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Well, for me it really wasn't a case of deciding to be an astronaut.

quote by Duane G. Carey
Added by Lucian Velea
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Astronaut

Verse 1
hey!
Makes my hair stand up on end,
something alien happening,
sychronize but don't comprehend,
cos where i stop that's where you begin!
Another moment i commit,
a pleasure rise im gonna take the hit,
and i'm addicted to the state your in,
cos your getting me out of it!
Chorus
Wasted, there's nothing gonna ace this,
and we're gonna go to space, dear,
cos i'm leaving with An Astronaut!
Music
Da Da Da Da!
Music
Verse 2
Proven now to X-ray specs,
something tells me your the alien sex,
i can't imagine now what comes next,
when this Astronaut connects!
Coming on when i touch your skin,
a kind of strange light you emit
I feel your gravity pull me in,
now your getting me out of it!
Chorus
Wasted, there's nothing gonna ace this,
and were gonna go to space, dear,
cos i'm leaving with An Astronaut!
Wasted, there's nothing gonna ace this,
and were gonna go to space, dear,
cos i'm leaving with An Astronaut!
Verse 3
There feet for Quantum Leap,
because space is hot and deep,
and we follow giant footprints,
as we fall in, falling like the twins,
through Saturn's holy rings,
and if they can't hold us where it's gonna end up,
anybody knows!
Music
An Astronaut
An Astronaut
Chorus
Wasted, there's nothing gonna ace this,
and were gonna go to space, dear,
cos i'm leaving with An Astronaut!
Wasted, there's nothing gonna ace this,
and were gonna go to space, dear,

[...] Read more

song performed by Duran Duran
Added by Lucian Velea
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Morning Bell / Amnesiac

after years of waiting * nothing came * and as your life flashed before your eyes you realize * i'm a reasonable man, get off, get off, get off my case * i'm a reasonable man, get off my case get off, get off my case * after years of waiting * after years of waiting * nothing came * and as your life flashed before your eyes you realize you were looking the wrong place * i'm a reasonable man, get off my case get off, get off my case * i'm a reasonable man, get off my case get off, get off my case * get off my case * i'm a reasonable man, get off my case get off, get off my case * get off my case * after years of waiting * i'm a reasonable man, get off my case get off, get off my case * get off my case * i'm a reasonable man, get off my case get off, get off my case * get off my case * i'm a reasonable man, get off my case get off, get off my case * get off my case * i'm a reasonable man, get off my case get off, get off my case * get off my case *

song performed by Radiohead
Added by Lucian Velea
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VIII. Dominus Hyacinthus de Archangelis, Pauperum Procurator

Ah, my Giacinto, he's no ruddy rogue,
Is not Cinone? What, to-day we're eight?
Seven and one's eight, I hope, old curly-pate!
—Branches me out his verb-tree on the slate,
Amo-as-avi-atum-are-ans,
Up to -aturus, person, tense, and mood,
Quies me cum subjunctivo (I could cry)
And chews Corderius with his morning crust!
Look eight years onward, and he's perched, he's perched
Dapper and deft on stool beside this chair,
Cinozzo, Cinoncello, who but he?
—Trying his milk-teeth on some crusty case
Like this, papa shall triturate full soon
To smooth Papinianian pulp!

It trots
Already through my head, though noon be now,
Does supper-time and what belongs to eve.
Dispose, O Don, o' the day, first work then play!
—The proverb bids. And "then" means, won't we hold
Our little yearly lovesome frolic feast,
Cinuolo's birth-night, Cinicello's own,
That makes gruff January grin perforce!
For too contagious grows the mirth, the warmth
Escaping from so many hearts at once—
When the good wife, buxom and bonny yet,
Jokes the hale grandsire,—such are just the sort
To go off suddenly,—he who hides the key
O' the box beneath his pillow every night,—
Which box may hold a parchment (someone thinks)
Will show a scribbled something like a name
"Cinino, Ciniccino," near the end,
"To whom I give and I bequeath my lands,
"Estates, tenements, hereditaments,
"When I decease as honest grandsire ought."
Wherefore—yet this one time again perhaps—
Shan't my Orvieto fuddle his old nose!
Then, uncles, one or the other, well i' the world,
May—drop in, merely?—trudge through rain and wind,
Rather! The smell-feasts rouse them at the hint
There's cookery in a certain dwelling-place!
Gossips, too, each with keepsake in his poke,
Will pick the way, thrid lane by lantern-light,
And so find door, put galligaskin off
At entry of a decent domicile
Cornered in snug Condotti,—all for love,
All to crush cup with Cinucciatolo!

