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Art is an attempt to integrate evil.

quote by Simone de Beauvoir
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Paradise Lost: Book 09

No more of talk where God or Angel guest
With Man, as with his friend, familiar us'd,
To sit indulgent, and with him partake
Rural repast; permitting him the while
Venial discourse unblam'd. I now must change
Those notes to tragick; foul distrust, and breach
Disloyal on the part of Man, revolt,
And disobedience: on the part of Heaven
Now alienated, distance and distaste,
Anger and just rebuke, and judgement given,
That brought into this world a world of woe,
Sin and her shadow Death, and Misery
Death's harbinger: Sad talk!yet argument
Not less but more heroick than the wrath
Of stern Achilles on his foe pursued
Thrice fugitive about Troy wall; or rage
Of Turnus for Lavinia disespous'd;
Or Neptune's ire, or Juno's, that so long
Perplexed the Greek, and Cytherea's son:

If answerable style I can obtain
Of my celestial patroness, who deigns
Her nightly visitation unimplor'd,
And dictates to me slumbering; or inspires
Easy my unpremeditated verse:
Since first this subject for heroick song
Pleas'd me long choosing, and beginning late;
Not sedulous by nature to indite
Wars, hitherto the only argument
Heroick deem'd chief mastery to dissect
With long and tedious havock fabled knights
In battles feign'd; the better fortitude
Of patience and heroick martyrdom
Unsung; or to describe races and games,
Or tilting furniture, imblazon'd shields,
Impresses quaint, caparisons and steeds,
Bases and tinsel trappings, gorgeous knights
At joust and tournament; then marshall'd feast
Serv'd up in hall with sewers and seneshals;
The skill of artifice or office mean,
Not that which justly gives heroick name
To person, or to poem. Me, of these
Nor skill'd nor studious, higher argument
Remains; sufficient of itself to raise
That name, unless an age too late, or cold
Climate, or years, damp my intended wing
Depress'd; and much they may, if all be mine,
Not hers, who brings it nightly to my ear.
The sun was sunk, and after him the star
Of Hesperus, whose office is to bring

[...] Read more

poem by John Milton
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Drop Kick That Evil

We've got to get together and defeat the beast that eats...
Any remnants of peace!
That beast wants to cease a potential feasting of peace,
Released.
And this keeps a people teased by evil.

We've got to get together on collective feet.
And march together in a harmonized beat.
To sweep away the preaching of what's evil.

Drop kick that evil.
Like a football kicked right over a goal.
Drop kick that evil.
Don't leave it in your hands to hold.
To get tackled and crushed up.
Laying flat on a knocked out butt.

We've got to get together and defeat the beast that eats...
Any remnants of peace!
We've got to get together on collective feet.
And march together in a harmonized beat.
To sweep away the preaching of what's evil.

Drop kick that evil.
Like a football kicked right over a goal.
Drop kick that evil.
Don't leave it in your hands to hold...
To get your butt dumped on!

That beast wants to cease a potential feasting of peace,
Released.
And this keeps a people teased by evil.
Drop kick that evil.

There is nothing that appeals.
Drop kick that evil.
No matter how you feel...
'Eveal' is real.

Drop kick that evil.
There is nothing that appeals.
Drop kick that evil.
No matter how you feel...
'Eveal' is real.

Drop kick that evil.
There is nothing that appeals.
Drop kick that evil.
No matter how you feel...
'Eveal' is real.

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Evil, I Call You!

Evil, I am calling!
Evil, do you hear?
Evil, I’m imploring!
Please – I beg your ear!

Evil, I beseech you Sir!
Evil, be you near?
Evil, might you spare some time?
Please – you must appear!

Deep in barren ground I feel a rumble and a quake:
Evil stirs beneath me now – oh how the earth doth shake!
Dark begins retreating back and gives to eerie glow:
Light of hues appeal to mind in glory of His show!

I, so truly worthy, view Evil’s phosphorescence!
I, so truly honoured, scent Evil’s rancid essence!

Whenceforth He rose – ‘twas Evil’s phantasm!
Climax unfolds in Evil’s orgasm!

