Poetry Friday - A Gift And Thoughts for America's Birthday

        It's Poetry Friday, and Michelle Kogan is hosting 

on her website, More Art 4 All here!  She's sharing a compendium of the "nearly-here" 250th birthday of the United States of America. Fraught with mixed feelings, her poem retains a thread, a good one, of hope!  

          Thanks for hosting, Michelle!

      I discovered this book at the used bookstore where I work. All-volunteer-run, a non-profit that relies on our customer's donations for nearly every book in the store. This book has certainly started me cogitating with its many words from wise writers. For this week, and its important history, knowing, as 'they' say, the way of the land, I chose this to share:

        "And whoever begins by being a dupe ends by becoming a scoundrel." 

                                                                                                               Voltaire 1694-1778

         You may smile when you read the poem I'm sharing, one I've used before while creating a gift for my grandchildren on certain milestone birthdays. Yet, I am also imagining our country's founders holding that same elation at what they have created! I do believe they didn't imagine recent times when events in our country have not been gleeful. Milne's words are not entirely for children! 

Spring Morning

                     A.A. Milne

Where am I going? I don't quite know.
Down to the stream where the king-cups grow-
Up on the hill where the pine-trees blow-
Anywhere, anywhere. I don't know.

Where am I going? The clouds sail by,
Little ones, baby ones, over the sky.
Where am I going? The shadows pass,
Little ones, baby ones, over the grass.

If you were a cloud, and sailed up there,
You'd sail on water as blue as air,
And you'd see me here in the fields and say:
"Doesn't the sky look green today?"

Where am I going? The high rooks call:
"It's awful fun to be born at all."
Where am I going? The ring-doves coo:
"We do have beautiful things to do."

If you were a bird, and lived on high,
You'd lean on the wind when the wind came by,
You'd say to the wind when it took you away:
"That's where I wanted to go today!"

Where am I going? I don't quite know.
What does it matter where people go?
Down to the wood where the blue-bells grow-
Anywhere, anywhere. I don't know.

 

       So, Happy Birthday, America, wishing a future for you where blue-bells and birds fill all lives with the freedom to love them.