On the Ning Nang Nong

Golden Books

On The Ning Nang Nong 

On the Ning Nang Nong Where the cows go Bong!
And the monkeys all say Boo!
There's a Nong Nang Ning
Where the trees go Ping
And the tea pots Jibber Jabber Joo.
On the Nong Ning Nang
All the mice go Clang!
And you just can't catch 'em when they do!
So it's Ning Nang Nong!
Cows go Bong!
Nong Nang Ning!
Trees go Ping!
Nong Ning Nang!

The mice go Clang!
What a noisy place to belong,
Is the Ning Nang Ning Nang Nong!

        Spike Milligan

Being stuck in the house with your family for weeks on end does something to your brain.

So We'll Go No More A Roving

Caspar David Friedrich

 

So We'll Go No More A Roving

So, we'll go no more a roving

   So late into the night,

Though the heart be still as loving,

   And the moon be still as bright.

For the sword outwears its sheath,

   And the soul wears out the breast,

And the heart must pause to breathe,

   And love itself have rest.

Though the night was made for loving,

   And the day returns too soon,

Yet we'll go no more a roving

   By the light of the moon.

Gordon, Lord Byron

When I read this, it seems like a different shade of the strange emotion I feel as I look out at the people walking by, people from my neighbourhood, people actually looking around and observing, even looking at me in my window – people who must live near enough to walk here, whom I've never seen till now. Or the people in the staggered line at the grocery store – silent, nervous, hesitant to smile. People! So close and yet so far. Will we ever go back to that interchange of pleasantries, that hug or handshake, that walk arm in arm? I hadn't thought of it as freedom, that casual proximity. But I see it now. I miss it. I miss walking in the park. But those gates have been shut and lines have been drawn, and we carefully measure the distance between us. Hearts may be as loving, but bodies are constrained. The poem may not be about a pandemic, but the sense of loss and reluctant acceptance of reality is all too familiar.

Easter Hymn

Arcabus

Easter Hymn

Death, and darkness get you packing,

Nothing now to man is lacking,

All your triumphs now are ended,

And what Adam marred is mended;

Graves are beds now for the weary,

Death a nap, to wake more merry;

Youth now, full of pious duty,

Seeks in thee for perfect beauty,

The weak, and aged tired, with length

Of days, from thee look for new strength,

And Infants with thy pangs Contest

As pleasant, as if with the breast;

Then, unto him, who thus hath thrown

Even to contempt thy kingdom down,

And by his blood did us advance

Unto his own Inheritance,

To him be glory, power, praise,

From this, unto the last of days.

Henry Vaughan

 

A Seedling

Benoit Trimborn

A seedling shoulders up some crumbs of ground:

The fields are suddenly green for miles around.

HO-O

fr. A Net of Fireflies

translated by Harold Stewart

Sneaky spring. She did it again.

when faces called flowers

Catrin Welz-Stein

when faces called flowers float out of the ground

and breathing is wishing and wishing is having-

but keeping is downward and doubting and never

-it's april(yes,april;my darling)it's spring!

yes the pretty birds frolic as spry as can fly

yes the little fish gambol as glad as can be

(yes the mountains are dancing together)

when every leaf opens without any sound

and wishing is having and having is giving-

but keeping is doting and nothing and nonsense

-alive;we're alive,dear:it's(kiss me now)spring!

now the pretty birds hover so she and so he

now the little fish quiver so you and so i

now the mountains are dancing, the mountains)

when more than was lost has been found has been found

and having is giving and giving is living-

but keeping is darkness and winter and cringing

-it's spring(all our night becomes day)o,it's spring!

all the pretty birds dive to the heart of the sky

all the little fish climb through the mind of the sea

all the mountains are dancing;are dancing)

e.e. cummings

I've been waiting forever to post this poem – but April's here, so the time is right. The mountains are dancing - ! That's so funny – it makes me think of Tolkien's Ents, the trees in their dance. It would be pretty glib to say that mountains don't dance, though – I mean, how do you know? The Bible says they clap their hands, so why couldn't they dance, too? Cummings says the birds and fish are frolicing and gamboling – and I think he's right. Isn't it possible that they enjoy themselves? I remember spring on the farm when the cows were let into the newly-green meadow for the first time. You've never seen such a hootenany! Tails in the air, gawky leaps and jumps, thunderingly disorganized stampedes in no particular direction... happy cows! If cows, why not birds and fish, why not mountains – why not us?

