Quotes about pruning, page 5
Love
Then said Almitra, 'Speak to us of Love.'
And he raised his head and looked upon the people, and there fell a stillness upon them.
And with a great voice he said:
When love beckons to you follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays waste the garden.
For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you. Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning.
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poem by Khalil Gibran
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Revisited
The roll of drums and the bugle's wailing
Vex the air of our vales-no more;
The spear is beaten to hooks of pruning,
The share is the sword the soldier wore!
Sing soft, sing low, our lowland river,
Under thy banks of laurel bloom;
Softly and sweet, as the hour beseemeth,
Sing us the songs of peace and home.
Let all the tenderer voices of nature
Temper the triumph and chasten mirth,
Full of the infinite love and pity
For fallen martyr and darkened hearth.
But to Him who gives us beauty for ashes,
And the oil of joy for mourning long,
Let thy hills give thanks, and all thy waters
Break into jubilant waves of song!
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poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
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Marksman Sam
When Sam Small joined the regiment,
'E were no' but a raw recruit,
And they marched 'im away one wint'ry day,
'Is musket course to shoot.
They woke 'im up at the crack o' dawn,
Wi' many a nudge and shake,
'E were dreaming that t' Sergeant 'ad broke 'is neck,
And 'e didn't want to wake.
Lieutenant Bird came on parade,
And chided the lads for mooning,
'E talked in a voice like a pound o' plums,
'Is tonsils needed pruning.
"Move to the right by fours," he said,
Crisp like but most severe,
But Sam didn't know 'is right from 'is left,
So pretended 'e didn't 'ear.
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poem by Marriott Edgar
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The Dominion
Oh, fair Ideal, unto whom,
Through days of doubt and nights of gloom,
Brave hearts have clung, while lips of scorn,
Made mock of thee as but a dream—
Already on the heights of morn
We see thy golden sandals gleam,
And, glimmering through the clouds that wrap thee yet,
The seven stars that are thy coronet.
Why tarriest thou 'twixt earth and heaven?
Go forth to meet her, Sisters seven!
'Tis but your welcome she awaits
Ere, casting off the veil of cloud,
The bodied Hope of blending States,
She stands revealed, imperial, proud;
As from your salutation sprung full-grown,
With green for raiment and with gold for zone.
From where beneath unclouded skies
Thy peerless haven glittering lies;
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poem by James Brunton Stephens
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And The Poems Sit There
And the poems sit there on the tracks,
on the shadows of serpentine ladders,
without engines, though moving, without diesels
to drive them, chain-letters to the world,
to a moment with nothing else to do,
to lonely abuses huddled by the flowering lamp
like fairies in boxes of shy plaster,
to broken windows who rage at the stars
for not accepting their jagged black holes,
to lovers who spend too long in the shower
pruning their gardens,
every ray of light in place
as they go out to pale their shining in the sun,
and the poppy girls with spider tongues
offering little green crowns to the bees, sit there
without moving, though moving,
pulling their hearts on long lifelines out of the void
that fuels their furnaces with crows,
that rescues drowned sailors from the rose of the sea,
that fangs the old lions with light
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poem by Patrick White
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Grandfather Squeers
'My grandfather Squeers,' said The Raggedy Man,
As he solemnly lighted his pipe and began--
'The most indestructible man, for his years,
And the grandest on earth, was my grandfather Squeers!
'He said, when he rounded his three-score-and-ten,
'I've the hang of it now and can do it again!'
'He had frozen his heels so repeatedly, he
Could tell by them just what the weather would be;
'And would laugh and declare, 'while the _Almanac_ would
Most falsely prognosticate, _he_ never could!'
'Such a hale constitution had grandfather Squeers
That, 'though he'd used '_navy_' for sixty odd years,
'He still chewed a dime's-worth six days of the week,
While the seventh he passed with a chew in each cheek:
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poem by James Whitcomb Riley
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The Broken Balance
I. Reference to a Passage in Plutarch's Life of Sulla
The people buying and selling, consuming pleasures, talking in the archways,
Were all suddenly struck quiet
And ran from under stone to look up at the sky: so shrill and mournful,
So fierce and final, a brazen
Pealing of trumpets high up in the air, in the summer blue over Tuscany.
They marvelled; the soothsayers answered:
'Although the Gods are little troubled toward men, at the end of each period
A sign is declared in heaven
Indicating new times, new customs, a changed people; the Romans
Rule, and Etruria is finished;
A wise mariner will trim the sails to the wind.'
I heard yesterday
So shrill and mournful a trumpet-blast,
It was hard to be wise.... You must eat change and endure; not be much troubled
For the people; they will have their happiness.
When the republic grows too heavy to endure, then Caesar will carry It;
When life grows hateful, there's power ...
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poem by Robinson Jeffers
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Vertumnus and Pomona : Ovid's Metamorphoses, book 14 [v. 623-771]
The fair Pomona flourish'd in his reign;
Of all the Virgins of the sylvan train,
None taught the trees a nobler race to bear,
Or more improv'd the vegetable care.
To her the shady grove, the flow'ry field,
The streams and fountains, no delights could yield;
'Twas all her joy the ripening fruits to tend,
And see the boughs with happy burthens bend.
The hook she bore instead of Cynthia's spear,
To lop the growth of the luxuriant year,
To decent form the lawless shoots to bring,
And teach th' obedient branches where to spring.
Now the cleft rind inserted graffs receives,
And yields an offspring more than nature gives;
Now sliding streams the thirsty plants renew,
And feed their fibres with reviving dew.
These cares alone her virgin breast employ,
Averse from Venus and the nuptial joy.
Her private orchards, wall'd on ev'ry side,
To lawless sylvans all access deny'd.
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poem by Alexander Pope
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The 'Body Size Advantages' Quartette.....[LONG; Human Body Size and Behavior; Humor? ]
The Advantages of Being Fat
Some may laugh when they read this title,
since for many American females (and males) slimness is an idol.
I admit a fat figure doesn't make me smile;
I'm attracted more easily, physically, to the anorexic style.
I know not all will think the same,
and some may think my thinking's lame,
but I believe it's true for both fat men and women
that in their lives less breaks they're given.
I don't mean grossly obese like a hippo,
but with REALLY BIG love handles, not just a ripple.
I myself could stand to lose some pounds.
It's not as easy as to some it sounds.
But I've taken up the task so now I must
speak of 'Advantages' of being fat. It's that or bust.:
Being fat can help anchor you in a storm,
and extra layers of fat in winter helps to keep you warm.
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poem by Bri Edwards
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Quia Multum Amavit
Am I not he that hath made thee and begotten thee,
I, God, the spirit of man?
Wherefore now these eighteen years hast thou forgotten me,
From whom thy life began?
Thy life-blood and thy life-breath and thy beauty,
Thy might of hands and feet,
Thy soul made strong for divinity of duty
And service which was sweet.
Through the red sea brimmed with blood didst thou not follow me,
As one that walks in trance?
Was the storm strong to break or the sea to swallow thee,
When thou wast free and France?
I am Freedom, God and man, O France, that plead with thee;
How long now shall I plead?
Was I not with thee in travail, and in need with thee,
Thy sore travail and need?
Thou wast fairest and first of my virgin-vested daughters,
Fairest and foremost thou;
And thy breast was white, though thy hands were red with slaughters,
Thy breast, a harlot's now.
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poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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