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I did as well as I knew how and have nothing to be ashamed of.

quote by Peter Tork
Added by Lucian Velea
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I Have A Woman Inside My Soul

I have a woman inside my soul,
Her eyes sombre and sad.
She waves her hand to try to reach me,
But I cant hear what she says.
I wish I knew what she says,
I wish I knew what she wants,
I wish I knew what she says to me,
I wish I knew what she means to me.
I see an asphalt road inside my soul,
Its pale even in a warm summers day.
It stretches into the mist and calls me,
But I dont know what it takes.
I wish I knew what it takes, (I wish I knew)
I wish I knew what it gives, (I wish I knew)
I wish I knew what it says to me, (I wish I knew)
I wish I knew what it means to me. (I wish I knew)
I see a tombstone inside my soul,
Its old and mossy, covered in dead leaves.
It stands with an engraving on it surface,
But I dont know what it reads.
I wish I knew what it reads, (I wish I knew)
I wish I knew what it says, (I wish I knew)
I wish I knew what it says to me, (I wish I knew)
I wish I knew what it means to me. (I wish I knew)
(yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, hey)
I feel snow covering inside my soul,
Its hard and shining in shades of grey.
No footsteps ever made their marks,
And I dont know when it melts.
I wish I knew when it melts, (I wish I knew)
I wish I knew when it happens, (I wish I knew)
I wish I knew if it happens at all, (I wish I knew)
I wish I knew what it means to me. (I wish I knew)
I hear a stream running inside my soul,
Its cold and clear and carries a tune.
But I dont know what it sings and tells,
I dont know where it goes.
I wish I knew what it sings,
I wish I knew where it goes,
I wish I knew what it sings, (I wish I knew)
I wish I knew where it goes, (I wish I knew)
I wish I knew what it sings. (I wish I knew)
(I wish I knew)
(I wish I knew) (yeah!)
(I wish I knew)
(I wish I knew)

song performed by Yoko Ono
Added by Lucian Velea
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Song of the Dardanelles

The Wireless tells and the cable tells
How our boys behaved by the Dardanelles.
Some thought in their hearts “Will our boys make good?”
We knew them of old and we knew they would!
Knew they would—
Knew they would;
We were mates of old and we knew they would.
They laughed and they larked and they loved likewise,
For blood is warm under Southern skies;
They knew not Pharoah (’tis understood),
And they got into scrapes, as we knew they would.
Knew they would—
Knew they would;
And they got into scrapes, as we knew they would.

They chafed in the dust of an old dead land
At the long months’ drill in the scorching sand;
But they knew in their hearts it was for their good,
And they saw it through as we knew they would.
Knew they would—
Knew they would;
And they saw it through as we knew they would.

The Coo-ee called through the Mena Camp,
And an army roared like the Ocean’s tramp
On a gale-swept beach in her wildest mood,
Till the Pyramids shook as we knew they would.
Knew they would—
Knew they would.
(And the Sphinx woke up as we knew she would.)

They were shipped like sheep when the dawn was grey;
(But their officers knew that no lambs were they).
They squatted and perched where’er they could,
And they “blanky-ed” for joy as we knew they would.
Knew they would—
Knew they would;
They “blanky-ed” for joy as we knew they would.

The sea was hell and the shore was hell,
With mine, entanglement, shrapnel and shell,
But they stormed the heights as Australians should,
And they fought and they died as we knew they would.
Knew they would—
Knew they would;
They fought and they died as we knew they would.

From the southern hills and the city lanes,
From the sandwaste lone and the Blacksoil Plains;
The youngest and strongest of England’s brood!—

[...] Read more

poem by Henry Lawson
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Avon's Harvest

Fear, like a living fire that only death
Might one day cool, had now in Avon’s eyes
Been witness for so long of an invasion
That made of a gay friend whom we had known
Almost a memory, wore no other name
As yet for us than fear. Another man
Than Avon might have given to us at least
A futile opportunity for words
We might regret. But Avon, since it happened,
Fed with his unrevealing reticence
The fire of death we saw that horribly
Consumed him while he crumbled and said nothing.

