The prayer ...

... by Celine Dion (she may not be my favourite singer, but I do like the first few lines from this song) ...

I pray you'll be our eyes,
and watch us where we go
And help us to be wise,
in times when we don't know
Let this be our prayer,
when we lose our way
Lead us to a place,
guide us with your grace
To a place where we'll be safe.

I pray we'll find your light
And hold it in our hearts
When stars go out each night
Let this be our prayer
When shadows fill our day
Lead us to a place
Guide us with your grace
Give us faith so we'll be safe

We ask that life be kind
And watch us from above
We hope each soul will find
Another soul to love
Let this be our prayer
Let this be our prayer
Just like every child
Just like every child

When we two are parted ..

...

When we two parted
In silence and tears,
Half broken-hearted,
To sever for years,
Pale grew thy cheek and cold,
Colder thy kiss;
Truly that hour foretold
Sorrow to this.

The dew of the morning
Sank chill on my brow
It felt like the warning
Of what I feel now.
Thy vows are all broken,
And light is thy fame:
I hear thy name spoken,
And share in its shame.

They name thee before me,
A knell to mine ear;
A shudder comes o'er me
Why wert thou so dear?
They know not I knew thee,
Who knew thee too well:
Long, long shall I rue thee
Too deeply to tell.

In secret we met
In silence I grieve
That thy heart could forget,
Thy spirit deceive.
If I should meet thee
After long years,
How should I greet thee?
With silence and tears.

~ Lord Byron

Good enough ...

... by Sarah McLachlan ...

Hey your glass is empty
it's a hell of a long way home
why don't you let me take you
it's no good to go alone
I never would have opened up
but you seemed so real to me
after all the bullshit I've heard
it's refreshing not to see
I don't have to pretend
she doesn't expect it from me

Don't tell me I haven't been good to you
don't tell me I have never been there for you
don't tell me why
nothing is good enough

Hey little girl would you like some candy
your momma said that it's OK
The door is open come on outside
no I can't come out today
it's not the wind that cracked your shoulder
and threw you to the ground
who's there that makes you so afraid
you're shaken to the bone
and I don't understand
you deserve so much more than this

So don't tell me why
he's never been good to you
don't tell me why
he's never been there for you
don't you know that why
is simply not good enough
so just let me try
and I will be good to you
just let me try
and I will be there for you
I'll show you why
you're so much more than good enough...

Tennessee Williams ...

... pretty much sums up how I feel at the moment ... "There is a time for departure even when there's no certain place to go."

Longing ...

... by Matthew Arnold

Come to me in my dreams, and then
By day I shall be well again!
For then the night will more than pay
The hopeless longing of the day.

Come, as thou cam'st a thousand times,
A messenger from radiant climes,
And smile on thy new world, and be
As kind to others as to me!

Or, as thou never cam'st in sooth,
Come now, and let me dream it truth;
And part my hair, and kiss my brow,
And say: My love! why sufferest thou?

Come to me in my dreams, and then
By day I shall be well again!
For then the night will more than pay
The hopeless longing of the day

When I am dead, my dearest ...

... by Christina Rossetti

When I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
Nor shady cypress tree:
Be the green grass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet;
And if thou wilt, remember,
And if thou wilt, forget.

I shall not see the shadows,
I shall not feel the rain;
I shall not hear the nightingale
Sing on, as if in pain:
And dreaming through the twilight
That doth not rise nor set,
Haply I may remember,
And haply may forget

I love the line - "Be the green grass above me with showers and dewdrops wet" ....

A Little fall of rain ...

... from Les Miserables ...

EPONINE
Don't you fret, M'sieur Marius
I don't feel any pain
A little fall of rain
Can hardly hurt me now
You're here, that's all I need to know
And you will keep me safe
And you will keep me close
And rain will make the flowers grow.

MARIUS
But you will live, 'Ponine - dear God above,
If I could heal your wounds with words of love.

