Herbs
A serviceable thing
Is fennel, mint, or balm,
Kept in the thrifty calm
Of hollows, in the spring;
Or by old houses pent.
Dear is its ancient scent
To folk that love the days forgot,
Nor think that God is not.
Sage, lavender, and rue,
For body’s hurt and ill,
For fever and for chill;
Rosemary, strange with dew,
For sorrow and its smart,
For breaking of the heart.
Yet pain, dearth, tears, all come to dust,
As even the herbs must.
Life-everlasting, too,
Windless, poignant, and sere,
That blows in the old year,
Townsmen, for me and you.
Why fret for wafting airs?
Why haste to sell our wares?
Captains and clerks, this shall befall;
This is the end of all.
Oh, this the end indeed!
Oh, unforgotten things,
Gone out of all the springs;
The quest, the dream, the creed!
Gone out of all the lands,
And yet safe in God’s hands; —
For shall the dull herbs live again,
And not the sons of men?
poem by Lizette Woodworth Reese
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Related quotes
After
Oh, the littles that remain!
Scent of mint out in the lane;
Flare of window; sound of bees; —
These, but these.
Three times sitting down to bread;
One time climbing up to bed;
Table-setting o’er and o’er;
Drying herbs for winter’s store;
This thing; that thing;—nothing more.
But just now out in the lane,
Oh, the scent of mint was plain!
poem by Lizette Woodworth Reese
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New Year....
on the first day of this new year
as the firecrackers mark the end
there will be goodbyes
but there will be more hellos still to come
some chains will be missing
i will be breaking some links
and reconnect with the untried ones
as i dropp some hot potatoes
i shall also select new herbs and spices
flavors of my year
rosemary, not thyme
new colors to love
brighter oranges, scarlet wines
new hair to sport
another softer brushes for my teeth
dimmer lights perhaps
and perfumed pillows
more love and less
talk.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Veggie Poetry
steamed okra
round, red, shiny tomatoes
violet onion, some white spring ones
and hot chili
with black pepper
some olive oil
and rosemary herbs for flavoring
a little salt
a little sugar
suit to your exquisite, exotic asian taste
add some more other
herbs and hot spices
mix them in a bowl
shed some tears
for summer salt
add some green lettuce
and black olives
and pickles to taste
pick some
then chew
do not swallow yet
take your time
enjoy your veggie poetry
do not take any meat
or poultry
now take your time alone
eat
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Rosemary
THERE was a long path through the fern,—
O Rosemary, dost thou not know?
A silver maple at the turn,
A little gate below.
There was a youth, there was a maid,
She in the light, he in the shade,
When all the world was fair to see,—
O Rosemary, O Rosemary!
There was a briar by the wall,—
O Rosemary, hast thou forgot?
A slender, tender hand and small,
Stained with a crimson spot.
There was a little cry of pain,
Two heads bent low, then raised again;
And all the sun seemed poured on me,—
O Rosemary, O Rosemary!
There came a sail upon the bay,—
O Rosemary, didst thou foreknow?
Two blue eyes wandered far away,
Two cheeks were all aglow:—
A sail which neared and grew until
It cast a heart in shadow chill;
When someone's ship came in from sea,—
O Rosemary, O Rosemary!
poem by Abbie Farwell Brown from The New England Magazine / Volume 23, Issue 3 (1897)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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L. e. l.
'Whose heart was breaking for a little love.'
Downstairs I laugh, I sport and jest with all;
But in my solitary room above
I turn my face in silence to the wall;
My heart is breaking for a little love.
Though winter frosts are done,
And birds pair every one,
And leaves peep out, for springtide is begun.
I feel no spring, while spring is wellnigh blown,
I find no nest, while nests are in the grove:
Woe's me for mine own heart that dwells alone,
My heart that breaketh for a little love.
While golden in the sun
Rivulets rise and run,
While lilies bud, for springtide is begun.
