My Adventures in Literature

"Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. It enriches the necessary competencies that daily life requires and provides; and in this respect, it irrigates the deserts that our lives have already become." (C.S. Lewis)

So this semester, I am taking Intro to Literature up at JCCC and LOVING it. So far it has been simply fantastic and I have had so much fun. Of course, my literature book and I have sort of a love hate relationship going on...it just so happens that all 2500 some-odd pages of this specimen of literature add about 5 pounds to my already murderous backpack...but then, I really simply adore its contents, so whats a girl to do? Continue going to Literature class and luxuriate in loosing myself in its pages? Yes. Set up an appointment with a chiropractor after carrying around 30 pounds on my back for a whole semester? Yes, too.
 
Annnyyway I am good at free-association :D Haha. The point of this post was ACTUALLY to share with you a pair of interesting poems we read in class today. The two were written by William Blake in the 1800s as companions for eachother, if you will, and are much more enjoyable if read together and then compared. So with out further ado, I present to you The Tyger and The Lamb:
 

The Lamb

 

Little Lamb, who made thee?

Dost thou know who made thee?

Gave thee life, and bid thee feed,

By the stream and o'er the mead;

Gave thee clothing of delight,

Softest clothing, woolly, bright;

Gave thee such a tender voice,

Making all the vales rejoice?

Little Lamb, who made thee?

Dost thou know who made thee?

 

Little Lamb, I'll tell thee,

He is called by thy name,

For He calls Himself a Lamb.

He is meek, and He is mild;

He became a little child.

I a child, and thou a lamb,

We are called by His name.

Little Lamb, God bless thee!

Little Lamb, God bless thee!

The Tyger

Tyger! Tyger! 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 watered heaven with their tears,

Did he smile his work to see?

Did he who made the lamb make thee?

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

Is the author comparing good and evil? Heaven and hell? Human nature before the fall vs. after the fall of man? Phrases in these poems point to all of these. And now, the fun part, is to explore for yourself and deide:)

Sonnet 43

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height

My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight

For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.

I love thee to the level of everyday's

Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.

I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;

I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.

I love thee with the passion put to use

In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints,—I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life!—and, if God choose,

I shall but love thee better after death.

~ Elizabeth Barrett Browning ~

While You Were Sleeping

Oh little town of Bethlehem

Looks like another silent night

Above your deep and dreamless sleep

A giant star lights up the sky

And while you're lying in the dark

There shines an everlasting light

For the King has left His throne

And is sleeping in a manger tonight, tonight

Oh Bethlehem, what you have missed while you were sleeping

For God became a man

And stepped into your world today

Oh Bethlehem, you will go down in history

As a city with no room for its King

While you were sleeping

While you were sleeping

Oh little town of Jerusalem

Looks like another silent night

The Father gave His only Son

The Way, the Truth, the Life had come

But there was no room for Him in the world

He came to save

Jerusalem, what you have missed while you were sleeping

The Savior of the world is dying on your cross today

Jerusalem, you will go down in history

As a city with no room for its King

While you were sleeping

While you were sleeping

United States of America

Looks like another silent night

As we're sung to sleep by philosophies

That save the trees and kill the children

And while we're lying in the dark

There's a shout heard 'cross the eastern sky

For the Bridegroom has returned

And has carried His bride away in the night, in the night

America, what will we miss while we are sleeping

Will Jesus come again

And leave us slumbering where we lay

America, will we go down in history

As a nation with no room for its King

Will we be sleeping

Will we be sleeping

While You Were Sleeping ~ Casting Crowns

from the album "Peace on Earth"

[photo credit: Me (hehe) :)]

How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43)

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

~ Elizabeth Barrett Browning

If I could choose a favorite sonnet from the 18th and 19th centuries, this one might be it. I love it. :) I recently read a novel based on (quite accurately) Elizabeth Barrett Browning's life, by one of the best historical novelists, Nancy Moser. She has also written on some of my other favorite historical women - including Jane Austen, Martha Washington, and Nannerl Mozart. But anyway - you should go and read her work. Espescially the one about Elizabeth. Even though its sad. Did you know her father forbade any of his children to marry? Elizabeth was nearly 40 years old when she finally ran away and married her one true love - Robert Browning - also a poet. Its a very romantic story and one taken straight from history. And that's what makes it so fascinating, as the autor Ms. Moser talks about. History often surprises me in that way - I have the ideas for a story, and the more I investigate, I find out what really happened was better than I ever could have made up. Gah I love it when that happens! Which reminds me of the story I am currently writing. Perhaps a snapshot of it will find its way on this blog in the near future. But I only said perhaps ;-)

~"I love thee with the breath, smiles, tears of all my life..."~

On Love

I tend to resort to poetry when I'm feeling melancholy (usually for no particular reason), but today I am suffering writer's block and must be content to read the words instead. Perhaps this poem's most memorable recitation was from the film Sense and Sensibility, where Marianne quotes it to her sister: "Is love a fancy or a feeling...or a Ferras?" ;)

Is love a fancy, or a feeling? No.
It is immortal as immaculate Truth,
'Tis not a blossom shed as soon as youth,
Drops from the stem of life--for it will grow,
In barren regions, where no waters flow,
Nor rays of promise cheats the pensive gloom.
A darkling fire, faint hovering o'er a tomb,
That but itself and darkness nought doth show,
It is my love's being yet it cannot die,
Nor will it change, though all be changed beside;
Though fairest beauty be no longer fair,
Though vows be false, and faith itself deny,
Though sharp enjoyment be a suicide,
And hope a spectre in a ruin bare.