So many a time had I been on the edge,
And off again, of a foremeasured fall
Into the darkness and discomfiture
Of his oblique rebuff, that finally
My silence honored his, holding itself
Away from a gratuitous intrusion
That likely would have widened a new distance
Already wide enough, if not so new.
But there are seeming parallels in space
That may converge in time; and so it was
I walked with Avon, fought and pondered with him,
While he made out a case for So-and-so,
Or slaughtered What’s-his-name in his old way,
With a new difference. Nothing in Avon lately
Was, or was ever again to be for us,
Like him that we remembered; and all the while
We saw that fire at work within his eyes
And had no glimpse of what was burning there.

So for a year it went; and so it went
For half another year—when, all at once,
At someone’s tinkling afternoon at home
I saw that in the eyes of Avon’s wife
The fire that I had met the day before
In his had found another living fuel.
To look at her and then to think of him,
And thereupon to contemplate the fall
Of a dim curtain over the dark end
Of a dark play, required of me no more
Clairvoyance than a man who cannot swim
Will exercise in seeing that his friend
Off shore will drown except he save himself.
To her I could say nothing, and to him
No more than tallied with a long belief
That I should only have it back again
For my chagrin to ruminate upon,
Ingloriously, for the still time it starved;

[...] Read more

poem by Edwin Arlington Robinson
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Walls

Im not ashamed
To say that Ive loved you well
Im not ashamed
To let you know
Im just a name thats all
Scratched upon your wall
Youve used it well but what the hell
Thats what walls are for
Im not ashamed
To listen to the fast-fallin rain
In the morning upon my window
Im not afraid to cry
Im not ashamed to try
To be your friend once again
cause thats whats friends are for
Friends are for sorting out the hang-ups that we hide
Walls are for shutting out the love we feel inside
Im not ashamed no to talk it over once again
To rearrange my vocabulary
But I cant seem to find
Any words to change your mind
Because I left them all behind
And thats what words are for
Words are for explaining the mistakes we might have made
Names are for calling when theres nothing left to say
Im not ashamed, no, to say that Ive loved you well
Im not ashamed, and yet I know
Im just a name, thats all
Scratched upon your wall
Youve used it well, but what the hell
Thats what walls are for
Im not ashamed of wearing out my old grey socks
Chasing you around the back woods
Im not ashamed to darn
Nor to proud to find some yarn
To sew them up once again
cause thats what socks are for

song performed by Gordon Lightfoot
Added by Lucian Velea
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Ashamed

i feel alone... i feel like i could die
i feel alone... i feel like i could die... tonight
carry on carry on

don't feel ashamed.. don't feel ashamed
i rather it be this way
you're not to blame you're not to blame
don't feel ashamed

i'm getting close...
to the other side
just close the door
i'll leave the past behind me
can you see my pride
it's only one step away from
freedom... freedom...

i feel i can fly anywhere with anyone

don't feel ashamed
i rather it be this way
you're not to blame
don't feel ashamed
don't feel ashamed
i rather it be this way
you're not to blame
don't feel ashamed

i love you baby... so don't you feel ashamed!!

song performed by Tommy Lee from Never A Dull Moment
Added by Lucian Velea
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0038 Why I'm ashamed of being British

It was so easy being a British child
in the 1930s:
everything was – or so it seems to memory’s
selective mind - so ordered:
how old was I, when I stopped
raising my school cap
(‘Don’t just touch it, Michael;
lift it! ’) to, not just staff at school,
but anyone to whom my parents talked
or who had talked (‘My, hasn’t he grown! ’
as if this was some personal achievement) to me,
or more likely, over my head, as I
shifted from foot to foot,
trapped in a grown-up world
of politenesses; which however
my mother loved and rightly
as one now raised in her station
from being polite to customers
in grandma’s terrace front-window shop
where homemade cooking was the income
now that the cotton dust had got to grandpa's lungs;
but now the wife of a man retired
at thirty-eight, stone-deaf…

