Shifting Baselines
 

http://www.shiftingbaselines.org/sli...istine_hi.html

by
The Ocean Conservancy.

Shifting Baselines
 

I love you Earth, your sky, your seas!
Oh, why did man have to harness thee?
You once were so beautiful, so wonderful so great.
Now man has made you hell.

Oh, God, was it by thy fate,
that such befell thy wondrous mate?

People, People!
It was wrongly said that Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us.
For Earth gives us life. Our sins bring only death.

jlrogers




"Simple Simon" wrote in message
...
http://www.shiftingbaselines.org/sli...istine_hi.html

by
The Ocean Conservancy.

Shifting Baselines
 

Thanks for the link.

"Simple Simon" wrote in message
...
http://www.shiftingbaselines.org/sli...istine_hi.html

by
The Ocean Conservancy.

Shifting Baselines
 

Sounds like something Crowhurst wrote...

Cheers MC

jlrogers wrote:



People, People!
It was wrongly said that Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us.
For Earth gives us life. Our sins bring only death.

Shifting Baselines
 

"jlrogers" wrote in message
. ..
I love you Earth, your sky, your seas!
Oh, why did man have to harness thee?
You once were so beautiful, so wonderful so great.
Now man has made you hell.

Oh, God, was it by thy fate,
that such befell thy wondrous mate?

People, People!
It was wrongly said that Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us.
For Earth gives us life. Our sins bring only death.


Anybody could write poetry that good!
Even I could, if only I would.
But, I can't..
So I shan't.
Isn't that good?


Regards


Donal - who's not a poet -and really knows it!
--

Shifting Baselines
 

I wrote that "poem" in 1960. The line, "It was wrongly said that Earth gets
its price for what Earth gives us," refers to "The Vision of Sir Launfal, by
James Russell Lowell, 1819-1891:
....
Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us;
The beggar is taxed for a corner to die in,
The priest hath his fee who comes and shrives us,
We bargain for the graves we lie in;
At the Devil's booth are all things sold
Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold;
For a cap and bells our lives we pay,
Bubbles we earn with a whole soul's tasking:
'T is heaven alone that is given away,
'T is only God may be had for the asking;
There is no price set on the lavish summer,
And June may be had by the poorest comer.

And what is so rare as a day in June?
Then, if ever, come perfect days;
Then Heaven tries the earth if it be in tune,
And over it softly her warm ear lays:
Whether we look, or whether we listen,
We hear life murmur, or see it glisten;
Every clod feels a stir of might,
An instinct within it that reaches and towers,
And, grasping blindly above it for light,
Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers;
The flush of life may well be seen
Thrilling back over hills and valleys;
The cowslip startles in meadows green,
The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice,
And there 's never a leaf or a blade too mean
To be some happy creature's palace;
The little bird sits at his door in the sun,
Atilt like a blossom among the leaves,
And lets his illumined being o'errun
With the deluge of summer it receives;
His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings,
And the heart in her dumb breast flutters and sings;
He sings to the wide world, and she to her nest,--
In the nice ear of Nature which song is the best?
http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/launfal.htm


"The_navigator©" wrote in message
...
Sounds like something Crowhurst wrote...

Cheers MC

jlrogers wrote:



People, People!
It was wrongly said that Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us.
For Earth gives us life. Our sins bring only death.