Porchlit: Recent Episodes
Porchlit
Porchlit was initially a site-specific, time duration Arts & History project taking place from April 23, 2015 to April 23, 2016 started by Yonnas Getahun, Campbell Thibo and Omar Willey. Beyond the Porch is the Seattle History podcast series by Omar Willey.
In der Kindheit frühen Tagen Hört ich oft von Engeln sagen, Die des Himmels hehre Wonne Tauschen mit der Erdensonne,
Daß, wo bang ein Herz in Sorgen Schmachtet vor der Welt verborgen, Daß, wo still es will verbluten, Und vergehn in Tränenfluten,
Daß, wo brünstig sein Gebet Einzig um Erlösung fleht, Da der Engel niederschwebt, Und es sanft gen Himmel hebt.
Ja, es stieg auch mir ein Engel nieder, Und auf leuchtendem Gefieder Führt er, ferne jedem Schmerz, Meinen Geist nun himmelwärts!
The angel
English Translation © Richard Stokes
In the early days of childhood I often heard tell of angels Who exchange heaven's pure bliss For the sun of earth, So that, when a sorrowful heart Hides its yearning from the world And would silenly bleed away And dissolve in streams of tears, And when its fervent prayer Begs only for deliverance, That angel will fly down And gently raise the heart to heaven. And to me too an angel descended, And now on shining wings Bear my spirit, free from all pain, Towards heaven!
Cambell Thibo sits on his stoop and reads a paragraph from "Journal of a Solitude," written by May Sarton in the early seventies.
I woke in tears this morning. I wonder whether it is possible at nearly sixty to change oneself radically. Can I learn to control resentment and hostility, the ambivalence, born somewhere far below the conscious level? If I cannot, I shall lose the person I love. There is nothing to be done but go ahead with life moment by moment and hour by hour--put out birdseed, tidy the rooms, try to create order and peace around me even if I cannot achieve it inside me.
This poem, published by William Butler Yeats in 1899, has been set to music by Caroline Herring. I sang it looking out my window to the East.
I went out to the hazel wood, Because a fire was in my head, And cut and peeled a hazel wand, And hooked a berry to a thread; And when white moths were on the wing, And moth-like stars were flickering out, I dropped the berry in a stream And caught a little silver trout.
When I had laid it on the floor I went to blow the fire a-flame, But something rustled on the floor, And someone called me by my name: It had become a glimmering girl With apple blossom in her hair Who called me by my name and ran And faded through the brightening air.
Though I am old with wandering Through hollow lands and hilly lands, I will find out where she has gone, And kiss her lips and take her hands; And walk among long dappled grass, And pluck till time and times are done, The silver apples of the moon, The golden apples of the sun.
Lament for Syria by Amineh Abou Kerech
Syrian doves croon above my head their call cries in my eyes. I’m trying to design a country that will go with my poetry and not get in the way when I’m thinking, where soldiers don’t walk over my face. I’m trying to design a country which will be worthy of me if I’m ever a poet and make allowances if I burst into tears. I’m trying to design a City of Love, Peace, Concord and Virtue, free of mess, war, wreckage and misery. Advertisement
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Oh Syria, my love I hear your moaning in the cries of the doves. I hear your screaming cry. I left your land and merciful soil And your fragrance of jasmine My wing is broken like your wing.
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I am from Syria From a land where people pick up a discarded piece of bread So that it does not get trampled on From a place where a mother teaches her son not to step on an ant at the end of the day. From a place where a teenager hides his cigarette from his old brother out of respect. From a place where old ladies would water jasmine trees at dawn. From the neighbours’ coffee in the morning From: after you, aunt; as you wish, uncle; with pleasure, sister… From a place which endured, which waited, which is still waiting for relief.
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Syria. I will not write poetry for anyone else.
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Can anyone teach me how to make a homeland? Heartfelt thanks if you can, heartiest thanks, from the house-sparrows, the apple-trees of Syria, and yours very sincerely.
Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/oct/01/the-13-year-old-syrian-refugee-prizewinning-poet-amineh-abou-kerech-betjeman-prize
Thank you Seattle Center and Office of Arts & Culture for partnering with Porchilt(http://porchlit.org/)! This is the fourth installment, or quarterly reading, for 2016. Special thank you to Laura Randall for inspiring this selection. Enjoy!!!
That time of year thou may'st in me behold When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang. In me thou see'st the twilight of such day, As after sunset fadeth in the west, Which by-and-by black night doth take away, Death's second self, that seals up all in rest. In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire That on the ashes of his youth doth lie, As the death-bed whereon it must expire Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by. This thou perceivest, which makes thy love more strong, To love that well which thou must leave ere long.
Oh dead bird come live here next to this dictionary. We will take walks by the edges of trauma.
by Maged Zaher recited by Campbell Thibo for Porchlit from 12th Avenue S & King St in Seattle, WA.
Once a quarter a volunteer from Porchlit reads poems from the Poetry Garden located at Seattle Center. This time Yonnas recites the poems etched and found on the stones of the garden from poets such as Margie Piercy, Pablo Neruda, Margaret Atwood, Hildegard of Bingen and Annie Sexton.
Especial thanks to Seattle Center, Office of Arts & Culture and Elisheba Johnson for working with Porchlit.
(Sonnet 154 from Town Hall, Seattle, WA after Seattle Poetry Grand Slam) The little Love-god lying once asleep, Laid by his side his heart-inflaming brand, Whilst many nymphs that vowed chaste life to keep Came tripping by; but in her maiden hand The fairest votary took up that fire Which many legions of true hearts had warmed; And so the General of hot desire Was, sleeping, by a virgin hand disarmed. This brand she quenched in a cool well by, Which from Love's fire took heat perpetual, Growing a bath and healthful remedy, For men diseased; but I, my mistress' thrall, Came there for cure and this by that I prove, Love's fire heats water, water cools not love.
(Sonnet 154 on the 400 year anniversary of Shakespeare from the original porch/balcony where a year ago Porchlit started in Seattle, WA)
The little Love-god lying once asleep, Laid by his side his heart-inflaming brand, Whilst many nymphs that vowed chaste life to keep Came tripping by; but in her maiden hand The fairest votary took up that fire Which many legions of true hearts had warmed; And so the General of hot desire Was, sleeping, by a virgin hand disarmed. This brand she quenched in a cool well by, Which from Love's fire took heat perpetual, Growing a bath and healthful remedy, For men diseased; but I, my mistress' thrall, Came there for cure and this by that I prove, Love's fire heats water, water cools not love.
(Last sonnet No. 154 on the 400 year anniversary of Shakespeare's death from David H. Koch Theater (New York City Ballet), Lincoln Center, NY)
The little Love-god lying once asleep, Laid by his side his heart-inflaming brand, Whilst many nymphs that vowed chaste life to keep Came tripping by; but in her maiden hand The fairest votary took up that fire Which many legions of true hearts had warmed; And so the General of hot desire Was, sleeping, by a virgin hand disarmed. This brand she quenched in a cool well by, Which from Love's fire took heat perpetual, Growing a bath and healthful remedy, For men diseased; but I, my mistress' thrall, Came there for cure and this by that I prove, Love's fire heats water, water cools not love.
(Sonnet 153 from Rainier Beach Library, Seattle, WA)
Cupid laid by his brand and fell asleep: A maid of Dian's this advantage found, And his love-kindling fire did quickly steep In a cold valley-fountain of that ground; Which borrowed from this holy fire of Love, A dateless lively heat, still to endure, And grew a seething bath, which yet men prove Against strange maladies a sovereign cure. But at my mistress' eye Love's brand new-fired, The boy for trial needs would touch my breast; I, sick withal, the help of bath desired, And thither hied, a sad distempered guest, But found no cure, the bath for my help lies Where Cupid got new fire; my mistress' eyes.
(Sonnet 152 from the entrance of Olympic Sculpture Park)
In loving thee thou know'st I am forsworn, But thou art twice forsworn, to me love swearing; In act thy bed-vow broke, and new faith torn, In vowing new hate after new love bearing: But why of two oaths' breach do I accuse thee, When I break twenty? I am perjured most; For all my vows are oaths but to misuse thee, And all my honest faith in thee is lost: For I have sworn deep oaths of thy deep kindness, Oaths of thy love, thy truth, thy constancy; And, to enlighten thee, gave eyes to blindness, Or made them swear against the thing they see; For I have sworn thee fair; more perjured eye, To swear against the truth so foul a lie!
(Sonnet 152 from The Swan Steps of the Swan Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon)
In loving thee thou know'st I am forsworn, But thou art twice forsworn, to me love swearing; In act thy bed-vow broke, and new faith torn, In vowing new hate after new love bearing: But why of two oaths' breach do I accuse thee, When I break twenty? I am perjured most; For all my vows are oaths but to misuse thee, And all my honest faith in thee is lost: For I have sworn deep oaths of thy deep kindness, Oaths of thy love, thy truth, thy constancy; And, to enlighten thee, gave eyes to blindness, Or made them swear against the thing they see; For I have sworn thee fair; more perjured eye, To swear against the truth so foul a lie!
(Sonnet 151 from 33 Church St, Blackpool FY1 1HT)
Love is too young to know what conscience is; Yet who knows not, conscience is born of love? Then, gentle cheater, urge not my amiss, Lest guilty of my faults thy sweet self prove. For thou betraying me, I do betray My nobler part to my gross body's treason; My soul doth tell my body that he may Triumph in love; flesh stays no farther reason, But rising at thy name, doth point out thee As his triumphant prize. Proud of this pride, He is contented thy poor drudge to be, To stand in thy affairs, fall by thy side. No want of conscience hold it that I call Her 'love,' for whose dear love I rise and fall.
(Sonnet 151 from a balcony in Stratford, Ontario)
Love is too young to know what conscience is; Yet who knows not, conscience is born of love? Then, gentle cheater, urge not my amiss, Lest guilty of my faults thy sweet self prove. For thou betraying me, I do betray My nobler part to my gross body's treason; My soul doth tell my body that he may Triumph in love; flesh stays no farther reason, But rising at thy name, doth point out thee As his triumphant prize. Proud of this pride, He is contented thy poor drudge to be, To stand in thy affairs, fall by thy side. No want of conscience hold it that I call Her 'love,' for whose dear love I rise and fall.
(Sonnet 150 from a porch in Seattle, WA)
O! from what power hast thou this powerful might, With insufficiency my heart to sway? To make me give the lie to my true sight, And swear that brightness doth not grace the day? Whence hast thou this becoming of things ill, That in the very refuse of thy deeds There is such strength and warrantise of skill, That, in my mind, thy worst all best exceeds? Who taught thee how to make me love thee more, The more I hear and see just cause of hate? O! though I love what others do abhor, With others thou shouldst not abhor my state: If thy unworthiness raised love in me, More worthy I to be beloved of thee.
(Sonnet 149 from the balcony inside of SIFF Cinema Egyptian)
Canst thou, O cruel! say I love thee not, When I against myself with thee partake? Do I not think on thee, when I forgot Am of my self, all tyrant, for thy sake? Who hateth thee that I do call my friend, On whom frown'st thou that I do fawn upon, Nay, if thou lour'st on me, do I not spend Revenge upon myself with present moan? What merit do I in my self respect, That is so proud thy service to despise, When all my best doth worship thy defect, Commanded by the motion of thine eyes? But, love, hate on, for now I know thy mind, Those that can see thou lov'st, and I am blind.
(Sonnet 149 from "from a fire escape in clifton, NJ"_
Canst thou, O cruel! say I love thee not, When I against myself with thee partake? Do I not think on thee, when I forgot Am of my self, all tyrant, for thy sake? Who hateth thee that I do call my friend, On whom frown'st thou that I do fawn upon, Nay, if thou lour'st on me, do I not spend Revenge upon myself with present moan? What merit do I in my self respect, That is so proud thy service to despise, When all my best doth worship thy defect, Commanded by the motion of thine eyes? But, love, hate on, for now I know thy mind, Those that can see thou lov'st, and I am blind.
(Sonnet 148 from Seattle Indian Health Board) O me! what eyes hath Love put in my head, Which have no correspondence with true sight; Or, if they have, where is my judgment fled, That censures falsely what they see aright? If that be fair whereon my false eyes dote, What means the world to say it is not so? If it be not, then love doth well denote Love's eye is not so true as all men's: no, How can it? O! how can Love's eye be true, That is so vexed with watching and with tears? No marvel then, though I mistake my view; The sun itself sees not, till heaven clears. O cunning Love! with tears thou keep'st me blind, Lest eyes well-seeing thy foul faults should find.
(Sonnet 147 from the initial porch on 12th Avenue S & King St) My love is as a fever longing still, For that which longer nurseth the disease; Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill, The uncertain sickly appetite to please. My reason, the physician to my love, Angry that his prescriptions are not kept, Hath left me, and I desperate now approve Desire is death, which physic did except. Past cure I am, now Reason is past care, And frantic-mad with evermore unrest; My thoughts and my discourse as madmen's are, At random from the truth vainly expressed; For I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright, Who art as black as hell, as dark as night.
(Sonnet 147 from a porch overlooking a body of water)
My love is as a fever longing still, For that which longer nurseth the disease; Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill, The uncertain sickly appetite to please. My reason, the physician to my love, Angry that his prescriptions are not kept, Hath left me, and I desperate now approve Desire is death, which physic did except. Past cure I am, now Reason is past care, And frantic-mad with evermore unrest; My thoughts and my discourse as madmen's are, At random from the truth vainly expressed; For I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright, Who art as black as hell, as dark as night.
Paige Gottheim reads "May I Feel Said He" by EE Cummings
may i feel said he
by e e cummings
may i feel said he (i'll squeal said she just once said he) it's fun said she (may i touch said he how much said she a lot said he) why not said she (let's go said he not too far said she what's too far said he where you are said she) may i stay said he (which way said she like this said he if you kiss said she may i move said he is it love said she) if you're willing said he (but you're killing said she but it's life said he but your wife said she now said he) ow said she (tiptop said he don't stop said she oh no said he) go slow said she (cccome?said he ummm said she) you're divine!said he (you are Mine said she)
From a stoop in Bed-Stuy Daniel London recites My Dad's Wallet by Raymond Carver. Enjoy!!!
My Dad's Wallet by Raymond Carver
Long before he thought of his own death, my dad said he wanted to lie close to his parents. He missed them so after they went away. He said this enough that my mother remembered, and I remembered. But when the breath left his lungs and all signs of life had faded, he found himself in a town 512 miles away from where he wanted most to be.
My dad, though. He was restless even in death. Even in death he had this one last trip to take. All his life he liked to wander, and now he had one more place to get to.
The undertaker said he'd arrange it, not to worry. Some poor light from the window fell on the dusty floor where we waited that afternoon until the man came out of the back room and peeled off his rubber gloves. He carried the smell of formaldehyde with him. He was a big man, this undertaker said. Then began to tell us why he liked living in his small town. This man who'd just opened my dad's veins. How much is it going to cost? I said.
He took out his pad and pen and began to write. First, the preparation chares. Then he figured the transportation of the remains at 22 cents a mile. But this was a round-trip for the undertaker, don't forget. Plus, say, six meals and two nights in a motel. He figured some more. Add a surcharge of $210 for his time and trouble, and there you have it.
He thought we might argue. There was a spot of color on each of his cheeks as he looked up from his figures. The same poor light fell in the same poor place on the dusty floor. My mother nodded as if she understood. But she hadn't understood a word of it. None of it had made any sense to her, beginning with the time she left home with my dad. She only knew that whatever was happening was going to take money. She reached into her purse and brought up my dad's wallet. The three of us in that little room that afternoon. Our breath coming and going.
We stared at the wallet for a minute. Nobody said anything. All the life had gone out of that wallet. It was old and rent and soiled. But it was my dad's wallet. And she opened it and looked inside. Drew out a handful of money that would go toward this last, most astounding, trip.
