January 27th, 2012 at 2:08 pm (Public Domain)
by Emily Dickinson
You left me, sweet, two legacies, –
A legacy of love
A Heavenly Father would content,
Had He the offer of;
You left me boundaries of pain
Capacious as the sea,
Between eternity and time,
Your consciousness and me.
January 25th, 2012 at 1:17 pm (Public Domain)
by Eleanor H. Porter
A CLOCK AND AUNT HANNAH
Mrs. Kate Hartwell, the Henshaw brothers’
sister from the West, was expected on the tenth.
Her husband could not come, she had written,
but she would bring with her, little Kate, the
youngest child. The boys, Paul and Egbert,
would stay with their father.
Billy received the news of little Kate’s coming
with outspoken delight.
“The very thing!” she cried. “We’ll have
her for a flower girl. She was a dear little creature,
as I remember her.”
Aunt Hannah gave a sudden low laugh.
“Yes, I remember,” she observed. “Kate
told me, after you spent the first day with her,
that you graciously informed her that little Kate
was almost as nice as Spunk. Kate did not fully
appreciate the compliment, I fear.”
Billy made a wry face.
“Did I say that? Dear me! I _was_ a terror
in those days, wasn’t I? But then,” and she
laughed softly, “really, Aunt Hannah, that was
the prettiest thing I knew how to say, for I
considered Spunk the top-notch of desirability.”
“I think I should have liked to know Spunk,”
smiled Marie from the other side of the sewing
table.
“He was a dear,” declared Billy. “I had
another ‘most as good when I first came to Hillside,
but he got lost. For a time it seemed as if I never
wanted another, but I’ve about come to the conclusion
now that I do, and I’ve told Bertram to find
one for me if he can. You see I shall be lonesome
after you’re gone, Marie, and I’ll have to have
_something_,” she finished mischievously.
“Oh, I don’t mind the inference–as long as
I know your admiration of cats,” laughed Marie.
“Let me see; Kate writes she is coming the
tenth,” murmured Aunt Hannah, going back
to the letter in her hand.
“Good!” nodded Billy. “That will give time
to put little Kate through her paces as flower
girl.”
“Yes, and it will give Big Kate time to _try_ to
make your breakfast a supper, and your roses
pinks–or sunflowers,” cut in a new voice, dryly.
“Cyril!” chorussed the three ladies in horror,
adoration, and amusement–according to whether
the voice belonged to Aunt Hannah, Marie, or
Billy.
Cyril shrugged his shoulders and smiled.
“I beg your pardon,” he apologized; “but
Rosa said you were in here sewing, and I told
her not to bother. I’d announce myself. Just
as I got to the door I chanced to hear Billy’s
speech, and I couldn’t resist making the amendment.
Maybe you’ve forgotten Kate’s love of
managing–but I haven’t,” he finished, as he
sauntered over to the chair nearest Marie.
“No, I haven’t–forgotten,” observed Billy,
meaningly.
“Nor I–nor anybody else,” declared a
severe voice–both the words and the severity
being most extraordinary as coming from the
usually gentle Aunt Hannah.
“Oh, well, never mind,” spoke up Billy, quickly.
“Everything’s all right now, so let’s forget it.
She always meant it for kindness, I’m sure.”
“Even when she told you in the first place
what a–er–torment you were to us?” quizzed
Cyril.
“Yes,” flashed Billy. “She was being kind to
_you_, then.”
“Humph!” vouchsafed Cyril.
For a moment no one spoke. Cyril’s eyes were
on Marie, who was nervously trying to smooth
back a few fluffy wisps of hair that had escaped
from restraining combs and pins.
“What’s the matter with the hair, little girl?”
asked Cyril in a voice that was caressingly irritable.
“You’ve been fussing with that long-
suffering curl for the last five minutes!”
Marie’s delicate face flushed painfully.
“It’s got loose–my hair,” she stammered,
“and it looks so dowdy that way!”
Billy dropped her thread suddenly. She sprang
for it at once, before Cyril could make a move to
get it. She had to dive far under a chair to capture
it–which may explain why her face was so
very red when she finally reached her seat again.
On the morning of the tenth, Billy, Marie, and
Aunt Hannah were once more sewing together,
this time in the little sitting-room at the end of
the hall up-stairs.
Billy’s fingers, in particular, were flying very
fast.
