I was also in love with the English language.
quote by Dick Schaap
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The White Cliffs
I
I have loved England, dearly and deeply,
Since that first morning, shining and pure,
The white cliffs of Dover I saw rising steeply
Out of the sea that once made her secure.
I had no thought then of husband or lover,
I was a traveller, the guest of a week;
Yet when they pointed 'the white cliffs of Dover',
Startled I found there were tears on my cheek.
I have loved England, and still as a stranger,
Here is my home and I still am alone.
Now in her hour of trial and danger,
Only the English are really her own.
II
It happened the first evening I was there.
Some one was giving a ball in Belgrave Square.
At Belgrave Square, that most Victorian spot.—
Lives there a novel-reader who has not
At some time wept for those delightful girls,
Daughters of dukes, prime ministers and earls,
In bonnets, berthas, bustles, buttoned basques,
Hiding behind their pure Victorian masks
Hearts just as hot - hotter perhaps than those
Whose owners now abandon hats and hose?
Who has not wept for Lady Joan or Jill
Loving against her noble parent's will
A handsome guardsman, who to her alarm
Feels her hand kissed behind a potted palm
At Lady Ivry's ball the dreadful night
Before his regiment goes off to fight;
And see him the next morning, in the park,
Complete in busbee, marching to embark.
I had read freely, even as a child,
Not only Meredith and Oscar Wilde
But many novels of an earlier day—
Ravenshoe, Can You Forgive Her?, Vivien Grey,
Ouida, The Duchess, Broughton's Red As a Rose,
Guy Livingstone, Whyte-Melville— Heaven knows
What others. Now, I thought, I was to see
Their habitat, though like the Miller of Dee,
I cared for none and no one cared for me.
III
A light blue carpet on the stair
And tall young footmen everywhere,
Tall young men with English faces
Standing rigidly in their places,
Rows and rows of them stiff and staid
[...] Read more
poem by Alice Duer Miller
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Synergy of Love
'Were you honed from poetry? '
I asked your saddened smile.
For it seems to tell a longing tale -
One of words in oratory
That speaks in languid metaphors
From lips of mind in deep despair
And solitude from inner wars
That over time has rendered life so frail.
'Were you carved from doleful prose? '
I sought to ask your gaze,
For a pain lies deep within your eyes -
One of barren territory
Where no fair heart could ever drift
And hope to venture back content
With grateful memories in a gift -
A land of your affectional demise.
'Do I hear a mournful hum? '
I wondered of your cry,
For it sings a song of deep lament -
One of quiet soliloquy
Recited on deserted strands
To waves that have no sense of song
And only wish to fight the sands -
A chant that cites emotional descent.
Do you know your face portrays
The colours of your soul?
It tells me at a single glance
Of how you burned your furnace whole
To stay the fire in our romance.
And see the prismic hues they bore!
I cherished all I ever saw:
Mauve of mystic; browns of rustic;
Reddened tones to match your blush;
Marine of passion, spending out your being,
Leaving you for ashen embers, fleeing
The dying light in hush of night.
And how you lay there empty.
So let me help re-grow the flowers
Once erect in fiery showers!
For now I've seen what love can do
When torn asunder - oh my catastrophic blunder!
But we must realise -
Our flaming want is meant to be!
We are the ocean and the sea;
[...] Read more
poem by Mark R Slaughter
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Forsaking My Love
I hate you
I wish to tear you away from me
This tumor that clings to my chest
The thing that makes me ache
That haunts my dreams
And tears at my desires
You have brought me only pain
My untamed heart
That beast that gnaws at my soul
That pitifully whines
Bringing my mind into unwanted pain
Yet how can I blame you
How can I chastise you when I listen intently to your pleas
Why should I punish you for what my eyes feed upon
How can I blame my eyes for falling upon her
She who brings light to the eternal darkness of my soul
She whose eyes bring me to subjection
Whose smile leaves me in awe
How can I blame you when my ears are met with her laughter
How they submerge into her song
How they quiver at her voice
Why should I punish you for inclining my soul
Tempting it with the one sense that has been forsaken by her
How could I look over the thought of the brushing of lips
The touching of hands
The binding of the soul, mind, and body
O you wretched heart
What am I to do with this constant companion
How could I tear you away
When she is the cause of my agony
Or rather
It is the lack of her which brings me sorrow
It is the need for her that leaves my heart in pain
Yet she is not mine
She was never mine
She will never be mine
O my poor heart
How can I make you see reason
When all you do is show me the truth
love love love love love love love
love love love love love love love
love love love love love love love
love love love love love love love
love love love love love love love
love love love love love love love
love love love love love love love
love love love love love love love
[...] Read more
poem by Michael Silver
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Her...