All love, are loved, save only I; their hearts
Beat warm with love and joy, beat full thereof:
They cannot guess, who play the pleasant parts,
My heart is breaking for a little love.
While beehives wake and whirr,
And rabbit thins his fur,
In living spring that sets the world astir.
I deck myself with skills and jewelry,
I plume myself like any mated dove:
They praise my rustling show, and never see
My heart is breaking for a little love.
While sprouts green lavender
With rosemary and myrrh,
For in quick spring the sap is all astir.
Perhaps some saints in glory guess the truth,
Perhaps some angels read it as they move,
And cry one to another full of ruth,
'Her heart is breaking for a little love.'
Though other things have birth,
And leap and sing for mirth,
When springtime wakes and clothes and feeds the earth.
Yet saith a saint: 'Take patience for thy scathe;'
Yet saith an angel: 'Wait, for thou shalt prove
True best is last, true life is born of death,
O thou, heart-broken for a little love.
Then love shall fill they girth,
And love make fat thy dearth,
When new spring builds new heaven and clean new earth.'
poem by Christina Georgina Rossetti
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The Herb Of Grace
Find some freckled fern seed to sprinkle in your shoes
And you may step invisible down the peopled street,
Or curve about the apple boughs like swallows if you choose,
Lifted by the elfin wings that tingle in your feet.
Oh, you may cull a-many sweets with fern seed iin your shoe!
But leave alone the rue--
Little boy, little girl,
Leave alone the rue!
Keep the downy dittany and storms will bring you calm,
Fill a vervain pillow for a thought-grieved head;
Cherish balm whene'er you can, there's none too much of balm,
And never stop for rosemary, 'twill follow where you tread.
Taste the scarlet love-apple, if youth will drive you to,
But leave alone the rue--
Fair lass, fine lad,
Leave alone the rue!
Mix tansy in your Easter cake and earn a placid year,
For though you cross the Little Folk they cannot then offend;
Give a spray and take a spray of ivy from your dear,
But pay with coin for parsley, or its price will be a friend.
Wear a four-leafed clover and the charm will win you through;
But leave alone the rue--
Grave man, wise woman,
Leave alone the rue!
Lovelier than wealth is laughing potentilla's gold,
Eyebright is beautiful and kind to eyes that weep;
Rich herbs of healing the wild glens hold
With hemlock and foxglove for those sick for sleep.
Surely there are flowers enough and strong leaves too!
Must you gather rue?
Poor things, poor things,
Leave alone the rue!
Come the aged creeping, each with wreaths for his own grave,
Dried roses, laurel leaves, wisps of dead grass,
Young-eyed forget-me-nots that old tears lave,
Heartsease, and love-lies-bleeding, bare thorns, alas!
Choice of life's harvesting that tells the tale true!
And all carry rue,
Evergreen, bitter green,
All carry rue!
poem by Elsie Cole
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The morning scent of rosemary
‘Rosemary – that’s for remembrance..'
Can you smell it now?
that tough yet choosy herb,
giving of itself;
remembrance, perhaps, for Northern Europeans,
of that package tour to Crete:
rising early, that first morning,
the body clock not quite adjusted,
the sun already warming mountain-sides
before it reaches down into the valley;
already, the intoxicating scent of wild herbs
rolling slowly down the hillside, telling you,
this, this, could be paradise..
below you, blue morning sea
beyond white walls of huddled houses..
still in the air, the hint of night-time’s blessed dew..
rosemary: did you think it named
after the fragrance of Mary’s own humility,
mingling with the scent of manger hay?
mingling with the sweetness of that day?
no – ‘ros marinus’, dew of the ocean,
is the meaning of its name…
though, how well it suits her memory..
suits, too, that remembered Cretan morning;
for before the Romans, Indians used those words;
the dew, humidity, rather than humility;
marine, cognate with the words
for the clear, pure light of sun on sea…
that Cretan morning:
the rosemaried fragrance of remembrance;
sunshine and white walls adoring one another;
sky and sea, two shades of Maryblue.
poem by Michael Shepherd
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Don't Hie Yourself to the Hideout.