“I told John to have Peggy at the door at
eleven,” she said, after a time; “but I think I
can finish running in this ribbon before then. I
haven’t much to do to get ready to go.”
“I hope Kate’s train won’t be late,” worried
Aunt Hannah.
“I hope not,” replied Billy; “but I told Rosa
to delay luncheon, anyway, till we get here. I–”
She stopped abruptly and turned a listening ear
toward the door of Aunt Hannah’s room, which
was open. A clock was striking. “Mercy!
that can’t be eleven now,” she cried. “But it
must be–it was ten before I came up-stairs.”
She got to her feet hurriedly.
Aunt Hannah put out a restraining hand.
“No, no, dear, that’s half-past ten.”
“But it struck eleven.”
“Yes, I know. It does–at half-past ten.”
“Why, the little wretch,” laughed Billy,
dropping back into her chair and picking up her work
again. “The idea of its telling fibs like that and
frightening people half out of their lives! I’ll
have it fixed right away. Maybe John can do it
–he’s always so handy about such things.”
“But I don’t want it fixed,” demurred Aunt
Hannah.
Billy stared a little.
“You don’t want it fixed! Maybe you like
to have it strike eleven when it’s half-past ten!”
Billy’s voice was merrily sarcastic.
“Y-yes, I do,” stammered the lady,
apologetically. “You see, I–I worked very hard to
fix it so it would strike that way.”
“_Aunt Hannah!_”
“Well, I did,” retorted the lady, with
unexpected spirit. “I wanted to know what time it
was in the night–I’m awake such a lot.”
“But I don’t see.” Billy’s eyes were perplexed.
“Why must you make it tell fibs in order to–to
find out the truth?” she laughed.
Aunt Hannah elevated her chin a little.
“Because that clock was always striking one.”
“One!”
“Yes–half-past, you know; and I never
knew which half-past it was.”
“But it must strike half-past now, just the
same!”
“It does.” There was the triumphant ring of
the conqueror in Aunt Hannah’s voice. “But
now it strikes half-past _on the hour_, and the clock
in the hall tells me _then_ what time it is, so I don’t
care.”
For one more brief minute Billy stared, before
a sudden light of understanding illumined her
face. Then her laugh rang out gleefully.
“Oh, Aunt Hannah, Aunt Hannah,” she
gurgled. “If Bertram wouldn’t call you the limit
–making a clock strike eleven so you’ll know it’s
half-past ten!”
Aunt Hannah colored a little, but she stood
her ground.
“Well, there’s only half an hour, anyway, now,
that I don’t know what time it is,” she maintained,
“for one or the other of those clocks strikes the
hour every thirty minutes. Even during those
never-ending three ones that strike one after
the other in the middle of the night, I can tell
now, for the hall clock has a different sound for
the half-hours, you know, so I can tell whether
it’s one or a half-past.”
“Of course,” chuckled Billy.
“I’m sure I think it’s a splendid idea,” chimed
in Marie, valiantly; “and I’m going to write it
to mother’s Cousin Jane right away. She’s an
invalid, and she’s always lying awake nights
wondering what time it is. The doctor says
actually he believes she’d get well if he could find
some way of letting her know the time at night,
so she’d get some sleep; for she simply can’t
go to sleep till she knows. She can’t bear a light
in the room, and it wakes her all up to turn an
electric switch, or anything of that kind.”
“Why doesn’t she have one of those phosphorous
things?” questioned Billy.
Marie laughed quietly.
“She did. I sent her one,–and she stood it
just one night.”
“Stood it!”
“Yes. She declared it gave her the creeps,
and that she wouldn’t have the spooky thing
staring at her all night like that. So it’s got to
be something she can hear, and I’m going to
tell her Mrs. Stetson’s plan right away.”
“Well, I’m sure I wish you would,” cried that
lady, with prompt interest; “and she’ll like it,
I’m sure. And tell her if she can hear a _town_
clock strike, it’s just the same, and even better;
for there aren’t any half-hours at all to think of
there.”
“I will–and I think it’s lovely,” declared
Marie.
“Of course it’s lovely,” smiled Billy, rising;
“but I fancy I’d better go and get ready to meet
Mrs. Hartwell, or the `lovely’ thing will be telling
me that it’s half-past eleven!” And she
tripped laughingly from the room.
