By Castle and River: The Forest

The Brook

By: Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892)

I come from haunts of coot and hern,
I make a sudden sally,
And sparkle out among the fern,
To bicker down a valley.

By thirty hills I hurry down,
Or slip between the ridges,
By twenty thorps, a little town,
And half a hundred bridges.

Till last by Philip's farm I flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on forever.

I chatter over stony ways,
In little sharps and trebles,
I bubble into eddying bays,
I babble on the pebbles.

With many a curve my banks I fret
by many a field and fallow,
And many a fairy foreland set
With willow-weed and mallow.

I chatter, chatter, as I flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on forever.

I wind about, and in and out,
with here a blossom sailing,
And here and there a lusty trout,
And here and there a grayling,

And here and there a foamy flake
Upon me, as I travel
With many a silver water-break
Above the golden gravel,

And draw them all along, and flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on forever.

I steal by lawns and grassy plots,
I slide by hazel covers;
I move the sweet forget-me-nots
That grow for happy lovers.

I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance,
Among my skimming swallows;
I make the netted sunbeam dance
Against my sandy shallows.

I murmur under moon and stars
In brambly wildernesses;
I linger by my shingly bars;
I loiter round my cresses;

And out again I curve and flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on forever.

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

The Forest

Sometimes, I think that if I was an optimistic idealist I would be happier. But I am not. I see things as they are, to the best of my ability. Things are bad. Things are very bad. And they are getting worse. But you know, that's OK. It is, because things are always the very worst right before they get a little bit more awful and then they get better.

You know, there is still a calmness, and a peace inside me. Even when things are the very worse. Even when I am in my deepest, darkest, most wretched places, and it seems like it has left, it hasn't. I know that because I always come out of those places.

To me, if there was a place that personified peace and happiness, it is a forest, and a field by the forest. The sun shines through the leaves and everything sparkles gold and silver. The butterflies float on the wind and land on the moss under the trees to drink the moisture. (And no, I have not been eating any mushrooms.) Mushrooms! There are mushrooms in the forest and little white flowers in the field. I wish I was a better writer so that I could better describe it.

But it is lovely.

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