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May you find yourself in the world…and may you enjoy the company!
William Blake

The Garden of Love

I laid me down upon a bank,
Where Love lay sleeping;
I heard among the rushes dank
Weeping, weeping.

Then I went to the heath and the wild,
To the thistles and thorns of the waste;
And they told me how they were beguiled,
Driven out, and compelled to the chaste.

I went to the Garden of Love,
And saw what I never had seen;
A Chapel was built in the midst,
Where I used to play on the green.

And the gates of this Chapel were shut
And "Thou shalt not," writ over the door;
So I turned to the Garden of Love
That so many sweet flowers bore.

And I saw it was filled with graves,
And tombstones where flowers should be;
And priests in black gowns were walking their rounds,
And binding with briars my joys and desires.

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Eleanor Farjean

Morning Has Broken

Morning has broken, like the first morning
Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird
Praise for the singing, praise for the morning
Praise for the springing fresh from the word

Sweet the rain's new fall, sunlit from heaven
Like the first dewfall, on the first grass
Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden
Sprung in completeness where his feet pass

Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning
Born of the one light, Eden saw play
Praise with elation, praise every morning
God's recreation of the new day

Last edited by Vicky2
Thank you for starting this thread Vicky.
It is a nice addition to yoko's garden post.

Robert Herrick

'Gather ye rose-buds'

Gather ye rose-buds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying:
And this same flower that smiles to-day,
To-morrow will be dying.

The glorious Lamp of Heaven, the Sun,
The higher he's a-getting
The sooner will his race be run,
And nearer he's to setting.

That age is best which is the first,
When youth and blood are warmer:
But being spent, the worse, and worst
Times, still succeed the former.

Then, be not coy, but use your time;
And while ye may, go marry:
For having lost but once your prime,
You may for ever tarry.

Last edited by Gisele
John Sewell

The Apple Garden

Since we cannot meet, my gaze goes to the blossom
it's countless ways of blending carmine into white
and laying both against a complementing green;
but choose however many stems I lean towards
when I inhale there's only scent there for me.

*

I didn't tell you this but when you left
I went through all your rooms and in the bathroom bin
found a drum of body powder with enough left in
when I turned the four holes in the top and tapped it out
against my skin to sense the touch of you again.

*

It's more than a taking off of make-up
when the last petal falls, it's a turning inwards
or a facing away -- becoming something no one
sees or thinks twice about: it's just a tree
that's all, perhaps that's all it ever was.

*

I write to ask: Is everything provisional?
You write that blossom is, but not good friendship
or lovers who are friends. It's months until we meet again,
until the tree reappears, blushed and glorious
under its apples. All it takes is our belief.

Last edited by Gisele
Thank you for joining me Gisele.

Muriel Stuart

In The Orchard

'I thought you loved me.' 'No, it was only fun.'
'When we stood there, closer than all?' 'Well, the harvest moon
Was shining and queer in your hair, and it turned my head.'
'That made you?' 'Yes.' 'Just the moon and the light it made
Under the tree?' 'Well, your mouth, too.' 'Yes, my mouth?'
'And the quiet there that sang like the drum in the booth.
You shouldn't have danced like that.' 'Like what?' 'So close,
Whith your head turned up, and the flower in your hair, a rose
That smelt all warm.' 'I loved you. I thought you knew
I wouldn't have danced like that with any but you.'
'I didn't know, I thought you knew it was fun.'
'I thought it was love you meant.' 'Well, it's done.' 'Yes, it's done.
I've seen boys stone a blackbird, and watched them drown
A kitten... it clawed at the reeds, and they pushed it down
Into the pool while it screamed. Is that fun, too?'
'Well, boys are like that... Your brothers...' 'Yes, I know.
But you, so lovely and strong! Not you! Not you!'
'They don't understand it's cruel. It's only a game.'
'And are girls fun, too?' 'No, still in a way it's the same.
It's queer and lovely to have a girl...' 'Go on.'
'It makes you mad for a bit to feel she's your own,
And you laugh and kiss her, and maybe you give her a ring,
But it's only in fun.' 'But I gave you everything.'
'Well, you shouldn't have done it. You know what a fellow thinks
When a girl does that.' 'Yes, he talks of her over his drinks
And calles her a--' 'Stop that now, I thought you knew.'
'But it wasn't with anyone else. It was only you.'
'How did I know? I thought you wanted it too.
I thought you were like the rest. Well, what's to be done?'
'To be done' 'Is it all right?' 'Yes.' 'Sure?' 'Yes, but why?'
'I don't know, I thought you where going to cry.
You said you had something to tell me.' 'Yes, I know.
It wasn't anything relly... I think I'll go.'
'Yes, it's late. There's thunder about, a drop of rain
Fell on my hand in the dark. I'll see you again
At the dance next week. You're sure that everything's right?'
'Yes,' 'Well, I'll be going.' 'Kiss me...' 'Good night.' ... 'Good night.'

