The Blythes Are Quoted by L.M. Montgomery.
Title: The Blythes Are Quoted.
Author: L.M. Montgomery.
Genre: Fiction, short stories, poetry, YA, children's lit, romance.
Country: Canada.
Language: English.
Publication Date: 2009. (Completed in the early 1940s).
Summary: The book consists of 15 short stories, and 41 poems of Anne's and later Walter's (in Part Two) that the Blythes discuss around the evening family fire. The book is split into Part One, that takes place before WWI and Walter's death, and Part Two, that covers the time after WWI and the time during WWII. The stories focus on small-town life in Glen St. Mary, Prince Edward Island. PART ONE: The Piper is the infamous poem of Walter Blythe's often mentioned in Rilla of Ingleside, which he writes in the trenches during World War I, about answering the call of the Piper that comes calling the children away. In Some Fools and a Saint, the new young Methodist minister takes lodgings in a house where Long Alec, his sister Lucia, a bed-ridden invalid Alice, a slow servant, and a bitter house-girl reside, but before he can successfully woo Lucia Field, he has to figure out the mystery behind the mysterious, disruptive, and malicious "hauntings" that have persistently plagued the house and its inhabitants for years. In Twilight in Ingleside the Blythes contemplate on and discuss three of Anne's poems: I Wish You, a poem about the light and adventure Anne wishes unto a reader's life; The Old Path Round the Shore, a sad poem about reminiscences of a lost love in nature; and Guest Room in the Country, an ode to all guest rooms. In An Afternoon with Mr. Jenkins, young Timothy is surprised to see his aunts grow progressively more upset and nervous about something to do with "it being time" and "something being taken away", but when they go to visit a lawyer about this mysterious issue, a strange man takes Timothy for an amazing day of fun and much-needed man-to-man talks - a man with a seeming conscience dilemma of his own. In The Second Evening, the Blythes hear and discuss four more of Anne's poems: The New House is a poem for a new house, and Anne's excitement for all that is yet to come within its walls; Robin Vespers is a poem to honour the life and songs of robins; Night is an ode to the beauty of the night; and Man and Woman, a poem about different hopes and expectations that men and women approach relationships with. In Retribution, Clarissa Wilcox rushes to the death-bed of David Anderson, the husband of her dead sister, to take the chance that he is still coherent to finally tell him all the horrible and awful things she thinks about him, and all the truths she'd held back, but she may have a sad ulterior reason for her anger. In The Third Evening, the Blythes discuss two more of Anne's poems: There Is a House I Love, which is Anne's love poem to a combination of Green Gables and The House of Dreams; and Sea Song, a poem of the sea inspired by Captain Jim and Captain Jim's Lifebook, both introduced in Anne's House of Dreams. In The Twins Pretend, bored millionaire Anthony Lennox, on the island for a summer vacation, allows the twins Jill and P.G. to re-design, re-decorate, and re-vitalize the house he had abandoned long ago for personal love-related tragic reasons, but when it is done the house may have a surprise from his past for him. In The Fourth Evening, one more of Anne's poems is contemplated on by the Blythes: To a Desired Friend is a poem about what one expects out of a strong, true, loyal friendship. In Fancy's Fool, Esme is still haunted by an instance from her childhood, when she spent time with her mentally-disturbed aunt, where she went into a magical garden and met ghostly figures from lives past, and when she goes back to the garden to try to reconcile her feelings that she wasn't influenced by an active imagination and a disturbed mind, she finds someone quite unexpected there. In The Fifth Evening, two more poems of Anne's are heard by the Blythes: Midsummer Day is a poem written by a teenage Anne that uses personification of the morning, the day, and the evening of a midsummer day; Remembered is a poem Anne wrote while in Richmond college about remembering and aching for a dear place close to her heart. In A Dream Comes True, Anthony Fingold regrets the simplicity and lack of adventure of his whole life, and reminisces on the differences between girl he had always wanted to impress - Caroline Wilkes, and Clara, the sweet and dutiful wife he married, until an unexpected and wild adventure with the now mentally disturbed Caroline puts everything he has in a new light. In The Sixth Evening, the Blythes discuss three more of Anne's poems: Farewell to an Old Room is a poem to honour Anne's room on the night of her wedding as she leaves it for the last time, and wishes all the joys it brought her to its next occupant; The Haunted