~ Sonnet VII, Hartley Coleridge

Now That I Have Seen

Albertine

by Brooke Fraser

I am sitting still, I think of Angelique

Her mother's voice over me

And the bullets in the wall where it fell silent

And on a thousandth hill, I think of Albertine

There in her eyes what I don't see with my own

Rwanda

Now that I have seen, I am responsible

Faith without deeds is dead

Now that I have held you in my own arms, I will not let go till you are

I am on a plane, across a distant sea

But I carry you in me

And the dust on, the dust on, the dust on my feet

I will tell the world, I will tell them where I have been

I will tell the world

I will tell them Albertine

I am on a stage, a thousand eyes on me

I will tell them Albertine

I will tell them Albertine

This is my Albertine...my Samantha. Now that I have seen, I am responsible. And I will never forget.

Lead Me To The Cross

Savior I come

Quiet my soul, remember

Redemption's hill

Where Your blood was spilled

For my ransom

Everything I once held dear

I count it all as lost

You were as I

Tempted and tried

You are

The word became flesh

Bore my sin and death

Now you're risen

Lead me to the cross

Where Your love poured out

Bring me to my knees

Lord I lay me down

Rid me of myselfI belong to You

Lead me, lead me to the cross

To your heart

To your heart

Lead me to your heart

Lead me to your heart

~ Hillsong United

In Remembrance of Him

He was despised and rejected by men;

A man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief;

And as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised,

And we esteemed him not.
Surely he has borne our griefs

And carried our sorrows;

Yet we esteemed him stricken,

Smitten by God, and afflicted.

But he was wounded for our transgressions;

He was crushed for our iniquities;

Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,

And with his stripes we are healed.

Isaiah 53:5-3

Poetry, Anyone?

Let me not to the marriage of true minds,

Admit impediments; Love is not love,

Which alters when it alteration finds,

Or bends with the remover to remove.

O, no, it is an ever-fixed mark

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wandering bark,

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken,

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

Within his bending sicke's compass come;

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error, and upon me proved,

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Sonnet 116

My New Favorite Song. Ever.

The lyrics to this song are beautiful. I listen to them over and over. I just discovered Tenth Avenue North as a band and I will HIGHLY reccomend them. I am a hopeless fan of sad, ballad-like guitar and am always phsyched when they are paired with a God-glorifying message!

Without further ado here are the lyrics to Times by Tenth Avenue North. Listen to it with the player on my sidebar.

My love is over,

Its underneath

Its inside,

Its in between,

The times you doubt me,

When you can't feel

The times that you've questioned 'Is this for real?'

The times you've broken,

The times that you mend

The times you hate me

And the times that you bend

Well my love is over,

Its underneath

Its inside,

Its in between,

These times you're healing

And when your heart breaks

The times that you feel like you've fallen from grace

The times you're hurting

The times that you heal

The times you go hungry and attempted to steal

In times of confusion

And chaos and pain

I'm there in your sorrow

Under the weight of your shame

I'm there through your heartache

Im there in the storm

In my love I will keep you

By my power alone

I dont care where you've fallen,

Where you have been

I'll never forsake you

My love never ends,

It never ends

.music.

Ah! greater than all words of mine can say,
The heights, the depths, the glories, of that sway.
No mortal tongue can bring authentic speech
Of that enchanted world beyond its reach;
No tongue but hers, when, lifted on the waves
Of Tone and Harmony, beyond the graves
Of all we lose, we drift entranced away
Out of the discords of the common day;
And she, the immortal goddess, on her breast
Lulls us to visions of a sweet unrest,
Smiles at the tyrannies of time and space,
And folds us in a mother's fond embrace,
Till, sailing on upon that mystic sea,
We feel that Life is Immortality.

~ Christopher Pearse Cranch

.snow flakes.

Out of the bosom of the Air,
Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken,
Over the woodlands brown and bare
Over the harvest-fields forsaken,
Silent, and soft, and slow,
Descends the snow.

Even as our cloudy fancies take
Suddenly shape in some divine expression,
Even as the troubled heart doth make,
In the white countenance confession,
The troubled sky reveals
The greif it feels.

This is the poem of the air,
Slowly in the silent syllables recorded;
This is the secret of despair,
Long in its cloudy bosom hoarded,
Now whispered and revealed
To wood and field.


~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow