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Sameness is the mother of disgust, variety the cure.

quote by Petrarch
Added by Lucian Velea
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Sister Helen

"Why did you melt your waxen man
Sister Helen?
To-day is the third since you began."
"The time was long, yet the time ran,
Little brother."
(O Mother, Mary Mother,
Three days to-day, between Hell and Heaven!)

"But if you have done your work aright,
Sister Helen,
You'll let me play, for you said I might."
"Be very still in your play to-night,
Little brother."
(O Mother, Mary Mother,
Third night, to-night, between Hell and Heaven!)

"You said it must melt ere vesper-bell,
Sister Helen;
If now it be molten, all is well."
"Even so,--nay, peace! you cannot tell,
Little brother."
(O Mother, Mary Mother,
O what is this, between Hell and Heaven?)

"Oh the waxen knave was plump to-day,
Sister Helen;
How like dead folk he has dropp'd away!"
"Nay now, of the dead what can you say,
Little brother?"
(O Mother, Mary Mother,
What of the dead, between Hell and Heaven?)

"See, see, the sunken pile of wood,
Sister Helen,
Shines through the thinn'd wax red as blood!"
"Nay now, when look'd you yet on blood,
Little brother?"
(O Mother, Mary Mother,
How pale she is, between Hell and Heaven!)

"Now close your eyes, for they're sick and sore,
Sister Helen,
And I'll play without the gallery door."
"Aye, let me rest,--I'll lie on the floor,
Little brother."
(O Mother, Mary Mother,
What rest to-night, between Hell and Heaven?)

"Here high up in the balcony,
Sister Helen,

[...] Read more

poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
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Ain't No Cure For Love (Crush Demo)

Aint no cure for love
Aint no cure for love
There aint no cure for love
Aint no cure
Cupid was a blind man
He must have missed his mark
Shot an arrow in the air and hit me in the heart
I went to see Saint Valentine
Said Whats come over me?
Daddy must have missed the chapter about the birds and bees
You can be the King of diamonds
You can cash in all your gold
You could hire Johnnie Cochran
Its too late to save your soul
Dont need no shot, no ambulance
Dont need prescription drugs
There aint no cure for love
They can find the cure for the common cold
When the pushing comes to shove
There aint no cure for love
Now someone call my lawyer
Im going to see my shrink
I found myself in the jewelry store buying a diamond ring
I went to see my doctor
Said Wont you help me please?
He said Son Im sorry, its a terminal disease
Cant get no love insurance
Cupid draws his bow
I aint waving boys, Im drowning
Its a damn good way to go
Dont need no shot, no ambulance
Dont need prescription drugs
There aint no cure for love
They can find the cure for the common cold
When the pushing comes to shove
There aint no cure for love
You can be the King of Diamonds
You can cash in all your gold
You can hire Johnnie Cochran
Its too late to save your soul
Dont need no shot, no ambulance
Dont need prescription drugs
There aint no cure for love
They can find the cure for the common cold
When the pushing comes to shove
There aint no cure for love
No aspirin
No ambulance
Or Voodoo you can think up
Aint no cure for love

[...] Read more

song performed by Bon Jovi
Added by Lucian Velea
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Aint No Cure For Love

I loved you for a long, long time
I know this love is real
It dont matter how it all went wrong
That dont change the way I feel
And I cant believe that times
Gonna heal this wound Im speaking of
There aint no cure,
There aint no cure,
There aint no cure for love.
Im aching for you baby
I cant pretend Im not
I need to see you naked
In your body and your thought
Ive got you like a habit
And Ill never get enough
There aint no cure,
There aint no cure,
There aint no cure for love
There aint no cure for love
There aint no cure for love
All the rocket ships are climbing through the sky
The holy books are open wide
The doctors working day and night
But theyll never ever find that cure for love
There aint no drink no drug
(ah tell them, angels)
Theres nothing pure enough to be a cure for love
I see you in the subwayand I see you on the bus
I see you lying down with me, I see you waking up
I see your hand, I see your hair
Your bracelets and your brush
And I call to you, I call to you
But I dont call soft enough
There aint no cure,
There aint no cure,
There aint no cure for love
I walked into this empty church I had no place else to go
When the sweetest voice I ever heard, whispered to my soul
I dont need to be forgiven for loving you so much
Its written in the scriptures
Its written there in blood
I even heard the angels declare it from above
There aint no cure,
There aint no cure,
There aint no cure for love
There aint no cure for love
There aint no cure for love
All the rocket ships are climbing through the sky
The holy books are open wide
The doctors working day and night

