raise me a dais of silk and down

i would be bringing you this if i could, julie.

here's a poem in honor of julie turley's birthday.

rosetti knows how to lay it on thick, and that's what i wish for julie's next year:  layers of silk & down, carvings of peacocks and feathered nests, golden grapes and thickly fruited trees--all things good and beautiful.

unthinkable abundance.

& i know she's not looking for the kind of love rosetti talks about here, but i wish that she will find that love of her inner artist she's been searching for.

i'm lucky to have her as a friend and a co-blogger, and i laugh and cry every time i read one of her soulful stories.  take some time to read what she's written this week in a fount of creativity.

A Birthday

BY CHRISTINA ROSSETTI

My heart is like a singing bird

                  Whose nest is in a water'd shoot;

My heart is like an apple-tree

                  Whose boughs are bent with thickset fruit;

My heart is like a rainbow shell

                  That paddles in a halcyon sea;

My heart is gladder than all these

                  Because my love is come to me.

Raise me a dais of silk and down;

                  Hang it with vair and purple dyes;

Carve it in doves and pomegranates,

                  And peacocks with a hundred eyes;

Work it in gold and silver grapes,

                  In leaves and silver fleurs-de-lys;

Because the birthday of my life

                  Is come, my love is come to me