education
23rd September – On This Day In History
Born:
1930 Ray Charles (singer & pianist)
Died:
1939 Sigmund Freud (father of psychology)
On This Day:
1979 Somali constitution is approved by its president
Have a good Sunday, 23rd September
Autumn Romance
Hand in hand they wandered
north-eastward across the vales
during the beautiful autumn time
in England’s Yorkshire Dales.
The sun shone over the valleys
nature was never so fair,
on the day he wooed the one he loved,
the girl with the flaxen hair.
The depth of his soul was captured
by a softness, pure as the snow.
His young life he would surrender
because he adored her so.
Voices echoed from a village church
and as he knelt before his love…
he could hear Mendelssohn’s melody:
‘O For the Wings of a Dove’.
Who else within the whole wide world
could feel such ecstasy rare?
At a time when fairy-tales came true,
they both vowed their lives to share.
– Joyce Hemsley
22nd September – On This Day
Born:
1958 Andrea Bocelli (singer – tenor)
Died:
1539 Guru Nanak (founder of Sikhism)
On This Day:
1908 Bulgaria declares independence (from the Ottoman Empire, modern day Turkey)
Have a good Saturday, 22nd September
Autumn
The cold breeze through the window left ajar as I rest
Reminds me that summer is gone and autumn is stirring,
Bringing sadness as the lawn is mown for the last time
Sadness as summer shorts give way to warmer trousers.
I watch as the cycle begins again, that dreaded cyclical
Pattern we can’t get out of, daytime and night,
Seedtime and harvest, laughter and tears, life and death
Only death breaks the dreaded cycle, death the end of all.
Oh joyous death, the end of life, of change, of stress
Beginning of new dimensions, of new experiences,
Glimpsed by sages in Antiquity, by Greeks by Persians
By Chinese, by Jews, by too many not to want it.
Autumn, bring on autumn, bring on winter,
Bring on spring and the following summer
Until I’ve seen them all and sleep to wake no more,
Bring on the seasons, the cycle the change, until my end.
– James Hart
21st September – On This Day In History
Born:
1947 Stephen King (horror author – Christian, The Shining etc)
Died:
19 BC Virgil (Roman poet)
On This Day:
1937 The Hobbit is published (by JRR Tolkien)
Have a good Friday, 21st September
An Autumn Evening
Dinner and day together go,
As round the table still we dwell,
Watching the sun descending slow,
Our faces shine with day’s farewell.
This is the moment of all time
When stillness reigneth over all:
When life calms down, the highest lime
Moves not, nor any leaf dares fall.
Shall we sit still in low-voiced talk
Anticipating lamp and book,
Or once more take a sauntering walk
Hill-ward to catch the sun’s last look?
The lambs and sheep have parted long,
No anxious bleat nor moor-hen’s call
Is heard, nor robin’s autumn song,
Absolute stillness reigns o’er all.
Over the orange-tinted brae,
Against that wondrous north-west sky,
Over the far sea golden-gray,
Where no horizon we descry.
A glorified world is there, behold,
Above that cloud-bank growing dim,
Where the great king hath laid his head,
Fragments of crimson still unfold:
Cherubim’s wings are ruby red,
So these may be the cherubim!
Now we return with noiseless tread,
These cottage doors are shut betimes,
Listen, this is old John Grimes’,
He reads before he goes to bed;
He reads a chapter of the Book
Of Books, to comfort his old wife,
Happily in this far Scotch nook,
Faith still trims the lamp of life.
But there our own high windows shine,
The evening fire is lit we see,
Wayfaring shoes let us resign,
And you will sing that hymn to me.
– William Bell Scott
20th September – On This Day In History
Born:
1948 George RR Martin (author – A Song Of Ice And Fire / Games Of Thrones)
Died:
2004 Brian Clough (Footballer and manager)
On This Day:
1258 Salisbury Cathedral is inaugurated
Have a good Thursday, 20th September
