Elizabeth+Bishop

**Elizabeth Bishop** **1911-1979** ===Elizabeth Bishop was born on February 8th, 1911 in Worcester, Massachusetts. Her father, who was a very successful builder, died later that year when Elizabeth was eight months old. In 1916, her mother became mentally ill and went to an asylum. Since her early years were spend with a somewhat dysfunctional family, Elizabeth moved to Nova Scotia to live with her grandparents. When her mother died in 1934, she moved into the house of one of her mothers wealthier relatives, who she did not enjoy as much as her grandparents. She went to Walnut Hill School where she wrote and published her first poems. She majored in English at Vassar College. Marion Moore, who was a librarian, inspired Elizabeth to start writing. During her middle-ages, she lived in Brazil and traveled the Eastern Hemisphere for four years. Most of her poems were written about her experiences and surroundings, because she did not like to write about life.===

__A Miracle for Breakfast__

 waiting for coffee and the charitable crumb that was going to be served from a certain balcony --like kings of old, or like a miracle. It was still dark. One foot of the sun steadied itself on a long ripple in the river.
 * "At six o'clock we were waiting for <span style="background-attachment: initial !important; background-clip: initial !important; background-color: transparent !important; background-image: none !important; background-origin: initial !important; background-position: initial initial !important; background-repeat: initial initial !important; border-bottom-color: transparent !important; border-bottom-style: none !important; border-bottom-width: 0px !important; border-left-color: transparent !important; border-left-style: none !important; border-left-width: 0px !important; border-right-color: transparent !important; border-right-style: none !important; border-right-width: 0px !important; border-top-color: transparent !important; border-top-style: none !important; border-top-width: 0px !important; bottom: 0px; color: blue !important; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-family: inherit !important; font-size: inherit !important; font-variant: normal; font-weight: inherit !important; left: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; padding-bottom: 0px !important; padding-left: 0px !important; padding-right: 0px !important; padding-top: 0px !important; position: static; right: 0px; text-decoration: underline !important; text-transform: none !important; top: 0px;">[|coffee] ,

The first ferry of the day had just crossed the river. It was so cold we hoped that the coffee would be very hot, seeing that the sun was not going to warm us; and that the crumb would be a loaf each, buttered, by a miracle. At seven a man stepped out on the balcony.

He stood for a minute alone on the balcony looking over our heads toward the river. A servant handed him the makings of a miracle, consisting of one lone cup of coffee and one roll, which he proceeded to crumb, his head, so to speak, in the clouds--along with the sun.

Was the man crazy? What under the sun was he trying to do, up there on his balcony! Each man received one rather hard crumb, which some flicked scornfully into the river, and, in a cup, one drop of the coffee. Some of us stood around, waiting for the miracle.

I can tell what I saw next; it was not a miracle. A beautiful villa stood in the sun and from its doors came the smell of hot coffee. In front, a baroque white plaster balcony added by birds, who nest along the river, --I saw it with one eye close to the crumb--

and galleries and marble chambers. My crumb my mansion, made for me by a miracle, through ages, by insects, birds, and the river working the stone. Every day, in the sun, at breakfast time I sit on my balcony with my feet up, and drink gallons of coffee.

We licked up the crumb and swallowed the coffee. A window across the river caught the sun as if the miracle were working, on the wrong balcony." ||

__I Am in Need of Music__  Over my fretful, feeling fingertips, Over my bitter-tainted, trembling lips, With melody, deep, clear, and liquid-slow. Oh, for the healing swaying, old and low, Of some <span style="background-attachment: initial !important; background-clip: initial !important; background-color: transparent !important; background-image: none !important; background-origin: initial !important; background-position: initial initial !important; background-repeat: initial initial !important; border-bottom-color: transparent !important; border-bottom-style: none !important; border-bottom-width: 0px !important; border-left-color: transparent !important; border-left-style: none !important; border-left-width: 0px !important; border-right-color: transparent !important; border-right-style: none !important; border-right-width: 0px !important; border-top-color: transparent !important; border-top-style: none !important; border-top-width: 0px !important; bottom: 0px; color: blue !important; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-family: inherit !important; font-size: inherit !important; font-variant: normal; font-weight: inherit !important; left: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; padding-bottom: 0px !important; padding-left: 0px !important; padding-right: 0px !important; padding-top: 0px !important; position: static; right: 0px; text-decoration: underline !important; text-transform: none !important; top: 0px;">[|song] sung to rest the tired dead, A song to fall like water on my head, And over quivering limbs, dream flushed to glow!
 * || "I am in need of music that would flow

There is a magic made by melody: A spell of rest, and quiet breath, and cool Heart, that sinks through fading colors deep To the subaqueous stillness of the sea, And floats forever in a moon-green pool, Held in the arms of rhythm and of sleep." || __Conversation__

 keeps asking questions. And then it stops and undertakes to answer in the same tone of voice. No one could tell the difference.
 * "The tumult in the heart

Uninnocent, these conversations start, and then engage the senses, only half-meaning to. And then there is no choice, and then there is no sense;

until a name and all its connotation are the same." ||