Why you dear, vanished from my sight?
If honest words hurt your heart
then hot springs burst from the snowy mountains
must also harm human folk.
Right advice will be sour to taste
but once chewed, haste won't throw you into waste.
Your mind curtseyed to hypocrisy
but turned off from melting mercy.
The gleaming stars going dim at early dawn,
come back with cheerful looks in the coming night.
The flowers shut their petals in the chill evening,
open and smile in elegance in the morn.
The birds welcoming the dawn with chirps,
do the orchestra again in the birth of next day.
The animals quenching their thirst leave the pond,
with gratefulness and trace the trails back to the spot.
The seasons bid bye not to die
but to revive again with spirit and verve.
The turtles hibernate for half year and wake up back
to explore the strange, unknown places.
The soaring eagle doesn't hover for ever.
The rivers lured to the seas come back as rainy clouds.
Living things sprouting from the earth return to it as dust.
Had you been away by the pride of your beauty,
I wouldn't have felt about you.
If you were off by the dictates of your heart,
then who could heal this bleeding heart?
If you play hard to get me back in thy heart,
you're human, otherwise worse than the animals.
Tell me dear, why you hied to the hideout,
or kill me hiding for long into the human jungle.
poem by Rajendran Muthiah
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Sweet Addiction
Tulips…Eurasian herbs
With deep shaped cup
Close kin of Lilies
From which hummingbirds sup
Begonias…. tropical herb,
showy flowers, waxy leaves…
Besieged by legions
of honeybees
Roses…often climbing shrubs…
Fragrant blossoms filling noses
Divided leaves, prickly stems
Varietal colored, bed of roses
Lavender…Mediterranean mint
Pale purple colour
Heady perfume, to scent
Bed linen and cover
Flowers, blossoms
Predilections
Scent and sight…
Sweet addictions
Dizzying choices,
A lie down in repose
The best place to compose in…
Is no bed of roses
poem by David Whalen
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The Choice
When skies are blue and days are bright
A kitchen-garden's my delight,
Set round with rows of decent box
And blowsy girls of hollyhocks.
Before the lark his Lauds hath done
And ere the corncrake's southward gone;
Before the thrush good-night hath said
And the young Summer's put to bed.
The currant-bushes' spicy smell,
Homely and honest, likes me well,
The while on strawberries I feast,
And raspberries the sun hath kissed.
Beans all a-blowing by a row.
Of hives that great with honey go,
With mignonette and heaths to yield
The plundering bee his honey-field.
Sweet herbs in plenty, blue borage
And the delicious mint and sage,
Rosemary, marjoram, and rue,
And thyme to scent the winter through.
Here are small apples growing round,
And apricots all golden-gowned,
And plums that presently will flush
And show their bush a Burning Bush.
Cherries in nets against the wall,
Where Master Thrush his madrigal
Sings, and makes oath a churl is he
Who grudges cherries for a fee.
Lavender, sweet-briar, orris. Here
Shall Beauty make her pomander,
Her sweet-balls for to lay in clothes
That wrap her as the leaves the rose.
Take roses red and lilies white,
A kitchen garden's my delight;
Its gillyflowers and phlox and cloves,
And its tall cote of irised doves.
poem by Katharine Tynan
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Quieta Ne Movete II
IF one should wake one's frozen faith
In sunlight of her radiant eyes,
Bid it forget its dream of death,
In this new dream of Paradise,
Bid it forget the long, slow pain,
The agony when, all in vain,
It fought for life, and how one swore,
Once cold, it should not waken more;
If hope one buried long ago
Should thrill beneath those smiles of hers,
Should in one's sere life stir and grow,
As in brown woods the young spring stirs;
If, breaking icy bonds of grief,
One's soul should start to bud and leaf,
It might forget in that springtide
How last year's leaves fell off and died.
