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If two wrongs don't make a right, try three.

quote by Laurence J. Peter
Added by Lucian Velea
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Ballad Of Jesus Of Nazareth

I.

It matters not what place he drew
At first life's mortal breath,
Some say it was in Bethlehem,
And some in Nazareth.
But shame and sorrow were his lot
And shameful was his death.

The angels sang, and o'er the barn
Wherein the infant lay,
They hung a star, for they foresaw
The sad world's better day,
But well God knew what thyme and rue
Were planted by his way.

The children of the Pharisees
In hymn and orison
Worshipped the prophets, whom their sires
To cruel death had done,
And said, 'had we been there their death
We had not looked upon.'

While the star shone the angels saw
The tombs these children built
For those the world had driven out,
And smitten to the hilt,
God knew these wretched sons would bear
The self-same bloody guilt.

Always had he who strives for men
But done some other thing,
If he had not led a hermit life,
Or had not had his fling,
We would have followed him, they say,
And made him lord and King.

For John was clothed in camel's hair
And lived among the brutes;
But Jesus fared where the feast was spread
To the sound of shawms and lutes,
Where gathered knaves and publicans
And hapless prostitutes.

Like children in the market place
Who sullen sat and heard,
With John they would not mourn, nor yet
Rejoice at Jesus' word;
Had Jesus mourned, or John rejoiced,
He had been King and lord.

[...] Read more

poem by Edgar Lee Masters
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The Cenci : A Tragedy In Five Acts

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

Count Francesco Cenci.
Giacomo, his Son.
Bernardo, his Son.
Cardinal Camillo.
Orsino, a Prelate.
Savella, the Pope's Legate.
Olimpio, Assassin.
Marzio, Assassin.
Andrea, Servant to Cenci.
Nobles, Judges, Guards, Servants.
Lucretia, Wife of Cenci, and Step-mother of his children.
Beatrice, his Daughter.

The Scene lies principally in Rome, but changes during the Fourth Act to Petrella, a castle among the Apulian Apennines.
Time. During the Pontificate of Clement VIII.

ACT I

Scene I.
-An Apartment in the Cenci Palace.
Enter Count Cenci, and Cardinal Camillo.

Camillo.
That matter of the murder is hushed up
If you consent to yield his Holiness
Your fief that lies beyond the Pincian gate.-
It needed all my interest in the conclave
To bend him to this point: he said that you
Bought perilous impunity with your gold;
That crimes like yours if once or twice compounded
Enriched the Church, and respited from hell
An erring soul which might repent and live:-
But that the glory and the interest
Of the high throne he fills, little consist
With making it a daily mart of guilt
As manifold and hideous as the deeds
Which you scarce hide from men's revolted eyes.

Cenci.
The third of my possessions-let it go!
Ay, I once heard the nephew of the Pope
Had sent his architect to view the ground,
Meaning to build a villa on my vines
The next time I compounded with his uncle:
I little thought he should outwit me so!

[...] Read more

poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Rearview

Ohhh.. Ohh..
I use to tell myself that you would wait
I borrowed time for two and I twisted fate
I left us floating in the air for wind to hold on to
It let me down it let you go
I drive around like everything's okay
And I feel the lightening in our own mistakes
And I was gonna tell you
I wish all our wrongs could be right
I'm too late
I looked in my rearview
And now I don't see you
Sometimes the things you want are hard to take
Sometimes the ones you love are risks you don't make, yeah
The dust has settled into nothingness
and I yearn for yesterday
Just look around
I'm still the same
I drive around like everything's okay
like everything's okay
And I feel the lightening in our own mistakes
and I was gonna tell you
I wish all our wrongs could be right
I'm too late
I looked in my rearview
And now I don't see you
So many things that we didn't say
So many reasons the world's not the same
Oh, it's not the same
I drive around like nothing's here has changed
But I know the sky has one more cloud to break
And I was gonna tell you
I wish all our wrongs could be right
I'm too late
I looked in my rearview
And now I don't see you
I said I
I drive and everything has changed
ohh..
and I feel the lightening it's in my own mistakes
and I was gonna tell you
I wish all our wrongs could be right
I'm too late
I looked in my rearview
and now I don't see you
I used to tell myself
that you
would wait

song performed by Anastacia
Added by Lucian Velea
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Speed Of Light

