Beautiful inexactly

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P e e l i n g s   O n   D i s p l a y

Semirural Scene

North, South Carolina

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You are not beautiful, exactly.

You are beautiful, inexactly.

You let a weed grow by the mulberry

And a mulberry grow by the house.

So close, in the personal quiet

Of a windy night, it brushes the wall

And sweeps away the day till we sleep.

A child said it, and it seemed true:

"Things that are lost are all equal."

But it isn't true. If I lost you,

The quiet wouldn't be yours. If I lost you,

I'd have to ask the grass to let me sleep.

= Marvin Bell =

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Happy Thursday

Return'd to its own delight

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I   S e c o n d   T h a t

Gibson Pond

Lexington, South Carolina

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To see a World in a Grain of Sand

And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand

And Eternity in an hour.

A Robin Red breast in a Cage

Puts all Heaven in a Rage.

A Dove house fill'd with doves & Pigeons

Shudders Hell thro' all its regions.

A dog starv'd at his Master's Gate

Predicts the ruin of the State.

A Horse misus'd upon the Road

Calls to Heaven for Human blood.

Each outcry of the hunted Hare

A fibre from the Brain does tear.

A Skylark wounded in the wing,

A Cherubim does cease to sing.

The Game Cock clip'd and arm'd for fight

Does the Rising Sun affright.

Every Wolf's & Lion's howl

Raises from Hell a Human Soul.

The wild deer, wand'ring here & there,

Keeps the Human Soul from Care.

The Lamb misus'd breeds public strife

And yet forgives the Butchers Knife.

The Bat that flits at close of Eve

Has left the Brain that won't Believe.

The Owl that calls upon the Night

Speaks the Unbeliever's fright.

He who shall hurt the little Wren

Shall never be belov'd by Men.

He who the Ox to wrath has mov'd

Shall never be by Woman lov'd.

The wanton Boy that kills the Fly

Shall feel the Spider's enmity.

He who torments the Chafer's sprite

Weaves a Bower in endless Night.

The Catterpillar on the Leaf

Repeats to thee thy Mother's grief.

Kill not the Moth nor Butterfly,

For the Last Judgement draweth nigh.

He who shall train the Horse to War

Shall never pass the Polar Bar.

The Beggar's Dog & Widow's Cat

Feed them & thou wilt grow fat.

The Gnat that sings his Summer's Song

Poison gets from Slander's tongue.

The poison of the Snake & Newt

Is the sweat of Envy's Foot.

The poison of the Honey Bee

Is the Artist's Jealousy.

The Prince's Robes & Beggar's Rags

Are Toadstools on the Miser's Bags.

A Truth that's told with bad intent

Beats all the Lies you can invent.

It is right it should be so;

Man was made for Joy & Woe.

And when this we rightly know

Thro' the World we safely go.

Joy & Woe are woven fine,

A Clothing for the soul divine;

Under every grief & pine

Runs a joy with silken twine.

The Babe is more than swadling Bands;

Throughout all these Human Lands

Tools were made & Born were hands,

Every Farmer Understands.

Every Tear from Every Eye

Becomes a Babe in Eternity.

This is caught by Females bright

And return'd to its own delight.

The Bleat, the Bark, Bellow & Roar

Are Waves that Beat on Heaven's Shore.

The Babe that weeps the Rod beneath

Writes Revenge in realms of death.

The Beggar's Rags, fluttering in Air

Does to Rags the Heavens tear.

The Soldier arm'd with Sword & Gun,

Palsied strikes the Summer's Sun.

The poor Man's Farthing is worth more

Than all the Gold on Afric's Shore.

One Mite wrung from the Labrer's hands

Shall buy & sell the Miser's Lands;

Or, if protected from on high,

Does that whole Nation sell & buy.

He who mocks the Infant's Faith

Shall be mock'd in Age & Death.

He who shall teach the Child to Doubt

The rotting Grave shall ne'er get out.

He who respects the Infant's faith

Triumphs over Hell & Death.

The Child's Toys & the Old Man's Reasons

Are the Fruits of the Two seasons.

The Questioner, who sits so sly

Shall never know how to Reply.

He who replies to words of Doubt

Doth put the Light of Knowledge out.

