Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds - John Lennon & Sir Paul McCartney

Picture yourself in a boat on a river,

With tangerine trees and marmalade skies.
Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly,
A girl with kaleidoscope eyes.


Cellophane flowers of yellow and green,
Towering over your head.
Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes,
And she's gone.

Lucy in the sky with diamonds,
Lucy in the sky with diamonds,
Lucy in the sky with diamonds,
Ah... Ah...


Follow her down to a bridge by a fountain,
Where rocking horse people eat marshmallow pies.
Everyone smiles as you drift past the flowers,
That grow so incredibly high.


Newspaper taxis appear on the shore,
Waiting to take you away.
Climb in the back with your head in the clouds,
And you're gone.


Picture yourself on a train in a station,
With plasticine porters with looking glass ties.
Suddenly someone is there at the turnstile,
The girl with kaleidoscope eyes.


- I love this trippy, psychedelic Beatles song. Today marks the passing of the woman who is said to have inspired this song (Lucy Vodden). I chose to call myself 'the girl with kaleidoscope eyes' because I believe that if you have (metaphorically speaking!) kaleidoscope eyes, you are open-minded and have the ability to see the beauty in everything. In the same way you are able to look into a kaleidoscope and see many separate shapes and colours come together and form patterns that are constantly changing - poems are strung together with words, visions, ideas, metaphors - life is strung together with people, nature, language, ideas, truth, love. The girl with kaleidoscope eyes sees the beauty and poetry of the ever-changing world around her and wants everyone to see through her kaleidoscope ;-)

Love After Love - Derek Walcott

The time will come

when, with elation,

you will greet yourself arriving

at your own door, in your own mirror,

and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored

for another, who knows you by heart.

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,

peel your own image from the mirror.

Sit. Feast on your life.

- As humans we spend so long looking for approval and love from other people that we forget ourselves. This reminds me of the song which goes 'learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all...' As I've said previously, I believe the most significant relationship you can have in your life is the one you have with yourself. You have to be willing to give yourself the love that you want others to give you. This process is a journey and I love how Walcott puts it 'the time will come, with elation...' suggesting you will be excited by yourself and proud when you look in the mirror, into your soul and who you really are.

Zero Circle - Rumi

Be helpless, dumbfounded,

Unable to say yes or no.
Then a stretcher will come from grace
to gather us up.


We are too dull-eyed to see that beauty.
If we say we can, we’re lying.
If we say No, we don’t see it,
That No will behead us
And shut tight our window onto spirit.


So let us rather not be sure of anything,
Beside ourselves, and only that, so
Miraculous beings come running to help.
Crazed, lying in a zero circle, mute,
We shall be saying finally,
With tremendous eloquence, Lead us.
When we have totally surrendered to that beauty,
We shall be a mighty kindness.




- I think the theme here is of 'giving in', there is great strength in knowing nothing if you allow there to be. See the beauty there is in embracing a world which you don't really understand...The term 'zero circle' is very interesting for a multitude of reasons. My own interpretation from Rumi's use of 'us' and 'we' is that he believes that surrender to our great creator invloves working together to create peace. If mankind were to unite in a circle that is everything - that is wholeness. A 'zero' circle is like a wheel that does not move in either direction...to lie in a zero circle is to unite as one and become 'mighty kindess' - to be still with everything and everyone.

Who Am I - Jason Mraz

I am not my face. I am not my hair.

I am not my family. I am not my care.

I am not my upbringing. I am not my mole.

I am not my receding gum. I am not my cold.

I am not my money. And I’m not my fame.

I’m not my hat. I’m not even my name.

I’m just an idea that happened upon love.

I am that I am and that I am is enough.

- Very beautiful poem. Even though Mraz has worldwide acclaim, he doesn't allow the fame to become him...he does not define himself by his money or his hat (he can often be seen wearing a hat!) The last lines "I'm just an idea that happened upon love. I am that I am and that I am is enough" are the most beautiful correlation of words I've seen in a poem. We all just began as an idea. In the grand picture we share oneness with all things. Spirit is eternal - his money, fame, hair, cold are not... Define yourself in that you are that you are...an idea which sprang into the world...like a poem or song from an artists mind.

A Dream Deferred - Langston Hughes

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore--

And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?