The history books at school were slender – since
we’d won every war – or if some foreigners thought
we hadn’t, it had all the same brought out great courage,
incredible bravery which was a lesson to us all,
fortitude and leadership and deeds
‘ surpassing the call of duty’. We’d even
won wars in places which technically weren’t ours,
called The Empire; over which we ruled
because we did it better than the natives;
because we were born to rule..

And we were taught by haunted heroes who’d fought
in the war to end all wars – the PT instructor
had a face like camouflage, white, greenish, brown and red,
where he’d been mustard-gassed; our heroes
were still close to us, although
they didn’t talk about it much. That was
another lesson in how to be British.

Geography was happy natives
(only the National Geographic Magazine
photographed their tits, and then only if brown)
moving export crops, balancing trade
and the occasional water-pot – which was always full.
And the sun never set on those red bits on the map
which were the British Empire…

[...] Read more

poem by Michael Shepherd
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The Bride's Prelude

“Sister,” said busy Amelotte
To listless Aloÿse;
“Along your wedding-road the wheat
Bends as to hear your horse's feet,
And the noonday stands still for heat.”
Amelotte laughed into the air
With eyes that sought the sun:
But where the walls in long brocade
Were screened, as one who is afraid
Sat Aloÿse within the shade.
And even in shade was gleam enough
To shut out full repose
From the bride's 'tiring-chamber, which
Was like the inner altar-niche
Whose dimness worship has made rich.
Within the window's heaped recess
The light was counterchanged
In blent reflexes manifold
From perfume-caskets of wrought gold
And gems the bride's hair could not hold,
All thrust together: and with these
A slim-curved lute, which now,
At Amelotte's sudden passing there,
Was swept in somewise unaware,
And shook to music the close air.
Against the haloed lattice-panes
The bridesmaid sunned her breast;
Then to the glass turned tall and free,
And braced and shifted daintily
Her loin-belt through her côte-hardie.
The belt was silver, and the clasp
Of lozenged arm-bearings;
A world of mirrored tints minute
The rippling sunshine wrought into 't,
That flushed her hand and warmed her foot.
At least an hour had Aloÿse—
Her jewels in her hair—
Her white gown, as became a bride,
Quartered in silver at each side—
Sat thus aloof, as if to hide.
Over her bosom, that lay still,
The vest was rich in grain,
With close pearls wholly overset:
Around her throat the fastenings met
Of chevesayle and mantelet.
Her arms were laid along her lap
With the hands open: life
Itself did seem at fault in her:
Beneath the drooping brows, the stir
Of thought made noonday heavier.

[...] Read more

poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
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Not Ashamed Of Being Ashamed

Some Frenchmen are ashamed of being French,
while others are ashamed that those who are ashamed aren’t proud;
though nowadays it’s hard to be a mensch,
it’s harder to oppose opinions of the madding crowd,
as well as those espoused by the elite,
which turns a blind eye to the problems of identity,
opining that a nation should backbeat
traditions and become an obsolete nonentity.