[...] Read more

song performed by Leonard Cohen
Added by Lucian Velea
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The Secret Whisky Cure

’Tis no tale of heroism, ’tis no tale of storm and strife,
But of ordinary boozing, and of dull domestic life—
Of the everlasting friction that most husbands must endure—
Tale of nagging and of drinking—and a secret whisky cure.
Name of Jones—perhaps you know him—small house-agent here in town—
(Friend of Smith, you know him also—likewise Robinson and Brown),
Just a hopeless little husband, whose deep sorrows were obscure,
And a bitter nagging Missis—and death seemed the only cure.

’Twas a common sordid marriage, and there’s little new to tell—
Save the pub to him was Heaven and his own home was a hell:
With the office in between them—purgatory to be sure—
And, as far as Jones could make out—well, there wasn’t any cure.

’Twas drink and nag—or nag and drink—whichever you prefer—
Till at last she couldn’t stand him any more than he could her.
Friends and relatives assisted, telling her (with motives pure)
That a legal separation was the only earthly cure.

So she went and saw a lawyer, who, in accents soft and low,
Asked her firstly if her husband had a bank account or no;
But he hadn’t and she hadn’t, they in fact were very poor,
So he bowed her out suggesting she should try some liquor cure.

She saw a drink cure advertised in the Sydney Bulletin—
Cure for brandy, cure for whisky, cure for rum and beer and gin,
And it could be given secret, it was tasteless, swift and sure—
So she purchased half a gallon of that Secret Whisky Cure.

And she put some in his coffee, smiling sweetly all the while,
And he started for the office rather puzzled by the smile—
Smile or frown he’d have a whisky, and you’ll say he was a boor—
But perhaps his wife had given him an overdose of Cure.

And he met a friend he hadn’t seen for seven years or more—
It was just upon the threshold of a private bar-room door—
And they coalised and entered straight away, you may be sure—
But of course they hadn’t reckoned with a Secret Whisky Cure.

Jones, he drank, turned pale, and, gasping, hurried out the back way quick,
Where, to his old chum’s amazement, he was violently sick;
Then they interviewed the landlord, but he swore the drink was pure—
It was only the beginning of the Secret Whisky Cure.

For Jones couldn’t stand the smell of even special whisky blends,
And shunned bar-rooms to the sorrow of his trusty drinking friends:
And they wondered, too, what evil genius had chanced to lure
Him from paths of booze and friendship—never dreaming of a Cure.

[...] Read more

poem by Henry Lawson
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Random things about my Mother

My mother whose eyes were strained
By a sadness that stained her eyes
With grey and blue hue

My mother who never blew
Out candles on a birthday cake

My mother who never knew
The thrills of flying in an airplane

My mother who forever threw
Her pearls to swine

My mother who knew
No contentment in living

My who mother never lived
To be even seventy two

My mother who it is true
Stopped living long before she died

My mother from whose mouth flew
Words of disappointment and fury

My mother whose lips
Tasted bitter tears

My mother sat impatiently
In sorrow through her years

My mother who like Kunta Kinte
Was tamed by Diabets

My mother who was tamed
By my father

My mother who was captured by my father

My mother who fought with my father
The two them struggling false teeth piercing each others flesh

My mother who my father told to go and cook the mint

My mother who would beat us and cause wounds and bruises to our skin

My mother who love to walk about

My mother who gave a toe
A day away

[...] Read more

poem by Fleurette Elaine Harris
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The Cure Of Calumette

Dere's no voyageur on de reever never
run hees canoe d'ecorce
T'roo de roar an' de rush of de rapide, w'ere it
jump lak a beeg w'ite horse,
Dere's no hunter man on de prairie, never
wear w'at you call racquette
Can beat leetle Fader O'Hara, de Curé of
Calumette.

