The pertinent words of a poet recurred to me with new force.

[Matt_K]

Never, bright flame, may be denied to me

Thy dear, life imaging, close sympathy.

What but my hopes shot upward e'er so bright?

What by my fortunes sunk so low in night?


Why art thou banished from our hearth and hall,

Thou who art welcomed and beloved by all?

Was thy existence then too fanciful

For our life's common light, who are so dull?

Did thy bright gleam mysterious converse hold

With our congenial souls? secrets too bold?



Well, we are safe and strong, for now we sit

Beside a hearth where no dim shadows flit,

Where nothing cheers nor saddens, but a fire

Warms feet and hands—nor does to more aspire

By whose compact utilitarian heap

The present may sit down and go to sleep,

Nor fear the ghosts who from the dim past walked,

And with us by the unequal light of the old wood fire

talked.



A poem by Ellen Sturgis Hooper,

published in the transcedentalist Dial(1,1840,193)


From a book "Walden" by Henry David Thoreau.

[cafemia]

~ A lovely poem, this one! When a sprit lies in darkness, sometimes one can truly be creative after which as if one is sprouting from soil. An occasional withdrawing and reflection into the soul is always nurturing to the spirit.