Daniel London, a New York Historian and Guide, reads "what the doctor said" by Raymond Carver. Enjoy!!!
What the Doctor Said by Raymond Carver
He said it doesn't look good he said it looks bad in fact real bad he said I counted thirty-two of them on one lung before I quit counting them I said I'm glad I wouldn't want to know about any more being there than that he said are you a religious man do you kneel down in forest groves and let yourself ask for help when you come to a waterfall mist blowing against your face and arms do you stop and ask for understanding at those moments I said not yet but I intend to start today he said I'm real sorry he said I wish I had some other kind of news to give you I said Amen and he said something else I didn't catch and not knowing what else to do and not wanting him to have to repeat it and me to have to fully digest it I just looked at him for a minute and he looked back it was then I jumped up and shook hands with this man who'd just given me Something no one else on earth had ever given me I may have even thanked him habit being so strong
(Sonnet 146 from "a stoop on Putnam, Brooklyn, NY")
Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth, [Why feed'st] these rebel powers that thee array? Why dost thou pine within, and suffer dearth, Painting thy outward walls so costly gay? Why so large cost, having so short a lease, Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend? Shall worms, inheritors of this excess, Eat up thy charge? is this thy body's end? Then soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss, And let that pine to aggravate thy store; Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross; Within be fed, without be rich no more: So shalt thou feed on Death, that feeds on men, And, Death once dead, there's no more dying then.
(Sonnet 146 from Russell Investment Building Seattle, WA)
Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth, ... ... ... these rebel powers that thee array Why dost thou pine within and suffer dearth, Painting thy outward walls so costly gay? Why so large cost, having so short a lease, Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend? Shall worms, inheritors of this excess, Eat up thy charge? Is this thy body's end? Then soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss, And let that pine to aggravate thy store; Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross; Within be fed, without be rich no more: So shall thou feed on Death, that feeds on men, And Death once dead, there's no more dying then.
(Sonnet 145 from West Seattle, WA)
Those lips that Love's own hand did make, Breathed forth the sound that said 'I hate', To me that languished for her sake: But when she saw my woeful state, Straight in her heart did mercy come, Chiding that tongue that ever sweet Was used in giving gentle doom; And taught it thus anew to greet; 'I hate' she altered with an end, That followed it as gentle day, Doth follow night, who like a fiend From heaven to hell is flown away. 'I hate', from hate away she threw, And saved my life, saying 'not you'.
(Sonnet 144 from University of Washington's Marine Sciences Building)
Two loves I have of comfort and despair, Which like two spirits do suggest me still: The better angel is a man right fair, The worser spirit a woman coloured ill. To win me soon to hell, my female evil, Tempteth my better angel from my side, And would corrupt my saint to be a devil, Wooing his purity with her foul pride. And whether that my angel be turned fiend, Suspect I may, yet not directly tell; But being both from me, both to each friend, I guess one angel in another's hell: Yet this shall I ne'er know, but live in doubt, Till my bad angel fire my good one out.
(Sonnet 143 from Brooklyn, NY)
Lo! as a careful housewife runs to catch One of her feather'd creatures broke away, Sets down her babe and makes an swift dispatch In pursuit of the thing she would have stay, Whilst her neglected child holds her in chase, Cries to catch her whose busy care is bent To follow that which flies before her face, Not prizing her poor infant's discontent; So runn'st thou after that which flies from thee, Whilst I thy babe chase thee afar behind; But if thou catch thy hope, turn back to me, And play the mother's part, kiss me, be kind: So will I pray that thou mayst have thy 'Will,' If thou turn back, and my loud crying still.
(Sonnet 142 from a church in West Seattle)
Love is my sin, and thy dear virtue hate, Hate of my sin, grounded on sinful loving: O! but with mine compare thou thine own state, And thou shalt find it merits not reproving; Or, if it do, not from those lips of thine, That have profaned their scarlet ornaments And sealed false bonds of love as oft as mine, Robbed others' beds' revenues of their rents. Be it lawful I love thee, as thou lov'st those Whom thine eyes woo as mine importune thee: Root pity in thy heart, that, when it grows, Thy pity may deserve to pitied be. If thou dost seek to have what thou dost hide, By self-example mayst thou be denied!
(Sonnet 141 from Capitol Hill, Seattle, WA. Photo by Tim Martin)
In faith I do not love thee with mine eyes, For they in thee a thousand errors note; But 'tis my heart that loves what they despise, Who, in despite of view, is pleased to dote. Nor are mine ears with thy tongue's tune delighted; Nor tender feeling, to base touches prone, Nor taste, nor smell, desire to be invited To any sensual feast with thee alone: But my five wits nor my five senses can Dissuade one foolish heart from serving thee, Who leaves unswayed the likeness of a man, Thy proud heart's slave and vassal wretch to be: Only my plague thus far I count my gain, That she that makes me sin awards me pain.
(Sonnet 141 from Culver City, CA) In faith I do not love thee with mine eyes, For they in thee a thousand errors note; But 'tis my heart that loves what they despise, Who, in despite of view, is pleased to dote. Nor are mine ears with thy tongue's tune delighted; Nor tender feeling, to base touches prone, Nor taste, nor smell, desire to be invited To any sensual feast with thee alone: But my five wits nor my five senses can Dissuade one foolish heart from serving thee, Who leaves unswayed the likeness of a man, Thy proud heart's slave and vassal wretch to be: Only my plague thus far I count my gain, That she that makes me sin awards me pain.
(Sonnet 140 from Olympia, WA)
Be wise as thou art cruel; do not press My tongue-tied patience with too much disdain; Lest sorrow lend me words, and words express The manner of my pity-wanting pain. If I might teach thee wit, better it were, Though not to love, yet, love to tell me so; As testy sick men, when their deaths be near, No news but health from their physicians know; For, if I should despair, I should grow mad, And in my madness might speak ill of thee; Now this ill-wresting world is grown so bad, Mad slanderers by mad ears believed be. That I may not be so, nor thou belied, Bear thine eyes straight, though thy proud heart go wide.
(Sonnet 140 from Tibo System)
Be wise as thou art cruel; do not press My tongue-tied patience with too much disdain; Lest sorrow lend me words, and words express The manner of my pity-wanting pain. If I might teach thee wit, better it were, Though not to love, yet, love to tell me so; As testy sick men, when their deaths be near, No news but health from their physicians know; For, if I should despair, I should grow mad, And in my madness might speak ill of thee; Now this ill-wresting world is grown so bad, Mad slanderers by mad ears believed be. That I may not be so, nor thou belied, Bear thine eyes straight, though thy proud heart go wide.
(Sonnet 139 from Gallery Onyx on 1st & Wall St)
O! call not me to justify the wrong That thy unkindness lays upon my heart; Wound me not with thine eye, but with thy tongue: Use power with power, and slay me not by art, Tell me thou lov'st elsewhere; but in my sight, Dear heart, forbear to glance thine eye aside: What need'st thou wound with cunning, when thy might Is more than my o'erpressed defence can bide? Let me excuse thee: ah! my love well knows Her pretty looks have been mine enemies; And therefore from my face she turns my foes, That they elsewhere might dart their injuries: Yet do not so; but since I am near slain, Kill me outright with looks, and rid my pain.
(Sonnet 138 from Cornish Playhouse @ Seattle Center)
When my love swears that she is made of truth, I do believe her though I know she lies, That she might think me some untutored youth, Unlearned in the world's false subtleties. Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young, Although she knows my days are past the best, Simply I credit her false-speaking tongue: On both sides thus is simple truth suppressed: But wherefore says she not she is unjust? And wherefore say not I that I am old? O! love's best habit is in seeming trust, And age in love, loves not to have years told: Therefore I lie with her, and she with me, And in our faults by lies we flattered be.
(Sonnet 137 recited from Portugal)
Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes, That they behold, and see not what they see? They know what beauty is, see where it lies, Yet what the best is take the worst to be. If eyes, corrupt by over-partial looks, Be anchored in the bay where all men ride, Why of eyes' falsehood hast thou forged hooks, Whereto the judgment of my heart is tied? Why should my heart think that a several plot, Which my heart knows the wide world's common place? Or mine eyes, seeing this, say this is not, To put fair truth upon so foul a face? In things right true my heart and eyes have erred, And to this false plague are they now transferred.
(Sonnet 137 from West Hollywood, CA)
Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes, That they behold, and see not what they see? They know what beauty is, see where it lies, Yet what the best is take the worst to be. If eyes, corrupt by over-partial looks, Be anchored in the bay where all men ride, Why of eyes' falsehood hast thou forged hooks, Whereto the judgment of my heart is tied? Why should my heart think that a several plot, Which my heart knows the wide world's common place? Or mine eyes, seeing this, say this is not, To put fair truth upon so foul a face? In things right true my heart and eyes have erred, And to this false plague are they now transferred.
(Sonnet 137 from the balcony of West Lake Mall/ Downtown Seattle)
Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes, That they behold, and see not what they see? They know what beauty is, see where it lies, Yet what the best is take the worst to be. If eyes, corrupt by over-partial looks, Be anchored in the bay where all men ride, Why of eyes' falsehood hast thou forged hooks, Whereto the judgment of my heart is tied? Why should my heart think that a several plot, Which my heart knows the wide world's common place? Or mine eyes, seeing this, say this is not, To put fair truth upon so foul a face? In things right true my heart and eyes have erred, And to this false plague are they now transferred.
(Sonnet 136 from 2nd & University in Seattle, WA)
Whoever hath her wish, thou hast thy Will, And Will to boot, and Will in overplus; More than enough am I that vex thee still, To thy sweet will making addition thus. Wilt thou, whose will is large and spacious, Not once vouchsafe to hide my will in thine? Shall will in others seem right gracious, And in my will no fair acceptance shine? The sea all water, yet receives rain still And in abundance addeth to his store; So thou, being rich in Will, add to thy Will One will of mine, to make thy large Will more. Let no unkind no fair beseechers kill; Think all but one, and me in that one Will.
(Sonnet 135 from 12th Avenue S & King St) Whoever hath her wish, thou hast thy Will, And Will to boot, and Will in over-plus; More than enough am I that vexed thee still, To thy sweet will making addition thus. Wilt thou, whose will is large and spacious, Not once vouchsafe to hide my will in thine? Shall will in others seem right gracious, And in my will no fair acceptance shine? The sea, all water, yet receives rain still, And in abundance addeth to his store; So thou, being rich in Will, add to thy Will One will of mine, to make thy large will more. Let no unkind, no fair beseechers kill; Think all but one, and me in that one Will.
(Sonnet 134 from Queen Anne Christian Church, Seattle, WA) So now I have confessed that he is thine, And I my self am mortgaged to thy will, Myself I'll forfeit, so that other mine Thou wilt restore to be my comfort still: But thou wilt not, nor he will not be free, For thou art covetous, and he is kind; He learned but surety-like to write for me, Under that bond that him as fast doth bind. The statute of thy beauty thou wilt take, Thou usurer, that put'st forth all to use, And sue a friend came debtor for my sake; So him I lose through my unkind abuse. Him have I lost; thou hast both him and me: He pays the whole, and yet am I not free.
(Sonnet 133 from 2nd & Stewart, Downtown Seattle, WA) Beshrew that heart that makes my heart to groan For that deep wound it gives my friend and me! Is't not enough to torture me alone, But slave to slavery my sweet'st friend must be? Me from myself thy cruel eye hath taken, And my next self thou harder hast engrossed: Of him, myself, and thee I am forsaken; A torment thrice three-fold thus to be crossed. Prison my heart in thy steel bosom's ward, But then my friend's heart let my poor heart bail; Whoe'er keeps me, let my heart be his guard; Thou canst not then use rigour in my jail: And yet thou wilt; for I, being pent in thee, Perforce am thine, and all that is in me.
(Sonnet 132 from E Olive Way & E Howell in Seattle, WA) Thine eyes I love, and they, as pitying me, Knowing thy heart torments me with disdain, Have put on black and loving mourners be, Looking with pretty ruth upon my pain. And truly not the morning sun of heaven Better becomes the grey cheeks of the east, Nor that full star that ushers in the even, Doth half that glory to the sober west, As those two mourning eyes become thy face: O, let it then as well beseem thy heart To mourn for me, since mourning doth thee grace, And suit thy pity like in every part. Then will I swear beauty herself is black And all they foul that thy complexion lack.
(Sonnet 132 from entrance of Onyx Gallery) Thine eyes I love, and they, as pitying me, Knowing thy heart torments me with disdain, Have put on black and loving mourners be, Looking with pretty ruth upon my pain. And truly not the morning sun of heaven Better becomes the grey cheeks of the east, Nor that full star that ushers in the even, Doth half that glory to the sober west, As those two mourning eyes become thy face: O, let it then as well beseem thy heart To mourn for me, since mourning doth thee grace, And suit thy pity like in every part. Then will I swear beauty herself is black And all they foul that thy complexion lack.
(Sonnet 131 from a porch in Apple Valley, California)
Thou art as tyrannous, so as thou art, As those whose beauties proudly make them cruel; For well thou know'st to my dear doting heart Thou art the fairest and most precious jewel. Yet, in good faith, some say that thee behold, Thy face hath not the power to make love groan; To say they err I dare not be so bold, Although I swear it to myself alone. And to be sure that is not false I swear, A thousand groans, but thinking on thy face, One on another's neck, do witness bear Thy black is fairest in my judgment's place. In nothing art thou black save in thy deeds, And thence this slander, as I think, proceeds.
(Sonnet 131 from a porch in Philadelphia, PA)
Thou art as tyrannous, so as thou art, As those whose beauties proudly make them cruel; For well thou know'st to my dear doting heart Thou art the fairest and most precious jewel. Yet, in good faith, some say that thee behold, Thy face hath not the power to make love groan; To say they err I dare not be so bold, Although I swear it to myself alone. And to be sure that is not false I swear, A thousand groans, but thinking on thy face, One on another's neck, do witness bear Thy black is fairest in my judgment's place. In nothing art thou black save in thy deeds, And thence this slander, as I think, proceeds.
(Sonnet 130 from a porch in Seattle, WA)
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red, than her lips red: If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. I have seen roses damasked, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks; And in some perfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound: I grant I never saw a goddess go, My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground: And yet by heaven, I think my love as rare, As any she belied with false compare.
(Sonnet 130 from Canberra, Australia)
My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips’ red; If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. I have seen roses damasked, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks; And in some perfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound; I grant I never saw a goddess go; My mistress when she walks treads on the ground. And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with false compare.
(Sonnet 129 from the Porch of Hugo House) The expense of spirit in a waste of shame Is lust in action: and till action, lust Is perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame, Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust; Enjoyed no sooner but despised straight; Past reason hunted; and no sooner had, Past reason hated, as a swallowed bait, On purpose laid to make the taker mad. Mad in pursuit and in possession so; Had, having, and in quest to have extreme; A bliss in proof, and proved, a very woe; Before, a joy proposed; behind a dream. All this the world well knows; yet none knows well To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.
(Sonnet 128 from West Seattle Bridge)
How oft when thou, my music, music play'st, Upon that blessed wood whose motion sounds With thy sweet fingers when thou gently sway'st The wiry concord that mine ear confounds, Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap, To kiss the tender inward of thy hand, Whilst my poor lips which should that harvest reap, At the wood's boldness by thee blushing stand! To be so tickled, they would change their state And situation with those dancing chips, O'er whom thy fingers walk with gentle gait, Making dead wood more bless'd than living lips. Since saucy jacks so happy are in this, Give them thy fingers, me thy lips to kiss.
(Sonnet 127 from a Porch in Lake Forest Park Seattle) In the old age black was not counted fair, Or if it were, it bore not beauty's name; But now is black beauty's successive heir, And beauty slandered with a bastard shame: For since each hand hath put on Nature's power, Fairing the foul with Art's false borrowed face, Sweet beauty hath no name, no holy bower, But is profaned, if not lives in disgrace. Therefore my mistress' eyes are raven black, Her eyes so suited, and they mourners seem At such who, not born fair, no beauty lack, Sland'ring creation with a false esteem: Yet so they mourn becoming of their woe, That every tongue says beauty should look so.