I can never get my mind off her,
I wonder if she'd mind if i'd,
make her my own,
and never let her go,
hug her tight,
treat her right,
act all polite,
take her on a date,
make sure i'm never late,
kiss her on her lips,
talk about our kids,
Make her feel like princess,
living in a castle,
hope that is not too much hassle,
But i am so blessed,
hope i can be the best,
hold you tight,
have your BR3A$t,
on my chest,
pass the test,
NOW YOUR MINE!
sorry for word spamming: (
love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love
poem by Jordan Moore
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Annus Mirabilis, The Year Of Wonders, 1666
1
In thriving arts long time had Holland grown,
Crouching at home and cruel when abroad:
Scarce leaving us the means to claim our own;
Our King they courted, and our merchants awed.
2
Trade, which, like blood, should circularly flow,
Stopp'd in their channels, found its freedom lost:
Thither the wealth of all the world did go,
And seem'd but shipwreck'd on so base a coast.
3
For them alone the heavens had kindly heat;
In eastern quarries ripening precious dew:
For them the Idumaean balm did sweat,
And in hot Ceylon spicy forests grew.
4
The sun but seem'd the labourer of the year;
Each waxing moon supplied her watery store,
To swell those tides, which from the line did bear
Their brimful vessels to the Belgian shore.
5
Thus mighty in her ships, stood Carthage long,
And swept the riches of the world from far;
Yet stoop'd to Rome, less wealthy, but more strong:
And this may prove our second Punic war.
6
What peace can be, where both to one pretend?
(But they more diligent, and we more strong)
Or if a peace, it soon must have an end;
For they would grow too powerful, were it long.
7
Behold two nations, then, engaged so far
That each seven years the fit must shake each land:
Where France will side to weaken us by war,
Who only can his vast designs withstand.
8
See how he feeds the Iberian with delays,
To render us his timely friendship vain:
And while his secret soul on Flanders preys,
He rocks the cradle of the babe of Spain.
9
Such deep designs of empire does he lay
[...] Read more
poem by John Dryden
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A Map Of Culture
Culture
Contents
What is Culture?
The Importance of Culture
Culture Varies
Culture is Critical
The Sociobiology Debate
Values, Norms, and Social Control
Signs and Symbols
Language
Terms and Definitions
Approaches to the Study of Culture
Are We Prisoners of Our Culture?
What is Culture?
I prefer the definition used by Ian Robertson: 'all the shared products of society: material and nonmaterial' (Our text defines it in somewhat more ponderous terms- 'The totality of learned, socially transmitted behavior. It includes ideas, values, and customs (as well as the sailboats, comic books, and birth control devices) of groups of people' (p.32) .
Back to Contents
[...] Read more
poem by Nyein Way
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Portugal Manoel Da Assumpcam Missionary.
'Portugal Manoel Da Assumpcam
Amar Sonar Moyna Pakki Amigo,
I never seen you in my live ever before
Which Country are you from?
My dear amigo Manoel Da Assumpcam.
Your colour of heritage in unknown Land l fear to bear your name in word.
I can't bear to missed you my amigo, Oh yes it can't be forgot either
You have contributed your nameless name in the nation without name
To influence other and to form the crowd in unknown Land,
Where are you from Sir?
And to shape not my nationalities in Language in Culture but yours!
The present Language in Bangla o' my dear amigo never was counted by.
You may be nothing To Government of Portugal than but today.
Priceless name in the heart of people's in the unknown Land.
I have nothing to say in Language Portuguese other than to say thank you.
For teaching and advocating me in Language in Bangla
That nation today celebrates every year.
With their tears on their eyes and face.
Bear to say words other than few minute in silent,
As orphanage children's looking at each other face.
Remembering those who gave their words in Bangla and live for.
And today I believe in visual hallucination it's not too late
to say how much I love you in Language in Bangla ‘Nil Dariar Prem'
The Birth of new Generation in Culture in Bangla.
Almost was given birth after more than three century in Bangla
'Inna-Lilla-He-O-Inna-He-La-He-Ra-Je-Ow n'
When will I met you?
Day of Kiamot is to far from Bay of Bengal to Portugal.
The mother of all living things on Earth,
Singing in the name of Almighty Lord ‘Allah' too
In the soil of unknown Land in British India my not his or her love.