Room is a poem that recounts people long dead and forgotten that had been through a room - "Even laughter has its ghost"; and The Song of Winter recounts the bad weather contrasted with a cozy house and getting together in front of a fireplace with loved ones. In Penelope Struts Her Theories, Penelope Craig is an expert in child psychology, though in theory only, but she is convinced that will be enough until she ends up with two adolescent boys on her hands and way more than she bargained for. In The Seventh Evening, the Blythes discuss three more of Anne's poems: Success is about a person who sacrifices everything for financial success, and can't admit that it wasn't worth it; The Gate of Dream is a poem of Anne's composed in Lover's Lane in her youth about her dreaming of and striving for her future life; and An Old Face describes a face aged with grace and full of wisdom at the end of a life, and Anne's yearning to age in this way, as well. In The Reconciliation, Miss Shelley finally decides to forgive Lisle Stephens for a 30-year-old slight, but when she realizes Lisle has no recollection and places no importance on a quarrel so many years past, her generous spirit gives out. In The Cheated Child, after his uncle's death, 8-year-old Pat has to decide which one of his relatives he will live with after giving them all a few months trial, but when he finds out he doesn't like any of them, and they want him only for the money that comes with adopting him, he runs away to a magical house he has been looking at and dreaming about from afar with an unsettled feeling in his heart, and finds the most unexpected thing there - family. In Fool's Errand, after the death of his mother, Lincoln Burns knows he's going to be forced to marry by his sister, but while he despairs of not really liking any of the girls available and being sure they would force him to give up his preferred way of life, he recalls an instance in his childhood when he met a young girl and had promised to come back and marry her some day, and though he knows it's a silly undertaking, journeys to look for her on the chance she may still be waiting. In The Pot and the Kettle, Chrissy is infuriated when her uncle's will states that she will inherit millions if she marries a man whom he had chosen for her whom she had never met (and a man who didn't even take an interest in coming down and seeing her before making his own choice), and runs off to visit her nurse in the country, where she conceals her privileged identity and, to her own horror, falls in love with a poor gardener, but when she finally gives in and gives up everything for all, she is shocked to discover the gardener had kept some parts of his identity secret, as well. PART TWO: In Another Ingleside Twilight, the Blythes discuss five poems of Blythe's and three of Anne's: Interlude is a melancholy poem of Walter's about dreams of yesterday; Come, Let Us Go is Anne's poem yearning for the good old days, and especially the peace the world had lost after the war; A June Day is Walter's celebration of a beautiful June day and the adventures it holds; Wind of Autumn is Walter's ode to the autumn wind he loved so much, and the haunting images of elder times it evokes; The Wild Places is Walter's appreciation for places in the wild away from busy cities and streets; For Its Own Sake is Anne's ode to love, and her description of how she loves Love for its own sake, and not for an expectation of anything in return; The Change, a poem of Anne's, describing a death of a little hope in the night; and I Know is a poem of Walter's about Rainbow Valley and Ingleside that is familiar in its natural beauty and always waiting for him with open arms. In Brother Beware, Timothy Randebush hatches an elaborate plan to kidnap a young woman and keep her on a deserted island in a comfortable house until his brother Amos leaves town, to save him from what he considers would be an imprudent match, but gets into trouble when he falls for the lady himself. In The Second Evening, the Blythes discuss another two poems of Anne's and one of Walter's: In The Wind, Anne celebrates different types of wind that she loves; The Bride Dreams is a poem of Anne's about a young bride waking up from a nightmare where she was dead but conscious in her grave, and could see many sad burials beside her, and the man she loves move on to another woman; May Song is Walter's poem about the beauty and possibility of spring, and a beautiful May day. Here Comes the Bride is a story told during the wait for an arrival of the bridal party, at a controversial wedding of two young people who had hated each other all their lives, with the bride having broken off an engagement to someone else just a couple of months prior, by several cynical and judgemental on-lookers, as well as friends and members of the family, who bring the true