He lowered His sight to peer my form
From orbits sunk in fiery storm.
Incredulous now, and twice in awe, I
Harkened close to Evil’s roar:

‘I Evil, appear at your request!
Pray tell, of what is thine behest!

Your say must be bold, for you do not run, and
You’re evil enough – is my work not done?
So speak of your wanting, my impious serf,
To hail my cathedral so deep in this earth. ’

I pulled up with pride and pushed out my chest:

‘Though I be Man in all his great fame,
My evil is lacking – my damage is lame –
I crave for the power that you can instill, to
Heighten my evil and drive up the thrill! '

Evil stared in disbelief:
Could I see a trace of grief?

‘I, Evil, must say unto you:
I see wars of destruction – both savage and wild –
People lay dying – that’s woman and child!
All of mankind lay poisoned and green
From virus of hatred – oh this I have seen!
You fight and you kill and maim animals and all:

[...] Read more

poem by Mark R Slaughter
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Publicly You Treat Me Evil

You don't have to be,
Pleasing and sweet.
But publicly...
You treat me evil.

In private you are so adored.
And I am sure...
You-are-my-equal.

But on the streets,
You then deceive.
You have a need,
To treat me evil.

Why do you seek,
To treat me evil.
In the streets,
You treat me evil.
Then alone and under sheets...
You-are-sweet-full.

Why do you seek,
To treat me evil.
In the streets,
You treat me evil.
Then alone and under sheets...
You-are-sweet-full.

But publicly,
You treat me evil.
People see,
You treat me evil.

Why is it in the streets you seek,
To be evil.
Why is it in the streets you seek,
To be evil.
Why is it in the streets you seek,
To be evil.
To be evil.
Then alone and under sheets...
You-are-sweet-full.
But...
Pub licly you treat me evil.
Publicly you treat me evil.
Publicly you treat me evil.
Treat me evil!
But...
Publicly you treat me evil.
Publicly you treat me evil.

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Hes Evil

Scene: a party political broadcast -- mr. black and his followers
He comes on smooth, cool and kind,
But he wants your body not your mind.
Hes got style, personality,
But hes the devil in reality.
Hell make you laugh, make you smile,
And make you feel good for a while.
Wicked smile, decadent grin,
He likes school girls, nuns and virgins.
His skin is soft but his mind is hard,
Hell lead you on then hell tear you apart.
Hell treat you rough and he will make you cry,
And you will kiss sweet innocence good-bye.
And once youre in therell be no getting out,
So look out, look out, look out, look out.
Hes evil. hes evil. hes evil. hes evil. hes evil.
Hes evil. hes evil. hes evil. hes evil. hes evil.
Hes got wit hes got charm.
But when he gets rough hell break your arm.
Hes got taste, manners and grace,
But when he gets tough hell slit your face.
Hell buy you jewels, expensive clothes,
Then his mindll go and hell bust your nose.
Hes a joker and a clown
But hell pervert you and drag you down.
He comes on smooth, cool and kind,
But he wants your body not your mind,
He is just the devil in disguise.
He will drag you down and he will make you cry,
And once youre in there will be no getting out.
So look out, look out, look out.
Look out, look out, look out.
Hes evil. hes evil. hes evil. hes evil. hes evil.
Hes evil. hes evil. hes evil. hes evil. hes evil.

song performed by Kinks
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Intrigue

THOU art my love
And thou art the peace of sundown
When the blue shadows soothe
And the grasses and the leaves sleep
To the song of the little brooks
Woe is me.

Thou art my love,
And thou art a storm
That breaks black in the sky
And, sweeping headlong,
Drenches and cowers each tree
And at the panting end
There is no sound
Save the melancholy cry of a single owl
Woe is me!

Thou art my love
And thou art a tinsel thing
And I in my play
Broke thee easily
And from the little fragments
Arose my long sorrow
Woe is me.

Thou art my love
And thou art a weary violet
Drooping from sun-caresses.
Answering mine carelessly
Woe is me.

Thou art my love
And thou art the ashes of other men's love
And I bury my face in these ashes
And I love them
Woe is me.

Thou art my love
And thou art the beard
On another man's face
Woe is me.

