About our day off

Since I am still sick (for those whose curiosity is unbounded--this cold started with a sore throat; segued into a fever of 102; gathered itself into a mucus-generating phrase which has exacerbated itself into an annoying post-nasal-drip cough; and, worst of all, resulted in voicelessness. ON MY BIRTHDAY!) I thought I would rely on a guest writer for some good stuff.
(As I mentioned, I am sick and IT'S MY BIRTHDAY.)

I was going to post one of my favorite John Keat's poems, this one:

When I have Fears that I may Cease to Be

When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,
Before high-piled books, in charactery,
Hold like rich garners the full ripen'd grain;
When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,
That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love;--then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.

But that seems pretty depressing for a sick person. Because I do plan to get better, any minute!

So I chose this one instead, because my birthday is in autumn, and I don't like it, but a poem like this makes me feel a little better, plus, our poet mentions spring:

To Autumn

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drows'd with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,--
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

Poems borrowed from: Poetry of John Keats (1795-1821)
Find out more about John Keats here: http://www.john-keats.com/

Well, stop surfin', go rest somewhere.

P.S. And, GO COLTS!