the free soul

“The free soul is rare,
but you know it when you see it
– basically because you feel good,
very good,
when you are near or with them.”

– Charles Bukowski

τροφή για σκέψη

the perfect date.

Remember

by Christina Rossetti

Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you plann’d:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.

μητέρα και γιός

DUCHESS OF YORK
O, let me speak!

KING RICHARD III
Do then: but I’ll not hear.

DUCHESS OF YORK
I will be mild and gentle in my speech.

KING RICHARD III
And brief, good mother; for I am in haste.

DUCHESS OF YORK
Art thou so hasty? I have stay’d for thee,
God knows, in anguish, pain and agony.

KING RICHARD III
And came I not at last to comfort you?

DUCHESS OF YORK
No, by the holy rood, thou know’st it well,
Thou camest on earth to make the earth my hell.
A grievous burthen was thy birth to me;
Tetchy and wayward was thy infancy;
Thy school-days frightful, desperate, wild, and furious,
Thy prime of manhood daring, bold, and venturous,
Thy age confirm’d, proud, subdued, bloody,
treacherous,
More mild, but yet more harmful, kind in hatred:
What comfortable hour canst thou name,
That ever graced me in thy company?

KING RICHARD III
Faith, none, but Humphrey Hour, that call’d
your grace
To breakfast once forth of my company.
If I be so disgracious in your sight,
Let me march on, and not offend your grace.
Strike the drum.

DUCHESS OF YORK
I prithee, hear me speak.

KING RICHARD III
You speak too bitterly.

DUCHESS OF YORK
Hear me a word;
For I shall never speak to thee again.

KING RICHARD III
So.

DUCHESS OF YORK
Either thou wilt die, by God’s just ordinance,
Ere from this war thou turn a conqueror,
Or I with grief and extreme age shall perish
And never look upon thy face again.
Therefore take with thee my most heavy curse;
Which, in the day of battle, tire thee more
Than all the complete armour that thou wear’st!
My prayers on the adverse party fight;
And there the little souls of Edward’s children
Whisper the spirits of thine enemies
And promise them success and victory.
Bloody thou art, bloody will be thy end;
Shame serves thy life and doth thy death attend.

Exit

William Shakespeare

check.

“I have already lost touch with a couple of people I used to be.”

– Joan Didion

Ρούντολφ το ελαφάκι

Ρούντολφ το ελαφάκι
με καρδούλα ταπεινή,
σαν πέφτει το βραδάκι
έχει μύτη φωτεινή.

Οι φίλοι του λαμπιόνι
τον φωνάζουν και γελούν,
τη μύτη του στο χιόνι
κρύβει όταν του μιλούν.

Όμως μια πρωτοχρονιά
είπε ο Αι-Βασίλης:
“Ρούντολφ, είσαι εσύ σοφός
έχεις μέσα σου το φως”.

Τα ελάφια στο κοπάδι
χαμηλώσανε τ’ αυτιά,
τώρα απαλή σαν χάδι
είναι όλων η ματιά.

Από τότε και κάθε καινούρια χρονιά,
του έλκηθρου πρώτος τραβά τα σκοινιά,
Ο Ρούντολφ οδηγεί
τον Αϊ-Βασίλη στη γη!

dinner at home

“Home is not where you are born; home is where all your attempts to escape cease”.

― Naguib Mahfouz

Solitude

by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Laugh, and the world laughs with you;
Weep, and you weep alone;
For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth,
But has trouble enough of its own.
Sing, and the hills will answer;
Sigh, it is lost on the air;
The echoes bound to a joyful sound,
But shrink from voicing care.

Rejoice, and men will seek you;
Grieve, and they turn and go;
They want full measure of all your pleasure,
But they do not need your woe.
Be glad, and your friends are many;
Be sad, and you lose them all,—
There are none to decline your nectared wine,
But alone you must drink life’s gall.

Feast, and your halls are crowded;
Fast, and the world goes by.
Succeed and give, and it helps you live,
But no man can help you die.
There is room in the halls of pleasure
For a large and lordly train,
But one by one we must all file on
Through the narrow aisles of pain.

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