EPONINE
Just hold me now, and let it be.
Shelter me, comfort me

MARIUS
You would live a hundred years
If I could show you how
I won't desert you now...

EPONINE
The rain can't hurt me now
This rain will wash away what's past
And you will keep me safe
And you will keep me close
I'll sleep in your embrace at last.

The rain that brings you here
Is Heaven-blessed!
The skies begin to clear
And I'm at rest
A breath away from where you are
I've come home from so far

So don't you fret, M'sieur Marius
I don't feel any pain
A little fall of rain
Can hardly hurt me now
That's all I need to know
And you will keep me safe
And you will keep me close

MARIUS (in counterpoint)
Hush-a-bye, dear Eponine,
You won't feel any pain
A little fall of rain
Can hardly hurt you now
I'm here
I will stay with you
Till you are sleeping

EPONINE
And rain...

MARIUS
And rain...

EPONINE
Will make the flowers...

MARIUS
Will make the flowers... grow...

... was my favourite song from the musical when I was 15, and still is now ...

A moment to remember ...

... by Alexander Pushkin may just answer the question asked ...

A magic moment I remember:
I raised my eyes and you were there,
A fleeting vision, the quintessence
Of all that's beautiful and rare.

I pray to mute despair and anguish,
To vain the pursuits world esteems,
Long did I near your soothing accents,
Long did I your features haunt my dreams.

Time passed. A rebel storm-blast scattered
The reveries that once were mine
And I forgot your soothing accents,
Your features gracefully divine.

In dark days of enforced retirement
I gazed upon grey skies above
With no ideals to inspire me
No one to cry for, live for, love.

Then came a moment of reinessance,
I looked up - you again are there
A fleeting vision, the quintessence
Of all that's beautiful and rare.

A question ...

... by Robert Frost

A voice said, Look me in the stars
And tell me truly, men of earth,
If all the soul-and-body scars
Were not too much to pay for birth.

... does ask an interesting question, but I sincerely do think (or maybe wish to believe) that the scars we do have, the burdens we do carry, somehow make us appreciate the stars in the sky more ...

Keeping Christmas ...

"A Short Christmas Sermon" ... by Henry Van Dyke ...

ROMANS, xiv, 6: ~ He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord.

It is a good thing to observe Christmas day. The mere marking of times and seasons, when men agree to stop work and make merry together, is a wise and wholesome custom. It helps one to feel the supremacy of the common life over the individual life. It reminds a man to set his own little watch, now and then, by the great clock of humanity which runs on sun time.

But there is a better thing than the observance of Christmas day, and that is, keeping Christmas.

Are you willing to forget what you have done for other people, and to remember what other people have done for you; to ignore what the world owes you, and to think what you owe the world; to put your rights in the background, and your duties in the middle distance, and your chances to do a little more than your duty in the foreground; to see that your fellow-men are just as real as you are, and try to look behind their faces to their hearts, hungry for joy; to own that probably the only good reason for your existence is not what you are going to get out of life, but what you are going to give to life; to close your book of complaints against the management of the universe,and look around you for a place where you can sow a few seeds of happiness--are you willing to do these things even for a day? Then you can keep Christmas.

Are you willing to stoop down and consider the needs and the desires of little children; to remember the weakness and loneliness of people who are growing old; to stop asking how much your friends love you, and ask yourself whether you love them enough; to bear in mind the things that other people have to bear on their hearts; to try to understand what those who live in the same house with you really want, without waiting for them to tell you; to trim your lamp so that it will give more light and less smoke, and to carry it in front so that your shadow will fall behind you; to make a grave for your ugly thoughts, and a garden for your kindly feelings, with the gate open--are you willing to do these things even for a day? Then you can keep Christmas.

Are you willing to believe that love is the strongest thing in the world--stronger than hate, stronger than evil, stronger than death--and that the blessed life which began in Bethlehem nineteen hundred years ago is the image and brightness of the Eternal Love? Then you can keep Christmas.