(Sonnet 126 from balcony of 5268 University Avenue/Seattle)
O thou, my lovely boy, who in thy power Dost hold Time's fickle glass, his sickle, hour; Who hast by waning grown, and therein showest Thy lovers withering, as thy sweet self growest. If Nature, sovereign mistress over wrack, As thou goest onwards still will pluck thee back, She keeps thee to this purpose, that her skill May time disgrace and wretched minutes kill. Yet fear her, O thou minion of her pleasure! She may detain, but not still keep, her treasure: Her audit (though delayed) answered must be, And her quietus is to render thee. ( ) ( )
(Sonnet 125 from a dock in Madison Park) Were't aught to me I bore the canopy, With my extern the outward honouring, Or laid great bases for eternity, Which proves more short than waste or ruining? Have I not seen dwellers on form and favour Lose all and more by paying too much rent For compound sweet, forgoing simple savour, Pitiful thrivers, in their gazing spent? No; let me be obsequious in thy heart, And take thou my oblation, poor but free, Which is not mixed with seconds, knows no art, But mutual render, only me for thee. Hence, thou suborned informer! a true soul When most impeached stands least in thy control.
(Sonnet 125 from 12th Avenue S & King ST)
Were't aught to me I bore the canopy, With my extern the outward honouring, Or laid great bases for eternity, Which proves more short than waste or ruining? Have I not seen dwellers on form and favour Lose all and more by paying too much rent For compound sweet, forgoing simple savour, Pitiful thrivers, in their gazing spent? No; let me be obsequious in thy heart, And take thou my oblation, poor but free, Which is not mixed with seconds, knows no art, But mutual render, only me for thee. Hence, thou suborned informer! a true soul When most impeached stands least in thy control.
(Sonnet 124 from 12th Avenues S & King St) If my dear love were but the child of state, It might for Fortune's bastard be unfathered, As subject to Time's love or to Time's hate, Weeds among weeds, or flowers with flowers gathered. No, it was builded far from accident; It suffers not in smiling pomp, nor falls Under the blow of thralled discontent, Whereto th' inviting time our fashion calls: It fears not policy, that heretic, Which works on leases of short-number'd hours, But all alone stands hugely politic, That it nor grows with heat, nor drowns with showers. To this I witness call the fools of time, Which die for goodness, who have lived for crime.
(Sonnet 123 from Seattle City Hall)
No, Time, thou shalt not boast that I do change: Thy pyramids built up with newer might To me are nothing novel, nothing strange; They are but dressings of a former sight. Our dates are brief, and therefore we admire What thou dost foist upon us that is old; And rather make them born to our desire Than think that we before have heard them told. Thy registers and thee I both defy, Not wondering at the present nor the past, For thy records and what we see doth lie, Made more or less by thy continual haste. This I do vow and this shall ever be; I will be true despite thy scythe and thee.
In this sonnet, the poet seeks to justify his carelessly giving away a blank notebook (tables) from his young friend.
Thy gift, thy tables, are within my brain Full character'd with lasting memory, Which shall above that idle rank remain Beyond all date, even to eternity; Or at the least, so long as brain and heart Have faculty by nature to subsist; Till each to razed oblivion yield his part Of thee, thy record never can be miss'd. That poor retention could not so much hold, Nor need I tallies thy dear love to score; Therefore to give them from me was I bold, To trust those tables that receive thee more: To keep an adjunct to remember thee Were to import forgetfulness in me.
(Sonnet 121 from 12th Avenue & King St)
'Tis better to be vile, than vile esteemed, When not to be, receives reproach of being, And the just pleasure lost which is so deemed Not by our feeling, but by others' seeing: For why should others' false adulterate eyes Give salutation to my sportive blood? Or on my frailties why are frailer spies, Which in their wills count bad what I think good? No; -- I am that I am, and they that level At my abuses reckon up their own: I may be straight, though they themselves be bevel; By their rank thoughts my deeds must not be shown; Unless this general evil they maintain, All men are bad, and in their badness reign.
(Sonnet 120 from 12th Avenue S & King St) That you were once unkind befriends me now, And for that sorrow, which I then did feel, Needs must I under my transgression bow, Unless my nerves were brass or hammered steel. For if you were by my unkindness shaken, As I by yours, you've passed a hell of time; And I, a tyrant, have no leisure taken To weigh how once I suffered in your crime. O! that our night of woe might have remembered My deepest sense, how hard true sorrow hits, And soon to you, as you to me, then tendered The humble salve, which wounded bosoms fits! But that your trespass now becomes a fee; Mine ransoms yours, and yours must ransom me.
(Sonnet 119 from Hugo House)
What potions have I drunk of Siren tears, Distilled from limbecks foul as hell within, Applying fears to hopes, and hopes to fears, Still losing when I saw myself to win! What wretched errors hath my heart committed, Whilst it hath thought itself so blessed never! How have mine eyes out of their spheres been fitted, In the distraction of this madding fever! O benefit of ill! now I find true That better is by evil still made better; And ruined love, when it is built anew, Grows fairer than at first, more strong, far greater. So I return rebuked to my content, And gain by ill thrice more than I have spent.
(Sonnet 118 from steps of Equinox Studios)
Like as, to make our appetites more keen, With eager compounds we our palate urge; As, to prevent our maladies unseen, We sicken to shun sickness when we purge; Even so, being full of your ne'er-cloying sweetness, To bitter sauces did I frame my feeding; And, sick of welfare, found a kind of meetness To be diseased, ere that there was true needing. Thus policy in love, to anticipate The ills that were not, grew to faults assured, And brought to medicine a healthful state Which, rank of goodness, would by ill be cured; But thence I learn and find the lesson true, Drugs poison him that so fell sick of you
(Sonnet 117 from Langston Hughes PAC)
Accuse me thus: that I have scanted all, Wherein I should your great deserts repay, Forgot upon your dearest love to call, Whereto all bonds do tie me day by day; That I have frequent been with unknown minds, And given to time your own dear-purchased right; That I have hoisted sail to all the winds Which should transport me farthest from your sight. Book both my wilfulness and errors down, And on just proof surmise accumulate; Bring me within the level of your frown, But shoot not at me in your wakened hate; Since my appeal says I did strive to prove The constancy and virtue of your love.
(Sonnet 116 from 12th Avenue S & King St)
Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark, That looks on tempests and is never shaken; It is the star to every wandering bark, Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken. Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle's compass come; Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be error and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
(Sonnet 115 from Seattle City Hall) Those lines that I before have writ do lie, Even those that said I could not love you dearer: Yet then my judgment knew no reason why My most full flame should afterwards burn clearer. But reckoning Time, whose million'd accidents Creep in 'twixt vows, and change decrees of kings, Tan sacred beauty, blunt the sharp'st intents, Divert strong minds to the course of altering things; Alas! why, fearing of Time's tyranny, Might I not then say, 'Now I love you best,' When I was certain o'er incertainty, Crowning the present, doubting of the rest? Love is a babe, then might I not say so, To give full growth to that which still doth grow?
(Sonnet 114 from 12th Avenue S & King St)
Or whether doth my mind, being crowned with you, Drink up the monarch's plague, this flattery? Or whether shall I say, mine eye saith true, And that your love taught it this alchemy, To make of monsters and things indigest Such cherubins as your sweet self resemble, Creating every bad a perfect best, As fast as objects to his beams assemble? O! 'tis the first, 'tis flattery in my seeing, And my great mind most kingly drinks it up: Mine eye well knows what with his gust is 'greeing, And to his palate doth prepare the cup: If it be poisoned, 'tis the lesser sin That mine eye loves it and doth first begin.
(Sonnet 113 from Poetry Garden via Seattle Center) Since I left you, mine eye is in my mind; And that which governs me to go about Doth part his function and is partly blind, Seems seeing, but effectually is out; For it no form delivers to the heart Of bird, of flower, or shape which it doth latch: Of his quick objects hath the mind no part, Nor his own vision holds what it doth catch; For if it see the rud'st or gentlest sight, The most sweet favour or deformed'st creature, The mountain or the sea, the day or night, The crow, or dove, it shapes them to your feature. Incapable of more, replete with you, My most true mind thus maketh mine eye untrue.
(Sonnet 112 from Richard Hugo House)
Your love and pity doth the impression fill, Which vulgar scandal stamped upon my brow; For what care I who calls me well or ill, So you o'er-green my bad, my good allow? You are my all-the-world, and I must strive To know my shames and praises from your tongue; None else to me, nor I to none alive, That my steeled sense or changes right or wrong. In so profound abysm I throw all care Of others' voices, that my adder's sense To critic and to flatterer stopped are. Mark how with my neglect I do dispense: You are so strongly in my purpose bred, That all the world besides methinks y'are dead.
(Sonnet 111 from the porch of St Stephen's Episcopal Church)
O! for my sake do you with Fortune chide, The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds, That did not better for my life provide Than public means which public manners breeds. Thence comes it that my name receives a brand, And almost thence my nature is subdued To what it works in, like the dyer's hand: Pity me, then, and wish I were renewed; Whilst, like a willing patient, I will drink Potions of eisel 'gainst my strong infection; No bitterness that I will bitter think, Nor double penance, to correct correction. Pity me then, dear friend, and I assure ye, Even that your pity is enough to cure me.
(Sonnet 110 from Poetry Garden by Lola E Peters)
Alas! 'tis true, I have gone here and there, And made my self a motley to the view, Gored mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear, Made old offences of affections new; Most true it is, that I have looked on truth Askance and strangely; but, by all above, These blenches gave my heart another youth, And worse essays proved thee my best of love. Now all is done, have what shall have no end: Mine appetite I never more will grind On newer proof, to try an older friend, A god in love, to whom I am confined. Then give me welcome, next my heaven the best, Even to thy pure and most most loving breast.
(Sonnet 109 from 12th Avenue S & King St)
O! never say that I was false of heart, Though absence seemed my flame to qualify, As easy might I from my self depart As from my soul which in thy breast doth lie: That is my home of love: if I have ranged, Like him that travels, I return again; Just to the time, not with the time exchanged, So that myself bring water for my stain. Never believe though in my nature reigned, All frailties that besiege all kinds of blood, That it could so preposterously be stained, To leave for nothing all thy sum of good; For nothing this wide universe I call, Save thou, my rose, in it thou art my all.
(Sonnet 108 from On the Boards)
What's in the brain that ink may character Which hath not figured to thee my true spirit? What's new to speak, what now to register, That may express my love, or thy dear merit? Nothing, sweet boy; but yet, like prayers divine, I must each day say o'er the very same; Counting no old thing old, thou mine, I thine, Even as when first I hallowed thy fair name. So that eternal love in love's fresh case, Weighs not the dust and injury of age, Nor gives to necessary wrinkles place, But makes antiquity for aye his page; Finding the first conceit of love there bred, Where time and outward form would show it dead.
(Sonnet 107 on 12th Avenue S & King St) Not mine own fears, nor the prophetic soul Of the wide world dreaming on things to come, Can yet the lease of my true love control, Supposed as forfeit to a confined doom. The mortal moon hath her eclipse endured, And the sad augurs mock their own presage; Incertainties now crown themselves assured, And peace proclaims olives of endless age. Now with the drops of this most balmy time, My love looks fresh, and Death to me subscribes, Since, spite of him, I'll live in this poor rhyme, While he insults o'er dull and speechless tribes: And thou in this shalt find thy monument, When tyrants' crests and tombs of brass are spent.
(Sonnet 106 from 12th Avenues S & King St) When in the chronicle of wasted time I see descriptions of the fairest wights, And beauty making beautiful old rhyme, In praise of ladies dead and lovely knights, Then, in the blazon of sweet beauty's best, Of hand, of foot, of lip, of eye, of brow, I see their antique pen would have expressed Even such a beauty as you master now. So all their praises are but prophecies Of this our time, all you prefiguring; And for they looked but with divining eyes, They had not skill enough your worth to sing: For we, which now behold these present days, Have eyes to wonder, but lack tongues to praise.
(Sonnet 105 from 12th Ave S & King St) Let not my love be called idolatry, Nor my beloved as an idol show, Since all alike my songs and praises be To one, of one, still such, and ever so. Kind is my love to-day, to-morrow kind, Still constant in a wondrous excellence; Therefore my verse to constancy confined, One thing expressing, leaves out difference. Fair, kind, and true, is all my argument, Fair, kind, and true, varying to other words; And in this change is my invention spent, Three themes in one, which wondrous scope affords. Fair, kind, and true, have often lived alone, Which three till now, never kept seat in one.
(Sonnet 104 from 12th Avenue S & King St) To me, fair friend, you never can be old, For as you were when first your eye I ey'd, Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold, Have from the forests shook three summers' pride, Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turned, In process of the seasons have I seen, Three April perfumes in three hot Junes burned, Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green. Ah! yet doth beauty like a dial-hand, Steal from his figure, and no pace perceived; So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth stand, Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceived: For fear of which, hear this thou age unbred: Ere you were born was beauty's summer dead.
(Sonnet 103 from Langston Hughes) Alack! what poverty my Muse brings forth, That having such a scope to show her pride, The argument all bare is of more worth Than when it hath my added praise beside! O! blame me not, if I no more can write! Look in your glass, and there appears a face That over-goes my blunt invention quite, Dulling my lines, and doing me disgrace. Were it not sinful then, striving to mend, To mar the subject that before was well? For to no other pass my verses tend Than of your graces and your gifts to tell; And more, much more, than in my verse can sit, Your own glass shows you when you look in it.
(Sonnet 102 from 12th Avenue & King S)
My love is strengthened, though more weak in seeming; I love not less, though less the show appear; That love is merchandized, whose rich esteeming, The owner's tongue doth publish every where. Our love was new, and then but in the spring, When I was wont to greet it with my lays; As Philomel in summer's front doth sing, And stops his pipe in growth of riper days: Not that the summer is less pleasant now Than when her mournful hymns did hush the night, But that wild music burthens every bough, And sweets grown common lose their dear delight. Therefore like her, I sometime hold my tongue: Because I would not dull you with my song.
(Sonnet 101, read from the porch at Giddens School, 20th and Lane)
O truant Muse what shall be thy amends For thy neglect of truth in beauty dyed? Both truth and beauty on my love depends; So dost thou too, and therein dignified. Make answer Muse: wilt thou not haply say, 'Truth needs no colour, with his colour fixed; Beauty no pencil, beauty's truth to lay; But best is best, if never intermixed'? Because he needs no praise, wilt thou be dumb? Excuse not silence so, for't lies in thee To make him much outlive a gilded tomb And to be praised of ages yet to be. Then do thy office, Muse; I teach thee how To make him seem, long hence, as he shows now.
Where art thou, Muse, that thou forget'st so long To speak of that which gives thee all thy might? Spend'st thou thy fury on some worthless song, Darkening thy power to lend base subjects light? Return, forgetful Muse, and straight redeem In gentle numbers time so idly spent; Sing to the ear that doth thy lays esteem And gives thy pen both skill and argument. Rise, restive Muse, my love's sweet face survey, If Time have any wrinkle graven there; If any, be a satire to decay, And make Time's spoils despised every where. Give my love fame faster than Time wastes life; So thou prevent'st his scythe and crooked knife.
(Sonnet 100 from 12th Avenue S & King St) Where art thou Muse that thou forget'st so long, To speak of that which gives thee all thy might? Spend'st thou thy fury on some worthless song, Darkening thy power to lend base subjects light? Return forgetful Muse, and straight redeem, In gentle numbers time so idly spent; Sing to the ear that doth thy lays esteem And gives thy pen both skill and argument. Rise, resty Muse, my love's sweet face survey, If Time have any wrinkle graven there; If any, be a satire to decay, And make Time's spoils despised every where. Give my love fame faster than Time wastes life, So thou prevent'st his scythe and crooked knife.
