The corn husker
Hard by the Indian lodges, where the bush
Breaks in a clearing, through ill-fashioned fields,
She comes to labour, when the first still hush
Of autumn follows large and recent yields.
Age in her fingers, hunger in her face,
Her shoulders stooped with weight of work and years,
But rich in tawny colouring of her race,
She comes a-field to strip the purple ears.
And all her thoughts are with the days gone by,
Ere might's injustice banished from their lands
Her people, that to-day unheeded lie,
Like the dead husks that rustle through her hands.
poem by Emily Pauline Johnson
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Related quotes
Put The Weight On My Shoulders
Put the weight on my shoulders
Take the load off of your mind
Cause the headwinds that blow
Will fade away in time
Rest yourself on my waters
Take the lifeline from me
Rise above what has passed
And let yourself be free
I only know what love must bear
Through laiden times I will be there
And when your down Ill break the fall
Loose the weight on my shoulders
It aint no weight at all
I only know what love must do
When fortune cries Ill follow you
And when your down Ill break your fall
Put the weight on my shoulders
It aint no weight at all
Put the weight on my shoulders
See you star how it shines
Cause theyre so many dreams
Left to find
Put the weight on my shoulders .....
Put the weight on my shoulders .....
Put the weight on my shoulders .....
Put the weight on my shoulders .....
Put the weight on my shoulders .....
song performed by by Gino Vanelli
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Golden Autumn Day
Well I heard the bells ringing, I was thinking about winning
In this God forsaken place
When my confidence was well, then I tripped and I felt
Right flat on my face
Now Im standing erect, and I feel like coming back
And the sun is shining gold
Put a smile on my face, get back in the human race
And get on with the show
And Im taking in the indian summer
And Im soaking it up in my mind
And Im pretending that its paradise
On a golden autumn day, on a golden autumn day
On a golden autumn day, an a golden autumn day
In the wee midnight hour I was parking my car
In this dimly lit town,
I was attacked by two thugs, who took me for a mug
And shoved me down on the ground
And they pulled out a knife, and I fought my way up
As they scarpered from the scene
Well this is no new york street, and theres no bobby on the beat
And things aint just what they seem
And Im taking in the indian summer
And Im soaking it up in my mind
And Im pretending that its paradise
On a golden autumn day, on a golden autumn day
On a golden autumn day, an a golden autumn day
Who would think this could happen in a city like this
Among blakes green and pleasant hills,
And we must remember as we go through september
Among these dark satanic mills
If theres such a thing as justice I could take them out and flog them
In the nearest green field
And it might be a lesson to the bleeders of the system
In this whole society
And Im taking in the indian summer
And Im soaking it up in my mind
And Im pretending like its paradise
On a golden autumn day, on a golden autumn day
On a golden autumn day, on a golden autumn day, golden autumn day ...
song performed by by Van Morrison
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Hush-a-bye Hard Times
Many years you have lingered around my cabin door
Oh hard times come again no more
Oh hard times come again no more
Oh hush a bye hard times, go ye away
Cause my hungry baby wants a gingerbread cake
Not a cow in the barn yard no money to spend
Not an egg in the hayloft, no little red hen
Chorus:
So, hush a bye baby dont cry no more
Your mama cant give you what youre crying for
Theres a wolf at the door with an angry
Cold hungry stare, he keeps howling of hard times
And the cupboard is bare
Oh, hush a bye hard times go ye to rest
Cause my ragged baby wants a new ruffled dress
And she wants some new shoes with buckles to wear
And she wants some silver bows for her golden hair
Repeat chorus twice
Hush a bye hard times go ye away
I dont intend to be treated this way
So, hush a bye baby
Hush a bye hard times
Hush a bye baby
Dont cry no more
Hush a bye hard times
Hush a bye baby
Hush a bye hard times
Come ye no more
Fade:
Many years you have lingered around my cabin door
Hush a bye hard times
Come ye no more
Hush a bye baby
Hush a bye hard times
Hush a bye baby
Dont cry no more
Hush a bye hard times
Hush a bye baby
Hush a bye hard times
Come ye no more
song performed by by Dolly Parton
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Buying and Selling chapter XI
And a merchant said, "Speak to us of Buying and Selling."
