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The faucet leak, and learn to leave them so.

quote by Marya Mannes
Added by Lucian Velea
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Were Gonna Move

(words & music by vera matson - elvis presley)
Well theres a leak in this old building
Yes, theres a leak in this old building
Well theres a leak in this old building
Were gonna move to a better home
We got no pane in this old window
We got no pane in this old window
We got no pane in this old window
Were gonna move to a better home
Well theres a hole in the roof where the rain pours in
A hole in the floor where it drops right out again
Well theres a leak in this old building
Well theres a leak in this old building
Well theres a leak in this old building
Were gonna move to a better home
Well theres a crack across the ceiling
Yes theres a crack across the ceiling
Well theres a crack across the ceiling
Were gonna find us a better home
Weve gotta stove without a chimney
Weve gotta stove without a chimney
What goods a stove without a chimney
Were gonna move to a better home
Pulling down window shades is no use at all
The kids and the neighbor can peep right through the wall
Well theres a leak in this old building
Well theres a leak in this old building
Well theres a leak in this old building
Were gonna move to a better, move to a better
Move to a better home

song performed by Elvis Presley
Added by Lucian Velea
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Ooh Baby

Oohbaby
Oohbaby
Oohoohooh
Since the day I saw you, baby, I knew you were for me
Always all by myself, I sought your company
All the fellas told me that you played me for a fool
Said I wouldnt hang out, id go home right after school
What did I do to you
To make you feel this way
You said youd be my baby
Never go away, go away
How could you leave when I need you, baby
How could you leave when I need you, baby
How could you leave when I need you, baby
How could you leave when I need you, baby
(oohbaby) how could you leave when I need you, baby
(oohbaby) how could you leave when I need you, baby
(oohoohooh) how could you leave when I need you, baby
How could you leave when I need you, baby
Spent all my time, baby, just working on my form
Trying to improve myself so I could give you more
You told me I was turning out the way that I should be
How could I know that you would turn your back on me
What did I do to you
To make you feel this way
You said youd be my baby
Never go away, go away
How could you leave when I need you, baby
How could you leave when I need you, baby
How could you leave when I need you, baby
How could you leave when I need you, baby
(oohbaby) how could you leave when I need you, baby
(oohbaby) how could you leave when I need you, baby
(oohoohooh) how could you leave when I need you, baby
How could you leave when I need you, baby
(oohbaby) how could you leave when I need you, baby
(oohbaby) how could you leave when I need you, baby
(oohoohooh) how could you leave when I need you, baby
How could you leave when I need you, baby
Ooh, baby, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh
How could you leave
Ooh, baby, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh
How could you leave
How could you leave
How could you leave
How could you leave
Ooh, baby, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh
Ooh, baby, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh
How could you leave
How could you leave

[...] Read more

song performed by New Edition
Added by Lucian Velea
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Learn

when broken
learn
when happy
learn
when bored
learn
when you float and does not know what to do
learn just the same
when filled with idealism
learn
when fed with what you cannot swallow
learn again
when the times get rough and you want to kill yourself
learn, learn, learn
you still have many things to learn
faces of life
bodies of life
learn, learn, learn everything
do not surrender

for in truth, you do not do what you only want
you will also do what you are told to do
no questions asked
or you will be left out
or you will be not a part of the picture
this life
learn, learn, learn, always learn
do not surrender
live, learn, live, learn
you will soon do all that others will tell you
learn, learn and learn again

and sooner you will have learned everything
and then do what you want to do
with firm conviction
you know now what is right
and that is what you will do,

now without even being told
you have become yourself

but still learn, learn, and learn again
because

you might be wrong,
try thinking some more, learn
relearn, learn, learn, learn, forevermore....

poem by Ric S. Bastasa
Added by Poetry Lover
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Leave Me Alone