The Strongest Poison ever known

Came from Caesar's Laurel Crown.

Nought can Deform the Human Race

Like to the Armour's iron brace.

When Gold & Gems adorn the Plow

To peaceful Arts shall Envy Bow.

A Riddle or the Cricket's Cry

Is to Doubt a fit Reply.

The Emmet's Inch & Eagle's Mile

Make Lame Philosophy to smile.

He who Doubts from what he sees

Will ne'er Believe, do what you Please.

If the Sun & Moon should Doubt

They'd immediately Go out.

To be in a Passion you Good may Do,

But no Good if a Passion is in you.

The Whore & Gambler by the State

Licenc'd build that Nation's Fate.

The Harlot's cry from Street to Street

Shall weave Old England's winding Sheet.

The Winner's Shout, the Loser's Curse 

Dance before dead England's Hearse.

Every Night & every Morn

Some to Misery are Born.

Every Morn & every Night

Some are Born to sweet delight.

Some are Born to sweet delight, 

Some are Born to Endless Night.

We are led to Believe a Lie

When we see not Thro' the Eye

Which was Born in a Night to perish in a Night

When the Soul Slept in Beams of Light.

God Appears & God is Light

To those poor Souls who dwell in Night.

But does a Human Form Display

To those who Dwell in Realms of day.

= William Blake =

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Happy Wednesday

Steals in calm

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I   S e e d   I t   A n d   I   T a k e d   I t

Kitchen Window

Columbia, South Carolina

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Beneath the golden balm
Settling on the fields
Evening steals in calm
And farmers count their yields
The bee is in the lavender,
The honey fills the comb,
But here a rain falls never-ending
And I am far from home.

= Jacqueline Carey =

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Happy Tuesday

Nectar at the roadside

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S e m i r u r a l   S o m n o l e n c e

Church Street

Swansea, South Carolina

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From blossoms comes

this brown paper bag of peaches

we bought from the boy

at the bend in the road where we turned toward

signs painted Peaches.

From laden boughs, from hands,

from sweet fellowship in the bins,

comes nectar at the roadside, dusty skin and all,

comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat.

O, to take what we love inside,

to carry within us an orchard, to eat

not only the skin, but the shade,

not only the sugar, but the days, to hold

the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into

the round jubilance of the peach.

There are days we live

as if death were nowhere

in the backgeround; from joy

to joy to joy, from wing to wing,

from blossom to blossom to

impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.

= Li-Young Lee =

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Happy Monday

In the mercy of his means

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C h e e k   b y   J o w l

West Cemetery

Amherst, Massachusetts

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FERN HILL

Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs
About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,
The night above the dingle starry,
Time let me hail and climb
Golden in the heydays of his eyes,
And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns
And once below a time I lordly had the trees and leaves
Trail with daisies and barley
Down the rivers of the windfall light.

And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns
About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,
In the sun that is young once only,
Time let me play and be
Golden in the mercy of his means,
And green and golden I was huntsman and herdsman, the calves
Sang to my horn, the foxes on the hills barked clear and
cold,
And the sabbath rang slowly
In the pebbles of the holy streams.

All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay
Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was
air
And playing, lovely and watery
And fire green as grass.
And nightly under the simple stars
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away,
All the moon long I heard, blessed among stables, the
nightjars
Flying with the ricks, and the horses
Flashing into the dark.

And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
With the dew, come back, the cock on his shoulder: it was all
Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
The sky gathered again
And the sun grew round that very day.
So it must have been after the birth of the simple light
In the first, spinning place, the spellbound horse walking
warm
Out of the whinnying green stable
On to the fields of praise.

And honoured among foxes and pheasants by the gay house
Under the new made clouds and happy as the heart was long,
In the sun born over and over,
I ran my heedless ways,
My wishes raced through the house high hay
And nothing I cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows
In all his tuneful turning so few and such morning songs
Before the children green and golden
Follow him out of grace.

Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would
take me
Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shadow of my hand,
In the moon that is always rising,
Nor that riding to sleep
I should hear him fly with the high fields
And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.
Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
Time held me green and dying
Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

= Dylan Thomas =

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Happy Thursday