(Sonnet 99 from Hugo House) The forward violet thus did I chide: Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that smells, If not from my love's breath? The purple pride Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dy'd. The lily I condemned for thy hand, And buds of marjoram had stol'n thy hair; The roses fearfully on thorns did stand, One blushing shame, another white despair; A third, nor red nor white, had stol'n of both, And to his robbery had annexed thy breath; But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth A vengeful canker eat him up to death. More flowers I noted, yet I none could see, But sweet, or colour it had stol'n from thee.
(Sonnet 98) From you have I been absent in the spring, When proud pied April, dressed in all his trim, Hath put a spirit of youth in every thing, That heavy Saturn laughed and leapt with him. Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell Of different flowers in odour and in hue, Could make me any summer's story tell, Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew: Nor did I wonder at the lily's white, Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose; They were but sweet, but figures of delight, Drawn after you, you pattern of all those. Yet seemed it winter still, and you away, As with your shadow I with these did play.
(Sonnet 97 from Equinox Studios) How like a winter hath my absence been From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year! What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen! What old December's bareness every where! And yet this time remov'd was summer's time, The teeming autumn, big with rich increase, Bearing the wanton burden of the prime, Like widow'd wombs after their lord's decease: Yet this abundant issue seem'd to me But hope of orphans and unfather'd fruit; For summer and his pleasures wait on thee, And, thou away, the very birds are mute; Or, if they sing, 'tis with so dull a cheer That leaves look pale, dreading the winter's near.
Sonnet 96
Some say thy fault is youth, some wantonness; Some say thy grace is youth and gentle sport; Both grace and faults are lov'd of more and less: Thou mak'st faults graces that to thee resort. As on the finger of a throned queen The basest jewel will be well esteem'd, So are those errors that in thee are seen To truths translated, and for true things deem'd. How many lambs might the stern wolf betray, If like a lamb he could his looks translate! How many gazers mightst thou lead away, If thou wouldst use the strength of all thy state! But do not so, I love thee in such sort, As thou being mine, mine is thy good report.
Sonnet 95 How sweet and lovely dost thou make the shame Which, like a canker in the fragrant rose, Doth spot the beauty of thy budding name! O! in what sweets dost thou thy sins enclose. That tongue that tells the story of thy days, Making lascivious comments on thy sport, Cannot dispraise, but in a kind of praise; Naming thy name blesses an ill report. O! what a mansion have those vices got Which for their habitation chose out thee, Where beauty's veil doth cover every blot And all things turns to fair that eyes can see! Take heed, dear heart, of this large privilege; The hardest knife ill-used doth lose his edge.
SONNET 95
How sweet and lovely dost thou make the shame Which, like a canker in the fragrant rose, Doth spot the beauty of thy budding name! O, in what sweets dost thou thy sins enclose! That tongue that tells the story of thy days, Making lascivious comments on thy sport, Cannot dispraise but in a kind of praise; Naming thy name blesses an ill report. O, what a mansion have those vices got Which for their habitation chose out thee, Where beauty's veil doth cover every blot, And all things turn to fair that eyes can see! Take heed, dear heart, of this large privilege; The hardest knife ill-used doth lose his edge.
SONNET 94
They that have power to hurt and will do none, That do not do the thing they most do show, Who, moving others, are themselves as stone, Unmoved, cold, and to temptation slow; They rightly do inherit heaven's graces And husband nature's riches from expense; They are the lords and owners of their faces, Others but stewards of their excellence. The summer's flower is to the summer sweet, Though to itself it only live and die, But if that flower with base infection meet, The basest weed out-braves his dignity; For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds; Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds.
(Sonnet 93) So shall I live, supposing thou art true, Like a deceived husband; so love's face May still seem love to me, though altered new; Thy looks with me, thy heart in other place: For there can live no hatred in thine eye, Therefore in that I cannot know thy change. In many's looks, the false heart's history Is writ in moods, and frowns, and wrinkles strange. But heaven in thy creation did decree That in thy face sweet love should ever dwell; Whate'er thy thoughts, or thy heart's workings be, Thy looks should nothing thence, but sweetness tell. How like Eve's apple doth thy beauty grow, If thy sweet virtue answer not thy show!
(Sonnet 92) But do thy worst to steal thyself away, For term of life thou art assured mine; And life no longer than thy love will stay, For it depends upon that love of thine. Then need I not to fear the worst of wrongs, When in the least of them my life hath end. I see a better state to me belongs Than that which on thy humour doth depend: Thou canst not vex me with inconstant mind, Since that my life on thy revolt doth lie. O what a happy title do I find, Happy to have thy love, happy to die! But what's so blessed-fair that fears no blot? Thou mayst be false, and yet I know it not
Sonnet 91- Some glory in their birth, some in their skill, Some in their wealth, some in their body's force, Some in their garments though new-fangled ill; Some in their hawks and hounds, some in their horse; And every humour hath his adjunct pleasure, Wherein it finds a joy above the rest: But these particulars are not my measure, All these I better in one general best. Thy love is better than high birth to me, Richer than wealth, prouder than garments' cost, Of more delight than hawks and horses be; And having thee, of all men's pride I boast: Wretched in this alone, that thou mayst take All this away, and me most wretched make.
William Shakespeare
Sonnet 90
Then hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now; Now, while the world is bent my deeds to cross, Join with the spite of fortune, make me bow, And do not drop in for an after-loss: Ah, do not, when my heart hath 'scoped this sorrow, Come in the rearward of a conquer'd woe; Give not a windy night a rainy morrow, To linger out a purposed overthrow. If thou wilt leave me, do not leave me last, When other petty griefs have done their spite But in the onset come; so shall I taste At first the very worst of fortune's might, And other strains of woe, which now seem woe, Compared with loss of thee will not seem so.
Say that thou didst forsake me for some fault, And I will comment upon that offence: Speak of my lameness, and I straight will halt, Against thy reasons making no defence. Thou canst not, love, disgrace me half so ill, To set a form upon desired change, As I'll myself disgrace; knowing thy will, I will acquaintance strangle, and look strange; Be absent from thy walks; and in my tongue Thy sweet beloved name no more shall dwell, Lest I, too much profane, should do it wrong, And haply of our old acquaintance tell. For thee, against my self I'll vow debate, For I must ne'er love him whom thou dost hate.
William Shakespeare Sonnet 89
in stereo ...
When thou shalt be disposed to set me light, And place my merit in the eye of scorn, Upon thy side, against myself I'll fight, And prove thee virtuous, though thou art forsworn. With mine own weakness being best acquainted, Upon thy part I can set down a story Of faults concealed, wherein I am attainted; That thou in losing me shalt win much glory: And I by this will be a gainer too; For bending all my loving thoughts on thee, The injuries that to myself I do, Doing thee vantage, double-vantage me. Such is my love, to thee I so belong, That for thy right, myself will bear all wrong.
Farewell! thou art too dear for my possessing, And like enough thou know'st thy estimate, The charter of thy worth gives thee releasing; My bonds in thee are all determinate. For how do I hold thee but by thy granting? And for that riches where is my deserving? The cause of this fair gift in me is wanting, And so my patent back again is swerving. Thy self thou gavest, thy own worth then not knowing, Or me to whom thou gav'st it else mistaking; So thy great gift, upon misprision growing, Comes home again, on better judgement making. Thus have I had thee, as a dream doth flatter, In sleep a king, but waking no such matter.
Yonnas recites Sonnet 86, Proud Full Sail of His Great Verse, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Was it the proud full sail of his great verse, Bound for the prize of all too precious you, That did my ripe thoughts in my brain inhearse, Making their tomb the womb wherein they grew? Was it his spirit, by spirits taught to write Above a mortal pitch, that struck me dead? No, neither he, nor his compeers by night Giving him aid, my verse astonished. He, nor that affable familiar ghost Which nightly gulls him with intelligence, As victors of my silence cannot boast; I was not sick of any fear from thence: But when your countenance filled up his line, Then lacked I matter; that enfeebled mine.
Melanie Masson, in memory of her grandmother Jenny, chose this day February 14th to read a Shakespeare's Sonnet for Porchlit. Here is Sonnet 85 by My Tongue Tied Muse. Enjoy!
My tongue-tied Muse in manners holds her still, While comments of your praise richly compiled, Reserve thy character with golden quill, And precious phrase by all the Muses filed. I think good thoughts, whilst others write good words, And like unlettered clerk still cry 'Amen' To every hymn that able spirit affords, In polished form of well-refined pen. Hearing you praised, I say ''tis so, 'tis true,' And to the most of praise add something more; But that is in my thought, whose love to you, Though words come hindmost, holds his rank before. Then others, for the breath of words respect, Me for my dumb thoughts, speaking in effect.
Yonnas recites Which Makes Your Praises Worse By William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Who is it that says most, which can say more, Than this rich praise, that you alone, are you, In whose confine immured is the store Which should example where your equal grew? Lean penury within that pen doth dwell That to his subject lends not some small glory; But he that writes of you, if he can tell That you are you, so dignifies his story. Let him but copy what in you is writ, Not making worse what nature made so clear, And such a counterpart shall fame his wit, Making his style admired every where. You to your beauteous blessings add a curse, Being fond on praise, which makes your praises worse.
Sonnet 83, from the porch at Langston Hughes Performing Arts Center
I never saw that you did painting need, And therefore to your fair no painting set; I found, or thought I found, you did exceed The barren tender of a poet's debt: And therefore have I slept in your report, That you yourself, being extant, well might show How far a modern quill doth come too short, Speaking of worth, what worth in you doth grow. This silence for my sin you did impute, Which shall be most my glory being dumb; For I impair not beauty being mute, When others would give life, and bring a tomb. There lives more life in one of your fair eyes Than both your poets can in praise devise.
Yonnas recite, Sonnet 83, Barren Tender of a Poets Debt by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
I never saw that you did painting need, And therefore to your fair no painting set; I found, or thought I found, you did exceed The barren tender of a poet's debt: And therefore have I slept in your report, That you yourself, being extant, well might show How far a modern quill doth come too short, Speaking of worth, what worth in you doth grow. This silence for my sin you did impute, Which shall be most my glory being dumb; For I impair not beauty being mute, When others would give life, and bring a tomb. There lives more life in one of your fair eyes Than both your poets can in praise devise.
Lola Peters recites, Sonnet 82, Thou Art As Fair by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
I grant thou wert not married to my Muse, And therefore mayst without attaint o'erlook The dedicated words which writers use Of their fair subject, blessing every book. Thou art as fair in knowledge as in hue, Finding thy worth a limit past my praise; And therefore art enforced to seek anew Some fresher stamp of the time-bettering days. And do so, love; yet when they have devised, What strained touches rhetoric can lend, Thou truly fair, wert truly sympathized In true plain words, by thy true-telling friend; And their gross painting might be better used Where cheeks need blood; in thee it is abused.
Sonnet 81, from the porch at 12th Ave S and S King St
Or I shall live your epitaph to make, Or you survive when I in earth am rotten; From hence your memory death cannot take, Although in me each part will be forgotten. Your name from hence immortal life shall have, Though I, once gone, to all the world must die: The earth can yield me but a common grave, When you entombed in men's eyes shall lie. Your monument shall be my gentle verse, Which eyes not yet created shall o'er-read, And tongues to be your being shall rehearse, When all the breathers of this world are dead; You still shall live (such virtue hath my pen) Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths of men.
From the exterior balcony of Seattle's City Hall Yonnas recites Even in the Mounts of Men, Sonnet 81, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Or I shall live your epitaph to make, Or you survive when I in earth am rotten; From hence your memory death cannot take, Although in me each part will be forgotten. Your name from hence immortal life shall have, Though I, once gone, to all the world must die: The earth can yield me but a common grave, When you entombed in men's eyes shall lie. Your monument shall be my gentle verse, Which eyes not yet created shall o'er-read, And tongues to be your being shall rehearse, When all the breathers of this world are dead; You still shall live (such virtue hath my pen) Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths of men.
Sonnet 80, from the porch at 12th and King.
O, how I faint when I of you do write, Knowing a better spirit doth use your name, And in the praise thereof spends all his might, To make me tongue-tied, speaking of your fame! But since your worth, wide as the ocean is, The humble as the proudest sail doth bear, My saucy bark inferior far to his On your broad main doth wilfully appear. Your shallowest help will hold me up afloat, Whilst he upon your soundless deep doth ride; Or being wreck'd, I am a worthless boat, He of tall building and of goodly pride: Then if he thrive and I be cast away, The worst was this; my love was my decay.
Sigma Vitali recites, Sonnet 80, How I Faint When I Of You Do Write by William Shakespeare from the entrance of Hugo House. Enjoy! Below is the sonnet for you to read as well.
O! how I faint when I of you do write, Knowing a better spirit doth use your name, And in the praise thereof spends all his might, To make me tongue-tied speaking of your fame. But since your worth, wide as the ocean is, The humble as the proudest sail doth bear, My saucy bark, inferior far to his, On your broad main doth wilfully appear. Your shallowest help will hold me up afloat, Whilst he upon your soundless deep doth ride; Or, being wracked, I am a worthless boat, He of tall building, and of goodly pride: Then if he thrive and I be cast away, The worst was this, my love was my decay
Omar Willey reconnects us to Great Depression days in Seattle, the men and women who built unwelcomed make shift houses and the visionary ones who would build Yesler Terrace.
"Enter Jesse Epstein."
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Jessica Charlton recites, Sonnet 79, Whilst I Alone by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Whilst I alone did call upon thy aid, My verse alone had all thy gentle grace; But now my gracious numbers are decayed, And my sick Muse doth give an other place. I grant, sweet love, thy lovely argument Deserves the travail of a worthier pen; Yet what of thee thy poet doth invent He robs thee of, and pays it thee again. He lends thee virtue, and he stole that word From thy behaviour; beauty doth he give, And found it in thy cheek: he can afford No praise to thee, but what in thee doth live. Then thank him not for that which he doth say, Since what he owes thee, thou thyself dost pay.
Sonnet 78
So oft have I invok'd thee for my Muse, And found such fair assistance in my verse, As every alien pen hath got my use, And under thee their poesy disperse. Thine eyes, that taught the dumb on high to sing, And heavy ignorance aloft to fly, Have added feathers to the learned's wing, And given grace a double majesty. Yet be most proud of that which I compile, Whose influence is thine and born of thee: In others' works thou dost but mend the style, And arts with thy sweet graces graced be; But thou art all my art and dost advance As high as learning my rude ignorance.
Campbell Thibo recites, Sonnet 76, Why Is My Verse So Barren Of New Pride by William Shakespeare from the porch of Hugo House. Enjoy!
Why is my verse so barren of new pride, So far from variation or quick change? Why with the time do I not glance aside To new-found methods, and to compounds strange? Why write I still all one, ever the same, And keep invention in a noted weed, That every word doth almost tell my name, Showing their birth, and where they did proceed? O! know sweet love I always write of you, And you and love are still my argument; So all my best is dressing old words new, Spending again what is already spent: For as the sun is daily new and old, So is my love still telling what is told.
Campbell Thibo recites So Are You To My Thoughts As Food To Life, Sonnet 75, by William Shakespeare from the entrance of Langston Hughes PAI. Enjoy!
So are you to my thoughts as food to life, Or as sweet-season'd showers are to the ground; And for the peace of you I hold such strife As 'twixt a miser and his wealth is found. Now proud as an enjoyer, and anon Doubting the filching age will steal his treasure; Now counting best to be with you alone, Then better'd that the world may see my pleasure: Sometime all full with feasting on your sight, And by and by clean starved for a look; Possessing or pursuing no delight Save what is had, or must from you be took. Thus do I pine and surfeit day by day, Or gluttoning on all, or all away.
