim eyes dazzled by the April light
And then one suddenly left the huddled group,
Lifted his muzzle, sniffed the freshness in.
Pawed the soft turf and, whinneying started trotting
Across the field; and one by one his fellows
With pricking ears each slowly followed him,
Timidly trotting: when the leader's trot
Broke into a canter, then into a gallop;
And now the whole herd galloped at his heels
Around the dewy meadow, hard hooves, used
To stumbling over treacherous stony tramways
And plunging hock-deep through black steamy puddles
Of the dusty narrow galleries, delighting,
In the soft spring of the resilient turf.
With a soft thunder of hooves,the sunshine flashing,
On their sleek coats, through the bright April weather.
They raced all day; and even when the night
Kindled clear stars above them in the sky
Strangely unsullied by the stack which now
No longer belched out blackness, still they raced,
Unwearied, as through their short sturdy limbs
The rebel blood like wildfire ran, their lungs
Filled with the breath of freedom. On they sped
Through the sweet dewy darkness; and all night
The watchman at the pithead heard the thudding
Of those careering and exultant hooves
Still circling in a crazy chase; and dawn
Found them still streaming raggedly around,
Tailing into a lagging cantering,
And so to a stumbling trot; when gradually,
Dropping out one by one, they started cropping
The dew-dank tender grass, which no foul reek
From the long idle pit now smirched, and drinking
With quivering nostrils the rich living breath
Of sappy growing things, the cool rank green
Greatful to eyes familiar from their colthood
Only with darkness and the dusty glimmer
Of lamplit galleries......

Out of the Morning
Clive Sansom

Out of the morning, grey as smoke,
Grey fields, grey sky,
The sudden stroke of heavy wings,
The sudden shock of white on grey,
A wild swan flying.

It came so sheerly from the mist,
Annunciation-Angel-like,
It shook the centre of my world,
It broke the greyness of my mind
Like great winds crying:

It woke all colours in the grey,
It spoke of speed and strength and power,
It told the beauty of the seed-
The core within the core of life-
In dead weeds lying;

My thoughts were shattered into light,
My heart was lifted into song;
I was that sudden stroke of wings,
I was the shock of white, the bird,
The wild swan flying!

Epitaph For an Airman
George Nichols

The shouting wind shall be his requiem,
The falling star his lofty monument;
No earthbound pangs can honour add to them
Who seek their honours in the firmament.

The light of dawn shall be his votive flame,
The purple cloud of dusk his canopy;
Who lived and died with dusk and dawn may claim
No lower tribute than this panoply.

His guiding stars shall now his bearers be
In mute procession through the mourning skies-
Partaker now of that high mystery
He could not share till death had made him wise.

Tonight's Sunset

Love Not Me for Comely Grace
John Wilbye

Love not me for comely grace,
For my pleasing eye or face;
Nor for any outward part,
No, nor for my constant heart:
For those may fail or turn to ill,
So thou and I shall sever.
Keep therefore a true woman's eye,
And love me still, but know not why;
So hast thou the same reason still
To doat upon me ever.

Happy Birthday James!
Hope that you have a brilliant day,
with love from Elaine x

If ever you are feeling unhappy, try watching this.

Works for me!

After
Richard Elwes

And after-
the laughing done, there follows in its place,
gentle and soft and warm,
a rippling, sunlit calm;
the smiling peace, the dear tranquility
dawns in your face
and hovers over me so tenderly.
O stay! O will you never stay?
Dissolving wraith by day,
by night retreating dream,
never remaining,
fading, waning,
becoming dimmer,
soon but a glimmer
the darkening gleam,
that was, a moment since, your eyes,
the gleam that dies
and vanishes and will not shine,
for all the gathering mists in mine.

Sometimes With One I Love
Walt Whitman

Sometimes with one I love I fill myself with rage,
for fear I effuse unreturn'd love,
But now I think there is no unreturn'd love,
the pay is certain one way or another,
(I loved a certain person ardently, and my love was not return'd,
Yet out of that I have written these songs.)

One Hour To Madness And Joy
Walt Whitman

One hour to madness and joy! O furious! O confine me not!
(What is this that frees me so in storms?
What do my shouts amid lightnings and raging winds mean?)

O to drink the mystic deliria deeper than any other man!
O savage and tender achings!
(I bequeath them to you, my children,
I tell them to you, for reasons, O bridegroom and bride.)

O to be yielded to you, whoever you are, and you to be yielded to me,
in defiance of the world!
O to return to Paradise! O bashful and feminine!
O to draw you to me, to plant on you for the first time the lips of a
determin'd man!

O the puzzle--the thrice-tied knot--the deep and dark pool! O all
untied and illumin'd!
O to speed where there is space enough and air enough at last!
O to be absolv'd from previous ties and conventions, I from mine, and
you from yours!
O to find a new unthought-of nonchalance with the best of nature!
O to have the gag remov'd from one's mouth!
O to have the feeling, to-day or any day, I am sufficient as I am!

