i've moved to megshearon.wordpress.com
go there.
bye.
meg
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
Monday, April 23, 2007
birches...
when i see birches bend to left and right
across the lines of straighter darker trees,
i like to think some boy's been swinging them.
but swinging doesn't bend them down to stay
as ice storms do. often you must have seen them
loaded with ice a sunny winter morning
after a rain. they click upon themselves
as the breeze rises, and turn many-colored
as the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.
soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells
shattering and avalanching on the snow crust -
such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
you'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.
they are dragged to the withered bracken by the load,
and they seem not to break; though once they are bowed
so low for long, they never right themselves:
you may see their trunks arching in the woods
years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground
like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
before them over their heads to dry in the sun.
but i was going to say when truth broke in
with all her matter of fact about the ice storm,
i should prefer to have some boy bend them
as he went out and in to fetch the cows -
some boy too far out of town to learn baseball,
whose only play was what he found himself,
summer or winter, and could play alone.
one by one he subdued his father's trees
by riding them down over and over again
until he took the stiffness out of them,
and not one but hung limp, not one was left
for him to conquer. he learned all there was
to learn about not launching out too soon
and so not carrying the tree away
clear to the ground. he always kept his poise
to the top branches, climbing carefully
with the same pains you use to fill a cup
up to the brim, and even above the brim.
then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish,
kicking his way down through the air to the ground.
so was i once myself a swinger of birches.
and so i dream of going back to be.
it's when i'm weary of considerations,
and life is too much a pathless wood
where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
broken across it, and one eye is weeping
from a twig's having lashed across it open.
i'd like to get away from earth away
and then come back to it and begin over.
may no fate willfully misunderstand me
and half grant what i wish and snatch me away
not to return. earth's the right place for love:
i don't know where it's likely to go better.
i'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
and climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
but dipped its top and set me down again.
that would be good both going and coming back.
one could do worse than be a swinger of birches.
- robert frost
i love robert frost. when i find myself down or depressed, i carry his works around with me. though sometimes i find myself wishing to live no more, i usually realize that my desires fit more in line with those of birches than with truly suicidal desires. i sometimes want to just stop for a while, just take a break. i don't want to die and cause pain to those i love, i don't want to quit...but i want to take a respite from the pains and toils of this life. i think life does this to all of us some times. so, i read this poem to remind myself that my desires are more likely those to take a break and come back than they are to leave forever. i'm not saying i never want to quit, but it's nice to hear someone put into words what you feel so desperately, or what you want to be able to feel so desperately.
across the lines of straighter darker trees,
i like to think some boy's been swinging them.
but swinging doesn't bend them down to stay
as ice storms do. often you must have seen them
loaded with ice a sunny winter morning
after a rain. they click upon themselves
as the breeze rises, and turn many-colored
as the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.
soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells
shattering and avalanching on the snow crust -
such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
you'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.
they are dragged to the withered bracken by the load,
and they seem not to break; though once they are bowed
so low for long, they never right themselves:
you may see their trunks arching in the woods
years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground
like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
before them over their heads to dry in the sun.
but i was going to say when truth broke in
with all her matter of fact about the ice storm,
i should prefer to have some boy bend them
as he went out and in to fetch the cows -
some boy too far out of town to learn baseball,
whose only play was what he found himself,
summer or winter, and could play alone.
one by one he subdued his father's trees
by riding them down over and over again
until he took the stiffness out of them,
and not one but hung limp, not one was left
for him to conquer. he learned all there was
to learn about not launching out too soon
and so not carrying the tree away
clear to the ground. he always kept his poise
to the top branches, climbing carefully
with the same pains you use to fill a cup
up to the brim, and even above the brim.
then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish,
kicking his way down through the air to the ground.
so was i once myself a swinger of birches.
and so i dream of going back to be.
it's when i'm weary of considerations,
and life is too much a pathless wood
where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
broken across it, and one eye is weeping
from a twig's having lashed across it open.
i'd like to get away from earth away
and then come back to it and begin over.
may no fate willfully misunderstand me
and half grant what i wish and snatch me away
not to return. earth's the right place for love:
i don't know where it's likely to go better.
i'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
and climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
but dipped its top and set me down again.
that would be good both going and coming back.
one could do worse than be a swinger of birches.
- robert frost
i love robert frost. when i find myself down or depressed, i carry his works around with me. though sometimes i find myself wishing to live no more, i usually realize that my desires fit more in line with those of birches than with truly suicidal desires. i sometimes want to just stop for a while, just take a break. i don't want to die and cause pain to those i love, i don't want to quit...but i want to take a respite from the pains and toils of this life. i think life does this to all of us some times. so, i read this poem to remind myself that my desires are more likely those to take a break and come back than they are to leave forever. i'm not saying i never want to quit, but it's nice to hear someone put into words what you feel so desperately, or what you want to be able to feel so desperately.
maybe i'll get into the blogging world
i keep saying i'm going to start blogging.
but, alas, i have never done so.
but, now, i am reading some peoples' blogs...so, maybe i'll start blogging myself.
i don't really know what to put up here, though.
you're not getting my journaling...and i don't think you really want to know what i think about the authorship of the book of john, or about erasmus, praise of folly and the affect of it's satirical writing on the reformation. i mean, maybe you're interested in that, and i would post it. but, i just don't think you want it. tell me if i'm wrong. now, excerpts from a paper i wrote about the interplay of mercy and justice in matthew seems a little more blog worthy. i'll see if i can find something in there i want to paste up here and maybe explicate some.
see, i want to write books...and when you put something up on a blog, it's there for everyone to take and read.
i know, that makes it free and accessible. fantastic. but, i'm also going to need to support myself to pay rent and bills and eat one day. that makes free sound a lot less appealing when it's writing that i love with all of my heart. it's right next to reading. hmm...that's an idea. i could write down here what i think of books that i'm reading. somewhat reviews, maybe, but also some thoughts that are sparked from the books...'cause i'm not gonna write books just like those i'm reading.
so, that's it. this blog is going to be a mix of musings on the rule of benedict, anne lamott, joan chittister, henri nouwen, kurt vonnegut, robert frost, par lagerkvist, kathleen norris, etc...
look for more soon.
but, alas, i have never done so.
but, now, i am reading some peoples' blogs...so, maybe i'll start blogging myself.
i don't really know what to put up here, though.
you're not getting my journaling...and i don't think you really want to know what i think about the authorship of the book of john, or about erasmus, praise of folly and the affect of it's satirical writing on the reformation. i mean, maybe you're interested in that, and i would post it. but, i just don't think you want it. tell me if i'm wrong. now, excerpts from a paper i wrote about the interplay of mercy and justice in matthew seems a little more blog worthy. i'll see if i can find something in there i want to paste up here and maybe explicate some.
see, i want to write books...and when you put something up on a blog, it's there for everyone to take and read.
i know, that makes it free and accessible. fantastic. but, i'm also going to need to support myself to pay rent and bills and eat one day. that makes free sound a lot less appealing when it's writing that i love with all of my heart. it's right next to reading. hmm...that's an idea. i could write down here what i think of books that i'm reading. somewhat reviews, maybe, but also some thoughts that are sparked from the books...'cause i'm not gonna write books just like those i'm reading.
so, that's it. this blog is going to be a mix of musings on the rule of benedict, anne lamott, joan chittister, henri nouwen, kurt vonnegut, robert frost, par lagerkvist, kathleen norris, etc...
look for more soon.
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