Amy's Place ... Poetry and Potpourri ... December, 2008

12-01-08 | JustAmy; St.Louie1; MamaBear; Billie

[JustAmy]

Welcome To....


'Amy's Place' welcomes all poets
and those who enjoy poetry.
'Amy's Place' is more than just about poetry.
Come in, relax, and share with fellow FReepers
your thoughts about any of the things on the *Menu*.

Enjoy! :)











Never Forget!





Bad Penny



Amy's personal guardian ~
the ever charming, lovable, huggable,
LouieWolf




Many thanks for stopping by. : )

[Billie]

Yes, with all the work that goes into the State Profiles, it's really nice we can revisit them occasionally.

"I only regret that I have but five states to give." :) (or six? I can't remember, but Lori has by far done the bulk of them - I think she's done all but 10 of those that were profiled - believe somewhere around 8 or 10 have not been done.

[GodBlessUSA]

It's a bummer the different browsers ruin the threads. I guess the html on posts is different too. Strange it will not read html the same. I messed up some threads by moving my pictures, trying to organize. I moved some back but many pics I can't find.

Everything is going great. Thanks! :) Take care of your finger. Hope it's not too bad of a cut. Enjoy your evening :)
HUGS

[JustAmy]

Good afternoon, LadyJ.
Happy to have you and your flying pups join us for WFW.

Hope you enjoyed your warm Wednesday.

[jaycee]

If you had seen my real sheltie, you probably would have swiped her. What a doll she was! Her name was Cagney and she was the boss of this household. My sheltie was a bit smaller with a little sharper features. And we had to spell around her.....know what I mean?

[jaycee]

Can I have that cat, please?

[JustAmy]

LOL

Isn’t she a cutie pie?

I’m not sure how far I got with my pings but I’m going to quit trying to catch up. Will try again tomorrow.

Hope you are feeling better, Jaycee.

[jaycee]

Wanna go sleigh-riding?

[JustAmy]

LOL

If you're driving, I'm walking. :)



How about some hot chocolate?

[La Enchiladita]

I never read that entire poem before. It is awesome, and I agree!!!

[La Enchiladita]

No problem, Majie. Here’s a belated “HAPPY BIRTHDAY” to Donny Osmond!!

I like the Osmonds too although I’m not as devoted a fan as you are. Thanks for the reminder!!!

Go, Donny and Marie!!

[Kitty Mittens]

Prayers for Alpha-8-25-02, and I pray he can and will be healed and out of the hospital soon.

Thank you SO Much, Dear Billie! He is a Dear Person, Good and Kind, and Loves the Lord with All his Heart. May our Savior's Healing Power be with him!

[Kitty Mittens]

What a sweetie she was. And I'm telling you when she died, my husband and I cried off and on for a week. It was such pain...I just can't explain it. Those who have been through it knows how bad it can hurt.

I've Experienced it, Dear Jaycee, and it's Horrible Beyond Words. :( My Sweet Kitty, Fang-Face, Passed Away in my Arms and it was One of the Most Painful Experiences of my Whole Life. :(

[La Enchiladita]

Hi, JustAmy!! Sorry to hear about the fog up there. We had it for a week not long ago; I don't like it. So, anyway, I just wanted to make a special announcement for one of my very favorite holiday traditions....

Please give

to the

Salvation Army

Bell-Ringers!!!

Thank you, everyone.

[MEG33]

Thank you again for the cute, pretty opening,Mama Bear, and for the darling kitten, Amy.
It reminds me of Rahki..I do believe I must make Rocky Balboa's name more feminine..LOL
Thank you for the sweet comments on my angel, Billie..
I put all the washed glass shades back on the fan and chandelier and got all the hydrants covered. It is going to
drop to 23 tonight. Brrrr..Going back to catch up on
what I missed
Get well wishes, jaycee.

