You become responsible forever, for what you have tamed.
classic quote by Antoine de Saint-Exupery
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Responsibility
Ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-eee,
Into my life came responsibility.
Shes got some shakin, kickin, sailin, long blonde hair,
And when I want to get off you know shell take me there.
Im talkin bout ...
Ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-eee,
She fill me up with responsibility.
Ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-eee,
She fill me up and let me down, cant you see ...
Life is full of re ...
Re-spons-ibil-ity.
Life is full of re ...
Re-spons--responsibility.
Life is full of re ...
Re-re--responsibility.
Life is full of responsibility.
And Im responsible for you and me.
Good lovin messin up my mind,
A chick like this one is so hard to find.
She takes care of everything I need,
And when I want some stuff you know that she takes heed.
Im talkin bout ...
Ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-eee,
She fill me up with responsibility -- yeah.
Ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-eee,
She fill me up and let me down, cant you see ...
Life is full of re ...
Re-spons-ibil-ity.
Life is full of re ...
Re-spons--responsibility.
Life is full of re ...
Re-re--responsibility.
Life is full of responsibility.
And Im responsible as I can be.
Yeah, responsible, responsible baby.
Yeah, responsible.
Ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-eee.
Ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo-eee.
Responsible, responsible baby.
Im tryin to be responsible, responsible baby ...
... yeah, ayyyy ... yeah ... ayyyy ...
Every day, baby; yes I am, baby; you know I can, baby.
Life is full of re ...
Re-spons-ibil-ity.
Life is full of re ...
Re-spons--responsibility.
Life is full of re ...
Re-re--responsibility.
Life is full of responsibility.
And Im responsible for you and me.
[...] Read more
song performed by Grand Funk Railroad
Added by Lucian Velea
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Give It To Me While It
Im burnin up
Its time to turn it up
Get in the middle and stir it up
Give it to me while its hot (hot hot hot)
Step up your game
Cause Im too crunk to be tamed
Now that youve sparked the flame
Give it to me while its hot
I know that you like it when
I go in and out again
Cant catch my breath
As sweat rolls down my face
Im lookin down at you
How you do the thing you do
And I scratch your neck
And my eyes roll back for you (ah)
Oh baby
Im burnin up
Its time to turn it up
Get in the middle and stir it up
Give it to me while its hot (hot hot hot)
Step up your game
Cause Im too crunk to be tamed
Now that youve sparked the flame
Give it to me while its hot
Dont answer the telephone
Shut the windows
Lock all the doors
Need no interruptions now
Somethings bout to be goin down
I want you to focus on
Our body temperature Im burnin up
I want you to give me all your love
Till I cant take it no more
Im burnin up
Its time to turn it up
Get in the middle and stir it up
Give it to me while its hot (hot hot hot)
Step up your game
Cause Im too crunk to be tamed
Now that youve sparked the flame
Must (must)
We play these games (play these games)
Tell me that you want me more
And I will turn the notches up on high
Lovin you cant deny
Baby I got that fire
I got (oooh oooh)
Give it to me while its hot
Not furious just curious
[...] Read more
song performed by TLC
Added by Lucian Velea
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Give It To Me While It's Hot
I'm burnin' up
It's time to turn it up
Get in the middle and stir it up
Give it to me while it's HOT (hot hot hot)
Step up your game
Cause I'm too crunk to be tamed
Now that you've sparked the flame
Give it to me while it's HOT
I know that you like it when
I go in and out again
Can't catch my breath
As sweat rolls down my face
I'm lookin' down at you
How you do the thing you do
And I scratch your neck
And my eyes roll back for you (ah)
Oh baby
I'm burnin' up
It's time to turn it up
Get in the middle and stir it up
Give it to me while it's HOT (hot hot hot)
Step up your game
Cause I'm too crunk to be tamed
Now that you've sparked the flame
Give it to me while it's HOT
Don't answer the telephone
Shut the windows
Lock all the doors
Need no interruptions now
Something's 'bout to be goin' down
I want you to focus on
Our body temperature I'm burnin' up
I want you to give me all your love
Till I can't take it no more
I'm burnin' up
It's time to turn it up
Get in the middle and stir it up
Give it to me while it's HOT (hot hot hot)
Step up your game
Cause I'm too crunk to be tamed
Now that you've sparked the flame
Must (must)
We play these games (play these games)
Tell me that you want me more
And I will turn the notches up on high
Lovin' you can't deny
Baby I got that fire
I got (oooh oooh)
Give it to me while it's HOT
Not furious just curious
[...] Read more
song performed by TLC
Added by Lucian Velea
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Not Responsible
Now let me ask you something:
Have you ever felt that you weren't responsible for the things that you do?
