A gloss on the following lines from “The Eolian Harp”
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge:
Methinks it should have been impossible
Not to love all things in a world so filled;
Where the breeze warbles and the mute still air
Is Music slumbering on her instrument.
Methinks it should have been impossible
Not to feel the rhythm of the spheres,
The joyous music of the Lord’s which still
In undertones so permeates our ears–
Methinks it should have been impossible
Not to love all things in a world so filled
With symphonies of His created score
With chords so firm and melody that’s trilled
By every living thing that we adore–
Not to love all things in a world so filled
Where the breeze warbles, and the mute still air
Is but the pause before the music swells
Again in great crescendo of our prayer
Of praise to Him from everyone who dwells
Where the breeze warbles, and the mute still air
Is Music slumbering on her instrument
In dreams of the eternal song to Him
Who orchestrates the harmonies He meant
To elevate our souls–our silent hymn
Is Music slumbering on her instrument.
Dr. Emory D. Jones is a retired English teacher who taught in Cherokee Vocational High School in Cherokee, Alabama, for one year, Northeast Alabama State Junior College for four years, Snead State Junior College in Alabama for three years, and Northeast Mississippi Community College for thirty-five years. He has published poems in such journals as Voices International, The White Rock Review, Free Xpressions Magazine, The Storyteller, Modern Poetry Quarterly Review, Gravel, Pasques Petals, The Pink Chameleon, and Encore: Journal of the NFSPS. He is retired and lives in Iuka, Mississippi, with his wife, Glenda. He has two daughters and four grandchildren.
Sparks of Calliope 