The Parrot & Lily Blog — Literary

The art of carving pictures in wood- an ancient tradition older than any of us, accompanied by excerpts of a poem that are even older. I begin to sing of rich-haired Demeter, awful goddess --of her and her trim-ankled daughter whom Aidoneus rapt away,given to him by all-seeing Zeus the loud-thunderer.  Apart from Demeter, lady of the golden sword and glorious fruits,she was playing with the deep-bosomed daughters of Oceanusand gathering flowers over a soft meadow, roses and crocuses and beautiful violets, irises also and hyacinthsand the narcissus which Earth made to grow at the will of Zeusand to please the Host of...

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,The earth, and every common sight,To me did seemApparelled in celestial light,The glory and the freshness of a dream.It is not now as it hath been of yore;—Turn wheresoe'er I may,By night or day.The things which I have seen I now can see no more.   The Rainbow comes and goes,And lovely is the Rose,The Moon doth with delightLook round her when the heavens are bare,Waters on a starry nightAre beautiful and fair;The sunshine is a glorious birth;But yet I know, where'er I go,That there hath past away a glory from the...

An Italian sonnet about an English city to frame your Sunday Earth has not anything to show more fair:Dull would he be of soul who could pass byA sight so touching in its majesty:  This City now doth, like a garment, wearThe beauty of the morning: silent, bare,Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie Open unto the fields, and to the sky;All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.  Never did sun more beautifully steepIn his first splendor, valley, rock, or hill;  Dear God! The very houses seem asleep;And all that mighty heart is lying still!   

Long ago there was a cat Who swallowed a ball of yarn And when the cat had kittens They all had sweaters on

  With breath of thyme and bees that hum, Across the years you seem to come,— Across the years with nymph-like head, And wind-blown brows unfilleted; A girlish shape that slips the bud In lines of unspoiled symmetry; A girlish shape that stirs the blood With pulse of Spring, Autonoe! Where’er you pass,—where’er you go, I hear the pebbly rillet flow; Where’er you go,—where’er you pass, There comes a gladness on the grass; You bring blithe airs where’er you tread,— Blithe airs that blow from down and sea; You wake in me a Pan not dead,— Not wholly dead!—Autonoe! How sweet with you on some green sod To wreathe the rustic garden-god;  How sweet beneath...