Lola Peters recites I Pine And Surfeit Day By Day, sonnet 75, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
So are you to my thoughts as food to life, Or as sweet-season'd showers are to the ground; And for the peace of you I hold such strife As 'twixt a miser and his wealth is found. Now proud as an enjoyer, and anon Doubting the filching age will steal his treasure; Now counting best to be with you alone, Then better'd that the world may see my pleasure: Sometime all full with feasting on your sight, And by and by clean starved for a look; Possessing or pursuing no delight Save what is had, or must from you be took. Thus do I pine and surfeit day by day, Or gluttoning on all, or all away.
Sigma Vitali recites But Be Contented, Sonnet 74, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
But be contented when that fell arrest Without all bail shall carry me away, My life hath in this line some interest, Which for memorial still with thee shall stay. When thou reviewest this, thou dost review The very part was consecrate to thee: The earth can have but earth, which is his due; My spirit is thine, the better part of me: So then thou hast but lost the dregs of life, The prey of worms, my body being dead; The coward conquest of a wretch's knife, Too base of thee to be remembered. The worth of that is that which it contains, And that is this, and this with thee remains.
From Hugo House Sigma Vitali recites, Sonnet 73, That Time of Year Thou Mayst In Me Behold by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
That time of year thou mayst in me behold When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, Bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang. In me thou see'st the twilight of such day As after sunset fadeth in the west; Which by and by black night doth take away, Death's second self, that seals up all in rest. In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire, That on the ashes of his youth doth lie, As the death-bed, whereon it must expire, Consumed with that which it was nourish'd by. This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong, To love that well, which thou must leave ere long.
Jessica Charlton recites What Merit Lived In Me, Sonnet 72, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
O! lest the world should task you to recite What merit lived in me, that you should love After my death,--dear love, forget me quite, For you in me can nothing worthy prove. Unless you would devise some virtuous lie, To do more for me than mine own desert, And hang more praise upon deceased I Than niggard truth would willingly impart: O! lest your true love may seem false in this That you for love speak well of me untrue, My name be buried where my body is, And live no more to shame nor me nor you. For I am shamed by that which I bring forth, And so should you, to love things nothing worth.
Knox Gardner stopped by the Porch on 12th Avenue S & King St to recite No Longer Mourn For Me, Sonnet 71, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
No longer mourn for me when I am dead Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell Give warning to the world that I am fled From this vile world with vilest worms to dwell: Nay, if you read this line, remember not The hand that writ it, for I love you so, That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot, If thinking on me then should make you woe. O! if, I say, you look upon this verse, When I perhaps compounded am with clay, Do not so much as my poor name rehearse; But let your love even with my life decay; Lest the wise world should look into your moan, And mock you with me after I am gone.
From the Porch/Balcony of On The Boards Yonnas recites, Sonnet 70, That Thou Art Blamed by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
That thou art blamed shall not be thy defect, For slander's mark was ever yet the fair; The ornament of beauty is suspect, A crow that flies in heaven's sweetest air. So thou be good, slander doth but approve Thy worth the greater, being wooed of time; For canker vice the sweetest buds doth love, And thou present'st a pure unstained prime. Thou hast passed by the ambush of young days Either not assailed, or victor being charged; Yet this thy praise cannot be so thy praise, To tie up envy, evermore enlarged, If some suspect of ill masked not thy show, Then thou alone kingdoms of hearts shouldst owe.
Jessica Charlton recites Sonnet 69, Those Parts of Thee, by Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Those parts of thee that the world's eye doth view Want nothing that the thought of hearts can mend; All tongues, the voice of souls, give thee that due, Uttering bare truth, even so as foes commend. Thy outward thus with outward praise is crown'd; But those same tongues, that give thee so thine own, In other accents do this praise confound By seeing farther than the eye hath shown. They look into the beauty of thy mind, And that in guess they measure by thy deeds; Then, churls, their thoughts, although their eyes were kind, To thy fair flower add the rank smell of weeds: But why thy odour matcheth not thy show, The soil is this, that thou dost common grow.
Lola E Peters recites Sonnet 68, Map of Days Outworn, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Thus is his cheek the map of days outworn, When beauty lived and died as flowers do now, Before these bastard signs of fair were born, Or durst inhabit on a living brow; Before the golden tresses of the dead, The right of sepulchres, were shorn away, To live a second life on second head; Ere beauty's dead fleece made another gay: In him those holy antique hours are seen, Without all ornament, itself and true, Making no summer of another's green, Robbing no old to dress his beauty new; And him as for a map doth Nature store, To show false Art what beauty was of yore.
Sigma Vitali recites His Presence Grace Impiety, Sonnet 67, by William Shakespeare from the entrance of Hugo House. Enjoy!
Ah! wherefore with infection should he live, And with his presence grace impiety, That sin by him advantage should achieve, And lace itself with his society? Why should false painting imitate his cheek, And steal dead seeming of his living hue? Why should poor beauty indirectly seek Roses of shadow, since his rose is true? Why should he live, now Nature bankrupt is, Beggared of blood to blush through lively veins? For she hath no exchequer now but his, And proud of many, lives upon his gains. O! him she stores, to show what wealth she had In days long since, before these last so bad.
Yonnas recites Sonnet 66, I Leave My Love Alone, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Tired with all these, for restful death I cry, As to behold desert a beggar born, And needy nothing trimm'd in jollity, And purest faith unhappily forsworn, And gilded honour shamefully misplaced, And maiden virtue rudely strumpeted, And right perfection wrongfully disgraced, And strength by limping sway disabled And art made tongue-tied by authority, And folly, doctor-like, controlling skill, And simple truth miscalled simplicity, And captive good attending captain ill: Tired with all these, from these would I be gone, Save that, to die, I leave my love alone.
For Beyond the Porch episode 32 Omar Willey, publisher at Seattle Star, retraces how our city came to have the largest ferry system in the country. Enjoy!
Jessica Charlton recites, Sonnet 65, Nor Stone, Nor Earth, Nor Boundless Sea by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea, But sad mortality o'ersways their power, How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea, Whose action is no stronger than a flower? O! how shall summer's honey breath hold out, Against the wrackful siege of battering days, When rocks impregnable are not so stout, Nor gates of steel so strong but Time decays? O fearful meditation! where, alack, Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid? Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back? Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid? O! none, unless this miracle have might, That in black ink my love may still shine bright.
Yonnas recites Fears to Lose, Sonnet 64, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
When I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced The rich proud cost of outworn buried age; When sometime lofty towers I see down-razed, And brass eternal slave to mortal rage; When I have seen the hungry ocean gain Advantage on the kingdom of the shore, And the firm soil win of the watery main, Increasing store with loss, and loss with store; When I have seen such interchange of state, Or state itself confounded to decay; Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate That Time will come and take my love away. This thought is as a death which cannot choose But weep to have that which it fears to lose.
Time's injurious Hand, Sonnet 63, by William Shakespeare recited by Yonnas Getahun. Enjoy!
Against my love shall be as I am now, With Time's injurious hand crushed and o'erworn; When hours have drained his blood and filled his brow With lines and wrinkles; when his youthful morn Hath travelled on to age's steepy night; And all those beauties whereof now he's king Are vanishing, or vanished out of sight, Stealing away the treasure of his spring; For such a time do I now fortify Against confounding age's cruel knife, That he shall never cut from memory My sweet love's beauty, though my lover's life: His beauty shall in these black lines be seen, And they shall live, and he in them still green.
Lola Peters recites Sonnet 61, Is it Thy Will, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Is it thy will, thy image should keep open My heavy eyelids to the weary night? Dost thou desire my slumbers should be broken, While shadows like to thee do mock my sight? Is it thy spirit that thou send'st from thee So far from home into my deeds to pry, To find out shames and idle hours in me, The scope and tenor of thy jealousy? O, no! thy love, though much, is not so great: It is my love that keeps mine eye awake: Mine own true love that doth my rest defeat, To play the watchman ever for thy sake: For thee watch I, whilst thou dost wake elsewhere, From me far off, with others all too near.
Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore, So do our minutes hasten to their end; Each changing place with that which goes before, In sequent toil all forwards do contend. Nativity, once in the main of light, Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crown'd, Crooked eclipses 'gainst his glory fight, And Time, that gave, doth now his gift confound. Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth, And delves the parallels in beauty's brow, Feeds on the rarities of nature's truth, And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow. And yet to times in hope my verse shall stand, Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.
If there be nothing new, but that which is Hath been before, how are our brains beguil'd, Which, labouring for invention, bear amiss The second burthen of a former child! O, that record could with a backward look, Even of five hundred courses of the sun, Show me your image in some antique book, Since mind at first in character was done! That I might see what the old world could say To this composed wonder of your frame; Whether we are mended, or whe'r better they, Or whether revolution be the same. O! sure I am, the wits of former days To subjects worse have given admiring praise.
From the steps of Hugo House Sigma Vitali recites Shakespeare Sonnet 59, For Invention Bear Amiss. Enjoy!
If there be nothing new, but that which is Hath been before, how are our brains beguil'd, Which labouring for invention bear amiss The second burthen of a former child. Oh that record could with a backward look, Even of five hundred courses of the sun, Show me your image in some antique book, Since mind at first in character was done, That I might see what the old world could say To this composed wonder of your frame; Whether we are mended, or where better they, Or whether revolution be the same. Oh sure I am the wits of former days, To subjects worse have given admiring praise.
Jessica Charlton recites Shakespeare's 58th Sonnet Made Me First Your Slave. Enjoy!
That god forbid, that made me first your slave, I should in thought control your times of pleasure, Or at your hand the account of hours to crave, Being your vassal, bound to stay your leisure! O! let me suffer, being at your beck, The imprison'd absence of your liberty; And patience, tame to sufferance, bide each check, Without accusing you of injury. Be where you list, your charter is so strong That you yourself may privilege your time To what you will; to you it doth belong Yourself to pardon of self-doing crime. I am to wait, though waiting so be hell, Not blame your pleasure be it ill or well.
Yonnas Getahun recites Sonnet 57 by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Being your slave what should I do but tend Upon the hours, and times of your desire? I have no precious time at all to spend; Nor services to do, till you require. Nor dare I chide the world without end hour, Whilst I, my sovereign, watch the clock for you, Nor think the bitterness of absence sour, When you have bid your servant once adieu; Nor dare I question with my jealous thought Where you may be, or your affairs suppose, But, like a sad slave, stay and think of nought Save, where you are, how happy you make those. So true a fool is love, that in your will, Though you do anything, he thinks no ill.
From the porch of Hugo House Star Angelina Murray recites Shakespeare Sonnet 56 Sweet Love, Renew Thy Force. Enjoy!
Sweet love, renew thy force; be it not said Thy edge should blunter be than appetite, Which but to-day by feeding is allayed, To-morrow sharpened in his former might: So, love, be thou, although to-day thou fill Thy hungry eyes, even till they wink with fulness, To-morrow see again, and do not kill The spirit of love, with a perpetual dulness. Let this sad interim like the ocean be Which parts the shore, where two contracted new Come daily to the banks, that when they see Return of love, more blest may be the view; As call it winter, which being full of care, Makes summer's welcome, thrice more wished, more rare.
From the porch located on the corner of 12th Avenue S and King St Yonnas recites Sonnet 55 by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Not marble, nor the gilded monuments Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme; But you shall shine more bright in these contents Than unswept stone, besmear'd with sluttish time. When wasteful war shall statues overturn, And broils root out the work of masonry, Nor Mars his sword, nor war's quick fire shall burn The living record of your memory. 'Gainst death, and all oblivious enmity Shall you pace forth; your praise shall still find room Even in the eyes of all posterity That wear this world out to the ending doom. So, till the judgment that yourself arise, You live in this, and dwell in lovers' eyes.
"I came to Seattle on the Wednesday morning train from Portland. I came here for the purpose of killing Creffield. I saw them this morning on First Ave and shot the man. That is all there is to it. He ruined my two sisters and I took his life." For Beyond the Porch 31 Omar Willey takes us to First and Cherry in 1903.
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From the balcony/porch of Hugo House Yonnas recites Sonnet 54 by Shakespeare. Enjoy!
O! how much more doth beauty beauteous seem By that sweet ornament which truth doth give. The rose looks fair, but fairer we it deem For that sweet odour, which doth in it live. The canker blooms have full as deep a dye As the perfumed tincture of the roses, Hang on such thorns, and play as wantonly When summer's breath their masked buds discloses: But, for their virtue only is their show, They live unwoo'd, and unrespected fade; Die to themselves. Sweet roses do not so; Of their sweet deaths are sweetest odours made: And so of you, beauteous and lovely youth, When that shall vade, my verse distills your truth.
Yonnas Getahun recites Sonnet 53, What is Your Substance, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
What is your substance, whereof are you made, That millions of strange shadows on you tend? Since every one hath, every one, one shade, And you but one, can every shadow lend. Describe Adonis, and the counterfeit Is poorly imitated after you; On Helen's cheek all art of beauty set, And you in Grecian tires are painted new: Speak of the spring, and foison of the year, The one doth shadow of your beauty show, The other as your bounty doth appear; And you in every blessed shape we know. In all external grace you have some part, But you like none, none you, for constant heart.
Omar Willey, Publisher at Seattle Star, dives into Male to Female ratio in 2016 and 1860's Seattle. Enjoy Here Come the Brides!
Jessica Charlton recites, Sonnet 51, Love Excuse the Slow Offence by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Thus can my love excuse the slow offence Of my dull bearer when from thee I speed: From where thou art why should I haste me thence? Till I return, of posting is no need. O! what excuse will my poor beast then find, When swift extremity can seem but slow? Then should I spur, though mounted on the wind, In winged speed no motion shall I know, Then can no horse with my desire keep pace. Therefore desire, (of perfect'st love being made) Shall neigh, no dull flesh, in his fiery race; But love, for love, thus shall excuse my jade- Since from thee going, he went wilful-slow, Towards thee I'll run, and give him leave to go.
Performer and Artist Erin Pike recites How Heavy Do I Journey, Sonnet 50, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
How heavy do I journey on the way, When what I seek, my weary travel's end, Doth teach that ease and that repose to say, 'Thus far the miles are measured from thy friend!' The beast that bears me, tired with my woe, Plods dully on, to bear that weight in me, As if by some instinct the wretch did know His rider lov'd not speed being made from thee. The bloody spur cannot provoke him on, That sometimes anger thrusts into his hide, Which heavily he answers with a groan, More sharp to me than spurring to his side; For that same groan doth put this in my mind, My grief lies onward, and my joy behind.
Yonnas Getahun recites I Can Allege No Cause, Sonnet 49, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Against that time, if ever that time come, When I shall see thee frown on my defects, When as thy love hath cast his utmost sum, Called to that audit by advis'd respects; Against that time when thou shalt strangely pass, And scarcely greet me with that sun, thine eye, When love, converted from the thing it was, Shall reasons find of settled gravity; Against that time do I ensconce me here, Within the knowledge of mine own desert, And this my hand, against my self uprear, To guard the lawful reasons on thy part: To leave poor me thou hast the strength of laws, Since why to love I can allege no cause.
From the porch/balcony of Richard Hugo House Yonnas recites Sonnet 48 by William Shakespeare.
How heavy do I journey on the way, When what I seek, my weary travel's end, Doth teach that ease and that repose to say, 'Thus far the miles are measured from thy friend!' The beast that bears me, tired with my woe, Plods dully on, to bear that weight in me, As if by some instinct the wretch did know His rider lov'd not speed being made from thee. The bloody spur cannot provoke him on, That sometimes anger thrusts into his hide, Which heavily he answers with a groan, More sharp to me than spurring to his side; For that same groan doth put this in my mind, My grief lies onward, and my joy behind.