Devorah Lauter writes an article about French identity politics in the LA Times, December 14,2009 (“As the French debate their identity, some recoil”) . The allusion to the Swiss minaret poll brings to mind my poem “Swiss Minarets, ” which Huffpo chose not to put on its blog. Lauter writes:
It was one of a series of government-run public debates aimed at defining the values that constitute French national identity. But in this middle-class suburb west of Paris, the discussion last week quickly turned into a cacophony of hot-tempered accusations. Rather than give his version of what it means to be French, an invited speaker, historian Jean-Yves Mollier, attacked his host (who sat stone-still a few feet in front of him) for supporting the national dialogue. Mollier said the ongoing debates represent none other than Vichy-style propaganda attempting to 'stigmatize' those who don't fall into France's ruling native caste, in this case mostly French Muslims of immigrant origin. Mollier and several other attendees proceeded to walk out. Meanwhile, two actors disguised as avid participants launched into a faux back-and-forth. 'Today, I'm ashamed of being French! ' said one of the men, standing up to be heard. The other, jumping to his feet, replied, 'Excuse me, but I'm proud of being French, and you, you should be ashamed of being proud of being ashamed of France! ' 'It's a shame for France! ' shouted back the first. 'I'm proud of the shame I feel for people like you who are ashamed of being French! ' cried the second. In the crowd, one middle-aged man's face turned the color of his pink shirt. He termed the scene 'disgraceful.' Host Anne Boquet, the local police chief, expressed her hope that the dialogue would 'remind people of their Republican values and to respect authority.'

'The debates can introduce that respect, ' she said, and help 'define the face of France we like today.' That, it seems, may be a long way off. The 3-month-long national debate series, spearheaded by conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy and his minister of immigration, has been the subject of heated controversy since a late November vote in Switzerland to ban the construction of minarets on mosques. Sympathy for the Swiss vote here, according to polls, has helped focus the debates, which began in November, on widely held demands that Muslims do more to blend into French society. Polls show that a small majority in France favor a ban on minarets like the one the Swiss approved with a 57.5% majority.

12/14/09

poem by Gershon Hepner
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Tamar

I
A night the half-moon was like a dancing-girl,
No, like a drunkard's last half-dollar
Shoved on the polished bar of the eastern hill-range,
Young Cauldwell rode his pony along the sea-cliff;
When she stopped, spurred; when she trembled, drove
The teeth of the little jagged wheels so deep
They tasted blood; the mare with four slim hooves
On a foot of ground pivoted like a top,
Jumped from the crumble of sod, went down, caught, slipped;
Then, the quick frenzy finished, stiffening herself
Slid with her drunken rider down the ledges,
Shot from sheer rock and broke
Her life out on the rounded tidal boulders.

The night you know accepted with no show of emotion the little
accident; grave Orion
Moved northwest from the naked shore, the moon moved to
meridian, the slow pulse of the ocean
Beat, the slow tide came in across the slippery stones; it drowned
the dead mare's muzzle and sluggishly
Felt for the rider; Cauldwell’s sleepy soul came back from the
blind course curious to know
What sea-cold fingers tapped the walls of its deserted ruin.
Pain, pain and faintness, crushing
Weights, and a vain desire to vomit, and soon again
die icy fingers, they had crept over the loose hand and lay in the
hair now. He rolled sidewise
Against mountains of weight and for another half-hour lay still.
With a gush of liquid noises
The wave covered him head and all, his body
Crawled without consciousness and like a creature with no bones,
a seaworm, lifted its face
Above the sea-wrack of a stone; then a white twilight grew about
the moon, and above
The ancient water, the everlasting repetition of the dawn. You
shipwrecked horseman
So many and still so many and now for you the last. But when it
grew daylight
He grew quite conscious; broken ends of bone ground on each
other among the working fibers
While by half-inches he was drawing himself out of the seawrack
up to sandy granite,
Out of the tide's path. Where the thin ledge tailed into flat cliff
he fell asleep. . . .
Far seaward
The daylight moon hung like a slip of cloud against the horizon.
The tide was ebbing
From the dead horse and the black belt of sea-growth. Cauldwell
seemed to have felt her crying beside him,

[...] Read more

poem by Robinson Jeffers
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Forever

I never wanted another
Come over to me and discover
How i want to be near you
And you need to be far away
You always seem to make me feel at home
Hey you
People like
I never knew, i never knew, i never knew why
You make me wanna cry
I never knew, i never knew, i never knew why
Forever live and die
I look at all of the people
Doing it over and over
You never get any older
I wish that you could be here
I look at you and i
Make the same mistakes
Hey you
People like
I never knew, i never knew, i never knew why
You make me wanna cry
I never knew, i never knew, i never knew why
Forever live and die
I never knew, i never knew, i never knew why
You make me wanna cry
I never knew, i never knew, i never knew why
Forever live and die
Repeat to fade

song performed by Omd
Added by Lucian Velea
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Canto the First

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

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

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

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

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

[...] Read more

poem by Byron from Don Juan (1824)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Had I Knew Ya!

