Pot of Poetry: Artichoke

It has been months I guess since my last post. I hate it that I haven't been able to post articles more often. However, I would like to share with you one rather short poem that touches my heart the moment I read it. It is called "Artichoke" by Joseph Hutchinson.

O heart weighed down by so many wings!

That's it. Just one line, but it says much more than that to me.

An artichoke is but an artichoke. But put down like this, it reminds me of Wordsworth's sonnet which talks about poor souls "who have felt the weight of too much liberty", which argues that too much freedom doesn't do us good and certainly doesn't make us happier. Having rules up to some points gives a sense of security. Having none gives a sense of uncertainty. Well, too many "wings" can wear us down.

Also for me, it sounds like someone being too tired because he has so many things to do, and he has so many things to do because he can do it. Because he has the "wings" to do it. In fact, your talent, your skills, your knowledge, and your abilities can be a deadly trap that enslaves you.

The moment I read this poem, I don't even think about artichokes anymore.

Pot of Poetry: When You're about to Die (Tichborne's Elegy)

What would you say if you know that you're about to die, tragically? What kind of farewell would you choose to say to those who love you, or, more importantly, to those whom you love?

There's a rather nice country music about that inspired by Tennyson's Lady of Shallott. But today we'll go further back to those times when everybody spoke poetry - Elizabethan/Jacobean England.

Picture yourself in the scariest jail in the country, The Tower, waiting for execution. You know it will come, you just don't know for sure when. Every sun that sets might be your last, every thought you think might perish with your body an hour from now, every memory of you might be forgotten before the year changes, everything that you have done might mean nothing at all. What would you say to your family, to fate, or to God?

It's difficult to picture myself saying anything worthy at all under that kind of situation. At least, fear doesn't help when you're trying to rhyme. What would? Resignation? Acceptance of your fate?

In 1586, Chidiock Tichborne was going to face Death. His crime? Treason. As a Catholic, he was persecuted for his religion during the later years of his life, and, maybe because of that, he agreed to take part in Babington Plot to murder Elizabeth and put Mary of Scot on the throne. The method of execution was too gruesome to be told, but it's enough to make anybody sane sick to his stomach. Instead of writing, I would picture myself weeping on the floor begging somebody to spare me the pain and humiliation.

No, not Tichborne. He spent his time writing to his wife one of the most touching Elegies I've ever read.

My prime of youth is but a frost of cares,
My feast of joy is but a dish of pain,
My crop of corn is but a field of tares,
And all my good is but vain hope of gain.
The day is gone and yet I saw no sun,
And now I live, and now my life is done. 

The spring is past, and yet it hath not sprung,
The fruit is dead, and yet the leaves are green,
My youth is gone, and yet I am but young,
I saw the world, and yet I was not seen,
My thread is cut, and yet it was not spun,
And now I live, and now my life is done. 

I sought my death and found it in my womb,
I lookt for life and saw it was a shade,
I trode the earth and knew it was my tomb,
And now I die, and now I am but made.
The glass is full, and now the glass is run,
And now I live, and now my life is done.

Poor, unfortunate 23-years-old. He was executed the day after.

Tichborne was not the only one who stared at death with a pen in his hand. There's another one, who has been one of my favourites: Sir Walter Raleigh.

Unlike Queen Elizabeth I, King James didn't share my sentiments for him. Raleigh was convicted and tried for treason, released 13 years later, only to be jailed again - and this time, executed. Before he died, he wrote this poem. For a man who had been so bitter in his other poems, this kind of calm resignation makes me tremble. I mean, he was the one who wrote The Lie, telling people and abstract things to shut up while he publicly accuse them of lying.

But maybe in the end, when everything is about to dissolve, when we feel worthless, unimportant, and hopeless, our only hope is to be alive again. "My God shall rise me up, I trust."

I hope he will.

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Any poetical last words you want to share?

Pot of Poetry: Favourite Poets

This month, Classics Club poses an interesting topic.

Let’s talk about classic poetry! Have you got a favorite classic poem? Do you read poetry? Why or why not? // You could also feature a poet or a book of poetry, rather than a poem.

 I have to say that I'm in love with poetry. When I was little, I wrote my own poems, a hobby I can't let go of when I grow up. Why? Maybe I will never know.

