Leitmotif.

A friend of mine mentioned to me that a favorite musician set this one to music on her latest album:

maggie and milly and molly and may

maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach(to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn't remember her troubles,and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and

may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it's always ourselves we find in the sea

- e.e. cummings

I keep coming back to this one again and again. Am also happy to hear that Nathalie Merchant has something new out. Her voice has soothed me since, well, when we both were kids.

Audio (Interesting accent, il faut admettre):

The Snail.



L'Escargot

L'escargot s'est logé
Sous un des pommiers du verger
Sa maison ronde et dure
n'a qu'une pièce, mais il jure
qu'il se moque du mauvais temps
Et qu'il y vit toujours content

Dans le verger
Sous un pommier
Monsieur l'escargot se promène
Sa maison l'abrite sans peine;
Si son logement n'est pas grand,
Il se moque du mauvais temps.

-adapté de l'anglais

(Kind of ironic to be supplying a translation of a translation, as the original is "adapted from the English.")

Snail.

A little snail lives
Under one of the trees in the apple orchard.
His tough little home
Has only one room, but he'll be the first to say
That he has no fear of bad weather
And that he's quite snug and content.

In the orchard
Under his tree
Mister Snail takes his daily walks
His house shelters him well;
Even if it isn't very big,
He has no fear of bad weather.

There have been many almost unbearably beautiful days this Spring. Have been reveling in the gorgeousness.

God's World

O world, I cannot hold thee close enough!
Thy winds, thy wide grey skies!
Thy mists that roll and rise!
Thy woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag
And all but cry with colour! That gaunt crag
To crush! To lift the lean of that black bluff!
World, World, I cannot get thee close enough!
Long have I known a glory in it all,
But never knew I this;
Here such a passion is
As stretcheth me apart. Lord, I do fear
Thou'st made the world too beautiful this year.
My soul is all but out of me, let fall
No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call.

-Edna St. Vincent Millay

The forsythia, primroses, pansies and crocuses will soon give way to cherries, azaleas, daffodils and lilacs, which will then fade into the background for the dogwoods, roses, wisteria and peonies. So goes this natural progression of blossoming, going to seed, then lying dormant until the next Spring.

Nothing Gold Can Stay

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leafs a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

-Robert Frost

Though a lot of where I live is green and thriving, there are many places that are not. My walk to school brings me through a particularly blighted area, an area where the only green one might see is from the weeds pushing up through cracks or perhaps a sickly tree that put forth a few leaves. Gray and black is the dominant color scheme.

The soundscape is dominated by car horns and the roar of 18-wheelers.

Sometimes, however, I am surprised to hear a few cheerful notes from the sparrows who seem to be the only birds (aside from pigeons) hardy enough to manage this environment. The sight and sound of one one of these little fellows perched on a chain link fence either calling to a mate or marking territory does much to make the walk more bearable.

The Darkling Thrush

I leant upon a coppice gate
When Frost was spectre-gray,
And Winter's dregs made desolate
The weakening eye of day.
The tangled bine-stems scored the sky
Like strings of broken lyres,
And all mankind that haunted nigh
Had sought their household fires.

The land's sharp features seemed to be
The Century's corpse outleant,
His crypt the cloudy canopy,
The wind his death-lament.
The ancient pulse of germ and birth
Was shrunken hard and dry,
And every spirit upon earth
Seemed fervourless as I.

At once a voice arose among
The bleak twigs overhead
In a full-hearted evensong
Of joy illimited;
An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,
In blast-beruffled plume,
Had chosen thus to fling his soul
Upon the growing gloom.

So little cause for carolings
Of such ecstatic sound
Was written on terrestrial things
Afar or nigh around,
That I could think there trembled through
His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
And I was unaware.

-Thomas Hardy