story to light. In The Third Evening, the Blythes read two of Anne's poems and one of Walter's: The Parting Soul is Anne's poem that she finished for Walter about a dying soul about to depart this world; My House is Walter's poem about what it takes for a house to become a home; and Memories is Anne's poem about beautiful nature recalling memories of someone to her that she can never have back again. In A Commonplace Woman, while ancient great-aunt Ursula is dying, her family waits impatiently and pities her for a completely unremarkable, useless life, while she recalls what to her is a youth most of the people she knows can never have - a passionate affair with a beautiful artist who becomes famous and puts a piece of her into his paintings forevermore, and an illegitimate child whom she watches over all of her life as a seamstress to the family and eventually saves from an abusive husband. In The Fourth Evening, the Blythes ruminate on two of Anne's and two of Walter's poems: Canadian Twilight is Walter's ode to the beauty of Canadian wilderness and nature; Oh, We Will Walk with Spring Today is yet another of Walter's poems that celebrates the joy and beauty of spring; Grief was written by Anne as an echo to Matthew's death in her youth, and the dealing with grief when it comes, and when it eventually passes, leaving one guilty of not feeling it anymore; and The Room is a poem of Anne's about a room haunted by miserable, unhappy ghosts. In The Road to Yesterday, Susette, faced with an impending proposal she knows she should accept from a man she doesn't really like, escapes his family to visit a farm where she played as a child with her friends, and runs into one of them, all grown-up, and though it's a man who used to be a boy that everyone, including Susette, really hated, and though she tries to hold on to that feeling, the man before her is very different from the boy she remembers - almost suspiciously so. In Au Revoir, the Blythes for the last time discuss four more of Walter's poems: I Want is a poem about yearning to get away from the noise of the city to the peace of nature and the country; The Pilgrim is a poem about a pilgrim on an eternal quest of wandering and beauty; Spring Song is a poem that celebrates the birth of Hope and Love every spring; and The Aftermath is a poem written on the battlefield shortly before Walter's death about the expectations versus the realities of war.
My rating: 8/10
My Review:
♥ "As for fools... we all have plenty of chances to be fools... and we take them."
~~Twilight at Ingleside.
♥ I WISH YOU
Friend o' mine, in the year oncoming
I wish you a little time for play.
And an hour to dream in the eerie gloaming
After the clamorous day.
(And the moon like a pearl from an Indian shore
To hang for a lantern above your door.)
A little house with friendly rafters
And someone in it to need you there,
Wine of romance and wholesome laughters
With a comrade or two to share.
(And some secret spot of your very own
Whenever you want to cry alone.)
I wish you a garden on fire with roses,
Columbines planted for your delight,
Scent of mint in its shadowy closes,
Clean gay winds at night.
(Some nights for sleeping and some to ride
With the broomstick witches far and wide.)
A goodly crop of figs to gather,
With a thistle or two to prick or sting,
Since a harvesting too harmless is rather
An unadventurous thing.
(And now and then, spite of reason of rule,
The chance to be a bit of a fool.)
I wish you a thirst that can never be sated
For all the loveliness earth can yield,
Slim, cool birches whitely mated
Dawn on an April field.
(And never too big a bill to pay
When the Fiddler finds he must up and away.)
♥ from THE OLD PATH ROUND THE SHORE
...Here everything still speaks of you... the waters lisp your name,
My listening heart repeats it as it used to when you came.
Your laughter in the breezes rings more clearly than your own,
The whispers in the fir boughs seem the echo of your tone,
The summer skies above the sea are as your deep eyes blue
But rose and lover wait in vain for you will come no more
To walk, the world forgetting, on the old path on the shore...
♥ from ROBIN VESPERS
One must be glad to hear them so,
They are so glad themselves;
Some darling secret they must know
Shared by the tree-top elves,
Some secret they would fain repeat
To us ere darkness falls,
When far and sweet and near and sweet
We list the robin calls.
♥ NIGHT
A pale, enchanted moon is sinking low
Behind the dunes that fringe the shadowy lea,
And there is haunted starlight on the flow
Of immemorial sea.
I am alone and need no more pretend
Laughter or smile to hide a hungry heart,
I walk with solitude as with a friend,
Enfolded and apart.
We tread and eerie road across the moor,
Where shadows weave upon their ghostly looms,
And winds sing an old lyric that might lure
Sad queens from ancient tombs.
