Status Updates From A Year of Reading Aloud: 52...

Pleasant Sounds
JOHN CLARE (1793–1864)

The rustling of leaves under the feet in woods and under hedges;
The crumpling of cat-ice and snow down wood-rides,
narrow lanes, and every street causeway;
Rustling through a wood or rather rushing, while the
wind halloos in the oak-toop like thunder;
The rustle of birds’ wings startled from their nests or
flying unseen into the bushes;

Thinking
WALTER D. WINTLE

If you think you are beaten, you are.
If you think you dare not, you don’t.
If you like to win, but think you can’t,
It’s a cinch you won’t.

If you think you’ll lose, you’re lost
For out of the world we find
Success begins with a fellow’s will.
It’s all a state of mind.

If you think you are outclassed, you are.
You’ve got to think high to rise.

Leisure
W. H. DAVIES (1871–1940)

What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep and cows.
No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.
No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.
No time to turn at Beauty’s glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.

‘Poetry can tell us what human beings are.
It can tell us why we stumble and fall and how,
miraculousl, we can stand up.’

MAYA ANGELOU

Good poems