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I had this habit of an academic of answering the question. I should have fobbed it off.

quote by John Hewson
Added by Lucian Velea
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13 Question Method

(chuck berry)
Now, the thirteen question method is the one to use
Listen to me!
Thirteen question method is the one to use
Im saying that the thirteen question method is the one you gotta use
If you wanna have some fun
cause the thirteen question method is the one to use
Uhn!
Question number one: you wanna have fun, uh hun
Question number two: what to do ?
Lets see!
Question number three: wanna go out and eat burger with me ?
God almighty!
For the thirteen question method is the one to use
Now the question number five: dont give me no jive this morning
Question number six: dont try no tricks, this evening
Question number seven: Ill pick you up at a quarter to eleven, baby
And question number eight: its a date
Thats question number nine: where to dine, this evening ?
Question number ten: ah, can we get in ?
Question number eleven: gonna be just like heaven ?
God almighty!
Question number twelve: we get by ourselves ?
cause the thirteen question method is the one to use
The thirteen question method is the one to use
Now the thirteen question method is the one gotta use if you wanna...
The thirteen question method is the one to use
And she says ah...
She says...
The thirteen question method is the one to use
The thirteen question method is the one to use
Now the thirteen question method is the one gotta use if you wanna have some fun
cause the...

song performed by Ry Cooder
Added by Lucian Velea
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Spasmolytic

Kicking the (kickin')...habit (2x)
K... K.. Kicking the...habit (3x)
Making time in a low rent high-rise
Downtown!
Downtown... (11x)
Kicking the...habit (4x)
Kicking the (kickin')...habit (4x)
Downtown (8x)
Swirling tastes phornicate rotted meat (2x)
Rotted meat... (8x)
She sits alone in the worry she's created (2x)
In the worry she's created...
Kicking the...habit (4x)
K...K..Kicking the...habit (2x)
Kicking the...habit (8x)
Kickin the habit (2x)
Kicking the (kickin')...habit
Kickin the habit (2x)
No!

song performed by Deftones
Added by Lucian Velea
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For Them It's Automatic

People lie and they like it...
Just that way.
People lie out of habit,
Like a sport...
To play!

It is in their eyes as if there's something to hide!
And there are those people lieing to defy with denying.
People lie and they like it...
Everyday.
People lie out of habit,
And it's here to stay!

It's in their eyes as if there's something to hide!
And there are those people lieing defying to deny,
They are lieing out of habit since for them it's automatic.
People lie and they like it...
Just that way.
Lieing out of habit since for them it's automatic.

People lie and they like it...
Everyday.
Lieing out of habit since for them it's automatic.
People lie and they like it...
Just that way.
Lieing out of habit since for them it's automatic.

It's in their eyes as if there's something to hide!
Lieing out of habit since for them it's automatic.
People lie and think,
They're in disguise.
And lieing out of habit since for them it's automatic.

People lie and think,
They're in disguise.
And lieing out of habit since for them it's automatic.
And lieing out of habit since for them it's automatic.

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Somethings Gotta Give

(does the noise in my head bother you)
Cyberotic head explode
Information overload
And I just cant take anymore
And Im gonna break
Somethings gotta give
Somethings gotta give
Somethings gotta give
Somethings gotta give
Digerotic mass appeal
Feels like flesh but tastes unreal
And Im gonna break
Somethings gotta give
(answering line)
Somethings gotta give
(answering line)
Somethings gotta give
(answering line)
Somethings gotta give
If love that seemed to fall from grace
Sitting on your interface
Your megahertz she cant forgive
Your love it died before you ever lived
Somethings gotta give
(answering line)
Somethings gotta give
(answering line)
Somethings gotta give
(answering line)
Somethings gotta give

song performed by Aerosmith
Added by Lucian Velea
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Breaking The Habit