Last edited by Vicky2
William Butler Yeats

Down by the Salley Gardens

Down by the salley gardens my love and I did meet;
She passed the salley gardens with little snow-white feet.
She bid me to take love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree;
But I, being young and foolish, with her would not agree.

In a field by the river my love and I did stand,
And on my leaning shoulder she laid her snow-white hand.
She bid me take life easy, as the grass grows on the weirs;
But I was young and foolish, and now am full of tears.

Last edited by Vicky2
In a Garden


Poetry of Sarah Teasdale


The world is resting without sound or motion,
Behind the apple tree the sun goes down
Painting with fire the spires and the windows
In the elm-shaded town.

Beyond the calm Connecticut the hills lie
Silvered with haze as fruits still fresh with bloom,
The swallows weave in flight across the zenith
On an aerial loom.

Into the garden peace comes back with twilight,
Peace that since noon had left the purple phlox,
The heavy-headed asters, the late roses
And swaying hollyhocks.

For at high-noon I heard from this same garden
The far-off murmur as when many come;
Up from the village surged the blind and beating
Red music of a drum;

And the hysterical sharp fife that shattered
The brittle autumn air,
While they came, the young men marching
Past the village square. . . .

Across the calm Connecticut the hills change
To violet, the veils of dusk are deep --
Earth takes her children's many sorrows calmly
And stills herself to sleep.

Last edited by Vicky2
The Deserted Garden
Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I mind me in the days departed,
How often underneath the sun
With childish bounds I used to run
To a garden long deserted.

The beds and walks were vanish’d quite;
And wheresoe’er had struck the spade,
The greenest grasses Nature laid,
To sanctify her right.

I call’d the place my wilderness,
For no one enter’d there but I.
The sheep look’d in, the grass to espy,
And pass’d it ne’ertheless.

The trees were interwoven wild,
And spread their boughs enough about
To keep both sheep and shepherd out,
But not a happy child.

Adventurous joy it was for me!
I crept beneath the boughs, and found
A circle smooth of mossy ground
Beneath a poplar-tree.

Old garden rose-trees hedged it in,
Bedropt with roses waxen-white,
Well satisfied with dew and light,
And careless to be seen.

Long years ago, it might befall,
When all the garden flowers were trim,
The grave old gardener prided him
On these the most of all.

Some Lady, stately overmuch,
Here moving with a silken noise,
Has blush’d beside them at the voice
That liken’d her to such.

Or these, to make a diadem,
She often may have pluck’d and twined;
Half-smiling as it came to mind,
That few would look at them.

O, little thought that Lady proud,
A child would watch her fair white rose,
When buried lay her whiter brows,
And silk was changed for shroud!—

Nor thought that gardener (full of scorns
For men unlearn’d and simple phrase)
A child would bring it all its praise,
By creeping through the thorns!

To me upon my low moss seat,
Though never a dream the roses sent
Of science or love’s compliment,
I ween they smelt as sweet.

It did not move my grief to see
The trace of human step departed:
Because the garden was deserted,
The blither place for me!

Friends, blame me not! a narrow ken
Hath childhood ‘twixt the sun and sward:
We draw the moral afterward—
We feel the gladness then.

And gladdest hours for me did glide
In silence at the rose-tree wall:
A thrush made gladness musical
Upon the other side.

