From the Quote of the Week Files, April 27, 2009

Welcome the to Quote of the Week. As we have mentioned, because April is National Poetry Month we have been featuring poems as the Quote of the Week. Below is a story of how this week's poem came to be.
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A couple of week's ago, my father and I were having a bite to eat and the TV was on to a rerun the 2005 Ford Ironman Contest in Hawaii. We weren't really paying much attention to it until they featured 3 contestants who were just starting the running part of the contest even though many had already finished the race. One contestant was 80 years old, the other was a women competing on one leg and the last was battling ALS. All were running well into the night. My father, watched intently and suddenly he was inspired to say,

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
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As some of you my know, my father is battling Alzheimer's Disease and it was a very moving and humbling experience for me as I listened to him recite this stanza of William Ernest Henley's poem, Invictus. And it was another reminder to me that while Alzheimer's may be stealing his brain cells, it isn't stealing his soul. So, this poem's for you Dad!
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Invictus

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate;
I am the captain of my soul.
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Wishing you a most beautiful day, wherever this may find you!

From the Quote of the Week Files, April 20, 2009

Welcome to the Quote of the Week. As you know, because it is National Poetry Month, we have been featuring poems as the Quote of the Week.

This week's poem was one that I had to interpret and write a paper about in my High School English Class (Mr. Jarrod was the teacher). I was able to come up with something thanks to the help of a much smarter and wiser older sister but I was still pretty much clueless of the poem's meaning. I have an idea of it's meaning today but would be interested in what you think!
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Flower in the crannied wall,
I pluck you out of the crannies,
I hold you here, root and all, in my hand,
Little flower -but if I could understand
What you are, root and all, and all in all,
I should know what God and man is.

Lord Alfred Tennyson
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A Recycled Quote of the Week Classic...

Two frogs fell into a deep cream bowl.
One was an optimistic soul.
But the other took the gloomy view.
"We'll drown," he lamented without much ado,
and with a last despairing cry,
he flung up his legs and said "Goodbye."
Quote the other frog with a steadfast grin,
"I can't get out but I won't give in,
I'll just swim around till my strength is spent,
then I'll die the more content."
Bravely he swam to work his scheme,
and his struggles began to churn the cream.
The more he swam, his legs a flutter,
the more the cream turned into butter.
On top of the butter at last he stopped,
and out of the bowl he gaily hopped.
What is the moral? It's easily found...
If you can't hop out, keep swimming around!

Anonymous
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Wishing you a most beautful day, wherever this may find you!

From the Quote of the Week Files, April 13, 2009

April is National Poetry Month and we are in the second week of featuring poems of note for the Quote of the Week. This week's poem is by former Poet Laureate of the United States, Billy Collins. It is a interesting poem (Link to the animated version) that had a way of staying in my mind. Tell me what you think!
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The Dead

The dead are always looking down on us,
they say,
while we are putting on our shoes or making a sandwich,
they are looking down through the glass-bottom boats,
of heaven as they row themselves slowly through eternity.
They watch the tops of our heads moving below on earth,
And when we lie down in a field or on a couch,
Drugged perhaps by the hum of a warm afternoon,
They think we are looking back at them,
which makes them lift their oars and fall silent and wait,
like parents,
for us to close our eyes

Billy Collins
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For an animated version ot the above poem, check out the following link...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iuTNdHadwbk
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A Recycled Quote of the Week Classic...

Love After Love

The time will come
when, with elation,
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror,
and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was yourself.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

Derek Walcott
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Wishing you a most beautiful day, wherever this may find you!

From the Quote of the Week Files, April 6, 2009

Welcome to the Quote of the Week, your weekly spiritual snack for mind, body & soul. April is National Poetry Month and with that in mind, the QoftheW will feature inspirational and meaningful poems for the next 4 weeks.

Life is An ongoing journey that all people must undergo and Mary Oliver's poem, The Journey, expresses the struggle we all face in trying to find ourselves through the all the obstacles that are in our way. Enjoy!
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The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice --
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do --
determined to save
the only life you could save.

~ Mary Oliver ~
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A Recycle Quote (poem) of the Week Classic...

Little Things

Little drops of water
Little grains of sand
Make the mighty ocean
And the pleasant land.

Little deeds of kindness,
Little words of love,
Make our world an Eden
Like the Heaven above.

Thus the little minutes
Humble though they be
Make the mighty ages
Of eternity.

~ Julia Carney ~
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Wishing you a most beautiful day, wherever this may find you!