Remembering last spring and looking forward . . . .

                                             Winter comes, can Spring be far behind? (Percy Bysshe Shelley)

                                                            I dreamed that as I wandered by the way
                                                            Bare Winter suddenly was changed to Spring,
                                                            And gentle odours led my steps astray,
                                                            Mixed with a sound of waters murmuring
                                                            Along a shelving bank of turf, which lay
                                                            Under a copse, and hardly dared to fling
                                                            Its green arms round the bosom of the stream,
                                                            But kissed it, and then fled, as Thou mightest in dream.

                                                        (Percy Bysshe Shelley, from "A Dream of the Unknown")

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The Mole had been working very hard all the morning, spring-cleaning his little home, first with brooms, then with dusters; then on ladders and steps and chairs, with a brush and a pail of whitewash; till he had dust in his throat and eyes, and splashes of whitewash all over his black fur, and an aching back and weary arms.

Spring was moving in the air above and in the earth below and around him, penetrating even his dark and lowly little house with its spirit of divine discontent and longing. It was small wonder, then, that he suddenly flung down his brush on the floor, said “Bother!” and “Oh blow!” and also “Hang spring-cleaning!” and bolted out of the house without even waiting to put on his coat.

Something up above was calling him imperiously, and he made for the steep little tunnel which answered in his case to the gravelled carriage-drive owned by animals whose residences are nearer to the sun and air. So he scraped and scratched and scrabbled and scrooged and then he scrooged again and scrabbled and scratched and scraped, working busily with his little paws and muttering to himself, “Up we go! Up we go!” till at last, pop! His snout came out into the sunlight, and he found himself rolling in the warm grass of a great meadow.

“This is fine!” he said to himself. “This is better than whitewashing!” The sunshine struck hot on his fur, soft breezes caressed his heated brow, and after the seclusion of the cellarage he had lived in so long the carol of happy birds fell on his dulled hearing almost like a shout.

Jumping off all his four legs at once, in the joy of living and the delight of spring without its cleaning, he pursued his way across the meadow till he reached the hedge on the further side. 

[from “The Wind in the Willows” by Kenneth Grahame 1859-1932]

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"It was a Lover and his Lass" - Thomas Morley's setting of Shakespeare's words, sung and played here by Flauto Dolce.




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This week the subject of A TOUCH OF CULTURE is the ballet and includes short extracts from four popular ballets.http://atouchofculture.blogspot.com

***A Touch of Culture**A Touch of Culture**A Touch of Culture***