[ConorMacNessa]

This is a long read but one of my favorites from my youth:

Renascence

ALL I could see from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood;
I turned and looked the other way,
And saw three islands in a bay.
So with my eyes I traced the line
Of the horizon, thin and fine,
Straight around till I was come
Back to where I’d started from;
And all I saw from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood.
Over these things I could not see:
These were the things that bounded me;
And I could touch them with my hand,
Almost, I thought, from where I stand.
And all at once things seemed so small
My breath came short, and scarce at all.
But, sure, the sky is big, I said;
Miles and miles above my head;
So here upon my back I’ll lie
And look my fill into the sky.
And so I looked, and, after all,
The sky was not so very tall.
The sky, I said, must somewhere stop,
And—sure enough!—I see the top!
The sky, I thought, is not so grand;
I ’most could touch it with my hand!
And reaching up my hand to try,
I screamed to feel it touch the sky.
I screamed, and—lo!—Infinity
Came down and settled over me;
Forced back my scream into my chest,
Bent back my arm upon my breast,
And, pressing of the Undefined
The definition on my mind,
Held up before my eyes a glass
Through which my shrinking sight did pass
Until it seemed I must behold
Immensity made manifold;
Whispered to me a word whose sound
Deafened the air for worlds around,
And brought unmuffled to my ears
The gossiping of friendly spheres,
The creaking of the tented sky,
The ticking of Eternity.
I saw and heard and knew at last
The How and Why of all things, past,
And present, and forevermore.
The Universe, cleft to the core,
Lay open to my probing sense
That, sick’ning, I would fain pluck thence
But could not,—nay! But needs must suck
At the great wound, and could not pluck
My lips away till I had drawn
All venom out.—Ah, fearful pawn!
For my omniscience paid I toll
In infinite remorse of soul.
All sin was of my sinning, all
Atoning mine, and mine the gall
Of all regret. Mine was the weight
Of every brooded wrong, the hate
That stood behind each envious thrust,
Mine every greed, mine every lust.
And all the while for every grief,
Each suffering, I craved relief
With individual desire,—
Craved all in vain! And felt fierce fire
About a thousand people crawl;
Perished with each,—then mourned for all!
A man was starving in Capri;
He moved his eyes and looked at me;
70 I felt his gaze, I heard his moan,
And knew his hunger as my own.
I saw at sea a great fog bank
Between two ships that struck and sank;
A thousand screams the heavens smote;
And every scream tore through my throat.
No hurt I did not feel, no death
That was not mine; mine each last breath
That, crying, met an answering cry
From the compassion that was I.
All suffering mine, and mine its rod;
Mine, pity like the pity of God.
Ah, awful weight! Infinity
Pressed down upon the finite Me!
My anguished spirit, like a bird,
5 Beating against my lips I heard;
Yet lay the weight so close about
There was no room for it without.
And so beneath the weight lay I
And suffered death, but could not die.

Long had I lain thus, craving death,
When quietly the earth beneath
Gave way, and inch by inch, so great
At last had grown the crushing weight,
Into the earth I sank till I
Full six feet under ground did lie,
And sank no more,—there is no weight
Can follow here, however great.
From off my breast I felt it roll,
And as it went my tortured soul
Burst forth and fled in such a gust
That all about me swirled the dust.

Deep in the earth I rested now;
Cool is its hand upon the brow
And soft its breast beneath the head
Of one who is so gladly dead.
And all at once, and over all
The pitying rain began to fall;
I lay and heard each pattering hoof
Upon my lowly, thatchèd roof,
And seemed to love the sound far more
Than ever I had done before.
For rain it hath a friendly sound
To one who’s six feet under ground;
And scarce the friendly voice or face:
A grave is such a quiet place.

The rain, I said, is kind to come
And speak to me in my new home.
I would I were alive again
To kiss the fingers of the rain,
To drink into my eyes the shine
Of every slanting silver line,
To catch the freshened, fragrant breeze
From drenched and dripping apple-trees.
For soon the shower will be done,
And then the broad face of the sun
Will laugh above the rain-soaked earth
Until the world with answering mirth
Shakes joyously, and each round drop
Rolls, twinkling, from its grass-blade top.
How can I bear it; buried here,
While overhead the sky grows clear
And blue again after the storm?
O, multi-colored, multiform,
Beloved beauty over me,
That I shall never, never see
Again! Spring-silver, autumn-gold,
That I shall never more behold!
Sleeping your myriad magics through,
Close-sepulchred away from you!
O God, I cried, give me new birth,
And put me back upon the earth!
Upset each cloud’s gigantic gourd
And let the heavy rain, down-poured
In one big torrent, set me free,
Washing my grave away from me!