Memories concern
Like opening the wound
Im picking me apart again
You all assume
Im safer in my room
Unless I try to start again
I dont want to be the one
Who battles always choose
Cuz inside I realize
That Im the one confused
I dont know whats worth fighting for
Or why I have to scream
I dont know why I instigate
And say what I dont mean
I dont know how I got this way
I know its not alright
So Im breaking the habit
Im breaking the habit tonight
Cultured my cure
I tightly lock the door
I try to catch my breath again
I hurt much more
Than anytime before
I have no options left again
I dont want to be the one
Who battles always choose
Cuz inside I realize
That Im the one confused
I dont know whats worth fighting for
Or why I have to scream
I dont know why I instigate
And say what I dont mean
I dont know how I got this way
Ill never be alright
So, Im breaking the habit
Im breaking the habit tonight
Ill paint it on the walls
Cuz Im the one that falls
Ill never fight again
And this is how it ends
I dont know whats worth fighting for
Or why I have to scream
But now I have some clarity
To show you what I mean
I dont know how I got this way
Ill never be alright
So, Im breaking the habit
Im breaking the habit
Breaking the habit tonight

song performed by Linkin Park
Added by Lucian Velea
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The Answering Machine

We flew here to see you
My feelings and i
I looked down on the city
From up in the sky
The sun was reflecting
From the roofs and the water
Spring had come early
In the parks and the old town
I came with a mission
To patch up a dream
We walked and I talked and my words were absorbed
Into the answering machine
I came two thousand miles
Just to take a look at you
But you were broken and frozen
A heartbreak of a statue
In the bulletproof mirrors where your eyes used to be
I stared at myself and I called for some help
Into the answering machine
The day slipped by and I tried and tried
You took me home and you said goodnight. sleep tight.
On the floor by the bedroom door
I watched you sleep and I left before first light
The bugs dont bite
The bugs dont bite
The bugs bite
From the land of the frozen
To the land of the low
We journeyed together
But we were always alone
So if I should come calling
Best not pick up the phone
Cause Im no good for you and youre no good for me
Let me talk to the answering machine
I can cope with the answering machine
Im a friend of the answering machine

song performed by Marillion
Added by Lucian Velea
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Answering Machine

We flew here to see you
My feelings and I
I looked down on the city
From up in the sky
The sun was reflecting
From the roofs and the water
Spring had come early
In the parks and the old town
I came with a mission
To patch up a dream
We walked and I talked and my words were absorbed
Into the answering machine
I came two thousand miles
Just to take a look at you
But you were broken and frozen
A heartbreak of a statue
In the bullet-proof mirrors
Where your eyes used to be
I stared at myself and I called for some help
Into the answering machine
The day slipped by and I tried and tried
You took me home and you said
"Goodnight, Sleep tight"
On the floor by the bedroom door
I watched you sleep and I left before first light
The bugs don't bite
The bugs don't bite
The bugs bite
From the land of the frozen
To the land of the low
We journeyed together
But we were always alone
So if I should come calling
Best not pick up the phone
Cause I'm no good for you and you're no good for me
Let me talk to the answering machine
I can cope with the answering machine
I'm a friend of the answering machine

song performed by Marillion
Added by Lucian Velea
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Change Of Habit

(words & music by b. kaye - b. weisman)
If youre in old habits
Set in your old ways
Changes are a-comin
For these are changing days
And if your head is in the sand
While things are goin on
What you need, what you need,
What you need is a change of habit
Now if youre in the habit
To let your temper fly
When you talk with people
Who dont see eye to eye
And if you dont believe it
Theres a newer world ahead
What you need, what you need,
What you need is a change of habit
A change of habit, a change of outlook
A change of heart, youll be all right
The halls of darkness
Have doors that open
Its never too late
To see the light
So if youre in the habit
Of putting people down
Just because theyre different
From the wrong side of town
Well, dont count on any medals son
Theyre pinning none on you
What you need, what you need,
What you need is a change of habit

song performed by Elvis Presley
Added by Lucian Velea
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Just Leave Them Like You've Had It

I've got to beat bad habits...
To leave them like I've had it!
Not to pick them up again...
If I do I'll never win.

Beat bad habits...
To leave them like I've had it!
Not to pick them up again...
It is as if I'll never win.

You remind me why I never come home.
Not yet a habit.
You remind me why I turn off my phone.
Not yet a habit.
You remind me why I love to live alone.
But from you it seems I've got to know what's going on!
And that's a habit.

I've got to beat bad habits...
To leave them like I've had it!
Not to pick them up again...
If I do I'll never win.

I've got to free from those bad habits.

Beat bad habits...
I've got to free from bad habits now.
Those habits...
Those ones I want to break but how?

You remind me why I never come home.
Not yet a habit.
You remind me why I turn off my phone.
Not yet a habit.
You remind me why I love to live alone.
But from you it seems I've got to know what's going on!
And that's a habit.