The speed of light slows down
As the feather hits the ground
And if nothing else gets proved
Its always faster than it sounds
A star that shines so bright
Would be eclipsed tonight
When you kiss the satellite
Because there was always you
And you alone believed
That light could bend this way
It dont seem right
To spend tonight
As I did today
If I had known that you would call
If I could dream that you would fall
If I could change these wrongs to right
I would have stayed at home tonight
Theres nothing you can do
To make this all brand new
And nothing you can say
To make it go away
Youve never been so wrong
So how can you act strong
When a fall from grace so hard
Should never take so long
And sat goodbye as you did today
If I had known that you would call
If I could dream that you would fall
If I could change these wrongs to right
I would have stayed at home tonight
So the speed of light remains
Ever constantly the same
Again tonight as it today
If I had known that you would call
If I could dream that you would fall
If I could change these wrongs to right
I would have stayed at home tonight
If I had known that you would call
If I could dream that you would fall
If I could change these wrongs to right
I would have stayed at home tonight

song performed by Omd
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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

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poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Princess (part 5)

Now, scarce three paces measured from the mound,
We stumbled on a stationary voice,
And 'Stand, who goes?' 'Two from the palace' I.
'The second two: they wait,' he said, 'pass on;
His Highness wakes:' and one, that clashed in arms,
By glimmering lanes and walls of canvas led
Threading the soldier-city, till we heard
The drowsy folds of our great ensign shake
From blazoned lions o'er the imperial tent
Whispers of war.
Entering, the sudden light
Dazed me half-blind: I stood and seemed to hear,
As in a poplar grove when a light wind wakes
A lisping of the innumerous leaf and dies,
Each hissing in his neighbour's ear; and then
A strangled titter, out of which there brake
On all sides, clamouring etiquette to death,
Unmeasured mirth; while now the two old kings
Began to wag their baldness up and down,
The fresh young captains flashed their glittering teeth,
The huge bush-bearded Barons heaved and blew,
And slain with laughter rolled the gilded Squire.

At length my Sire, his rough cheek wet with tears,
Panted from weary sides 'King, you are free!
We did but keep you surety for our son,
If this be he,--or a dragged mawkin, thou,
That tends to her bristled grunters in the sludge:'
For I was drenched with ooze, and torn with briers,
More crumpled than a poppy from the sheath,
And all one rag, disprinced from head to heel.
Then some one sent beneath his vaulted palm
A whispered jest to some one near him, 'Look,
He has been among his shadows.' 'Satan take
The old women and their shadows! (thus the King
Roared) make yourself a man to fight with men.
Go: Cyril told us all.'
As boys that slink
From ferule and the trespass-chiding eye,
Away we stole, and transient in a trice
From what was left of faded woman-slough
To sheathing splendours and the golden scale
Of harness, issued in the sun, that now
Leapt from the dewy shoulders of the Earth,
And hit the Northern hills. Here Cyril met us.
A little shy at first, but by and by
We twain, with mutual pardon asked and given
For stroke and song, resoldered peace, whereon
Followed his tale. Amazed he fled away
Through the dark land, and later in the night

[...] Read more

poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson
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Vive Anarchy

With the lifting of the curtain,
Distance, dim, but grimly certain,
Breaks my vision of a city, populous and great,
To my senses, sorrow-sated,
Senses sad and satiated, Faintly comes the thunder peal of treasured wrong and hate
Broken down,
Beaten down,
By awakened people and the iron arm of Fate.
Pallid forms, by famine shrunken,
Helots, harlots, ribald, drunken,
Wine and blood-wet, onward thro' the torchlit highways sweep,
Through a city disunited,
Through a city flame ignited,
To the sound of song and trumpet and the cannon's deep
Distant boom,
Through the gloom,
While the fire fiends madly leaps from tower to temple steep.

Reinforced from slum and alley,
By this wild and weird reveille,
Pours the army of the people where their banners drape,
In a city barricaded,
In a city fusilladed
By the deadly rifle and the Gatling and the grape,
Crashing down,
Smashing down
Lanes and alleys filthy, and the foul abode of rape.

Tyrants flee and cowards falter-,
For a lamp-post and a halter
Wait for every tyrant at the corner of the street,
In the hour of retribution,
In the night of revolution,
When on common ground the tyrant and the helot meet,
Endless wrongs,
Countless wrongs,
Burning in the helot's bosom - fanned to fever heat.

