ABOUT THE POETRY EVENT

Good afternoon,

I'd like to express how a wonderful experience "Discovering the Poem inside You" has been. The setting, which I'd never been to, is remarkably beautiful, with outstanding acoustics. The reciters did the best reading version, better than every rehearsal. Finally, the narration was carried out by a true master of ceremonies. I hope everybody enjoyed the event as much as I did.

ON POETRY

Thomas Hardy was, to my mind, an unusual writer. As a novelist he emerged as one of the late figures of the Victorian period. Some of his best-known novels are Tess d'Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure. With the change of century and although everyone does not share my opinion, nonetheless, Hardy excelled at poetry. With a Romantic influence and a critical view of society, he wrote some of the most brilliant poems of the beginning of the 20th century in English. Here is one sample:

Neutral tones

We stood by a pond that winter day,

And the sun was white, as though chidden of God,

And a few leaves lay on the starving sod;

         – They had fallen from an ash, and were gray.

Your eyes on me were as eyes that rove

Over tedious riddles of years ago;

And some words played between us to and fro

         On which lost the more by our love.

The smile on your mouth was the deadest thing

Alive enough to have strength to die;

And a grin of bitterness swept thereby

         Like an ominous bird a-wing….

Since then, keen lessons that love deceives,

And wrings with wrong, have shaped to me

Your face, and the God curst sun, and a tree,

         And a pond edged with grayish leaves. 

 

 

 

Outstanding mental image of the feelings of an abandoned lover.

 

Moving on to something hilarious, I hope you enjoy this one:

 

Ah, Are You Digging On My Grave?

    "Ah, are you digging on my grave,
My loved one? Planting rue?"
"No: yesterday he went to wed
One of the brightest wealth has bred.
'It cannot hurt her now,' he said,
'That I should not be true.'"

"Then who is digging on my grave,
My nearest dearest kin?"
"Ah, no: they sit and think, 'What use!
What good will planting flowers produce?
No. Tendance of her mound can loose
Her spirit from Death's gin.'"

"But someone digs upon my grave?
My enemy? Prodding sly?"
"Nay: when she heard you had passed the Gate
That shuts on all flesh soon or late,
She thought you no more worth her hate,
And cares not where you lie.

"Then, who is digging on my grave?
Say, since I have not guessed!"
"O it is I, my mistress dear,
Your little dog , who still lives near,
And much I hope my movements here
Have not disturbed your rest?"

"Ah yes! You dig upon my grave...
Why flashed it not to me
That one true heart was left behind!
What feeling do we ever find
To equal among human kind
A dog's fidelity!"

"Mistress, I dug upon your grave
To bury a bone, in case
I should be hungry near this spot
When passing on my daily trot.
I am sorry, but I quite forgot
It was your resting place."