I've got to beat bad habits...
To leave them like I've had it!
Not to pick them up again...
If I do I'll never win.

Beat bad habits...
To leave them like I've had it!
Not to pick them up again...
It is as if I'll never win.

I've got to free from those bad habits.

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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His Answer To My Question Was A Question

His answer to my question
Was a question
My answer to his reply
Was returned
With another question
The game of
Answering and asking
Questions
Did not end
Till I questioned
The very motive
Of our conversation
We came to the conclusion
How to pass time?
Was the biggest question
Asking questions
And creating confusion
Was the answer
So we passed our time
Asking and answering questions
The question now is
Whether we did right or wrong?
The answer is
Why ask a useless question?

poem by Nirantar Dr.Rajendra Tela
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Lara. A Tale

The Serfs are glad through Lara's wide domain,
And slavery half forgets her feudal chain;
He, their unhoped, but unforgotten lord--
The long self-exiled chieftain is restored:
There be bright faces in the busy hall,
Bowls on the board, and banners on the wall;
Far chequering o'er the pictured window, plays
The unwonted fagots' hospitable blaze;
And gay retainers gather round the hearth,
With tongues all loudness, and with eyes all mirth.

II.
The chief of Lara is return'd again:
And why had Lara cross'd the bounding main?
Left by his sire, too young such loss to know,
Lord of himself;--that heritage of woe,
That fearful empire which the human breast
But holds to rob the heart within of rest!--
With none to check, and few to point in time
The thousand paths that slope the way to crime;
Then, when he most required commandment, then
Had Lara's daring boyhood govern'd men.
It skills not, boots not, step by step to trace
His youth through all the mazes of its race;
Short was the course his restlessness had run,
But long enough to leave him half undone.

III.
And Lara left in youth his fatherland;
But from the hour he waved his parting hand
Each trace wax'd fainter of his course, till all
Had nearly ceased his memory to recall.
His sire was dust, his vassals could declare,
'Twas all they knew, that Lara was not there;
Nor sent, nor came he, till conjecture grew
Cold in the many, anxious in the few.
His hall scarce echoes with his wonted name,
His portrait darkens in its fading frame,
Another chief consoled his destined bride,
The young forgot him, and the old had died;
'Yet doth he live!' exclaims the impatient heir,
And sighs for sables which he must not wear.
A hundred scutcheons deck with gloomy grace
The Laras' last and longest dwelling-place;
But one is absent from the mouldering file,
That now were welcome to that Gothic pile.

IV.
He comes at last in sudden loneliness,
And whence they know not, why they need not guess;

[...] Read more

poem by Byron
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The life or death question

You could guess from the crowd
converging on the Memorial Hall
and on a Saturday night, that
the speaker must be world-famed in his field,
making his first visit to the college.

A French scientist of renown –
cognitive theory or some such –
turned Buddhist monk these thirty, forty years,
he carried the blessing and the curse,
the burden of responsibility not only of his vocation
but his fame. The hall was packed.

Serene – ‘together’ has to be the word –
he spoke for an hour; enthusiastic applause;
then question time.

There’s always that tense silence before
the first question…how will
the hall respond tonight? Will it hold the level
of the speaker’s mind? …we knew all too well
those ‘first question’ students – the one
who had to wrap a compliment in
confectioner’s sugar, eliciting an inward groan –
as if the speaker were unaware of his own ability...
she’d marry rich, then live a life of patronising
complacency bestowing well-publicised charity…

or the one whose ‘clever’ question blatantly advertised
to whoever might be impressed, beyond herself,
that she was already on the speaker’s wavelength
before the lecture and before the rest of us…
she’d commit herself to a future academic life
of maintaining this self-superiority,
exhausting herself, losing friends and influencing few…

but no – tonight it was that wild and self-abusive student
who seldom attended any lecture except to challenge –
‘Can you give me one single reason
why I should go on living? ’..

You could have heard a cliché drop..
a pin; a paperclip; but loud, the universal thought –
how could the speaker know, this was the brilliant boy
of already three serious suicide attempts…
representative of the rite of passage greatly magnified,
sex, drugs, rocknroll, and whatever lay beyond…

‘No… I cannot…’

[...] Read more

poem by Michael Shepherd
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Canto the Second

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

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

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

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

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

[...] Read more

poem by Byron from Don Juan (1824)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Lara

LARA. [1]

CANTO THE FIRST.

