Down the hill I went, and then, I forgot the ways of men, For night-scents, heady and damp and cool Wakened ecstasy
Interpretation
The quote captures the transcendence of nature, where one's worries fade away in the presence of night and its scents.
In this quote, Sara Teasdale expresses how the beauty and sensory richness of nature can lead to profound feelings of joy and ecstasy. As she descends the hill, she becomes enveloped in the scents of the night, which evoke a sense of liberation from the complexities of human life, allowing an appreciation for the natural world to take over.
In practice
This quote can be used during a poetry reading to emphasize the connection between nature and emotional experience.
As the waves of perfume, heliotrope, rose, _x000D_ _x000D_ Float in the garden when no wind blows, _x000D_ _x000D_ Come to us, go from us, whence no one knows; _x000D_ _x000D_ So the old tunes float in my mind, _x000D_ _x000D_ And go from me leaving no trace behind, _x000D_ _x000D_ Like fragrance borne on the hush of the wind.
From my spirit's gray defeat, From my pulse's flagging beat, From my hopes that turned to sand Sifting through my close-clenched hand, From my own fault's slavery, If I can sing, I still am free. For with my singing I can make A refuge for my spirit's sake, A house of shining words, to be My fragile immortality.
I thought of you and how you love this beauty, And walking up the long beach all alone I heard the waves breaking in measured thunder As you and I once heard their monotone. Around me were the echoing dunes, beyond me The cold and sparkling silver of the sea -- We two will pass through death and ages lengthen Before you hear that sound again with me.
Lyric night of the lingering Indian Summer, Shadowy fields that are scentless but full of singing, Never a bird, but the passionless chant of insects, Ceaseless, insistent. The grasshopper's horn, and far-off, high in the maples, The wheel of a locust leisurely grinding the silence Under a moon waning and worn, broken, Tired with summer.
Let it be forgotten, as a flower is forgotten, Forgotten as a fire that once was singing gold, Let it be forgotten forever and ever, Time is a kind friend, he will make us old.
For I shall learn from flower and leaf, That color every drop they hold, To change the lifeless wine of grief To living gold.
If the outer world is diminished in its grandeur, then the emotional, imaginative, intellectual, and spiritual life of the human is diminished or extinguished. Without the soaring birds, the great forests, the sounds and coloration of the insects, the free-flowing streams, the flowering fields, the sight of clouds by day and the stars at night, we become impoverished in all that makes us human.
We the human species, are confronting a planetary emergency-a threat to the survival of our civilization that is gathering ominous and destructive potential...the earth has a fever. And the fever is rising...Indeed, without realizing it, we have begun to wage war on earth itself.
What I love most about nature is how indifferent it is to us humans and human suffering. While we are here with our little or big tragedies - the wind is blowing, the leaves are rustling in the trees, the flowers bloom, and die - there's a great comfort in that indifference.
Nothing in nature is exhausted in its first use...In God, every end is converted into a new means.
It's a brilliant surface in that sunlight. The horizon seems quite close to you because the curvature is so much more pronounced than here on earth. It's an interesting place to be. I recommend it.
As much as I converse with sages and heroes, they have very little of my love and admiration. I long for rural and domestic scene, for the warbling of birds and the prattling of my children.
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