Let the tyrant beg no pity-
His the palace, his the city,
His the silken raiment and the costly food and wine;
Ours the forms emaciated,
Of the women violated,
Ours the endless torture in the workshop and the mine;
Hunted down,
Hounded down
To the level of the felon and the concubine.

By our women fever-stricken,
Where the foetid odours thicken

[...] Read more

poem by Edwin James Brady
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The Labour Agitator

LET the liar call me liar,
And the robber call me thief.
They can only fan the fire
That is born of my belief.
While I’m speaking, while I’m writing,
To reform the wrongful laws,
Well I know that I am fighting
For the grand old Cause.

See the army of the rebels
Marching on for evermore.
We are countless as the pebbles
That are strewn along the shore.
Agitating, agitating,
Till the Truth has sealed the fate
Of the wrongs that I am hating
With the grand old Hate.

Though no battle banner rustles
In a smoke that blurs the blue,
As when “heroes” poured from Brussels
To the field of Waterloo,
Though we do not hear the rattle
Of the rifles in the wars,
There is glory in the battle
For the grand old Cause.

See the army of the rebels
Marching on for evermore.
We are countless as the pebbles
That are strewn along the shore.
Agitating, agitating,
Till the Truth has sealed the fate
Of the wrongs that I am hating
With the grand old Hate.

No! I look not to the reaping
In the dynasty of men,
For I know that I’ll be sleeping
In a slandered grave e’er then.
Till his right to man is given
We’ll rebel, and we’ll rebel
As we would rebel in heaven
If it proved a hell.

See the army of the rebels
Marching on for evermore.
We are countless as the pebbles

[...] Read more

poem by Henry Lawson
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The Fight at Eureka Stockade

"Was I at Eureka?" His figure was drawn to a youthful height,
And a flood of proud recollections made the fire in his grey eyes bright;
With pleasure they lighted and glisten'd, tho' the digger was grizzled and old,
And we gathered about him and listen'd while the tale of Eureka he told.

"Ah, those were the days," said the digger, "twas a glorious life that we led,
When fortunes were dug up and lost in a day in the whirl of the years that are dead.
But there's many a veteran now in the land - old knights of the pick and the spade,
Who could tell you in language far stronger than mine 'bout the fight at Eureka Stockade.

"We were all of us young on the diggings in days when the nation had birth -
Light-hearted, and careless, and happy, and the flower of all nations on earth;
But we would have been peaceful an' quiet if the law had but let us alone;
And the fight - let them call it a riot - was due to no fault of our own.

"The creed of our rulers was narrow - they ruled with a merciless hand,
For the mark of the cursed broad arrow was deep in the heart of the land.
They treated us worse than the negroes were treated in slavery's day -
And justice was not for the diggers, as shown by the Bently affray.

"P'r'aps Bently was wrong. If he wasn't the bloodthirsty villain they said,
He was one of the jackals that gather where the carcass of labour is laid.
'Twas b'lieved that he murdered a digger, and they let him off scot-free as well,
And the beacon o' battle was lighted on the night that we burnt his hotel.

"You may talk as you like, but the facts are the same (as you've often been told),
And how could we pay when the license cost more than the worth of the gold?
We heard in the sunlight the clanking o' chains in the hillocks of clay,
And our mates, they were rounded like cattle an' handcuffed an' driven away.

"The troopers were most of them new-chums, with many a gentleman's son;
And ridin' on horseback was easy, and hunting the diggers was fun.
Why, many poor devils who came from the vessel in rags and down-heeled,
Were copped, if they hadn't their license, before they set foot on the field.

"But they roused the hot blood that was in us, and the cry came to roll up at last;
And I tell you that something had got to be done when the diggers rolled up in the past.
Yet they say that in spite o' the talkin' it all might have ended in smoke,
But just at the point o' the crisis, the voice of a quiet man spoke.

" `We have said all our say and it's useless, you must fight or be slaves!' said the voice;
" `If it's fight, and you're wanting a leader, I will lead to the end - take your choice!'
I looked, it was Pete! Peter Lalor! who stood with his face to the skies,
But his figure seemed nobler and taller, and brighter the light of his eyes.

"The blood to his forehead was rushin' as hot as the words from his mouth;
He had come from the wrongs of the old land to see those same wrongs in the South;
The wrongs that had followed our flight from the land where the life of the worker was spoiled.
Still tyranny followed! no wonder the blood of the Irishman boiled.