When the girl that you are with is just too much
She is so out of sight, baby, that all you can say is:
Well, all right!
I'm not responsible, not responsible
For anything I do when I'm with you
I'm not responsible, it's impossible
To be so very near and not feel part of you
You've got such a hold on me
You make it seem so easy, but it's true, oh yeah
I get such a happy feeling
Knowing that you feel the same way too
Whoa..oa, baby, all right
I'm not responsible, not responsible
When you can make a man do what you want him to
I'm not responsible, it's impossible
To be so very near and not know what to do
You got such a hold on me
You make it seem so easy but it's true, oh yeah
I get such a happy feeling
Knowing that you feel the same way too
I get such a happy feeling
Knowing that you feel the same way too
Believe me baby, etc....
song performed by Tom Jones
Added by Lucian Velea
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Our Level Of Responsibility!
our level of responsibility
far deeper than our occasional
stabs at compassion, and truth...
when we sit down to eat, and eat
far more than we need, and throw
the leftovers out... we are
responsible fot the hungry!
when we go to sleep at night, in
houses too big and too plush, we
are responsible for the homeless...
when we drive our SUV's around for
no reason at all, burning excess
gas, we are responsible for the
oil spills...
when we vote people in office,
whose agenda is profit at all costs,
we are responsible for countries
invaded...
when we turn our backs and walk away,
or stick our heads in the sand, we are
responsible for the loss of human rights...
when we allow the banning of books, and
legislation against free speech, we are
responsible for ignorance, and allow
ourselves to be enslaved!
responsible, every thought, every intent,
every action!
poem by Eric Cockrell
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Darkness Of Greed
Greed!
Causing innocent blood to flow
Entire culture, lost in the overthrow
They came to seize and take whatever they please
Then all they gave back was death and disease
My people were left with no choice but to decide
To conform to a system, responsible for genocide
Responsible for genocide
Responsible for genocide...
Spoken:
aids is killing the entire african nation
And a vaccine is still supposedly under preparation
But these governments they dont mind the procrastination
They say well kill them off, take their land and go there for vaction.
My peoples culture was strong, it was pure
And if not for that white greed
It wouldve endured
My people were left with no choice but to decide
To conform to a system
Their minds enslaved
Their souls encaged
I feel the rage
Its brutality can never be undone
But the sun is not yet set
The bass and drums and microphones a threat
Thats when ya investigate the crimes from the inside
And see that theyre responsible for genocide
Responsible for genocide
Responsible for genocide...
Ya cram ya culture down my throat
Say Im inferior when I find that I choke
Ya fill my mind with a false sense of history
And then you wonder why I have no identity?
Well Ill strike a match and itll catch and
Spread the insight we need
A tiny fire, burning bright
Shedding light on the darkness of greed
A yes yes yall
And ya dont stop
Shedding light on the darkness of greed
A yes yes yall
And ya dont stop
Shedding light on the darkness of greed
song performed by Rage Against The Machine
Added by Lucian Velea
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Darkness
Greed
Causing innocent blood to flow
Entire culture lost in the overthrow
They came to see, take whatever they please
Then all they gave back was death and disease
People were left with no choice but to decide
To conform to a system responsible for genocide
Responsible for genocide, responsible for genocide
Aids is killing the entire african nation
And a vaccine is still supposedly under preparation
But these governments, they dont mind the procrastination.