Thou art my love
And thou art a temple
And in this temple is an altar
And on this altar is my heart
Woe is me.

Thou art my love
And thou art a wretch.

[...] Read more

poem by Stephen Crane
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Live no evil

Say no evil; refraining to bring even the most
inconspicuous of hatred to your immaculately divine
lips,
See no evil; closing your eyes as they lecherously
wandered; casting their diabolical glimpse upon
innocuous entities trespassing through this mighty
planet,
Propagate no evil; disseminating only philanthropic
benevolence from your palms; in every entity you
encountered; during your impoverished existence upon
Mother Earth,
Hear no evil; basking only in the glory of melodiously
captivating sound; gushing like an untamed whirlwind
to the faintest cry of your fellow comrades in
inexplicable distress,
Sing no evil; chopping your tongue to an infinite bits
of inconspicuous ash; the instant it uttered things
against God’s most enthrallingly mesmerizing planet,
Patronize no evil; harboring only the irrefutable
essence of celestial peace profoundly within your
magnanimous soul; blatantly ostracizing those who
condemned wonderful humanity,
Fantasize no evil; drifting the intriguing chords of
your brain towards a land more enchanting than
paradise; the instant the devil tried capsizing it
from all sides,
Philosophize no evil; tirelessly browsing through only
textbooks of charismatic mankind; immortalizing its
spirit till even centuries after; you relinquished
breath and died,
Shield no evil; audaciously vanquishing every single
trace of malice from the gloomy interiors of your
dwelling; substituting it with an everlasting stream
on perpetual love,
Paint no evil; using your fingers to uplift tyrannized
humanity; sketching with them an infinite myriad of
shapes; that profusely enlightened disastrously
devastated lives,
Chase no evil; indefatigably embarking upon a mission
to save earth from bloodshed; evacuate the most
inconspicuous iota of treachery from the complexion of
satanic soil,
Eat no evil; relishing the fruits of freedom every
moment of your diminutive life; escalating higher than
the rhapsodic clouds with your comrades by your
majestic side,
Transcend no evil; perennially existing beneath the
blessings of the Omnisciently divine; savoring as well
diffusing harmonious happiness; to every iota of this
boundlessly beautiful planet,

[...] Read more

poem by Nikhil Parekh
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People Evil Leave A Permanent Stain

People evil leave a permanent stain...
Felt like nothing other.
People evil leave a permanent stain...
And forever this is suffered.
People evil leave a permanent stain.
And it remains,
With a paining that continues...
Sustaining and to drain.

People evil leave a permanent stain...
And forever it is suffered.
People evil leave a permanent stain.
And it remains.

We pray that it's forgiveness...
With a hope that it will soothe.
And we do this with a wish,
It is the best that we can do.
But...
Evil never leaves,
Us.
Evil never leaves.

We pray that it's forgiveness...
With a hope that it will soothe.
But...
Evil never leaves,
Us.
Evil never leaves.

People evil leave a permanent stain...
Felt like nothing other.
People evil leave a permanent stain...
And forever this is suffered.
People evil leave a permanent stain.
And it remains,
With a paining that continues...
Sustaining and to drain.

We pray that it's forgiveness...
With a hope that it will soothe.
But...
Evil never leaves,
Us.
Evil never leaves.

We pray that it's forgiveness...
With a hope that it will soothe.
But...
Evil never leaves,

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Evil That Dwells Within

I see faces that walk past me, And a shadow that stands beside me, I see you and the evil sees me.

When I am alone the evil always calls to me, The evil whispers to me but only inside my head, The evil is always around me and influencing my hatred of others.

The evil so frighting that others would flee from it but I find A new view of life with it, When good should envelope me the evil burns it away from me. I have no room for your pathetic lies and excuses this evil inside me is all I need.

It never judges only befriends me, I hate it but I wish to love it, With the evil that dwells within I can do anything and not fear anything or anyone, Speak my mind with decision I have not found my religion. God was never there but the evil that fills me.

I am angry and always seem to be, Only A few are selected to see the good in me, Others will have to deal with the evil that stands beside me, People judged to many times and now my mind is full of hatred, Burning my feelings and spitting on me.

