“The tongues of the lightning Snakes”

The tongues of the lightning Snakes flicker and twist, one to the other.
They flash across the foliage of the cabbage palms.
Lightning flashes through the clouds with the flickering tongues of the snakes.
It is always there, at the wide expanse of water, at the place of the sacred tree.
All over the sky their tongues flicker, above the place called Rising Clouds, the place called Standing Clouds.
All over the sky tongues flickering and twisting.
They are always there at the camp by the wide expanse of water.
All over the sky the tongues flicker: at the place called Two Sisters where the guardian ancestors are
Lighting flashes throught the clouds, flash of the Lightning Snake.
Its blinding flash lights up the cabbage palms,
Gleams on the cabbage palms and on the shining leaves.

  --Aboriginal Australian Song

Abanaki Song

Photo by Mark Samuels at Phototrektours.com

Come, my beloved, let us go up the shining mountain, and sit together;
we will watch the sun go down in beauty from that shining place.
We will sit there till the Night Traveler rises in beauty above the shining mountain;
we will watch him as he climbs to the skies.
We will watch also the little stars following their chief.
We will watch the northern lights playing their game of ball in their cold, glistening country.
We will sit there on the beautiful mountain while the thunder beats his drum.
We will see the flashes from the lit pipe of the lightning.
We will see the great whirlwind race with the squall.
We will sit there until all creatures drowse.
There we will hear the great owl sing his usual song: “Go to sleep, go to sleep,”
and see all animals obey his call.
We will sit there in beauty on the mountain, and watch the small stars in their sleepless flight.
They do not mind the song “Go to sleep”;
and the Night Traveler will come closer,
to warn us that everything is sleeping except ourselves and the little stars.
They and their chief are coursing along, and our minds go with them.
Then the owl sleeps; and his call to sleep sleeps;
and the lightning’s flash from a long way off;
the great pipe is going out;
and the thunder ceases to beat his drum;
and though our bodies urge us to sleep,
we sit in beauty, very still, upon the shining mountain.

From "A Wedding"

Into the enormous sky flew
a whirlwind of blue-gray patches—
a flock of doves spiraling up
suddenly from the dovecotes.

And to see them makes you wish,
just as the wedding-feast is ending,
years of happiness for this couple,
flung onto the wind like doves.

Life too is only an instant,
only a dissolving of ourselves
into everyone,
as if we gave ourselves as gifts.

Only a wedding, only the depths
of a window and the sound rushing in,
only a song, or a dream,
only a blue-gray dove.

  --Boris Pasternak

Sheva Berachot (Traditional Seven Blessings)

Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the Universe, Creator of the fruit of the vine.

Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the Universe, Who created everything for his glory.

Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the Universe, Creator of man.

Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the Universe, Who created man in His image in the image of His likeness, and provided for perpetuation of His kind. Blessed are You, Who formed man.

Let the barren city (Jerusalem) be jubilantly happy and joyful at her joyous reunion with her children. Blessed are You, Who fills Zion with the joy of her children.

May You gladden the loving couple as you gladdened Your creations in the Garden of Eden of old. Blessed are You, Who fills the groom and bride with joy.

Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the Universe, Who created joy and celebration, groom and bride, rejoicing, jubilation, pleasure and delight, love and brotherhood, peace and friendship. May there soon be heard, Lord our God, in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, the sound of joy and the sound of celebration, the voice of a groom and the voice of a bride, the happy shouting of grooms from bridal canopies, and of young men from their feasts of song. Blessed are You Who makes the groom and bride rejoice together.

From “Letters to a Young Poet”

Someday there will be girls and women whose name will no longer mean the mere opposite of the male, but something in itself, something that makes one think not of any complement, but only of life and reality: the female human being.  This advance will transform to love experience, which is now filled with error, will change it from the ground up, and reshape it into a relationship that is meant to be between one human being and another, no longer one that flows from man to woman.  And this more human love (which will fulfill itself with infinite consideration and gentleness, and kindness and clarity in binding and releasing) will resemble what we are now preparing painfully and with great struggle: the love that consists in this: that two solitudes protect and border and greet each other.