Well,
Let others climb the heights o' the court, the camp!

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Hard Up Case

You told me once I was your pride and joy
I guess those days are dead and gone
You must have took me for some golden boy
You didnt know what you were taking on
It was a hard up case
It was a hard up case
Just another hard up case
It was a hard up case
Just another hard up case
Now all the angles have been played in threes
There isnt much that I can say
I know you gave your little heart to me
I guess I threw the thing away
It was a hard up case
It was a hard up case
Just another hard up case
It was a hard up case
Just another hard up case
Sometimes the truth is kind of hard to find
But dont you worry I can read your mind
And you dont have to tell me to my face
You put some other joker in my place
They dealt us houses full with the queens and kings
And now theyre calling out our bluff
cause you and me girl we had everything
But it just wasnt quite enough
Now thats a hard up case
It was a hard up case
Just another hard up case
It was a hard up case
Just another hard up case
You say the truth is gonna set me free
Like you might throw a dog a bone
I know youre thinking that the jokes on me
Just take a look at what you re dragging home --
Another hard up case
It was a hard up case
Just another hard up case
It was a hard up case
Just another hard up case

song performed by Steely Dan
Added by Lucian Velea
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V. Count Guido Franceschini

Thanks, Sir, but, should it please the reverend Court,
I feel I can stand somehow, half sit down
Without help, make shift to even speak, you see,
Fortified by the sip of … why, 't is wine,
Velletri,—and not vinegar and gall,
So changed and good the times grow! Thanks, kind Sir!
Oh, but one sip's enough! I want my head
To save my neck, there's work awaits me still.
How cautious and considerate … aie, aie, aie,
Nor your fault, sweet Sir! Come, you take to heart
An ordinary matter. Law is law.
Noblemen were exempt, the vulgar thought,
From racking; but, since law thinks otherwise,
I have been put to the rack: all's over now,
And neither wrist—what men style, out of joint:
If any harm be, 't is the shoulder-blade,
The left one, that seems wrong i' the socket,—Sirs,
Much could not happen, I was quick to faint,
Being past my prime of life, and out of health.
In short, I thank you,—yes, and mean the word.
Needs must the Court be slow to understand
How this quite novel form of taking pain,
This getting tortured merely in the flesh,
Amounts to almost an agreeable change
In my case, me fastidious, plied too much
With opposite treatment, used (forgive the joke)
To the rasp-tooth toying with this brain of mine,
And, in and out my heart, the play o' the probe.
Four years have I been operated on
I' the soul, do you see—its tense or tremulous part—
My self-respect, my care for a good name,
Pride in an old one, love of kindred—just
A mother, brothers, sisters, and the like,
That looked up to my face when days were dim,
And fancied they found light there—no one spot,
Foppishly sensitive, but has paid its pang.
That, and not this you now oblige me with,
That was the Vigil-torment, if you please!
The poor old noble House that drew the rags
O' the Franceschini's once superb array
Close round her, hoped to slink unchallenged by,—
Pluck off these! Turn the drapery inside out
And teach the tittering town how scarlet wears!
Show men the lucklessness, the improvidence
Of the easy-natured Count before this Count,
The father I have some slight feeling for,
Who let the world slide, nor foresaw that friends
Then proud to cap and kiss their patron's shoe,
Would, when the purse he left held spider-webs,
Properly push his child to wall one day!