[...] Read more

poem by Henry Lawson
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We so Great

we so great
we all want
to be somebody
seeking him
in the moon,
in the star,
in the sun

we so great
we all want
to be somebody
seeking him
till the ends
of the universe
in ourselves,
in friends and foes
in the almighty,
we so great
we all want
to be somebody
some do it right
some do it half right
some just plain all wrong -
not an echo of themselves
we so great
we all want
to be somebody
despite all the odds
the rights learn
from half rights
and the wrongs learn
from all wrongs
we so great
we get the world going
with all the rights
wrongs, half rights
and half wrongs

poem by John Tiong Chunghoo
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You and I...Could Give Love One More Try

How many wrongs have you known before?
How many times have you said,
No more to love.
And it was love you needed?

How many wrongs have you known before?
How many times have you said,
No more to love.
And it was love you needed?

I've been there myself as well.
I have said to 'go to hell' and cried!
Inside I knew I lied.
I wanted to die!

How many wrongs have you known before?
How many lies had you heard...
Before the door you opened closed,
And you stood there to pace the floor.
Feeling never you would ever trust again?
I have been there before.
And will again,
I'm sure.
Since I know I understand your heart!

How many wrongs have you known before?
How many times have you said,
No more to love.
And it was love you needed?

I've been there myself as well.
I have said to 'go to hell' and cried!
Inside I knew I lied.
I wanted to die!
But you and I...
Could give love,
One more try!

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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As long as the world shall last there will be wrongs, and if no man objected and no man rebelled, those wrongs would last forever. The objector and the rebel who raises his voice against what he believes to be the injustice of the present and the wrongs of the past is the one who hunches the world along.

quote by Clarence Darrow
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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In My Lifetime

[jay-z]
It's the thought of a ride that make my eyes wide, i'm caught up
I'm trying to make, all of my dreams materialize, so i sorta
Say my goodbyes to the straight and narrow
I found a new route, you bout to see my life change
I make the means justify the ends, i make the cream
Materialize keys to a benz, and so i'm rollin
For now, holdin down the fort, who's controllin?
The ground's gotta blow em, yep, y'all shoulda told em
Uhh, my first felony's approachin, copped my first key
Took a freeze, now i'm frozen
I bought a black mac, i'm outta control
Losin bankrolls on blackjack, you gotta know
It always crossed my mind that feds be tappin the lines like gregory hines
Still on the phone discussin my biz like it could never be mines
I know the price, know the risk, know the wrongs, and the rights
Still my blood flows ice, it's just my life
Chorus:
What's the meaning, what's the meaning of life?
*scratched "in my lifetime"*
What's the meaning, what's the meaning of life?
*scratched "in my lifetime"*
[jay-z]
I'm like the bass with the ass, splashin cold cash
The big willie get you chilly when i pass, brrrrrr
Is it, just a mirage all these girls thankin god
Is this, world my world, am i the star of stars?
Baby pimped out, i'm gettin too large and smokin cigars
All chicks is hollerin bout chica, the whole city's buzzin
Wasn't checkin for me a dozen or so, months ago
Now i'm all they know, i'm a person
Lettin the cristal's breathe at the barnacle bar
Under my sleeve, vernacular, 50 g's
I'm talkin big cheese, you gotta be down to dig these, uhh
Give me a rush like you wouldn't believe, my head's about to bust
Acceleratin what drives me, hope i don't gotta die
To see, see i can't lie to me
I know the price, know the risk, know the wrongs and the rights
Still my blood flows ice, it's just my life
Chorus 2x
[jay-z]
Uhh, from the beginning see we never seen the ending
Running up in all the women, all the linen, all the jewels, huh
We sported pele's, gold diamonds and pirelli's
Sports cars, the good life'll give you a belly but that's cool
As i, zone in the al capone, watch me
Cause the medusa's head on versace turned me to stone
Now my poems just ain't poems, they bloody, when i recite em
Bones get disconnected like the phones
Now, i'm a hardened criminal with game

[...] Read more

song performed by Jay-Z
Added by Lucian Velea
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Easier

