A Reprise

Lovely a photo by ladyhildegarde on Flickr. I thought for a moment I was climbing the steps to the beekeeper's mansion. It makes me want to return. Reading: Gone to Earth , by Mary Gladys Meredith Webb.

Because you wish it a photo by ladyhildegarde on Flickr. Reading: Shirley , by Charlotte Bronte.

I have truly never identified with the lyrics of a song to such great extent that they corresponded directly to myself in this piercing, precise way. But this gives words to my darkest self and also identifies the word "Opheliac" as nothing else can sufficiently. I'm your Opheliac I've been so disillusioned I know you'd take me back But still I feigned confusion I couldn't be your friend My world was too unstable You might have seen the end But you were never able To keep me breathing As the water rises up again Before I slip away You know the games I play And the words I say When I want my own way You know the lies I tell When you've gone through hell And I say I can't stay You know how hard it can be To keep believing in me When everything and everyone Becomes my enemy and when There's nothing more you can do I'm gonna blame it on you It's not the way I want to be I only hope that in the end you will see It's the Opheliac in me I...

  There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. Hamlet Act I, scene 5, 159-167

“I have no wit, no words, no tears; My heart within me like a stone Is numbed too much for hopes or fears. Look right, look left, I dwell alone; I lift mine eyes, but dimmed with grief No everlasting hills I see; My life is in the falling leaf: O Jesus, quicken me.” Christina Rossetti Sunday morning our road was too waterlogged to allow us to get to church safely, and we had to turn back. We spent a busy day at home that seemed to last forever. I made bread and ironed and put up our laundered curtains, which now look fresh and new. Saturday night’s sleep was savory and deep. When I woke, my mind was rested, my heart at peace. Over breakfast I read the words of Christina Rossetti, the poem of which I quoted the first stanza above. I realized that I have not been the first person alive to suffer spiritually, to say the least, to suffer doubts because of what I experience in the world. Even the voice of logic in my mind for weeks has ...

Loving angst Downstairs I laugh, I sport and jest with all; But in my solitary room above I turn my face in silence to the wall; My heart is breaking for a little love. I feel no spring, while spring is well-nigh blown, I find no nest, while nests are in the grove: Woe's me for mine own heart that dwells alone, My heart that breaketh for a little love. L.E.L., Christina Rossetti I have always loved angst, the brokenhearted, songs that sing about the abandoning lover with despair, spirit or whatever. I know Elton John feels the same way since I have heard "Sad Songs Say So Much." You can keep your Celine Dion. Give me darkly beautiful passion, betrayal, despair. I love this (excerpted) poem by Christina Rossetti. If I could scrape together the negative feelings I sometimes have and make something like that out of them I would be redeemed forever. "My heart is breaking for a little love," I have been dramatizing it whilst counting out my filters, taking kettle tem...

I dreamt I set a sunflower, And red as blood it grew-- But such a sunflower never Bloomed beneath the sun.

O dream how sweet, too sweet, too bitter sweet, Whose wakening should have been in Paradise, Long while running, how short when run, Time to eternity has descended, Timeless eternity has begun.

Christina Rossetti. Then I cried out upon him: Cease, Leave me in peace: Fear not that I should crave Aught thou mayst have. Leave me in peace, yea trouble me no more, Lest I arise and chase thee from my door. What, shall I not be let Alone, that thou dost vex me yet? But all night long that voice spake urgently: 'Open to Me' Still harping in mine ears: 'Rise, let Me in.'

Aunt Olivia told Peggy and me about him on the afternoon we went over to help her gather her late roses for pot-pourri. We found her strangely quiet and preoccupied. As a rule she was fond of mild fun, alert to hear East Grafton gossip, and given to sudden little trills of almost girlish laughter, which for the time being dispelled the atmosphere of gentle old- maidishness which seemed to hang about her as a garment. At such moments we did not find it hard to believe--as we did at other times--that Aunt Olivia had once been a girl herself. This day she picked the roses absently, and shook the fairy petals into her little sweet-grass basket with the air of a woman whose thoughts were far away. We said nothing, knowing that Aunt Olivia's secrets always came our way in time. When the rose-leaves were picked, we carried them in and upstairs in single file, Aunt Olivia bringing up the rear to pick up any stray rose-leaf we might drop. In the south-west room, where there was no carpet ...