I would not had wished you break your neck.
Had I knew ya!
I would have given you much more respect.
Had I knew ya.

With the best...
Had I knew ya!
Of sincerity one gets.

I would not had wished you break your neck.
Had I knew ya!
I would have given you much more respect.
Had I knew ya.

With the best...
Had I knew ya!
Of sincerity one gets.

You can bet...
My foul mouth would be kept,
Under lock and key and silent breath!

You can bet...
Knowing you don't annoy!
You can bet...
Knowing you don't annoy!

I would not had wished you break your neck.
Had I knew ya!
I would have given you much more respect.
Had I knew ya.

With the best...
Had I knew ya!
Of sincerity one gets.

Knowing you don't annoy!

I would not had wished you break your neck.
Had I knew ya!
You can bet...
Had I knew ya!
Knowing you don't annoy!

You can bet...
Had I knew ya!
Knowing you don't annoy!

You can bet...
Had I knew ya!

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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The Lawyer’s Second Tale: Christian

A highland inn among the western hills,
A single parlour, single bed that fills
With fisher or with tourist, as may be;
A waiting-maid. as fair as you can see,
With hazel eyes, and frequent blushing face,
And ample brow, and with a rustic grace
In all her easy quiet motions seen,
Large of her age, which haply is nineteen,
Christian her name, in full a pleasant name,
Christian and Christie scarcely seem the same;
A college fellow, who has sent away
The pupils he has taught for many a day,
And comes for fishing and for solitude,
Perhaps a little pensive in his mood,
An aspiration and a thought have failed,
Where he had hoped, another has prevailed,
But to the joys of hill and stream alive,
And in his boyhood yet, at twenty-five.
A merry dance, that made young people meet,
And set them moving, both with hands and feet;
A dance in which he danced, and nearer knew
The soft brown eyes, and found them tender too.
A dance that lit in two young hearts the fire,
The low soft flame, of loving sweet desire,
And made him feel that he could feel again;
The preface this, what follows to explain.
That night he kissed, he held her in his arms,
And felt the subtle virtue of her charms;
Nor less bewildered on the following day,
He kissed, he found excuse near her to stay,
Was it not love? And yet the truth to speak,
Playing the fool for haply half a week,
He yet had fled, so strong within him dwelt
The horror of the sin, and such he felt
The miseries to the woman that ensue.
He wearied long his brain with reasonings fine,
But when at evening dusk he came to dine,
In linsey petticoat and jacket blue
She stood, so radiant and so modest too,
All into air his strong conclusions flew.
Now should he go. But dim and drizzling too,
For a night march, to-night will hardly do,
A march of sixteen weary miles of way.
No, by the chances which our lives obey,
No, by the Heavens and this sweet face, he’ll stay.

A week he stayed, and still was loth to go,
But she grew anxious and would have it so.
Her time of service shortly would be o’er,
And she would leave; her mistress knew before.

[...] Read more

poem by Arthur Hugh Clough from Mari Magno or Tales on Board
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Canto the Sixteenth

I
The antique Persians taught three useful things,
To draw the bow, to ride, and speak the truth.
This was the mode of Cyrus, best of kings --
A mode adopted since by modern youth.
Bows have they, generally with two strings;
Horses they ride without remorse or ruth;
At speaking truth perhaps they are less clever,
But draw the long bow better now than ever.

