Showing results by author "William Blake" in All Categories

Poetry is often cited as our greatest use of words. The English language has well over a million of them and poets down the ages seem, at times, to make use of every single one. But often they use them in simple ways to describe anything and everything from landscapes to all aspects of the human condition. Poems can evoke within us an individual response that takes us by surprise; that opens our ears and eyes to very personal feelings.

Poems can evoke within us an individual response that takes us by surprise; that opens our ears and eyes to very personal feelings. Forget the idea of classic poetry being somehow dull and boring and best kept to children's textbooks. It still has life, vibrancy and relevance to our lives today.

Dictionaries summon up many words, but none fulfill. Love itself is often ethereal, felt but only seen in a glance, a look, a fleeting touch. Part of love’s beauty is perhaps in the fact that the question never can be adequately answered; it's ephemeral, a chimera of the heart and only felt. Our own experiences are unique and personal to ourselves and of little help defining it for another.

Romanticism was a new movement in philosophy and the arts that began in the late 18th century when major political events shook the world, such as the French Revolution and American independence. It marked a distinct contrast to the prevailing Enlightenment ideals and in poetry represented a more personal intuitive, emotional and meditative expression with a back-to-nature imperative. It subsequently altered the way in which we perceive poetry and beyond as well as defining our own modern sensibilities to the arts.