And if you keep it for a day, why not always?

But you can never keep it alone.

(I love this sermon when I read it back in August, but I will like to add a verse to its ending ~ “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible" (Matthew 19: 16) ... Have a lovely Christmas as we reflect on God's amazing gift to all mankind on this Christmas Day ...)

Come here ...

... a lovely song from Kath Bloom, played in an even more amazing film ~ "Before sunrise" ...

There's wind that blows in from the north.
And it says that loving takes this course.
Come here. Come here.
No I'm not impossible to touch I have never wanted you so much.
Come here. Come here.
Have I never laid down by your side.
Baby, let's forget about this pride.
Come here. Come here.
Well I'm in no hurry. Don't have to run away this time.
I know you're timid.
But it's gonna be all right this time.

camomile tea ...

... is the tea of choice for one of my favourite people on the earth ... and Katherine Mansfield has written a poem on it ... I love the picture this poem draws and it reminds me so much of him ...

Outside the sky is light with stars;
There's a hollow roaring from the sea.
And, alas! for the little almond flowers,
The wind is shaking the almond tree.

How little I thought, a year ago,
In the horrible cottage upon the Lee
That he and I should be sitting so
And sipping a cup of camomile tea.

Light as feathers the witches fly,
The horn of the moon is plain to see;
By a firefly under a jonquil flower
A goblin toasts a bumble-bee.

We might be fifty, we might be five,
So snug, so compact, so wise are we!
Under the kitchen-table leg
My knee is pressing against his knee.

Our shutters are shut, the fire is low,
The tap is dripping peacefully;
The saucepan shadows on the wall
Are black and round and plain to see.

Because She Would Ask Me Why I Loved Her ...

... by Christopher Brennan

If questioning would make us wise
No eyes would ever gaze in eyes;
If all our tale were told in speech
No mouths would wander each to each.

Were spirits free from mortal mesh
And love not bound in hearts of flesh
No aching breasts would yearn to meet
And find their ecstasy complete.

For who is there that lives and knows
The secret powers by which he grows?
Were knowledge all, what were our need
To thrill and faint and sweetly bleed?

Then seek not, sweet, the "If" and "Why"
I love you now until I die.
For I must love because I live
And life in me is what you give.

~ is a pretty intense poem, but I love the first and final lines ... I once heard a talk about love, in that instead of saying "I love you because of what you have done, or for whom you are, or if you will ...", we can instead just love with no reason or condition attached ... As to if it is really possible in this earth, I am not sure, but "So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love" (1 Cor 13:13).

Butterfly Laughter ...

... by Katherine Mansfield is a lovely little poem, reminding you of the importance of those precious, little things in life ... we do tend to overcomplicate the various aspects of our lives, and somehow, it is so easy to lose sight of what is important ... Soemtimes, we all just need to be still, and try to remember the blue butterfly in our lives ...

In the middle of our porridge plates
There was a blue butterfly painted
And each morning we tried who should reach the
butterfly first.
Then the Grandmother said: "Do not eat the poor
butterfly."
That made us laugh.
Always she said it and always it started us laughing.
It seemed such a sweet little joke.
I was certain that one fine morning
The butterfly would fly out of our plates,
Laughing the teeniest laugh in the world,
And perch on the Grandmother's lap.

Confession

by Frantisek Halas ...

Touched by all that love is
I draw closer toward you
Saddened by all that love is
I run from you

Surprised by all that love is
I remain alert in stillness
Hurt by all that love is
I yearn for tenderness

Defeated by all that love is
at the truthful mouth of the night
Forsaken by all that love is
I will grow toward you.


- This poem does summarise the spectrum of fears/doubts/longings/joys/pains/hopes one experiences/sees in love, but we still draw toward it, for it is the answer to our souls ...

Nobody knows ...

... is a song by Pink ...

