Love Comes, Love Goes

A Young Girl Leaning on a Window Sill   Rembrandt van Rijn

Let Love Go, If Go She Will

by Robert Lewis Stevenson

Let love go, if go she will.

Seek not, O fool, her wanton flight to stay.

Of all she gives and takes away

The best remains behind her still.

The best remains behind; in vain

Joy she may give and take again,

Joy she may take and leave us pain,

If yet she leave behind

The constant mind

To meet all fortunes nobly, to endure

All things with a good heart, and still be pure,

Still to be foremost in the foremost cause,

And still be worthy of the love that was.

Love coming is omnipotent indeed,

But not Love going. Let her go. The seed

Springs in the favouring Summer air, and grows,

And waxes strong; and when the Summer goes,

Remains, a perfect tree.

Joy she may give and take again,

Joy she may take and leave us pain.

O Love, and what care we?

For one thing thou hast given, O Love, one thing

Is ours that nothing can remove;

And as the King discrowned is still a King,

The unhappy lover still preserves his love.

The Tenth Day of Christmas

Paradise  Jan Brueghel the Younger

John 1:1-5

In the beginning was the Word, 

and the Word was with God, 

and the Word was God. 

He was in the beginning with God. 

All things were made through Him, 

and without Him nothing was made 
that was made.

Nativity Scene of Hope
Rembrandt van Rijn

In Him was life, 

and the life was the light of men.

And the light shines in the darkness, 

and the darkness did not comprehend it.

Love to Read

Rembrandt's Mother as the Biblical Prophetess Hannah  Rembrandt van Rijn

There is no Frigate like a Book

                                          by Emily Dickinson

There is no frigate like a book
To take us lands away,
Nor any coursers like a page
Of prancing poetry.
This traverse may the poorest take
Without oppress of toll;
How frugal is the chariot
That bears a human soul!

Blowsy Weather

The Storm on the Sea of Galilee  Rembrandt van Rijn

A Wet Sheet and a Flowing Sea 

                             by Allan Cunningham
A wet sheet and a flowing sea,
A wind that follows fast
And fills the white and rustling sail
And bends the gallant mast;
And bends the gallant mast, my boys,
While like the eagle free
Away the good ship flies, and leaves
Old England on the lee.

"O for a soft and gentle wind!"
I heard a fair one cry:
But give to me the snoring breeze
And white waves heaving high;
And white waves heaving high, my lads,
The good ship tight and free—
The world of waters is our home,
And merry men are we.

There's tempest in yon hornèd moon,
And lightning in yon cloud:
But hark the music, mariners!
The wind is piping loud;
The wind is piping loud, my boys,
The lightning flashes free—
While the hollow oak our palace is,
Our heritage the sea.