I am a sister to the loveliness
Of cool, far hill and long-remembered shore,
Finding in it a sweet forgetfulness
Of all that hurt before.
The world of day, its bitterness and cark,
No longer have the power to make me weep...
I welcome this communion of the dark
As toilers welcome sleep.
♥ DR BLYTHE, repentantly:- "No, but I always think of you beginning to live when I saw you first. The egotism of man, you will say truly. But people do forget because they have to. The world couldn't go on if they didn't. And there is something to hurt one every day, you know."
~~The Second Evening.
♥ They went out and sat down on the veranda steps. Anthony looked around him. What a beautiful, melancholy old place it was! And once it had been so gay.
How weedy had grown the garden his mother had love! That far corner where nothing had been allowed to grow but violets was a jungle of burdocks. He felt the reproach of the house. It had once been full. Men and women had loved each other in it. There had been births and deaths... agony and joy... prayer... peace... shelter.
And yet it was not satisfied. It craved more life. It was a shame to have neglected it so long. He had loved it well once.
♥ "Men in love are never sensible... and rarely unselfish, Jill. And, you see, I was terribly hurt."
♥ "Surely you know who Helen of Troy was!"
"Of course. My ancient history has grown a little rusty, that's all. She was the lady men fought for ten years about. I wonder if the winner thought she was worth fighting about so long?"
"Susan Baker says no woman ever is or was," said P.G., "but then nobody ever fought about her."
~~The Twins Pretend.
♥ TO A DESIRED FRIEND
I have a right to you...
In your face I read you, witty, loving, loyal,
Made for discontents divine, satisfactions royal,
We will dare more greatly, faring on a common way...
I know that we can be young and old together,
Playing life's great game with zest, caring little whether
Gain or loss come of it, so the game be worth the play.
I would not be friends with all... friendship is too fine
To be thus worn threadbare out... but you are mine!
I know we love the same things...
Little wandering stars, all the timeless rapture
Of a windy night when our thoughts are safe from capture,
All the pale witcheries or old enchanted woods.
We can walk the open road when rainy twilights linger,
Or when sunset touches us with a golden finger,
Or be intimate with moonlight in gypsy solitudes.
Shining autumns will be ours, white immortal Mays,
Nights that will be purple pearls, binding in our days.
We will give each other
The right good gift of a laughter free from malice,
Glowing words that fall blood-red as drops from a chalice,
Daring to be silent, too, because we trust.
We will be merry when the firelight purrs and flashes,
We will sorrow together over the white ashes,
When our high dreams have gone into the dust.
Nice old rooms will nicer be for our folly talks,
Gardens will the dearer be for our remembered walks.
We have a right to each other...
A right to the savour and tang of losing and keeping,
A right to a fellowship in sowing and reaping,
Oh, there will be time for all we have to tell!
We have lost too much in the years that are behind us.
Here's my hand... take it as frankly... all will be well...
Till the last lure beckons, till the road makes end,
You and I will keep our step, friend with friend.
♥ WALTER thinking: I hope I'll meet a friend like that some day.
A VOICE NO ONE HEARS: You will. And his name will be death.
~~The Fourth Evening.
♥ "So the ugly duckling has turned out a swan," twinkled Mrs. Barry when they met... by way of setting Esme at ease.
But Esme, had Mrs. Barry but known it, was not in any special need of that. She was always quite mistress of herself under the fine aloofness which so many mistook for shyness... so many except Mrs. Dr. Blythe and she lived too far away for frequent meetings.
~~Fancy's Fool.
♥ from MIDSUMMER DAY
Evening comes as an angel fair
Over the hills of western glory,
With a mist of starshine upon her hair
In her lucent eyes a remembered story;
Walking graciously over the lands,
Benediction and peace in her hands,
Holding close to her ivory breast
Dear memories like infants hushed to rest.
Under the purring pines she sings
Where the clear, cold dews are limpidly falling,
Hers is the wisdom of long-loved things,
Lo, in her voice we may hear them calling.
She will teach us the holy mystery
Of the darkness glimmering o'er the lea,
And we shall know ere we fall asleep
That our souls are given to her to keep.