They say well kill them off, take their land and go there for vacation
My peoples culture was strong and was pure
And if not for that white greed, it would have endured
My people were left with no choice but to decide
To conform to a system
Their minds did slay
Their souls they cage
You feel the rage
This brutality can never be undone
But the sun has not yet set
The bass and drums and microphone a threat
Thats when youve got to get the cry from the inside
And see that theyre responsible for genocide
Responsible for genocide, responsible for genocide
You jam your culture down my throat
Say Im inferior when apon it I choke
You fill my mind with a false sense of history
And then you wonder why I have no identity
Well strike a match and itll catch
And spread the insight we need
A tiny fire burning bright
Shedding light on the darkness of greed
A yes yes yall and you dont stop
Shedding light on the darkness of greed
A yes yes yall and you dont stop
Shedding light on the darkness of greed
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
song performed by Rage Against The Machine
Added by Lucian Velea
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Pantoum: Wandering
In the end it doesn't matter
Brush or roller paint afloating
As the consequences scatter
Dribbles show through extra coating.
Brush or roller paint afloating
Canvas, plaster wall or papers
Dribbles show through extra coating
Elongated teardropp tapers.
Canvas, plaster wall or papers
Home is dry or sometimes soggy
Elongated teardropp tapers
Drooling gape of grinning doggy.
Home is dry or sometimes soggy
Early man tamed wolf from wild
Drooling gape of grinning doggy
Vestige of a beast bred mild.
Early man tamed wolf from wild
Modern man tamed rocket power
Vestige of a beast bred mild
Tripper humming at the tower.
Modern man tamed rocket power
Vital need for space exploring
Tripper humming at the tower
Engines roaring, now we're soaring.
Vital need for space exploring
Exercise for bones and muscles
Engines roaring, now we're soaring
Random span of weighty tussles.
Exercise for bones and muscles
Sometimes parts and paths are bendless
Random span of weighty tussles
Next to nil, a moment's endless.
Sometimes parts and paths are bendless
As the consequences scatter
Next to nil, a moment's endless
In the end it doesn't matter.
poem by Diane Hine
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Lord, how easily we keep You responsible
Lord, how easily we keep You responsible
for every disaster hitting us on this apostate rebel earth
and still You see everything, every moment
that things decay into amok, how touching
we are seeking to a greater worthiness.
Lord, how easily we keep You responsible
and we never think properly,
we at times want to judge You according to our feelings
and still You see everything, every moment
where we act in aberration, at times totally without humanity,
act against other older people.
Lord, how easily we keep You responsible
as if the consequence of our choices and deeds are infectious from You,
to further send us to damnation, bring infection to everyone, even the elderly
and still You see everything, every moment
where we are suffering, are following You or are avoiding, every deed and glance,
where You look into the depths and to You nothing is at face value.
Lord, how easily we keep You responsible
for every disaster hitting us on this apostate rebel earth.
poem by Gert Strydom
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I Can Hear You
i am here i can hear you.
but just like them i need not bother.
we are all free
we have our own light
freely given
we are responsible for our own lives
now
you too, no one can be responsible for you.
if you die, die alone.
if you cry, cry alone.
if you smile, and laugh, that is a decision.
if you die, that is a decision.
if you live, that is another decision.
a choice.
an ocean of choices.
an ocean of choices over a continent of options.
take your pick
and be yourself.
me? i choose to live. I choose to be happy.
i choose to be responsible. I don't bother sad people
or happy people.
I scratch my back when it itches.
i set the correct time for my ejaculations.
i sit and relax at my own pace.
i take a walk and breathe. I fill my lungs with so much air.
I float like a cloud. I jump like a grasshopper.
I see like the sun.
I fly like an eagle.
I get high sometimes
and get so low sometimes
but i care about myself
and live my life the way i want it.
i don't humiliate myself with making other people responsible for me.
I can do it.
I don't want other people to drive my car for me
i have hands.
I don't let people open the door for me
i have fingers.
I live my life. That is my business.
I am a breather, that is what i do.
When life does not have meaning anymore
like a wall
i bump it on the wall and then i go.
I know where. I decide that too.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Les Bijoux (The Jewels)
La très chère était nue, et, connaissant mon coeur,
Elle n'avait gardé que ses bijoux sonores,
Dont le riche attirail lui donnait l'air vainqueur
Qu'ont dans leurs jours heureux les esclaves des Mores.
Quand il jette en dansant son bruit vif et moqueur,
Ce monde rayonnant de métal et de pierre
Me ravit en extase, et j'aime à la fureur
Les choses où le son se mêle à la lumière.