Everybodys gonna try to tell you what to do, uhh-haa
And never, never, never, never, let it be said that its true
Oh-oh, hey, give it to my baby
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me alone
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me alone
Theyre the kind of people thatll always let you down
I know you, too, you dont ever give it a frown
Oh, do it, do it, now, do it, do it
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me alone
Get down, baby
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me alone
Oh, come now, leave me alone, mam, okay, baby
Oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha
Dont you know some people, they just dont know when to stop
Give it to me, now
They cant tell the floor from the ceiling or the top
And therere other types, they always make you wait
And theyre always the first to say, the state you come from
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me alone
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me alone
Love me, love me, love me, love me, love me forever
Love me, love me, love me, love me, love me forever
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me alone, oh
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me, leave me alone
Leave me alone
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha, oh, oh, yeah
Ah-ha-ha

song performed by Lou Reed
Added by Lucian Velea
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You Learn

I recommend getting your heart trampled on to anyone
I recommend walking around naked in your living room
Swallow it down (what a jagged little pill)
It feels so good (swimming in your stomach)
Wait until the dust settles

You live you learn
You love you learn
You cry you learn
You lose you learn
You bleed you learn
You scream you learn

I recommend biting off more then you can chew to anyone
I certainly do
I recommend sticking your foot in your mouth at any time
Feel free
Throw it down (the caution blocks you from the wind)
Hold it up (to the rays)
You wait and see when the smoke clears

You live you learn
You love you learn
You cry you learn
You lose you learn
You bleed you learn
You scream you learn

Wear it out (the way a three-year-old would do)
Melt it down (you're gonna have to eventually anyway)
The fire trucks are coming up around the bend

You live you learn
You love you learn
You cry you learn
You lose you learn
You bleed you learn
You scream you learn

You grieve you learn
You choke you learn
You laugh you learn
You choose you learn
You pray you learn
You ask you learn
You live you learn

song performed by Alanis Morissette from Jagged Little Pill
Added by Lucian Velea
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Learn

Learn, learn, learn,—
Our beautiful world is not a field for sheep;
Not just a place wherein to laugh and weep,
To eat and drink, to dance and sigh and sleep,
And then to moulder into senseless dust.

Learn, learn, learn,—
Look up and learn—you cannot look too high!
Not for the earthly wealth which brains can buy,
Not for the sake of gold and luxury—
Treasures corrupted by the moth and rust.

Learn, learn, learn,—
As one in whom the Lord has breathed His breath,
And aye redeemèd from the power of death—
Not as the dumb brute-beast that perisheth,
Not as a soulless, thoughtless, thankless clod.

Learn, learn, learn,—
With love and awe and patience—not in haste;
Drink deeply,—do not pass by with a taste;
O make your land a garden, not a waste!—
Your mind bright, to reflect the face of God.

Learn, learn, learn,—
The mystic beauty and the truth of life;
Search out the treasures whereof earth is rife,
Search on all sides, with pain and prayer and strife;
Search even into darkness. Do not fear.

Learn, learn, learn,—
With a true, steadfast heart, lay up your hoard;
God will sort out the treasures you have stored,
And set them in His bright light, afterward.
He will make all your difficulties clear.

Learn, learn, learn,—
Death is no breaking at a certain place;
We only pause there for a little space.
And then—you would not shame Him to His face?—
You, in His Image and own Likeness made!

Learn, learn, learn,—
Walk with wide-open eyes and reverent heart.
Worship as God the beautiful in art.
Though you see now but dimly, and in part,
All shall be clear in time. Be not afraid.

poem by Ada Cambridge
Added by Poetry Lover
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Mind Over Matter

Mind over matter.
Keeps a face from looking sadder.
And that joy that hasn't come,
For one...
Becomes fair game.

Mind over matter.
Keeps a face from looking sadder.
And that joy that hasn't come,
For one...
Becomes fair game.

Drip to drop,
Tears fall.
They wont stop,
At all.
Until that faucet's turned off!
To prove one's life is not a loss.

Drip to drop,
Tears fall.
They wont stop,
At all.
Until that faucet's turned off!
To prove one's life is not a loss.

Mind over matter.
Keeps a face from looking sadder.
And that joy that hasn't come,
For one...
Becomes fair game.

Drip to drop,
Tears fall.
Mind over matter.
Keeps a face from looking sadder.

They wont stop,
At all.
And that joy that hasn't come,
For one...
Becomes fair game.