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Keeping A Light

Written by natalie cole
Hey, did you happen to see my sweet baby?
He was walkin on down the road
Tell him for me that if you see him tonight
Everything is alright
cause I know how he gets when hes low
Oh, hes a beautiful man
Kinda hard to understand but
Hes the only good man that I know
Wont you tell him for me
Im keepin a light shinin in the window
Just in case he decides to come home
Shining in the window just in case he decides to come home
(hes a beautiful man, kinda hard to understand)
But hes the only good man that I know
Wont you tell him for me? (tell him, tell him, tell him, tell him)
Im keeping a light (tell him, tell him, tell him, tell him) shining in the window
Just in case he decides to come home (ooh, ah)
Shining in the window
Just in case he decides to come home
Oh, we had quite a spat and that was all that but
We both said things that we didnt mean
Wont you tell him for me (tell him, tell him, tell him, tell him)
Im keeping a light (tell him, tell him, tell him, tell him) shining in the window
Just in case he decides to come home (ooh, ah)
Shining in the window
In case he decides to come home
Im keepin (ooh, ah) a light, baby
Just in case he decides to come home
Cant (ooh, ah) you see the light?
Cant (ooh, ah) you see the light?
Keepin (ooh, ah) a light, baby
Just in case he decides to come home
Oh, (tell him, tell him, tell him, tell him) just in case, just in case
Im keeping a light, baby (tell him, tell him, tell him, tell him)
Just in case, just in case
Oh say can you see (tell him, tell him, tell him, tell him)
My light, shinin, shining, (just in case) shining
I wonder can you see my light shinin, (tell him, tell him, tell him, tell him, just in case) burnin, shinin, burnin, shinin, burnin

song performed by Natalie Cole
Added by Lucian Velea
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IV. Tertium Quid

True, Excellency—as his Highness says,
Though she's not dead yet, she's as good as stretched
Symmetrical beside the other two;
Though he's not judged yet, he's the same as judged,
So do the facts abound and superabound:
And nothing hinders that we lift the case
Out of the shade into the shine, allow
Qualified persons to pronounce at last,
Nay, edge in an authoritative word
Between this rabble's-brabble of dolts and fools
Who make up reasonless unreasoning Rome.
"Now for the Trial!" they roar: "the Trial to test
"The truth, weigh husband and weigh wife alike
"I' the scales of law, make one scale kick the beam!"
Law's a machine from which, to please the mob,
Truth the divinity must needs descend
And clear things at the play's fifth act—aha!
Hammer into their noddles who was who
And what was what. I tell the simpletons
"Could law be competent to such a feat
"'T were done already: what begins next week
"Is end o' the Trial, last link of a chain
"Whereof the first was forged three years ago
"When law addressed herself to set wrong right,
"And proved so slow in taking the first step
"That ever some new grievance,—tort, retort,
"On one or the other side,—o'ertook i' the game,
"Retarded sentence, till this deed of death
"Is thrown in, as it were, last bale to boat
"Crammed to the edge with cargo—or passengers?
"'Trecentos inseris: ohe, jam satis est!
"'Huc appelle!'—passengers, the word must be."
Long since, the boat was loaded to my eyes.
To hear the rabble and brabble, you'd call the case
Fused and confused past human finding out.
One calls the square round, t' other the round square—
And pardonably in that first surprise
O' the blood that fell and splashed the diagram:
But now we've used our eyes to the violent hue
Can't we look through the crimson and trace lines?
It makes a man despair of history,
Eusebius and the established fact—fig's end!
Oh, give the fools their Trial, rattle away
With the leash of lawyers, two on either side—
One barks, one bites,—Masters Arcangeli
And Spreti,—that's the husband's ultimate hope
Against the Fisc and the other kind of Fisc,
Bound to do barking for the wife: bow—wow!
Why, Excellency, we and his Highness here
Would settle the matter as sufficiently

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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III. The Other Half-Rome