Promptly at the appointed time John with
Peggy drew up before the door, and Billy, muffled
in furs, stepped into the car, which, with its
protecting top and sides and glass wind-shield, was
in its winter dress.
“Yes’m, ’tis a little chilly, Miss,” said John,
in answer to her greeting, as he tucked the heavy
robes about her.
“Oh, well, I shall be very comfortable, I’m
sure,” smiled Billy. “Just don’t drive too rapidly,
specially coming home. I shall have to get a
limousine, I think, when my ship comes in, John.”
John’s grizzled old face twitched. So evident
were the words that were not spoken that Billy
asked laughingly:
“Well, John, what is it?”
John reddened furiously.
“Nothing, Miss. I was only thinkin’ that if
you didn’t ‘tend ter haulin’ in so many other
folks’s ships, yours might get in sooner.”
“Why, John! Nonsense! I–I love to haul
in other folks’s ships,” laughed the girl, embarrassedly.
“Yes, Miss; I know you do,” grunted John.
Billy colored.
“No, no–that is, I mean–I don’t do it–
very much,” she stammered.
John did not answer apparently; but Billy
was sure she caught a low-muttered, indignant
“much!” as he snapped the door shut and took
his place at the wheel.
To herself she laughed softly. She thought she
possessed the secret now of some of John’s
disapproving glances toward her humble guests of
the summer before.
January 24th, 2012 at 12:05 pm (Public Domain)
by Emily Dickinson
‘T was such a little, little boat
That toddled down the bay!
‘T was such a gallant, gallant sea
That beckoned it away!
‘T was such a greedy, greedy wave
That licked it from the coast;
Nor ever guessed the stately sails
My little craft was lost!
January 23rd, 2012 at 11:32 am (Public Domain)
by Horatio Alger, Jr.
In the hushed hours of night, when the air quite still,
I hear the strange cry of the lone whippoorwill,
Who Chants, without ceasing, that wonderful trill,
Of which the sole burden is still, “Whip-poor-Will.”
And why should I whip him? Strange visitant,
Has he been playing truant this long summer day?
I listened a moment; more clear and more shrill
Rang the voice of the bird, as he cried, “Whip-poor-Will.”
But what has poor Will done? I ask you once more;
I’ll whip him, don’t fear, if you’ll tell me what for.
I paused for an answer; o’er valley and hill
Rang the voice of the bird, as he cried, “Whip-poor-Will.”
Has he come to your dwelling, by night or by day,
And snatched the young birds from their warm nest away?
I paused for an answer; o’er valley and hill
Rang the voice of the bird, as he cried, “Whip-poor-Will.”
Well, well, I can hear you, don’t have any fears,
I can hear what is constantly dinned in my ears.
The obstinate bird, with his wonderful trill,
Still made but one answer, and that, “Whip-poor-Will.”
But what HAS poor Will done? I prithee explain;
I’m out of all patience, don’t mock me again.
The obstinate bird, with his wonderful trill,
Still made the same answer, and that, “Whip-poor-Will.”
Well, have your own way, then; but if you won’t tell,
I’ll shut down the window, and bid you farewell;
But of one thing be sure, I won’t whip him until
You give me some reason for whipping poor Will.
I listened a moment, as if for reply,
But nothing was heard but the bird’s mocking cry.
I caught the faint echo from valley and hill;
It breathed the same burden, that strange “Whip-poor-Will.”
January 22nd, 2012 at 10:55 am (Public Domain)
by Horatio Alger, Jr.
“A victory! –a victory!”
Is flashed across the wires;
Speed, speed the news from State to State,
Light up the signal fires!
Let all the bells from all the towers
A joyous peal ring out;
We’ve gained a glorious victory,
And put the foe to rout!
A mother heard the chiming bells;
Her joy was mixed with pain.
“Pray God,” she said, “my gallant boy
Be not among the slain!”
Alas for her! that very hour
Outstretched in death he lay,
The color from his fair, young face
Had scarcely passed away.
His nerveless hand still grasped the sword.
He never more might wield,
His eyes were sealed in dreamless sleep
Upon that bloody field.
The chestnut curls his mother oft
Had stroked in fondest pride,
Neglected hung ia clotted locks,
With deepest crimson dyed.
Ah! many a mother’s heart shall ache,
And bleed with anguish sore,
When tidings come of him who marched
So blithely forth to war.