II
The cause of this effect, or this defect, --
"For this effect defective comes by cause," --
Is what I have not leisure to inspect;
But this I must say in my own applause,
Of all the Muses that I recollect,
Whate'er may be her follies or her flaws
In some things, mine's beyond all contradiction
The most sincere that ever dealt in fiction.

III
And as she treats all things, and ne'er retreats
From any thing, this epic will contain
A wilderness of the most rare conceits,
Which you might elsewhere hope to find in vain.
'T is true there be some bitters with the sweets,
Yet mix'd so slightly, that you can't complain,
But wonder they so few are, since my tale is
"De rebus cunctis et quibusdam aliis."

IV
But of all truths which she has told, the most
True is that which she is about to tell.
I said it was a story of a ghost --
What then? I only know it so befell.
Have you explored the limits of the coast,
Where all the dwellers of the earth must dwell?
'T is time to strike such puny doubters dumb as
The sceptics who would not believe Columbus.

V
Some people would impose now with authority,
Turpin's or Monmouth Geoffry's Chronicle;
Men whose historical superiority
Is always greatest at a miracle.
But Saint Augustine has the great priority,
Who bids all men believe the impossible,
Because 't is so. Who nibble, scribble, quibble, he
Quiets at once with "quia impossibile."

[...] Read more

poem by Byron from Don Juan (1824)
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Don Juan: Canto The Sixteenth

The antique Persians taught three useful things,
To draw the bow, to ride, and speak the truth.
This was the mode of Cyrus, best of kings--
A mode adopted since by modern youth.
Bows have they, generally with two strings;
Horses they ride without remorse or ruth;
At speaking truth perhaps they are less clever,
But draw the long bow better now than ever.

The cause of this effect, or this defect,--
'For this effect defective comes by cause,'--
Is what I have not leisure to inspect;
But this I must say in my own applause,
Of all the Muses that I recollect,
Whate'er may be her follies or her flaws
In some things, mine's beyond all contradiction
The most sincere that ever dealt in fiction.

And as she treats all things, and ne'er retreats
From any thing, this epic will contain
A wilderness of the most rare conceits,
Which you might elsewhere hope to find in vain.
'Tis true there be some bitters with the sweets,
Yet mix'd so slightly, that you can't complain,
But wonder they so few are, since my tale is
'De rebus cunctis et quibusdam aliis.'

But of all truths which she has told, the most
True is that which she is about to tell.
I said it was a story of a ghost--
What then? I only know it so befell.
Have you explored the limits of the coast,
Where all the dwellers of the earth must dwell?
'Tis time to strike such puny doubters dumb as
The sceptics who would not believe Columbus.

Some people would impose now with authority,
Turpin's or Monmouth Geoffry's Chronicle;
Men whose historical superiority
Is always greatest at a miracle.
But Saint Augustine has the great priority,
Who bids all men believe the impossible,
Because 'tis so. Who nibble, scribble, quibble, he
Quiets at once with 'quia impossibile.'

And therefore, mortals, cavil not at all;
Believe:--if 'tis improbable you must,
And if it is impossible, you shall:
'Tis always best to take things upon trust.
I do not speak profanely, to recall

[...] Read more

poem by Byron
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Tale IX

EDWARD SHORE.

Genius! thou gift of Heav'n! thou light divine!
Amid what dangers art thou doom'd to shine!
Oft will the body's weakness check thy force,
Oft damp thy vigour, and impede thy course;
And trembling nerves compel thee to restrain
Thy nobler efforts, to contend with pain;
Or want (sad guest!) will in thy presence come,
And breathe around her melancholy gloom:
To life's low cares will thy proud thought confine,
And make her sufferings, her impatience, thine.
Evil and strong, seducing passions prey
On soaring minds, and win them from their way,
Who then to Vice the subject spirits give,
And in the service of the conqu'ror live;
Like captive Samson making sport for all,
Who fear'd their strength, and glory in their fall.
Genius, with virtue, still may lack the aid
Implored by humble minds, and hearts afraid;
May leave to timid souls the shield and sword
Of the tried Faith, and the resistless Word;
Amid a world of dangers venturing forth,
Frail, but yet fearless, proud in conscious worth,
Till strong temptation, in some fatal time,
Assails the heart, and wins the soul to crime,
When left by honour, and by sorrow spent,
Unused to pray, unable to repent,
The nobler powers, that once exalted high
Th' aspiring man, shall then degraded lie:
Reason, through anguish, shall her throne forsake,
And strength of mind but stronger madness make.
When Edward Shore had reach'd his twentieth