Another day that finds her living yet,
Little Pompilia, with the patient brow
And lamentable smile on those poor lips,
And, under the white hospital-array,
A flower-like body, to frighten at a bruise
You'd think, yet now, stabbed through and through again,
Alive i' the ruins. 'T is a miracle.
It seems that, when her husband struck her first,
She prayed Madonna just that she might live
So long as to confess and be absolved;
And whether it was that, all her sad life long
Never before successful in a prayer,
This prayer rose with authority too dread,—
Or whether, because earth was hell to her,
By compensation, when the blackness broke
She got one glimpse of quiet and the cool blue,
To show her for a moment such things were,—
Or else,—as the Augustinian Brother thinks,
The friar who took confession from her lip,—
When a probationary soul that moved
From nobleness to nobleness, as she,
Over the rough way of the world, succumbs,
Bloodies its last thorn with unflinching foot,
The angels love to do their work betimes,
Staunch some wounds here nor leave so much for God.
Who knows? However it be, confessed, absolved,
She lies, with overplus of life beside
To speak and right herself from first to last,
Right the friend also, lamb-pure, lion-brave,
Care for the boy's concerns, to save the son
From the sire, her two-weeks' infant orphaned thus,
And—with best smile of all reserved for him—
Pardon that sire and husband from the heart.
A miracle, so tell your Molinists!

There she lies in the long white lazar-house.
Rome has besieged, these two days, never doubt,
Saint Anna's where she waits her death, to hear
Though but the chink o' the bell, turn o' the hinge
When the reluctant wicket opes at last,
Lets in, on now this and now that pretence,
Too many by half,—complain the men of art,—
For a patient in such plight. The lawyers first
Paid the due visit—justice must be done;
They took her witness, why the murder was.
Then the priests followed properly,—a soul
To shrive; 't was Brother Celestine's own right,
The same who noises thus her gifts abroad.
But many more, who found they were old friends,
Pushed in to have their stare and take their talk

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Contractors Of Piece

Contractors of piece,
Deciding which piece each will keep.
Contractors of piece,
Deciding which piece each will keep.

Even though wars are ending.
And valiant troops have done their deed.
Loved ones in their hometowns,
Are relieved there's a fighting...
That finally has come to cease.

Restoring broken unities...
Of awaiting friends and families,
Seems not to stop...
The fighting over rebuilding greed.

Contractors...
Now on shores destroyed by wars.
Contractors...
Armed with plans and making demands.
Contractors...
Hoping to restore their greed.
Contractors...
Wanting to get themselves a piece.

Even though wars are ending.
And valiant troops have done their deed.
Loved ones in their hometowns,
Are relieved there's a fighting...
That finally has come to cease.

But contractors...
Now on shores destroyed by wars.
Contractors...
Armed with plans and making demands.
Contractors...
Hoping to restore their greed.
Contractors...
Wanting to get themselves a piece.

Contractors...
Now on shores destroyed by wars.
Contractors...
Armed with plans and making demands.
Contractors...
Hoping to restore their greed.
Contractors...
Wanting to get themselves a piece.

Contractors.

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Bad Case Of The Blues

(kenneth gamble / roland chambers)
(such a bad case of the blues)
Ooh, hoo, hoo, hoo
I thought that you would be
A little different when it came to lovin me
Now, I see I was living a dream
cause all I do is cry
And kiss your love goodbye
Got a bad case of the blues
Its what I get from lovin you
Such a bad case of the blues
Its what I get from lovin you-oo-oo-oo
I thought that I would never see
How it feels to live a life of misery
I dont have anything to look forward to
But miss the love Ive lost
And pay the losers cost
Got a bad case of the blues
Its what I get from lovin you
Such a bad case of the blues
Its what I get from lovin you-oo-oo-oo
Now all I do is cry
And kiss your love goodbye, hey
Got a bad case of the blues
Its what I get from lovin you, babe
Such a bad case of the blues
Its what I get from lovin you
Got a bad case of the blues
Its what I get from lovin you
Such a bad case of the blues
Its what I get from lovin you, yeah
A bad case of the blues
What I get from lovin you, baby
Such a bad case of

song performed by Dusty Springfield
Added by Lucian Velea
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Sunitha Williams-The astronaut