Nor he nor I did e’er incline
To peck or pluck the blossoms white:—
How should I know but that they might
Lead lives as glad as mine?

To make my hermit-home complete,
I brought clear water from the spring
Praised in its own low murmuring,
And cresses glossy wet.

And so, I thought, my likeness grew
(Without the melancholy tale)
To ‘gentle hermit of the dale,’
And Angelina too.

For oft I read within my nook
Such minstrel stories; till the breeze
Made sounds poetic in the trees,
And then I shut the book.

If I shut this wherein I write,
I hear no more the wind athwart
Those trees, nor feel that childish heart
Delighting in delight.

My childhood from my life is parted,
My footstep from the moss which drew
Its fairy circle round: anew
The garden is deserted.

Another thrush may there rehearse
The madrigals which sweetest are;
No more for me!—myself afar
Do sing a sadder verse.

Ah me! ah me! when erst I lay
In that child’s-nest so greenly wrought,
I laugh’d unto myself and thought,
‘The time will pass away.’

And still I laugh’d, and did not fear
But that, whene’er was pass’d away
The childish time, some happier play
My womanhood would cheer.

I knew the time would pass away;
And yet, beside the rose-tree wall,
Dear God, how seldom, if at all,
Did I look up to pray!

The time is past: and now that grows
The cypress high among the trees,
And I behold white sepulchres
As well as the white rose,—

When wiser, meeker thoughts are given,
And I have learnt to lift my face,
Reminded how earth’s greenest place
The colour draws from heaven,—

It something saith for earthly pain,
But more for heavenly promise free,
That I who was, would shrink to be
That happy child again.

Last edited by Vicky2
Thank you ladies.
This is a lovely thread.



Sougi ( 1421 - 1502 )

Hito wo yume to ya
omoishiruramu;
sumi suteshi,
sono wa kochou no
yadori nite
Translation of Steven D. Carter:


That man's life is but a dream -
is what we now come to know.

Its house abandoned,
the garden has become home
to butterflies.
Last edited by yoko
In Life’s Garden

Count your garden by the flowers,
never by the leaves that fall.

Count your days by the golden hours,
don't remember the clouds at all.

Count your nights by the stars,
not by shadows.

Count your life with smiles not tears,
and with joy through all your life.

Count your age by friends not years.


Anonymous

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Give me odorous at sunrise a garden of beautiful flowers where I can walk undisturbed. ~Walt Whitman


Our England is a garden, and such gardens are not made
By singing: -"Oh, how beautiful!" and sitting in the shade.
~Rudyard Kipling, "The Glory of the Garden"


How fair is a garden amid the trials and passions of existence. ~Benjamin Disraeli


The best place to seek God is in a garden. You can dig for him there. ~George Bernard Shaw, The Adventures of the Black Girl in Her Search for God, 1932

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  • KASHMIRspring
This bouquet of scented blossoms
I have plucked from that garden
and have called it "The Secret Rose Garden."
In it are blooming
roses of the mysteries of the heart
untold before;
in it the tongues of the lilies are all singing,
and the eyes of the narcissus behold all, far and near.
Gaze on each one of these with your heart's eyes
till your doubts melt away.
You will see tradition, earthly and mystical truths,
all arranged clearly in knowledge and detail.
Do not seek with cold eyes to find blemishes,
or the roses will turn to thorns as you gaze.
Ingratitude is a sign of ignorance,
for those who know the truth are thankful.
When you remember me, breathe"mercy be upon
him."
I am ending with my own name:
" O Allah, grant me a lauded end."

Mahmud Shabistari

From The Garden of Heaven

FROM the garden of Heaven a western breeze
Blows through the leaves of my garden of earth;
With a love like a huri I'ld take mine ease,
And wine! bring me wine, the giver of mirth!
To-day the beggar may boast him a king,
His banqueting-hall is the ripening field,
And his tent the shadow that soft clouds fling.

A tale of April the meadows unfold--
Ah, foolish for future credit to slave,
And to leave the cash of the present untold!
Build a fort with wine where thy heart may brave
The assault of the world; when thy fortress falls,
The relentless victor shall knead from thy dust
The bricks that repair its crumbling walls.

