Mom gave me a book that had once belonged to her father. Grandpa's loving labor was as a Methodist minister. The book is full of a lot of grist for that mill! And, so being, is full of treasure.
The copyright is 1937, the title 1,000 Quotable Poems, (it's an anthology of modern verse :-). Clark and Gillespie -- a man and a woman. It is a re-compilation of two volumes of poems. The best thing, the greatest treasure, is that i can hear Grandpa's voice saying them. I can also hear my Dad's. Seeing as how Grandpa walks in our hearts and not on the earth, and Dad doesn't remember any of them anymore, it's a huge gift to hear them in these words.
They memorized poems. I think it was part of their education. Much can be said of the state of education, what it was, what it is, what it can be, what it should be, yada yada (and that there has been a war against public education in the U.S. since the first public school opened). I'm not going down that road any further at the moment. I only memorized one poem (Shakespeare's 18th Sonnet, which i can still do, if i think about it, but to type it would not do justice to the punctuation...). Poems, like song, are stored in a different part of the brain than are "simple" facts. They seem to stick longer as well. Or maybe we don't use that part of our brain enough. Well, anyway, here are just a few of the voices:
A new acquaintance of mine was talking about how often we are our own worst critics, or own biggest barriers, or own problem. We all know that. And knowing that we all face the same "enemy," just as we all learn how to walk, is good.
My Enemy, by Edwin L. Sabin
An enemy I had, whose mien
I stoutly strove in vain to know;
For hard he dogged my steps, unseen,
Wherever I might go.
My plans he balked; my aims he foiled;
He blocked my every onward way.
When for some lofty goal I toiled,
He grimly said me nay.
"Come forth!" I cried, "Lay bare thy guise!
They wretched features I would see."
Ye talways to my straining eyes
He dwelt in mystery.
Until one night I held him fast,
The veil from off his form did draw;
I gazed upon his face at last --
And, lo! myself I saw.
Pretty good, huh? Then, if you are a sibling, you will remember a parent saying, "If you can't say anything nice then don't say anything at all." This one goes a bit further:
Three Gates, From the Arabian
If you are tempted to reveal
A tale to you someone has told
About another, make it pass,
Before you speak, three gates of gold.
These narrow gates: First, "Is it true?"
Then, "Is it needful?" In your mind
Give truthful answer. And the next
Is last and narrowest, "Is it kind?"
And if to reach your lips at last
It passes through these gateways three,
Then you may tell the tale, nor fear
What the result of speech may be.
This last treasure, for now, was very much like opening up a special box in the attic and finding something beautiful there. I had never known the title to this one, but the word's are spoken in my Dad's voice every time i look at it.
Something to remember when you talk to your friends today:
The Arrow and the Song, by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where:
For so swiftly it flew, the sight,
Could not follow it in its flight.
I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For who has sight, so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?
Long, long afterward, in an oak,
I found the arrow still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend.