I.

The Serfs are glad through Lara's wide domain, [2]
And slavery half forgets her feudal chain;
He, their unhoped, but unforgotten lord —
The long self-exiled chieftain is restored:
There be bright faces in the busy hall,
Bowls on the board, and banners on the wall;
Far chequering o'er the pictured window, plays
The unwonted fagots' hospitable blaze;
And gay retainers gather round the hearth,
With tongues all loudness, and with eyes all mirth.

II.

The chief of Lara is return'd again:
And why had Lara cross'd the bounding main?
Left by his sire, too young such loss to know,
Lord of himself; — that heritage of woe,
That fearful empire which the human breast
But holds to rob the heart within of rest! —
With none to check, and few to point in time
The thousand paths that slope the way to crime;
Then, when he most required commandment, then
Had Lara's daring boyhood govern'd men.
It skills not, boots not, step by step to trace
His youth through all the mazes of its race;
Short was the course his restlessness had run,
But long enough to leave him half undone.

III.

And Lara left in youth his fatherland;
But from the hour he waved his parting hand
Each trace wax'd fainter of his course, till all
Had nearly ceased his memory to recall.
His sire was dust, his vassals could declare,
'Twas all they knew, that Lara was not there;
Nor sent, nor came he, till conjecture grew
Cold in the many, anxious in the few.
His hall scarce echoes with his wonted name,
His portrait darkens in its fading frame,
Another chief consoled his destined bride,
The young forgot him, and the old had died;
"Yet doth he live!" exclaims the impatient heir,
And sighs for sables which he must not wear.

[...] Read more

poem by Byron
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Her Only Bad Habit Is Me

We walk hand in hand
through our world today.
We will walk that way forever,
if bad habits don’t get in the way.
Now she has only one bad habit,
and that habit is me.

If I do something wrong,
she does not see my failing there.
She would rather go on loving,
the man she chose to care.
Now my bad habit shine like a beckon,
but she does not really care.

So though we wander with love,
through to the sunset somewhere.
I think of how lucky I am,
with everything I see.
So glad she has only one bad habit,
and that habit is me.

14 June 2007

poem by David Harris
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Habit Inhibitor

You need to get up and change.
And stop that complaining,
About the same 'thang'.
Yes,
You need to get up and change!
And get rid of...
Or,
Arrange that pain.
Yes,
You need to get up and change!
You're a habit inhibitor a lip bitter giver!
Yes,
You need to get up and change!
You're a misfit fixed to unhappiness,
Looking for another trick...
To end that mix the same.

You need to get up and change.
And stop that complaining,
About the same 'thang'.
Yes,
You need to get up and change!
You're a habit inhibitor a lip bitter giver!
Yes,
You need to get up and change!
You're a misfit fixed to unhappiness,
Looking for another trick...
To end that mix the same.

You're a habit inhibitor a lip bitter giver!
A misfit fixed to unhappiness,
Looking for another trick...
To end that mix the same.

You need to get up and change.
And stop that complaining,
About the same 'thang'.
Yes,
You need to get up and change!
And stop looking for another trick...
To end that same 'thang' claimed!

You need to get up and change.
You're a habit inhibitor a lip bitter giver!
Yes,
You need to get up and change!
You're a misfit fixed to unhappiness.

You need to get up and change.
You're a habit inhibitor a lip bitter giver!

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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trying to break my Habit

Memories consume
Like opening the wound
I'm picking me apart again
You all assume
I'm safe here in my room
Unless I try to start againI don't want to be the one
The battles always choose
'Cause inside I realize
That I'm the one confused

I don't know what's worth fighting for
Or why I have to scream.
I don't know why I instigate
And say what I don't mean.
I don't know how I got this way
I know it's not alright.
So I'm breaking the habit,
I'm breaking the habit
Tonight
Clutching my cure
I tightly lock the door
I try to catch my breath again
I hurt much more
Than anytime before
I had no options left again
I'll paint it on the walls
'Cause I'm the one that falls
I'll never fight again
And this is how it ends
I don't know what's worth fighting for
Or why I have to scream
But now I have some clarity
to show you what I mean
I don't know how I got this way
I'll never be alright
So, I'm breaking the habit
I'm breaking the habit
I'm breaking the habit
Tonight

poem by Pawan Kumar 'Meonlafesta'
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The Scripture of the Golden Eternity

1
Did I create that sky? Yes, for, if it was anything other than a conception in my mind I wouldnt have said 'Sky'-That is why I am the golden eternity. There are not two of us here, reader and writer, but one, one golden eternity, One-Which-It-Is, That-Which- Everything-Is.

