By Thomas Bailey Aldrich
Great thoughts in crude, unshapely verse set forth, Lose half their preciousness, and ever must. Unless the diamond with its own rich dust Be cut and polished, it seems little worth.
Illustration • Simple Moments • Daria Danilova
“I spent my life folded between the pages of books. In the absence of human relationships I formed bonds with paper characters. I lived love and loss through stories threaded in history; I experienced adolescence by association. My world is one interwoven web of words, stringing limb to limb, bone to sinew, thoughts and images all together. I am a being comprised of letters, a character created by sentences, a figment of imagination formed through fiction.”
~ Tahereh Mafi, Shatter Me
📖Illustration • Over the Rainbow • Laura Orsolini
"Be glad, and your friends are many; Be sad, and you lose them all, There are none to decline your nectar's wine, But alone you must drink life's gall."
- Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Solitude
🍂🍵Illustration • Fall Meeting • Salome Herzog
"Can you remember who you were before the world told you who to be?" ~ Charles Bukowski
☂️🍄🟫Illustration by Elisabeth Dorrian
By Edgar Guest
Good books are friendly things to own. If you are busy they will wait. They will not call you on the phone Or wake you if the hour is late. They stand together row by row, Upon the low shelf or the high. But if you’re lonesome this you know: You have a friend or two nearby.
The fellowship of books is real. They’re never noisy when you’re still. They won’t disturb you at your meal. They’ll comfort you when you are ill. The lonesome hours they’ll always share. When slighted they will not complain. And though for them you’ve ceased to care Your constant friends they’ll still remain.
Good books your faults will never see Or tell about them round the town. If you would have their company You merely have to take them down. They’ll help you pass the time away, They’ll counsel give if that you need. He has true friends for night and day Who has a few good books to read.
🍵📕Illustration by Nora Inla
by Ramona Graham
SPRING
The joys of living wreathe my face, My heart keeps time to freshet's race; Of balmy airs I drink my fill— Why, there's a yellow daffodil! Along the stream a soft green tinge Gives hint of feathery willow fringe; Methinks I heard a Robin's "Cheer"— I'm glad Spring's here!
SUMMER
An afternoon of buzzing flies. Heat waves that sear, and quivering rise; The long white road, the plodding team, The deep, cool grass in which to dream; The distant cawing of the crows, Tall, waving grain, long orchard rows; The peaceful cattle in the stream— Midsummer's dream!
AUTUMN
A cold, gray day, a lowering sky, A lonesome pigeon wheeling by; The soft, blue smoke that hangs and fades, The shivering crane that flaps and wades; Dead leaves that, whispering, quit their tree, The peace the river sings to me; The chill aloofness of the Fall— I love it all!
WINTER
A sheet of ice, the ring of steel, The crunch of snow beneath the heel; Loud, jingling bells, the straw-lined sleigh, A restless pair that prance and neigh; The early coming of the night, Red glowing logs, a shaded light; The firelit realm of books is mine— Oh, Winter's fine!
Illustration • Sacred Circle of Seasons • Julene Ewert
Open A Book
By Jane Baskwill
Open a book And you will find People and places of every kind; Open a book And you can be Anything that you want to be; Open a book And you can share Wondrous worlds you find in there; Open a book And I will too You read to me And I’ll read to you.
Illustration by Leah Melcher
My Book by Annette Wynne
A little gate my book can be That leads to fields of minstrelsy, And though you think I sit at home Afar in foreign fields I roam.
🌸Illustration • Reader • Charlotte LeBleu
“Books are the quietest and most constant of friends; they are the most accessible and wisest of counselors, and the most patient of teachers.” ~ Charles William Elliot
Illustration • Girl Reading • Laura Orsolini
“Books are a uniquely portable magic.” ~ Stephen King
Illustration by Sandra Conejeros
“There are many little ways to enlarge your world. Love of books is the best of all.” ~ Jacqueline Kennedy
Illustration • Summer Mood • Charlotte LeBleu
"If you have a garden and a library you have everything you need."
~ Cicero
Illustration • Under the Lilac • Asia Spettel
"Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation. They deepen and widen and expand our sense of life: They feed the soul.
When writers make us shake our heads with the exactness of their prose and their truths, and even make us laugh about ourselves or life, our buoyancy is restored.
We are given a shot at dancing with, or at least clapping along with, the absurdity of life, instead of being squashed by it over and over again. It's like singing on a boat during a terrible storm at sea.
You can't stop the raging storm, but singing can change the hearts and spirits of the people who are together on that ship."
~ Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
Illustration • On the Wind • Marie Muravski
"I thank you God for this most amazing day, for the leaping greenly spirits of trees, and for the blue dream of sky and for everything which is natural, which is infinite, which is yes." ~ E. E. Cummins
Illustration • Reading in the Garden • Camila Pinheiro
"Just the knowledge that a good book is awaiting one at the end of a long day makes the day happier." ~ Kahleen Norris
Illustration • Girl On Top • Mandy Pritty
“We may sit in our library and yet be in all quarters of the earth.”
~ John Lubbock
📚🐈🐈⬛Illustration • Everyday Library • Dawn Cooper
" The universe has two centers: one in the "the human heart, the other in the starry sky." ~ Victor Hugo
🌃Parisian Night Sky • Illustration Nakata
