Poem Trees

There is a hill called Castle in the Clumps called Wittenham in the shire of Oxford in that storybook country called Blighty. And on that hill is a tree called Poem.

Anglophile that I am, I can find a bit of old-world atmosphere even in the most tropical of islands. Like my own poem tree I found the other day.

What is this life if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

~ W.H. Davies

In this short Life

That only lasts an hour

How much - how little - is

Within our power

~ Emily Dickinson

Despite the rush of Memorial Weekend and sun-drenched afternoons and the wishful waiting of the world, I find myself drawn to the peace and quiet of poetry.

I'm Nobody! Who are you? 

Are you - Nobody - too?

Then there's a pair of us! 

Don't tell! they'd advertise - you know!

How dreary - to be - Somebody! 

How public - like a Frog -

To tell one's name - the livelong June -

To an admiring Bog!

~Emily Dickinson

Sometimes I cannot put into words the ups and downs, the love and loss, the hopes and fears, the everyday life that I, like everyone else, must go through. But the poets have already voiced my thoughts. I love this poem by Emily Dickinson, because it talks about being afraid of joy. Why does it feel safer to suffer? It is difficult to let the light of hope in through the cracks.

It might be lonelier

Without the Loneliness -

I'm so accustomed to my Fate - 

Perhaps the Other - Peace -

Would interrupt the Dark -

And crowd the little Room -

Too scant - by Cubits - to contain

The Sacrament - of Him -

I am not used to Hope -

It might intrude upon -

Its sweet parade - blaspheme the place -

Ordained to Suffering -

It might be easier

To fail - with Land in Sight -

Then gain - My Blue Peninsula - 

To perish - of Delight -

~ Emily Dickinson

And yet, I find myself hoping, dreaming, waiting - "once below a time".

Though they go mad they shall be sane,

Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;

Though lovers be lost love shall not;

And death shall have no dominion.

~ Dylan Thomas

I wandered lonely as a cloud

 That floats on high o'er vales and hills

~ William Wordsworth