From the entrance of Hugo House Sigma Vitali recites Sonnet 46 by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Betwixt mine eye and heart a league is took, And each doth good turns now unto the other: When that mine eye is famish'd for a look, Or heart in love with sighs himself doth smother, With my love's picture then my eye doth feast, And to the painted banquet bids my heart; Another time mine eye is my heart's guest, And in his thoughts of love doth share a part: So, either by thy picture or my love, Thy self away, art present still with me; For thou not farther than my thoughts canst move, And I am still with them, and they with thee; Or, if they sleep, thy picture in my sight Awakes my heart, to heart's and eyes' delight.
From the porch/balcony of @ontheboards On the Boards entrance Yonnas recites Sonnet 46 by Williams Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Mine eye and heart are at a mortal war, How to divide the conquest of thy sight; Mine eye my heart thy picture's sight would bar, My heart mine eye the freedom of that right. My heart doth plead that thou in him dost lie, A closet never pierced with crystal eyes, But the defendant doth that plea deny, And says in him thy fair appearance lies. To 'cide this title is impannelled A quest of thoughts, all tenants to the heart; And by their verdict is determined The clear eye's moiety, and the dear heart's part: As thus: mine eye's due is thine outward part, And my heart's right, thine inward love of heart.
Yonnas recites This Told, I Joy By Shakespeare Sonnet 45. Enjoy!
The other two, slight air and purging fire, Are both with thee, wherever I abide; The first my thought, the other my desire, These present-absent with swift motion slide. For when these quicker elements are gone In tender embassy of love to thee, My life, being made of four, with two alone Sinks down to death, oppressed with melancholy; Until life's composition be recured By those swift messengers return'd from thee, Who even but now come back again, assured Of thy fair health, recounting it to me: This told, I joy; but then no longer glad, I send them back again and straight grow sad.
Jessica recites, If the dull substance of my flesh were thought, Sonnet 44 by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
If the dull substance of my flesh were thought, Injurious distance should not stop my way; For then despite of space I would be brought, From limits far remote, where thou dost stay. No matter then although my foot did stand Upon the farthest earth removed from thee; For nimble thought can jump both sea and land As soon as think the place where he would be. But ah! thought kills me that I am not thought, To leap large lengths of miles when thou art gone, But that, so much of earth and water wrought, I must attend time's leisure with my moan, Receiving nought by elements so slow But heavy tears, badges of either's woe.
Dreams Do Show Thee Me by Shakespeare, Sonnet 43, recited by Yonnas Getahun.
When most I wink, then do mine eyes best see, For all the day they view things unrespected; But when I sleep, in dreams they look on thee, And darkly bright, are bright in dark directed. Then thou, whose shadow shadows doth make bright, How would thy shadow's form form happy show To the clear day with thy much clearer light, When to unseeing eyes thy shade shines so! How would, I say, mine eyes be blessed made By looking on thee in the living day, When in dead night thy fair imperfect shade Through heavy sleep on sightless eyes doth stay! All days are nights to see till I see thee, And nights bright days when dreams do show thee me.
Loves Me But Me Alone, Sonnet 42, by William Shakespeare recited by Yonnas. Enjoy! That thou hast her it is not all my grief, And yet it may be said I loved her dearly; That she hath thee is of my wailing chief, A loss in love that touches me more nearly. Loving offenders thus I will excuse ye: Thou dost love her, because thou know'st I love her; And for my sake even so doth she abuse me, Suffering my friend for my sake to approve her. If I lose thee, my loss is my love's gain, And losing her, my friend hath found that loss; Both find each other, and I lose both twain, And both for my sake lay on me this cross: But here's the joy; my friend and I are one; Sweet flattery! then she loves but me alone.
Yonnas recites Sonnet 41, When I am absent from thy heart, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Those pretty wrongs that liberty commits, When I am sometime absent from thy heart, Thy beauty, and thy years full well befits, For still temptation follows where thou art. Gentle thou art, and therefore to be won, Beauteous thou art, therefore to be assailed; And when a woman woos, what woman's son Will sourly leave her till he have prevailed? Ay me! but yet thou mightst my seat forbear, And chide thy beauty and thy straying youth, Who lead thee in their riot even there Where thou art forced to break a twofold truth: Hers by thy beauty tempting her to thee, Thine by thy beauty being false to me.
For Beyond the Porch 29 our host Omar Willey, Publisher at Seattle Star, takes us to 1889 Seattle in which landowner Guy Phinney envisions "a ballpark, a hotel, a stone chapel, a boat house with a hunters' lodge, a bandstand, a menagerie of animals, an English-style park, a greenhouse and a mansion" in his 200 acre forest.
Please enjoy and share!
Yonnas recites Sonnet 39, With Manners May I Sing by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
O! how thy worth with manners may I sing, When thou art all the better part of me? What can mine own praise to mine own self bring? And what is't but mine own when I praise thee? Even for this, let us divided live, And our dear love lose name of single one, That by this separation I may give That due to thee which thou deserv'st alone. O absence! what a torment wouldst thou prove, Were it not thy sour leisure gave sweet leave, To entertain the time with thoughts of love, Which time and thoughts so sweetly doth deceive, And that thou teachest how to make one twain, By praising him here who doth hence remain.
Yonnas recites Pain Be Mine, Sonnet 38, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
How can my muse want subject to invent, While thou dost breathe, that pour'st into my verse Thine own sweet argument, too excellent For every vulgar paper to rehearse? O! give thy self the thanks, if aught in me Worthy perusal stand against thy sight; For who's so dumb that cannot write to thee, When thou thy self dost give invention light? Be thou the tenth Muse, ten times more in worth Than those old nine which rhymers invocate; And he that calls on thee, let him bring forth Eternal numbers to outlive long date. If my slight muse do please these curious days, The pain be mine, but thine shall be the praise.
Omar Willey recites Sonnet 37, As a Decrepit Father Takes Delight, by Shakespeare. Enjoy!
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 crowned 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!
Yonnas recites Sonnet 37, Shadow Doth Such Substance Give, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
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 crowned 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!
Omar Willey recites Sonnet 36, Confess That We Two Must Be Twain, by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Let me confess that we two must be twain, Although our undivided loves are one: So shall those blots that do with me remain, Without thy help, by me be borne alone. In our two loves there is but one respect, Though in our lives a separable spite, Which though it alter not love's sole effect, Yet doth it steal sweet hours from love's delight. I may not evermore acknowledge thee, Lest my bewailed guilt should do thee shame, Nor thou with public kindness honour me, Unless thou take that honour from thy name: But do not so, I love thee in such sort, As thou being mine, mine is thy good report.
Lola Peters Recites Sonnet 35 All men make faults by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
No more be grieved atthat which thou hast done: Roses have thorns, and silver fountains mud: Clouds and eclipses stain both moon and sun, And loathsome canker lives in sweetest bud. All men make faults, and even I in this, Authorizing thy trespass with compare, Myself corrupting, salving thy amiss, Excusing thy sins more than thy sins are; For to thy sensual fault I bring in sense, Thy adverse party is thy advocate, And 'gainst myself a lawful plea commence: Such civil war is in my love and hate, That I an accessary needs must be, To that sweet thief which sourly robs from me.
Porchlit reaches through, yet beyond our particular place, and through, yet past our chosen set of poetry. I invite you, dear listener, to join me a moment as I attempt to describe what Porchlit means to me, and what I hope for.
For two-thirds of a year, you and I have continued posting and hearing daily readings in Seattle, mostly from the historic porch on the corner of 12th Ave S and S King St. Usually, a reader will participate once, though several of us have repeated. At this particular moment we recite primarily from the Sonnets of William Shakespeare, counting down to the 400th anniversary of his death on April 23, 2016.
Over the course of this project so far, Yonnas, Omar and I have developed warm relations with the owner of the home - 'the Porchlit house.' I know the neighborhood better. More than this, I have, through you, grown to love many authors and poets I had otherwise had no opportunity to know; Denise Levertov, Richard Hugo and Theodore Roethke are only a few. I deeply enjoy listening, as if to storytime, to Porchlit's stream on SoundCloud as I settle to sleep at night.
Moreover, the practice of reading for Porchlit - the ritual, if you will - has grown on me, so much so that I miss it while away on extended stay in New York.
Porchlit is not only about reading aloud on the porch at the corner of 12th and King, though this certainly embodies its essence. To me, it reawakens, using modern means, an ancient tradition. It invites us to stand in – to me – ineffable spaces which are at once entirely public yet also protected by welcome and familiarity.
The way in which we all select content for these readings also seems more genuine to me than modern publishing. It bears similarity, in my opinion, to storytelling traditions. We choose, perhaps unconsciously, the works we most wish to see continue in our literature.
While physical proximity is challenging today (though no less essential to storytelling), we aim through Porchlit to allow a personal interchange – albeit through translation – between one who loves literature and the patient, curious listener. Where this occurs, and who listens, is flexible by design. Thus I ask your forgiveness in advance for reading, now in addition to the Porchlit house, from other porches around the country or world.
I also welcome you, whoever you are, to contribute to Porchlit, be it from your porch or ours, daily, weekly or once in your life. I welcome you to listen to the recordings here and comment on them if you choose. Beyond this, I hope you will consider ways you can support the preservation of these spaces: historic homes, semi-public porches. And, above all, preserve our collective knowledge and love of literature.
Lola Peters recites Sonnet Number Thirty-Four by William Shakespeare on Christmas. Enjoy!
Why didst thou promise such a beauteous day, And make me travel forth without my cloak, To let base clouds o'ertake me in my way, Hiding thy bravery in their rotten smoke? 'Tis not enough that through the cloud thou break, To dry the rain on my storm-beaten face, For no man well of such a salve can speak, That heals the wound, and cures not the disgrace: Nor can thy shame give physic to my grief; Though thou repent, yet I have still the loss: The offender's sorrow lends but weak relief To him that bears the strong offence's cross. Ah! but those tears are pearl which thy love sheds, And they are rich and ransom all ill deeds.
Omar Willey stopped by Porchlit today to recite Shakespeare's thirty-third sonnet. Enjoy!
Full many a glorious morning have I seen Flatter the mountain tops with sovereign eye, Kissing with golden face the meadows green, Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy; Anon permit the basest clouds to ride With ugly rack on his celestial face, And from the forlorn world his visage hide, Stealing unseen to west with this disgrace: Even so my sun one early morn did shine, With all triumphant splendour on my brow; But out, alack, he was but one hour mine, The region cloud hath mask'd him from me now. Yet him for this my love no whit disdaineth; Suns of the world may stain when heaven's sun staineth.
Yonnas recites Sonnet 32 by William Shakespeare.
If thou survive my well-contented day, When that churl Death my bones with dust shall cover And shalt by fortune once more re-survey These poor rude lines of thy deceased lover, Compare them with the bett'ring of the time, And though they be outstripped by every pen, Reserve them for my love, not for their rhyme, Exceeded by the height of happier men. O! then vouchsafe me but this loving thought: 'Had my friend's Muse grown with this growing age, A dearer birth than this his love had brought, To march in ranks of better equipage: But since he died and poets better prove, Theirs for their style I'll read, his for his love'.
Yonnas Getahun recites Sonnet 31 by Williams Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Thy bosom is endeared with all hearts, Which I by lacking have supposed dead; And there reigns Love, and all Love's loving parts, And all those friends which I thought buried. How many a holy and obsequious tear Hath dear religious love stol'n from mine eye, As interest of the dead, which now appear But things removed that hidden in thee lie! Thou art the grave where buried love doth live, Hung with the trophies of my lovers gone, Who all their parts of me to thee did give, That due of many now is thine alone: Their images I loved, I view in thee, And thou (all they) hast all the all of me.
I Think On Thee, Dear Friend sonnet Number 30 by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
When to the sessions of sweet silent thought I summon up remembrance of things past, I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought, And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste: Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow, For precious friends hid in death's dateless night, And weep afresh love's long since cancelled woe, And moan the expense of many a vanished sight: Then can I grieve at grievances foregone, And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan, Which I new pay as if not paid before. But if the while I think on thee, dear friend, All losses are restor'd and sorrows end.
I Scorn To Change My State With Kings, sonnet number 29, by William Shakespeare recited by Yonnas.
When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes I all alone beweep my outcast state, And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries, And look upon myself, and curse my fate, Wishing me like to one more rich in hope, Featured like him, like him with friends possessed, Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope, With what I most enjoy contented least; Yet in these thoughts my self almost despising, Haply I think on thee, and then my state, Like to the lark at break of day arising From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate; For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings That then I scorn to change my state with kings.
From the porch of Richard Hugo House Yonnas recites Sonnet Number 28 by Williams Shakespeare "Daily Draw My Sorrows Longer." Enjoy!
How can I then return in happy plight, That am debarred the benefit of rest? When day's oppression is not eas'd by night, But day by night and night by day oppressed, And each, though enemies to either's reign, Do in consent shake hands to torture me, The one by toil, the other to complain How far I toil, still farther off from thee. I tell the day, to please him thou art bright, And dost him grace when clouds do blot the heaven: So flatter I the swart-complexion'd night, When sparkling stars twire not thou gild'st the even. But day doth daily draw my sorrows longer, And night doth nightly make grief's length seem stronger.
Yonnas recites Sonnet 27 by Shakespeare For Myself, No Quiet Find. Enjoy!
Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed, The dear repose for limbs with travel tired; But then begins a journey in my head To work my mind, when body's work's expired: For then my thoughts--from far where I abide-- Intend a zealous pilgrimage to thee, And keep my drooping eyelids open wide, Looking on darkness which the blind do see: Save that my soul's imaginary sight Presents thy shadow to my sightless view, Which, like a jewel hung in ghastly night, Makes black night beauteous, and her old face new. Lo! thus, by day my limbs, by night my mind, For thee, and for myself, no quiet find.
Yonnas recites Sonnet 26 by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
Lord of my love, to whom in vassalage Thy merit hath my duty strongly knit, To thee I send this written embassage, To witness duty, not to show my wit: Duty so great, which wit so poor as mine May make seem bare, in wanting words to show it, But that I hope some good conceit of thine In thy soul's thought, all naked, will bestow it: Till whatsoever star that guides my moving, Points on me graciously with fair aspect, And puts apparel on my tottered loving, To show me worthy of thy sweet respect: Then may I dare to boast how I do love thee; Till then, not show my head where thou mayst prove me.
For Beyond the Porch 28 Omar gives us a historical context of Seattle weather. Enjoy! To enjoy the other twenty-seven historical podcasts by Omar Willey click here:- https://soundcloud.com/porchlit/sets/beyond-the-porch-series-by
Yonnas recites Sonnet Twenty-Five, That Love and Am Beloved, by William Shakespeare.
Let those who are in favour with their stars Of public honour and proud titles boast, Whilst I, whom fortune of such triumph bars Unlook'd for joy in that I honour most. Great princes' favourites their fair leaves spread But as the marigold at the sun's eye, And in themselves their pride lies buried, For at a frown they in their glory die. The painful warrior famoused for fight, After a thousand victories once foiled, Is from the book of honour razed quite, And all the rest forgot for which he toiled: Then happy I, that love and am beloved, Where I may not remove nor be removed.
Yonnas recites Shakespeare's Sonnet number 24. Mine eye hath played the painter and hath steeled, Thy beauty's form in table of my heart; My body is the frame wherein 'tis held, And perspective that is best painter's art. For through the painter must you see his skill, To find where your true image pictured lies, Which in my bosom's shop is hanging still, That hath his windows glazed with thine eyes. Now see what good turns eyes for eyes have done: Mine eyes have drawn thy shape, and thine for me Are windows to my breast, where-through the sun Delights to peep, to gaze therein on thee; Yet eyes this cunning want to grace their art, They draw but what they see, know not the heart.
Yonnas, from the balcony of Seattle's City Hall, recites Sonnet 23 Unperfect Actor on the Stage by William Shakespeare. Enjoy!
"I will not praise that purpose not to sell," writes Shakespeare to end Sonnet 21. Please enjoy.