Ooohhh...
Drip to drop,
Tears fall.
They wont stop,
At all.
Until that faucet's turned off!
To prove one's life is not a loss.

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Added by Poetry Lover
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Leave This Man Alone

(Justin Hayward)
Ah, leave this man alone, Ah, leave this man alone
Young girls with long faces come to me at night and stay the night
Why am I so lonely?
Tell me is it right? (Is it right?)
Leave them, leave them, leave them, leave those things alone
Leave them, leave them, leave them, leave those things alone
Someone said I loved you, but I can't think where (I can't think where)
You know so much about me
So don't stand and stare, stand and stare
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave my mind alone
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave this man alone
Ah, ah, leave this man alone
Ah, ah, leave this
(Instrumental)
Ah, ah, leave this man alone
Ah, ah, leave this
Someone said I loved you, but I can't think where (I can't think where)
You know so much about me
So don't stand and stare, stand and stare
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave my mind alone
Leave me, leave me, leave me, leave this man alone
Ah, ah, leave this man alone
Ah, ah, leave this man alone
Ahhhh
*************************************************************

song performed by Moody Blues
Added by Lucian Velea
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Canto the Second

I
Oh ye! who teach the ingenuous youth of nations,
Holland, France, England, Germany, or Spain,
I pray ye flog them upon all occasions,
It mends their morals, never mind the pain:
The best of mothers and of educations
In Juan's case were but employ'd in vain,
Since, in a way that's rather of the oddest, he
Became divested of his native modesty.

II
Had he but been placed at a public school,
In the third form, or even in the fourth,
His daily task had kept his fancy cool,
At least, had he been nurtured in the north;
Spain may prove an exception to the rule,
But then exceptions always prove its worth -—
A lad of sixteen causing a divorce
Puzzled his tutors very much, of course.

III
I can't say that it puzzles me at all,
If all things be consider'd: first, there was
His lady-mother, mathematical,
A—never mind; his tutor, an old ass;
A pretty woman (that's quite natural,
Or else the thing had hardly come to pass);
A husband rather old, not much in unity
With his young wife—a time, and opportunity.

IV
Well—well, the world must turn upon its axis,
And all mankind turn with it, heads or tails,
And live and die, make love and pay our taxes,
And as the veering wind shifts, shift our sails;
The king commands us, and the doctor quacks us,
The priest instructs, and so our life exhales,
A little breath, love, wine, ambition, fame,
Fighting, devotion, dust,—perhaps a name.

V
I said that Juan had been sent to Cadiz -—
A pretty town, I recollect it well -—
'T is there the mart of the colonial trade is
(Or was, before Peru learn'd to rebel),
And such sweet girls—I mean, such graceful ladies,
Their very walk would make your bosom swell;
I can't describe it, though so much it strike,
Nor liken it—I never saw the like:

[...] Read more

poem by Byron from Don Juan (1824)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Prince Hohenstiel-Schwangau, Saviour of Society

Epigraph

Υδραν φονεύσας, μυρίων τ᾽ ἄλλων πόνων
διῆλθον ἀγέλας . . .
τὸ λοίσθιον δὲ τόνδ᾽ ἔτλην τάλας πόνον,
. . . δῶμα θριγκῶσαι κακοῖς.

I slew the Hydra, and from labour pass'd
To labour — tribes of labours! Till, at last,
Attempting one more labour, in a trice,
Alack, with ills I crowned the edifice.

