Edition 8
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Stones
I have a large collection, which increases all the time,
Something that is personal, and ultimately mine.
Every time I travel, a tiny stone I take,
From mountains, beaches, houses,the seaside or a lake.
Every place I've visited, since I was roughly eight,
I'd take a tiny pebble to remind me of the date.
The stones I have are many,of a myriad shapes and sizes,
And there within this box of mine are many sweet surprises.
The place where both my sons were born, I have a stone I took,
And from a tiny stream in Wales beside a babbling brook.
I have a stone from by the church, upon my wedding day,
And from my dearest Fathers grave, while I would kneel and pray.
And every place I've visited, countries far and wide,
From every house I've ever lived, just gathered from outside.
A pebble from the driveway ,of Princess Di's late home,
Another one from Paris, Japan and even Rome.
Then places in America, I always bring one back,
I label it, and wrap it, and pop it in a pack.
A stone I have from Singapore, and one or two from Spain,
And one I gathered from my beach, standing in the rain.
Pebbles from sweet Florida, gathered in the sun,
Pebbles from Wisconsin, I treasure every one.
I recall we drove for hours, for a Minnesota stone,
But it is just as priceless as the one I have from home.
Then friends they too will send me, pebbles from afar,
White Egyptian pebbles, pebbles from Quatar.
I have a stone from Alcatraz, lebelled with the date,
Mount Rushmore is another one, the box is quite a weight!
And when the winter nights draw in, upon my sofa curled,
I sometimes get my pebbles out, and visit 'round the world.
What happy recollections, of places I have seen,
And places where friends thought of me, wherever they have been.
As stones they are just worthless, as so often I am told...
But to me each stone within my box, is worth far more than gold.
Copyright ©2005 Sally Y Hemingway
Antrim Coast Road, Northern Ireland.
Love among the Ruins
by Robert Browning
Where the quiet-coloured end of evening smiles,
Miles and miles
On the solitary pastures where our sheep
Half-asleep
Tinkle homeward through the twilight, stray or stop
As they crop?
Was the site once of a city great and gay,
(So they say)
Of our country’s very capital, its prince
Ages since
Held his court in, gathered councils, wielding far
Peace or war.
Now,?the country does not even boast a tree,
As you see,
To distinguish slopes of verdure, certain rills
From the hills
Intersect and give a name to, (else they run
Into one)
Where the domed and daring palace shot its spires
Up life fires
O’er the hundred-gated circuit of a wall
Bounding all,
Made of marble, men might march on nor be pressed,
Twelve abreast.
And such plenty and perfection, see, of grass
Never was!
Such a carpet as, this summer time, o’erspreads
And embeds
Every vestige of the city, guessed alone,
Stock or stone?
Where a multitude of men breathed joy and woe
Long ago;
Lust of glory pricked their hearts up, dread of shame
Struck them tame;
And that glory and that shame alike, the gold
Bought and sold.
Now,?the single little turret that remains
On the plains,
By the caper overrooted, by the gourd
Overscored,
While the patching houseleek’s head of blossom winks
Through the chinks?
Marks the basement whence a tower in ancient time
Sprang sublime,
And a burning ring, all round, the chariots traced
As they raced,
And the monarch and his minions and his dames
Viewed the games.
And I know, while thus the quiet-coloured eve
Smiles to leave
To their folding, all our many-tinkling fleece
In such peace,
And the slopes and rills in undistinguished grey
Melt away?
That a girl with eager eyes and yellow hair
Waits me there
In the turret whence the charioteers caught soul
For the goal,
When the king looked, where she looks now, breathless, dumb
Till I come.
But he looked upon the city, every side,
Far and wide,
All the mountains topped with temples, all the glades’
Colonnades,
All the causeys, bridges, aqueducts,?and then,
All the men!
When I do come, she will speak not, she will stand,
Either hand
On my shoulder, give her eyes the first embrace
Of my face,
Ere we rush, ere we extinguish sight and speech
Each on each.
In one year they sent a million fighters forth
South and North,
And they built their gods a brazen pillar high
As the sky,
Yet reserved a thousand chariots in full force?
Gold, of course.
Oh heart! oh blood that freezes, blood that burns!
Earth’s returns
For whole centuries of folly, noise and sin!
Shut them in,
With their triumphs and their glories and the rest!
Love is best!
Pause music on this page before starting film please.
Me gardening, early August 2010.
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