And he answered and said:
To you the earth yields her fruit, and you shall not want if you but know how to fill your hands.
It is in exchanging the gifts of the earth that you shall find abundance and be satisfied.
Yet unless the exchange be in love and kindly justice, it will but lead some to greed and others to hunger.
When in the market place you toilers of the sea and fields and vineyards meet the weavers and the potters and the gatherers of spices, -
Invoke then the master spirit of the earth, to come into your midst and sanctify the scales and the reckoning that weighs value against value.
And suffer not the barren-handed to take part in your transactions, who would sell their words for your labour.
To such men you should say,
"Come with us to the field, or go with our brothers to the sea and cast your net;
For the land and the sea shall be bountiful to you even as to us."
And if there come the singers and the dancers and the flute players, - buy of their gifts also.
For they too are gatherers of fruit and frankincense, and that which they bring, though fashioned of dreams, is raiment and food for your soul.
And before you leave the marketplace, see that no one has gone his way with empty hands.
For the master spirit of the earth shall not sleep peacefully upon the wind till the needs of the least of you are satisfied.
poem by Khalil Gibran
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The Poet Tree
Rustle, little leaves above, rustle in the breeze...
Rustle, little leaves of love, rustle mid God's peace!
Rustle, every night and day, rustle every hour...
Rustle, rustle, come what may, rustle mid God's power!
Rustle, for then wise words are formed,
Great expectations made!
Through such as these, men's hearts are warmed
And children's prayers are prayed!
Rustle upon the Poet Tree,
Above the poets' ears,
So they may learn each melody,
These God-picked volunteers...
Rustle sweetly, and gently on,
Persist from age to age -
Let all God's poets write upon
Their separate nearby page...
Rustle until all humans die
And no more poets live!
Until no soul would question, 'Why? '
And there's no cause to give!
Rustle until God tells you stop,
'Dear friends, at last, be free...
'Tis time for you to fall, to drop...
Beneath the Poet Tree...
I've loved each poem, every one...
And Jesus loved them, too!
You've blessed the world! Your task is done!
Your rustle days are through...'
poem by Denis Martindale
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Occupational Therapy
Find me a scissors and some paper,
So I can start to shape her.
First the feet and legs, all two;
Up to the knees then a skirt will do.
Then to the middle to angle at the arms,
Down to the fingers (this is where it gets hard) .
Then once they look presentable,
Off up to the shoulders, curving up at the neck
To a face well rounded.
All done now, our paper cut out of you.
Ready for colouring,
You can begin with the blue :)
poem by Harriet James
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Sojourning and Wandering
AUTUMN
A GOOD stay-at-home season is Autumn: then there's
work to be joined in by all:
Though the fawns, where the brackens make covert, may range away undeterred,
The stags that were lone upon hillocks now give heed to the call,
To the bellowing call of the hinds, and they draw back to the herd.
A good stay-at-home season is Autumn; the brown world's marked into fields;
The corn is up to its growth; the acorns teem in the wood;
By the side of the down-fallen fort even the thorn-bush yields
A crop, and there by the rath the hazel nuts drop from a load.
SPRING
Now, coming on Spring, the days will be growing,
And after Saint Bride's Day my sail I will throw;
Since the thought has come to me I fain would be going,
Till I stand in the middle of the County Mayo!
The first of my days will be spent in Claremorris,
And in Balla, beside it, I'll have drinking and sport,
To Kiltimagh, then, I will go on a visit,
And there, I can tell you, a month will be short.
I solemnly swear that the heart in me rises,
As the wind rises up and the mists break below,
When I think upon Carra, and on Gallen down from it,
The Bush of the Mile, and the Plains of Mayo!
Killeadean's my village, and every good's in it;
The rasp and blackberry to set to one's tooth;
And if Raftery stood in the midst of his people,
Old age would go from him, and he'd step to his youth!
poem by Padraic Colum
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Ideals
Better than land or gold or trade
Are a high ideal and a purpose true;
Better than all of the wealth we've made
Is the work for others that now we do.
For Rome grew rich and she turned to song
And danced to music and drank her wine,
But she sapped the strength of her fibres strong
And a gilded shroud was her splendor fine.
