A Contemplation upon Flowers
BRAVE flowers--that I could gallant it like you,
And be as little vain!
You come abroad, and make a harmless show,
And to your beds of earth again.
You are not proud: you know your birth:
For your embroider'd garments are from earth.
You do obey your months and times, but I
Would have it ever Spring:
My fate would know no Winter, never die,
Nor think of such a thing.
O that I could my bed of earth but view
And smile, and look as cheerfully as you!
O teach me to see Death and not to fear,
But rather to take truce!
How often have I seen you at a bier,
And there look fresh and spruce!
You fragrant flowers! then teach me, that my breath
Like yours may sweeten and perfume my death.
poem by Henry King
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Related quotes
Earth teach me to forget myself as melted snow forgets its life. Earth teach me resignation as the leaves which die in the fall. Earth teach me courage as the tree which stands all alone. Earth teach me regeneration as the seed which rises in the spring.
quote by William Alexander
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Spring And Winter
Spring is near
It is visible in the rear-
View mirror, winter is going to a far away place
From where it'll move at a very slow pace
It will encircle the Earth
And curb every birth
Spring will follow,
Fill life in the things gone hollow
Spring will make all the flowers shine
While winters make every one whine
Spring gives a pleasant touch to everything
Winter gives dullness to even bling
Spring will come and make us dance
While in winter, we don't like such a chance
Winter makes us crave for quilt and the sun
In spring, even failure seems something we won
In winter we search for everything hot
In spring, greenery spreads a lot
And makes us miss it when it is gone
Like we miss night every winter dawn
I hope spring comes soon
And be what it is supposed to be - a boon
I miss spring every single night
Come spring soon, the time has come, the time is right!
poem by Aishwarya Misra
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The Stable Of Bethlehem
’Twas not a palace proud and fair
He chose for His first home;
No dazz’ling pile of grandeur rare,
With pillar’d hall and dome;
Oh no! a stable, rude and poor,
Received Him at His birth;
And thus was born, unknown, obscure,
The Lord of Heaven and Earth.
No band of anxious menials there,
To tend the new-born child,
Joseph alone and Mary fair
Upon the infant smiled;
No broidered linens fine had they
Those little limbs to fold,
No baby garments rich and gay,
No tissues wrought with gold.
Come to your Saviour’s lowly bed,
Ye vain and proud of heart!
And learn with bowed and humbled head
The lesson ’twill impart;
’Twill teach you not to prize too high
The riches vain of earth—
But to lay up in God’s bright sky
Treasures of truer worth.
And you, poor stricken sons of grief,
Sad outcasts of this life,
Come, too, and seek a sure relief
For your heart’s bitter strife;
Enter that village stable door,
And view that lowly cot—
Will it not teach you to endure,
And even bless your lot?
poem by Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon
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On Autumn´s Earth
This is the beginning
Now carry me away
On to the faraway new day
That now is born to play
Yes this is the beginning
Moments dreamed and found
Everything in its singing
That comes again around
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
On autumn´s earth
Yesterdays were all turning
In their beat´s echo heart
Forever in lay and burning
Poles and miles apart
Flames of their color giving
All that came from within
Days their dreams own living
As worlds take their spin
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
On autumn´s earth
Swept away in their call
Dreams that were carried on
Love songs of colors fall
Until their moments are gone
You and I had our calling
Dreams that were not to be
Now like autumn earth's falling
All that we had is now free
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
On autumn´s earth
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
On autumn´s earth
poem by Peter S. Quinn
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On Autumns Earth
This is the beginning
Now carry me away
On to the faraway new day
That now is born to play
Yes this is the beginning
Moments dreamed and found
Everything in its singing
That comes again around
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
On autumn´s earth
Yesterdays were all turning
In their beat´s echo heart
Forever in lay and burning
Poles and miles apart
Flames of their color giving
All that came from within
Days their dreams own living
As worlds take their spin
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
On autumn´s earth
Swept away in their call
Dreams that were carried on
Love songs of colors fall
Until their moments are gone
You and I had our calling
Dreams that were not to be
Now like autumn earth's falling
All that we had is now free
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
Times of days and worth
Each their together role
On autumn´s earth
Flowers on autumn´s earth
Reaching their own goal
On autumn´s earth
poem by Peter S. Quinn
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The Reaper And The Flowers
There is a Reaper whose name is Death,
And, with his sickle keen,
He reaps the bearded grain at a breath,
And the flowers that grow between.
``Shall I have nought that is fair?'' saith he;
``Have nought but the bearded grain?
Though the breath of these flowers is sweet to me,
I will give them all back again.''
He gazed at the flowers with tearful eyes,
He kissed their drooping leaves;
It was for the Lord of Paradise
He bound them in his sheaves.
``My Lord has need of these flowerets gay,''
The Reaper said, and smiled;
``Dear tokens of the earth are they,
Where he was once a child.
``They shall all bloom in fields of light,
Transplanted by my care,
And saints, upon their garments white,
These sacred blossoms wear.''
And the mother gave, in tears and pain,
The flowers she most did love;
She knew she should find them all again
In the fields of light above.