Hees fader is full-blooded Irish, an' hees moder
is pure Canayenne,
Not offen dat stock go tegedder, but she's
fine combination ma frien'
For de Irish he's full of de devil, an' de French
dey got savoir faire,
Dat's mak'it de very good balance an' tak'
you mos' ev'ry w' ere.

But dere' wan t'ing de Curé wont stan' it;
mak' fun of de Irlandais
An' of course de French we say not'ing,
'cos de parish she's all Canayen,
Den you see on account of de moder, he can't
spik hese'f very moche,
So de ole joke she's all out of fashion, an' wan
of dem t'ing we don't touch.

Wall! wan of dat kin' is de Curé, but w'en he
be comin' our place
De peop' on de parish all w'isper, 'How
young he was look on hees face;
Too bad if de wedder she keel heem de firse
tam he got leetle wet,
An' de Bishop might sen' beeger Curé, for it's
purty tough place, Calumette!'

Ha! ha! how I wish I was dere, me, w'en he
go on de mission call
On de shaintee camp way up de reever, drivin'
hees own cariole,
An' he meet blagger' feller been drinkin', jus'
enough mak' heem ack lak fou,
Joe Vadeboncoeur, dey was call heem, an' he's
purty beeg feller too!

Mebbe Joe he don't know it's de Curé, so he's
hollerin', 'Get out de way,
If you don't geev me whole of de roadside,
sapree! you go off on de sleigh.'
But de Curé he never say not'ing, jus' poule

[...] Read more

poem by William Henry Drummond
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Like No Other...Mother

Mother...

Mother, who gave us her heart...her very soul.
Mother, who's understanding never wavered.
Mother, the one who dried our tears.
Mother, she lead us to the path of His Love.
Mother, who washed our cloths and cleaned the house.
Mother, who instilled confidence in her children.
Mother, who walked us to school.
Mother, who loved us like no other.
Mother, who quelled the anger within us.
Mother, who drove us to all our practices.
Mother, who never forgot our special occasions.
Mother, who protected her family, as a lion to a cub.
Mother, who always supported our father.
Mother, who scrimped and saved for our daily needs.
Mother, who was always the last to eat.
Mother, who was always the first to rise.
Mother, who cared for the animals.
Mother, a love that knew no limits.
Mother, who forever placed her family, before herself.
Mother, who was grateful, for every passing acknowledgement.
Mother, whose eyes shined, when she heard the words,
I love you mom.
Mother, who always saw the good in us.
Mother, who always taught us to never, never, give up.
Mother, who instilled in us, to be better.
Mother, who made us believe, we could accomplish anything.
Mother, mother...mother, you were like no other.

Mother, you will always remain, in our
hearts, in our deeds, in our thoughts,
in our lives and in our prayers.

Surely, beyond the stars, there's a special place for Mothers.

poem by Joe Fazio
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Thurso’s Landing

I
The coast-road was being straightened and repaired again,
A group of men labored at the steep curve
Where it falls from the north to Mill Creek. They scattered and hid
Behind cut banks, except one blond young man
Who stooped over the rock and strolled away smiling
As if he shared a secret joke with the dynamite;
It waited until he had passed back of a boulder,
Then split its rock cage; a yellowish torrent
Of fragments rose up the air and the echoes bumped
From mountain to mountain. The men returned slowly
And took up their dropped tools, while a banner of dust
Waved over the gorge on the northwest wind, very high
Above the heads of the forest.
Some distance west of the road,
On the promontory above the triangle
Of glittering ocean that fills the gorge-mouth,
A woman and a lame man from the farm below
Had been watching, and turned to go down the hill. The young
woman looked back,
Widening her violet eyes under the shade of her hand. 'I think
they'll blast again in a minute.'
And the man: 'I wish they'd let the poor old road be. I don't
like improvements.' 'Why not?' 'They bring in the world;
We're well without it.' His lameness gave him some look of age
but he was young too; tall and thin-faced,
With a high wavering nose. 'Isn't he amusing,' she said, 'that
boy Rick Armstrong, the dynamite man,
How slowly he walks away after he lights the fuse. He loves to
show off. Reave likes him, too,'
She added; and they clambered down the path in the rock-face,
little dark specks
Between the great headland rock and the bright blue sea.