The Rome of old with its wealth and wine
Was the handiwork of a sturdy race;
They builded well and they made it fine
And they dreamed of it as their children's place.
They thought the joys they had won to give,
And which seemed so certain and fixed and sure,
To the end of time in the world would live
And the Rome they'd fashioned would long endure.
They passed to their children the hoarded gold,
Their marble halls and their fertile fields!
But not the spirit of Rome of old,
Nor the Roman courage that never yields.
They left them the wealth that their hands had won,
But they failed to leave them a purpose true.
They left them thinking life's work all done,
And Rome went down and was lost to view.
We must guard ourselves lest we follow Rome.
We must leave our children the finer things.
We must teach them love of the spot called home
And the lasting joy that a purpose brings.
For vain are our Flag and our battles won,
And vain are our lands and our stores of gold,
If our children feel that life's work is done.
We must give them a high ideal to hold.
poem by Edgar Albert Guest
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The Sowing
Upon the wind sheltered hillside,
the sharp tang of metal and the sting of salt air lay
over a field of blood-red poppies, no Flander's Field.
At years fall, fields of rape roll like waves,
in the harshness of winter-sleet, stray boulders bow;
like the backs of mothers, daughters sowing.
Their nails torn, ragged and bleeding.
They bleed by the moon, and son upon the field.
No white crosses mark their passing.
For hundreds of years, and crops of rape, barley and wheat;
small hands, soft hands, and soft thighs bleed.
They bleed daughters, and sons.
They birth the fields and in the fields by consent or rape;
unadorned by silver stars or purple hearts.
Today, as May's sun wakes the blood blasted pasture,
each precious dropp blooms…..a heroines acknowledgement
the poppies yield.
poem by Deborah Guzzi
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Desespoir
The seasons send their ruin as they go,
For in the spring the narciss shows its head
Nor withers till the rose has flamed to red,
And in the autumn purple violets blow,
And the slim crocus stirs the winter snow;
Wherefore yon leafless trees will bloom again
And this grey land grow green with summer rain
And send up cowslips for some boy to mow.
But what of life whose bitter hungry sea
Flows at our heels, and gloom of sunless night
Covers the days which never more return?
Ambition, love and all the thoughts that burn
We lose too soon, and only find delight
In withered husks of some dead memory.
poem by Oscar Wilde
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Hymn 123
The repenting prodigal.
Luke 15:13,etc.
Behold the wretch whose lust and wine
Had wasted his estate,
He begs a share among the swine,
To taste the husks they eat!
"I die with hunger here," he cries,
"I starve in foreign lands;
My father's house has large supplies
And bounteous are his hands.
"I'll go, and with a mournful tongue
Fall down before his face,-
Father, I've done thy justice wrong,
Nor can deserve thy grace."
He said, and hastened to his home,
To seek his father's love;
The father saw the rebel come,
And all his bowels move.
He ran, and fell upon his neck,
Embraced and kissed his son;
The rebel's heart with sorrow brake
For follies he had done.
"Take off his clothes of shame and sin,"
The father gives command,
"Dress him in garments white and clean,
With rings adorn his hand.
"A day of feasting I ordain,
Let mirth and joy abound;
My son was dead, and lives again,
Was lost, and now is found."
poem by Isaac Watts
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Last Days of Summer
Whatever the way the summer days end,
In the type of summer is how it has been,
Whether a good one or bad one,
The last days of summer,
Can be sad or happy endings,
As each season ends,
With another one beginning,
The summer could have been,
Miserable yet,
Sun scorching us everyday,
And sunlight shining on all our faces,
It is how it is,
Out there where all is seen,
In,
Summer days of fun,
Summer days of love,
Summer days of seeing,
Summer days of been,
Out and about where summer is,
And when summer came and went?
With a mundane feeling that it left?