When it comes to poets, "two loves I have" - Shakespeare and Keats. The two are very very different both in style and sense. Keats, as a Romantic poet, loves the melancholy of Nature. His poems flow like springs of water, or fall like leaves in autumn, or whisper like breeze before rain. The other is completely different. Shakespeare uses a lot of different rhetorical techniques to convey his thoughts. He's a drama king, and he knows how to get people's attention. His poems talk about so man different things, delivers huge variety of emotions and thoughts, and resonates with the deepest, most secret desires in human beings.

Shakespeare wrote mostly plays. Never mind they're poetic, they're still plays. It's quite a different thing. When using poetry for plays, Shakespeare pays attention to the dramatic nuance that poems have. That's why he wrote in metrical lines of iambic pentameter. But he also wrote poetry. They are not much, compared to his plays, but they are still worthily famous. If you are in love and don't know how to express your feeling, read his sonnets out loud. It helps.

Lately I sometimes find myself reciting this particular sonnet.

O! never say that I was false of heart,
Though absence seemed my flame to qualify,
As easy might I from my self depart
As from my soul which in thy breast doth lie:
That is my home of love: if I have ranged,
Like him that travels, I return again;
Just to the time, not with the time exchanged,
So that myself bring water for my stain.
Never believe though in my nature reigned,
All frailties that besiege all kinds of blood,
That it could so preposterously be stained,
To leave for nothing all thy sum of good;
   For nothing this wide universe I call,
   Save thou, my rose, in it thou art my all.

It sounds like a lame excuse, but that depends on what you are talking about. I am a fangirl, so when I fall in love with something, I let myself fall hard. However, there are several things I can't entirely leave. "That is my home of love." If I get distracted, if I fall in love with something entirely different, if it seems like I have a new obsession, in short, "if I have ranged/Like him that travels," I will return.

Oh, but the poem above is hardly my favourite sonnet of Shakespeare. In fact, I cannot choose my favourite. It so much depends upon my moods and feelings at a given moment.

Now let's talk about Keats. I don't remember the first time I read his poems. I remember though, long before I actually read his works, I read a quote in a Japanese manga, saying, "Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard, are sweeter." The manga attributed it to Keats. Sadly, it was a translation, and believe me, it took me some time to finally get the authentic English version of that sentence.

My current favourite from Keats is some lines from his "Lines to Fanny." But that's not it. The pain and beauty of reading Keats is reading death in every line. You can't forget that he's dying when he wrote those. I can't read "Bright Star" or "Ode to Grecian Urn" without thinking of the poet's desire to stay still, to be "still steadfast, still unchangeable", to happily "forever piping songs forever new," to stop the clock and enjoy that one perfect moment forever. Whether it's "Ode to a Nightingale" or "To Autumn" or anything else that he wrote, it always gives me some sort of melancholic sadness. The worst part is, of course, I love him nonetheless.

So, Keats and Shakespeare - my two big loves. Do you have any?

Pot of Poetry: Poe's "To My Mother"

Edgar Allan Poe was a renowned poet and short-story writer. His expertise is frightening people out. I can only imagine the things that he's been through both physically and mentally.

This is true for most of his poems. However, some of his poems remind me that he's just a proper human being as the rest of us, a person with ordinary feelings, ordinary affections, ordinary capacity to love. I think the poem "To My Mother" is a perfect example of that.

Because I feel that, in the Heavens above,
The angels, whispering to one another,
Can find, among their burning terms of love,
None so devotional as that of “Mother,”
Therefore by that dear name I long have called you—
You who are more than mother unto me,
And fill my heart of hearts, where Death installed you
In setting my Virginia's spirit free.
My mother—my own mother, who died early,
Was but the mother of myself; but you
Are mother to the one I loved so dearly,
And thus are dearer than the mother I knew
By that infinity with which my wife
Was dearer to my soul than its soul-life.

The first four lines is filial obligation. A child is expected to be "devotional" to their mothers, to treat them with love and respect. But Poe is not talking about his mother here. He's talking about his wife's mother. His deceased wife's mother.

He says that "death installed [the mother]/In setting [his wife's] spirit free." And that's the reason why that mother is "more than a mother" to him. Because he loved his wife so much, he extended that love to the people that his wife loved and the people that loved his wife.

He even has a reason to love his wife's mother more than his own mother because he his wife "was dearer to [his] soul than its soul-life." The fact that he loves her mother more than his mother is in parallel with the fact that he loves her more than he loves himself.

But it doesn't mean that the mother is just a representative of is wife, or replacement of his mother. He calls her My Mother. It's his own mother. His relationship with her is also personal, not just an in-law relationship.