year,
He felt his bosom light, his conscience clear;
Applause at school the youthful hero gain'd,
And trials there with manly strength sustain'd:
With prospects bright upon the world he came,
Pure love of virtue, strong desire of fame:
Men watch'd the way his lofty mind would take,
And all foretold the progress he would make.
Boast of these friends, to older men a guide,
Proud of his parts, but gracious in his pride;
He bore a gay good-nature in his face,
And in his air were dignity and grace;
Dress that became his state and years he wore,
And sense and spirit shone in Edward Shore.
Thus, while admiring friends the Youth beheld,
His own disgust their forward hopes repell'd;

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poem by George Crabbe
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The Book of Annandale

I

Partly to think, more to be left alone,
George Annandale said something to his friends—
A word or two, brusque, but yet smoothed enough
To suit their funeral gaze—and went upstairs;
And there, in the one room that he could call
His own, he found a sort of meaningless
Annoyance in the mute familiar things
That filled it; for the grate’s monotonous gleam
Was not the gleam that he had known before,
The books were not the books that used to be,
The place was not the place. There was a lack
Of something; and the certitude of death
Itself, as with a furtive questioning,
Hovered, and he could not yet understand.
He knew that she was gone—there was no need
Of any argued proof to tell him that,
For they had buried her that afternoon,
Under the leaves and snow; and still there was
A doubt, a pitiless doubt, a plunging doubt,
That struck him, and upstartled when it struck,
The vision, the old thought in him. There was
A lack, and one that wrenched him; but it was
Not that—not that. There was a present sense
Of something indeterminably near—
The soul-clutch of a prescient emptiness
That would not be foreboding. And if not,
What then?—or was it anything at all?
Yes, it was something—it was everything—
But what was everything? or anything?
Tired of time, bewildered, he sat down;
But in his chair he kept on wondering
That he should feel so desolately strange
And yet—for all he knew that he had lost
More of the world than most men ever win—
So curiously calm. And he was left
Unanswered and unsatisfied: there came
No clearer meaning to him than had come
Before; the old abstraction was the best
That he could find, the farthest he could go;
To that was no beginning and no end—
No end that he could reach. So he must learn
To live the surest and the largest life
Attainable in him, would he divine
The meaning of the dream and of the words
That he had written, without knowing why,
On sheets that he had bound up like a book
And covered with red leather. There it was—
There in his desk, the record he had made,

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poem by Edwin Arlington Robinson
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Never Been

I've never been touched like this- I've never been
I've never been kissed like this- I've never been
I never knew it felt like this- I never knew
I never knew a love like this

Pardon me- excuse me- forgive me- I can't help it
But I see- the energy- 'tween you and me- and I'm selfish
Don't want no- other girls- calling you- never ever
Cause I want- us to stay- together- forever

I've never been touched like this- I've never been
I've never been kissed like this- I've never been
I never knew it felt like this- I never knew
I never knew a love like this

Believe me- when I say- there is no one- I mean none
That can do- the things you do- the things you did- and get done
And I believe- that I can feel- this way- for a reason
In all the ways- you make me feel- boy you keep- me breathing

I've never been touched like this- I've never been
I've never been kissed like this- I've never been
I never knew it felt like this- I never knew
I never knew a love like this