I have never been bullied but people do it visually by glaring at me, Not my popular friends but the ones who don't know me, I hate you and wish to see you feel the evil within me, But I will not release it because it would make A scene.

When my time is right and Satan depicts and calls back the evil within me, Than I will be free. I am to young to live this way but feel I need to be to teach me a lesson, By doing it carefully. My friends Don't know the way I view things because I hide it like I have hid everything, I am close to them but still the evil seems to follow me.

Some days are worse when the evil influences everyone around me and they seem to turn it all on me, they can't contain my evil like I can contain it, The evil is powerful but not more powerful than me, But the evil can change my mood faster than a bullet can kill an enemy.

My mood changes and all I see is Red and Blasphemy, Go into a dark fit that is inside me, Brings up my anger and hatred that I feel towards others. Can't stop the anger from rising but it is all I can do to strive and fight the feelings inside me.

I gain control and the evil will never take hold, It follows me and is the shadow beside me.

poem by Connor Whyte
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The Believer's Jointure : Chapter II.

Containing the Marks and Characters of the Believer in Christ; together with some further privileges and grounds of comfort to the Saints.

Sect. I.

Doubting Believers called to examine, by marks drawn from their love to Him and his presence, their view of his glory, and their being emptied of Self-Righteousness, &c.

Good news! but, says the drooping bride,
Ah! what's all this to me?
Thou doubt'st thy right, when shadows hide
Thy Husband's face from thee.

Though sin and guilt thy spirit faints,
And trembling fears thy fate;
But harbour not thy groundless plaints,
Thy Husband's advent wait.

Thou sobb'st, 'O were I sure he's mine,
This would give glad'ning ease;'
And say'st, Though wants and woes combine,
Thy Husband would thee please.

But up and down, and seldom clear,
Inclos'd with hellish routs;
Yet yield thou not, nor foster fear:
Thy Husband hates thy doubts.

Thy cries and tears may slighted seem,
And barr'd from present ease;
Yet blame thyself, but never dream
Thy Husband's ill to please.

Thy jealous unbelieving heart
Still droops, and knows not why;
Then prove thyself to ease thy smart,
Thy Husband bids the try.

The following questions put to the
As scripture-marks, may tell
And shew, what'er thy failings be,
Thy Husband loves thee well.

MARKS.

Art thou content when he's away?
Can earth allay thy pants?
If conscience witness, won't it say,
Thy Husband's all thou wants?

[...] Read more

poem by Ralph Erskine
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The Masque Of Pandora

THE WORKSHOP OF HEPHAESTUS

HEPHAESTUS (standing before the statue of Pandora.)
Not fashioned out of gold, like Hera's throne,
Nor forged of iron like the thunderbolts
Of Zeus omnipotent, or other works
Wrought by my hands at Lemnos or Olympus,
But moulded in soft clay, that unresisting
Yields itself to the touch, this lovely form
Before me stands, perfect in every part.
Not Aphrodite's self appeared more fair,
When first upwafted by caressing winds
She came to high Olympus, and the gods
Paid homage to her beauty. Thus her hair
Was cinctured; thus her floating drapery
Was like a cloud about her, and her face
Was radiant with the sunshine and the sea.

THE VOICE OF ZEUS.
Is thy work done, Hephaestus?

HEPHAESTUS.
It is finished!

THE VOICE.
Not finished till I breathe the breath of life
Into her nostrils, and she moves and speaks.

HEPHAESTUS.
Will she become immortal like ourselves?

THE VOICE.
The form that thou hast fashioned out of clay
Is of the earth and mortal; but the spirit,
The life, the exhalation of my breath,
Is of diviner essence and immortal.
The gods shall shower on her their benefactions,
She shall possess all gifts: the gift of song,
The gift of eloquence, the gift of beauty,
The fascination and the nameless charm
That shall lead all men captive.

HEPHAESTUS.
Wherefore? wherefore?

(A wind shakes the house.)