Trust not the word of that foe in the fight!
Shall the lamp of the synagogue lend its flame
To set thy monastic torches alight?
Drunken am I, yet place not my name
In the Book of Doom, nor pass judgment on it;
Who knows what the secret finger of Fate
Upon his own white forehead has writ!

And when the spirit of Hafiz has fled,
Follow his bier with a tribute of sighs;
Though the ocean of sin has closed o'er his head,
He may find a place in God's Paradise.




Hafiz
Last edited by Inda
He is the Ultimate Rest unbounded:
He has spread His form of love throughout all the world.
From that Ray which is Truth, streams
of new forms are perpetually springing: and He pervades those forms.
All the gardens and groves and bowers
are abounding with blossoms; and
the air breaks forth into ripples of joy.



Kabir
Last edited by Inda
My goodness!! You have been busy. Roll Eyes
Nice thread.

Lilac Garden
Go down to Kew in lilac-time, in lilac-time, in lilac-time;
Go down to Kew in lilac-time (it isn't far from London!)
And you shall wander hand in hand with love in summer's wonderland;
Go down to Kew in lilac-time (it isn't far from London!)

From 'The Barrel-Organ' by Alfred Noyes (1880-1958)

Last edited by Sue 1
To Spring

William Blake (1783)


O thou with dewy locks, who lookest down
Through the clear windows of the morning, turn
Thine angel eyes upon our western isle,
Which in full choir hails thy approach, O Spring!

The hills tell one another, and the listening
Valleys hear; all our longing eyes are turn’d
Up to thy bright pavilions: issue forth
And let thy holy feet visit our clime!

Come o’er the eastern hills, and let our winds
Kiss thy perfumèd garments; let us taste
Thy morn and evening breath; scatter thy pearls
Upon our lovesick land that mourns for thee.

O deck her forth with thy fair fingers; pour
Thy soft kisses on her bosom; and put
Thy golden crown upon her languish’d head,
Whose modest tresses are bound up for thee.

Last edited by Vicky2
Lines Written in Early Spring

William Wordsworth (1798)


I heard a thousand blended notes,
While in a grove I sate reclined,
In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts
Bring sad thoughts to the mind.

To her fair works did Nature link
The human soul that through me ran;
And much it grieved my heart to think
What man has made of man.

Through primrose tufts, in that green bower,
The periwinkle trailed its wreaths;
And ’tis my faith that every flower
Enjoys the air it breathes.

The birds around me hopped and played,
Their thoughts I cannot measure:--
But the least motion which they made
It seemed a thrill of pleasure.

The budding twigs spread out their fan,
To catch the breezy air;
And I must think, do all I can,
That there was pleasure there.

If this belief from heaven be sent,
If such be Nature’s holy plan,
Have I not reason to lament
What man has made of man?

Last edited by Vicky2
Emily Dickinson


A Light exists in Spring
Not present on the Year
At any other period —
When March is scarcely here

A Color stands abroad
On Solitary Fields
That Science cannot overtake
But Human Nature feels.

It waits upon the Lawn,
It shows the furthest Tree
Upon the furthest Slope you know
It almost speaks to you.

Then as Horizons step
Or Noons report away
Without the Formula of sound
It passes and we stay —

A quality of loss
Affecting our Content
As Trade had suddenly encroached
Upon a Sacrament.

Last edited by Vicky2
Lilac time is here again.
All the gardens and parks are filled with colour and scent.

From:

When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed
by Walt Whitman



When lilacs last in the dooryard bloomed,
And the great star early drooped in the western sky in the night,
I mourned, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.

Ever-returning spring, trinity sure to me you bring,
Lilac blooming perennial and drooping star in the west,
And thought of him I love.

Last edited by Sue 1
The roses are starting to bloom again in the gardens.

Nobody knows this little Rose by Emily Dickinson

Nobody knows this little Rose --
It might a pilgrim be
Did I not take it from the ways
And lift it up to thee.
Only a Bee will miss it --
Only a Butterfly,
Hastening from far journey --
On its breast to lie --
Only a Bird will wonder --
Only a Breeze will sigh --
Ah Little Rose -- how easy
For such as thee to die!