"He had decided to save fifty centavos to fulfill a dream he had cherished ever since he was a child: to have a cup of Viennese coffee. Through the windows of the Hotel Frances he had seen the waiters pass with trays held high above their heads on which lay these treasures: tall glass goblets crowned with towers of whipped cream and adorned with beautiful glazed maraschino cherries. The day of his first paycheck, he had crossed back and forth outside the establishment before getting up the courage to go through the door. Finally, beret in hand, he had stepped timidly across the threshold and entered the luxurious dining room, with its teardrop chandeliers and stylish furniture, convinced that everyone was staring at him, that their thousand eyes found his suit too tight and his shoes old. He sat down on the edge of the chair, his ears burning, and gave his order to the waiter with a mere thread of a voice. He waited impatiently, watching people come and go in the tall mirro...

Little boxes made of ticky-tacky, Little boxes, little, boxes, Little boxes all the same. Pete Seeger (1919 - ) U.S. folksinger and songwriter. Song lyric. "Little Boxes"

Very fragile. Very little. Always correctly dressed in white. Through the house her footsteps sounded disciplined and so polite. Dusting, watering flowers too, with busy, little housewife's hands. Baking bread. Walking in the park, writing letters to family and friends. Loving sister. Obedient daughter. A daily game with dolls and house. But deep inside were fires flaring as the silent screams arose. Behind locked doors of maiden's chambers with embroideries and lace lay a stranger, known to no one. Much too lonely. Much too brave. She's like a cold, unfeeling surgeon listening to her naked pain. As her pillow hindered screaming while doing autopsy on her own brain. Translated by Liv Wenger

Linda Ronstadt hearts call hearts fall swallowed in the rain who knows life grows hollow and so vain wandering in the winter light the wicked and the sane bear witness to salvation and life starts over again now the clear sky is all around you love's shadow will surround you all through the night star glowing in the twilight tell me true hope whispers and i will follow till you love me too

Procol Harum We skipped the light fandango turned cartwheels 'cross the floor I was feeling kinda seasick but the crowd called out for more The room was humming harder as the ceiling flew away When we called out for another drink the waiter brought a tray And so it was that later as the miller told his tale that her face, at first just ghostly, turned a whiter shade of pale She said, 'There is no reason and the truth is plain to see.' But I wandered through my playing cards and would not let her be one of sixteen vestal virgins who were leaving for the coast and although my eyes were open they might have just as well've been closed She said, 'I'm home on shore leave,' though in truth we were at sea so I took her by the looking glass and forced her to agree saying, 'You must be the mermaid who took Neptune for a ride.' But she smiled at me so sadly that my anger straightway died If music be the food of love then laughter is its queen and likewise if ...

Wallace Stevens 1 Complacencies of the peignoir, and late Coffee and oranges in a sunny chair, And the green freedom of a cockatoo Upon a rug mingle to dissipate The holy hush of ancient sacrifice. She dreams a little, and she feels the dark Encroachment of that old catastrophe, As a calm darkens among water-lights. The pungent oranges and bright, green wings Seem things in some procession of the dead, Winding across wide water, without sound. The day is like wide water, without sound. Stilled for the passing of her dreaming feet Over the seas, to silent Palestine, Dominion of the blood and sepulchre. 2 Why should she give her bounty to the dead? What is divinity if it can come Only in silent shadows and in dreams? Shall she not find in comforts of the sun, In pungent fruit and bright green wings, or else In any balm or beauty of the earth, Things to be cherished like the thought of heaven? Divinity must live within herself: Passions of rain, or moods in falling snow; Grievings in lone...