O something unprov'd! something in a trance!
O madness amorous! O trembling!
O to escape utterly from others' anchors and holds!
To drive free! to love free! to dash reckless and dangerous!
To court destruction with taunts--with invitations!
To ascend--to leap to the heavens of the love indicated to me!
To rise thither with my inebriate Soul!
To be lost, if it must be so!
To feed the remainder of life with one hour of fulness and freedom!
With one brief hour of madness and joy.

Snowfall
Hamish Brown

When the first snows come
It is like quiet benediction,
The service over.
We shuffle out, at peace,
Cleansed from civilisation
And the year done.
We look out on drifting purity
As strangers from another age,
Misunderstood.
For a world impoverished, this we know:
That truth has stood.

Tonight I Can Write (incomplete)
Pablo Neruda

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write, for example,'The night is shattered
and the blue stars shiver in the distance.'

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me sometimes, and I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.

I no longer love her, that's certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.

Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.

Sonnets of War
Richard Elwes

The melting waters move and flow again,
and Life's awakening pulse is everywhere,
responsive, stirring in the souls of men.
And Spring's heroic song is in the air,
sounding her deathless, ancient certainties:
that valiant hearts were never vainly stilled,
that truth must ever triumph over lies,
that martyred blood was never vainly spilled.
As heirs of an immortal chivalry,
advancing bravely down the storied years,
we take our places in their company
and catch her message with their dauntless ears.
For Life itself is with us in the field,
who call on perjured tyranny to yield.

Christmas Eve Sunrise

GIFSoup

The Song of Love
Ludwig Lewisohn

How shall I guard my soul so that it be
Touched not by thine? And how shall it be brought,
Lifted above thee, unto other things?
Ah, gladly would I hide it utterly
Lost in the dark where are no murmurings,
In strange and silent places that do not
Vibrate when thy deep soul quivers and sings.
But all that touches us two makes us twin
Even as the bow crossing the violin
Draws but one voice from the two strings that meet.
Upon what instrument are we two spanned?
And what great player has us in his hand?
O song most sweet.

it may not always be so
e e cummings

it may not always be so; and i say
that if your lips, which i have loved, should touch
another's, and your dear strong fingers clutch
his heart, as mine in time not far away;
if on another's face your sweet hair lay
in such a silence as i know, or such
great writhing words as, uttering overmuch,
stand helplessly before the spirit at bay;

if this should be, i say if this should be --
you of my heart, send me a little word;
that i may go unto him, and take his hands,
saying, Accept all happiness from me.
Then shall i turn my face, and hear one bird
sing terribly afar in the lost lands.

Oh, look who it is! Thomas Campion (1567-1620)

Fain would I wed
Thomas Campion

Fain would I wed a fair young man that night and day could please me,
When my mind or body grieved, that had the power to ease me.
Maids are full of longing thoughts that breed a bloodless sickness,
And that, oft I hear men say, is only cured by quickness.
Oft I have been wooed and praised, but never could be movèd;
Many for a day or so I have most dearly lovèd,
But this foolish mind of mine straight loathes the thing resolvèd;
If to love be sin in me, that sin is soon absolvèd.
Sure I think I shall at last fly to some holy order;
When I once am settled there, then can I fly no farther.
Yet I would not die a maid, because I had a mother,
As I was by one brought forth, I would bring forth another.

i carry your heart with me
e.e.cummings

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

Who Ever Loved That Loved Not at First Sight?
Christopher Marlowe

It lies not in our power to love or hate,
For will in us is overruled by fate.
When two are stripped, long ere the course begin,
We wish that one should love, the other win;

And one especially do we affect
Of two gold ingots, like in each respect:
The reason no man knows; let it suffice
What we behold is censured by our eyes.
Where both deliberate, the love is slight:
Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight?

My Love Was Warm
Robert Louis Stevenson

MY love was warm; for that I crossed
The mountains and the sea,
Nor counted that endeavour lost
That gave my love to me.

If that indeed were love at all,
As still, my love, I trow,
By what dear name am I to call
The bond that holds me now.

As we never forget a loved, lost pet and because James has recently mentioned Fusker again, here's a couple of paragraphs from his Telegraph column...

"My Top Gear colleagues think it terribly funny that I once proclaimed that I loved my cat, Fusker, above all else; more, even, than my old Bentley. But, so help me, I do. Before anyone writes in with some cod psychology and any nonsense about me projecting on to a dumb animal, I am well aware that Fusker does not love me. He loves cat food.

The flow of adoration runs in one direction; I spend hours talking to him, even though the only word he might possibly understand is "Fusker", and in return not one sound of any consequence has ever emanated from his witless furry face. He has never passed me a spanner or written any of this column, except for a bit that went fasdfij ffeug djdvbv9821."

And I will bring back this...

'I took a chair and threw it...'
Felix Dennis

I took a chair and threw it
Across my unmade bed
When I returned one evening,
To find my old cat dead.

Yet when an ailing neighbour
Passed on - no missiles flew.
The ties that bind are stronger
Than what we tie them to.