Last edited by Vicky2
Poetry of John Keats (1795-1821)


To Autumn

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drows'd with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,--
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

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Poem lyrics of To Autumn by William Blake.

O Autumn, laden with fruit, and stain'd
With the blood of the grape, pass not, but sit
Beneath my shady roof; there thou may'st rest,
And tune thy jolly voice to my fresh pipe,
And all the daughters of the year shall dance!
Sing now the lusty song of fruits and flowers.

"The narrow bud opens her beauties to
The sun, and love runs in her thrilling veins;
Blossoms hang round the brows of Morning, and
Flourish down the bright cheek of modest Eve,
Till clust'ring Summer breaks forth into singing,
And feather'd clouds strew flowers round her head.

"The spirits of the air live in the smells
Of fruit; and Joy, with pinions light, roves round
The gardens, or sits singing in the trees."
Thus sang the jolly Autumn as he sat,
Then rose, girded himself, and o'er the bleak
Hills fled from our sight; but left his golden load.

Last edited by Vicky2
As Summer into Autumn slips by Emily Dickinson

As Summer into Autumn slips
And yet we sooner say
"The Summer" than "the Autumn," lest
We turn the sun away,

And almost count it an Affront
The presence to concede
Of one however lovely, not
The one that we have loved --

So we evade the charge of Years
On one attempting shy
The Circumvention of the Shaft
Of Life's Declivity.

Last edited by Vicky2
Autumn Fires

by Robert Louis Stevenson

In the other gardens
And all up the vale,
From the autumn bonfires
See the smoke trail!

Pleasant summer over
And all the summer flowers,
The red fire blazes,
The grey smoke towers.

Sing a song of seasons!
Something bright in all!
Flowers in the summer,
Fires in the fall!

Last edited by Sue 1
"Gardener’s , like everyone else, live second by second and minute by minute. What we see at one
particular moment is then and there before us. But there is a second way of seeing. Seeing with the
eye of memory, not the eye of our anatomy, calls up days and seasons past and years gone by."
- Allen Lacy, The Gardener’s Eye, 1992



Last edited by Sue 1
My garden still has quite a bit of snow.
Waiting anxiously for spring to come.

Love,
Sue


"In the bleak mid winter Frosty wind made moan, Earth stood hard as iron, Water like a stone, Snow had fallen, snow on snow, Snow on snow, In the bleak mid winter of, Long ago."

Christina Rossetti



Artist: Robert Bateman

"Winter is in my head, but eternal spring is in my heart."

Victor Hugo

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Last edited by Sue 1
Our gardens are beginninbg to take on different shades.
The flowers of summer are giving way to the colours of autumn.



Count your garden by the flowers,
never by the leaves that fall.

Count your days by the golden hours,
don't remember the clouds at all.

Count your nights by the stars,
not by shadows.

Count your life with smiles not tears,
and with joy through all your life.

Count your age by friends not years.


Anonymous
Last edited by Sue 1
You are right Sue, our gardens are taking on different shades.
I have quite a few Echinacea Purpurea, Purple Coneflowers, that start to bloom in the later part of summer, right into the fall. They make a definite transition in the seasons.



"The last of Summer is Delight --
Deterred by Retrospect.
'Tis Ecstasy's revealed Review --
Enchantment's Syndicate.

To meet it -- nameless as it is --
Without celestial Mail --
Audacious as without a Knock
To walk within the Veil."

- Emily Dickinson, The Last of Summer is Delight
Last edited by Inda
"As Summer into Autumn slips
And yet we sooner say
"The Summer" than "the Autumn," lest
We turn the sun away,

And almost count it an Affront
The presence to concede
Of one however lovely, not
The one that we have loved --

So we evade the charge of Years
On one attempting shy
The Circumvention of the Shaft
Of Life's Declivity."

- Emily Dickinson, As Summer Into Autumn Slips

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Last edited by Inda
This was one of those perfect New England days in late summer where the spirit of autumn takes a first stealing flight, like a spy, through the ripening country-side, and, with feigned sympathy for those who droop with August heat, puts her cool cloak of bracing air about leaf and flower and human shoulders.

