the pulley

Today, in Grantham Pennsylvania, it is 67 degrees outside. Yes, folks, this winter is officially the bizarrest in college-student memory. It's also very, very windy, which is fun, except when you want to look nice to meet with your professors. Or if you're carrying a stack of papers. That would probably not be fun either. But if I had a kite, it would be perfect kite weather. Unless it stormed and I got struck by lightning, in which case I could be a genius and invent electricity, except that I'm several hundred years too late.

I found this poem by George Herbert in my Med-Ren reading last night, and since it's about rest (or "repose" as my Norton anthology helpfully tells me in the margins), what we all crave but what we're not, under any circumstances, going to get until we die, I thought I would share it with all of you. It's called "The Pulley."

When God at first made man,
Having a glass of blessings standing by,
"Let us," said he, "pour on him all we can:
Let the world's riches, which dispersed lie,
contract into a span."

So strength first made a way;
then beauty flowed, then wisdom, honor, pleasure.
When almost all was out, God made a stay,
Perceiving that, alone of all his treasure,
Rest in the bottom lay.

"For if I should," said He,
"Bestow this jewel also on my creature,
He would adore my gifts instead of me,
And rest in Nature, not the God of Nature;
So both should losers be.

"Yet let him keep the rest,
But keep them with repining restlessness:
Let him be rich and weary, that at least,
If goodness lead him not, yet weariness
May toss him to my breast."