Sunitha Williams—We are proud of her!
All women kind -We are proud
She is from India—We are proud
She is an Indian American astronaut—We are proud
She has set a record for maximum no: of space walks
by a woman astronaut—We are proud
She and her Japanese colleague, Akihiko Hoside
together fixed a problem in the I S S -We are proud
They completed a problematic task
of repairing the switching mechanism
of the main power unit—We are proud
They installed a camera on the
robotic arm of the space station—We are proud
She holds the record of the space flight
by a woman astronaut of 195 days—We are proud
May God Bless her—We are proud of her!

poem by Chandra Thiagarajan
Added by Poetry Lover
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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.

[...] Read more

poem by Byron from Don Juan (1824)
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The King of the Vasse

A LEGEND OF THE BUSH.

MY tale which I have brought is of a time
Ere that fair Southern land was stained with crime,
Brought thitherward in reeking ships and cast
Like blight upon the coast, or like a blast
From angry levin on a fair young tree,
That stands thenceforth a piteous sight to see.
So lives this land to-day beneath the sun,—
A weltering plague-spot, where the hot tears run,
And hearts to ashes turn, and souls are dried
Like empty kilns where hopes have parched and died.
Woe's cloak is round her,—she the fairest shore
In all the Southern Ocean o'er and o'er.
Poor Cinderella! she must bide her woe,
Because an elder sister wills it so.
Ah! could that sister see the future day
When her own wealth and strength are shorn away,
A.nd she, lone mother then, puts forth her hand
To rest on kindred blood in that far land;
Could she but see that kin deny her claim
Because of nothing owing her but shame,—
Then might she learn 'tis building but to fall,
If carted rubble be the basement-wall.

But this my tale, if tale it be, begins
Before the young land saw the old land's sins
Sail up the orient ocean, like a cloud
Far-blown, and widening as it neared,—a shroud
Fate-sent to wrap the bier of all things pure,
And mark the leper-land while stains endure.
In the far days, the few who sought the West
Were men all guileless, in adventurous quest
Of lands to feed their flocks and raise their grain,
And help them live their lives with less of pain
Than crowded Europe lets her children know.
From their old homesteads did they seaward go,
As if in Nature's order men must flee
As flow the streams,—from inlands to the sea.

In that far time, from out a Northern land,
With home-ties severed, went a numerous band
Of men and wives and children, white-haired folk:
Whose humble hope of rest at home had broke,
As year was piled on year, and still their toil
Had wrung poor fee from -Sweden's rugged soil.
One day there gathered from the neighboring steads,
In Jacob Eibsen's, five strong household heads,—
Five men large-limbed and sinewed, Jacob's sons,

[...] Read more

poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
Added by Poetry Lover
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Case Of The Pta

[busta]
Oh man, oh man, oh man, oh man
Yo, yo, yo, I cant understand
Why the parents and the teachers
And everybody trying to o the kids
The young generation yo,
Whats the deal brah, charlie brown, man
[charlie brown]
I dont know what the deal is
You hafta ask my partna dinco d
Yo yo tell us d tell us d
Mass confusion g, I dont know whats up
Hey yo man
(its just another case of that old pta)
Huh man
[dinco d]
In school I wrote notes and took quotes from shakespeare
And other types of rhymes to show you that I (care)
But things like together forever to you my only one (only one)
It was special I can say it was another one
You would say someones knocking at my window
(knock knock)
Someones ringing my bell
(ding dong)
Its about two in the morning
(hey yo g, what the hells going on? )
(its just another case of that old pta)
But never the less here goes to show my potential
And even though our love was three-dimensional
One (me) two (you) three (your pops) now what am I to do
I had to transform into educated lad
Going around doing chores for your dad
Playing a duck, wearing sweaters and shoes
Chilling with pop just listen to the blues
And talking to your mom about a love for her daughter
Suggesting to me that I just oughta
Watch myself
(inch by inch)
Watch myself
(and use some sense)
So I did
(hey)
It didnt do a damn thing
But a case to complain, so now I sing
(its just another case of that old pta)
[busta]
Roaarrr busta rhymes the mighty infamous
Always misbehaving and mischeivous
Causing aggravation Ill never pause
Pushing out spit balls through plastic straws