♥ from REMEMBERED
Through the shriek of the city comes to me
A whisper of some old ecstasy,
Dusk on the meadows and dusk on the sea;
Apple-blossoms cool with night,
Grey ghost-mists by the harbour light,
And a new moon setting sad and fair
Behind a hill that has knelt in prayer.
I had forgotten that far spruce hill
With its wind of darkness blowing chill,
Haunt of owl and of whippoorwill.
But now I think of it and know
That it has my heart wherever I go,
There with the friendship of wind and star,
Where one can believe the Green Folk are.
People rush by me mad and fleet
But I am not on this haggard street,
I am out where the shadows and silences meet
Round an old grey house that is dear to me
Between the hills and the calling sea,
Where one in the twilight magic may
Find a lost and lovely yesterday.
♥ DR. BLYTHE: "...but as far as being a slave of time goes we are all that in one way or another, Anne-girl."
SUSAN: "But a good deal depends on who is your master."
JEM: "Gold, whether tarnished or not, is a very necessary thing in this world, mother."
SUSAN: "Good sound sense for you."
DR. BLYTHE: "So long as you are not its slave, Jem. Perhaps that is why the editors wouldn't take your poem, Anne. They saw too little gold to be sympathetic with your scorn of it."
~~The Fifth Evening.
♥ They would never have elected him elder, he reflected, as he trotted along the village street, if they had known what a desperate fellow he was in reality. They never dreamed of the wild adventures and glorious deeds he was constantly having and performing in imagination.
When he raked and burned leaves on Sara Allenby's lawn he was fighting Indians on old frontiers; while he painted George Robinson's barn he was discovering a gold mine on the Rand; while he helped Marhsall Elliott haul in his hay he was rescuing a beauteous maiden from drowning at great risk to himself; while he was putting up the storm windows at Ingleside he was blazing trails through primeval forests, treading where no other foot had trod; when he unloaded Augustus Palmer's coal he was being taken captive by a cannibal king on some savage island; when he helped Trench Moore cut ice he was stalking tigers in equatorial jungles; while he chopped wood and puttered about the garden he was in splendid peril exploring Polar seas; when he sat in church by the side of his impeccable Clara, in her honey-coloured Sunday crimps, he was robbing temples in Burma of emeralds as large as pigeon eggs... or should it be rubies?
♥ It would have amazed Anthony not a little if he had known that Clara knew all about his passion for Caroline Wilkes... and did not care. She knew all that it amounted to. Just one of those crazy fancies of his. And she knew what Caroline Wilkes was like now and what ailed her. And why the Wilkes family had come to Prince Edward Island that year so early. Everyone knew. It would have amazed Anthony had he known how much Clara knew. Perhaps it would amaze most husbands.
~~A Dream Comes True.
♥ from FAREWELL TO AN OLD ROOM
So I say goodbye with tears
To my room of happy years,
And if she who comes to stay
Here when I have gone away
Be a girl I leave her, too,
All the fairy dreams I knew,
All my fancies, all the hosts
Of my little friendly ghosts.
♥ from THE HAUNTED ROOM
Here Dorothea dances yet,
That dark and vivid girl,
Though many a year the graveyard dust
Has shrouded cheek and curl.
Here Allan tells a tale of love
That brings its olden thrill,
Though Allan's lips are mute and cold,
And Allan's heart is still.
Here Will's wild strains of music yet
In witching cadence fall,
Though Will's old fiddle long untouched
Hangs soundless on the wall.
Edith and Howard, Jen and Joe,
They come, a friendly host,
I hear their laughter and their jests...
Even laughter has its ghost.
♥ "And is he in love with Miss Craig?"
What an outspoken person this Mrs. Blythe was! On her part she was thinking how hard it was to find out simple things. People took it so for granted that you must know all they did.
♥ "Does Miss Craig like children? It seems to me that that is a very important point."
"I asked her that once," said Mrs. Collins, "and all she said was, 'My dear Nora, why don't you ask me if I like grown-up people?' Now, what do you make out of that?"
"Well, she was right," said Mrs. Fulton. "Some children are likeable and some aren't."
A memory of Josie Pye drifted across Anne's mind.
"We all know that," she said, "in spite of sentimental piffle."