I ceased; and through the breathless hush
That answered me, the far-off rush
Of herald wings came whispering
Like music down the vibrant string
Of my ascending prayer, and—crash!
Before the wild wind’s whistling lash
The startled storm-clouds reared on high
And plunged in terror down the sky,
And the big rain in one black wave
Fell from the sky and struck my grave.
I know not how such things can be;
I only know there came to me
A fragrance such as never clings
To aught save happy living things;
A sound as of some joyous elf
Singing sweet songs to please himself,
And, through and over everything,
A sense of glad awakening.
The grass, a-tiptoe at my ear,
Whispering to me I could hear;
I felt the rain’s cool finger-tips
Brushed tenderly across my lips,
Laid gently on my sealèd sight,
And all at once the heavy night
Fell from my eyes and I could see,—
A drenched and dripping apple-tree,
A last long line of silver rain,
A sky grown clear and blue again.
And as I looked a quickening gust
Of wind blew up to me and thrust
Into my face a miracle
Of orchard-breath, and with the smell,—
I know not how such things can be!—
I breathed my soul back into me.
Ah! Up then from the ground sprang I
And hailed the earth with such a cry
As is not heard save from a man
Who has been dead, and lives again.
About the trees my arms I wound;
Like one gone mad I hugged the ground;
I raised my quivering arms on high;
I laughed and laughed into the sky,
Till at my throat a strangling sob
Caught fiercely, and a great heart-throb
Sent instant tears into my eyes;
O God, I cried, no dark disguise
Can e’er hereafter hide from me Thy radiant identity!
Thou canst not move across the grass
But my quick eyes will see Thee pass,
Nor speak, however silently,
But my hushed voice will answer Thee.
I know the path that tells Thy way
Through the cool eve of every day;
God, I can push the grass apart
And lay my finger on Thy heart!

The world stands out on either side
No wider than the heart is wide;
Above the world is stretched the sky,—
No higher than the soul is high.
The heart can push the sea and land
Farther away on either hand;
The soul can split the sky in two,
And let the face of God shine through.
0 But East and West will pinch the heart
That can not keep them pushed apart;
And he whose soul is flat—the sky
Will cave in on him by and by.

Edna St. Vincent Millay

Lamh Foistenach Abu!

[jaycee]

Lots of people who don't have pets or have never experienced the pain of losing a beloved animal do have a hard time understanding, don't they? We've had a lot of pets during the time we were raising the kids and we always loved them all. But seems the last two dogs I had hurt the most. I have heard you speak of your cat. She must have been a sweet one..he/she, didn't know which. LOL~~~

[jaycee]

Darling little dog.....we may have seen that cutie last year but not framed. Thanks for all your sweet comments to everyone including me. Get off that ladder. Speaking of ladders, I feel a lot safer on my aluminum ladder than I do a chair or stool. My SIL is always saying she climbs on a chair and I warn her constantly that it is not safe but she is hard headed. I am scared of falling. My brother always says its not "if we fall, its more like when we fall the older we get".

[Kitty Mittens]

Sending a Thank you to Everyone for the Pings. Amy and Lori, your #1152 is Adorable. : )

[jaycee]

Oh my, how delicious that looks! I have been in the kitchen looking for something sweet.....guess I could make hot chocolate but that means I have to work..LOL~~~~!

Yes, Amy, that was quite a sleigh ride, huh? I used to love sleigh riding when I was a kid and a young lady.

[jaycee]

Its impossible to catch up.....don’t worry, you post a lot of pretty and cute things. I’ve always heard you can’t catch up on sleep either. Do we believe that?