What you got- Them others don't- Cause you're the one I want
You make me hot- Them others don't- Cause baby you're the one I love
What you got- Them others don't- Cause you're the one I want
You make me hot- Them others don't- Cause baby you're the one I love

I've never been touched like this- I've never been
I've never been kissed like this- I've never been
I never knew it felt like this- I never knew
I never knew a love like this

I've never been touched like this- I've never been
I've never been kissed like this- I've never been
I never knew it felt like this- I never knew
I never knew a love like this

song performed by Mary J Blige from No More Drama
Added by Lucian Velea
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The Garden of Years

I

I have shut fast the door, and am alone
With the sweet memory of this afternoon,
That saw my vague dreams on a sudden grown
Into fulfilment, as I oft have known
Stray notes upon a keyboard fall atune
When least persuaded. I besought no boon
Of Fate to-day; I that, since first Love came
Into my life, have been so importune.
To-day alone I did not press my claim,
And lo! all I have dreamed of is my own!

II

I have shut fast the door, for so I may
Relive that moment of the turn of tide—
That swift solution of the long delay
That clothed with silver splendor dying day;
And, with low-whispering memory for guide,
See once again your startled eyes confide
The secret of surrender; and your hand
Flutter toward mine, before you turn aside—
And the gold wings of young consent expand
Fresh from the cracking chrysalis of Nay!

III

I did not dare to speak at first. It seemed
A thing unreal, that with the air might blend—
That strange swift signal—and I feared I dreamed!
Ahead, the city’s lamps, converging, gleamed
To a thin angle at the street’s far bend,
And, as we neared, each from its column’s end
Stepped out, and past us, furtive, slipped away:
Nor could Love’s self a longer respite lend
The radiant moments of our shortening day,
That Time, the donor, one by one redeemed.

IV

We spoke of eloquently empty things;
Of younger days that were before we met,
The trivial acts to which the memory clings,
And in familiar spots unbidden brings
To mind, when graver matters we forget.
The sacred secret lay unspoken, yet
Hovered, half-veiled, between our conscious eyes,
Touched with an indefinable regret
For that swift moment of our love’s surprise—

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poem by Guy Wetmore Carryl from The Garden of Years and Other Poems (1901)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Lawyer’s First Tale: Primitiæ or Third Cousins

I

‘Dearest of boys, please come to-day,
Papa and mama have bid me say,
They hope you’ll dine with us at three;
They will be out till then, you see,
But you will start at once, you know,
And come as fast as you can go.
Next week they hope you’ll come and stay
Some time before you go away.
Dear boy, how pleasant it will be,
Ever your dearest Emily!’
Twelve years of age was I, and she
Fourteen, when thus she wrote to me,
A schoolboy, with an uncle spending
My holidays, then nearly ending.
My uncle lived the mountain o’er,
A rector, and a bachelor;
The vicarage was by the sea,
That was the home of Emily:
The windows to the front looked down
Across a single-streeted town,
Far as to where Worms-head was seen,
Dim with ten watery miles between;
The Carnedd mountains on the right
With stony masses filled the sight;
To left the open sea; the bay
In a blue plain before you lay.
A garden, full of fruit, extends,
Stone-walled, above the house, and ends
With a locked door, that by a porch
Admits to churchyard and to church;
Farm-buildings nearer on one side,
And glebe, and then the countrywide.
I and my cousin Emily
Were cousins in the third degree;
My mother near of kin was reckoned
To hers, who was my mother’s second:
My cousinship I held from her.
Such an amount of girls there were,
At first one really was perplexed:
’Twas Patty first, and Lydia next,
And Emily the third, and then,
Philippa, Phoebe, Mary Gwen.
Six were they, you perceive, in all;
And portraits fading on the wall,
Grandmothers, heroines of old,
And aunts of aunts, with scrolls that told
Their names and dates, were there to show
Why these had all been christened so.

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poem by Arthur Hugh Clough from Mari Magno or Tales on Board
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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