Liberian Literary Magazine
SARA TEASDALE
Advice To A Girl
No one worth possessing Can be quite possessed; Lay that on your heart, My young angry dear; This truth, this hard and precious stone, Lay it on your hot cheek, Let it hide your tear. Hold it like a crystal When you are alone And gaze in the depths of the icy stone. Long, look long and you will be blessed: No one worth possessing Can be quite possessed.
LOUISA MAY ALCOTT
Thoreau ' s Flute
We sighing said, " Our Pan is dead; His pipe hangs mute beside the river Around it wistful sunbeams quiver, But Music ' s airy voice is fled. Spring mourns as for untimely frost; The bluebird chants a requiem; The willow-blossom waits for him; The Genius of the wood is lost."
Then from the flute, untouched by hands, There came a low, harmonious breath: " For such as he there is no death; His life the eternal life commands; Above man ' s aims his nature rose. The wisdom of a just content Made one small spot a continent And turned to poetry life ' s prose.
" Haunting the hills, the stream, the wild, Swallow and aster, lake and pine, To him grew human or divine, Fit mates for this large-hearted child. Such homage Nature ne ' er forgets, And yearly on the coverlid ' Neath which her darling lieth hid Will write his name in violets.
" To him no vain regrets belong Whose soul, that finer instrument, Gave to the world no poor lament, But wood-notes ever sweet and strong. O lonely friend! he still will be A potent presence, though unseen, Steadfast, sagacious, and serene; Seek not for him-- he is with thee."
Promoting Liberian literature, Arts and Culture
WALT WHITMAN
A Noiseless Patient Spider
A noiseless, patient spider, I mark’ d, where, on a little promontory, it stood, isolated; Mark’ d how, to explore the vacant, vast surrounding, It launch’ d forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself; Ever unreeling them— ever tirelessly speeding them.
And you, O my Soul, where you stand, Surrounded, surrounded, in measureless oceans of space, Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing,— seeking the spheres, to connect them; Till the bridge you will need, be form’ d— till the ductile anchor hold; Till the gossamer thread you fling, catch somewhere, O my Soul..
THOMAS HARDY
Drummer Hodge
They throw in Drummer Hodge, to rest Uncoffined-- just as found: His landmark is a kopje-crest That breaks the veldt around: And foreign constellations west Each night above his mound.
Young Hodge the drummer never knew-- Fresh from his Wessex home-- The meaning of the broad Karoo, The Bush, the dusty loam, And why uprose to nightly view Strange stars amid the gloam.
Yet portion of that unknown plain Will Hodge for ever be; His homely Northern breast and brain Grow to some Southern tree, And strange-eyed constellations reign His stars eternally.
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