You have seen better days, dear? So have I —
And worse too, for they brought no such bud-mouth
As yours to lisp "You wish you knew me!" Well,
Wise men, 't is said, have sometimes wished the same,
And wished and had their trouble for their pains.
Suppose my Œdipus should lurk at last
Under a pork-pie hat and crinoline,
And, latish, pounce on Sphynx in Leicester Square?
Or likelier, what if Sphynx in wise old age,
Grown sick of snapping foolish people's heads,
And jealous for her riddle's proper rede, —
Jealous that the good trick which served the turn
Have justice rendered it, nor class one day
With friend Home's stilts and tongs and medium-ware,—
What if the once redoubted Sphynx, I say,
(Because night draws on, and the sands increase,
And desert-whispers grow a prophecy)
Tell all to Corinth of her own accord.
Bright Corinth, not dull Thebes, for Lais' sake,
Who finds me hardly grey, and likes my nose,
And thinks a man of sixty at the prime?
Good! It shall be! Revealment of myself!
But listen, for we must co-operate;
I don't drink tea: permit me the cigar!
First, how to make the matter plain, of course —
What was the law by which I lived. Let 's see:
Ay, we must take one instant of my life
Spent sitting by your side in this neat room:
Watch well the way I use it, and don't laugh!
Here's paper on the table, pen and ink:
Give me the soiled bit — not the pretty rose!
See! having sat an hour, I'm rested now,
Therefore want work: and spy no better work
For eye and hand and mind that guides them both,
During this instant, than to draw my pen
From blot One — thus — up, up to blot Two — thus —
Which I at last reach, thus, and here's my line
Five inches long and tolerably straight:

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning (1871)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Speeding to Leave Your Behind Behind!

Speeding to leave your behind behind!
Speeding to leave your behind.
Speeding to leave your behind behind!
Speeding to leave your behind.

Get up and ready we gotta go.
Speeding to leave your behind.
You can't benefit if you're dragging slow.
Speeding to leave your behind.
Who said what you do,
Doesn't get you where your'e going.

Speeding to leave your behind behind!
Speeding to leave your behind.
Speeding to leave your behind behind!
Speeding to leave your behind.

Get up and ready we gotta go.
Speeding to leave your behind.
You can't benefit if you're dragging slow.
Speeding to leave your behind.
Who said what you do,
Doesn't get you where your'e going.

Speeding to leave your behind behind!
Speeding to leave your behind.
Speeding to leave your behind behind!
Speeding to leave your behind.

Why stay up half the night!
Looking for a falling star?
To make a wish...
Then,
Dismiss it.

And why,
Do you wish to fight with me?
Someone who's always there for you!
Someone who wants to have life,
Like you do!

I don't wanna do it but I'm...
Speeding to leave your behind behind!
Speeding to leave your behind.
But I'm...
Speeding to leave your behind behind!
Speeding to leave your behind.

Get up and ready we gotta go.
Speeding to leave your behind.

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Added by Poetry Lover
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Leave Those Cranky People Alone

It is best to leave those cranky alone.
It pays to leave those cranky people alone.

Leave those cranky people,
Seeking nothing but an evil.
You,
Just...
Leave those cranky people alone!

When you answer your telephone,
To stop a constant ringing.
Just leave those cranky people alone.

And all you hear is whining,
With a blues heard singing.
Just,
Leave those cranky people alone.
It pays to leave those cranky people alone.
It is best to leave those cranky...
Alone.

Don't condone it.
Leave those people alone.

Don't you try to own it!
Leave those people alone.

Don't,
Condone it.
Leave those people alone.

Don't you try to even own it!
Leave those people alone.

When nothing but complaints,
Drop out of their mouths.
Just,
Leave those cranky people alone.
It is best to leave those cranky alone.
It pays to leave those cranky...
Alone.

Keep your mind freed from heating.
Leave those people alone.
Don't you dare accept their beating.
Leave those people alone.
When you feel a headache brewing,
And you don't know what to do.
Hey..
Leave those cranky people alone!

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Added by Poetry Lover
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Leave Them. Leave Them Alone

When people are immuned,
To get a message that is coming...
Leave them.
Leave them alone.
When people stubbornly refuse to hear a message,
Others hear...
Just leave them,
Alone on their own.

Too many have been fitted to be limited!
So leave them.
Leave them alone.
Too many have been gifted with the flapping of lips.
So leave them.
Leave them alone.

When people are immuned,
To get a message that is coming...
Just leave them.
Leave them alone.
When people rather shuck and jive,
To realize their own survival...
Just leave them,
Alone on their own.

Too many wish to sit and make a game of it.
So leave them.
Leave them alone.
Too many rather drift and not take benefit,
So leave them...
Leave them alone.