II
The road-workers had made their camp
North of this headland, where the sea-cliff was broken down and
sloped to a cove. The violet-eyed woman's husband,
Reave Thurso, rode down the slope to the camp in the gorgeous
autumn sundown, his hired man Johnny Luna
Riding behind him. The road-men had just quit work and four
or five were bathing in the purple surf-edge,
The others talked by the tents; blue smoke fragrant with food
and oak-wood drifted from the cabin stove-pipe
And slowly went fainting up the vast hill.
Thurso drew rein by
a group of men at a tent door
And frowned at them without speaking, square-shouldered and
heavy-jawed, too heavy with strength for so young a man,
He chose one of the men with his eyes. 'You're Danny Woodruff,

[...] Read more

poem by Robinson Jeffers
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Mother...

Mother, who gave us her heart...her very soul.
Mother, who's understanding never wavered.
Mother, the one who dried our tears.
Mother, she lead us to the path of His Love.
Mother, who washed our cloths and cleaned the house.
Mother, who instilled confidence in her children.
Mother, who walked us to school.
Mother, who loved us like no other.
Mother, who quelled the anger within us.
Mother, who drove us to all our practices.
Mother, who never forgot our special occasions.
Mother, who protected her family, as a lion to a cub.
Mother, who always supported our father.
Mother, who scrimped and saved for our daily needs.
Mother, who was always the last to eat.
Mother, who was always the first to rise.
Mother, who cared for the animals.
Mother, a love that knew no limits.
Mother, who forever placed her family, before herself.
Mother, who was grateful, for every passing acknowledgement.
Mother, whose eyes shined, when she heard the words,
I love you mom.
Mother, who always saw the good in us.
Mother, who always taught us to never, never, give up.
Mother, who instilled in us, to be better.
Mother, who made us believe, we could accomplish anything.
Mother, mother...mother, you were like no other.

Mother, you will always remain, in our
hearts, in our deeds, in our thoughts,
in our lives and in our prayers.

Surely, beyond the stars, there's a special place for Mothers.

poem by Joe Fazio
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Mother...This ones' For You...

Mother, who gave us her heart...her very soul.
Mother, who's understanding never wavered.
Mother, the one who dried our tears.
Mother, she lead us to the path of His Love.
Mother, who washed our cloths and cleaned the house.
Mother, who instilled confidence in her children.
Mother, who walked us to school.
Mother, who loved us like no other.
Mother, who quelled the anger within us.
Mother, who drove us to all our practices.
Mother, who never forgot our special occasions.
Mother, who protected her family, as a lion to a cub.
Mother, who always supported our father.
Mother, who scrimped and saved for our daily needs.
Mother, who was always the last to eat.
Mother, who was always the first to rise.
Mother, who cared for the animals.
Mother, a love that knew no limits.
Mother, who forever placed her family, before herself.
Mother, who was grateful, for every passing acknowledgement.
Mother, whose eyes shined, when she heard the words,
I love you mom.
Mother, who always saw the good in us.
Mother, who always taught us to never, never, give up.
Mother, who instilled in us, to be better.
Mother, who made us believe, we could accomplish anything.
Mother, mother...mother, you were like no other.

Mother, you will always remain, in our
hearts, in our deeds, in our thoughts,
in our lives and in our prayers.