How lucky you was never assassinated by knowing you was pigeons,
As Bongo Bandhu,
First Prime Ministers of Bangladesh.
I miss you ‘Manoel Da Assumpcam'
Your name prescribed in Language Bangla by name
'Shaheed Minar'
Capital City o Bangladesh.
By name once was known Dac-ca' now became ‘DHA-KA'
Your name in my Language Mother tongues days and nights,
‘Joy Bangla'
To Miss you my dear amigo you left us under your own broken umbrella.
[...] Read more
poem by Abdul Haye Amin
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Body Language
Words and music by freddie mercury
Give me body give me body body
Give me your body
Dont talk dont talk dont talk dont talk
Baby dont talk
Body language body language body language
Give me your body
Just give me yeah your body
Give me yeah your body
Dont talk
Body language huh huh
Body language body language
You got red lips snakes in your eyes
Long legs great thighs
You got the cutest ass Ive ever seen
Knock me down for a six any time
Look at me I gotta case of body language
Look at me I gotta case of body language
Look at me I gotta case of body language
Look at me I gotta case of body language
Of body language of body language
Yeah sexy body sexy sexy body
I want your body
Baby youre hot
Body language body language body language
Body language body language body language
Body language body language body language
song performed by Queen
Added by Lucian Velea
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Bitter Blow of Love
Love! you dealt a bitter blow –
You lay me cross the mortal plains,
Bedewed, bedimmed amongst a show
Of tearful clouds: eternal rains
To weep at my enduring foe
Of harsh reality – searing pains of
Destiny: dependable propensity
To fool myself repeatedly
That I could ever triumph over love!
Copyright Mark R Slaughter 2009
[...] Read more
poem by Mark R Slaughter
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Katie
It may be through some foreign grace,
And unfamiliar charm of face;
It may be that across the foam
Which bore her from her childhood's home,
By some strange spell, my Katie brought,
Along with English creeds and thought --
Entangled in her golden hair --
Some English sunshine, warmth, and air!
I cannot tell -- but here to-day,
A thousand billowy leagues away
From that green isle whose twilight skies
No darker are than Katie's eyes,
She seems to me, go where she will,
An English girl in England still!
I meet her on the dusty street,
And daisies spring about her feet;
Or, touched to life beneath her tread,
An English cowslip lifts its head;
And, as to do her grace, rise up
The primrose and the buttercup!
I roam with her through fields of cane,
And seem to stroll an English lane,
Which, white with blossoms of the May,
Spreads its green carpet in her way!
As fancy wills, the path beneath
Is golden gorse, or purple heath:
And now we hear in woodlands dim
Their unarticulated hymn,
Now walk through rippling waves of wheat,
Now sink in mats of clover sweet,
Or see before us from the lawn
The lark go up to greet the dawn!
All birds that love the English sky
Throng round my path when she is by:
The blackbird from a neighboring thorn
With music brims the cup of morn,
And in a thick, melodious rain
The mavis pours her mellow strain!
But only when my Katie's voice
Makes all the listening woods rejoice
I hear -- with cheeks that flush and pale --
The passion of the nightingale!
Anon the pictures round her change,
And through an ancient town we range,
Whereto the shadowy memory clings
Of one of England's Saxon kings,
And which to shrine his fading fame
Still keeps his ashes and his name.
[...] Read more
poem by Henry Timrod
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Who's To Blame
Oh Mother Ghana; Mother Ghana
What has happened to you?
What has happened to your culture?
They say we've fold arms against 'Vernacular' language
Instead opened arms wide to 'English' language
Oh Mother Ghana Mother Ghana
Why?
At school, we are taught the things we do not know
By the 'English' language
Why not 'Vernacular' language?
Oh Mother Ghana, Oh Mother Ghana
Where is your true identity as pure African?
Where is your pride as true Ghanaian?
Oh Mother Ghana, Oh Mother Ghana,
Day after day
When we put on the uniform as students
We are forbidden to speak 'Vernacular' language
Instead the 'English' language
Why Mother Ghana, why Mother Ghana?
When we speak 'Vernacular' language; your culture,
They say: 'Speak English' someone's culture!
When we speak 'English' that someone's culture
They say: 'Abrofosem; speak vernacular language' your culture!
Oh Mother Ghana, Oh Mother Ghana
Who's to blame?