If from warm faith and hope set high
A lovely living child was born,
With lips more pure than starlit sky,
And eyes as clear as summer morn,
Child-love might grow till one forgot
Old love, that was and now is not--
Forgot that far-off time of tears,
And all these desolated years.
And yet of faith, hope, love, one knows
So well what end the years will make,
If one should dig beneath Time's snows
And wake them now for her sweet sake.
New life may mean new joy; but then,
What lives again may die again,
And to that second death there may
Be no new resurrection-day.
poem by Edith Nesbit
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An Everlasting Love
Ive been here all your life watching your crying game
You were the heaven in my lonely world
And he was your sun and your rain
I was losing you before I ever held you tight
Before you ever held me in your arms
And I wont make you blue
And maybe an everlasting love will do
Ah, we got an everlasting love
So tall, so wide, so high above the rumble of thunder down below
Its your love I need, its the only show
And its you want an everlasting dream
Can take us anywhere are the tears of yesterday
We killed the pain , we blew away the memories of the tears we cried
And an everlasting love will never die
Take me out of the cold
Give me what Ive hungered for
If its the pleasure of taking my heart that you need
Then it only makes me love you more
I was yours before the stars were born and you were mine
I could have saved you all the pain you knew
And I wont make you cry
And maybe an everlasting love can try
Ah, we got an everlasting love
So tall , so wide, so high above the rumble of thunder down below
Its your love I need, its the only show
And its you want an everlasting dream
Can take us anywhere are the tears are yesterday
We killed the pain , we blew away the memories of the tears we cried
And an everlasting love will never die
(repeat last verse 2 more times and fade)
song performed by by Bee Gees
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Great May
Who said the Spring was dead?
She would not come again,
Dust on her starry head,
For a sad world in pain?
The thing they have said in vain,
She comes new garlanded:
Lovely on hill and plain
Her lights, her flowers are shed.
Never was such a May!
Mercy of God, to prove
Life springs from the clay
And every treasured love
Walks in a heavenly grove.
The Lord God's holiday
To the soft coo of the dove
With the young lambs at play.
Lo! yours, and yours, are there,
I see them leap and run
In a May-world past compare
Whereof our God is sun.
They rejoice, yea, every one
In the ambient light and air,
Their pleasures are not done
From morn till evening star.
Never was such a Spring!
Oh, you whose eyes are wet,
Listen, take comforting,
Our God does not forget.
Poor folk that fear and fret
Your hours are on the wing
To the loves that wait you yet,
Raised up and triumphing.
poem by Katharine Tynan
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The Spring And The Fall
In the spring of the year, in the spring of the year,
I walked the road beside my dear.
The trees were black where the bark was wet.
I see them yet, in the spring of the year.
He broke me a bough of the blossoming peach
That was out of the way and hard to reach.
In the fall of the year, in the fall of the year,
I walked the road beside my dear.
The rooks went up with a raucous trill.
I hear them still, in the fall of the year.
He laughed at all I dared to praise,
And broke my heart, in little ways.
Year be springing or year be falling,
The bark will drip and the birds be calling.
There's much that's fine to see and hear
In the spring of a year, in the fall of a year.
'Tis not love's going hurt my days.
But that it went in little ways.
poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay
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Sage
I planted some sage along
with other herbs
and got small bushes
with blue-purple flowers
and greyish-green leaves.
We used the sage
in the cooking
and sometimes in salads
to flavour it,
but in my mother’s garden
at the front gate
a gigantic blooming bush of sage
greeted me
as if I was setting my foot
into Eden itself.
It was almost a metre high
and twice that breadth
and almost similar in shape
as the neighbour’s rondavel
across the street
and I rubbed some leaves
between my fingers
and it smelt like mint to me.
[Reference: rodavel = a type of round brick hut with a grass roof.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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Which Is So!
THEY CAME TO DRAG I BY THE BELTS!
HE SMOKES HERBS!
THEY SAID!
STILL STAYED I MEDITATING!