~Sarah Orne Jewett

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Last edited by Sue 1
My world, you were like a nerighbouring girl to me when I was a child, a stranger, timid in her love.
Then you grew bold and talked to me across the fence, offering to me your toys and flowers and shells.
You coaxed me away from my task, you tempted me into the land of mysteries at the weedy corner of some garden in the midday loneliness.
Then you told me stories of things that happened in an eternal past, which the present ever longs to meet, rescued from its prison of moments.

Rabindranath Tagore

Last edited by Inda
The springtime of Lovers has come,

that this dust bowl may become a garden;

the proclamation of heaven has come,

that the bird of the soul may rise in flight.

The sea becomes full of pearls,

the salt marsh becomes sweet as kauthar,

the stone becomes a ruby from the mine,

the body becomes wholly soul.

Rumi

Last edited by Inda
Do the people around here put up with someone who is old, belligerent, cantankerous,
and negative about the way the country has gone to hell in a handbasket?

That's on my good days. Then add the fact I live in Louisiana and see what's happening to the people here.

Oh well. When you run me off you won't be getting a virgin.

anyway- It's worth a try to see if I have any common ground with anybody here. I like all the available topics I see on the board.
Everyone is very welcome on Givnology. It gives us all some inspiration and even relaxation. All things are peaceful here.

Robert Frost

Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.


Enjoy the pots in the garden. We are starting to see late summer and autumn flowers.

Love,
Vicky 2Hearts

Last edited by Vicky2
"In the garden, Autumn is, indeed the crowning glory of the year, bringing us the fruition of months of thought and care and toil. And at no season, safe perhaps in Daffodil time, do we get such superb colour effects as from August to November."
- Rose G. Kingsley, The Autumn Garden, 1905

Last edited by Inda
"My heart is a garden tired with autumn,
Heaped with bending asters and dahlias heavy and dark,
In the hazy sunshine, the garden remembers April,
The drench of rains and a snow-drop quick and clear as a spark;

Daffodils blowing in the cold wind of morning,
And golden tulips, goblets holding the rain --
The garden will be hushed with snow, forgotten soon, forgotten --
After the stillness, will spring come again?"

- Sara Teasdale, The Garden
*****************************

Last edited by Inda
"I am the dust in the sunlight, I am the ball of the sun . . .
I am the mist of morning, the breath of evening . . . .
I am the spark in the stone, the gleam of gold in the metal . . . .
The rose and the nightingale drunk with its fragrance.
I am the chain of being, the circle of the spheres,
The scale of creation, the rise and the fall.
I am what is and is not . . .
I am the soul in all."

- Rumi


Last edited by Inda
"In the assemblies of the enlightened ones there have been many cases of mastering the Way bringing forth the heart of plants and trees; this is what awakening the mind for enlightenment is like. The fifth patriarch of Zen was once a pine-planting wayfarer; Rinzai worked on planting cedars and pines on Mount Obaku. ... Working with plants, trees, fences and walls, if they practice sincerely they will attain enlightenment."

- Dogen Zenji, Japanese Zen Buddhist Grand Master , Awakening the Unsurpassed Mind-

http://www.gardendigest.com/spirit.htm

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  • springgardensteps
Last edited by yoko
"Gardening helps us realize somatically, viscerally, the laws of growth and gradual unfolding. We can't pull the plants up to make them grow, but we can help facilitate and midwife their blooming, each in his own way, time, and proper season. I have learned a little about patience and humility from my gardens. It's so obviously not something I'm doing that creates this miracle! I also like to reflect upon and appreciate the exquisitely, evanescent, transitory, and poignant nature of things in the garden. If you love the Dharma, you have to farm it. Go to a garden. Just stand in it. Breathe in the air, the fragrances, the light, the temperature, the music of the different plants, insects, birds, worms, caterpillars, grasshoppers, and butterflies. Inhale the prana (cosmic energy) of all the abundantly growing things. Recharge your inner batteries. This is the joy of natural meditation."