2
The awakened Buddha to show the way, the chosen Messiah to die in the degradation of sentience, is the golden eternity. One that is what is, the golden eternity, or, God, or, Tathagata-the name. The Named One. The human God. Sentient Godhood. Animate Divine. The Deified One. The Verified One. The Free One. The Liberator. The Still One. The settled One. The Established One. Golden Eternity. All is Well. The Empty One. The Ready One. The Quitter. The Sitter. The Justified One. The Happy One.

3
That sky, if it was anything other than an illusion of my mortal mind I wouldnt have said 'that sky.' Thus I made that sky, I am the golden eternity. I am Mortal Golden Eternity.

4
I was awakened to show the way, chosen to die in the degradation of life, because I am Mortal Golden Eternity.

5
I am the golden eternity in mortal animate form.

6
Strictly speaking, there is no me, because all is emptiness. I am empty, I am non-existent. All is bliss.

7
This truth law has no more reality than the world.

8
You are the golden eternity because there is no me and no you, only one golden eternity.

9
The Realizer. Entertain no imaginations whatever, for the thing is a no-thing. Knowing this then is Human Godhood.

10
This world is the movie of what everything is, it is one movie, made of the same stuff throughout, belonging to nobody, which is what everything is.

11
If we were not all the golden eternity we wouldnt be here. Because we are here we cant help being pure. To tell man to be pure on account of the punishing angel that punishes the bad and the rewarding angel that rewards the good would be like telling the water 'Be Wet'-Never the less, all things depend on supreme reality, which is already established as the record of Karma earned-fate.

12
God is not outside us but is just us, the living and the dead, the never-lived and never-died. That we should learn it only now, is supreme reality, it was written a long time ago in the archives of universal mind, it is already done, there's no more to do.

13
This is the knowledge that sees the golden eternity in all things, which is us, you, me, and which is no longer us, you, me.

14
What name shall we give it which hath no name, the common eternal matter of the mind? If we were to call it essence, some might think it meant perfume, or gold, or honey. It is not even mind. It is not even discussible, groupable into words; it is not even endless, in fact it is not even mysterious or inscrutably inexplicable; it is what is; it is that; it is this. We could easily call the golden eternity 'This.' But 'what's in a name?' asked Shakespeare. The golden eternity by another name would be as sweet. A Tathagata, a God, a Buddha by another name, an Allah, a Sri Krishna, a Coyote, a Brahma, a Mazda, a Messiah, an Amida, an Aremedeia, a Maitreya, a Palalakonuh, 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 would be as sweet. The golden eternity is X, the golden eternity is A, the golden eternity is /\, the golden eternity is O, the golden eternity is [ ], the golden eternity is t-h-e-g-o-l-d-e-n-e-t-e-r- n-i-t-y. In the beginning was the word; before the beginning, in the beginningless infinite neverendingness, was the essence. Both the word 'god' and the essence of the word, are emptiness. The form of emptiness which is emptiness having taken the form of form, is what you see and hear and feel right now, and what you taste and smell and think as you read this. Wait awhile, close your eyes, let your breathing stop three seconds or so, listen to the inside silence in the womb of the world, let your hands and nerve-ends drop, re-recognize the bliss you forgot, the emptiness and essence and ecstasy of ever having been and ever to be the golden eternity. This is the lesson you forgot.

15
The lesson was taught long ago in the other world systems that have naturally changed into the empty and awake, and are here now smiling in our smile and scowling in our scowl. It is only like the golden eternity pretending to be smiling and scowling to itself; like a ripple on the smooth ocean of knowing. The fate of humanity is to vanish into the golden eternity, return pouring into its hands which are not hands. The navel shall receive, invert, and take back what'd issued forth; the ring of flesh shall close; the personalities of long dead heroes are blank dirt.

