for you

my cousin once asked me to send her some of the little bits of poetry that i like, and i don't know if i ever did that- and recently, she was telling me that she thought that the discussion of art was reserved for those who are experts on the matter. i told her to take it from me- you don't need to be an accomplished artist to have a sense of connection with art- her response to a piece is as valid as anyone else's. to help remind her of that, this post is dedicated to her. it's just a collection of little phrases that i've collected here and there, that i deem poetry- the music of the following phrases help me remember what is beautiful in my life. those of you who know me well have heard me quote these more than once, i am sure: i'm leaving out the credits, so if you want to know who said what, ask me...

"and i or you pocketless of a dime may purchase the pick of the earth." ( i LOVE this- it is a beautiful way of saying that the best things in life are free...)

"a violet by a mossy stone,
half hidden from the eye!
fair as a star, when only one
is shining in the sky."

"you cannot control your laughter,
you cannot control your love."

"as i read 'jane eyre', i wondered what women dreamt as they gazed at men and at the sea."

"the moment he saw her something inside him knelt down."

"i read my soul by the light of her face." (this is the most gorgeous sentiment i have ever come across in my life. this runs through my head at random moments and i sigh at the words.)

"you must choose between pain and drudgery." (i could write a paragraph about what i think this means, but i don't want to color your interpretations... ask me though, and i'll be glad to expound!)

"he cannot alter what he loves most in her, her lack of compromise, where the romance of the poems she loves still sits with ease in the real world." (from the novel 'the english patient.' that entire book is full of the romance of poetry- romance in an inspired sense, at least in my opinion.)

"massacred time falling with ashes to the floor, tipped by tapered fingers no artist could ignore." (by a friend of mine, from one of many poems she has sent to me without quite realizing how good they are.)

"goethe's poems are like tiny paintings in beautiful frames."

"to live is to be marked.
to live is to change, to acquire the words of a story,
and that is the only celebration we mortals really know."

"as i walk, as i walk, the universe is walking with me." (from the navajo rain dance ceremony. i wrote a paper on walking in victorian literature last year, and this was the entire prologue.)

"i resist anything better than my own diversity
and breathe the air, and leave plenty after me
and am not stuck up, and am in my place." (whitman)

"if literature is more than an escapist pastime, then it should be understood to offer a testimony to what concerns us as alive and thoughtful people..." (walder, postcolonial literatures in english.)

"the magic suggestiveness of music"

so there you have it. an overload of quotes! take them in and take from them what you will. remember- as oscar wilde said-

"it is the spectator and not life that art really mirrors."