Was the last days of summer,
And the begining of another,
Autumn as we know it,
Fall in other places,
Where the ending of one season shows,
By the decaying of it,
When Autumn Fall shows,
Where we will wrap up and snuggle,
With warm cuppas drinks,
With a book,
Or,
Catch up on watching films,
Yet,
Still,
Musing over the summer days,
Of sunshine memories,
Now,
Warm hats and gloves,
With rustle leaves,
That rustle beneath,
Our feet as we walk,
Through the park,
And see,
The summer leaves turn,
To autumn shades,
Taking in,
The last days of summer,
Reflecting,
And remember,
The falls of Autumn's,
Is the signs of summer,
That has ended,
And minglings with,
All that falls,
From the summer ending,
To autumn beginnings,
Is the,
Decaying,
Of summer,
To regrow itself,
For next season's of summer,
When it begins again,
Yet,
In between,
There's,
Autumn,
Winter,
Spring,
Till,
Again,
Last days of summer,
And all in bloom again.
poem by Ellen Ni Bheachain
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Bush Hay
The stamp of Scotland is on his face,
But he sailed to the South a lad,
And he does not think of the black bleak hills
And the bitter hard youth he had;
He thinks of a nearer and dearer past
In the bright land far away,
When the teams went up and the teams came down,
In the days when they made bush hay.
The fare was rough and the bush was grim
In the “years of his pilgrimage”,
But he gained the strength that is still with him
In his hale, late middle age.
He thinks of the girl at the halfway inn
They use as a barn to-day—
Oh, she was a dumpling and he was thin
In the days when they made bush hay.
The ration teams to the Bathurst Plains
Were often a fortnight full.
And they branched all ways in the early days
And back to the port with wool.
They watched for the lights of old Cobb & Co.
That flashed to the West away,
When drivers drove six on a twelve-mile stage
In the days when they made bush hay.
He has made enough, and he’s sold his claim,
And he goes by the morning train,
From the gold-field town in the sultry West
To his home by the sea again,
Where a bustling old body’s expecting him
Whose hair is scarcely grey,
And she was the girl of the halfway house
In the days when they made bush hay.
poem by Henry Lawson
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One Lucky Gal
(poetry in progress)
such a great number of years
she has collected, one lucky gal
ninety three of them to be exact,
showering her smile with such
a maze of enthusiastic signatures
so frenziedly delineated through her
face contours one wonders the days
clocked onto her with their hands each day
and her walk, it is so heavy with memories
sweetness, bitterness, joy and sorrow
lthey are weighing down on her muscles
she walks with her face to the ground
her greatest companion till this day
always keeping her supported,
never giving way
her ears, they are a thousand miles away
what a blessing, she thinks, for she longs
more for the days she had lived
and soon her eyes will be too glad to
bide farewell too and choose nights as friends,
everything will be quiet, peaceful and
serene, just what she has been
pining for to close her years
the ninety odd years will weigh away
light as autumn leaves over the fields
in so many shades and in so many dance
sequences to give her one exciting last
farewell from the stage of the world
and on every loved one's heart, a real life
story for each leaf that has flown to lighten
up her years
poem by John Tiong Chunghoo
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Hands of Life
I wash my hands
in the days
And the years slip
between my fingers
Leaving them clean
except for bits of weeks
Under my nails that
are hard to get out,
hard to forget
Life has left them
hard and cracked
Scared and scaled
mangled and crushed
And so are my hands
poem by Midnights Voice
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The Fire Of Redemption
i am a dissident,
a fugitive, a renegade,
condemned by apathy as subversive.
i am an individual,
a burning bush,
a fire in the night.
i am a homeless star
in a sky gone black,
the mouth and face of hunger.
i am passion's anger,
and compassion's hands,
i am a man and not a body.
i am a spiritual heretic,
a relic from a time
when the spirit was the cause.
i am a bridge, a pair of shoes,
a jug that holds water.
i am the seeds, the sower,
the rain and the sun.
i am the common dance,
the holy sweat,
i am hard work and erection.
i am the prayer prayed
by the side of the road,
the father's firmness,
and the mother's breasts.
i am sickness and death,
the price of years,
i am simple resurrection.
i am the lover unchained,
the wind that breaks the door,
the rain that falls in the naked night.
i am the voice behind silence,
the shout of the snow.
i am birth and beginning,
i am the fire of redemption!
poem by Eric Cockrell
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Thoughts In A Wheat-Field
IN his wide fields walks the Master,
In his fair fields, ripe for harvest,
Where the evening sun shines slant-wise
On the rich ears heavy bending;
Saith the Master: 'It is time.'