Fools are taking numbers just to stand and wait.
So leave them.
Leave them alone.
Fools like this await for frosting on their cake.
So leave them,
To taste it alone.

Too many wish to sit and make a game of it.
So leave them.
Leave them alone.
Too many rather drift and not take benefit,
So leave them...
Leave them alone.

When people are immuned,
To get a message that is coming...
Just leave them.
Leave them alone.

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Added by Poetry Lover
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Stranded

Standing here helpless
Where do I go
If you leave me alone
Where do I turn now
If it don't work out
As for as I can see
This isn't the way
That you said it would be...

Don't leave me like this
Don't leave me stranded
If you walk away now
You leave me empty handed
Don't leave me like this
Don't leave me stranded
Don't leave me now
Don't leave me...

Wasn't it you
Who brought me here
To the place lovers go
Just look at these arms
Reaching out to you
You said that you'd always care
I just turned around
And there's nobody there

Don't leave me like this
Don't leave me stranded
If you walk away now
You leave me empty handed
Don't leave me like this
Don't leave me stranded
Don't leave me now
Don't leave me...

You said that you'd always care
I just turned around and there's
nobody there

Don't leave me like...
Don't leave me like this
Don't leave me stranded
If you walk away now
You leave me empty handed
Don't leave me like this
Don't leave me stranded
stranded
Don't leave me like this
Don't leave me stranded

[...] Read more

song performed by Heart from Brigade
Added by Lucian Velea
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Love 'em And Leave 'em

My limousine is a-waitin'
And I see you comin' my way, hey, hey, hey
I'm sittin' by the window
And you ask me which hotel I stay in
Well, make a reservation
Between the hours of ten and two, how do you do
You've got the time to remember
I've gotta slick proposition you
There's nothing else I'd rather do
So you lift your dress
You wanna impress
There's one thing I've got to confess
Love 'em, leave 'em, love 'em, leave 'em
Love 'em, leave 'em, love 'em, leave 'em, yeah
Yeah, yeah
Mmm, so I give you my number
You say you will see me tonight
You just have to remember
Check with me if it's alright
You wanna sit in my driver's seat
If you do it's alright with me
I've got to hand it to you, baby
You know what a girl's gotta do
There's nothing else I'd rather do
With you, but I, but I
Love 'em, leave 'em, love 'em, leave 'em
Love 'em, leave 'em
Love 'em, leave 'em, love 'em, leave 'em
Love 'em, leave 'em, love 'em, leave 'em, yeah
Love 'em, leave 'em, love 'em, leave 'em
Love 'em, leave 'em, love 'em, leave 'em, yeah
Love 'em, leave 'em, love 'em, leave 'em
Love 'em, leave 'em, love 'em, leave 'em, yeah
Love 'em, leave 'em, love 'em, leave 'em
Love 'em, leave 'em, love 'em, leave 'em, yeah
Love 'em, leave 'em

song performed by Kiss
Added by Lucian Velea
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Love em & Leave em

My limousine is a-waitin
And I see you comin my way, hey, hey, hey
Im sittin by the window
And you ask me which hotel I stay in
Well, make a reservation
Between the hours of ten and two, how do you do
Youve got the time to remember
Ive gotta slick proposition you
Theres nothing else Id rather do
So you lift your dress
You wanna impress
Theres one thing Ive got to confess
Love em, leave em, love em, leave em
Love em, leave em, love em, leave em, yeah
Yeah, yeah
Mmm, so I give you my number
You say you will see me tonight
You just have to remember
Check with me if its alright
You wanna sit in my drivers seat
If you do its alright with me
Ive got to hand it to you, baby
You know what a girls gotta do
Theres nothing else Id rather do
With you, but i, but i
Love em, leave em, love em, leave em
Love em, leave em
Love em, leave em, love em, leave em
Love em, leave em, love em, leave em, yeah
Love em, leave em, love em, leave em
Love em, leave em, love em, leave em, yeah
Love em, leave em, love em, leave em
Love em, leave em, love em, leave em, yeah
Love em, leave em, love em, leave em
Love em, leave em, love em, leave em, yeah
Love em, leave em

song performed by Kiss
Added by Lucian Velea
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VI. Giuseppe Caponsacchi

