Bee

___________________________ TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that, the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I marked the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way I doubted if I should ever come back. I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. ------------------- Robert Frost. 1875–

_New Year's Recipe__________________________ If you want to have a beautiful New Year The color of the rainbow or the color of your peace, A New Year beyond comparing to all the time you've already lived,(lived badly perhaps or senselessly) If you want to have a year Not freshly painted with everything back on the right track, But new in the feelings of coming to be;New Down to the heart of the things you are least aware of (to begin with what's inside you) New, spontaneous, you don't find it to be so perfect, But with it you eat, you walk, You love, you understand, you work. You don't need to drink champagne or any other drink ,You don't need to go on visits or receive cards (You plan to receive cards?Send telegrams?) You don't need To make a list of good resolutions To file in your bureau drawer. You don't need to cry with regret Over foolish things you've already done Or to half believe That by the decree of hope From January onward things will ch...

  To Mary: I Sleep with Thee I sleep with thee, and wake with thee,  And yet thou art not there;  I fill my arms with thoughts of thee,  And press the common air.  Thy eyes are gazing upon mine  When thou art out of sight;  My lips are always touching thine  At morning, noon, and night.  I think and speak of other things  To keep my mind at rest,  But still to thee my memory clings  Like love in woman's breast.  I hide it from the world's wide eye  And think and speak contrary,  But soft the wind comes from the sky  And whispers tales of Mary.  The night-wind whispers in my ear,  The moon shines on my face;  The burden still of chilling fear  I find in every place.  The breeze is whispering in the bush,  And the leaves fall from the tree,  All sighing on, and will not hush,  Some pleasant tales of thee.  Song [Secret Love] I hid my love when young while I Couldn't bear the buzzing of a fly I hid my love to my despite Till I could not bear to look at light I dare not gaze up...

We Have Been Friends Together We have been friends together, In sunshine and in shade; Since first beneath the chestnut-trees In infancy we played. But coldness dwells within thy heart, A cloud is on thy brow; We have been friends together— Shall a light word part us now? We have been gay together; We have laugh’d at little jests; For the fount of hope was gushing Warm and joyous in our breasts. But laughter now hath fled thy lip, And sullen glooms thy brow; We have been gay together— Shall a light word part us now? We have been sad together, We have wept, with bitter tears, O’er the grass-grown graves, where slumber’d The hopes of early years. The voices which are silent there Would bid thee clear thy brow; We have been sad together— Oh! what shall part us now? Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton (1808-1877)

The Ecstasy Where, like a pillow on a bed,      A pregnant bank swell'd up, to rest  The violet's reclining head,      Sat we two, one another's best.  Our hands were firmly cemented      By a fast balm, which thence did spring;  Our eye-beams twisted, and did thread      Our eyes upon one double string.  So to engraft our hands, as yet      Was all the means to make us one;  And pictures in our eyes to get      Was all our propagation.  As, 'twixt two equal armies, Fate      Suspends uncertain victory,  Our souls—which to advance their state,      Were gone out—hung 'twixt her and me.  And whilst our souls negotiate there,      We like sepulchral statues lay;  All day, the same our postures were,      And we said nothing, all the day.  If any, so by love refined,      That he soul's language understood,  And by good love were grown all mind,      Within convenient distance stood,  He—though he knew not which soul spake,      Because both meant, both spake the s...

[One day I wrote her name upon the strand] One day I wrote her name upon the strand,  But came the waves and washed it away:  Again I wrote it with a second hand,  But came the tide, and made my pains his prey.  Vain man, said she, that dost in vain assay  A mortal thing so to immortalize!  For I myself shall like to this decay,  And eek my name be wiped out likewise.  Not so (quoth I), let baser things devise  To die in dust, but you shall live by fame:  My verse your virtues rare shall eternize,  And in the heavens write your glorious name;  Where, whenas death shall all the world subdue,  Our love shall live, and later life renew. Edmund Spenser 

Mary’s Lamb Mary had a little lamb, Its fleece was white as snow; And everywhere that Mary went, The lamb was sure to go. He followed her to school one day— That was against the rule; It made the children laugh and play, To see a lamb at school. So the teacher turned him out, But still he lingered near, And waited patiently about, Till Mary did appear. Then he ran to her, and laid His head upon her arm, As if he said, "I'm not afraid— You'll keep me from all harm." "What makes the lamb love Mary so?" The eager children cry. "Oh, Mary loves the lamb, you know," The teacher did reply. Sarah Josepha Hale