Elle était donc couchée et se laissait aimer,
Et du haut du divan elle souriait d'aise
À mon amour profond et doux comme la mer,
Qui vers elle montait comme vers sa falaise.
Les yeux fixés sur moi, comme un tigre dompté,
D'un air vague et rêveur elle essayait des poses,
Et la candeur unie à la lubricité
Donnait un charme neuf à ses métamorphoses;
Et son bras et sa jambe, et sa cuisse et ses reins,
Polis comme de l'huile, onduleux comme un cygne,
Passaient devant mes yeux clairvoyants et sereins;
Et son ventre et ses seins, ces grappes de ma vigne,
S'avançaient, plus câlins que les Anges du mal,
Pour troubler le repos où mon âme était mise,
Et pour la déranger du rocher de cristal
Où, calme et solitaire, elle s'était assise.
Je croyais voir unis par un nouveau dessin
Les hanches de l'Antiope au buste d'un imberbe,
Tant sa taille faisait ressortir son bassin.
Sur ce teint fauve et brun, le fard était superbe!
— Et la lampe s'étant résignée à mourir,
Comme le foyer seul illuminait la chambre
Chaque fois qu'il poussait un flamboyant soupir,
Il inondait de sang cette peau couleur d'ambre!
The Jewels
My darling was naked, and knowing my heart well,
She was wearing only her sonorous jewels,
Whose opulent display made her look triumphant
Like Moorish concubines on their fortunate days.
When it dances and flings its lively, mocking sound,
This radiant world of metal and of gems
Transports me with delight; I passionately love
[...] Read more
poem by Charles Baudelaire
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Andromeda Unfettered
ANDROMEDA.
Chained to the years by the measureless wrong of man,
Here I hang, here I suffer, here I cry,
Since the light sprang forth from the dark, and the day began;
Since the sky was sundered and saved from the sea,
And the mouth of the beast was warm on the breast of the sod,
And the bird's feed glimmered like rings on the blossoming tree,
And the rivers ran silver with scales, and the earth was thronged
With creatures lovely and sane and wild and free;
Till the Image of God arose from the dust and trod
Woman and beast and bird into slavery.
Who has wronged me? Man who all earth has wronged:
Who has mocked me? Man, who made mock of God.
CHORUS OF FIRST WOMEN.
Nay, what do you seek?
If of men we be chained,
Our chains be of gold,
If the fetters we break
What conquest is gained?
Shall a hill-top out-spread a pavilion more safe than our palace hold?
Without toil, we are fed,
We have gold to our hire,
We have kings at out thrall,
And made smooth is our bed
For the fools of desire.
We falter the world with our eyelids, at our laughter men scatter and fall.
What is freedom but danger,
And death, and disaster?
We are safe: Fool, to crave
The unknown, the stranger!
More fettered the back than the burden; man bows; he is slave to a slave!
ANDROMEDA.
Yes, in most bitter waters have they drowned
My spirit, And my soul grows grey on sleep!
What if with wreaths my empty hands are bound?
I am slave for all their roses, and I keep
A tryst with cunning, and a troth with tears.
Time has kissed out my lips, and I am dumb.
I am so long called fool, I am become
That fool-of street or shrine. By body bears
Burden of men and children. I have been
All that man has desired or dreamed of me.
I have trodden a double-weary way-with Sin,
[...] Read more
poem by Muriel Stuart
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You are responsible, forever, for what you have tamed. You are responsible for your rose.
