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Of a Certain Friendship by Elsa Gidlow (1898-1986) Odd how you entered my house quietly, Quietly left again. While you stayed you ate at my table, Slept in my bed. There was much sweetness, Yet little was done, little said. After you left there was pain, Now there is no more pain. But the door of a certain room in my house Will be always shut. Your fork, your plate, the glass you drank from, The music you played, Are in that room With the pillow where last your head was laid. And there is one place in my garden Where it’s best that I set no foot. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe

Ahead and Around by Laura Riding Jackson (1901-1991) Ahead and Around Met, quarreled, quilled the bird of peace, Untidied a pleasant plane. Ahead accused Around of complete deceit, Around accused Ahead of being discontented. Neither listened to each. Either lined on, Making round straight and straight round, Permitting nothing in-between, Licked space clean, Fattened unhappily and flew Along the geometrical faith of two-and-two, Hated apart; and far and far Each wanderer Hoped toward a spiritually reconnoitered heaven. “For,” cried sinuous Around, “More and less than I, am I, Nature of all things, all things the nature of me.” Ahead echoed the cry. Sped toward its own eternity Of the sweet end before the bitter beyond, beyond. And both were brave and both were strong, And the ways of both were like and long, And adventured freely in fettered song: One that circled as it sang, One that longitudinally rang. The spite prospered. The spite stopped. Both earned the same end differently, Prided along two different paths, Reached the same humility Of an old-trodden start. Birth is the beginning where all part. Death is the beginning where they meet. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe

Voyages V by Hart Crane (1899-1932) Meticulous, past midnight in clear rime,    Infrangible and lonely, smooth as though cast    Together in one merciless white blade— The bay estuaries fleck the hard sky limits. —As if too brittle or too clear to touch!    The cables of our sleep so swiftly filed, Already hang, shred ends from remembered stars.    One frozen trackless smile... What words    Can strangle this deaf moonlight? For we Are overtaken. Now no cry, no sword    Can fasten or deflect this tidal wedge, Slow tyranny of moonlight, moonlight loved    And changed... “There’s Nothing like this in the world,” you say,    Knowing I cannot touch your hand and look    Too, into that godless cleft of sky Where nothing turns but dead sands flashing. “—And never to quite understand!” No, In all the argosy of your bright hair I dreamed    Nothing so flagless as this piracy.                                                But now Draw in your head, alone and too tall here.    Your eyes already in the slant of drifting foam;    Your breath sealed by the ghosts I do not know:    Draw in your head and sleep the long way home. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe

The Gift of India by Sarojini Naidu (1879-1949) Is there aught you need that my hands withhold, Rich gifts of raiment or grain or gold? Lo! I have flung to the East and West Priceless treasures torn from my breast, And yielded the sons of my stricken womb To the drum-beats of duty, the sabres of doom. Gathered like pearls in their alien graves Silent they sleep by the Persian waves, Scattered like shells on Egyptian sands, They lie with pale brows and brave, broken hands, They are strewn like blossoms mown down by chance On the blood-brown meadows of Flanders and France. Can ye measure the grief of the tears I weep Or compass the woe of the watch I keep? Or the pride that thrills thro’ my heart’s despair And the hope that comforts the anguish of prayer? And the far sad glorious vision I see Of the torn red banners of Victory? When the terror and tumult of hate shall cease And life be refashioned on anvils of peace, And your love shall offer memorial thanks To the comrades who fought in your dauntless ranks, And you honour the deeds of the deathless ones Remember the blood of thy martyred sons! This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe

To the Memory of Mary Young by Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872-1906)     God has his plans, and what if we     With our sight be too blind to see     Their full fruition; cannot he,     Who made it, solve the mystery?     One whom we loved has fall'n asleep,     Not died; although her calm be deep,     Some new, unknown, and strange surprise     In Heaven holds enrapt her eyes.     And can you blame her that her gaze     Is turned away from earthly ways,     When to her eyes God's light and love     Have giv'n the view of things above?     A gentle spirit sweetly good,     The pearl of precious womanhood;     Who heard the voice of duty clear,     And found her mission soon and near.     She loved all nature, flowers fair,     The warmth of sun, the kiss of air,     The birds that filled the sky with song,     The stream that laughed its way along.     Her home to her was shrine and throne,     But one love held her not alone;     She sought out poverty and grief,     Who touched her robe and found relief.     So sped she in her Master's work,     Too busy and too brave to shirk,     When through the silence, dusk and dim,     God called her and she fled to him.     We wonder at the early call,     And tears of sorrow can but fall     For her o'er whom we spread the pall;     But faith, sweet faith, is over all.     The house is dust, the voice is dumb,     But through undying years to come,     The spark that glowed within her soul     Shall light our footsteps to the goal.     She went her way; but oh, she trod     The path that led her straight to God.     Such lives as this put death to scorn;     They lose our day to find God's morn. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe

