Poetry | The Beauty Around Us

Ode to a Cow

When life seems one too many for you,

Go and look at a Cow.

When the futures black and the outlooks blue,

Go and look at a Cow.

For she does nothing but eat her food,

and sleep in the meadows entirely nood,

Refusing to fret or worry or brood,

Because she doesn’t know how. …

Whenever you’re feeling bothered or sore,

Go and look at a Cow,

When everything else is a fearful bore,

Go and look at a Cow.

Observe her gentle and placid air,

Her nonchalance and savoir faire,

Her absolute freedom from every care,

Her imperturbable brow. …

So when you’re at the end of your wits,

Go and look at a Cow

Or when your nerves are frayed to bits,

And wrinkles furrow your brow;

She’ll merely Moo in her gentle way,

Switching her rudder as if to say:

“Bother tomorrow! Let’s Live today!

Take the advice of a cow!” …

from The Old Farmers Almanac – 1936 –

First Day of Spring

It is the first day of Spring, and this is what I see.

First Day of Spring

“Ah, who will tell me, in these leaden days,
Why the sweet Spring delays,
And where she hides, — the dear desire
Of every heart that longs
For bloom, and fragrance, and the ruby fire
Of maple-buds along the misty hills,
And that immortal call which fills
The waiting wood with songs?
The snow-drops came so long ago,
It seemed that Spring was near!
But then returned the snow
With biting winds, and all the earth grew sere,
And sullen clouds drooped low
To veil the sadness of a hope deferred…”

~ Henry Van Dyke, Late Spring

Beauty in the Rain

It is a foggy, rainy Saturday.

BEAUTY IN THE RAIN
by Jim Metcalf

If you fancy that you have an eye for beauty,
test it on a rainy day…
A cold and foggy day that wears no make-up.

Test it in the shades of gray
that consume the sun and rob the flowers of their colors,
leaving them forlorn in dingy places
like tired and aging ballerinas in faded dancing clothes;
huddling in the drafty wings of empty opera houses.

Gaze across the rooftops and the chimneys,
painted like Utrillo’s Paris
On the canvas of the smoke and fog
of a dying afternoon in winter.

It takes no eye for beauty
to find it on a lovely day.
It thrusts itself upon you
in the sunshine and the warm.
But it hides; becomes aloof, elusive
in the cold and in the rain.

Come, Walk With Me

Come, Walk With Me
a poem by Emily Jane Brontë

Come, walk with me,
There’s only thee
To bless my spirit now –
We used to love on winter nights
To wander through the snow;
Can we not woo back old delights?
The clouds rush dark and wild
They fleck with shade our mountain heights
The same as long ago
And on the horizon rest at last
In looming masses piled;
While moonbeams flash and fly so fast
We scarce can say they smiled –

Come walk with me, come walk with me;
We were not once so few
But Death has stolen our company
As sunshine steals the dew –
He took them one by one and we
Are left the only two;
So closer would my feelings twine
Because they have no stay but thine –

‘Nay call me not – it may not be
Is human love so true?
Can Friendship’s flower droop on for years
And then revive anew?
No, though the soil be wet with tears,
How fair soe’er it grew
The vital sap once perished
Will never flow again
And surer than that dwelling dread,
The narrow dungeon of the dead
Time parts the hearts of men -‘

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Bob and I went to Niagara Falls yesterday to celebrate my birthday. En route Niagara Falls we made a brief stop at Griffis Sculpture Park – Rohr Hill Road Site – in Ashford Hollow, NY, where I took the photograph shown above. I feel that the poem “Come, Walk With Me” fits the photograph very well. Do you feel the same way too?

Remembering Dad

Dad passed away 9 years ago today, at the age of 74. Dad was less than a month away from his 75th birthday. This morning I pored through photographs from years past. While looking through the photographs, I recaptured memories of days gone by. I remembered Dad with smiles not tears.

Please click on photograph to enlarge.

This photograph was taken in June 2003 at a family reunion. As Bob and I were getting ready to leave, I asked him to take a picture of my family. I am so thankful that I have this photograph. This is the last photograph I have of Dad, Mom, my brother, Jim, and I.

Don’t think of him as gone away
his journey’s just begun
life holds so many facets
this earth is only one.

Just think of him as resting
from the sorrows and the tears
in a place of warmth and comfort
where there are no days and years.

Think how he must be wishing
that we could know today
how nothing but our sadness
can really pass away.

And think of him as living
in the hearts of those he touched
for nothing loved is ever lost
and he was loved so much.

-Author Unknown

Jack Frost

Jack Frost
By C.E. Pike

Look out! Look out!
Jack Frost is about!|
He’s after our fingers and toes;
And all through the night,
The gay little sprite
Is working where nobody knows.

He’ll climb each tree,
So nimble is he,
His silvery powder he’ll shake.
To windows he’ll creep
And while we’re asleep
Such wonderful pictures he’ll make.

Art, courtesy of Jack Frost

Across the grass
He’ll merrily pass,
And change all its greenness to white.
Then home he will go
And laugh ho, ho ho!
What fun I have had in the night.

A Memorial Day Poem

A Memorial Day Poem

We walked among the crosses
Where our fallen soldiers lay.
And listened to the bugle
As TAPS began to play.

The Chaplin led a prayer
We stood with heads bowed low.
And I thought of fallen comrades
I had known so long ago.

They came from every city
Across this fertile land.
That we might live in freedom.
They lie here ‘neath the sand.

I felt a little guilty
My sacrifice was small.
I only lost a little time
But these men lost their all.

Now the services are over
For this Memorial Day.
To the names upon these crosses
I just want to say,

Thanks for what you’ve given
No one could ask for more.
May you rest with God in heaven
From now through evermore.

– by C W Johnson

The Beauty Around Us

Showcases Portraiture, Scenic & Nature Photography and Feaures a Photo Journal Blog

Posts tagged ‘Poetry’

Ode to a Cow

First Day of Spring

Beauty in the Rain

Come, Walk With Me

Remembering Dad

Jack Frost

A Memorial Day Poem