Thursday Text: Love in Autumn

Sara Teasdale seems appropriate now that it's autumn - her seasonal poems are so delightful.

I sought among the drifting leaves,
The golden leaves that once were green,
To see if Love were hiding there
And peeping out between.

For thro' the silver showers of May
And thro' the summer's heavy heat,
In vain I sought his golden head
And light, fast-flying feet.

Perhaps when all the world is bare
And cruel winter holds the land,
The Love that finds no place to hide
Will run and catch my hand.

I shall not care to have him then,
I shall be bitter and a-cold --
It grows too late for frolicking
When all the world is old.

Then little hiding Love, come forth,
Come forth before the autumn goes,
And let us seek thro' ruined paths
The garden's last red rose.

Thursday Text: Spring Rain

Here's a spring poem from Sara Teasdale:

I thought I had forgotten,
But it all came back again
To-night with the first Spring thunder
In a rush of rain.

I remembered a darkened doorway
Where we stood while the storm swept by,
Thunder gripping the earth
And lightning scrawled on the sky.

The passing motor buses swayed,
For the street was a river of rain,
Lashed into little golden waves
In the lamp light's stain.

With the wild Spring rain and thunder
My heart was wild and gay;
Your eyes said more to me that night
Than your lips would ever say. . . .

I thought I had forgotten,
But it all came back again
To-night with the first Spring thunder
In a rush of rain.

Thursday Text: May Day

A lovely springtime poem by Sara Teasdale: May Day.

A delicate fabric of bird song
Floats in the air,
The smell of wet wild earth
Is everywhere.

Red small leaves of the maple
Are clenched like a hand,
Like girls at their first communion
The pear trees stand.

Oh I must pass nothing by
Without loving it much,
The raindrop try with my lips,
The grass with my touch;

For how can I be sure
I shall see again
The world on the first of May
Shining after the rain?

Thursday Text: On a March Day

I took this picture on Monday after we had some rain that froze and made everything look really pretty. Here's a poem by Sara Teasdale.

Here in the teeth of this triumphant wind
 That shakes the naked shadows on the ground,
Making a key-board of the earth to strike
 From clattering tree and hedge a separate sound,

Bear witness for me that I loved my life,
 All things that hurt me and all things that healed,
And that I swore it this day in March,
 Here at the edge of this new-broken field.

You only knew me, tell them I was glad
 For every hour since my hour of birth,
And that I ceased to fear, as once I feared,
 The last complete reunion with the earth.

Thursday Text: A Winter Night

Here's another season-appropriate poem by Sara Teasdale: A Winter Night.

My window-pane is starred with frost,
The world is bitter cold to-night,
The moon is cruel, and the wind
Is like a two-edged sword to smite.

God pity all the homeless ones,
The beggars pacing to and fro.
God pity all the poor to-night
Who walk the lamp-lit streets of snow.

My room is like a bit of June,
Warm and close-curtained fold on fold,
But somewhere, like a homeless child,
My heart is crying in the cold.

Thursday Text: September Midnight

Sara Teasdale is always great for seasonal poetry. Here's one I found recently called September Midnight.

Lyric night of the lingering Indian Summer,
Shadowy fields that are scentless but full of singin,
Never a bird, but the passionless chant of insects,
Ceaseless, insistent.

The grasshopper's horn, and far-off, high in the maples,
The wheel of a locust leisurely grinding the silence
Under a moon waning and worn, broken,
Tired with summer.

Let me remember you, voices of little insects,
Weeds in the moonlight, fields that are tangled with asters,
Let me remember, soon will the winter be on us,
Snow-hushed and heavy.

Over my soul murmur your mute benediction,
While I gaze, O fields that rest after harvest,
As those who part look long in the eyes they lean to,
Lest they forget them.

Thursday Text: Dusk in June

A lovely poem by Sara Teasdale:

Dusk in June

Evening, and all the birds
In a chorus of shimmering sound
Are easing their hearts of joy
For miles around.

The air is blue and sweet,
The few first stars are white, --
Oh let me like the birds
Sing before night.

Thursday Text: Stars

My most recent poetry class (6 or 7 years ago) introduced me to Sara Teasdale. Her poems are generally on the short side and are very descriptive and beautiful. I just learned that she was from St. Louis. This poem especially spoke to me:

Stars

Alone in the night
On a dark hill
With pines around me
Spicy and still,

And a heaven full of stars
Over my head,
White and topaz
And misty red;

Myriads with beating
Hearts of fire
That aeons
Cannot vex or tire;

Up the dome of heaven
Like a great hill,
I watch them marching
Stately and still,
And I know that I
Am honored to be
Witness
Of so much majesty.