First Things RSS Feed - Belle Randall https://www.firstthings.com/author/belle-randall en-us Copyright 2025 First Things. All Rights Reserved. ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) Mon, 20 Jan 2025 16:56:33 -0500 https://d2201k5v4hmrsv.cloudfront.net/img/favicon-196.png First Things RSS Feed Image https://www.firstthings.com/rss/author/belle-randall 60 The Four Quartets Revisited https://www.firstthings.com/article/2010/01/the-four-quartets-revisited https://www.firstthings.com/article/2010/01/the-four-quartets-revisited Fri, 01 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0500 On opening a long unopened book,
What dank whiff rises from the parting pages,
What genie is released, what dark spell broken,
As if some warm breath trapped inside for ages

Were by a daylight glance set free?
Your father’s hand has jotted in the margins
Its own blunt text of what must be
Lecture notes, and planted his place marker

Like a flag among the “Dry Salvages”
A college “schedule card,” a blank
Grid for weekly classes, and on the back”
O fees and late fees time alone assuages”

We know the longhand’s labored look
A child’s, but why that child would scrawl
A phrase so apt for now is beyond recall:
On opening a long unopened book.

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]]> Playing Scratch-and-Win https://www.firstthings.com/article/2006/05/003-playing-scratch-and-win https://www.firstthings.com/article/2006/05/003-playing-scratch-and-win Mon, 01 May 2006 00:00:00 -0400 The Scratch machine dispenses fun

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