[...] Read more

song performed by Busta Rhymes
Added by Lucian Velea
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The Priest They Called Him

fight tuberculosis, folks. christmas eve, an old
Junkie selling christmas seals on north park street.
The priest, they called him. fight tuberculosis, folks.
People hurried by, gray shadows on a distant wall.
It was getting late and no money to score.
He turned into a side street and the lake wind hit him like a knife.
Cab stop just ahead under a streetlight.
Boy got out with a suitcase. thin kid in prep school clothes,
Familiar face, the priest told himself, watching from the doorway.
remindsme of something a long time ago. the boy, there, with his overcoat
Unbuttoned, reaching into his pants pocket for the cab fare.
The cab drove away and turned the corner. the boy went inside
A building. hmm, yes, maybe - the suitcase was there in the doorway.
The boy nowhere in sight. gone to get the keys, most likely,
Have to move fast. he picked up the suitcase and started for the corner.
Made it. glanced down at the case. it didnt look like the case the boy had,
Or any boy would have. the priest couldnt put his finger on what was so
Old about the case. old and dirty, poor quality leather, and heavy.
Better see whats inside. he turned into lincoln park, found an
Empty place and opened the case. two severed human legs that belonged to
A young man with dark skin. shiny black leg hairs glittered in the
Dim streetlight. the legs had been forced into the case and he had to use
His knee on the back of the case to shove them out. legs, yet,
He said, and walked quickly away with the case.
Might bring a few dollars to score. the buyer sniffed suspiciously.
kind of a funny smell about it. its just mexican leather.
well, some joker didnt cure it.
The buyer looked at the case with cold disfavor.
not even right sure he killed it, whatever it is.
Three is the best I can do and it hurts. but since this is christmas
And youre the priest... he slipped three bills under the table into the
Priests dirty hand. the priest faded into the street shadows, seedy
And furtive. three cents didnt buy a bag, nothing less than a nickel.
Say, remember that old addie croaker told me not to come back unless
I paid him the three cents I owe him. yeah, isnt that a fruit for ya,
Blow your stack about three lousy cents.
The doctor was not pleased to see him.
now, what do you want? I told you!
The priest laid three bills on the table. the doctor put the
Money in his pocket and started to scream.
Ive had troubles! people have been around!
I may lose my license! the priest just sat there, eyes, old and heavy with
Years of junk, on the doctors face.
i cant write you a prescription. the doctor jerked open a drawer
And slid an ampule across the table. thats all I have in the office!
The doctor stood up. take it and get out! he screamed, hysterical.
The priests expression did not change.
The doctor added in quieter tones, after all, Im a professional man,
And I shouldnt be bothered by people like you.
is that all you have for me? one lousy quarter g? couldnt you lend

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song performed by Nirvana
Added by Lucian Velea
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Alma; or, The Progress of the Mind. In Three Cantos. - Canto I.

Matthew met Richard, when or where
From story is not mighty clear:
Of many knotty points they spoke,
And pro and con by turns they took:
Rats half the manuscript have ate;
Dire hunger! which we still regret;
O! may they ne'er again digest
The horrors of so sad a feast;
Yet less our grief, if what remains,
Dear Jacob, by thy care and pains
Shall be to future times convey'd:
It thus begins:

** Here Matthew said,
Alma in verse, in prose, the mind,
By Aristotle's pen defined,
Throughout the body squat or tall,
Is
bona fide
, all in all;
And yet, slapdash, is all again
In every sinew, nerve, and vein;
Runs here and there, like Hamlet's ghost,
While every where she rules the roast.