quote by Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Added by Lucian Velea
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Are You That Somebody
[timbaland]
Dirty south, can yall really feel me
East coast feel me
West coast feel me
(repeat x 2)
[aaliyah - verse 1 (playa sings the parentheses)]
Boy, I been watching you like a hawk in the sky
That flies, cause you were my prey (my prey)
Boy, I promise you if we keep bumpin heads
I know that one of these days (days)
We gon hook it up while we talk on the phone
But see, I dont know if thats good
I been holding back this secret from you
I probably shouldnt tell it but
[chorus]
If i, if I let you know
You cant tell nobody
Im talking bout nobody
Are you responsible
Boy I gotta watch my back
Cause Im not just anybody
Is it my go, is it your go
Sometimes Im goody-goody
Right now Im naughty naughty
Say yes or say no
Cause I really need somebody
Tell me your that somebody
[aaliyah verse 2]
Boy, wont you pick me up at the park right now
Up the block, while everyone sleeps (sleeps, sleeps)
Ill be waiting there with my tucks, my loads, my hat
Just so Im low key
If you tell the world (dont sleep, you know that well be weak)
Oh boy, see Im trusting you with my heart, my soul
I probably shouldnt let ya but if i
[chorus 2]
If i, if I let this go
You cant tell nobody
Im talking bout nobody
Are you responsible
Boy I gotta watch my back
Cause Im not just anybody
Is it my go, is it your go
Sometimes Im goody-goody
Right now Im naughty naughty
Say yes or say no
Cause I really need somebody
Tell me your that somebody
[timbaland]
Baby girl
[...] Read more
song performed by Aaliyah
Added by Lucian Velea
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I Should Have Been More Responsible...
i should have been responsible for you
suffer for your loss
i could have drawn a map to find you
you are lost
it is this regret
that i keep on leaving
i, too, has a life of my own to live
a mountain to climb
a river to cross
a house to build or destroy
if i really want to
a grave to visit, flowers to throw away
to the winds
it is this disappointment that has kept me alive
i could have been more responsible
to each of you, sick and needing help
or dying and needing even just a prayer
but i too, has the time too short
to accomplish what i haven't
lots of unfinished business too
and so i cannot be yet taken
i've been empty, so empty that i begin to float
i drift like everyone else
still undecided where to land and be myself again
when i was just born
what i lost, i have not yet recovered,
my innocence, what i had was so much, this pride,
what i must achieve, seems but only a dream,
and it is not coming, no signal, no warning,
death for instance... oh,
i should have been more responsible than that,
i could have lived the life you've wasted.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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The Island: Canto II.
I.
How pleasant were the songs of Toobonai,
When Summer's Sun went down the coral bay!
Come, let us to the islet's softest shade,
And hear the warbling birds I the damsels said:
The wood-dove from the forest depth shall coo,
Like voices of the Gods from Bolotoo;
We'll cull the flowers that grow above the dead,
For these most bloom where rests the warrior's head;
And we will sit in Twilight's face, and see
The sweet Moon glancing through the Tooa tree, to
The lofty accents of whose sighing bough
Shall sadly please us as we lean below;
Or climb the steep, and view the surf in vain
Wrestle with rocky giants o'er the main,
Which spurn in columns back the baffled spray.
How beautiful are these! how happy they,
Who, from the toil and tumult of their lives,
Steal to look down where nought but Ocean strives!
Even He too loves at times the blue lagoon,
And smooths his ruffled mane beneath the Moon.
II.
Yes-from the sepulchre we'll gather flowers,
Then feast like spirits in their promised bowers,
Then plunge and revel in the rolling surf
Then lay our limbs along the tender turf,
And, wet and shining from the sportive toil,
Anoint our bodies with the fragrant oil,
And plait our garlands gathered from the grave,
And wear the wreaths that sprung from out the brave.
But lo I night comes, the Mooa woos us back,
The sound of mats are heard along our track;
Anon the torchlight dance shall fling its sheen
In flashing mazes o'er the Marly's green;
And we too will be there; we too recall
The memory bright with many a festival,
Ere Fiji blew the shell of war, when foes
For the first time were wafted in canoes.
Alas! for them the flower of manhood bleeds;
Alas! for them our fields are rank with, weeds:
Forgotten is the rapture, or unknown,
Of wandering with the Moon and Love alone.
But be it so:-they taught us how to wield
The club, and rain our arrows o'er the field:
Now let them reap the harvest of their art!
But feast to-night! to-morrow we depart.
Strike up the dance! the Cava bowl fill high!
Drain every drop!-to-morrow we may die.
In summer garments be our limbs arrayed;
[...] Read more
A Ballad Of Fair Ladies In Revolt
I
See the sweet women, friend, that lean beneath
The ever-falling fountain of green leaves
Round the white bending stem, and like a wreath
Of our most blushful flower shine trembling through,
To teach philosophers the thirst of thieves:
Is one for me? is one for you?
