| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Rivers to the Sea by Sara Teasdale: Oh, there are breasts to bear his head,
And lips whereon his lips can lie,
But I must be till I am dead
Only a cry.
CHANCE
How many times we must have met
Here on the street as strangers do,
Children of chance we were, who passed
The door of heaven and never knew.
IMMORTAL
So soon my body will have gone
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Peter Pan by James M. Barrie: Mrs. Darling first heard of Peter when she was tidying up her
children's minds. It is the nightly custom of every good mother
after her children are asleep to rummage in their minds and put
things straight for next morning, repacking into their proper
places the many articles that have wandered during the day. If
you could keep awake (but of course you can't) you would see your
own mother doing this, and you would find it very interesting to
watch her. It is quite like tidying up drawers. You would see
her on her knees, I expect, lingering humorously over some of
your contents, wondering where on earth you had picked this thing
up, making discoveries sweet and not so sweet, pressing this to
Peter Pan |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Confidence by Henry James: that Bernard would allude no more either to Miss Vivian or to what had
happened at Baden. This request was easy to comply with, and Bernard,
in writing, strictly conformed to it; but it seemed to him that the act
of doing so was in itself a cooling-off. What would be a better proof
of what is called a "tension" than an agreement to avoid a natural topic?
Bernard moralized a little over Gordon's "just susceptibilities,"
and felt that the existence of a perverse resentment in so honest a nature
was a fact gained to his acquaintance with psychological science.
It cannot be said, however, that he suffered this fact to occupy
at all times the foreground of his consciousness. Bernard was like
some great painters; his foregrounds were very happily arranged.
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