'English or Vernacular language'
Oh Mother Ghana; Oh Mother Ghana.
poem by Francis Julian Zewu
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The language with largest vocabulary
It has only seven letters
And has the largest vocabulary
There is no dearth
Of expression
For any situation or emotion
One same thing
Can mean a million things
King Solomon deciphered
Ants’ impression using this language
Indian mythology has it that
A much revered teacher
Taught all his disciples
Using this language
Clearing their all doubts
On any subject
It is not written
It is not spoken
It is not heard
But has in-depth meaning
And a lot application
It is not formally taught
As it has no syllabus
People pick up this
In their life paths
Some do not just pick this up
But, make excellent use of it
And successfully overcome
Difficult and challenging maneuvers
This language came into being
Long before the creation of this universe
Yes, it is not a just a global language
It is a universal language
This is in use world over
This is a common language
But often not used
This language has no grammar
No problem of spelling words wrong
There are no present, future or past tenses
There is no subject, predicate or object
As there are no sentences framed with this language
When used the person can still keep smiling
Often understood as a consent granted
Even the just new born is
[...] Read more
poem by Bashyam Narayanan
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The Victories Of Love. Book II
I
From Jane To Her Mother
Thank Heaven, the burthens on the heart
Are not half known till they depart!
Although I long'd, for many a year,
To love with love that casts out fear,
My Frederick's kindness frighten'd me,
And heaven seem'd less far off than he;
And in my fancy I would trace
A lady with an angel's face,
That made devotion simply debt,
Till sick with envy and regret,
And wicked grief that God should e'er
Make women, and not make them fair.
That he might love me more because
Another in his memory was,
And that my indigence might be
To him what Baby's was to me,
The chief of charms, who could have thought?
But God's wise way is to give nought
Till we with asking it are tired;
And when, indeed, the change desired
Comes, lest we give ourselves the praise,
It comes by Providence, not Grace;
And mostly our thanks for granted pray'rs
Are groans at unexpected cares.
First Baby went to heaven, you know,
And, five weeks after, Grace went, too.
Then he became more talkative,
And, stooping to my heart, would give
Signs of his love, which pleased me more
Than all the proofs he gave before;
And, in that time of our great grief,
We talk'd religion for relief;
For, though we very seldom name
Religion, we now think the same!
Oh, what a bar is thus removed
To loving and to being loved!
For no agreement really is
In anything when none's in this.
Why, Mother, once, if Frederick press'd
His wife against his hearty breast,
The interior difference seem'd to tear
My own, until I could not bear
The trouble. 'Twas a dreadful strife,
And show'd, indeed, that faith is life.
He never felt this. If he did,
I'm sure it could not have been hid;
For wives, I need not say to you,
[...] Read more
poem by Coventry Patmore
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Language Of Love
I want your flesh and blood
And to feel your heart pumping hard
I want to tell my story to your eyes
I want to watch you react
To me baby
Maybe Im dreaming
I got to do something
We may be on the same planet
Living in different worlds
Do you speak the language of love
Living in the touch of your fingers
Are you the passionate type
Is this a natural thing
Do you speak the language of love
Second hand emotional trigger
In the devils playground
Hear the church bells ring
I speak the language of love
I speak the language of love
Shes my great obsession
And the girl likes me too
I think she has the wrong impression
She thinks I want to be friends
Maybe Im dreaming
I better do something
We might be on the same planet
But talk different tongues
Do you speak the language of love
Living in the touch of your fingers
Are you the passionate type
Is this a natural thing
Do you speak the language of love
Second hand emotional trigger
In the devils playground
Hear the church bells ring
I speak the language of love
I speak the language of love
She thinks I want to be friends
Maybe Im dreaming
I better do something
We may be on the same planet
Living in different worlds
I speak the language of love
I speak the language of love
Do you speak the language of love
Living in the touch of your fingers
Are you the passionate type
Is this a natural thing
Do you speak the language of love
Second hand emotional trigger
[...] Read more
song performed by Rick Springfield
Added by Lucian Velea
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The Language Of Love
I want your flesh and blood
And to feel your heart pumping hard
I want to tell my story to your eyes
I want to watch you react
To me baby
Maybe I'm dreaming
I got to do something
We may be on the same planet
Living in different worlds
Do you speak the language of love
Living in the touch of your fingers
Are you the passionate type
Is this a natural thing
Do you speak the language of love
Second hand emotional trigger
In the devil's playground
Hear the church bells ring
I speak the language of love
I speak the language of love
She's my great obsession
And the girl likes me too
I think she has the wrong impression
She thinks I want to be friends
Maybe I'm dreaming
I better do something
We might be on the same planet
But talk different tongues
Do you speak the language of love
Living in the touch of your fingers
Are you the passionate type
Is this a natural thing
Do you speak the language of love
Second hand emotional trigger
In the devil's playground
Hear the church bells ring
I speak the language of love
I speak the language of love
She thinks I want to be friends
Maybe I'm dreaming
I better do something
We may be on the same planet
Living in different worlds
I speak the language of love
I speak the language of love
Do you speak the language of love
Living in the touch of your fingers
Are you the passionate type
Is this a natural thing
Do you speak the language of love
Second hand emotional trigger
[...] Read more
song performed by Rick Springfield
Added by Lucian Velea
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4.17 Love
Man - embodiment of love be,
But his want is for things worldly,
So unable to view Divine's beauty,
Just lost in possessions worldly.
