The Gentle Lady

For years now I have been fascinated with miniature paintings and last night I won this darling piece. The obsessive collector in me has a vision of a whole wall of these tiny little jewels. I love the skill it would have taken to execute them and they tell such an evocative story of centuries past, providing a window into the lives of the people who commissioned them. I believe this piece is 19th century but I have seen others available from the previous century and it just makes me so excited that I could own something so personal from that age.

On Monsieur's Departure

On Monsieur's Departure

I grieve and dare not show my discontent,

I love and yet am forced to seem to hate,

I do, yet dare not say I ever meant,

I seem stark mute but inwardly to prate.

I am and not, I freeze and yet am burned.

Since from myself another self I turned.

My care is like my shadow in the sun,

Follows me flying, flies when I pursue it,

Stands and lies by me, doth what I have done.

His too familiar care doth make me rue it.

No means I find to rid him from my breast,

Till by the end of things it be supprest.

Some gentler passion slide into my mind,

For I am soft and made of melting snow;

Or be more cruel, love, and so be kind.

Let me or float or sink, be high or low.

Or let me live with some more sweet content,

Or die and so forget what love ere meant. 

Queen Elizabeth I

www.poemhunter.com

Wonderful Things

1880's transferware bowl

Egyptian Revival Sphinx Head Humidor Jar

I am always looking for little things that are useful and evocative. Tonight I bought a wonderful little transferware bowl with charming cracks and chips made in the 1880's for my special brush cleaning soap. Why not make that little task at the end of the day as pleasant as possible. It reminds me of turn of the century NZ and is so charming. I also purchased a wonderful Art Deco Egyptian Revival humidor which I must admit I do not yet have a use for but I couldn't resist it.