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Quote by Gladys Taber

Work

The book of Stillmeadow

This book explores the lives and relationships within the close-knit community of Stillmeadow, capturing the essence of small-town life and the human experience. more

Author

Gladys Taber
Gladys Taber

Gladys Taber was an American author born on April 12, 1899, and died on March 11, 1980. Known for her profound insights into nature and rural life, her works often revolve around the natural landscapes and rural life in New England. more

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“Most people liked it best in the early spring, when the woods down to the river seemed to shift almost before one’s eyes from snowdrop white to daffodil yellow to the shimmer of bluebells—when the rooks cawed furiously in the beeches, the garden woke to life in a splurge of rhododendrons, and the young lambs caught their heads five times a day in the fencing down the drive. I shall always remember it with the profoundest gratitude, though, as it was that May, that last May, in the last of my old summers.”

“At the foot of the mountain the old man found himself in a broad glade grown thick with rushes, a small stream looping placidly over shallow sands stippled with dace shadows, the six-pointed stars of skating waterspiders drifting like bright frail medusas. He squatted and dipped a palmful of water to his lips, watched the dace drift and shimmer. Scout waded past him, elbow-deep into the stream, lapped at it noisily. Strings of red dirt receded from his balding hocks, marbling in the water like blood. The dace skittered into the channel and a watersnake uncurled from a rock at the far bank and glided down the slight current, no more demonstrative of effort or motion than a flute note. The old man drank and then leaned back against the sledge. The glade hummed softly. A woodhen called from the timber on the mountain and to that sound of all summer days of seclusion and peace the old man slept.”