I woke up early
And I can't see the light
My back is broad but
It's been a long and lonely night
What if I'm a fool for even trying
To right the wrongs when all we
had is dying
Like moving shadows
We dance around remains
The burning embers
Illuminate my shame
So yes, I am a fool for even trying
To right the wrongs when all
we had is dying
It's easier to leave
Not to face the pain
With everything to lose
Nothing left to gain
Broken
Empty promises you made
Token
Empty gestures that you made
I am reeling, reeling
Easier to leave
So you walked away With everything to lose
There's nothing left to say
You disappoint me With a Judus kiss
Crown and anoint me
The poison pours from your lips
So yes, I am a fool for even trying
To right the wrongs when ail we had is dying
It's easier to leave
Not to face the pain
With everything to lose
Nothing left to gain
Broken
Empty promises you made
Token
Empty gestures that you made
I am reeling, reeling
Easier to leave
So you walked away With everything to lose
There's nothing left to say
Broken
Empty Promises you gave
Token
Empty gestures that yov made
Unspoken
did you ever mean to stay
I am reeling, reeling

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song performed by Lisa Stansfield
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Grand Ole Opry Song

Come and listen to my story if you will Im gonna tell
About a gang of fellers from down at nashville
First Ill start with old red foley doin the chattanooga shoe
We cant forget hank williams with them good old lovesick blues
Its time for roy acuff to go to memphis on his train
With minnie pearl and rod brasfield and lazy jim day
Turn on all your radios I know that you will wait
Hear little jimmy dickens sing take an old cold tater and wait
Therell be guitars and fiddles, earl scruggs and his banjo too
Bill monroe singing em the honky tonky blues
Ernest tubbs number two wrongs wont make a right
At the grand ole opry evry saturday night
There was uncle dave macon his gold tooth and plug-hat
Cowboy copas singing tragic romance
Signed sealed and delivered with sam and kirk mcgee
And the master of ceremony was mr. george d. hays
There was lonzo and oscar a-poppin bubble gum
George morgan singin candy kisses yum yum
Got a hole in my bucket bringin in that georgia mill
Well sing the sunny side of the mountain and dance to the chicken reel
Therell be guitars and fiddles and banjo pickin too
Bill monroe singin em the honky tonky blues
Ernest tubbs number too wrongs wont make a right
At the grand ole opry evry saturday night
You can talk about your singers in all kinds of way
But none could sing the old songs like bradley kincaid
With his old hound dog guitar and the famous blue tail fly
Stringbean with hank snow and old fiddlin chubby wise
Therell be guitars and fiddles, earl scruggs and his banjo too
Bill monroe singin em the honky tonky blues
Ernest tubbs number two wrongs dont make a right
At the grand ole opry evry saturday night

song performed by Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
Added by Lucian Velea
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Heart Of Stone

All the blood in their souls pour out,
look for something in the dark
Blinded they find nothing
another lust given in,
another trust shut within
Listen to him speak so holy,
father God, I'm saved
That's fall that matters let the rest burn in hell
Preach false,
a sin is a sin,
doesn't give you the right to condemn then to hell
they know their wrongs you don't have to tell them their faults
Once you were a sinner
how would you like it
if someone laughed at you because of your wrongs?
I'm not here to accept their sings
but I'm here to show them love within
Listen to him speak so holy, Father God I'm saved
That's all that really matters let the rest burn in hell.
No Matter how hard you try
you can't convince me that you represent Christ
No more, I'm fed up with this... you've already killed too many souls
It's time you wake up and see the truth Christian,
I stand no afraid of my beliefs
Learn to love your enemies,
to open their eyes you must be willing to die
Look at your own wrongs before you look at someone else's
You want to save souls or put souls to death
Giving our savior a bad name,
giving me a bad name
You're so wrong with your beliefs,
sit in church every week,
but never do you help the weak
This is time to take back what's ours,
not to give the world what's ours
Don't you want to see everyone saved
or just yourself with a river of blood on your hands?

song performed by Underoath
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!

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

I.

I stood in Venice, on the Bridge of Sighs;
A palace and a prison on each hand:
I saw from out the wave her structures rise
As from the stroke of the enchanter’s wand:
A thousand years their cloudy wings expand
Around me, and a dying glory smiles
O’er the far times when many a subject land
Looked to the wingèd Lion’s marble piles,
Where Venice sate in state, throned on her hundred isles!

II.

She looks a sea Cybele, fresh from ocean,
Rising with her tiara of proud towers
At airy distance, with majestic motion,
A ruler of the waters and their powers:
And such she was; her daughters had their dowers
From spoils of nations, and the exhaustless East
Poured in her lap all gems in sparkling showers.
In purple was she robed, and of her feast
Monarchs partook, and deemed their dignity increased.

III.