Oh! sad for them, the stricken down
In manhood’s early dawn,
And sadder yet for loving hearts.
God comfort them that mourn!
Yes, victory has a fearful price
Our hearts may shrink to pay,
And tears will mingle with the joy
That greets a glorious day.
But he who dies in freedom’s cause,
We cannot count him lost;
A battle won for truth and right
Is worth the blood it cost!
O mothers! count it something gained
That they, for whom you mourn,
Bequeath fair Freedom’s heritage
To millions yet unborn;–
And better than a thousand years
Of base, ignoble breath,
A patriot’s fragrant memory,
A hero’s early death!
January 21st, 2012 at 10:18 am (Public Domain)
by Edgar Allan Poe
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
“‘T is some visiter,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door–
Only this, and nothing more.”
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow:–vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow–sorrow for the lost Lenore–
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore–
Nameless here for evermore.
And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me–filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
“‘T is some visiter entreating entrance at my chamber door
Some late visiter entreating entrance at my chamber door;–
This it is, and nothing more.”
Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
“Sir,” said I, “or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you”–here I opened wide the door;–
Darkness there, and nothing more.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, “Lenore!”
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, “Lenore!”
Merely this and nothing more.
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping, somewhat louder than before.
“Surely,” said I, “surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore–
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore;–
‘T is the wind and nothing more!”
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door–
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door–
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
“Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,” I said, “art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore,–
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore!”
Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning–little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door–
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as “Nevermore.”
But the Raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered–not a feather then he fluttered–
Till I scarcely more than muttered, “Other friends have flown before–
On the morrow _he_ will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.”
Then the bird said, “Nevermore.”
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
“Doubtless,” said I, “what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore–
Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore
Of ‘Never–nevermore.’”
But the Raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore–
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking “Nevermore.”
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom’s core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion’s velvet lining that the lamplight gloated o’er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamplight gloating o’er
_She_ shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
“Wretch,” I cried, “thy God hath lent thee–by these angels he hath sent thee
Respite–respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore!”
Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
“Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!–prophet still, if bird or devil!–
Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted–
On this home by Horror haunted–tell me truly, I implore–
Is there–_is_ there balm in Gilead?–tell me–tell me, I implore!”
Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
“Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil–prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above, us–by that God we both adore–
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore–
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore.”
Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
“Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!” I shrieked, upstarting–
“Get thee back into the tempest and the Night’s Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken!–quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!”
Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming,
And the lamplight o’er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted–nevermore!
January 20th, 2012 at 9:43 am (Public Domain)
by Edgar Allan Poe
At morn–at noon–at twilight dim–
Maria! thou hast heard my hymn!
In joy and wo–in good and ill–
Mother of God, be with me still!
When the Hours flew brightly by,
And not a cloud obscured the sky,
My soul, lest it should truant be,
Thy grace did guide to thine and thee
Now, when storms of Fate o’ercast
Darkly my Present and my Past,
Let my future radiant shine
With sweet hopes of thee and thine!
January 19th, 2012 at 9:31 am (Public Domain)
by Walter de la Mare
They told me Pan was dead, but I
Oft marvelled who it was that sang
Down the green valleys languidly
Where the grey elder-thickets hang.
Sometimes I thought it was a bird
My soul had charged with sorcery;
Sometimes it seemed my own heart heard
Inland the sorrow of the sea.
But even where the primrose sets
The seal of her pale loveliness,
I found amid the violets
Tears of an antique bitterness.
January 18th, 2012 at 9:00 am (Public Domain)
by Edgar Allan Poe
Of all who hail thy presence as the morning–
Of all to whom thine absence is the night–
The blotting utterly from out high heaven
The sacred sun–of all who, weeping, bless thee
Hourly for hope–for life–ah, above all,
For the resurrection of deep buried faith
In truth, in virtue, in humanity–
Of all who, on despair’s unhallowed bed
Lying down to die, have suddenly arisen
At thy soft-murmured words, “Let there be light!”
At thy soft-murmured words that were fulfilled
In thy seraphic glancing of thine eyes–
Of all who owe thee most, whose gratitude
Nearest resembles worship,–oh, remember
The truest, the most fervently devoted,
And think that these weak lines are written by him–
By him who, as he pens them, thrills to think
His spirit is communing with an angel’s.
