The Hub

If you think you are beaten, you are; If you think you dare not, you don't. If you'd like to win, but you think you can't, It is almost a cinch- you won't. If you think you'll lose, you've lost; For out in this world we find Success begins with a fellow's will It's all in the state of mind. If you think you're outclassed, you are; You've got to think high to rise. You've got to be sure of yourself before You can ever win the prize. Life's battles don't always go To the stronger or faster man; But sooner or later the man who wins Is the one who thinks he can!

There is a place where the sidewalk ends And before the street begins, And there the grass grows soft and white, And there the sun burns crimson bright, And there the moon-bird rests from his flight To cool in the peppermint wind. Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black And the dark street winds and bends. Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow, And watch where the chalk-white arrows go To the place where the sidewalk ends. Yes we'll walk with a walk that is measured and slow, And we'll go where the chalk-white arrows go, For the children, they mark, and the children, they know The place where the sidewalk ends.

About the poet:  Kahlil Gibran was the key figure in a Romantic movement that transformed Arabic literature in the first half of the twentieth century. Educated in Beirut, Boston, and Paris, Gibran was influenced by the European modernists of the late nineteenth century. His early works were sketches, short stories, poems, and prose poems written in simple language for Arabic newspapers in the United States. These pieces spoke to the experiences and loneliness of Middle Eastern immigrants in the New World. More at this website at Poetry.com:  https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/kahlil-gibran Now, Thus goes the poem: In the ancient days, when the first quiver of speech came to my lips, I ascended the holy mountain and spoke unto God, saying, “Master, I am thy slave.  Thy hidden will is my law and I shall obey thee for ever more.”   But God made no answer, and like a mighty tempest passed away.   And after a thousand years I ascended the holy mountai...

O hushed October morning mild, Thy leaves have ripened to the fall; Tomorrow’s wind, if it be wild, Should waste them all. The crows above the forest call; Tomorrow they may form and go. O hushed October morning mild, Begin the hours of this day slow. Make the day seem to us less brief. Hearts not averse to being beguiled, Beguile us in the way you know. Release one leaf at break of day; At noon release another leaf; One from our trees, one far away. Retard the sun with gentle mist; Enchant the land with amethyst. Slow, slow! For the grapes’ sake, if they were all, Whose leaves already are burnt with frost, Whose clustered fruit must else be lost— For the grapes’ sake along the wall.

                                     John Keats was an English Romantic poet. He was one of the main figures of the second generation of Romantic poets, along with Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley, despite his works having been in publication for only four years before his death from tuberculosis at the age of 25.(Wiki) Link:  http://www.online-literature.com/keats/ Beauty is truth, truth beauty,'--that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. - Ode to a Grecian Urn                                                                 ...Keats Now, the poem: Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,     Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;  Conspiring  with him ...

ABOUT:  Emily Elizabeth Dickinson  (December 10, 1830 – May 15, 1886) was an American poet.  Emily Dickinson is one of America’s greatest and most original poets of all time. She took definition as her province and challenged the existing definitions of poetry and the poet’s work.   Read more here: Emily Dickinson Now, enjoy the short yet powerful poem: I'm nobody! Who are you? Are you nobody, too? Then there's a pair of us — don't tell! They'd banish us, you know. How dreary to be somebody! How public, like a frog To tell your name the livelong day To an admiring bog! A Quote: "Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul - and sings the tunes without the words - and never stops at all..." - Emily Dickinson

ABOUT THE POET (SOURCE: Sylvia plath organization and wikipedia)   S ylvia Plath   ( October 27, 1932 – February 11, 1963) was an American poet, novelist, and short-story writer. Born in   Boston ,   Massachusetts , she studied at   Smith College   and   Newnham College   at the   University of Cambridge   before receiving acclaim as a poet and writer. She married fellow poet   Ted Hughes   in 1956, and they lived together in the United States and then in   England . They had two children,   Frieda   and   Nicholas , before separating in 1962. Plath was clinically depressed for most of her adult life, and was treated multiple times with electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). She committed suicide in 1963. Plath is credited with advancing the genre of confessional poetry and is best known for two of her published collections,  The Colossus and Other Poems  an...