Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Up and up

I was perusing my older sister's family blog the other day. Her latest post was on the mischief her youngest gets into facilitated by his awesome climbing skills. I clearly thought to myself "man, I'm so glad J. hasn't figured out that he can climb onto things like that." Literally the next day what should I see when I came into our living room but this.....



and a little later, this...




I am going to be careful about what I think from now on!

On another note J. has started nursery at church (which believe me has been wonderful! I forgot how much I like church). He really loves it. He's the life of the nursery. He runs into the nursery room (on most occasions) yelling a victory yell. So far we have only had him brought to us once and it was five minutes before church ended anyway. A week or so ago when I went down one of the nursery workers, Ben, told us that during singing time they had been singing a song about ducks. He said that during the chorus all of the little ones were supposed to say "quack, quack, quack" (one of J's first words) but J would say "stuck, stuck, stuck." Ben said that everyone laughed so when he kept doing it they thought J was just trying to be funny (which would not be surprising at all). In fact they later looked down after the chorus and noticed that J's foot was stuck between the legs of two chairs. He was in fact "stuck, stuck, stuck." My boy's no dummy. Well, that's all my lovely readers. For this evening at least. Tune in next time for... hmm... more J. adventures? Most likely.

Saturday, March 12, 2011

Sonnet: Ozymandias

I MET a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command.
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

- Percy Bysshe Shelley




I love this sonnet. I heard it not long ago at a poetry reading/musical performance. I love the images that float so clearly across the mind. It also reminded me of the Epic of Gilgamesh for some strange reason. I read more of Shelley's work but this remains one of my favorites. I thought you might enjoy it too.