[107] - 4
Inherent in all persons does be,
Love and compassion unfailingly.
Give to others your love freely,
And receive in turn love purely.
[108] - 4
Love neither want nor sex be,
Nor desire for physical body,
Removing anger, ego clearly,
All attachments and jealousy.
[109] - 4
All love be but prompted only,
By God's grace and bliss surely,
Pray for well-being of everybody,
Love everyone with all humility.
[110] - 4
Fill your heart with love and see,
Experience the true bliss so simply,
It drives the bad thoughts out fully,
Brewing compassion and clemency.
[111] - 4
Our world but on love does be,
And on love our world be only,
Love - most important in life be,
Live in love as love God be surely.
[112] - 4
Useless distinctions, spirituality,
If in heart love not resident be,
Share love with others purely,
Else it is ingratitude to society,
[113] - 4
Love a gift of God does be,
Share it with all unfailingly,
Not just for humanity only,
But all creations by Divinity.
[114] - 4
Immerse in love and no need be,
Of severe spiritual exercise truly,
Live in love for love but God be,
Direct your love to Him plainly.
[115] - 4
Practice what you learn daily,
Never lost in materials clearly,
Just love - the mark of Lord be,
Drown in this ocean unceasingly.
[116] - 4
[...] Read more
poem by Munnan Misra
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Hablemos El Mismo Idioma
En la vida hay tantos senderos por caminar
Qu ironia que al fin nos llevan al mismo lugar
Pesar de las diferencias que solemos buscar
Respiramos el mismo aire, despertamos al mismo sol
Nos alumbra la misma luna, necesitamos sentir amor
Nos alumbra la misma luna, necesitamos sentir amor
Hay tanto tiempo que hemos perdido por discutir
Por diferencias que entre nosotros no deben existir
Las costumbres, raices y herencias que me hacen quien soy
Son coloros de un arcoiris, acordes de un mismo son
Las palabras se hacen fronteras, cuando no nacen del corazn
Hablemos el mismo idioma y as las cosas irn mejor
(coro)
Hablemos el mismo idioma, que hay tantas
Cosas porque luchar
Hablemos el mismo idioma, que solo unidos se lograrn
Hablemos el mismo idioma, que nunca es tarde para empezar
Hablemos el mismo idioma, bajo la bandera de libertad
Si lo pensamos nosotros tenemos tanto en comn
Y no conviene que el mundo nos oiga
Con una sla voz
Es importante seguir adelante con fuerza
Y con f
Forgemos nuevos caminos, en la unin hay
Un gran poder
Orgullosos de ser latinos no importa
De donde, todo podemos vencer
(coro)
Hablemos el mismo idioma, que hay tantas
Cosas porque luchar
Hablemos el mismo idioma, que solo unido se lograr
Hablemos el mismo idioma, que nunca es tarde para empezar
Hablemos el mismo idioma, bajo la bandera de libertad
Hablemos el mismo idioma dame la mano
Mi hermano
(ad lib) no importa de donde seas todos
Somos hermanos t ves
Que no existan las diferencias entre nosotros hispanos
En esta vida hay que trabajar para lograr lo que queremos, latinos
Las palabras se hacen fronteras cuando no se
Hablan del corazn si t ves
No importa raza ni religion, somos hermanos
En el corazn pero que fuerza tenemos
Los latinos si nos mantenemos unidos
(translation:
In life there are so many paths that we can choose to walk
How ironic that they all lead to the same place
In spite of all the differences that we tend
To look for in each other
We all breathe the same air and wake up to the same sun
[...] Read more
song performed by Gloria Estefan
Added by Lucian Velea
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Tongue-suicide is not only the choice of children. It is common among the infantile heads of state and power merchants whose evacuated language leaves them with no access to what is left of their human instincts for they speak only to those who obey, or in order to force obedience. The systematic looting of language can be recognized by the tendency of its users to forgo its nuanced, complex, mid-wifery properties for menace and subjugation. Oppressive language does more than represent violence; it is violence; does more than represent the limits of knowledge; it limits knowledge. Whether it is obscuring state language or the faux-language of mindless media; whether it is the proud but calcified language of the academy or the commodity driven language of science; whether it is the malign language of law-without-ethics, or language designed for the estrangement of minorities, hiding its racist plunder in its literary cheek — it must be rejected, altered and exposed. It is the language that drinks blood, laps vulnerabilities, tucks its fascist boots under crinolines of respectability and patriotism as it moves relentlessly toward the bottom line and the bottomed-out mind. Sexist language, racist language, theistic language — all are typical of the policing languages of mastery, and cannot, do not permit new knowledge or encourage the mutual exchange of ideas.
