by Winky. Torres del Paine.
DAWN IN THE ANDES
’T IS dawn;—the distant Andes’ rocky spires,
One after one, have caught the orient fires.
Where the dun condor shoots his upward flight,
His wings are touched with momentary light.
Meantime, beneath the mountains’ glittering heads,
A boundless ocean of gray vapor spreads,
That o’er the champaign, stretching far below,
Moves now, in clustered masses, rising slow,
Till all the living landscape is displayed
In various pomp of color, light, and shade,
Hills, forests, rivers, lakes, and level plain
Lessening in sunshine to the southern main.
The llama’s fleece fumes with ascending dew;
The gem-like humming-birds their toils renew;
And there, by the wild river’s devious side,
The tall flamingo, in its crimson pride,
Stalks on, in richest plumage bright arrayed,
With snowy neck superb, and legs of lengthening shade.
-- William Lisle Bowles
KILAUEA
You volcano
As energy goes...
Smiling eyes of Pele's tears
Flame and fan the acrid air
Beneath the silver mantles edge
So near
Far... bellows below
Go forth
Between vented
Rock and crust
Take hands,
Push your shoulders up
To the sky
You Volcano
Do as you must
and erupt
You need to cry
Don't be interrupted
When your feeling tough
I can see you've had enough
You Volcano
Spit your curses high
Lava launch
into the sea
Raining light for every
Star at night to see
As they live or die
You Volcano
Make islands groan and grow
Stretch out into waves and sigh
Rise and shift your might
like an earthbound meteorite
That never dies
Only rest your head
You Volcano
on blackened lava bed
Stone tears stilled
never say good bye
-- Anne Therese
PARIS
Paris
A wonderful city
A place for lovers
Paris
A city to dream wild
Paris
In that river the boats are moving with lovers inside
Watching that beautiful sky above the river
And the moon from that beautiful sky
Is shining in
The river
Paris
A city that never sleeps
Paris
The romance is in the air
Paris
The lovers are feeling the love that are in the air
Paris
That smell of the roses the lovers can smell
Paris
This is the sign that spring is here
Paris
Spring is the most beautiful time of the year
Now that winter has finally gone to sleep
Paris
The lovers welcome spring with open arms
-- Aldo Kraas
DOVER BEACH
The sea is calm to-night,
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; -- on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanch'd land,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.
Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Aegean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.
The sea of faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furl'd.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.
Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night
-- Matthew Arnold
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IMAGE CREDITS:
- Image: by Winky. Torres del Paine.
- Image: by Mariano Mantel. Corazón de la Montaña.
- Image: by Zach Jackson. Lava.
- Image: by D.W. Peterson, for National Park Service. Courtesy of Image Editor. Kilauea Volcano at Mauna Ulu.
- Image: by Howard Ignatius. First Light Over Kilauea Caldera.
- Image: by Daniel Gorenkin. Lava from Kilauea Volcano.
- Image: by Jonathan. Champs-Élysées from Above.
- Image: by Petter Palander. La Fayette Up.
- Image: by Carfull...assignment: Mongolia. Dover Cliffs.
- Image: by Archangel12. Dover Cliffs, South Foreland Lighthouse.
- Image: by Alan L. Kilauea Lighthouse.
- Image: by Chiguachi. Andes.
- Image: by BN App - Download now!
- Image: by Moyan Brenn. Paris.