ARMED MEN CAME WITH GUNS!
TO CHASE AND HARRASS I
DO TELL ME!
IF INDEED I DID SMOKE HERBS!
WHICH IS MORE DANGEROUS TO MINE HEALTH AND THE PUBLIC'S HEALTH?
THE MEN AND THEIR MACHINE GUNS?
OR I WITH MY HERBS TO BE SMOKED BY I?
poem by Overlord Don Manuel Ihcakeyno
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So Hurt
Its hard I know to understand
Nothing lasts for ever
The things you used to say and do
The places you would go to meet
When you were together
You set your face against the tide
The harsh words that were spoken
But after all the anger
The shouting and the tears
You found your heart was broken
Fight the tears
Fight the fever
Dont give in
Soul deceiver
So hurt
With the pain you cant hide
So lost
And lonely inside
So hurt
When the feeling has died
So hurt
With the pain you cant hide
So lost
And lonely inside
So hurt
When the feeling has died
Just like the clock went back ten years
To make a new beginning
To work out how to live your life
To take the board and play the game
And recognise youre winning
Your memories mean nothing now
Youre just a little older
Moving forward with the crowd
Silent fears but laughing loud
Not wiser but just bolder
Fight the tears
Fight the fever
Fight the hurt
Dont give up
So hurt
With the pain you cant hide
So lost
And lonely inside
So hurt
When the feeling has died
So hurt
With the pain you cant hide
So lost
And lonely inside
So hurt
When the feeling has died
song performed by by Human League
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Lover's Quarrels
JOIN hands, my dear, clasp long and close and fast,
Even this present we shall soon call past,
And lay among the unforgotten days,
Not the less loved because they could not last.
Make haste to put our hasty words away,
And hide them with dead leaves of yesterday,
Cast them aside among forgotten things,
Keep the love warm that turns to green life's grey.
Each little thorn that pricks these present hours
Is sure to hide under our memories' flowers,
Till we shall say, turning the dry wreath over,
'How sweet they were--these dear dead days of ours!'
poem by Edith Nesbit
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Spring Fever
(words & music by giant - baum - kaye)
A little bird, he told me so
He said come on, get on the go
Open your eyes the sky is full of butterflies
The blossoms on the trees stir up the honey bees
Spring makes my fever right
Spring fever, spring is here at last
Spring fever, my hearts beating fast
Get up, get out spring is everywhere
Well if you feel the wanderlust
Just grab a car or hop a bus
In every town theres excitement to be found
So much is happening
Dont miss the joy of spring
The worlds in love just look around
Spring fever comes to everyone
Spring fever, its time for fun
Get up, get out spring is everywhere
Spring fever, its spring fever time
Spring fever, watch that fever climb
Get up, get out spring is everywhere
Spring is everywhere
song performed by by Elvis Presley
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Poet To Be Yet
NOT he who sings smooth songs that soothe—
Sweet opiates that lull asleep
The sorrow that would only weep;
There are some spirit-stains so deep
That only tears may wash away.
Not he whose lays thrill fiercely till
The soul is sick with surfeiting,
Such passion flies, and leaves its sting,
Till through the body quivering
The wearied dull pain throbs again.
Not he whose glad voice says “Rejoice!”
For whom no clouds o'ercast the sky;
Whose god is in his heaven so high
That this dull world he come not nigh:
Life is no sun-kissed optimist!
But he who Sorrow's presence knows,
Who hears the minor chords beneath
The song of life, and feels the breath
Upon his cheek of quiet death,
Yet stirs and sings of life and love.
Who in his suffering yet can sing;
With that calm pathos in his face—
The hopeless yearning of the race—
Can chant the faith that holds its place,
Upsurging through each sore heart's speech;
Who, though his heart bleed, onward leads;
Who knows eternal is our quest,
Yet bids us toil and strive—not rest—
Who looks life o'er and takes its best—
This is the poet to be yet!
poem by Arthur Henry Adams
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