The most touching part is that it's true. Poe was so close to his mother-in-law. He sent letters to her as much as one would to a mother. He might be the master of psychopathic stories but, a man is but a man.

Pot of Poetry: From Lines to Fanny, by John Keats

It's Romantic month in Classics Club. When I first heard it, I instantly thought of him - Keats. For me, he is the definition of Romantic Poetry. His poems give some sort of peace and serenity to its reader.

Some months ago I believe, I stumbled upon his lines to Fanny. The first three lines were okay, but the fourth..

Touch has a memory. O say, love, say,
What can I do to kill it and be free
In my old liberty?

The idea that you can remember a touch, that not your brain, but your skin, your muscles, can remember a touch, is lovely. It's not only your brain that refuses to forget, but all parts if you, all parts that have experienced love.

But the next few lines are even more lovely.

When every fair one that I saw was fair
Enough to catch me in but half a snare,
Not keep me there:

The 'half a snare' part is brilliant. There are those times when you see people and you are physically or mentally or in some other way attracted to them. But because you have someone else that you love, they don't 'keep you there'. You don't fall for those people because you can't forget the one that truly has your heart entrapped.

What I really love about this poem, or just Keats in general, is the simplicity of the language, of the wording. It makes it sound so sincere, so innocent. You don't smell deception. In some Renaissance poems, sometimes you smell flattery in the air, maybe because the words are complicated, or because the poet forces the rhyme. Sometimes (not always, but sometimes) the poems don't 'flow' naturally, and you think that the poet is trying to deceive you. But this poem doesn't feel that way.

I am not good at explaining poetry. I think I can never do Keats justice whenever I talk about him. I must stop now before I talk more nonsense.

If I can find the time before the end of the month, I'd like to share something from Poe, another poet that I like.

The Rape of Lucrece: 'Conscience, how dost thou afflict me'

I can't find the right title for this blog post. Why is that? Is it because I've waited to long before actually pen this down? The thing is, it's not easy to review this particular narrative poem. It's simple, and yet, it's a lot of things.

Longer than his other work, Venus and Adonis, Lucrece tells the darker shade of love - lust. It talks about a man's reaction to a sudden and strong desire and the aftermath of his decision.

The argument of the poem actually spoils everything out. Sextus Tarquinius (Tarquin) wanted to prove for himself the virtue of Collatine's wife, Lucrece, of whom her husband had boasted a lot. He went to Collatine's house just to find Collatine's praise of Lucrece "hath done her beauty wrong, Which far exceeds his barren skill to show." Tarquin, unable to resist the temptation, raped Lucrece. He left her devastated in the morning, ashamed of what he had done, but too proud to actually admit it. Lucrece sent word to her husband, requested his immediate return, and, in front of everyone, killed herself - but not before relating all Tarquin had done.

Nothing so interesting in the plot. Shakespeare's beauty, after all, is rarely in the cheesy plot. His strength is in the characters, the human beings. Now the two main characters here have an interesting trait of humanity - conscience. But these two work it out differently.

Pot of Poetry: Poetry in Your Lives

Hi, everyone. I've been thinking about this crazy idea for some time, and I honestly think it would be awesome to share your personal experience with poetry. I know not so many people read my blog anyway, so please share the news, so we can share our experience with poetry with all poetry lovers all around the world.

Here's the thing. You don't have to be a Lit Student or poetry expert to join, you don't even have to understand the terms and techniques. You just need to share a story about reading or finding a poem along your way of life and feel it - I mean like, really feel it. Poetry changes lives, I believe in that. I believe in the power of words. There have been many times when I found myself in some situation and my mind spontaneously read a line or two from a poem that I knew. Those are awesome experience.

So, I want to be honest with you. I actually plan on collecting your stories and share it in a book for people in my country to read (so I will translate all English into Indonesian for the sake of my countrymen). Poetry in Indonesia (I don't know how it is in other parts of the world) is scarce. Literature in Indonesia is scarce. We don't have that long tradition of European Literature or Chinese Literature. It's hard to find, and hard to get. But I believe we can make things better - start from scratch. Why not? When people learn that poetry mean something they will start to read poems, and they will start to write poems. And the next time I talk with somebody about poetry, they would respond the same way they do when somebody talks about the latest Beyonce album or the latest Transformer movie.

Is it worth trying?