The Fly and the Ant by Jean de La Fontaine (1621-1695) A fly and ant, upon a sunny bank,      Discuss'd the question of their rank.      'O Jupiter!' the former said,      'Can love of self so turn the head,      That one so mean and crawling,      And of so low a calling,      To boast equality shall dare      With me, the daughter of the air?      In palaces I am a guest,      And even at thy glorious feast.      Whene'er the people that adore thee      May immolate for thee a bullock,      I'm sure to taste the meat before thee.      Meanwhile this starveling, in her hillock,      Is living on some bit of straw      Which she has labour'd home to draw.      But tell me now, my little thing,      Do you camp ever on a king,      An emperor, or lady?      I do, and have full many a play-day      On fairest bosom of the fair,      And sport myself upon her hair.      Come now, my hearty, rack your brain      To make a case about your grain.'      'Well, have you done?' replied the ant.      'You enter palaces, I grant,      And for it get right soundly cursed.      Of sacrifices, rich and fat,      Your taste, quite likely, is the first; -      Are they the better off for that?      You enter with the holy train;      So enters many a wretch profane.      On heads of kings and asses you may squat;      Deny your vaunting I will not;      But well such impudence, I know,      Provokes a sometimes fatal blow.      The name in which your vanity delights      Is own'd as well by parasites,      And spies that die by ropes - as you soon will      By famine or by ague-chill,      When Phoebus goes to cheer      The other hemisphere, -      The very time to me most dear.      Not forced abroad to go      Through wind, and rain, and snow,      My summer's work I then enjoy,      And happily my mind employ,      From care by care exempted.      By which this truth I leave to you,      That by two sorts of glory we are tempted,      The false one and the true.      Work waits, time flies; adieu: -      This gabble does not fill      My granary or till.' This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe

Nocturne by Sadakichi Hartmann (1867-1944) Upon the silent sea-swept land      The dreams of night fall soft and gray,           The waves fade on the jeweled sand                Like some lost hope of yesterday. The dreams of night fall soft and gray      Upon the summer-colored seas,           Like some lost hope of yesterday,                The sea-mew’s song is on the breeze. Upon the summer-colored seas      Sails gleam and glimmer ghostly white,           The sea-mew’s song is on the breeze                Lost in the monotone of night. Sails gleam and glimmer ghostly white,      They come and slowly drift away,           Lost in the monotone of night,                Like visions of a summer-day. They shift and slowly drift away      Like lovers’ lays that wax and wane,           The visions of a summer-day                Whose dreams we ne’er will dream again. Like lovers’ lays wax and wane      The star dawn shifts from sail to sail,           Like dreams we ne’er will dream again;                The sea-mews follow on their trail. The star dawn shifts from sail to sail,      As they drift to the dim unknown,           The sea-mews follow on their trail                In quest of some dreamland zone. In quest of some far dreamland zone,      Of some far silent sea-swept land,           They are lost in the dim unknown,                Where waves fade on jeweled sand                     And dreams of night fall soft and gray,                          Like some lost hope of yesterday. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe

I Was Looking a Long While by Walt Whitman (1819-1892) I was looking a long while for a clue to the history of the past for myself, and for these chants - and now I have found it; It is not in those paged fables in the libraries, (them I neither accept nor reject;) It is no more in the legends than in all else; It is in the present - it is this earth to-day; It is in Democracy - (the purport and aim of all the past;) It is the life of one man or one woman to-day - the average man of to-day; It is in languages, social customs, literatures, arts; It is in the broad show of artificial things, ships, machinery, politics, creeds, modern improvements, and the interchange of nations, All for the average man of to-day. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe

We never know how high we are (1176) by Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) We never know how high we are   Till we are called to rise; And then, if we are true to plan,   Our statures touch the skies— The Heroism we recite   Would be a daily thing, Did not ourselves the Cubits warp   For fear to be a King— This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe

Chicago by Carl Sandburg (1878-1967)         Hog Butcher for the World,         Tool maker, Stacker of Wheat,         Player with Railroads and the Nation's              Freight Handler;         Stormy, husky, brawling,         City of the Big Shoulders: They tell me you are wicked and I believe them, for I have seen your painted women under the gas lamps luring the farm boys. And they tell me you are crooked and I answer: yes, it is true I have seen the gunman kill and go free to kill again. And they tell me you are brutal and my reply is: On the faces of women and children I have seen the marks of wanton hunger. And having answered so I turn once more to those who sneer at this my city, and I give them back the sneer and say to them: Come and show me another city with lifted head singing so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning. Flinging magnetic curses amid the toil of piling job on job, here is a tall bold slugger set vivid against the little soft cities; Fierce as a dog with tongue lapping for action, cunning as a savage pitted against the wilderness,             Bareheaded,             Shoveling,             Wrecking,             Planning,             Building, breaking, rebuilding, Under the smoke, dust all over his mouth, laughing with white teeth, Under the terrible burden of destiny laughing as a young man laughs, Laughing even as an ignorant fighter laughs who has never lost a battle, Bragging and laughing that under his wrist is the pulse, and under his ribs the heart of the people,             Laughing! Laughing the stormy, husky, brawling laughter of Youth, half-naked, sweating, proud to be Hog Butcher, Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat, Player with Railroads and Freight Handler to the Nation. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe

My Shadow by Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894) I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me, And what can be the use of him is more than I can see. He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head; And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed. The funniest thing about him is the way he likes to grow— Not at all like proper children, which is always very slow; For he sometimes shoots up taller like an India-rubber ball, And he sometimes gets so little that there’s none of him at all. He hasn’t got a notion of how children ought to play, And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way. He stays so close beside me, he’s a coward you can see; I’d think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me! One morning, very early, before the sun was up, I rose and found the shining dew on every buttercup; But my lazy little shadow, like an arrant sleepy-head, Had stayed at home behind me and was fast asleep in bed. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe

A Jelly-Fish by Marianne Moore (1887-1972) Visible, invisible, A fluctuating charm, An amber-colored amethyst Inhabits it; your arm Approaches, and It opens and It closes; You have meant To catch it, And it shrivels; You abandon Your intent— It opens, and it Closes and you Reach for it— The blue Surrounding it Grows cloudy, and It floats away From you. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit iwillreadtoyou.substack.com/subscribe