{"id":131,"date":"2019-05-16T14:23:00","date_gmt":"2019-05-16T14:23:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/2019\/05\/16\/a-poem-for-thursday\/"},"modified":"2020-10-26T22:42:08","modified_gmt":"2020-10-26T22:42:08","slug":"a-poem-for-thursday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/2019\/05\/16\/a-poem-for-thursday\/","title":{"rendered":"A Poem for a Thursday #32"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Photo by\u00a0Leone Venter<\/a>\u00a0on\u00a0<\/span>Unsplash<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Robert Graves was a British poet, classicist, novelist, and critic. Graves was one of the most well-known WWI poets along with Siegfreid Sassoon and Wilfred Owen. He was one of the first to write poets about what it was really like to be in the front lines.\u00a0 Graves is also known for his autobiography Good-bye To A<\/i>ll That. <\/i>I found today’s poem in a Norton Anthology of Poetry <\/i>I bought recently. I am not totally sure what he is trying to say but I like the way the words sound and, to be honest, that is mostly how I pick poems.<\/p>\n

Children, if you dare to think<\/i>
\nOf the greatness, rareness, muchness,<\/i>
\nFewness of this precious only<\/i>
\nEndless world in which you say<\/i>
\nYou live, you think of things like this:<\/i>
\nBlocks of slate enclosing dappled<\/i>
\nRed and green, enclosing tawny<\/i>
\nYellow nets, enclosing white<\/i>
\nAnd black acres of dominoes,<\/i>
\nWhere a neat brown paper parcel<\/i>
\nTempts you to untie the string.<\/i>
\nIn the parcel a small island,<\/i>
\nOn the island a large tree,\u00a0<\/i>
\nOn the tree a husky fruit.<\/i>
\nStrip the husk and pare the rind off:\u00a0<\/i>
\nIn the kernel you will see<\/i>
\nBlocks of slate enclosed by dappled\u00a0<\/i>
\nRed and green, enclosed by tawny\u00a0<\/i>
\nYellow nets, enclosed by white<\/i>
\nAnd black acres of dominoes,<\/i>
\nWhere the same brown paper parcel–<\/i>
\nChildren, leave the string alone!<\/i>
\nFor who dares undo the parcel<\/i>
\nFinds himself at once inside it,<\/i>
\nOn the island, in the fruit,<\/i>
\nBlocks of slate about his head<\/i>
\nFinds himself enclosed by dappled\u00a0<\/i>
\nGreen and red, enclosed by yellow<\/i>
\nTawny nets, enclosed by black<\/i>
\nAnd white acres of dominoes,<\/i>
\nWith the same brown paper parcel<\/i>
\nStill unopened on his knee<\/i>
\nAnd, if he then should dare to think<\/i>
\nOf the fewness, muchness, rareness,<\/i>
\nGreatness of this endless only<\/i>
\nPrecious world in which he says<\/i>
\nHe lives–he then unties the string.<\/i>
\n
\n<\/i>
\nWarning to Children<\/i>
\nRobert Graves<\/p>\n

Reese at Typings<\/a> has a poem by Tom Disch this week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Photo by\u00a0Leone Venter\u00a0on\u00a0Unsplash Robert Graves was a British poet, classicist, novelist, and critic. Graves was one of the most well-known WWI poets along with Siegfreid Sassoon and Wilfred Owen. He was one of the first to write poets about what it was really like to be in the front lines.\u00a0 Graves is also known for his autobiography Good-bye To All That. I found today’s poem in a Norton Anthology of Poetry I bought recently. I am not totally sure what he is trying to say but I like the way the words sound and, to be honest, that is mostly how I pick poems. Children, if you dare to think Of the greatness, rareness, muchness, Fewness of this precious only Endless world in which you say You live, you think of things like this: Blocks of slate enclosing dappled Red and green, enclosing tawny Yellow nets, enclosing white And black acres of dominoes, Where a neat brown paper parcel Tempts you to untie the string. In the parcel a small island, On the island a large tree,\u00a0 On the tree a husky fruit. Strip the husk and pare the rind off:\u00a0 In the kernel you will see Blocks of slate enclosed by dappled\u00a0 Red and green, enclosed by tawny\u00a0 Yellow nets, enclosed by white And black acres of dominoes, Where the same brown paper parcel– Children, leave the string alone! For who dares undo the parcel Finds himself at once inside it, On the island, in the fruit, Blocks of slate about his head Finds himself enclosed by dappled\u00a0 Green and red, enclosed by yellow Tawny nets, enclosed by black And white acres of dominoes, With the same brown paper parcel Still unopened on his knee And, if he then should dare to think Of the fewness, muchness, rareness, Greatness of this endless only Precious world in which he says He lives–he then unties the string. Warning to Children Robert Graves Reese at Typings has a poem by Tom Disch this week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1617,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poem-for-a-thursday"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2592,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131\/revisions\/2592"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1617"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}