Like I said before, don't hesitate to share. If it's so personal and you don't want to do it openly or publicly, just send it to my email museforsaken[at]gmail[dot]com. I'll keep your secret safe. Make it as personal as possible. I have written something like it in Pot of Poetry section of this blog. So if you feel like you don't love your boy/girlfriend as much as you want and you think Teasdale's "I am not yours" fits the emotion, just share it. If you lost a family member, and you think of Dylan Thomas' "Do not go gentle into that good night", please share it.

(Untuk teman-teman dari Indonesia, jangan ragu-ragu membagikan pengalaman dengan pujangga-pujangga Indonesia ya. Makin banyak, makin aneh, dan makin mengejutkan artinya makin baik.)

Here below is the linky if you want to share it in your blog. If you want to write it as a comment, please do. Or you can email me, as stated above. Thanks in advance for your participation.

Weekend Quote #49

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
        Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,— 

This weekend I must put down two lines from Keats' renowned poem - "To Autumn." It's a beautiful, sweet poem describing - as the title suggests - autumn. But the lines that I love the most are the ones above. It's just that they feel so lonely.

In that poem, Keats mentioned Summer as 'warm days', something bright, warm, and lovely. And he connected the Spring with music, merriment, joy. Spring and Summer are usually described as such. Youth, bliss, love, joy, happiness, spirit. Autumn is quiet, and I feel it's usually a perfect picture of decay.

But Keats saw it differently. "Thou hast thy music too." Autumn is not Summer or Spring, not as lovely, not as sweet. But it has its music too. It is special in its own way.

Suddenly we are all Autumn. We are different, and we are not always understood. There are people better than us, there are people richer, smarter, nicer, kinder, prettier than us, and that is life. There are times when we compare ourselves to Spring and Summer of the world - those people. But you know what? 'Don't think about it! We have our music too.'

The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost

I cannot help thinking about this poem over and over again. In fact, I've been using two lines of it as my status in more than one social media. What I love about it, as what I love about most Frost's poems, is that the poems are written in most simple words, but have deep meaning. For me personally, the poem tells you everything that passes your mind when you're about to take an important decision that might change your whole life. And here it goes:

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth; 

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same, 

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way
I doubted if I should ever come back. 

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Isn't it just so sweet? Frost beautifully expressed the gravity and seriousness of decision-making in something as simple as choosing someone's way. I've never formally analysed a poem before, and I don't even know the right way to do it. But I'd like to tell you how the poem sounds to me.

Firstly the poem found himself in a branching road – a road of his life. He knew he couldn't 'travel both,' but he considered seriously which road he's going to take. Aren't we all like that, especially when facing an important decision in our lives? At last he made his decision, but his choice was not something that people would ordinarily choose. He chose a road 'grassy and wanted wear.'

One of the lines I love most in this poem: “Oh, I kept the first for another day!/Yet knowing how way leads on to way/I doubted if I should ever come back.” I do that all the time, thinking that one day I will do something I chose to postpone ages ago. But in reality, we all know that time doesn't go in a circle. It goes on, and because our decision leads us to another, we can't just go back and try another option.

Some people think that the poem's sigh in the last stanza expresses his regret of the choice he had made long time ago. For me, it's like when you are lying on your back and thinking about the past, taking a deep breath. And then you smile because long time ago, you chose the road 'less travelled by,' and that's why your life, your journey, your story, is different. I must be a sigh of satisfaction.

(And now it reminds me of the song My Way)

Raleigh's Epitaph

Even such is time, which takes in trust
Our youth, our joys, and all we have,
And pays us but with age and dust,
Who in the dark and silent grave
When we have wandered all our ways
Shuts up the story of our days,
And from which earth, and grave, and dust
The Lord will raise me up, I trust.

Lines above are Sir Walter Raleigh's. Stories say that he wrote it the night before his execution. It was found in his Bible – a good place to write your last words. I have no idea what's wrong with me or what's so right with him that I feel very sorry for his death. I mean, I don't even know him or what kind of person he is. I only know that he was a soldier, a captain, a pirate (legal one), and a courtier. He's one of Elizabeth I's favourites, I heard.

The poem above is so beautiful. It starts rather sadly, for the writer knew that he must die. It's just the rule of nature. But the last two lines express his hope to raise again, to live again by God's Almighty power.

Apart from reading this poem, I also read his last speech right before his execution, and also some reports on his trial. He was a good, eloquent, persuasive speaker. I told you, I almost cried reading those.

Truly this makes me think what I would leave when I know it is the end. Perhaps I should start writing my own epitaph.