Surely, beyond the stars, there's a special place for Mothers.

poem by Joe Fazio
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Mother In Law

(a. toussaint)
Mother in law, mother in law
Mother in law, mother in law
The worst person I know
Mother in law, mother in law
She worries me so
Mother in law, mother in law
If she leaves us alone
We could have a happy home
Sent from down below
Mother in law, mother in law
Mother in law, mother in law
Satan should be her name
Mother in law, mother in law
To me theyre about the same
Mother in law, mother in law
Everytime I open my mouth
Steps in trying to put me out
How could you stood so low
Mother in law, mother in law
Mother in law, mother in law
Come home with my pay
Mother in law, mother in law
She asks me what I made
Mother in law, mother in law
She thinks her advice is a contribution
If she would leave that would be the solution
Dont come back no more
Mother in law, mother in law
Mother in law, mother in law....

song performed by Huey Lewis And The News
Added by Lucian Velea
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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,—

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Rose Mary

Of her two fights with the Beryl-stone
Lost the first, but the second won.

PART I

“MARY mine that art Mary's Rose
Come in to me from the garden-close.
The sun sinks fast with the rising dew,
And we marked not how the faint moon grew;
But the hidden stars are calling you.
“Tall Rose Mary, come to my side,
And read the stars if you'd be a bride.
In hours whose need was not your own,
While you were a young maid yet ungrown
You've read the stars in the Beryl-stone.
“Daughter, once more I bid you read;
But now let it be for your own need:
Because to-morrow, at break of day,
To Holy Cross he rides on his way,
Your knight Sir James of Heronhaye.
“Ere he wed you, flower of mine,
For a heavy shrift he seeks the shrine.
Now hark to my words and do not fear;
Ill news next I have for your ear;
But be you strong, and our help is here.
“On his road, as the rumour's rife,
An ambush waits to take his life.
He needs will go, and will go alone;
Where the peril lurks may not be known;
But in this glass all things are shown.”
Pale Rose Mary sank to the floor:—
“The night will come if the day is o'er!”
“Nay, heaven takes counsel, star with star,
And help shall reach your heart from afar:
A bride you'll be, as a maid you are.”
The lady unbound her jewelled zone
And drew from her robe the Beryl-stone.
Shaped it was to a shadowy sphere,—
World of our world, the sun's compeer,
That bears and buries the toiling year.
With shuddering light 'twas stirred and strewn
Like the cloud-nest of the wading moon:
Freaked it was as the bubble's ball,
Rainbow-hued through a misty pall
Like the middle light of the waterfall.
Shadows dwelt in its teeming girth
Of the known and unknown things of earth;
The cloud above and the wave around,—
The central fire at the sphere's heart bound,
Like doomsday prisoned underground.

[...] Read more

poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
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Oh! My Mama, Happy Mother's Day!

Oh! My mama, happy mother’s day
You are the greatest mother I have ever had
You are my mother today
You will be my mother tomorrow
You are always my mother
You will forever be my mother

Thank you my mother for bringing me into this world
Thank you my mother for taking care of me in your womb
Thank you my mother caring for me as a toddler
Thank you my mother for feeding me since I was a baby
Thank you my mother for all the clothes you bought for me
Thank you my mother for teaching me good manners at home

Thank you my mother for sending me to school
Thank you my mother for supervising my homework
Thank you my mother for ensuring I eat before going to school
Thank you my mother for all the regular pocket money
Thank you my mother for liking my friends
Thank you my mother for all the everyday advices

My mother always remind me that fingers are not equal
As I grow up, I have seen the correlation of this analogy
To many human beings, neighbors, societies and nationalities
Oh! My mama, thank you for your words of wisdom
My mother taught me many things that I have never read in books
Thank you my mother for all your guiding philosophies

Oh! My mama, I sincerely wish everyday could be Mother’s Day
One day in a year is not enough to thank my wonderful mother
Oh! My mama, I will forever be your child
Oh! My mama, you will eternally be my mother
Thank you my mother for being my best friend
Thank you my mother for being my trusted adviser
I honestly wish you HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY!

poem by Julius Babarinsa
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Oh! My Mama, Happy Mother's Day!