~~Penelope Struts Her Theories.
♥ SUCCESS
Come, drain the cup held to our lips at last,
Though it may yield the briny taste of tears,
For this we have foregone our joy of youth,
For this we have lived bitter, patient years...
What tang does brew of fig and thistle keep?
Let us drink deep!
Oh, shudder not... the goblet is of gold!
For this we bent our knee at a grim shrine
While others danced to kind and merry gods!
For this we put aside life' choicest wine,
To slake our still unsated lift up
This sacramental cup!
Surely 'twill pay for all that we have missed...
Laughter unlaughed, sweet hours of love and sleep,
Hungers unsatisfied and barren dreams,
How the sly years are mocking us! Drink deep
And vaunt... for who can guess it is a lie?...
The price was not too high.
Was it for such a devil's jorum we
Bartered our precious things and turned from ease,
Winning by dint of many a gallant day
Splendid defeats and abject victories?
But see you not how bring the diamond wink?
Be brave... once more... and drink!
♥ from AN OLD FACE
...Many a wild, adventurous year
Wrote its splendid record here,
Stars of many an old romance
Shine in that ironic glance;
Many a hideous vital day
Came and smote and passed away,
Now this face is ripe and glad,
Patient, sane, a little sad.
Friend to life yet with no fear
Of the darkness drawing near,
Those so-gallant eyes must see
Dawnlight of eternity.
See the Secret Vision still
High on some supernal hill...
'Tis a daring hope I hold
To look like this when I am old.
♥ "Do you suppose a boy brought up at Oaklands would choose this?"
Barney waved his hand at the sagging gate and at the old clapboard house that needed paint so badly and at an outmoded reaper in the yard.
But to Pat he seemed to be waving at the boatload of petunias and Jiggs and the bedroom with the garden door at the long, level meadows beyond and at an unseen school where he would be "Pat" among the boys and the Squaw Baby would be sitting where she could stick her tongue out at him whenever she wanted to.
~~The Cheated Child.
♥ But then they had always taken different views of the business of living. Helen wanted to make the business prosperous. Lincoln wanted to make it beautiful. To him it did not matter so much of the wheat crop failed as long as the autumn brought asters and goldenrod.
Like other men in Mowbray Narrows he was accustomed to walk around his farm every Sunday. But it was not, as with them, to see how his roots and pastures were and how the sheep were coming on. Instead it was for the sake of his own dear woods at the back... little fields with young spruces all round them... grey, windy pastures of twilight... or a lane where shadows blew about.
♥ "You may tire of reality... but you never tire of dreams," Mrs. Blythe had said.
♥ He always liked to be out in the night... to stand on his hill and watch the stars in a beautiful aloneness... to pace up and down under dim stately trees that were of some kin to him... to enjoy the beauty of darkness or the fine blue crystal of moonlight.
If he married any of the women he knew, would he be able to do this?
♥ It all came back to the fact that he was sure nobody would ever understand him as well as he understood himself.
~~Fool's Errand.
♥ "'I have a right to make my own mistakes,' I said."
"So have we all," thought Clack, "but we haven't the right to blame the consequences on somebody else. Though most of us do it," she added honestly.
♥ "Oh, she likes a bouquet for the dining room table, especially when she has company. But she doesn't care a hoot for the garden itself. As Mrs. Blythe says, you have to work in a garden yourself or you miss its meaning."
♥ "The real reason is... you think a gardener is not good enough for a governess."
"Don't be absurd, Don."
"So many true things are absurd."
~~The Pot and the Kettle.
♥ from INTERLUDE
...I saw a shadowy ship
Upon her seaward way,
And felt upon my lip
A kiss of yesterday.
I walked again beside
The dark enchantress, Night,
Until the dawn's white pride
Brought back a lost delight.
♥ from COME, LET US GO
...The gentle night will be kind to me,
The ivied porch will be motherly,
By the old stone step and the sagging sill
The hopes of youth are lingering still,
And I shall find when that steps is crossed
A secret of peace that the world has lost.
♥ A JUNE DAY
Come, 'tis a day that was born for dreaming,
A day in June for adventurers.