16
The point is we're waiting, not how comfortable we are while waiting. Paleolithic man waited by caves for the realization of why he was there, and hunted; modern men wait in beautified homes and try to forget death and birth. We're waiting for the realization that this is the golden eternity.

17
It came on time.

[...] Read more

poem by Jack Kerouac
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The Corsair

'O'er the glad waters of the dark blue sea,
Our thoughts as boundless, and our soul's as free
Far as the breeze can bear, the billows foam,
Survey our empire, and behold our home!
These are our realms, no limits to their sway-
Our flag the sceptre all who meet obey.
Ours the wild life in tumult still to range
From toil to rest, and joy in every change.
Oh, who can tell? not thou, luxurious slave!
Whose soul would sicken o'er the heaving wave;
Not thou, vain lord of wantonness and ease!
whom slumber soothes not - pleasure cannot please -
Oh, who can tell, save he whose heart hath tried,
And danced in triumph o'er the waters wide,
The exulting sense - the pulse's maddening play,
That thrills the wanderer of that trackless way?
That for itself can woo the approaching fight,
And turn what some deem danger to delight;
That seeks what cravens shun with more than zeal,
And where the feebler faint can only feel -
Feel - to the rising bosom's inmost core,
Its hope awaken and Its spirit soar?
No dread of death if with us die our foes -
Save that it seems even duller than repose:
Come when it will - we snatch the life of life -
When lost - what recks it but disease or strife?
Let him who crawls enamour'd of decay,
Cling to his couch, and sicken years away:
Heave his thick breath, and shake his palsied head;
Ours - the fresh turf; and not the feverish bed.
While gasp by gasp he falters forth his soul,
Ours with one pang - one bound - escapes control.
His corse may boast its urn and narrow cave,
And they who loath'd his life may gild his grave:
Ours are the tears, though few, sincerely shed,
When Ocean shrouds and sepulchres our dead.
For us, even banquets fond regret supply
In the red cup that crowns our memory;
And the brief epitaph in danger's day,
When those who win at length divide the prey,
And cry, Remembrance saddening o'er each brow,
How had the brave who fell exulted now!'

II.
Such were the notes that from the Pirate's isle
Around the kindling watch-fire rang the while:
Such were the sounds that thrill'd the rocks along,
And unto ears as rugged seem'd a song!
In scatter'd groups upon the golden sand,
They game-carouse-converse-or whet the brand:

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poem by Byron
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Book Ninth [Residence in France]

EVEN as a river,--partly (it might seem)
Yielding to old remembrances, and swayed
In part by fear to shape a way direct,
That would engulph him soon in the ravenous sea--
Turns, and will measure back his course, far back,
Seeking the very regions which he crossed
In his first outset; so have we, my Friend!
Turned and returned with intricate delay.
Or as a traveller, who has gained the brow
Of some aerial Down, while there he halts
For breathing-time, is tempted to review
The region left behind him; and, if aught
Deserving notice have escaped regard,
Or been regarded with too careless eye,
Strives, from that height, with one and yet one more
Last look, to make the best amends he may:
So have we lingered. Now we start afresh
With courage, and new hope risen on our toil.
Fair greetings to this shapeless eagerness,
Whene'er it comes! needful in work so long,
Thrice needful to the argument which now
Awaits us! Oh, how much unlike the past!

Free as a colt at pasture on the hill,
I ranged at large, through London's wide domain,
Month after month. Obscurely did I live,
Not seeking frequent intercourse with men,
By literature, or elegance, or rank,
Distinguished. Scarcely was a year thus spent
Ere I forsook the crowded solitude,
With less regret for its luxurious pomp,
And all the nicely-guarded shows of art,
Than for the humble book-stalls in the streets,
Exposed to eye and hand where'er I turned.

France lured me forth; the realm that I had crossed
So lately, journeying toward the snow-clad Alps.
But now, relinquishing the scrip and staff,
And all enjoyment which the summer sun
Sheds round the steps of those who meet the day
With motion constant as his own, I went
Prepared to sojourn in a pleasant town,
Washed by the current of the stately Loire.

Through Paris lay my readiest course, and there
Sojourning a few days, I visited
In haste, each spot of old or recent fame,
The latter chiefly, from the field of Mars
Down to the suburbs of St. Antony,
And from Mont Martre southward to the Dome

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poem by William Wordsworth
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