Oh! My mama, happy mother's day
You are the greatest mother I have ever had
You are my mother today
You will be my mother tomorrow
You are always my mother
You will forever be my mother

Thank you my mother for bringing me into this world
Thank you my mother for taking care of me in your womb
Thank you my mother caring for me as a toddler
Thank you my mother for feeding me since I was a baby
Thank you my mother for all the clothes you bought for me
Thank you my mother for teaching me good manners at home

Thank you my mother for sending me to school
Thank you my mother for supervising my homework
Thank you my mother for ensuring I eat before going to school
Thank you my mother for all the regular pocket money
Thank you my mother for liking my friends
Thank you my mother for all the everyday advices

My mother always remind me that fingers are not equal
As I grow up, I have seen the correlation of this analogy
To many human beings, neighbors, societies and nationalities
Oh! My mama, thank you for your words of wisdom
My mother taught me many things that I have never read in books
Thank you my mother for all your guiding philosophies

Oh! My mama, I sincerely wish everyday could be Mother's Day
One day in a year is not enough to thank my wonderful mother
Oh! My mama, I will forever be your child
Oh! My mama, you will eternally be my mother
Thank you my mother for being my best friend
Thank you my mother for being my trusted adviser
I honestly wish you HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!

poem by Bikramjyoti Kashyop
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The Victories Of Love. Book I

I
From Frederick Graham

Mother, I smile at your alarms!
I own, indeed, my Cousin's charms,
But, like all nursery maladies,
Love is not badly taken twice.
Have you forgotten Charlotte Hayes,
My playmate in the pleasant days
At Knatchley, and her sister, Anne,
The twins, so made on the same plan,
That one wore blue, the other white,
To mark them to their father's sight;
And how, at Knatchley harvesting,
You bade me kiss her in the ring,
Like Anne and all the others? You,
That never of my sickness knew,
Will laugh, yet had I the disease,
And gravely, if the signs are these:

As, ere the Spring has any power,
The almond branch all turns to flower,
Though not a leaf is out, so she
The bloom of life provoked in me;
And, hard till then and selfish, I
Was thenceforth nought but sanctity
And service: life was mere delight
In being wholly good and right,
As she was; just, without a slur;
Honouring myself no less than her;
Obeying, in the loneliest place,
Ev'n to the slightest gesture, grace
Assured that one so fair, so true,
He only served that was so too.
For me, hence weak towards the weak,
No more the unnested blackbird's shriek
Startled the light-leaved wood; on high
Wander'd the gadding butterfly,
Unscared by my flung cap; the bee,
Rifling the hollyhock in glee,
Was no more trapp'd with his own flower,
And for his honey slain. Her power,
From great things even to the grass
Through which the unfenced footways pass,
Was law, and that which keeps the law,
Cherubic gaiety and awe;
Day was her doing, and the lark
Had reason for his song; the dark
In anagram innumerous spelt
Her name with stars that throbb'd and felt;

[...] Read more

poem by Coventry Patmore
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The Interpretation of Nature and

I.

MAN, being the servant and interpreter of Nature, can do and understand so much and so much only as he has observed in fact or in thought of the course of nature: beyond this he neither knows anything nor can do anything.


II.

Neither the naked hand nor the understanding left to itself can effect much. It is by instruments and helps that the work is done, which are as much wanted for the understanding as for the hand. And as the instruments of the hand either give motion or guide it, so the instruments of the mind supply either suggestions for the understanding or cautions.

III.

Human knowledge and human power meet in one; for where the cause is not known the effect cannot be produced. Nature to be commanded must be obeyed; and that which in contemplation is as the cause is in operation as the rule.

IV.

Towards the effecting of works, all that man can do is to put together or put asunder natural bodies. The rest is done by nature working within.

V.