And then that line – that amazing line -

“when more than was lost has been found has been found” - I could say that over and over. More than was lost. More than was lost! Is that possible? It would take a lot of faith, to believe that. Dancing mountain faith.

Miracles

Laura Thomas

Miracles


Why, who makes much of a miracle?
As to me I know of nothing else but miracles,
Whether I walk the streets of Manhattan,
Or dart my sight over the roofs of houses toward the sky,
Or wade with naked feet along the beach just in the edge of the water,
Or stand under trees in the woods,
Or talk by day with any one I love, or sleep in the bed at night with any one I love,
Or sit at table at dinner with the rest,
Or look at strangers opposite me riding in the car,
Or watch honey-bees busy around the hive of a summer forenoon,
Or animals feeding in the fields,
Or birds, or the wonderfulness of insects in the air,
Or the wonderfulness of the sundown, or of stars shining so quiet and bright,
Or the exquisite delicate thin curve of the new moon in spring;
These with the rest, one and all, are to me miracles,
The whole referring, yet each distinct and in its place.

To me every hour of the light and dark is a miracle,
Every cubic inch of space is a miracle,
Every square yard of the surface of the earth is spread with the same,
Every foot of the interior swarms with the same.

To me the sea is a continual miracle,
The fishes that swim-the rocks-the motion of the waves-the ships with men in them,
What stranger miracles are there?


Walt Whitman

 

Whitman is right. Miracles are common as dirt. Everywhere we look – can we explain the things we see, the normal, everyday things – a glass of water! Think of the mysteries in a glass of water alone – what is the water made of ? How has it come to be in the glass? Where has it been? And the glass – we may think we know what it's made of, but how was glass first discovered? Who was it that saw what could be done with it? One question only leads to another. One fantastic thing only leads to another. And we walk through our homes, through our streets, through forests, along beaches and streams – surrounded, innundated, swirled within an expanding crescendo of amazement. 

It's quite true, there is nothing I know that is not a miracle.

 

Their Fire

Albert Bierstadt

 

Their Fire

Their fire was small. They fed it only enough

To keep them through the night and to keep them

Together and unafraid

Lying between it and the face of the cliff

Where, at the foot under a hanging stone,

They had made their shelter

For a time, as others had in years so distant

Now, they seemed as thick and soft as the stillness

Standing around their sleep

In which the animals also slept (the beavers

And otters whose doors were deep under the water,

Squirrels in their hollows)

Or walked in the sleep of others (the gray foxes,

The martens and black bears, silent, listening).

Had they too wondered,

Those other makers of fire, how long to linger

In this same place, how many living seasons

It would keep them warm,

Would hold them together at a single hearthstone

While the round year turned the sky, thickened the clouds

Or thinned then, turning

The snow and the rain as it turned the wind, turned leaves

And turned the color of their hair like ermine's fur

And turned the earth?

They held their hands out to that restless fire

As if to shield it, to calm it, and they turned

Their faces to its light.

David Wagoner

I wanted to ignore the circumstances and just have poems. But poetry comes out of what we’re living. And what we’re living is so strange that it’s hard to know what to say or do. But it does feel like each family unit (sometimes that means 1, because 1 is a potential family, and comes from a family, whether blood or water, however fractured or subtracted from) is sitting by its fire, ruminating over the past, wondering about the future. We are self-absorbed at this moment, so I like how this poem brings nature back into the scene. I’m so glad to see for myself the cherry trees blossoming, or the Northern Flickers as they drum loudly on any metal available – the season is Spring and it is expanding and blossoming. It reminds me that we will too. I keep my loved ones close, and turn my face to the light. Warm my hands at the fire. What tomorrow brings is tomorrow’s problem. We’re "together now, and unafraid".