Though no leaf shows brown decadence,
And September's nightly frost-bite
Only reddens the horizon,
'It is full time,' saith the Master,
The wise Master, 'It is time.'
Lo, he looks. That look compelling
Brings his laborers to the harvest;
Quick they gather, as in autumn
Passage-birds in cloudy eddies
Drop upon the seaside fields;
White wings have they, and white raiment,
White feet shod with swift obedience,
Each lays down his golden palm branch,
And uprears his sickle shining,
'Speak, O Master,--is it time?'
O'er the field the servants hasten,
Where the full-stored ears droop downwards,
Humble with their weight of harvest:
Where the empty ears wave upward,
And the gay tares flaunt in rows:
But the sickles, the sharp sickles,
Flash new dawn at their appearing,
Songs are heard in earth and heaven,
For the reapers are the angels,
And it is the harvest time.
O Great Master, are thy footsteps
Even now upon the mountains?
Are thou walking in thy wheat-field?
Are the snowy-wingèd reapers
Gathering in the silent air?
Are thy signs abroad, the glowing
Of the distant sky, blood-reddened,--
And the near fields trodden, blighted,
Choked by gaudy tares triumphant,--
Sure, it must be harvest time?
Who shall know the Master's coming?
Whether it be at dawn or sunset,
When night dews weigh down the wheat-ears,
Or while noon rides high in heaven,
Sleeping lies the yellow field?
Only, may thy voice, Good Master,
Peal above the reapers' chorus,
And dull sound of sheaves slow falling,--
'Gather all into My garner,
For it is My harvest time.'
poem by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
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The Weight Of The Wind
(pal waaktaar)
Your face looked new against the town
Youve come to lose some memories
Like you Ive come to touch new grounds
You want to lose
The weight of the wind
Rests hard on your shoulders
Bringing you down
The one that you love
Will never be find
You speak into the falling rain
Words youd lost, but found again
You see their snakey arms entwined
So clear and cruel
In your jealous mind
Youve got to lose
The weight of the wind
Hard on your shoulders
Getting you down
The one that you love
Will never be found
song performed by by A-Ha
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Ballade of Summer's Sleep
Sweet summer is gone; they have laid her away-
The last sad hours that were touched with her grace-
In the hush where the ghosts of the dead flowers play;
The sleep that is sweet of her slumbering space
Let not a sight or a sound erase
Of the woe that hath fallen on all the lands:
Gather, ye dreams, to her sunny face,
Shadow her head with your golden hands.
The woods that are golden and red for a day
Girdle the hills in a jewelled case,
Like a girl's strange mirth, ere the quick death slay
The beautiful life that he hath in chase.
Darker and darker the shadows pace
Out of the north to the southern sands,
Ushers bearing the winter's mace:
Keep them away with your woven hands.
The yellow light lies on the wide wastes gray,
More bitter and cold than the winds that race,
From the skirts of the autumn, tearing away,
This way and that way, the woodland lace.
In the autumn's cheek is a hectic trace;
Behind her the ghost of the winter stands;
Sweet summer will moan in her soft gray place:
Mantle her head with your glowing hands.
Envoi.
Till the slayer be slain and the spring displace
The might of his arms with her rose-crowned bands,
Let her heart not gather a dream that is base:
Shadow her head with your golden hands.
poem by Archibald Lampman
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Melville and Coghill - The Place Of The Little Hand
DEAD, with their eyes to the foe,
Dead, with the foe at their feet;
Under the sky laid low
Truly their slumber is sweet,
Though the wind from the Camp of the
Slain Men blow,
And the rain on the wilderness beat.
Dead, for they chose to die
When that wild race was run;
Dead, for they would not fly,
Deeming their work undone,
Nor cared to look on the face of the sky,
Nor loved the light of the sun.
Honor we give them and tears,
And the flag they died to save,
Rent from the raid of the spears,
Wet from the war and the wave,
Shall waft men’s thoughts through the dust of the years,
Back to their lonely grave!
poem by Andrew Lang
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