II
- Fair sirs, we give you welcome, yield you place,
And you shall choose among us which you will,
Without the idle pastime of the chase,
If to this treaty you can well agree:
To wed our cause, and its high task fulfil.
He who's for us, for him are we!
III
- Most gracious ladies, nigh when light has birth,
A troop of maids, brown as burnt heather-bells,
And rich with life as moss-roots breathe of earth
In the first plucking of them, past us flew
To labour, singing rustic ritornells:
Had they a cause? are they of you?
IV
- Sirs, they are as unthinking armies are
To thoughtful leaders, and our cause is theirs.
When they know men they know the state of war:
But now they dream like sunlight on a sea,
And deem you hold the half of happy pairs.
He who's for us, for him are we!
V
- Ladies, I listened to a ring of dames;
Judicial in the robe and wig; secure
As venerated portraits in their frames;
And they denounced some insurrection new
Against sound laws which keep you good and pure.
Are you of them? are they of you?
VI
- Sirs, they are of us, as their dress denotes,
And by as much: let them together chime:
It is an ancient bell within their throats,
[...] Read more
poem by George Meredith
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The Four Seasons : Winter
See, Winter comes, to rule the varied year,
Sullen and sad, with all his rising train;
Vapours, and clouds, and storms. Be these my theme,
These! that exalt the soul to solemn thought,
And heavenly musing. Welcome, kindred glooms,
Congenial horrors, hail! with frequent foot,
Pleased have I, in my cheerful morn of life,
When nursed by careless Solitude I lived,
And sung of Nature with unceasing joy,
Pleased have I wander'd through your rough domain;
Trod the pure virgin-snows, myself as pure;
Heard the winds roar, and the big torrent burst;
Or seen the deep-fermenting tempest brew'd,
In the grim evening sky. Thus pass'd the time,
Till through the lucid chambers of the south
Look'd out the joyous Spring, look'd out, and smiled.
To thee, the patron of her first essay,
The Muse, O Wilmington! renews her song.
Since has she rounded the revolving year:
Skimm'd the gay Spring; on eagle-pinions borne,
Attempted through the Summer-blaze to rise;
Then swept o'er Autumn with the shadowy gale;
And now among the wintry clouds again,
Roll'd in the doubling storm, she tries to soar;
To swell her note with all the rushing winds;
To suit her sounding cadence to the floods;
As is her theme, her numbers wildly great:
Thrice happy could she fill thy judging ear
With bold description, and with manly thought.
Nor art thou skill'd in awful schemes alone,
And how to make a mighty people thrive;
But equal goodness, sound integrity,
A firm, unshaken, uncorrupted soul,
Amid a sliding age, and burning strong,
Not vainly blazing for thy country's weal,
A steady spirit regularly free;
These, each exalting each, the statesman light
Into the patriot; these, the public hope
And eye to thee converting, bid the Muse
Record what envy dares not flattery call.
Now when the cheerless empire of the sky
To Capricorn the Centaur Archer yields,
And fierce Aquarius stains the inverted year;
Hung o'er the farthest verge of Heaven, the sun
Scarce spreads through ether the dejected day.
Faint are his gleams, and ineffectual shoot
His struggling rays, in horizontal lines,
Through the thick air; as clothed in cloudy storm,
Weak, wan, and broad, he skirts the southern sky;
And, soon-descending, to the long dark night,
[...] Read more
poem by James Thomson
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The Columbiad: Book II
The Argument
Natives of America appear in vision. Their manners and characters. Columbus demands the cause of the dissimilarity of men in different countries, Hesper replies, That the human body is composed of a due proportion of the elements suited to the place of its first formation; that these elements, differently proportioned, produce all the changes of health, sickness, growth and decay; and may likewise produce any other changes which occasion the diversity of men; that these elemental proportions are varied, not more by climate than temperature and other local circumstances; that the mind is likewise in a state of change, and will take its physical character from the body and from external objects: examples. Inquiry concerning the first peopling of America. View of Mexico. Its destruction by Cortez. View of Cusco and Quito, cities of Peru. Tradition of Capac and Oella, founders of the Peruvian empire. Columbus inquires into their real history. Hesper gives an account of their origin, and relates the stratagems they used in establishing that empire.