Answer you, Sirs? Do I understand aright?
Have patience! In this sudden smoke from hell,—
So things disguise themselves,—I cannot see
My own hand held thus broad before my face
And know it again. Answer you? Then that means
Tell over twice what I, the first time, told
Six months ago: 't was here, I do believe,
Fronting you same three in this very room,
I stood and told you: yet now no one laughs,
Who then … nay, dear my lords, but laugh you did,
As good as laugh, what in a judge we style
Laughter—no levity, nothing indecorous, lords!
Only,—I think I apprehend the mood:
There was the blameless shrug, permissible smirk,
The pen's pretence at play with the pursed mouth,
The titter stifled in the hollow palm
Which rubbed the eyebrow and caressed the nose,
When I first told my tale: they meant, you know,
"The sly one, all this we are bound believe!
"Well, he can say no other than what he says.
"We have been young, too,—come, there's greater guilt!
"Let him but decently disembroil himself,
"Scramble from out the scrape nor move the mud,—
"We solid ones may risk a finger-stretch!
And now you sit as grave, stare as aghast
As if I were a phantom: now 't is—"Friend,
"Collect yourself!"—no laughing matter more—
"Counsel the Court in this extremity,
"Tell us again!"—tell that, for telling which,
I got the jocular piece of punishment,
Was sent to lounge a little in the place
Whence now of a sudden here you summon me
To take the intelligence from just—your lips!
You, Judge Tommati, who then tittered most,—
That she I helped eight months since to escape
Her husband, was retaken by the same,
Three days ago, if I have seized your sense,—
(I being disallowed to interfere,
Meddle or make in a matter none of mine,
For you and law were guardians quite enough
O' the innocent, without a pert priest's help)—
And that he has butchered her accordingly,
As she foretold and as myself believed,—
And, so foretelling and believing so,
We were punished, both of us, the merry way:
Therefore, tell once again the tale! For what?
Pompilia is only dying while I speak!
Why does the mirth hang fire and miss the smile?
My masters, there's an old book, you should con
For strange adventures, applicable yet,

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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An Essay on Criticism

Part I

INTRODUCTION. That it is as great a fault to judge ill as to write ill, and a more dangerous one to the public. That a true Taste is as rare to be found as a true Genius. That most men are born with some Taste, but spoiled by false education. The multitude of Critics, and causes of them. That we are to study our own Taste, and know the limits of it. Nature the best guide of judgment. Improved by Art and rules, which are but methodized Nature. Rules derived from the practice of the ancient poets. That therefore the ancients are necessary to be studied by a Critic, particularly Homer and Virgil. Of licenses, and the use of them by the ancients. Reverence due to the ancients, and praise of them.

'Tis hard to say if greater want of skill
Appear in writing or in judging ill;
But of the two less dangerous is th'offence
To tire our patience than mislead our sense:
Some few in that, but numbers err in this;
Ten censure wrong for one who writes amiss;
A fool might once himself alone expose;
Now one in verse makes many more in prose.

'Tis with our judgments as our watches, none
Go just alike, yet each believes his own.
In Poets as true Genius is but rare,
True Taste as seldom is the Critic's share;
Both must alike from Heav'n derive their light,
These born to judge, as well as those to write.
Let such teach others who themselves excel,
And censure freely who have written well;
Authors are partial to their wit, 'tis true,
But are not Critics to their judgment too?

Yet if we look more closely, we shall find
Most have the seeds of judgment in their mind:
Nature affords at least a glimm'ring light;
The lines, tho' touch'd but faintly, are drawn right:
But as the slightest sketch, if justly traced,
Is by ill col'ring but the more disgraced,
So by false learning is good sense defaced:
Some are bewilder'd in the maze of schools,
And some made coxcombs Nature meant but fools:
In search of wit these lose their common sense,
And then turn Critics in their own defence:
Each burns alike, who can or cannot write,
Or with a rival's or an eunuch's spite.
All fools have still an itching to deride,
And fain would be upon the laughing side.
If Mævius scribble in Apollo's spite,
There are who judge still worse than he can write.

