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 “The informality of family life is a blessed condition that allows us all to become our best while looking our worst.” – Marge Kennedy —

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 “I am blessed to have so many great things in my life – family, friends, and God. All will be in my thoughts daily.” –Lil’ Kim —

Billy and Blaze

Title: Billy and Blaze

Author and Illustrator: C. W. Anderson

Rating: ★★★★★

Age Category: Children's Literature

    Back Cover Synopsis: 

    A Boy and His Horse

    Billy was a little boy who "loved horses more than anything else in the world." Imagine how happy he was when he got his very own pony for his birthday! From that day on, Billy was seldom seen without his new friend, Blaze.

    Riding through fields and woods, Billy and Blaze learned to trust and understand one another - and to jump over fences and fallen trees with ease. They were a great team, but were they good enough to win the gleaming silver cup at the Mason Horse Show?

    This is the first book in the classic Billy and Blaze series. Sensitive drawings and easy-to-read words capture the warmth and gentle understanding between a boy and his horse. 

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 “Everyone needs a house to live in, but a supportive family is what builds a home.” – Anthony Liccione —

Sonnet 52 by William Shakespeare

Sonnet 52

by William Shakespeare

So am I as the rich, whose blessed key
Can bring him to his sweet up-locked treasure,
The which he will not every hour survey,
For blunting the fine point of seldom pleasure.
Therefore are feasts so solemn and so rare,
Since, seldom coming, in the long year set,
Like stones of worth they thinly placed are,
Or captain jewels in the carcanet.
So is the time that keeps you as my chest,
Or as the wardrobe which the robe doth hide,
To make some special instant special blest,
By new unfolding his imprison'd pride.
Blessed are you, whose worthiness gives scope,
Being had, to triumph, being lack'd, to hope.

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 “There’s nothing that makes you more insane than family. Or more happy, or more exasperated, or more secure.” – Jim Butcher —

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 “If the family were a boat, it would be a canoe that makes no progress unless everyone paddles." – Letty Cottin Pogrebin —

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 “That's what people do who love you. They put their arms around you and love you when you're not so lovable.”― Deb Caletti —

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 “One day you will do things for me that you hate. That is what it means to be family.”― Jonathan Safran Foer —

Now We Are Six

Title: Now We Are Six

Author: A. A. Milne

Illustrator: Ernest H. Shepard

Rating: ★★★★★

Age Category: Children's Literature

    Dust Jacket Synopsis: 

    For all who are six or sixty-six, or anywhere in between, A. A. Milne wrote this collection of verses about Christopher Robin and, of course, his great friend, Winnie-the-Pooh.

    Readers will be moved by the gentle humor and playful rhythms of what have become some of the best-loved poems for children. And they will find delight and reassurance in Milne's world - an always accessible, sun-filled realm of the imagination - a world perfectly rendered in Ernest Shepard's enchanting illustrations.

    The essential book for that all-important birthday, Now We Are Six is much more than a worthy successor to When We Were Very Young. It is a classic in its own right, treasured by every new generation of readers.

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"Poets are shameless with their experiences: They exploit them." —Friedrich Nietzsche—

Sonnet 53 by William Shakespeare

Sonnet 53

by William Shakespeare

What is your substance, whereof are you made,
That millions of strange shadows on you tend?
Since every one hath, every one, one shade,
And you, but one, can every shadow lend.
Describe Adonis, and the counterfeit
Is poorly imitated after you;
On Helen's cheek all art of beauty set,
And you in Grecian tires are painted new:
Speak of the spring and foison of the year;
The one doth shadow of your beauty show,
The other as your bounty doth appear;
And you in every blessed shape we know.
In all external grace you have some part,
But you like none, none you, for constant heart.

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Always be a poet, even in prose. —Charles Baudelaire—

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Painting is silent poetry, and poetry is painting that speaks. —Plutarch—

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Poetry is nearer to vital truth than history. —Plato—

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 A poet’s work … to name the unnameable, to point at frauds, to take sides, start arguments, shape the world, and stop it from going to sleep. —Salman Rushdie—

When We Were Very Young

 

Title: When We Were Very Young

Author: A. A. Milne

Illustrator: Ernest H. Shepard

Rating: ★★★★★

Age Category: Children's Literature

    Dust Jacket Synopsis: 

    A. A. Milne's classic celebration of childhood, When We Were Very Young, is a collection of verses that reach to the heart of the youngest listener. His poems sing with a playful innocence, weaving together the worlds of reality and enchanting make-believe. They are matched perfectly by Ernest Shepard's whimsical illustrations, which have delighted and reassured countless readers. Those who look carefully will discover the very first appearance of that Best Bear in All the World, Winnie-the-Pooh. 

    These poems have been read and reread to generations of children. Today, more than sixty years after their first publication, they still ring so true that they will surely find a cherished place on every bookshelf.

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The crown of literature is poetry. —W. Somerset Maugham—

Sonnet 2 by William Shakespeare

Sonnet 2 

by William Shakespeare

When forty winters shall beseige thy brow,

And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field,

Thy youth's proud livery, so gazed on now,

Will be a tatter'd weed, of small worth held:

Then being ask'd where all thy beauty lies,

Where all the treasure of thy lusty days,

To say, within thine own deep-sunken eyes,

Were an all-eating shame and thriftless praise.

How much more praise deserved thy beauty's use,

If thou couldst answer 'This fair child of mine

Shall sum my count and make my old excuse,'

Proving his beauty by succession thine!

This were to be new made when thou art old,

And see thy blood warm when thou feel'st it cold.

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 All poets, all writers are political. They either maintain the status quo, or they say, “Something’s wrong, let’s change it for the better.” —Sonia Sanchez—