Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein

There is a place where the sidewalk ends
And before the street begins,
And there the grass grows soft and white,
And there the sun burns crimson bright,
And there the moon-bird rests from his flight
To cool in the peppermint wind.

Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black
And the dark street winds and bends.
Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow
We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And watch where the chalk-white arrows go
To the place where the sidewalk ends.

Yes we’ll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And we’ll go where the chalk-white arrows go,
For the children, they mark, and the children, they know
The place where the sidewalk ends.

For: Nurt Thurs – What If …?

A Calendar of Sonnets: May by Helen Hunt Jackson

O Month when they who love must love and wed!
Were one to go to worlds where May is naught,
And seek to tell the memories he had brought
From earth of thee, what were most fitly said?
I know not if the rosy showers shed
From apple-boughs, or if the soft green wrought
In fields, or if the robin’s call be fraught
The most with thy delight. Perhaps they read
Thee best who in the ancient time did say
Thou wert the sacred month unto the old:
No blossom blooms upon thy brightest day
So subtly sweet as memories which unfold
In aged hearts which in thy sunshine lie,
To sun themselves once more before they die.

For: Nurt Thurs – Past and Future

Happy Father’s Day!

Sonnet 37: As a decrepit father takes delight
by William Shakespeare

As a decrepit father takes delight
To see his active child do deeds of youth,
So I, made lame by Fortune’s dearest spite,
Take all my comfort of thy worth and truth.
For whether beauty, birth, or wealth, or wit,
Or any of these all, or all, or more,
Entitled in thy parts, do crown and sit,
I make my love engrafted to this store.
So then I am not lame, poor, nor despised,
Whilst that this shadow doth such substance give
That I in thy abundance am sufficed
And by a part of all thy glory live.
Look what is best, that best I wish in thee.
This wish I have; then ten times happy me!

For: Nurt Thursday – Inside Job

Parallel – Daily Prompt

The shore that call us home
Was the title of the poem
By Samuel Hazo in 1949
Makes me think about my life
Every time I go home and meet my
Family, friends and relatives again
After some time when I’m here
And they are there living differently
Yet parallel to each other, there’s this
Nostalgic feeling, of being home again
This land or these islands I miss so much
It doesn’t matter where I am now, and
I’m building a home with my family here
But over there where I used to call home
Full of childhood memories, of school,
Of college, of my first experience at work
First love, first kiss, first of everything
These experiences made me and taught me
They gave me a solid foundation of how
It is to be me, all the trials and errors
They gave me the confidence to try and
Explore different things and I have proved
That I can do it no matter where
So even when I’m happy here
I’d still be a girl with a fringe
I’d always go back to the shore
That calls me home, the Philippines

For: Parallel, Nurt Thursday – Your Energy

Friendship IXX by Khalil Gibran

And a youth said, “Speak to us of Friendship.”

Your friend is your needs answered.

He is your field which you sow with love and reap with thanksgiving.

And he is your board and your fireside.

For you come to him with your hunger, and you seek him for peace.

When your friend speaks his mind you fear not the “nay” in your own mind, nor do you withhold the “ay.”

And when he is silent your heart ceases not to listen to his heart;

For without words, in friendship, all thoughts, all desires, all expectations are born and shared, with joy that is unacclaimed.

When you part from your friend, you grieve not;

For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain.

And let there be no purpose in friendship save the deepening of the spirit.

For love that seeks aught but the disclosure of its own mystery is not love but a net cast forth: and only the unprofitable is caught.

And let your best be for your friend.

If he must know the ebb of your tide, let him know its flood also.

For what is your friend that you should seek him with hours to kill?

Seek him always with hours to live.

For it is his to fill your need, but not your emptiness.

And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures.

For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.

For: Nurt Thursday – Dreams

Tale Weaver – #163 – Aging – 15th March

old woman portrait vietnam three tamarind m’nong

I was rummaging through the attic
in the filth, searching for some documents
old memento, toys and games of our antic
brown faded photos of our descents

I found an old photograph of a woman
she was beautiful, I save it as my keepsake
lines on her face tell us experience she’d done
her eyes conveyed her joy, hope and ache

an enigma, seducing me to deconstruct
I can feel her wraith in my zone
enlightening me of proper conduct
her past mistakes to atone

her alexithymia makes me want to express
something she wasn’t able to do
perhaps she was in distress
if only I could have a cue

like colouring her life with crayons
through the convex lens the search
looking for truth, spending aeons
thinking of it as my research

We’re nearly there and we have to keep going
Praise the Lord for managing to continue
Look, I could see a glint of assurance at the end
The overgrown garden with herbs is my witness
Hush, don’t feel guilty for not doing other things
As the leaves sway with the winds, be happy
Our sense of woe slowly disappearing
We are compelled to continue until the end
To give us some sort of satisfaction and hope

For: Tale Weaver – #163 – Aging – 15th March, Nurt Thursday – Rise and Soar

Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar

Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar is an open-air museum and heritage park in Bagac, Bataan, Philippines. Spread over 400 hectares, the park features a collection of 27 Spanish Colonial buildings and stone houses (bahay na bato in Tagalog), planned to resemble a settlement reminiscent of the period. These houses were carefully dismantled, brick by brick, transplanted from different parts of the Philippines and rehabilitated in these premises, to resemble the original structure. For parts that were missing, woodwork and bricks were replicated to resemble the original structure. For this, the Ciudad employs a workforce of 130 people, including 10 wood sculptors, three metal sculptors, 30 craftsmen who design ceilings, and construction workers. There are also five architects, two of whom are historical architects, and two artists. The resort also has a restaurant, a beach, calesa rides and a swimming pool. (https://www.lascasasfilipinas.com/)

For: Our World: 26 February 2018 , Nurt Thurs – Your Author