And every clamor bright

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L i g h t   a n d   L i f e

First Responders Memorial

Columbia, South Carolina

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The farthest Thunder that I heard

Was nearer than the Sky

And rumbles still, though torrid Noons

Have laid their missiles by --

The Lightning that preceded it

Struck no one but myself --

But I would not exchange the Bolt

For all the rest of Life --

Indebtedness to Oxygen

The Happy may repay,

But not the obligation

To Electricity --

It founds the Homes and decks the Days

And every clamor bright

Is but the gleam concomitant

Of that waylaying Light --

The Thought is quiet as a Flake --

A Crash without a Sound,

How Life's reverberation

Its Explanation found --

= Emily Dickinson =

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Happy Saturday

For a breath I tarry

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L o o k   Y o n d e r   a n d   L i s t e n

Pleasant Forest Cemetery

Knoxville, Tennessee

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From far, from eve and morning
And yon twelve-winded sky,
The stuff of life to knit me
Blew hither: here am I.

Now -- for a breath I tarry
Nor yet disperse apart --
Take my hand quick and tell me,
What have you in your heart.

Speak now, and I will answer;
How shall I help you, say;
Ere to the wind's twelve quarters
I take my endless way.

= A.E. Housman =

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In Loving Memory

of my grandfather

Dorsey Rollins Sandifer

December 4, 1915 - September 19, 1994

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Happy Friday

There is no telling where time is

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D i n e r

Elmwood Cemetery

Columbia, South Carolina

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We sit late, watching the dark slowly unfold:

No clock counts this.

When kisses are repeated and the arms hold

There is no telling where time is.

It is midsummer: the leaves hang big and still:

Behind the eye a star;

Under the silk of the wrist a sea, tell

Time is nowhere.

We stand; leaves have not timed the summer.

No clock now needs

Tell we have only what we remember:

Minutes uproaring with our heads

Like an unfortunate King's and his Queen's

When the senseless mob rules;

And quietly the trees casting their crowns

Into the pools.

= Ted Hughes =

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Happy Thursday

It is something to be sure of a desire

^  a s k e d  ^

^  a n s w e r e d  ^

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Rambo

Columbia, South Carolina

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It is something to have wept as we have wept,
It is something to have done as we have done,
It is something to have watched when all men slept,
And seen the stars which never see the sun.

It is something to have smelt the mystic rose,
Although it break and leave the thorny rods,
It is something to have hungered once as those
Must hunger who have ate the bread of gods.

To have seen you and your unforgotten face,
Brave as a blast of trumpets for the fray,
Pure as white lilies in a watery space,
It were something, though you went from me today.

To have known the things that from the weak are furled,
Perilous ancient passions, strange and high;
It is something to be wiser than the world,
It is something to be older than the sky.

In a time of sceptic moths and cynic rusts,
And fattened lives that of their sweetness tire
In a world of flying loves and fading lusts,
It is something to be sure of a desire.

Lo, blessed are our ears for they have heard;
Yea, blessed are our eyes for they have seen:
Let the thunder break on man and beast and bird
And the lightning. It is something to have been.

= G.K. Chesterton =

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Happy Wednesday

Though I here delay

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H o m e w a r d   I   G o

Magnolia Cemetery

Augusta, Georgia

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To feel, to know, to soar unlimited,
'Mid throngs of light-winged angels sweeping far,
And pore upon the realms unvisited,
That tessellate the unseen unthought star,
To be the thing that now I feebly dream
Flashing within my faintest, deepest gleam.

Ah, caverns of my soul! how thick your shade,
Where flows that life by which I faintly see, --
Wave your bright torches, for I need your aid,
Golden-eyed demons of my ancestry!
Your son though blinded hath a light within,
A heavenly fire which ye from suns did win.

O Time! O Death! I clasp you in my arms,
For I can soothe an infinite cold sorrow,
And gaze contented on your icy charms, 
And that wild snow-pile which we call to-morrow;
Sweep on, O soft, and azure-lidded sky,
Earth's waters to your gentle gaze reply.

I am not earth-born, though I here delay;
Hope's child, I summon infiniter powers;
And laugh to see the mild and sunny day
Smile on the shrunk and thin autumnal hours;
I laugh, for hope hath happy place with me,
If my bark sinks, 'tis to another sea.

= William Ellery Channing =

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Happy Tuesday