Or crust and sugar over--

like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

- The imagery here is incredible - a raisin is already dry but left in the sun becomes inedible...leave your dream for too long and you will no longer remember or understand how your mind concieved of it. Once the dream is out there in the world, does it take on a mind of its own and run away from you if you stop giving it attention? In the end Hughes questions if a dream deferred can explode...by this I believe he is questioning whether or not putting off your dream can ultimately lead to your destruction, like a bomb exploding in your mind. Whatever it is you dream of doing - follow your heart...

You're Beautiful - Simon Armitage

You're Beautiful because you're classically trained.

I'm ugly because I associate piano wire with strangulation.

You're beautiful because you stop to read the cards in newsagents' windows about lost cats and missing dogs.

I'm ugly because of what I did to that jellyfish with a lolly-stick and a big stone

You're beautiful because for you, politeness is instinctive, not a marketing campaign

I'm ugly because desperation is impossible to hide.

Ugly like he is,

Beautiful like hers,

Beautiful like Venus,

Ugly like his,

Beautiful like she is,

Ugly like Mars.

You're beautiful because you believe in coincidence and the power of thought.

I'm ugly because I proved God to be a mathematical impossibility

You're beautiful because you prefer home-made soup to the packet stuff.

I'm ugly because once, at a dinner party, I defended the aristocracy and wasn't even drunk.

You're beautiful because you can't work the remote control.

I'm ugly because of satellite television and twenty-four hour rolling news.

Ugly like he is,

Beautiful like hers,

Beautiful like Venus,

Ugly like his,

Beautiful like she is,

Ugly like Mars.

You're beautiful because you cry at weddings as well as funerals.

I'm ugly because I think of children as another species from a different world.

You're beautiful because you look great in any colour including red.

I'm ugly because I think shopping is strictly for the acquisition of material goods.

You're beautiful because when you were born, undiscovered planets lined up to peep over the rim of your cradleand lay gifts of gravity and light at your miniature feet.

I'm ugly for saying 'love at first sight' is another form of mistaken identity and that the most human of all responses is to gloat.

Ugly like he is,

Beautiful like hers,

Beautiful like Venus,

Ugly like his,

Beautiful like she is,

Ugly like Mars.

You' re beautiful because you've never seen the inside of a car-wash,

I'm ugly because I always ask for a receipt.

You're beautiful for sending a box of shoes to the third world.

I'm ugly because I remember the telephone numbers of ex-girlfriends and the year Schubert was born.

You're beautiful because you sponsored a parrot in a zoo.

I'm ugly because when I sigh it's like the slow collapse of a circus tent.

Ugly like he is,

Beautiful like hers,

Beautiful like Venus,

Ugly like his,

Beautiful like she is,

Ugly like Mars.

You're beautiful because you can point at a man in a uniform and laugh.

I'm ugly because I was a police informer in a previous life.

You're beautiful because you drink a litre of water and eat three pieces of fruit a day.

I'm ugly for taking the line that a meal without meat is a beautiful woman with one eye.

You're beautiful because you don't see love as a competition and you know how to lose.

I'm ugly because I kissed the FA Cup then held it up to the crowd.

You're beautiful because of a single buttercup in the top buttonhole of your cardigan.

I'm ugly because I said the World's Strongest Woman was a muscleman in a dress.

You're beautiful because you couldn't live in a lighthouse.

I'm ugly for making hand-shadows in front of the giant bulb, so when they look up, the captains of vessels in distress see the ears of a rabbit, or the eye of a fox, or the legs of a galloping black horse.

Ugly like he is,

Beautiful like hers,

Beautiful like Venus,

Ugly like his,

Beautiful like she is,

Ugly like Mars.

Ugly like he is,

Beautiful like hers,

Beautiful like Venus,

Ugly like his,

Beautiful like she is,

Ugly like Mars.

- I love how Armitage has taken the simple concept of beauty and shown how 'true beauty is in the eye of the beholder'. That saying is one the modern society may dispute, proclaiming that beauty is how you have your hair/make-up/whatever done...In essence what this poem shows is that what really defines true beauty is what is within your heart and how you choose to live your life. What makes her beautiful is when she stops to look at the signs for the lost pets in the window, where he is poking a dead jellyfish - she cares about other living things, he doesn't. She believes in coincidence, where he uses reasoning to disprove God - she is open-minded, he isn't. She's never seen the inside of a car-wash, where he always asks for a receipt - she is innocent, he is cynical. She is beautiful in her spirit and that's what he admires about her. Beauty is something you choose to have...great, thought-provoking poem.