- Rainer Maria Rilke

"The Owl and the Pussy-Cat"

The Owl and the Pussy-Cat went to sea

In a beautiful pea-green boat:

They took some honey, and plenty of money

Wrapped up in a five-pound note.

The Owl looked up to the stars above,

And sang to a small guitar,

“O lovely Pussy, O Pussy, my love,

What a beautiful Pussy you are,

You are,

You are!

What a beautiful Pussy you are!”

Pussy said to the Owl, “You elegant fowl,

How charmingly sweet you sing!

Oh! let us be married; too long we have tarried:

But what shall we do for a ring?”

They sailed away, for a year and a day,

To the land where the bong-tree grows;

And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood,

With a ring at the end of his nose,

His nose,

His nose,

With a ring at the end of his nose.

“Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling

Your ring?” Said the Piggy, “I will.”

So they took it away, and were married next day

By the Turkey who lives on the hill.

They dined on mince and slices of quince,

Which they ate with a runcible spoon;

And hang in hang, on the edge of the sand,

They danced by the light of the moon,

The moon,

The moon,

They danced by the light of the moon.

- Edward Lear

"Is It for Now or for Always"

Is it for now or for always,

The world hangs on a stalk?

Is it a trick or a trysting place,

The woods we have found to walk?

Is it a mirage or a miracle,

Your lips that lift at mine:

And the suns like a juggler’s juggling-balls,

Are they a sham or a sign?

Shine out, my sudden angel,

Break fear with breast and brow,

I take you now and for always,

For always is always now.

- Philip Larkin

From "The Imitation of Christ"

Love is a great thing, a great good in every way; it alone lightens what is heavy, and leads smoothly over all roughness. For it carries a burden without being burdened, and makes every bitter thing sweet and tasty. Love wants to be lifted up, not held back by anything low. Love wants to be free, and far from all worldly desires, so that its inner vision may not be dimmed and good fortune bind it or misfortune cast it down. Nothing is sweeter than love; nothing stronger, nothing higher, nothing wider; nothing happier nothing fuller, nothing better in heaven and earth; for love is born of God…

Love keeps watch and is never unaware, even when it sleeps; tired, it is never exhausted; hindered, it is never defeated; alarmed, it is never afraid; but like a living flame and a burning torch it bursts upward and blazes forth…

Love is quick, sincere, dutiful, joyous, and pleasant; brave, patient, faithful, prudent, serene, and vigorous; and it never seeks itself. For whenever we seek ourselves, we fall away from love. Love is watchful, humble, and upright; not weak, or frivolous, or directed toward vain things; temperate, pure, steady, calm, and alert in all the senses. Love is devoted and thankful to God, always trusting and hoping in him, even when it doesn’t taste his sweetness, for without pain no one can live in love.

- Thomas A Kempis

"A Wedding Toast"

St. John tells how, at Cana’s wedding-feast,

The water-pots poured wine in such amount

That by his sober count

There were a hundred gallons at the least.

It made no earthy sense, unless to show

How whatsoever love elects to bless

Brims to a sweet excess

That can without depletion overflow.

Which is to say that what love sees is true;

That the world’s fullness is not made but found.

Life hungers to abound

And pour its plenty out for such as you.

Now, if your loves will lend an ear to mine,

I toast you both, good son and dear new daughter.

May you not lack for water,

And may that water smack of Cana’s wine.



- Richard Wilbur

"We Tow, How Long We Were Fool'd"

We two, how long we were fool’d

Now transmuted, we swiftly escape as Nature escapes,

We are Nature, long have we been absent, but now we return,

We become plants, trunks, foliage, roots, bark,

We are bedded in the ground, we are rocks,

We are oaks, we grow in the opening side by side,

We browse, we are two among the wild herds spontaneous as any,

We are two fishes swimming in the sea together,

We are what locust blossoms are, we drop scent around lanes mornings and evenings,

We are also the coarse smut of beasts, vegetables, minerals,

We are two predatory hawks, we soar above and look down,

We are two resplendent suns, we it is who balance ourselves orbic and stellar, we are as two comets,

We prowl fang’d and four-footed in the woods, we spring on prey,

We are two clouds forenoons and afternoons driving overhead,

We are seas mingling, we are two of those cheerful waves rolling over each other and interwetting each other,

We are that the atmosphere is, transparent, receptive, pervious, impervious,

We are snow, rain, cold, darkness, we are each product and influence of the globe,

We have circled and circled till we have arrived home again, we two,

We have voided all but freedom and all but our own joy.