Keats in May: “Think not of it, sweet one, so”

When Katherine of November's Autumn announced her intention to make a Keats Blog Tour, I was immediately interested to participate. Keats is one of the most prominent poet in English Literature and more importantly, I like his poems. I read him for the first time four years ago. I found him in the library and started reading, thinking that I must at least know something about him, since he has great reputation. Then this poem, which I'm going to write about, presented itself to me.

Think not of it, sweet one, so
Give it not a tear;
Sigh thou mayst, but bid it go
Any, anywhere.
Do not look so sad, sweet one
Sad and fadingly;
Shed one drop then -- It is gone--
Oh, 'twas born to die
Still so pale? Then, dearest, weep
Weep! I'll count the tears;
And each one shall be a bliss
For thee in after years.
Brighter has it left thine eyes
Then a sunny rill
And thy whispering melodies
Are tenderer still
Yet, as all things mourn awhile
At fleeting blisses
Let us too!-- but be our dirge
A dirge of kisses

Simple, isn't it? This poem is so simple, so easy to understand, but it rings true, sincere, and full of consolation. It's so interesting how such lines, simple lines, can bring such effect to me.

It's my hobby to recite poems when they reflect my thoughts of feelings. I recite this almost every time I feel like crying. I always start with the first stanza, with emphasis on “Give it not a tear.” When it's not enough, I continue to the next one, “Shed one drop, then.” Well, the next is easy enough to guess. For very hard times, it ends in the third stanza, while I weep and count the tears, with a hope that things will be better next time.

It sounds weird perhaps, but it's true. For me, the poem helps me to control my feelings, and sometimes to pour out my feelings in tears. It works better than self-help books and people's 'dont-be-sad' lines.  

That's all from me. Please visit other participants' post for the tour too. 

Keats and Shakespeare Expressing Disappointment in Love

This thing just came to me this morning. I was scrolling down the 'Shakespeare' tag on my tumblr, trying my best to be patient with quotes wrongly attributed to Shakespeare. Then Keats' poem ran through my brain. Alright, just the first line of it, but I'll put all of them here anyway. It's very beautiful.

I.
You say you love; but with a voice
Chaster than a nun's, who singeth
The soft Vespers to herself
While the chime-bell ringeth -
O love me truly! 

II.
You say you love; but with a smile
Cold as sunrise in September,
As you were Saint Cupid's nun,
And kept his weeks of Ember.
O love me truly! 

III.
You say you love - but then your lips
Coral tinted teach no blisses.
More than coral in the sea -
They never pout for kisses -
O love me truly! 

IV.
You say you love; but then your hand
No soft squeeze for squeeze returneth,
It is like a statue's dead -
While mine to passion burneth -
O love me truly!

V.
O breathe a word or two of fire!
Smile, as if those words should burn be,
Squeeze as lovers should - O kiss
And in thy heart inurn me!
O love me truly!

The first, second, and fifth stanzas are my favourite, personally. But then I felt that I have read something of a similar tone, but more bitter, somewhere in my huge Shakespeare Complete Works. Then I remembered.

VII.
Fair is my love, but not so fair as fickle;
Mild as a dove, but neither true nor trusty;
Brighter than glass, and yet, as glass is, brittle;
Softer than wax, and yet, as iron, rusty:
A lily pale, with damask dye to grace her,
None fairer, nor none falser to deface her.
Her lips to mine how often hath she joined,
Between each kiss her oaths of true love swearing!
How many tales to please me hath she coined,
Dreading my love, the loss thereof still fearing!
Yet in the midst of all her pure protestings,
Her faith, her oaths, her tears, and all were jestings.
She burn'd with love, as straw with fire flameth;
She burn'd out love, as soon as straw outburneth;
She framed the love, and yet she foil'd the framing;
She bade love last, and yet she fell a-turning.
Was this a lover, or a lecher whether?
Bad in the best, though excellent in neither.

It's from The Passionate Pilgrim, widely attributed to Shakespeare, although many people also contributed to the work. I have personal experience with this poem. One of my loved ones once experienced the poet's feeling exactly, and I wrote this over and over again, just to release the disappointment I felt as well. It's one of my way to express empathy.

Well, sometimes it's fun, reading something with broken-hearted tone in it. Or perhaps I read and watch too much tragedy.

Weekend Quote #12

“Go, soul, the body's guest,

Upon a thankless errand;

Fear not to touch the best;

The Truth shall be thy warrant.”

