Love Thursday: Love with Frost
Friend and faithful reader Lucy of On My Way 2 Work and Other Stuff sent in a this adorable photo:
with the note:
Here is the frosty heart inside my car window one Saturday morning. My windows frost over inside and outside if I don’t park it in the garage! But this was nice to see and reminded me of you!
So sweet! And, in turn, this photo reminded me of one of my favorite poems by Robert Frost:
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
Somehow this poem always manages to give me a warm fuzzy despite the cold overtones. Frost was truly an amazing wordsmith.
What are your favorite poems?
Happy Love Thursday everyone!
21 Beans of Wisdom to “Love Thursday: Love with Frost”
Michelle Kaminsky is an American attorney-turned-freelance writer who lived in her family's ancestral village in Calabria, Italy for 15 years. This blog is now archived.
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What a beautiful frost! And I love that poem!
Glad you enjoyed Kalee! Thanks for coming by 🙂
Aw, how cute! I love it when life gives little presents like that.
My favourite poem, which I first read in a mock GCSE English Lit exam too many years ago to remember now, is Love Songs in Age by Philip Larkin. It’s so beautifully bittersweet and true. I’m very glad that I had to read it carefully for the exam, because it really made me take notice of it. On the first reading, I just skimmed. On the second, I realised that there was more to it than just a soppy love story. On the third, it brought tears to my eyes, and I then couldn’t write fast enough to keep up with all the thoughts coming out of my head. (I got an A for the paper, as I remember, so the poem has affected me in more ways than one.)
I just read it now, Katja, and I will go back in a bit and read it again as the words sink in…gorgeous. Thank you for sharing!
.-= Katja | Driving Like a Maniac´s last blog ..Eating the Italian way =-.
Although when I was in school poetry never really touched me I’ve since grown to appreciate it.
One of my favourites is “Hope” is the thing with feathers, by Emily Dickinson
“Hope” is the thing with feathers—
That perches in the soul—
And sings the tune without the words—
And never stops—at all—
And sweetest—in the Gale—is heard—
And sore must be the storm—
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm—
I’ve heard it in the chillest land—
And on the strangest Sea—
Yet, never, in Extremity,
It asked a crumb—of Me.
Just got a nice shiver from reading that, Felix; thank you so much for sharing. It’s lovely!
.-= Felix´s last blog ..Time Spent in O’Connell Street, Dublin =-.
Great picture and poem! I had an old Volvo that had frosted windows inside and out back in my college days. One of the windows was a bit out of adjustment and I was too lazy to fix it until we had a driving rain that blow into the car.
Driving rain is highly underrated as a motivational tool 😉 Thanks, Gil!
What a cool picture -yeah, cool of frost, I know but you know what I mean. I really liked that.
And that poem -there is a very small patch of “woods” along our road that I take when I walk good old Sammy, our little mutt. And since December and with the never-ending snow we’ve had in January/February, each time I walk the dog, when I come to that location, that poem always comes to my mind. (It is also one of my favorite poems too, ya know! Shared tastes, there -right?)
Great minds! Plus that whole central PA thing, I think 🙂
.-= Jeni Hill Ertmer´s last blog ..Sorry, Wrong Number! =-.
I love you, I love you, little arms around my own. But oh, how I shall miss you, my dear when you are grown. Shelley
Open my heart
and you will see
graved inside of it,
Italy
Robert Browning
Michelle- your picture and poem brought me cold chills. Time for a fire. 😉
*Le sigh* wonderful choice 🙂
.-= JB @ jbulie’s blog´s last blog ..Introducing my mom. =-.
My favourite poem would have to be Dorothea McKellar’s ‘My Country’, in part because it is about my country, Australia. The second verse is the most famous and well known by Australians:
I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror –
The wide brown land for me!
See here for the poem in full: http://www.anointedlinks.com/my_country.html
Gorgeous! Thanks Cathy!
.-= Cathy´s last blog ..Third Day of March – beginning of ‘tempo pazzo’ =-.
That is a really sweet picture. I don’t understand poetry very well so I don’t have a favorite. But I love this idea of Love Thursday.
Glad you enjoyed Michelle; you should give poetry another chance, though! It’s not all esoteric and hard to understand; poetry can also be what *you* make of it and how it makes you feel. Emily Dickinson is great…Elizabeth Barrett Browning is another of my faves 🙂
.-= Michelle @ Italian Mama Chef´s last blog ..Pizza, pizza and more pizza! =-.
Such a fantastic picture to wake up and find…I would have been tempted to scrape the ice around the little heart. 🙂 Winter does have a way of warming our souls, just when we need it most. (Still – I’m ready for sunshine and some patio weather!! lol)
Happy Love Thursday!