- Walt Whitman

"I'll give my love an apple without a core"

I’ll give my love an apple without a core,

Ill give my love a house without a door,

Ill give my love a palace wherein she may be,

And she may unlock it without any key.

My head is the apple without a core,

My mind is the house without a door,

My heart is the palace wherein she may be,

And she may unlock it without any key


- Anonymous

"You that love Lovers"

You that love Lovers,

this is your home. Welcome!

In the midst of making form, Love

made this form that melts form,

with love for the door, and

Soul, the vestibule.

Watch the dust grains moving

in the light near the window.

Their dance is our dance.

We rarely hear the inward music,

but we’re all dancing to it nevertheless,

directed by what teaches us,

the pure joy of the sun,

our Music Master.


- Rumi

"Sonnet XVII"

I don’t love you as if you were the salt-rose, topaz

or arrow of carnations that propagate fire:

I love you as certain dark things are loved,

secretly, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that doesn’t bloom and carries

hidden within itself the light of those flowers,

and thanks to your love, darkly in my body

lives the dense fragrance that rises from the earth.

I love you without knowing how, or when or from where,

I love you simply, without problems or pride:

I love you in this way because I don’t know any other way of loving

but this, in which there is no I or you,

so intimate that your had upon my chest is my hand,

so intimate that when I fall asleep it is your eyes that close.

- Pablo Neruda

"Song"

Do not fear to put thy feet

Naked in the river sweet;

Think not leech, or newt, or toad

Will bite thy foot, when thou hast trod:

Nor let the water rising high

As thou wad’st in, make thee cry

And sob; but ever live with me

And not a wave shall trouble thee.


- John Fletcher

“At the Wedding March”

God with honour hang your head,
Groom, and grace you, bride, your bed
With lissome scions, sweet scions,
Out of hallowed bodies bred.

Each be other’s comfort kind:
Deep, deeper than divined,
Divine charity, dear charity,
Fast you ever, fast bind.

Then let the March tred our ears:
I to him turn with tears
Who to wedlock, his wonder wedlock,
Deals triumph and immortal years.

  --Gerard Manley Hopkins

“Of all the Souls that stand create—“

Of all the Souls that stand create—
I have elected—One—
When Sense from Spirit—flies away—
And Subterfuge—is done—
When that which is—and that which was—
Apart—intrinsic—stand—
And this brief Drama in the flesh—
Is shifted—like a Sand—
When Figures show their royal Front—
And Mists—are carved away,
Behold the Atom—I preferred—
To all the lists of Clay!

  --Emily Dickinson

“Wild Nights—Wild Nights!”

Wild Nights—Wild Nights!
Where I with thee
Wild Nights should be
Our luxury!

Futile—the Winds—
To a Heart in port—
Done with the Compass—
Done with the Chart!

Rowing in Eden—
Hi, the Sea!
Might I but moor—Tonight—
In Thee!

  --Emily Dickinson

“The Two of You”

Don’t run anymore. Quiet. How softly it rains
On the roofs of the city. How perfect
All things are. Now, for the two of you
Waking up in a royal bed by a garret window.
For a man and a woman. For one plant divided
Into masculine and feminine which longed for each other.
Yes, this is my gift to you. Above ashes
On a bitter, bitter earth. Above the subterranean
Echo of clamoring and vows. So that now at dawn
Yu must be attentive: the tilt of a head,
A hand with a comb, two faces in a mirror
Are only forever once, even if unremembered,
So that you will watch what is, though it fades away,
And are grateful every moment for your being.
Let that little park with greenish marble busts
In the pearl-gray light, under a summer drizzle,
Remain as it was when you opened the gate.
And the street of tall peeling porticoes
Which this love of yours suddenly transformed.

  --Czeslaw Milosz

From “Love Song”

Everything that touches us, me and you,
takes us together like a violin’s bow,
which draws one voice out of two separate strings.
Upon what instrument are we two spanned?
And what musician holds us in his hand?
Oh sweetest song.

  --Rainer Maria Rilke