O, not in cruelty, not in wrath,
The Reaper came that day;
'Twas an angel visited the green earth,
And took the flowers away.
poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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Voices Of The Night : The Reaper And The Flowers
There is a Reaper whose name is Death,
And, with his sickle keen,
He reaps the bearded grain at a breath,
And the flowers that grow between.
'Shall I have nought that is fair?' saith he;
'Have nought but the bearded grain?
Though the breath of these flowers is sweet to me,
I will give them all back again.'
He gazed at the flowers with tearful eyes,
He kissed their drooping leaves;
It was for the Lord of Paradise
He bound them in his sheaves.
'My Lord has need of these flowerets gay,'
The Reaper said, and smiled;
'Dear tokens of the earth are they,
Where he was once a child.
'They shall all bloom in fields of light,
Transplanted by my care,
And saints, upon their garments white,
These sacred blossoms wear.'
And the mother gave, in tears and pain,
The flowers she most did love;
She knew she should find them all again
In the fields of light above.
O, not in cruelty, not in wrath,
The Reaper came that day;
'Twas an angel visited the green earth,
And took the flowers away.
poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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Life
Life, betwixt birth ‘n death
Choices determine fate
From first to dying breath
Finish Earth, we graduate
“Behold I Make All Things New”
New realms to explore;
New colors, shapes, sizes
New paradigm, metaphor
New, yet unclaimed prizes
Infinite God, Infinite Wisdom
Teach us love, light, altruism
ROTMS
poem by Ray Lucero
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Autumn Thoughts
Gone hath the Spring, with all its flowers,
And gone the Summer's pomp and show,
And Autumn, in his leafless bowers,
Is waiting for the Winter's snow.
I said to Earth, so cold and gray,
'An emblem of myself thou art.'
'Not so,' the Earth did seem to say,
'For Spring shall warm my frozen heart.'
I soothe my wintry sleep with dreams
Of warmer sun and softer rain,
And wait to hear the sound of streams
And songs of merry birds again.
But thou, from whom the Spring hath gone,
For whom the flowers no longer blow,
Who standest blighted and forlorn,
Like Autumn waiting for the snow;
No hope is thine of sunnier hours,
Thy Winter shall no more depart;
No Spring revive thy wasted flowers,
Nor Summer warm thy frozen heart.
poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
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The Grave
The grave that they dug him had flowers
Gathered from the hillsides in bright summer colors,
And the brown earth bleached white at the edge of his gravestone.
Hes gone.
When the wars of our nation did beckon,
A man barely twenty did answer the calling.
Proud of the trust that he placed in our nation,
Hes gone,
But eternity knows him, and it knows what weve done.
And the rain fell like pearls on the leaves of the flowers
Leaving brown, muddy clay where the earth had been dry.
And deep in the trench he waited for hours,
As he held to his rifle and prayed not to die.
But the silence of night was shattered by fire
As guns and grenades blasted sharp through the air.
And one after another his comrades were slaughtered.
In morgue of marines, alone standing there.
He crouched ever lower, ever lower with fear.
They cant let me die! the cant let me die here!
Ill cover myself with the mud and the earth.
Ill cover myself! I know Im not brave!
The earth! the earth! the earth is my grave.
The grave that they dug him had flowers
Gathered from the hillsides in bright summer colors,
And the brown earth bleached white at the edge of his gravestone.
Hes gone.
song performed by by Don McLean
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Birth And Death
Birth and death, twin-sister and twin-brother,
Night and day, on all things that draw breath,
Reign, while time keeps friends with one another
Birth and death.
Each brow-bound with flowers diverse of wreath,
Heaven they hail as father, earth as mother,
Faithful found above them and beneath.
Smiles may lighten tears, and tears may smother
Smiles, for all that joy or sorrow saith:
Joy nor sorrow knows not from each other
Birth and death.
poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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Universal Prayer
Father of all! In every age,
In ev'ry clime ador'd,
By saint, by savage, and by sage,
Jehovah, Jove, or Lord!
Thou Great First Cause, least understood,
Who all my sense confin'd
To know but this, that Thou art good,
And that myself am blind:
Yet gave me, in this dark estate,
To see the good from ill;
And, binding Nature fast in Fate,
Left free the human Will.
What Conscience dictates to be done,
Or warns me not to do;
This teach me more than Hell to shun,
That more than Heav'n pursue.
What blessings thy free bounty gives
Let me not cast away;
For God is paid when man receives;
T' enjoy is to obey.
Yet not to earth's contracted span
Thy goodness let me bound,
Or think thee Lord alone of man,
When thousand worlds are round.
Let not this weak, unknowing hand
Presume thy bolts to throw,
And teach damnation round the land
On each I judge thy foe.
If I am right, thy grace impart,
Still in the right to stay;
If I am wrong, O teach my heart
To find that better way.
Save me alike from foolish Pride
Or impious Discontent,
At aught thy wisdom has denied,
Or aught that goodness lent.
Teach me to feel another's woe,
To right the fault I see:
That mercy I to others show,
That mercy show to me.