In Venice, Tasso’s echoes are no more,
And silent rows the songless gondolier;
Her palaces are crumbling to the shore,
And music meets not always now the ear:
Those days are gone - but beauty still is here.
States fall, arts fade - but Nature doth not die,
Nor yet forget how Venice once was dear,
The pleasant place of all festivity,
The revel of the earth, the masque of Italy!

IV.

But unto us she hath a spell beyond
Her name in story, and her long array
Of mighty shadows, whose dim forms despond
Above the dogeless city’s vanished sway;
Ours is a trophy which will not decay
With the Rialto; Shylock and the Moor,
And Pierre, cannot be swept or worn away -
The keystones of the arch! though all were o’er,
For us repeopled were the solitary shore.

V.

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poem by Byron from Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (1818)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Third Monarchy, being the Grecian, beginning under Alexander the Great in the 112. Olympiad.

Great Alexander was wise Philips son,
He to Amyntas, Kings of Macedon;
The cruel proud Olympias was his Mother,
She to Epirus warlike King was daughter.
This Prince (his father by Pausanias slain)
The twenty first of's age began to reign.
Great were the Gifts of nature which he had,
His education much to those did adde:
By art and nature both he was made fit,
To 'complish that which long before was writ.
The very day of his Nativity
To ground was burnt Dianaes Temple high:
An Omen to their near approaching woe,
Whose glory to the earth this king did throw.
His Rule to Greece he scorn'd should be confin'd,
The Universe scarce bound his proud vast mind.
This is the He-Goat which from Grecia came,
That ran in Choler on the Persian Ram,
That brake his horns, that threw him on the ground
To save him from his might no man was found:
Philip on this great Conquest had an eye,
But death did terminate those thoughts so high.
The Greeks had chose him Captain General,
Which honour to his Son did now befall.
(For as Worlds Monarch now we speak not on,
But as the King of little Macedon)
Restless both day and night his heart then was,
His high resolves which way to bring to pass;
Yet for a while in Greece is forc'd to stay,
Which makes each moment seem more then a day.
Thebes and stiff Athens both 'gainst him rebel,
Their mutinies by valour doth he quell.
This done against both right and natures Laws,
His kinsmen put to death, who gave no cause;
That no rebellion in in his absence be,
Nor making Title unto Sovereignty.
And all whom he suspects or fears will climbe,
Now taste of death least they deserv'd in time,
Nor wonder is t if he in blood begin,
For Cruelty was his parental sin,
Thus eased now of troubles and of fears,
Next spring his course to Asia he steers;
Leavs Sage Antipater, at home to sway,
And through the Hellispont his Ships made way.
Coming to Land, his dart on shore he throws,
Then with alacrity he after goes;
And with a bount'ous heart and courage brave,
His little wealth among his Souldiers gave.
And being ask'd what for himself was left,
Reply'd, enough, sith only hope he kept.

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poem by Anne Bradstreet
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Medea in Athens

Dead is he? Yes, our stranger guest said dead--
said it by noonday, when it seemed a thing
most natural and so indifferent
as if the tale ran that a while ago
there died a man I talked with a chance hour
when he by chance was near me. If I spoke
"Good news for us but ill news for the dead
when the gods sweep a villain down to them,"
'twas the prompt trick of words, like a pat phrase
from some one other's song, found on the lips
and used because 'tis there: for through all day
the news seemed neither good nor ill to me.

And now, when day with all its useless talk
and useless smiles and idiots' prying eyes
that impotently peer into one's life,
when day with all its seemly lying shows
has gone its way and left pleased fools to sleep,
while weary mummers, taking off the mask,
discern that face themselves forgot anon
and, sitting in the lap of sheltering night,
learn their own secrets from her--even now
does it seem either good or ill to me?
No, but mere strange.

And this most strange of all
that I care nothing.

Nay, how wild thought grows.
Meseems one came and told of Jason's death:
but 'twas a dream. Else should I, wondering thus,
reck not of him, nor with the virulent hate
that should be mine against mine enemy,
nor with that weakness which sometimes I feared
should this day make me, not remembering Glaucè,
envy him to death as though he had died mine?

Can he be dead? It were so strange a world
with him not in it.

Dimly I recall
some prophecy a god breathed by my mouth.
It could not err. What was it? For I think;--
it told his death¹.

Has a god come to me?
Is it thou, my Hecate? How know I all?
For I know all as if from long ago:
and I know all beholding instantly.
Is not that he, arisen through the mists?--

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poem by Augusta Davies Webster
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