- Lama Surya Das, Awakening to the Sacred, 1999

Last edited by yoko
From The Garden of Heaven


FROM the garden of Heaven a western breeze
Blows through the leaves of my garden of earth;
With a love like a huri I’ld take mine ease,
And wine! bring me wine, the giver of mirth!
To-day the beggar may boast him a king,
His banqueting-hall is the ripening field,
And his tent the shadow that soft clouds fling.

A tale of April the meadows unfold–
Ah, foolish for future credit to slave,
And to leave the cash of the present untold!
Build a fort with wine where thy heart may brave
The assault of the world; when thy fortress falls,
The relentless victor shall knead from thy dust
The bricks that repair its crumbling walls.

Trust not the word of that foe in the fight!
Shall the lamp of the synagogue lend its flame
To set thy monastic torches alight?
Drunken am I, yet place not my name
In the Book of Doom, nor pass judgment on it;
Who knows what the secret finger of Fate
Upon his own white forehead has writ!

And when the spirit of Hafiz has fled,
Follow his bier with a tribute of sighs;
Though the ocean of sin has closed o’er his head,
He may find a place in God’s Paradise.


From: Teachings of Hafiz

Translated by Gertrude Bell 1897

Last edited by Inda
To Linger in a Garden Fair


MIRTH, Spring, to linger in a garden fair,
What more has earth to give? All ye that wait,
Where is the Cup-bearer, the flagon where?
When pleasant hours slip from the hand of Fate,
Reckon each hour as a certain gain;
Who seeks to know the end of mortal care
Shall question his experience in vain.

Thy fettered life hangs on a single thread–
Some comfort for thy present ills devise,
But those that time may bring thou shalt not dread.
Waters of Life and Irem’s Paradise–
What meaning do our dreams and pomp convey,
Save that beside a mighty stream, wide-fed,
We sit and sing of wine and go our way!

The modest and the merry shall be seen
To boast their kinship with a single voice;
There are no differences to choose between,
Thou art but flattering thy soul with choice!
Who knows the Curtain’s secret? . . . Heaven is mute
And yet with Him who holds the Curtain, e’en
With Him, oh Braggart, thou would’st raise dispute!

Although His thrall shall miss the road and err,
‘Tis but to teach him wisdom through distress,
Else Pardon and Compassionate Mercy were
But empty syllables and meaningless.
The Zealot thirsts for draughts of Kausar’s wine,
And Hafiz doth an earthly cup prefer–
But what, between the two, is God’s design?


From: Teachings of Hafiz

Translated by Gertrude Bell 1897

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  • springpicture
Last edited by Inda

And don’t think the garden loses its ecstasy in winter. It’s quiet, but the roots are down there riotous

 

. ~Rumi

*******

 

The garden of love is green without limit and yields many fruit other than sorrow and joy

.

~Rumi

********

 

Come out here where the roses have opened. Let soul and world meet.

 

~Rumi

********

 

Last edited by Inda

Written by: William Henry Davies 

 
 A week ago I had a fire 
To warm my feet, my hands and face; 
Cold winds, that never make a friend, 
Crept in and out of every place.
Today the fields are rich in grass, And buttercups in thousands grow; I'll show the world where I have been-- With gold-dust seen on either shoe.
Till to my garden back I come, Where bumble-bees for hours and hours Sit on their soft, fat, velvet bums, To wriggle out of hollow flowers.

Last edited by Vicky2
The Little Garden
 gif
Amy Lowell (from A Dome of Many-Coloured Glass, 1912)
clr gif


A little garden on a bleak hillside
    Where deep the heavy, dazzling mountain snow
    Lies far into the spring. The sun’s pale glow
Is scarcely able to melt patches wide
About the single rose bush. All denied
    Of nature’s tender ministries. But no, —
    For wonder-working faith has made it blow
With flowers many hued and starry-eyed.
    Here sleeps the sun long, idle summer hours;
Here butterflies and bees fare far to rove
    Amid the crumpled leaves of poppy flowers;
Here four o’clocks, to the passionate night above
    Fling whiffs of perfume, like pale incense showers.
    A little garden, loved with a great love!

Last edited by Inda

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