I hear you Katie…a little sunshine goes a long way after the winter 🙂
.-= Katie in MA´s last blog ..The bagged lunch conundrum. =-.
lovely photo and Frost’s poem is one of my all time favorites.
Glad you enjoyed CCL 😉
.-= Ciaochowlinda´s last blog ..La Sbrisolona and Galaverna =-.
Oh Michelle, thank you so much…for showing the picture, I know you have a lot of followers and readers and I so wanted to share it with everyone! I love the poetry too! We are getting milder weather here this weekend so no chance of frost inside my car which is a good thing! Take a visit over my way, went to the lake this morning to see the sunrise!
Gorgeous! Thanks again for sharing, Lucy!
.-= lucy´s last blog .. =-.
Grazie, Michelle. I enjoyed the lovely picture and reading such a nice poem. A nice way to start my work day 🙂 Happy Love Thursday to you as well.
Thanks for stopping in, Awedree 🙂
Ah, lovely.
Here’s my favorite:
Most Like an Arch This Marriage
By John Ciardi
Most like an arch—an entrance which upholds
and shores the stone-crush up the air like lace.
Mass made idea, and idea held in place.
A lock in time. Inside half-heaven unfolds.
Most like an arch—two weaknesses that lean
into a strength. Two fallings become firm.
Two joined abeyances become a term
naming the fact that teaches fact to mean.
Not quite that? Not much less. World as it is,
what’s strong and separate falters. All I do
at piling stone on stone apart from you
is roofless around nothing. Till we kiss
I am no more than upright and unset.
It is by falling in and in we make
the all-bearing point, for one another’s sake,
in faultless failing, raised by our own weight.
Gorgeous! Thanks so much Judy!
.-= coffeejitters (Judy Haley)´s last blog ..Early bird =-.
Hmmm. As a poet & surrounded by poetry…I would say whatever I’m reading/rereading at the time. Lately it has been Keats…who is beautiful & a joy forever.
What a lovely thing for Lucy to send you.
Many thoughts of Italia tonight…
ciao-meow, Michelle (from Giulia the gattina)
How wonderful to be always surrounded by poetry…I need to work on that 😉
.-= Susan´s last blog ..Ballet Shoe High-Wire Act =-.
Great picture, and that is one of my all time favorite poems as well.
Also, I have a “love thursday” picture I keep meaning to send you…one of these days! 😉
I’m here when you’re ready, Karina!
.-= Karina´s last blog ..Only the Good Friday – Even in Bad Times =-.
R. Frost is a favorite of mine as well. I have a collection of his poems but sadly the book is packed in a box in storage right now. “The Road Not Taken” would be my pick, have always loved that one.
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I marked the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
Yes, this is truly my favorite Frost; so glad you shared it 🙂
.-= Rebecca´s last blog ..i’m spreading the news =-.
To bless this region, its vendages, and those
Who call it home: though one cannot always
Remember exactly who one has been happy,
There is no forgetting that one was.
AUden in the poem Goodye to the Mezzogiorno
Thanks so much Jo!
Goodbye to the Mezzogiorno by Auden – the correction:)
To bless this region, its vendages, and those
Who call it home: though one cannot always
Remember exactly WHY one has been happy,
There is no forgetting that one was.
like the sunburnt country too!
Love love love!
I loved reading your post and the comments attached to it. I especially loved finding another admirer of Jon Ciardi. I hope you visit my blog more often. Have a wonderful day…Mary
Thanks so much Mary! Hope you’re well…can’t wait to see what you’ve been cooking!
.-= Mary´s last blog ..Key West Lime Bars =-.
*SWOON* We love it!!!
What a beautiful love thursday heart. Delicate and fleeting. Sweet. ;D
Scarlett & Viaggiatore
So true…lovely in fact 🙂
.-= Wanderlust Scarlett´s last blog ..Baby Got Back =-.
That is funny! I was just writing an ode to spring on my blog and waxing on about fisherman and poetry (Il postino and Neruda). Lucky thing I remembered that I am not a poet but did remember that I can appreciate a good poem. One of the poems that has stuck with me these many years is one that I read in high school by Bertold Brecht:
In a dream last night
I saw a great storm
It seized the scaffolding
It tore the cross-clasps
The iron ones, down.
But what was made of wood
Swayed and remained.
I always liked this one as it makes me realize that flexibility is the key to surviving…what bends and sways remains and adapts.
And as for odes to spring…I fall back to a childhood favorite my mother used to recite from Robert Louis Stevenson: A birdie with a yellow bill, hopped upon my window sill, cocked his shining eye and said, ain’t you ‘shamed you sleepy head…
now that’s my ode to spring and I’m sticking with it!
Love love love, Melissa! Grazie mille for sharing 🙂
.-= Melissa Muldoon´s last blog ..• primavera, pescatori e poesia =-.