"Nobody knows
Nobody knows but me
That I sometimes cry
If I could pretend that I'm asleep
When my tears start to fall
I peek out from behind these walls
I think nobody knows
Nobody knows no

Nobody likes
Nobody likes to lose their inner voice
The one I used to hear before my life
Made a choice
But I think nobody knows
No no
Nobody knows
No

Baby
Oh the secret's safe with me
There's nowhere else in the world that I could ever be
And baby don't it feel like I'm all alone
Who's gonna be there after the last angel has flown
And I've lost my way back home
I think nobody knows no
I said nobody knows
Nobody cares

It's win or lose not how you play the game
And the road to darkness has a way
Of always knowing my name
But I think nobody knows
No no
Nobody knows no no no no

Baby
Oh the secret's safe with me
There's nowhere else in the world that I could ever be
And baby don't it feel like I'm all alone
Who's gonna be there after the last angel has flown
And I've lost my way back home
And oh no no no no
Nobody knows
No no no no no no

Tomorrow I'll be there my friend
I'll wake up and start all over again
When everybody else is gone
No no no

Nobody knows
Nobody knows the rhythem of my heart
The way I do when I'm lying in the dark
And the world is asleep
I think nobody knows
Nobody knows
Nobody knows but me
Me"

But somebody does ... if you would only believe ...

Would you notice when I am gone?

... is a question which each of us asks ourselves at some points in our lives ... this is a story of someone who died without anyone knowing ...

http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/the_way_we_live/article2334698.ece

but there are people who do care, as shown in the article. Sometimes, we just have to look a bit deeper, to hold onto them a bit longer, to allow them to be a bit closer ... otherwise, we will live in a world where we are utterly alone ...

being adopted as adults ...

... is an article written by Ariel Leve in The Times ... its concept is probably very silly, but it does raise some interesting questions, and somehow, it seems like a good idea for my memory clinic ... it will be good for my patients if they are visited by their "families" every now and then ... families can be so mis-matched, but I suppose that is what makes them special in a strange kinda way ...

http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/ariel_leve/article5113682.ece

change ...

... is something which we all aspire to, as shown in the recent election in America. I have been reading "Germinal" by Emile Zola, and the following paragraphs strike a chord. We all want justice, but can it really be achieved on earth? Can Mr Obama really carry the hope of so many people on his shoulders, without disappointing some? Can we forsake the world that is to come?

~
"What a crazy idea!" said the young man. "Do you need a damn God and his paradise to make you happy? Can't you make your own happiness on earth all by yourself?"

He talked on endlessly, in increasingly passionate tones. And suddenly, the bolts locking the horizon burst open to let a gleam of light break through and illuminate the grim lives of these poor people. The endless chain of poverty, the brutish labour, the bestial life they led, first shorn of their fleeces and then led to the slaughter, all this suffering disappeared, as if a great blaze of sunshine had swept it away; and in a dazzling, magical vision, justice descended from heaven. Since God himself was dead, it would be justice which would now ensure the happiness of men, by opening up a kingdom of equality and fraternity. Just like in fairy-tales, a new society would grow up overnight, a great city, shimmering like a mirage, where each citizen would fulfill his appointed duties and take his part in the community of joy. The rotten old world would crumble to dust, a new young breed of humanity purged of its crimes would form a single, united race of workers , who would have for their motto; to each according to his worth, and each one's worth to be judged according to his efforts. And the dream grew continually vaster and finer, all the more seductive for riding higher and higher into the realms of impossible fantasy.

At first La Mahreude refused to listen, for she was seized with a vague feeling of panic. No, really, it was too fantastic, you shouldn't get carried away by such ideas, for they made life even more revolting afterwards, and then you would kill anyone who got in your way, just to be happy. When she noticed the anxious gleam in Maheu's eyes, she grew worried, seeing him so carried away, and cried out, interrupting Etienne:

"Don't you listen, my dear? Can't you see he's telling us fairy-tales? ... D'you think the bourgeoisie will ever agree to work as hard as we do?"