High o'er his world as thus Columbus gazed,
And Hesper still the changing scene emblazed,
Round all the realms increasing lustre flew,
And raised new wonders to the Patriarch's view.
He saw at once, as far as eye could rove,
Like scattering herds, the swarthy people move
In tribes innumerable; all the waste,
Wide as their walks, a varying shadow cast.
As airy shapes, beneath the moon's pale eye,
People the clouds that sail the midnight sky,
Dance thro the grove and flit along the glade,
And cast their grisly phantoms on the shade;
So move the hordes, in thickets half conceal'd,
Or vagrant stalking thro the fenceless field,
Here tribes untamed, who scorn to fix their home,
O'er shadowy streams and trackless deserts roam;
While others there in settled hamlets rest,
And corn-clad vales a happier state attest.
The painted chiefs, in guise terrific drest,
Rise fierce to war, and beat their savage breast;
Dark round their steps collecting warriors pour,
Some fell revenge begins the hideous roar;
From hill to hill the startling war-song flies,
And tribes on tribes in dread disorder rise,
Track the mute foe and scour the howling wood,
Loud as a storm, ungovern'd as a flood;
Or deep in groves the silent ambush lay,
Lead the false flight, decoy and seize their prey,
Their captives torture, butcher and devour,
Drink the warm blood and paint their cheeks with gore.
Awhile he paused, with dubious thoughts opprest,
And thus to Hesper's ear his doubts addrest:
Say, to what class of nature's sons belong
The countless tribes of this untutor'd throng?
Where human frames and brutal souls combine,
No force can tame them, and no arts refine.
Can these be fashion'd on the social plan,
Or boast a lineage with the race of man?
When first we found them in yon hapless isle,
They seem'd to know and seem'd to fear no guile;
A timorous herd, like harmless roes, they ran,
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poem by Joel Barlow
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Cassandra Southwick
To the God of all sure mercies let my blessing rise today,
From the scoffer and the cruel He hath plucked the spoil away;
Yes, he who cooled the furnace around the faithful three,
And tamed the Chaldean lions, hath set His handmaid free!
Last night I saw the sunset melt though my prison bars,
Last night across my damp earth-floor fell the pale gleam of stars;
In the coldness and the darkness all through the long night-time,
My grated casement whitened with autumn's early rime.
Alone, in that dark sorrow, hour after hour crept by;
Star after star looked palely in and sank adown the sky;
No sound amid night's stillness, save that which seemed to be
The dull and heavy beating of the pulses of the sea;
All night I sat unsleeping, for I knew that on the morrow
The ruler said the cruel priest would mock me in my sorrow,
Dragged to their place of market, and bargained for and sold,
Like a lamb before the shambles, like a heifer from the fold!
Oh, the weakness of the flesh was there¯the shrinking and the shame;
And the low voice of the Tempter like whispers to me came,
'Why sit'st thou thus forlornly,' the wicked murmur said,
'Damp walls thy bower beauty, cold earth thy maiden bed?
'Where be the smiling faces, and voices soft and sweet,
Seen in thy father's dwelling, hoard in the pleasant street?
Where be the youths whose glances, the summer Sabbath through,
Turned tenderly and timidly unto thy father's pew?
'Why sit'st thou here, Cassandra? Bethink thee with what mirth
Thy happy schoolmates gather around the warm, dark hearth;
How the crimson shadows tremble on foreheads white and fair,
On eyes of merry girlhood, half hid in golden hair.
'Not for thee the hearth-fire brightens, not for thee kind words are spoken,
Not for thee the nuts of Wenham woods by laughing boys are broken;
No first-fruits of the orchard within thy lap are laid,
For thee no flowers of autumn the youthful hunters braid.
'O weak, deluded maiden!¯by crazy fancies led,
With wild and raving railers an evil path to tread;
To leave a wholesome worship, and teaching pure and sound,
And mate with maniac women, loose-haired and sackcloth-bound,
'And scoffers of the priesthood, who mock at things divine,
Who rail against thy pulpit, and holy bread and wine;
Bore from their cart-tail scourgings, and from the pillory lame,
Rejoicing in their wretchedness, and glorying in their shame.
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poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
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