Love Song
William Carlos Williams
Sweep the house clean,
hang fresh curtains
in the windows
put on a new dress
and come with me!
The elm is scattering
its little loaves
of sweet smells
from a white sky!
Who shall hear of us
in the time to come?
Let him say there was
a burst of fragrance
from black branches.
Possession
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
That which we had we still possess,
Though leaves may drop and stars may fall;
No circumstance can make it lessOr take it from us, all in all.
That which is lost we did not own;
We only held it for a day–A leaf by careless breezes blown:
No fate could take our own away.
I hold it as a changeless law
From which no soul can ever sway or swerve,
We have that in us which will draw
Whate’er we need or most deserve.
Even as the magnet to the steel
Our souls are to the best desires;
The Fates have hearts and they can feel-
-They know what each true heart requires.
We think we lose when most we gain;
We call joys ended ere begun;
When stars fade out do skies complain,
Or glory in the rising sun?
No fate could rob us of our own-
-No circumstance can make it less;
What time removes was but a loan,
For what was ours we still possess.
Choose
Carl Sandburg
THE single clenched fist lifted and ready,
Or the open asking hand held out and waiting.
Choose:
For we meet by one or the other.
The Face of All the World
Elizabeth Browning
The face of all the world is changed, I think,
Since first I heard the footsteps of thy soul
Move still, oh, still, beside me, as they stole
Betwixt me and the dreadful outer brink
Of obvious death, where I, who thought to sink,
Was caught up into love, and taught the whole
Of life in a new rhythm. The cup of dole
God gave for baptism, I am fain to drink,
And praise its sweetness, Sweet, with thee anear.
The names of country, heaven, are changed away
For where thou art or shalt be, there or here;
And this . . . this lute and song . . . loved yesterday,
(The singing angels know) are only dear
Because thy name moves right in what they say.
Climbing
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Who climbs the mountain does not always climb.
The winding road slants downward many a time;
Yet each descent is higher than the last.
Has thy path fallen? That will soon be past.
Beyond the curve the way leads up and on.
Think not thy goal forever lost or gone.
Keep moving forward; if thine aim is right
Thou canst not miss the shining mountain height.
Who would attain to summits still and fair,
Must nerve himself through valleys of despair.
Love’s Power
Lydia Avery Coonley
If Only Thou Art True
George Barlow
William Morris
Love is enough: though the world be a-waning,
And the woods have no voice but the voice of complaining,
Though the skies be too dark for dim eyes to discover
The gold-cups and daisies fair blooming thereunder,
Though the hills be held shadows, and the sea a dark wonder,
And this day draw a veil over all deeds passed over,
Yet their hands shall not tremble, their feet shall not falter:
The void shall not weary, the fear shall not alter
These lips and these eyes of the loved and the lover.
Veni Creator
Czeslaw Milosz
Come, Holy Spirit,
bending or not bending the grasses,
appearing or not above our heads in a tongue of flame,
at hay harvest or when they plough in the orchards,
or when snow covers crippled firs in the Sierra Nevada.
I am only a human being: I need visible signs.
I tire easily, building the stairway of abstraction.
Many a time I asked, you know it well,
that the statue in church lift its hand, only once, just once, for me.
But I understand that signs must be human,
therefore, call one person, anywhere on earth,
not me-after all I have some decency-
and allow me, when I look at that person,
to marvel at you