In sonnet 20, the poet laments that his "master/mistress" has been "pricked" by nature and is unattainable. Still, he seeks to claims his love, though women may have use of his "addition."
Yonnas recites Shakespeare Sonnet Devouring Time.
Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion's paws, And make the earth devour her own sweet brood; Pluck the keen teeth from the fierce tiger's jaws, And burn the long-lived phoenix in her blood; Make glad and sorry seasons as thou fleet'st, And do whate'er thou wilt, swift-footed Time, To the wide world and all her fading sweets; But I forbid thee one most heinous crime: O! carve not with thy hours my love's fair brow, Nor draw no lines there with thine antique pen; Him in thy course untainted do allow For beauty's pattern to succeeding men. Yet, do thy worst old Time: despite thy wrong, My love shall in my verse ever live young.
For podcast 27 Omar Willey takes us to World War II. "t's 1944. Seattle is known as the most racially tolerant city on the left coast. Along with that tolerance has come a kind of complacency. " And Omar warns us the rush of packaging Seattle for new residents and tourists conveniently buries such stories as the Fort Lawton Riot. Let's remember. Click here to enjoy all the Seattle History podcasts by Omar Willey here https://soundcloud.com/porchlit/sets/beyond-the-porch-series-by.
Late this evening I walked from Capitol Hill to read from the magnificent porch at Langston Hughes Performing Arts Center.
Yonnas Getahun recites from the balcony of Seattle City Hall Shakespeare Sonnet number 4. Enjoy!
Omar Willey, Publisher at Seattle Star, leads us through another Beyond the Porch segment. This time reflecting on Seattle's struggle to embrace its full potential contrasting between its prominent engineers and dominating middle class.
"Seattle has been blessed with thoughtful, insightful engineers who have carefully considered the greatness of their city when embarking on projects. Engineers like R.H. Thomson, George Cotterill, and Virgil Bogue have, throughout time, considered Seattle as a future metropolis, a New York of the West Coast, or, in Charles Terry's words, at least a New York Alki."
Please enjoy and share!
Feiya Waya stopped by downtown at City Hall to recite Shakespeare's sonnet number 3. Please enjoy and consider signing up to recite one of the remaining 151 sonnets from one of four locations here http://porchlit.org/volunteer.
Lola Peters stopped by the porch on 12th Avenue S and King St and recited the second of one-hundred-fifty-four sonnets by Shakespeare. Enjoy and please consider signing up to recite over the remaining 152 days. http://porchlit.org/volunteer
Madeline Crowley recites a selection from James Agee written 1915 set on a porch. Enjoy!
By lamplight, the lamp he requested the city to fix, and moonlight, which has always been fixed in its own way, Yonnas reads this song with ice and fog. Enjoy!
He made this book because he needed a place to place his poems. I have it now because he needed a hand to hand them to.
Omar Willey, Publisher at Seattle Star, is back with another episode of Seattle History for Porchlit. "In a country where people generally believe that politicians are fickle and will say anything to get elected, there are still some flip-flops that are so swift and masterful they command a kind of bizarre respect." Please enjoy and share!
Tonight I read for Porchlit from my porch. I love my porch, and this is the first and only home that I've had in Seattle. I'm moving to a new home soon, so I wanted to pay this porch some respect. Today is an important day for me, as it marks a weird 13th anniversary for my family. Yesterday, I was thinking about what I was reading 13 years ago, and also how confused I felt just all of the time. I finally remembered that it was the year that I first read Sylvia Plath's "The Bell Jar". I began re-reading it last night and this passage stood out to me.
I first encountered this poem through a choral setting by Jean Belmont. Here is a lovely performance by the Hofstra Chamber Choir. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKdyroUGg1A
I found this quote facing the contents of "How the Irish Saved Civilization" by Thomas Cahill. It comes from Niebuhr's "The Irony of American History".
The Doorbell, a short story Vladimir Nabokov, Read By Yonnas from 12th Avenue S and King St. Please enjoy and share!
Simon uses the chord progression from a Bach chorale, "O Haupt Voll Blut und Wunden," to sustain this introspective poem. Once, I heard this chorale performed straight, followed by "American Tune" with guitar. I wept, shuddering. I owe my relationship with music and dance to Paul Simon.
So much wisdom.
Kipling lived in a political climate as charged or more than ours. He later supported British Imperialism and championed involvement in the Great War, to which he tragically lost his only son.
From "Confessions of a Hooligan” Petra Zanki recites "What am I, Who am I" in Croatian. Please enjoy and share.
After viewing Nicholas Sironka's batik show at Tobya Art Gallery, I found this text on a site devoted to Maasai living in London.
Sironka told me the plaid patterns the Maasai wear owe their origin to Scottish missionaries.
Do please forgive my overacting. To speak this not braying is incredibly difficult. Lear pauses to reflect on his (lack of) authority over torrential, libidinous nature.
Yonnas reads from the intro of Elie Faure's Modern Art book which is one of five in series about the History of Art. Enjoy!
Mimi Allin stopped by Porchlit today to recite Things I Didn't Know I Loved by Nazim Hikmet. Please enjoy and share!
Kalan reads a second Serbian author today - this translation thanks to Christina Pribicevic-Zoric.
Wilson stood on the porch today to recite from this Serbian poet - translation by Steven Teref and Maja Teref.
I found this translation on a website which introduces readers to modern Chinese poetry: http://modernchinesepoetry.com/
"Modern Chinese poetry was born from the broader intellectual movement that took place in China around 1917-1921, known as the May-Fourth Movement; for the first time in history, vernacular Chinese was accepted as a legitimate poetic voice. "
This poem, written at Scarborough in December, 1826, has long been sung as a Christian hymn under the title, "A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief." Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints remember it as the last hymn sung - by John Taylor - before the martyrdom of Joseph and Hyrum Smith at Carthage Jail, June 27, 1844. https://www.lds.org/ensign/2013/06/two-witnesses-three-days-and-the-aftermath-of-the-martyrdom?lang=eng
Omar Willey, Publisher @SeattleStar, marks the half point of Porchlit's 12-month site specific art history project with an exploration of a Seattle arts movement troop called Invisible Seattle. "So opens the Prologue of one of the more remarkable novels of the 1980s. What's remarkable about it, you say? What's remarkable is that the novel was written not by one author but by an entire city: the city of Seattle.
The book was called Invisible Seattle and its story is one of the more fascinating not just in local writing but in all of American literature."
Please enjoy and share.
The complete text of the essay can be found here: http://kurungabaa.net/2011/01/18/being-prey-by-val-plumwood/
From the beginning of Porchlit, we have wondered whether we could reach through the home at 12th Ave. S. and S. King St. to other stages around the Puget Sound, and across the world. I feel a deeper commonality between place and literature than even this one location can show. Take this as a test, exploring the nature of our medium. We are learning to use a new definition of public reading, a more generous boundary between private and public space.
Jessica Charlton reads Milan Kundera's The Book of Laughter and Forgetting. Please enjoy and share.
When finished reading, I stepped away from the porch to photograph it. A passing man suddenly motioned me to the side of the house where he (without the use of English) suggested I photograph one section of the side roof. He then walked away, across the street, with an empty shopping cart. Life, what is it but a dream?
When Steve Peters stopped by Porchlit back in July he did a short improvisation about the home and the surrounding of 12th Avenue S & King St. Enjoy!
The lone standing Romanesque arch in front of Henry M. Jackson Federal building, the architect who designed it and the question "Who was Elmer H. Fisher?" is where Omar Willey guides us in this weeks edition of Beyond the Porch. Please enjoy, reflect and share.
Campbell starts off our morning with a reading of Ivan Doig's This House of Sky. Enjoy!
Here Omar Willey reflects on a specific type of individual, Terry Pettus, in Seattle History's past who fought for unions, was accused of overthrowing the government along with the Seattle Seven, & Paul Robeson, and whose retirement, writing detective novels, was interrupted by a city council imperative to 'clean up Lake Union.' Also we invite you to visit Terry Pettus Park.
Jessica Charlton stopped by Ocotober 12th and read two chapters from Sharon Creech's Walk Two Moons; "The Chickabiddy Starts a Story," and "The Badlands." Please enjoy and share!
Yonnas recites Praxilla On Becoming a God from 5th Century BC. Discovered from an artist studio visit of Barbara Earl Thomas in which the artist expressed the importance of poetry, and music to get into her creative space.
Yonnas recites Denise Levertov's Complaint and Rejoinder. Enjoy! Thank you Barbara Earl Thomas for having this poem in your studio.
Yonnas recites a reimagined and reworked excerpt from Fifty Shades of Gray by artist Jennifer Zwick. Enjoy!
Jessica Charlton, @JessicaCharlton, reads Matthew Klingle's Emerald City: An Environmental History of Seattle. In her own words, "I read from Matthew Klingle's Emerald City: An Environmental History of Seattle. If I could have, then I would have read the whole book. It was very interesting! I found it at the library today, but it's not allowed to leave the premises, so I had to photocopy different pages." Enjoy!
Before sunrise on September 30th Omar Willey reads Denise Levertov's "THE DAY THE AUDIENCE WALKED OUT ON ME, AND WHY." Please enjoy and share!
Omar Willey Christin Call's, "an attempt to not move mountains for a Bavarian village, 1962" Enjoy!
Omar Willey, Publisher @SeattleStar, begins with the presumption of Seattle's liberalism and then takes us to Seattle 1853 and start of the Suffrage movement here. "Politically, Seattle is known as "liberal." That word is, in many ways, loaded. It's also inadequate to the task of description. Seattle's political landscape is, somewhat more accurately, a mixture of populists and progressives against a background of pure inertia. And the inertia sometimes mobilizes on one side or the other before receding once more into the background."
Also remember Sharing is Caring. Please forward!
Seattle Author Jane Wong will be reading as part of the LitCrawl Seattle 2015 series on October 22nd. Here is Brian McGuigan, Director of Lit Crawl, reciting her poem The Act of Killing. Go to http://litcrawl.org/seattle/ to learn all that it entails & remember "Sharing is Caring."
Omar stopped by to recite "The Opal Sea", by Ella Higginson, once poet laureate of Washington State. Please enjoy and share!
Omar recites, "the first female publisher in the United States," Alice Harriman. Please enjoy and share!
"My name is Cielito. I am standing on the corner of South King Street and 12th Avenue South just a few blocks up from where my father likely stayed when he first arrived in this country as a Filipino immigrant. That was 87 years ago and I will read the work of Carlos Buloson also a Filipino Immigrant who stayed for a time here in Seattle. Likely walked the same streets at the same time as my father." Thank you Cielito Pascual @cielitoPascual.
Artist and Performer Pol Rosenthal, @polrosenthal, stopped by Porchlit today to recite Joshua Saul Beckman's Gods Wicker Basket Furnace. Please enjoy and share!
Also visit http://porchlit.org/about to learn more and take part in Porchlit.
Chelsea Werner-Jatzke stopped by Porchlit today to recite The Wedding by Stacey Levine. Chelsea is one of the authors who is part of Lit Crawl Seattle taking place on October 22nd in Seattle, WA. What is Lit Crawl? Basically a paradise for literature lovers but here is how it is described on itcrawl.org/seattle/about
"For one beautiful and awesomely weird night, over 80 Pacific Northwest readers and artists will fill Capitol and First Hill bars with stories about oyster foraging and the Jesus movement, photography of Seattle outcasts and innocents, and odes to football and salt."
Yonnas, @yonnastgetahun, recites Matt Ganos', @mattygspeaks, To The Moon from Suits for the Swarm. Please enjoy and share! Learn more at www.porchlit.org.
Yonnas,@yonnastgetahun, stopped by to recite a poem by Roberto Ascalon, @RobertoAscalon, titled Said the Aswang To The Babalyan. Learn more at www.porchlit.org!
Lola E Peters,@LEPetersSeattle , recites The Blues by Denise Gantt, @KumaniGantt. Enjoy and share!
Lola E Peters,@LEPetersSeattle, joins us again to share Alvin L.A. Horn's,@alvinlahorn, Trees are Falling. Enjoy!
Sophia Wheelwright, @SophiaVW, recites a selection from Still LIfe by Woodpecker by Tom Robbins. Please enjoy and share!
Sophia Wheelwright, @SophiaVW, recites This Sentence, a selection, from Even Cowgirls Get the Blues by Tom Robbins. Please enjoy and share!
Sophia Wheelwright @SophiaVW stopped by @porchlit today and read The Hug by Tess Gallagher. Fantastic! Please enjoy and share the joy of literature.
Lola Peters @LEPetersSeattle stopped by @porchlit today to recite three works. Last one by @yonnastgetahun. Enjoy and Share!
Lola Peters @LEPetersSeattle stopped by @porchlit today to recite three works. First two by Raúl Sánchez. Enjoy and share!
Lola Peters @LEPetersSeattle stopped by @porchlit today to recite three works. First two by Raúl Sánchez.
Erin Lynch @lyncherinmarie stopped by @Porchlit today to recite "Coming Home" by Tess Gallagher. Please enjoy and share!
"1919- Montreal Canadiens vs Seattle Metropolitans Series Not Completed. And, as they say, thereby hangs a tale." Excellent podcast by Omar Willey @wiloma publisher @TheSeattleStar on "the worst epidemic to hit the human race."
@misswashuta stopped by @porchlit and recited Laura Da' Raven Talks Curriculum. Enjoy and share!
Kevin O'Conner did multiple readings today @Porchlit. Here is his second reading of Lola E Peter's poetry. Enjoy!
Kevin O'Conner did multiple readings today @Porchlit. Here is his reading of Lola E Peter's Poetry 101. Enjoy!
Kevin O'Conner did multiple readings today @Porchlit. Here is his reading of Kelli Russell Agodon's Self-Portrait with Reader. Enjoy!
For his nineteenth podcast of our city Seattle's history, Omar Willey dives in and traces Seattle Library from its inception to its most recent success led by Deborah Jacobs.
"Seattle had tried to start a library, but attempts were met with general indifference. In 1888, however, the Ladies' Library Association received a land grant for a library site. They raised about half the funds necessary to build, and requested that the city council of Seattle chip in the rest to serve Seattle's exploding population."
Enjoy and share.
Here is a second reading today by Melanie Masson. This one is "Contingency Museum" by Megan Snyder-Camp. Enjoy and share.
Melanie stopped by Porchlit today to recite Degrees Of Gray In Philipsburg By Richard Hugo. Enjoy and share.
Lola graced Porchlit Seattle Author's and Writer month with a reading of Omar Willey's Why I Write. Enjoy and share.
Jessica Charlton stopped by Porchlit today to recite Theodore Roethke's "A Field Of Light." Enjoy!
Yonnas recites from recently published book by Seattle Author Lola E. Peters from The Book Of David. Enjoy!
introducing La Mélancolie des dragons by Phillipe Quesne, September 13, 5:00 p.m. at On the Boards.
Omar Willey recites All Things Return to the Shar's Parking Lot by Graham Isaac. Enjoy!
Published in The Stranger March 27, 2013. Read by Campbell Thibo, lucky to hear a runner passing by.
"The Porchlit house is in an area these days known as Little Saigon. It hasn't always been called that, of course. It's been Nihonmachi, Chinatown, Garlic Gulch, and Manilatown in the past, but since the end of the Vietnam War in 1975, it has slowly acquired a distinctly Vietnamese flavor.
The transformation of Seattle's Little Saigon actually begins in China." Need I sary more. Listen in, reflect, and share.
Here is the third reading of Seattle Authors & Writers on one day by Lola Peters. Enjoy!
Lola stopped by to do three readings in one day. Here is the second one. Enjoy as she recites Kevin J O'Conner!
Lola Peters stopped by to do multiple readings today. Enjoy 1st of 3 by her on 9/8/2015. Enjoy!
Left Bank Books opened its doors in 1973. In 1975 it published this, its first pamphlet, written by one of its founders, Lynne Thorndycraft.
