All that is real to me

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T i l l   Y o u   T u r n   B l u e

Laurel Grove Cemetery

Rock Hill, South Carolina

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I believe in the ordinary day
that is here at this moment and is me

I do not see it going its own way
but I never saw how it came to me

It extends beyond whatever I may
think I know and all that is real to me

it is the present that it bears away
where has it gone when it has gone from me

there is no place I know outside today
except for the unknown all around me

the only presence that appears to stay
everything that I call mine it lent me

even the way that I believe the day
for as long as it is here and is me

= W.S. Merwin =

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Happy Monday

Be Thou my dignity

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C r o s s i n g s

Pleasant Forest Cemetery

Knoxville, Tennessee

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Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art.
Thou my best thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

Be Thou my wisdom, and Thou my true Word;
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord;
Thou my great Father, I Thy true son;
Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.

Be Thou my battle shield, sword for the fight;
Be Thou my dignity, Thou my delight;
Thou my soul’s shelter, Thou my high tower:
Raise Thou me heavenward, O power of my power.

Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise,
Thou mine inheritance, now and always:
Thou and Thou only, first in my heart,
High King of Heaven, my treasure Thou art.

High King of Heaven, my victory won,
May I reach Heaven’s joys, O bright Heaven’s Sun!
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
Still be my vision, O Ruler of all.

= Dallan Forgaill =

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For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to shew himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him. 

= 2 Chronicles 16:9 =

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Happy Sunday

When light is put away

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U p p i t y

July Sky

Columbia, South Carolina

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We grow accustomed to the Dark --

When Light is put away --

As when the Neighbor holds the Lamp

To witness her Good bye --

A Moment -- We uncertain step

For newness of the night --

Then -- fit our Vision to the Dark --

And meet the Road -- erect --

And so of larger -- Darknesses --

These Evenings of the Brain --

When not a Moon disclose a sign --

Or Star -- come out -- within --

The Bravest -- grope a little --

And sometimes hit a Tree

Directly in the Forehead --

But as they learn to see --

Either the Darkness alters --

Or something in the sight

Adjusts itself to Midnight --

And Life steps almost straight.

= Emily Dickinson =

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Happy Saturday

Between the ash cloud and the dun

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S h a r d   T i m e s

Roadside Ruins

Batesburg-Leesville, South Carolina

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This after-sunset is a sight for seeing.

Cliff-heads of craggy cloud surrounding it.
-- And dwell you in that glory-show?

You may; for there are strange strange things in being,

 Stranger than I know.

Yet if that chasm of splendour claim your presence

Which glows between the ash cloud and the dun,

How changed must be your mortal mould!

Changed to a firmament-riding earthless essence

From what you were of old:

All too unlike the fond and fragile creature

Then known to me ... Well, shall I say it plain?

I would not have you thus and there,

But still would grieve on, missing you, still feature

You as the one you were.

= Thomas Hardy =

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Happy Friday

A big ride over a thousand acres

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R o b i n ' s   N e s t

Temple Baptist Church Graveyard

Lenoir, North Carolina

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Who are we in the valley of their language?

The landscape listens to their

Shapes like sounds

That perfectly express the heliocryptic

Slant of the rays they tread

Homeward to barn.

And so -- grown bright enough to still our speech

And let them embody a thought

We cannot say --

We perch on the fence and study that free tongue

Of color wonderfully winding

The ragged hill.

It used to be when cows came home transfigured

One of us always jumped some

Flank of splendor

In hope of a big ride over a thousand acres --

Only to get thrown hard

On humble ground.

But now their quiet moves us. Our golden faces

Crisped by aubergine shadows from

Our golden hands

Turn after them an abstruse longing to learn --

From the slowly pageanted idiom

Their shapes take on

With jewelled clarity from the hypnogogic

THAT ART THOU still hanging bright

In the West --

Just who we are in the valley of any language

If only the gates of our silence

Let in sky.

= Frederick Stern Bock =

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Happy Thursday