But little by little the charm started to work on her too. She finally started to smile as her imagination was aroused, tempting her to enter this marvellous world of hope. It was so sweet to forget the pain of reality, if only for an hour! When you live like an animal, with your nose to the grindstone, you need at least a little pocket of lies, so that you can enjoy gloating over things you can never possess. And what really excited her, what made her agree with the young man, was the idea of justice.

"You're right there!" she cried. "For me, once something's just, I will go to hell for it ... And it's true, it would be only justice for us to have fun for a change."

Then Maheu felt able to let himself go.

"In the name of all that's holy! I'm not a rich man, but I'd certainly give a hundred sous not to die before I've seen all that ... What's an upset, eh? Will it happen soon, and how are we going to do it?"

Etienne started talking again. The old society was falling apart, for, he affirmed outright, it couldn't last more than a few months longer. As for the means of putting it into practice, he seemed to be less sure of himself, confusing his sources and, given the ignorance o his audience, feeling no scruples at launching into explanations where he himself was out of his depth. All the systems he knew of went into his maw, smoothed over by his certainty of an easy triumph, of a universal embrace which would put an end to the misunderstandings between the classes; apart from the ill will of one or two individual bosses or bourgeois who might perhaps have to be made to see reason. And the Maheus appeared to understand and approve, accepting this miraculous solutions with the blind faith of converts, like the early Christians at the beginning of the Church who awaited the emergence of a perfect society out of the very compost of the ancient world. Little Alzire hung on every world, imagining happiness as a vision of a very warm house where the children would play all the time and eat as much as they wanted to. Catherine sat transfixed, still holding her chin in her hands. staring at Etienne, and where he fell silent, she shivered slightly, as if she suddenly felt cold.

But La Maheude looked at the cuckoo clock.

"Past nine o'clock, what are we thinking of! We'll never get up in the morning."

And the Maheus left the table, feeling sick at the hart, and near to despair. They had suddenly felt as if they were going to be rich, and now they fell back with a crash into the mire. Old Bonnemort, who was leaving for the pit, complained that that sort of story didn't make the soup taste any better; while the others went upstairs one by one, suddenly noticing the damp on the walls and the foul, fetid air. Upstairs, once Catherine, who was last into bed, had blown out the candle, Etienne heard her tossing and turning feverishly in the midst of the silent and slumbering village before she was able to sleep.

~ by Emile Zola, translated by Peter Collier

Courage ...

~ by Anne Sexton

It is in the small things we see it.
The child's first step,
as awesome as an earthquake.
The first time you rode a bike,
wallowing up the sidewalk.
The first spanking when your heart
went on a journey all alone.
When they called you crybaby
or poor or fatty or crazy
and made you into an alien,
you drank their acid
and concealed it.

Later,
if you faced the death of bombs and bullets
you did not do it with a banner,
you did it with only a hat to
comver your heart.
You did not fondle the weakness inside you
though it was there.
Your courage was a small coal
that you kept swallowing.
If your buddy saved you
and died himself in so doing,
then his courage was not courage,
it was love; love as simple as shaving soap.

Later,
if you have endured a great despair,
then you did it alone,
getting a transfusion from the fire,
picking the scabs off your heart,
then wringing it out like a sock.
Next, my kinsman, you powdered your sorrow,
you gave it a back rub
and then you covered it with a blanket
and after it had slept a while
it woke to the wings of the roses
and was transformed.

Later,
when you face old age and its natural conclusion
your courage will still be shown in the little ways,
each spring will be a sword you'll sharpen,
those you love will live in a fever of love,
and you'll bargain with the calendar
and at the last moment
when death opens the back door
you'll put on your carpet slippers
and stride out.

~ I am not entirely sure how I feel about this poem, but I like the way she describes sorrow, especially given the poetess' history of depression and multiple attempts of suicides ... I think writing such a hopeful poem requires a great deal of courage in itself ...