Here is a work of literature reflecting on Seattle by T.O. Stine and recited by Omar Willey. What would it be like to hear this from the top of Smith Tower? Enjoy!
Nicole Kistler, Co-Artistic Director of Duwamish Revealed, stopped by Porchlit to read Kelly Martineau. Enjoy!
What a poem written by Esther Altshul Helfgott. What a selection and reading by Mr. Omar Willey. Enjoy!
Omar stopped by Porchlit today to read Tom Mohrman for Seattle Authors series. Enjoy!!!
Author, Poet, and Performer Matt Gano starts Seattle Authors Series for Porchlit by a masterful reading of Pacific Northwest writer Richard Brautigan. Enjoy!
Walk with Omar Willey, Publisher at Seattle Star, down 2nd avenue to glean an image of Seattle intertwined with booze, gold mining, police corruption and learn of a Seattle resident who shot down a disgraced Sheriff. Enjoy and share.
Wallace Stegner spent some (probably unhappy) time in an orphanage on Beacon Hill while very young. Read by Campbell Thibo.
Arts leader, curator and just all around awesome Seattleite Priya Frank stopped by today for an inspiring poem by Charlie Chaplin. Enjoy!!!
Annea did a surprise reading this morning from Porchlit which is always welcomed. Enjoy!
Yonnas stopped by today to read from You Shall Know Our Velocity by Dave Eggers about the protagonist's guilt at their spirited travel around the globe.
What happens when art is deliberated by committee? Omar Willey, Publisher of Seattle Star, critically reflects on Public Arts Program in Seattle's history. "Meritocracy cedes to bureaucracy as the list fills with people whose work is guaranteed not to draw controversy. There success as public artists in Seattle is generally proportional to how little attention their work calls to itself." Please enjoy and share.
Arts advocate and entrepreneur Ilaria Ghattas stopped by Porchlit today and shared There is Still Some Time. Moving.
Jennifer stopped by Porchlit today and recited from a 1905 edition The Works of Edgar Allan Poe an excerpt from Tamerlane. Enjoy!
Valerie Curtis-Newton recites through the sound waves of Seattle traffic Alice Childress's Like One of the Family. Just excellent!
For this week's podcast Omar Willey takes us to Seattle in the 1960's and the political infrastructure of strong city council and weak mayor.
Might be the first Porchlit reading with rain in the background and Jessie reciting Anaïs Nin through the howling city. How delightful!
Leader and entrepreneur David Pierre-Louis stopped by today and read from one of the best lyricists Mos Def. Enjoy!
"When push comes to shove however Seattle's desire for money always runs hotter than it is Puritanism at least until the money is secure and then Puritanism rears it head." Pause to enjoy, reflect and please share.
Writer Chelsea Werner-Jatzke stopped by Porchlit today to read Living by Grace Paley. Enjoy!
What is "the event that separates Seattle from the frontier town to Seattle the city?" Enjoy!
Second reading by Maja Purcell on August 3rd and this one is of Edgar Allen Poe's Alone. How appropriate since most often contributors make the creative trek by themselves to recite.
Anneya Umyam accompanied by her nieces on drums sings Hang Loose by Alabama Shakes. Enjoy!
Lola Peters stopped by Porchlit today and recited a monologue from the play Cymbeline. Even the birds pause to reflect on it.
Here is an excerpt in which Mary the heroine faces Doro, a four thousand year old Psychic Parasite.
Omar Willey reflects on the value of AM/FM Radio in African American communities while tracing gentrification in Central District, Seattle starting in the 1980's. And a little about Jimi Hendrix. Enjoy!
Campbell reads from Steve Solomon's Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades by Porchlit
Yonnas reads from The Collected Stories of Lydia David a selection titled Mildred and the Oboe.
Matty stopped by Porchlit today and read 'one of the major German-language poets of the post-World War II era' Paul Celan. Given the second half of the year long porchlit project will focus on Shakespeare's sonnets we are moved to share little bit of Celan's profound life story. "In October,(1941) the Romanians deported a large number of Jews after forcing them into a ghetto, where Celan translated William Shakespeare's Sonnets and continued to write his own poetry." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Celan
What does Slavery have to do with landscape design in Seattle at the start of the twentieth century? Learn about the progressive ideals that shaped Seattle and more.
Darcy stopped by Porchilt with her friends and read The Invitation. "It doesn't interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love for your dream for the adventure of being alive."
In this chapter she describes the early believers' flight from Mecca to Medina. She quotes Edward Said: "Exile is the unhealabe rift ... between the self and its true home."
Author, Poet and community leader stopped by Porchlit today to recite a poignant intro from American poet and philosopher Amiri Baraka's book Blues People when he was still named LeRoi Jones. How relevant!
"Elevators are for kissing unless Cairo is in the background," by Maged Zaher from The Revolution Happened and You Didn't Call Me. Available for purchase at Elliott Bay Books.
Composer and artist Steve Peters stopped by Porchlit today and recited Pablo Neruda. Enjoy!
The founding fathers of Seattle, developers, who stayed and how Capitol Hill was named by the one that left; James A Moore. Take these minutes by Omar to deepen your roots in Seattle.
We received our first request for Porchlit. All we needed to satisfy is that it be a female author. Yonnas reads Sappho.
Breanne stopped by Porchlit to recite Don't You Wonder Sometimes by Tracy K. Smith. Enjoy!
Omar takes us to Central District and how it was formed. What are the boundaries of Central District for you? Who was the biggest culprit of racist land covenant was? What year were these land covenants officially repealed in Seattle neighborhoods? This and more with Omar Willey. Enjoy and Reflect!!!
Joseph Lavy, Co-artistic Director of Akropolis Performance Lab, takes us directly to the Declaration of Independence take up on July 4th, 1776. How do these words echo 239 years later?
Yonnas reads from Irving Stone's Dear Theo which tells the autobiographical story of Vincent van Gogh through his letters to his brother Theo van Gogh. In this excerpt Vincent confesses of his love.
Written during the Nazi occupation of France in 1942. Read by Campbell Thibo.
Next month (Aug 2015) in Seattle The Esoterics will perform this poem (en français) set for unaccompanied chorus by Francis Poulenc. www.theesoterics.org
Comedian, writer and activist Brett Hamil stopped by Porchlit today and recited a selection from Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu. Enjoy! Also check out his videos at this link https://plus.google.com/+BrettHamil/videos
"Let's take you back this week to the Gay 90's. March 9, 1893." After a week of celebration & pride Omar Willey takes us to early Washington State & Seattle history and the introduction of moral laws to prohibit sexual activities beyond procreation.
Elisheba Johnson chose I, Too by Langston Hughes and how timely and appropriate this poem still sings in American consciousness in 2016.
poems by Eichendorff and Emerson, read by Campbell Thibo.
An unexpected visitor stopped by mid- recitation. We talked long, off-tape.
Kristina contributes to Porchlit today by doing a reading of Reinaldo Goetz Kluge. Enjoy!
Producer and Program Director at Northwest Film Forum Courtney Sheehan stopped by Porchlit today and recited A Man said to the Universe by Stephen Crane.
by Annie Dillard.
(I mistakenly invented a pseudo-yiddish word, "schlematic," rather than reading "schematic.")
How did Ballard become to be and more? Omar takes us through the early formation of Ballard and the long history of Scandinavian Americans in our burgeoning city Seattle. Enjoy!
From the San Quentin College Program of personal essays titled Is it Safe Yonnas reads You Can't Hide Love. A story of loss and faith.
Paul Komada recites a passage from Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities. How appropriate! Paul is an excellent artist who captures that we overlook in the city. www.paulkomada.com
"The telephone rang in long magnificent peels and she sprinted to stop the sound knowing who the caller would be." With this Madeline recites an excerpt from Frances Johnson written by Stacey Levine.
In Garlic Gulch, Beyond the Porch Podcast 6, Omar Willey leads us to examine the struggles and contributions of Italian Americans to Seattle. He addresses what was 'whitenenss' in the early twentieth century as well how Pike Place Market came to be.
Zhenya Lavy, co-artistic director of Akropolis Performance Lab, stopped by Porchlit today and recited from Art Objects: Essays on Ecstasy and Effrontery written by Jeanette Winterson. "I have to work for art if I want art to work on me." Timely and insightful.
James Pangilinan stopped by again to Porchlit today and recited an excerpt from El Filibusterismo. Enjoy and research Jose Rizal and the history of the Philippines.
Never underestimate the power of literature or art to inspire change. Here is a reading by James Pangilinan of the preface and introduction of the "novel that sparked the Philippines republic." In his own words he adds:-
June 12, 2015- or June 11 in local calendrical time- marked the 117th anniversary of the Philippines' independence. Yet this freedom was delayed, attenuated and malformed not least due to the US admiral Dewey's occupation of Manila by May 1898, in addition to the elite dominance in performing the "people"- the popular basis for what was the first republic in Asia born of anti-colonial struggle. Rizal's novel embodies, through a creative satire, both the freedoms and limits of the Filipino national autonomy. It gave the spark for things to come or yet to be.
Kristina contributes to Porchlit on June 10, 2015 by reciting Father Son and Holy Ghost by Audre Lorde. Doorknobs and all.
two detained Japanese poets speak, Kenichi Takemoto and Michiko Mizumoto. read by Campbell Thibo
Omar Willey asks us to correct the history of art in Seattle by recognizing the contribution of Japanese American artists that came before the publication of LIfe Magazine's article on Northwest Art published November 28, 1957.
the first of a four-poem set, 'In Abbot Zan's Room at Duyan Temple,' is by Du Fu, poet during the High Tang period.
I shake with excitement every time I read the opening to this novel, published in 1925.
This is the vocal line from a song for piano and voice, from the "Songs of Travel" cycle by Ralph Vaughan Williams.
" I will make you brooches and toys for your delight Of birdsong at morning and star-shine at night. "
Nikki Schultz, a recent transplant to Seattle's art community, recites Rebecca and Her Lover Ate Oysters by Karen Finneyfrock.
For Beyond the Porch segment of Porchlit Omar Willey guides us through the formation of Chinatown or International District in Seattle. Timely and astute!
Author, writer, and translator David Michael Ramirez recites his translation of Yoshonori Henguchi. Enjoy!!!
What happened when writer, critic, and horticulturist Jim Demetre recited Don Quixote on the porch located on 12th Avenue S & King St on May 30th? He had "a run in with the king's men."
from within an enclosed porch, lock reads words
"to wake the dark we are, To find us and bind us beyond us To an age of wakefulness"
osip mandelstam died in transport to a Stalin-era gulag in 1938. His wife nadezhda wrote two memoirs of their lives together and of the Stalinist regime: Hope Against Hope (1970) and Hope Abandonded (1974).
Mallory Bea Leisten stopped by this afternoon at Porchlit and illustrates, through an excerpt by Toni Morrison, how a river from MIssissippi and the Northwest arrive at the same point, past development, past gentrification and reeling to our imagination.
Begin you day with Erin Jorgensen's recitation of A Little Ramble by Robert Walser. Hear the juxtaposition of the story and the setting from which Erin recites it. The story was published in 1914. The porch was built 1900.
Star Angelina Murray stopped by Porchlit today, May 27th 2015, and read an excerpt from Crazy Brave a memoir by Joy Harjo. "This is my heart. It is a good heart. Weaves a membrane of mist and fire." Enjoy and share!!!!!
Author, artist and community leader Lola Peters contributes to Porchlit on 5/26/2015. She kindly shares Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston and allows us to lay in to literature yet again.
Fire & Water by Omar Willey explores how part of Beacon Hill and the area around the house that has inspired this whole experiment, 500 12th Avenue S, was shaped in late 19th Century.
Artist & Performer Campbell Thibo surprises us with a recitation of the Quran on the evening of May 24th 2015.
"Little after 3pm, standing on the porch," Ariel shares the delight of Jeffrey McDaniel's poem The Quiet World.
May 22nd Omar Willey recites Lillian E Russell's The Potato from Porchlit on 12th Avenue S & King St. Enjoy!
Campbell Thibo remembers a loose translation of "In The Summer" by Syrian poet Nizar Qabbani. This was first interpretation I heard of this poem, set for choir by Eric Banks and performed by The Esoterics.
Another:
In the summer I stretch out on the shore And think of you Had I told the sea What I felt for you, It would have left its shores, Its shells, Its fish, And followed me.
Writer and artist Lindsey Gjording recites from 12th Avenue S and King St Claw Cloud by Sam Shephard. Enjoy!
Artist and choreographer Vanessa DeWolf reads from Watkins Household Hints by Elaine Allen. Enjoy!!!
May 18th Kate Pope contributes an excerpt from Samuel Beckett to Porchlit on 12th Avenue S and King St.
I read two poems from an anthology of Venezuelan poetry. The first is "sunday, 8 am" by Maria Antonieta Flores and the second is "When The Government Falls" by Martha Kornblith.
Omar Willey, publisher at Seattle Star, a writer and historian leads us to reflect on how a key bridge in our city got its beloved name; Jose Rizal Bridge.
Morning of May 16th Yonnas Getahun recites a recently gifted poem Directive by Robert Frost.
May 15th Lauren recites Edna St Vincent Millay for Porchlit. What a selection. What a choice.
Campbell, a co-founder, of Porchlit stops by Porchlit to sing a capella Chimes of Freedom Flashing by Bob Dylan. Enjoy!
May 13th Janet Galore stops by Porchlit on 12th Avenue S & King St and shares The Machine Stops.
May 12th Tina stops by Porchlit on 12th Avenue S and King and recites Unknown Solider. 346 days to go.
"From Porchlit on 12th Avenue & King" Mary Margaret recites for us The Fish written by the American Poet Laureate Elizabeth Bishop. Enjoy!
May 11th Mary Margaret climbed on to the porch on 12th Avenue and King to share poems by Elizabeth Bishop.
Petra share Baudelaire in French and for those of us who don't speak it invites us to appreciate the way the poem is recited, and accentuated.
On May 9th, with a friend in company, Laura recites selections of The Descent of Alette by Alice Notely on the 'Porch.' Enjoy!
Choreographer and dancer Markeith Wiley stops by Porchlit today and shares a piercing excerpt from How to be Black by Baratunde Thurston. Enjoy!
Fabian a visiting writer from Vienna goes to the porch on 12th Avenue S and King St and recites Ingeborg Bachmann. He shares with us after translating to English Austria's Ingeborg Bachmann. How literature transcends and unites us all.
Katja stops by in front of 12th Avenue S and King St in Seattle and recites a collage of Anaïs Nin from here journals. Have you stopped to reflect today about Anaïs Nin and her journals? Also if you are in Seattle and want to contribute a passage of literature to the community at large signup here. http://bit.ly/1dsRZ1N
Yonnas Getahun reaches Porchlit on 12th Avenue & King S Seattle to recite from an excerpt of Remembrance of Things Past by March Proust translated by C.K. Scott Moncrieff
Masterfully writer, actor, and curator Philip Wohlstetter from memory recites To His Coy Mistress by Andrew Marvell. Enjoy Seattle!
Beyond the Porch 1. Omar Wiley, using the central point of 12th Avenue S and King S, we are transported to how this city we call Seattle would have been like four hundred years ago.
On the afternoon of May 5th 2015 Vanessa recites Gertrude Stein. 'The pleasure of literature'
"To the delight of my morning I opened Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman to find this poem Native Moments." Recited on May 4th, 2015.
Artist Campbell Thibo reads a selection from Jewish & Christian Scripture. "I love the image of the lion and calf lying down together and of knowledge covering the earth as water covers the sea." 5/3/2015.
Bill Kennedy recites the Galloping Cat by Stevie Smith on May 2nd. Attached image is of his study on the property located at 500 12th Avenue S in Seattle. Enjoy!
Hamlet laments his mother remarrying - her husband's brother - so soon after his death.
Mikol is the first artist to record video and the first one to recite the most challenging of literature that of James Joyce Finnegans Wake. #porchlit