“Great poetry does not teach us anything – it changes us. Man is like a musical instrument of many strings, of which only a few are sounded by the narrow interests of his daily life; and the others, for want of use, are continually becoming tuneless and forgotten. Heroic poetry is a phantom finger swept over all the strings, arousing from man’s whole nature a song of answering harmony. It is the poetry of action, for such alone can arouse the whole nature of man. It touches all the strings – those of wonder and pity, of fear and joy. It ignores morals, for its business is not in any way to make us rules for life, but to make character. It is not, as a great English writer has said, ‘a criticism of life’, but rather a fire in the spirit, burning away what is mean and deepening what is shallow.”
— W. B. Yeats, from “Irish Poets and Irish Poetry” in The Irish Fireside, October 9, 1886 (via litverve)
FALL OF THE TITANS: Here’s a very memorable, powerful image that I just found, taken in the Valle dei Templi (‘Valley of Temples’) in Sicily, Italy. The photograph depicts two landmarks that,despite being ruined, undoubtedly retains a sense of faded opulence and grandeur.
On the left you have the Temples of ‘Castor and Pollux’, which is ironically a modern reconstruction from the early 19th century. It stands next to the fallen head of ‘Eros Blindfolded’, which has a haunting, eerie quality to it. I think that I attribute those qualities to it due to the fact that the God of Love’s eye’s look as if they have been completely removed.
No doubt, if the blindfold were actually placed across those eyes (or lack thereof), I would feel differently towards the statue. Captured from this angle however, it adds a solemnity to the otherwise picture perfect landscape. Some of you might think it adds to the latter quality of the overall image.
this post reminded me of Shelley’s poem
Ozymandias
I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)
“There are no unsacred places; there are only sacred places and desecrated places.”
—Wendell Berry, from Given: Poems (Counterpoint, 2005)
“And if the earthly should forget you,
say to the silent loam: I flow.
To the rushing water speak: I am.”
— Rainer Maria Rilke (trans. Edward Snow), from “Sonnets to Orpheus” (II, 29)
(Source: the-final-sentence)
“Only mystery makes us live. Only mystery.”
— Federico García Lorca;“Deep Song and Other Prose”; written at the foot of one of his sketches (via littlemoono)
(Source: petrichour)
“Let your soul stand cool and composed
before a million universes.”
— Walt Whitman (via nirvikalpa)
(Source: heartbloodspirit)
“Re-examine all you have been told.
Dismiss what insults your soul.”
- Walt Whitman
“The intellectual is always showing off,
the lover is always getting lost.
The intellectual runs away.
afraid of drowning;
the whole business of love
is to drown in the sea.
Intellectuals plan their repose;
lovers are ashamed to rest.
The lover is always alone.
even surrounded by people;
like water and oil, he remains apart.
The man who goes to the trouble
of giving advice to a lover
get nothing. He’s mocked by passion.
Love is like musk. It attracts attention.
Love is a tree, and the lovers are its shade.
”
— Rumi (via aphoticvenusrising)
(Source: madeineightyeight)
“And your very flesh shall be a great poem.”
— Walt Whitman (via larmoyante)
(Source: larmoyante)
