Sunrise
Cool blue-grey vapour, earliest light;
Cloak of whispered anticipation
Heralding a daily rite:
Morning's arrival; dark's dissipation.
First rays have already kissed lands east, faraway,
Coursing across forests and fields,
While here, darkness holds stubborn sway,
Bleakly aware of its inevitable yield.
Distant, eastwards, dark curtains sway;
Horizon brightens: a soft, subtle hint.
Black retreats to indigo, cobalt, then grey;
Westward parabola: shade becomes tint.
As one, nature’s creatures, restive for the day,
Pause their stir, and silently bide.
Cresting the horizon, the sun breaks its way,
Painting red, gold and pink the cloud underside.
The orb quickly emerges; in a moment it bursts forth;
Gilding the landscape; first flutter of warmth
Matinal light spills over the earth;
In nascent day, another morning takes form.
Rich pinks and oranges meld into crisp blues and whites.
The world below bustles, awake, at the ready.
As the sun looks down, sends one final arc of bright,
Colourful encore to dawn’s sweet melody.
A visit with Katie and Sky
These two lovely characters never fail to raise a smile.
And sometimes they make silly faces of their own!
This one is soft-focussed, but it's one of my favourites, because it shows off Sky's sweet character, and reminds me ever so much of our old dog, Mira, who used to do the ''claw'' manoeuvre whenever we dared stop petting her:
Tiger, tiger
TIGER, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare seize the fire?
And what shoulder and what art
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand and what dread feet?
What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? What dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?
When the stars threw down their spears,
And water'd heaven with their tears,
Did He smile His work to see?
Did He who made the lamb make thee?
Tiger, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
-William Blake
Petals
Life is a stream
On which we strew
Petal by petal the flower of our heart;
The end lost in dream,
They float past our view,
We only watch their glad, early start.
Freighted with hope,
Crimsoned with joy,
We scatter the leaves of our opening rose;
Their widening scope,
Their distant employ,
We never shall know. And the stream as it flows
Sweeps them away,
Each one is gone
Ever beyond into infinite ways.
We alone stay
While years hurry on,
The flower fared forth, though its fragrance still stays.
- Amy Lowell