The study of nature with a view to works is engaged in by the mechanic, the mathematician, the physician, the alchemist, and the magician; but by all (as things now are) with slight endeavour and scanty success.

VI.

It would be an unsound fancy and self-contradictory to expect that things which have never yet been done can be done except by means which have never yet been tried.

VII.

The productions of the mind and hand seem very numerous in books and manufactures. But all this variety lies in an exquisite subtlety and derivations from a few things already known; not in the number of axioms.

VIII.

Moreover the works already known are due to chance and experiment rather than to sciences; for the sciences we now possess are merely systems for the nice ordering and setting forth of things already invented; not methods of invention or directions for new works.

IX.

The cause and root of nearly all evils in the sciences is this -- that while we falsely admire and extol the powers of the human mind we neglect to seek for its true helps.

X.

The subtlety of nature is greater many times over than the subtlety of the senses and understanding; so that all those specious meditations, speculations, and glosses in which men indulge are quite from the purpose, only there is no one by to observe it.

XI.

As the sciences which we now have do not help us in finding out new works, so neither does the logic which we now have help us in finding out new sciences.

XII.

The logic now in use serves rather to fix and give stability to the errors which have their foundation in commonly received notions than to help the search after truth. So it does more harm than good.

XIII.

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poem by Sir Francis Bacon
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Song of Wink Star

The Song of Wink Star
a happy story for children of all ages
story and text © Raj Arumugam, June 2008

☼ ☼

☼ Preamble

Come…children all, children of all ages…sit close and listen…
Come and listen to this happy story of the stars and of life…
Come children of the universe, children of all nations and of all races, and of all climates and of all kinds of space and dimensions and universes…
Come, dearest children of all beings of the living universe, come and listen to The Song of Wink Star…

Come and listen to this story, this happy story…listen, as the story itself sings to you…

Sit close then, and listen to the story that was not made by any, or written by a poet, or fashioned by grandfathers and grandmothers warming themselves at the fire of burning stars…

O dearest children all, come and listen to the story that lives
of itself, and that glows bright and happy….

Come…children all, children of all ages, come and listen to this happy story, the story so natural and smooth as life, as it sings itself to you….

☼ The Song of Wink Star
a happy story for children of all ages

☼ 1

Night Child, always so light and gentle, slept on a flower.
And every night, before he went to sleep, he would look up at the sky.
He would look at the eastern corner, five o’clock.

And there he would see all the stars in near and distant galaxies that were only visible to the People of Star Eyes.

Night Child was one of the People of Star Eyes. And so he could see the stars. And of all the stars he could see, he loved to watch Wink Star.

Wink Star twinkled and winked and laughed.
Every night Wink Star did that. Winked and laughed.

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poem by Raj Arumugam
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The mother and the artist

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of wonderfully emollient freshness; every
unfurling instant of impregnably magnificent existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of spellbindingly undefeated innocence; every
unfurling instant of symbiotically pristine existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of timelessly unconquerable truth; every unfurling
instant of bounteously magnanimous existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of unfathomably unfettered creativity; every
unfurling instant of timelessly burgeoning existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of royally triumphant resplendence; every
unfurling instant of unconquerably majestic existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of eternally exhilarating vivaciousness; every
unfurling instant of redolently insuperable existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of unbelievably ameliorating optimism; every
unfurling instant of marvelously benign existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of brilliantly liberated camaraderie; every
unfurling instant of iridescently inscrutable existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of unshakably virgin righteousness; every
unfurling instant of beautifully untainted existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of uninhibitedly heavenly frolic; every unfurling
instant of tantalizingly sensuous existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of compassionately humanitarian friendship; every
unfurling instant of magically mitigating existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of miraculously everlasting freshness; every
unfurling instant of invincibly coalescing existence,

A mother might bear just a single child in 9 months; but an artist blossoms
into an infinite children of pricelessly ubiquitous oneness; every unfurling

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poem by Nikhil Parekh
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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!

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