Undertowers - designs

[Chrysophylax Dives]

A library is a magical place

('Double Helix staircase' by ScottDPenman on DeviantArt)

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Come watch with us the stars for hours
Touch the Moon of Undertowers!
So smell the thrilling-sweet and rotten
Unforgettable, unforgotten
River-smell, and hear the breeze
Sobbing in the little trees.
See, do the elm-clumps gently stand
Still guardians of our Elvish land?
The chestnuts shade, in reverend dream,
Our yet unacademic stream?
Is dawn a secret shy and cold
Anadyomene, silver-gold?
And sunset still a golden sea
In Fairbairn's house with Dwarvish tea?
And after, ere the night is born,
Do hares come out about the corn?
Oh, is the water sweet and cool,
Gentle and brown, above the pool?
And laughs the immortal river still
Under the mill, under the mill?
See, is there Beauty yet to find?
And Certainty? and Quiet kind?
Deep meadows yet, for to forget
The lies, and truths, and pain? . . . oh! yet
Stand the Elvish Towers Three,
And honey in our Dwarvish Tea.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Hobbits, hold tight to your handkerchiefs!

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Frodo Baggins does not see the Sea on Cerin Amroth, even though he climbs a tree; he must descend a staircase before he sees the Sea. In the same Elvish Mirror, Frodo sees the Eye. Between his first vision of the Sea and his first vision of the Eye, Frodo sees three ships that, together, frame an age of the world when Valinor had vanished yet the world still knew enchantment. Alas! Even that hidden light has now vanished, and never will return.

[Saranna]

Saranna gazed in blissful astonishment at the huge amount of work and planning and development achieved by @Hill. Surely it was only a matter of days since they last discussed Library plans and the Underhill Thing! Now she saw a beautiful study room filled with books (hoping HIll had kindly done some work on her study/Office,) but quite happy if this was his own room pictured- evidently the surroundings had caused him to burst into poetry, hopefully the start of many years of writing. And the artwork showing the ingenious stairways of the tower was fit to have been displayed in the Elder Days across the sea, and would be sure to please any artlover in the future.
('That reminds me' she mused. 'I must ask Hill whether we shall be able to retrieve works of scholarship and tales from otherwhens as well as otherwheres. If so, no scholars and students of any other time and place will be as fortunate as ours.')

Shadows of the Towers, Shadows of time, Shadows of words yet to be spoken.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

A tower is but a deep well turned inside out.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

[Chrysophylax Dives]

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Love is a growing, or full constant light,
And his first minute, after noon, is night.

[Aikári Salmarinian]

Chrys: Ohh a picture thread like the ones in the Cottage. How nice. How cute is that turtle, are those in your area to be found? And some sort of fungus. Nice pic with the bridge, the water and the willows in the background. It could be my neighbourhood. Interesting poem you wrote, I believe is yours. I can't rhyme in English. Thanks for sharing!

[Chrysophylax Dives]

:) None of the poetry is mine, Aiks! I am a magpie. The pictures are taken around here, though. You are by no means the only person who calls the above a turtle - I am sure it is a tortoise. Here - also stolen - is the song of the mock turtle. I note the line: There is another shore, you know, upon the other side. - which seems to resonate in Undertowers. The song is recited by the Mock Turtle, who learned it in school from his teacher, Tortoise, who, he explains, taught us.

"Will you walk a little faster?" said a whiting to a snail,
"There's a porpoise close behind us, and he's treading on my tail.
See how eagerly the lobsters and the turtles all advance!
They are waiting on the shingle—will you come and join the dance?
Will you, won't you, will you, won't you, will you join the dance?
Will you, won't you, will you, won't you, won't you join the dance?

"You can really have no notion how delightful it will be
When they take us up and throw us, with the lobsters, out to sea!"
But the snail replied "Too far, too far!" and gave a look askance—
Said he thanked the whiting kindly, but he would not join the dance.
Would not, could not, would not, could not, would not join the dance.
Would not, could not, would not, could not, could not join the dance.

"What matters it how far we go?" his scaly friend replied,
"There is another shore, you know, upon the other side.
The further off from England the nearer is to France—
Then turn not pale, beloved snail, but come and join the dance.
Will you, won't you, will you, won't you, will you join the dance?
Will you, won't you, will you, won't you, won't you join the dance?"