quote by Toni Morrison
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Victories Of Love. Book I
I
From Frederick Graham
Mother, I smile at your alarms!
I own, indeed, my Cousin's charms,
But, like all nursery maladies,
Love is not badly taken twice.
Have you forgotten Charlotte Hayes,
My playmate in the pleasant days
At Knatchley, and her sister, Anne,
The twins, so made on the same plan,
That one wore blue, the other white,
To mark them to their father's sight;
And how, at Knatchley harvesting,
You bade me kiss her in the ring,
Like Anne and all the others? You,
That never of my sickness knew,
Will laugh, yet had I the disease,
And gravely, if the signs are these:
As, ere the Spring has any power,
The almond branch all turns to flower,
Though not a leaf is out, so she
The bloom of life provoked in me;
And, hard till then and selfish, I
Was thenceforth nought but sanctity
And service: life was mere delight
In being wholly good and right,
As she was; just, without a slur;
Honouring myself no less than her;
Obeying, in the loneliest place,
Ev'n to the slightest gesture, grace
Assured that one so fair, so true,
He only served that was so too.
For me, hence weak towards the weak,
No more the unnested blackbird's shriek
Startled the light-leaved wood; on high
Wander'd the gadding butterfly,
Unscared by my flung cap; the bee,
Rifling the hollyhock in glee,
Was no more trapp'd with his own flower,
And for his honey slain. Her power,
From great things even to the grass
Through which the unfenced footways pass,
Was law, and that which keeps the law,
Cherubic gaiety and awe;
Day was her doing, and the lark
Had reason for his song; the dark
In anagram innumerous spelt
Her name with stars that throbb'd and felt;
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poem by Coventry Patmore
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First Book
OF writing many books there is no end;
And I who have written much in prose and verse
For others' uses, will write now for mine,–
Will write my story for my better self,
As when you paint your portrait for a friend,
Who keeps it in a drawer and looks at it
Long after he has ceased to love you, just
To hold together what he was and is.
I, writing thus, am still what men call young;
I have not so far left the coasts of life
To travel inland, that I cannot hear
That murmur of the outer Infinite
Which unweaned babies smile at in their sleep
When wondered at for smiling; not so far,
But still I catch my mother at her post
Beside the nursery-door, with finger up,
'Hush, hush–here's too much noise!' while her sweet eyes
Leap forward, taking part against her word
In the child's riot. Still I sit and feel
My father's slow hand, when she had left us both,
Stroke out my childish curls across his knee;
And hear Assunta's daily jest (she knew
He liked it better than a better jest)
Inquire how many golden scudi went
To make such ringlets. O my father's hand,
Stroke the poor hair down, stroke it heavily,–
Draw, press the child's head closer to thy knee!
I'm still too young, too young to sit alone.
I write. My mother was a Florentine,
Whose rare blue eyes were shut from seeing me
When scarcely I was four years old; my life,
A poor spark snatched up from a failing lamp
Which went out therefore. She was weak and frail;
She could not bear the joy of giving life–
The mother's rapture slew her. If her kiss
Had left a longer weight upon my lips,
It might have steadied the uneasy breath,
And reconciled and fraternised my soul
With the new order. As it was, indeed,
I felt a mother-want about the world,
And still went seeking, like a bleating lamb
Left out at night, in shutting up the fold,–
As restless as a nest-deserted bird
Grown chill through something being away, though what
It knows not. I, Aurora Leigh, was born
To make my father sadder, and myself
Not overjoyous, truly. Women know
The way to rear up children, (to be just,)
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poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning from Aurora Leigh (1856)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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