This Weekend Quote is but a few lines from Sir Walter Raleigh's poem “The Lie.” It's a wonderful, beautiful, and at the same time, sad poem. Some say he wrote this poem in the Tower of London, where he was finally executed. I respect Sir Walter's frankness and courage shown in this poem, and in his other poems.

The poem's theme is political and social criticism. He condemns the church, the state, the court, the nobles – people he thinks responsible – in this poem. Dissatisfied with things in the society, he even states love and zeal to be false, and art to have no soundness. Just imagining him reading this in his cell makes my heart bleed. But for now I just want to focus on the first 4 lines of the poem.

He asks his “soul” to go and tell people their faults, since he cannot do so, being a soon-to-be-dead person. He states that the errand is “thankless,” that no one would praise him for doing such, and yet he still wants to say his thoughts. He knows that the subjects condemned in his poem are people of high position, therefore he urges his soul not to “fear to touch the best” people, because he knows well the truth of his saying, and that truth gives him the right to accuse the people of their guilt.

Well, that's mine. Now I'm ready for yours.

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Weekend Quote is hosted by Half-Filled Attic. Feel free to join. You can:

• Give the context of the quote
• Give your opinion whether you agree or disagree with it
• Share your experience related to the quote
• Share similar quotes you remember
• Or anything else. Just have fun with the quote.

Me, Love, and Pushkin

This sounds more like a confession than an analysis. In fact, I think it IS a confession. Alexander Pushkin's two love poems are my love stories – in real life. I'd like to share it to know whether my readers have the same experience.

All my love stories consist of either of these things below. The first is an unwanted love, or, perhaps, a forbidden love. I liked a person with whom I could never be, and then I found Pushkin's love poem, Confession.

I love you-- though I rage at it,
Though it is shame and toil misguided,
And to my folly self-derided
Here at your feet I will admit!
It ill befits my years, my station,
Good sense has long been overdue!
And yet, by every indication,
Love's plague has stricken me anew:
You're out of sight-- I fall to yawning;
You're here-- I suffer and feel blue,
And barely keep myself from owning,
Dear elf, how much I care for you!
.....
Aline! I ask but to be pitied,
I do not dare to plead for love;
Love, for the sins I have committed,
I am perhaps not worthy of.
But make believe! Your gaze, dear elf,
Is fit to conjure with, believe me!
Ah, it is easy to deceive me!. . .
I long to be deceived myself!

The second type of love that I experience is the love described in Pushkin's other poem, I loved you. I feel like I don't love the person anymore, but who knows whether some love lingers still within my heart?

I loved you; and perhaps I love you still,
The flame, perhaps, is not extinguished; yet
It burns so quietly within my soul,
No longer should you feel distressed by it.
Silently and hopelessly I loved you,
At times too jealous and at times too shy.
God grant you find another who will love you
As tenderly and truthfully as I

Truthful in every line, I was driven to madness upon reading it. I read it over and over again aloud while taking a bath, hurting my heart everytime I did so. I had forgotten this poem for some time, then I remember it again. The occasion dictates so.

I don't know what's wrong. Perhaps Pushkin and me, far separated by time and place in this world, share still the same fate. Or perhaps the story is so common that the poems are just general thoughts or ordinary phase of life. But I'm still grateful that at least somebody can put in words what I cannot put myself. And perhaps instead of these two sad love poems I will find a love fit for Shakespeare's line, a love “for one, of one, still such and ever so” that won't “alter when alteration finds, or bend with the remover to remove.”

Weekend Quote #8

“Stone walls doe not a prison make,

  Nor iron bars a cage;

Mindes innocent and quiet take

  That for an hermitage;

If I have freedome in my love,

  And in my soule am free,

Angels alone that sore above

  Enjoy such liberty.”

- Richard Lovelace

This week I take something different. It's taken from Lovelace's To Althea from Prison. I read this from Rafael Sabatini's novel Captain Blood, though in simplified version. Charmed by the verse, I looked for the complete poem and read it.

Lovelace wrote this poem in prison. The poet was one of the cavalier poets, who supported Charles I. (I really didn't know about this before I chose it to be my weekend quote. Any similarity between his ideology and Athos' is not intended). In his poem, he argues that he is still free, because in his mind he does nothing wrong. He is still free to be loyal to Charles I, he is still free to think and to love anyone he wants.

I like this poem because I also believe in that kind of freedom, a freedom that cannot be deprived from anyone – the freedom of heart and the freedom of mind. People can always control others' bodies, acts, and deeds. But no matter how strict they control those things, the heart and the mind will always be free.

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