Rose Leaf and Apple Leaf

At Chartres Cathedral, scarlet light suddenly strikes the carved screen as an organ surges and a boy’s voice rings out. What can a moment like that awaken in the stillness of stone?

Rennell Rodd’s poems travel from cathedral shadows to Roman ruins and sea-fringed shores, finding beauty in the play of light, sound and memory. Introduced by Oscar Wilde, this collection prizes the music and craft of verse, yet its polished forms hold tender sadness too: the ache of lost youth, the gravity of death, the perilous wonder of love. A sea-king’s grave, a flower-bright lyric after rain, an old church made suddenly solemn—each offers a glimpse of a life where joy and sorrow are inseparable. What hidden feeling will the next image bring to the surface?

With centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world.

Who are we? We're Cairn Press. Our background is in design, publishing, typography, and technology. These skills fuel our mission to create the highest quality Public Domain eBooks available online, at an affordable price. We give them the treatment they deserve; our proprietary process restores books for a better overall user experience in design, readability, and e-reader compatibility.