Some have at first for Wits, then Poets pass'd;
Turn'd Critics next, and prov'd plain Fools at last.
Some neither can for Wits nor Critics pass,
As heavy mules are neither horse nor ass.
Those half-learn'd witlings, numerous in our isle,
As half-form'd insects on the banks of Nile;
Unfinish'd things, one knows not what to call,

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poem by Alexander Pope
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VII. Pompilia

I am just seventeen years and five months old,
And, if I lived one day more, three full weeks;
'T is writ so in the church's register,
Lorenzo in Lucina, all my names
At length, so many names for one poor child,
—Francesca Camilla Vittoria Angela
Pompilia Comparini,—laughable!
Also 't is writ that I was married there
Four years ago: and they will add, I hope,
When they insert my death, a word or two,—
Omitting all about the mode of death,—
This, in its place, this which one cares to know,
That I had been a mother of a son
Exactly two weeks. It will be through grace
O' the Curate, not through any claim I have;
Because the boy was born at, so baptized
Close to, the Villa, in the proper church:
A pretty church, I say no word against,
Yet stranger-like,—while this Lorenzo seems
My own particular place, I always say.
I used to wonder, when I stood scarce high
As the bed here, what the marble lion meant,
With half his body rushing from the wall,
Eating the figure of a prostrate man—
(To the right, it is, of entry by the door)
An ominous sign to one baptized like me,
Married, and to be buried there, I hope.
And they should add, to have my life complete,
He is a boy and Gaetan by name—
Gaetano, for a reason,—if the friar
Don Celestine will ask this grace for me
Of Curate Ottoboni: he it was
Baptized me: he remembers my whole life
As I do his grey hair.

All these few things
I know are true,—will you remember them?
Because time flies. The surgeon cared for me,
To count my wounds,—twenty-two dagger-wounds,
Five deadly, but I do not suffer much—
Or too much pain,—and am to die to-night.

Oh how good God is that my babe was born,
—Better than born, baptized and hid away
Before this happened, safe from being hurt!
That had been sin God could not well forgive:
He was too young to smile and save himself.
When they took two days after he was born,
My babe away from me to be baptized
And hidden awhile, for fear his foe should find,—

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poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
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Canto the First

I
I want a hero: an uncommon want,
When every year and month sends forth a new one,
Till, after cloying the gazettes with cant,
The age discovers he is not the true one;
Of such as these I should not care to vaunt,
I'll therefore take our ancient friend Don Juan—
We all have seen him, in the pantomime,
Sent to the devil somewhat ere his time.

II
Vernon, the butcher Cumberland, Wolfe, Hawke,
Prince Ferdinand, Granby, Burgoyne, Keppel, Howe,
Evil and good, have had their tithe of talk,
And fill'd their sign posts then, like Wellesley now;
Each in their turn like Banquo's monarchs stalk,
Followers of fame, "nine farrow" of that sow:
France, too, had Buonaparté and Dumourier
Recorded in the Moniteur and Courier.

III
Barnave, Brissot, Condorcet, Mirabeau,
Petion, Clootz, Danton, Marat, La Fayette,
Were French, and famous people, as we know:
And there were others, scarce forgotten yet,
Joubert, Hoche, Marceau, Lannes, Desaix, Moreau,
With many of the military set,
Exceedingly remarkable at times,
But not at all adapted to my rhymes.

IV
Nelson was once Britannia's god of war,
And still should be so, but the tide is turn'd;
There's no more to be said of Trafalgar,
'T is with our hero quietly inurn'd;
Because the army's grown more popular,
At which the naval people are concern'd;
Besides, the prince is all for the land-service,
Forgetting Duncan, Nelson, Howe, and Jervis.

V
Brave men were living before Agamemnon
And since, exceeding valorous and sage,
A good deal like him too, though quite the same none;
But then they shone not on the poet's page,
And so have been forgotten:—I condemn none,
But can't find any in the present age
Fit for my poem (that is, for my new one);
So, as I said, I'll take my friend Don Juan.

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poem by Byron from Don Juan (1824)
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