We will have done with worry and scheming,
Here, where a west wind purrs;
We will forget we are tired and old,
We will forget our plots for gold,
We will just remember the little wild rose,
Ad the lure of a cloud that comes and goes.
We will just remember the nested meadow,
And the wonderful peace of the high blue skies,
The leaves' green flicker, the wood-fern's shadow,
The moths and the butterflies.
We will drive out fear and take hope instead,
We will wander just where our feet are led,
Taking no heed for roof or bar,
Till we keep an old tryst with the evening star.
Good-bye for a day to the bitter striving,
The fret and corrosion of desk and mart,
Ours will be gypsy honey for hiving,
And ours the childhood heart.
Ours to loiter by brooks empearled,
As if there were never a clock in the world,
Ours to march with the windy firs...
We are June-time adventurers!
♥ WIND OF AUTUMN
I walked with Wind of Autumn across the upland airy,
Where canny eyes might hope to spy the little Men in Green,
By road of firs that should have led right on to land of faery,
Enchanted lands the sun and moon between.
I might have met the Olden Gods in those wild friendly places,
I think they peeped at me and laughed as I went on my way,
The little fauns and satyrs hid in all the haunted places
Where Wind of Autumn led me on that day.
The hemlock harp for music, immortal wine for drinking,
Oh, but we were rare good comrades, that gallant wind and I,
As hand in hand we wandered till roguish stars were winking
Between the scurrying cloudlets in the sky.
And oh, my sleep was sweet that night until the dawn came shyly,
And all the pretty dreams I had made haste to slip away,
For Wind of Autumn just outside was calling, calling, slyly,
"Come with me for another spendthrift day."
♥ from THE WILD PLACES
...For these wild places hold their own
Boon myths of faun and goblin still,
And have a lingering goodwill
For folk in green if truth were known...
Oh, what an old delightful fear...
Hush... listen... hear!
♥ from THE CHANGE
...The west wind overhead in the beeches
Is the friend of lovers still,
And the river puts its arm as bluely
Around the beckoning hill.
The rose that laughed in the waning twilight
Laughs with the same delight,
But, pale and sweet as the lilies of Eden,
A little hope died last night.
♥ JEM: - "But what about 'the little house'?"
RILLA: - "Oh, that was really Ingleside and mums. But he thought 'little house' more romantic. You can't tie yourself strictly down to facts in poetry.
SUSAN: - "Nor in anything, I do believe. I've lived long enough to learn that. There are some things that are truer than facts, as Mrs. Dr. dear once said to me."
~~Another Ingleside Twilight.
♥ Of course it was mighty lonesome for her there with not even a dog to talk to. Suppose he took her a dog. No, that would never do. A dog might attract attention by barking. But a cat, now. The very thing. She had mentioned she was fond of cats... also that she had heard a rat. He'd take her a cat. He'd better take it the next evening. Rats sometimes did a lot of damage.
By four o'clock the next day Timothy was skimming across the Harbour. In the bow was a yowling, squirming, shapeless thing... Matilda Merry's cat tied up in a potato bag.
Timothy suspected that Matilda Merry would raise Cain when she missed her pet but after kidnapping women you grew callous in respect to cats.
~~Brother Beware.
♥ from THE WIND
...But I loved the wind of the valley more
With the homely wholesome croon of it,
The wind of the hearth and the open door,
Friendship and love were the boon of it.
Wind of a garden of balm and musk,
Wind of the midnight, wind of the dusk,
Wind of the valley, blow for me
Wherever my own fireside may be.
♥ from MAY SONG
...The world is full of songs...
Like hearts of voiceless birds...
To us the joy belongs
Of giving to them words.
To us the joy of May,
Of every lyric thing...
What though our heads are grey?
No one is old in spring.
No one is old and sad,
Immortal youth is here...
We'll just be mad and glad
With the mad, glad young year!
♥ from MY HOUSE
...It wants faces like flowers at the windows and doors,
It wants secrets and follies and fun,
It wants love by the hearthstone and friends by the gate,
And good sleep when the long day is done:
It wants laughter and joy, it wants gay trills of song
On the stairs, in the hall, everywhere,
It wants wooings and weddings and funerals and births,
It wants tears, it wants sorrow and prayer,
Content with itself as the years go and come...
Oh, it needs many things for a house to be home!