This system, Richard, we are told
The men of Oxford firmly hold:
The Cambridge wits, you know, deny
With
ispe dixit
to comply:
They say (for in good truth they speak
With small respect of that old Greek)
That, putting all his words together,
'Tis three blue beans in one blue bladder.

Alma, they strenuously maintain,
Sits cock-horse on her throne, the brain,
And from that seat of thought dispenses,
Her sovereign pleasure to the senses.
Two optic nerves, they say, she ties,
Like spectacle across the eyes,
By which the spirits bring her word
Whene'er the balls are fix'd or stirr'd;
How quick at Park and play they strike;
The duke they court; the toast they like;
And at St. James's turn their grace
From former friends, now out of place.

Without these aids, to be more serious,

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poem by Matthew Prior
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Head On Collision

I've been waiting for a good day
I've been holding back long enough
I've been hurting to tell you some things
it's not the falling of the temperature
that's making all our bones run cool
it's the breeze you make
the presence felt when you're around me

and it feels like I'm at an all-time low
slightly bruised and broken
from our head on collision
I've never seen this side of you
another tragic case of feeling
bruised and broken
from our head on collision
I've never seen this side of you
another tragic case

and I'm still waiting for a good day
I think I've held this long enough
I think it's safe to tell you some things
it's not just what you say to people
and it's not the way you look at me
it's the way you present yourself
for all your worst critics to see

and it feels like I'm at an all-time low
slightly bruised and broken
from our head on collision
I've never seen this side of you
another tragic case of feeling
bruised and broken
from our head on collision
I've never seen this side of you
another tragic case

then you were gone
you were gone
all this time you just didn't know it yet
you were gone
all this time you just didn't know it yet
you were gone

and it feels like I'm at an all-time low
slightly bruised and broken
from our head on collision
I've never seen this side of you
another tragic case of feeling
bruised and broken
from our head on collision

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song performed by New Found Glory from Sticks And Stones
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II. Half-Rome

What, you, Sir, come too? (Just the man I'd meet.)
Be ruled by me and have a care o' the crowd:
This way, while fresh folk go and get their gaze:
I'll tell you like a book and save your shins.
Fie, what a roaring day we've had! Whose fault?
Lorenzo in Lucina,—here's a church
To hold a crowd at need, accommodate
All comers from the Corso! If this crush
Make not its priests ashamed of what they show
For temple-room, don't prick them to draw purse
And down with bricks and mortar, eke us out
The beggarly transept with its bit of apse
Into a decent space for Christian ease,
Why, to-day's lucky pearl is cast to swine.
Listen and estimate the luck they've had!
(The right man, and I hold him.)

Sir, do you see,
They laid both bodies in the church, this morn
The first thing, on the chancel two steps up,
Behind the little marble balustrade;
Disposed them, Pietro the old murdered fool
To the right of the altar, and his wretched wife
On the other side. In trying to count stabs,
People supposed Violante showed the most,
Till somebody explained us that mistake;
His wounds had been dealt out indifferent where,
But she took all her stabbings in the face,
Since punished thus solely for honour's sake,
Honoris causâ, that's the proper term.
A delicacy there is, our gallants hold,
When you avenge your honour and only then,
That you disfigure the subject, fray the face,
Not just take life and end, in clownish guise.
It was Violante gave the first offence,
Got therefore the conspicuous punishment:
While Pietro, who helped merely, his mere death
Answered the purpose, so his face went free.
We fancied even, free as you please, that face
Showed itself still intolerably wronged;
Was wrinkled over with resentment yet,
Nor calm at all, as murdered faces use,
Once the worst ended: an indignant air
O' the head there was—'t is said the body turned
Round and away, rolled from Violante's side
Where they had laid it loving-husband-like.
If so, if corpses can be sensitive,
Why did not he roll right down altar-step,
Roll on through nave, roll fairly out of church,
Deprive Lorenzo of the spectacle,

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poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
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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,

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poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
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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:

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poem by Robert Browning (1871)
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