Mean tho' I am, not wholly so,
Since quicken'd by thy breath;
O lead me whereso'er I go,
Thro' this day's life or death!
This day be bread and peace my lot:
All else beneath the sun
Though know'st if best bestow'd or not,
And let Thy will be done.
To Thee, whose temple is of Space,
Whose altar earth, sea, skies,
One chorus let all Beings raise!
All Nature's incense rise!
poem by Alexander Pope
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Vanitas Vanitatum
All the flowers of the spring
Meet to perfume our burying;
These have but their growing prime,
And man does flourish but his time:
Survey our progress from our birth;
We are set, we grow, we turn to earth.
Courts adieu, and all delights,
All bewitching appetites!
Sweetest breath and clearest eye,
Like perfumes, go out and die;
And consequently this is done
As shadows wait upon the sun.
Vain ambition of kings
Who seek by trophies and dead things
To leave a living name behind,
And weave but nets to catch the wind.
poem by John Webster
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A Charm
Take of English earth as much
As either hand may rightly clutch.
In the taking of it breathe
Prayer for all who lie beneath.
Not the great nor well-bespoke,
But the mere uncounted folk
Of whose life and death is none
Report or lamentation.
Lay that earth upon thy heart,
And thy sickness shall depart!
It shall sweeten and make whole
Fevered breath and festered soul.
It shall mightily restrain
Over-busied hand and brain.
It shall ease thy mortal strife
'Gainst the immortal woe of life,
Till thyself, restored, shall prove
By what grace the Heavens do move.
Take of English flowers these --
Spring's full-vaced primroses,
Summer's wild wide-hearted rose,
Autumn's wall-flowerr of the close,
And, thy darkness to illume,
Winter's bee-thronged ivy-bloom.
Seek and serve them where they bide
From Candlemas to Christmas-tide,
For these simples, used aright,
Can restore a failing sight.
These shall cleanse and purify
Webbed and inward-turning eye;
These shall show thee treasure hid,
Thy familiar fields amid;
And reveal (which is thy need)
Every man a King indeed!
poem by Rudyard Kipling
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To ward of anarchy.
You teach me not to steal.
Can you teach the rodent?
You teach me not to kill.
Can you teach the cat?
You teach me not to cuckold.
Can you teach the street dog?
None of them obey;
Nor are they away from God.
I obey; not to please the God
But to ward off anarchy.
03.02.2001, Pmdi
poem by Rm. Shanmugam Chettiar
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Tempest Tossed
New Year here heralds cares to come, scarce cheer,
In this age of transition where the earth,
New born, is torn protesting at its birth,
Emerging prematurely from the bier
That too well represents the dying year.
Each breath brings death towards us, proves its worth
Eternal yet ephemeral, tears, mirth.
Not in itself, but by an insight clear
Nature gifts bestows on who know dear
Is bought all liberty sought where its dearth
Never seemed so much the rule through wide world's girth.
Enter a clown, whose painted smile masks fear.
The Past is dead. New forces Fate shall steer.
Yet hide-bound minds remain too tied to berth,
Trammelled with ghosts past, whereas the earth
Witness whirlpool, progress drawing near: -
Oh, tempest tossed Tomorrow shall appear!
poem by Jonathan Robin
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Change Is Manifest In Mortal Life
change is manifest in mortal life
soul lessons learned in toil strife
future years teach bit morals sold
eternity heaven faith witness told
billions live upon this lesson earth
at death died bitter lesson is truth
wages sin received sentence death
breath experiences teach seal truth
poem by Terence George Craddock
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Forever
THOSE we love truly never die,
Though year by year the sad memorial wreath,
A ring and flowers, types of life and death,
Are laid upon their graves.
For death the pure life saves,
And life all pure is love; and love can reach
From heaven to earth, and nobler lessons teach
Than those by mortals read.
Well blest is he who has a dear one dead:
A friend he has whose face will never change—
A dear communion that will not grow strange;
The anchor of a love is death.
The blessed sweetness of a loving breath
Will reach our cheek all fresh through weary years.
For her who died long since, ah! waste not tears,
She's thine unto the end.
Thank God for one dead friend,
With face still radiant with the light of truth,
Whose love comes laden with the scent of youth,
Through twenty years of death.
poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
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Where Have All The Robins Gone?
Where have all the robins gone?
They've left and gone to soon
Their empty hollow loving nests
are stilled against the moon
A Spring that was, has come and gone
The worms have dug down deep
Summer's warmth has left the earth
Fall's harvest here to reap
I beg the Winter stay away
To cruel and cold for me
But nature has it's purpose
Rest now......then you will see
Spring returns the Robin's breast
Lost in fields of flowers
Growth anew abounds on earth
The wealth of fresh Spring showers
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The Happy Man
To teach the grey earth like a child,
To bid the heavens repent,
I only ask from Fate the gift
Of one man well content.
Him will I find: though when in vain
I search the feast and mart,
The fading flowers of liberty,
The painted masks of art.
I only find him at the last,
On one old hill where nod
Golgotha's ghastly trinity-
Three persons and one god.
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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