♥ Talk about gossip! It was the most powerful thing in the world and always would be.
♥ "And I suppose those fools in the parlour down there are pitying me. Fools! Fools! Life has been good. I have had my hours. Have they ever had one? Nobody ever loved Kathie as Larry loved me... nobody ever loved her at all. And nobody loved poor John. Yes, they have despised me... the whole Anderson clan have always despised me. But I have lived... oh, I have lived... and they have never lived... at least none of my generation. I... I... I have been the one who has lived. I have sinned... so the world would say... I have been a murderess... so the world would say... but I have lived!"
~~A Commonplace Woman.
♥ from Oh, We Will Walk with Spring Today
Oh, we will walk with spring today,
With fair and laughing Lady May,
In all sweet carelessness among
The gods who rules when earth was young:
On secret trails of spell and rune
Where wondrous things might happen soon,
Some hidden pixy whisper low
A wise Lost Word of Long Ago
Or naked foot of dryad press
Her path of haunted loveliness.
...Oh, we will walk with spring today
Along a scented blossom way,
In friendly mossy hollows sip
A sacramental fellowship,
And tryst with winds that seem the truth
To blow from out the Land of Youth,
Oh, we will be as glad as song
And happy as our quest is long,
With hearts that laugh because in Spring
One can believe in anything.
♥ GRIEF
To my door came grief one day
In the dawnlight ashen grey,
All unwelcome entered in,
Took the seat where Joy had been
At my hearthstone when the glow
Of my fire had faded low,
In Love's own accustomed place
Grief sat with me face to face.
In the noonday's ministry
Grief was ever near to me,
In the mournful eventide
Grief was closely at my side,
Shrinking from her sullen woe
Much I longed to see her go.
Music lost its tender grace
When I looked on her grim face,
Flowers no more were sweet to me,
Sunshine lost its witchery,
Laughter hid itself in fear
Of that Presence dour and dear,
Little dreams in pale dismay
Made all haste to steal away.
Reft of what had made me glad,
Grief alone was all I had,
Then I took her to my breast,
Cherished her as welcome guest,
Fairer every day she grew,
More beloved, king and true...
Thus it was that Grief to me
Friend and comrade came to be.
Broke at last a bitter day
When my dear Grief went away;
On a silver-dappled dawn
I awoke and found her gone;
Oh, the emptiness and smart
That she left within my heart!
Vain my lonely, ceaseless plea,
"Faithless Grief, come back to me!"
♥ from THE ROOM
...There are no happy ghosts...
The happy dead lie still;
Only they come, the hosts,
Who did or suffer ill.
Old scandals lurk and creep,
Old lies and mockeries,
Secrets that poisoned sleep,
And ancient cruelties.
Oh, who would think this room,
This pleasant firelit place,
Where rosy shadows bloom
Was such a haunted place?
♥ "Anyway, it's a poor family that can't afford one madman. I was never much of a one for poetry but didn't somebody once write something like this? I'm sure I've heard Walter quoting it.
There is a pleasure in being mad
That none but madmen know."
~~The Road to Yesterday.
♥ from THE PILGRIM
...I may be I shall tread
Some fair uncharted way,
Where I shall meet my dead
Dear dreams of yesterday.
The white spring shall be mine
And mine the summer's good,
The tang of autumn wine,
The winter's solitude.
Here, boughs shall hold me in
With green possessive grace,
There, where the dunes begin,
Wave spray shall whip my face.
I'll wander far and wide
With neither haste nor rest,
All beauty for my guiding star
And my eternal quest.
♥ from SPRING SONG
...O Hope, you blossom on my way
Like violet from the clod,
And Love makes rosy all the way
When spring comes back from God.
♥ JEM: - "Walter never bayonetted anyone, mother. But he saw... he saw..."
ANNE, steadily: - "I am thankful now, Jem, that Walter did not come back. He could never have lived with his memories... and if he had seen the futility of the sacrifice they made then mirrored in this ghastly holocaust..."
JEM: thinking of Jam, Jr., and young Walter: - "I know... I know. Even I who am a tougher brand than Walter... but let us talk of something else. Who was it said, 'We forget because we must'? He was right."
~~Au Revoir.