William Blake

On the day of his death, William Blake worked relentlessly on his Dante's series. Eventually he paused in his work and turned to his wife, who was in tears by his bedside. Beholding her, Blake is said to have cried, "Stay Kate! Keep just as you are- I will draw your portrait-for you have ever been an angel to me!"

How do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on, when in your heart you begin to understand there is no going back? There are some things time cannot mend. Some hurts that go too deep... that have taken hold.

The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien

Hope

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.

-Emily Dickinson

Crush

Let's go, drive til the morning comes
And watch the sunrise and fill our souls up
We'll drink some wine til we get drunk
It's crazy I'm thinking Just knowing that the world is round
I'm here I'm dancing on the ground
Am I right side up or right side down, and is this real or am I dreaming?

Dave

His to claim

Her hair clung around her neck
Like seaweed to the corpse of a drown sailor
Her chest rose steadily
With the ebb and flow of the morning tide
He stared at her
While she stared at the ceiling
Her eyes were a lifeless green
They reminded him of the sea
She was cold like this, in the pale morning
When only the light creeping in gave her the appearance of life
He knew no matter how long he looked at her
She would never look to him
She would never be his to claim
The light spread further into the room
Alighting her red hair, causing it to shimmer with gold
Like the sun dancing across the waves at dawn
She smelled as though she came directly from the sea
Her sweat clinging to her skin, salty and sweet
The scent, the memory of her taste
His heart clenched, he closed his eyes in quiet agony
He yearned to reach out and touch her
To feel her there
To pull her to his chest and bury himself in her hair
To feel her warmth rush and overwhelm him
To become intoxicated with passion and willingly drown in her
But he knew if he reached out and touched her
She would fall away like water in his hands