I hear the rushing of a mighty wind
Through all the halls and chambers of my house!
Her parted lips inhale it, and her bosom

[...] Read more

poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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The Task: Book V. -- The Winter Morning Walk

‘Tis morning; and the sun, with ruddy orb
Ascending, fires the horizon; while the clouds,
That crowd away before the driving wind,
More ardent as the disk emerges more,
Resemble most some city in a blaze,
Seen through the leafless wood. His slanting ray
Slides ineffectual down the snowy vale,
And, tinging all with his own rosy hue,
From every herb and every spiry blade
Stretches a length of shadow o’er the field.
Mine, spindling into longitude immense,
In spite of gravity, and sage remark
That I myself am but a fleeting shade,
Provokes me to a smile. With eye askance
I view the muscular proportion’d limb
Transform’d to a lean shank. The shapeless pair
As they design’d to mock me, at my side
Take step for step; and as I near approach
The cottage, walk along the plaster’d wall,
Preposterous sight! the legs without the man.
The verdure of the plain lies buried deep
Beneath the dazzling deluge; and the bents
And coarser grass, upspearing o’er the rest,
Of late unsightly and unseen, now shine
Conspicuous, and in bright apparel clad,
And fledged with icy feathers, nod superb.
The cattle mourn in corners, where the fence
Screens them, and seem half petrified to sleep
In unrecumbent sadness. There they wait
Their wonted fodder; not like hungering man,
Fretful if unsupplied; but silent, meek,
And patient of the slow-paced swain’s delay.
He from the stack carves out the accustom’d load,
Deep plunging, and again deep plunging oft,
His broad keen knife into the solid mass:
Smooth as a wall the upright remnant stands,
With such undeviating and even force
He severs it away: no needless care,
Lest storms should overset the leaning pile
Deciduous, or its own unbalanced weight.
Forth goes the woodman, leaving unconcern’d
The cheerful haunts of man; to wield the axe
And drive the wedge in yonder forest drear,
From morn to eve his solitary task.
Shaggy, and lean, and shrewd, with pointed ears
And tail cropp’d short, half lurcher and half cur,
His dog attends him. Close behind his heel
Now creeps he slow; and now, with many a frisk
Wide scampering, snatches up the driften snow
With ivory teeth, or ploughs it with his snout;

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poem by William Cowper
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Gareth And Lynette

The last tall son of Lot and Bellicent,
And tallest, Gareth, in a showerful spring
Stared at the spate. A slender-shafted Pine
Lost footing, fell, and so was whirled away.
'How he went down,' said Gareth, 'as a false knight
Or evil king before my lance if lance
Were mine to use--O senseless cataract,
Bearing all down in thy precipitancy--
And yet thou art but swollen with cold snows
And mine is living blood: thou dost His will,
The Maker's, and not knowest, and I that know,
Have strength and wit, in my good mother's hall
Linger with vacillating obedience,
Prisoned, and kept and coaxed and whistled to--
Since the good mother holds me still a child!
Good mother is bad mother unto me!
A worse were better; yet no worse would I.
Heaven yield her for it, but in me put force
To weary her ears with one continuous prayer,
Until she let me fly discaged to sweep
In ever-highering eagle-circles up
To the great Sun of Glory, and thence swoop
Down upon all things base, and dash them dead,
A knight of Arthur, working out his will,
To cleanse the world. Why, Gawain, when he came
With Modred hither in the summertime,
Asked me to tilt with him, the proven knight.
Modred for want of worthier was the judge.
Then I so shook him in the saddle, he said,
"Thou hast half prevailed against me," said so--he--
Though Modred biting his thin lips was mute,
For he is alway sullen: what care I?'

And Gareth went, and hovering round her chair
Asked, 'Mother, though ye count me still the child,
Sweet mother, do ye love the child?' She laughed,
'Thou art but a wild-goose to question it.'
'Then, mother, an ye love the child,' he said,
'Being a goose and rather tame than wild,
Hear the child's story.' 'Yea, my well-beloved,
An 'twere but of the goose and golden eggs.'

And Gareth answered her with kindling eyes,
'Nay, nay, good mother, but this egg of mine
Was finer gold than any goose can lay;
For this an Eagle, a royal Eagle, laid
Almost beyond eye-reach, on such a palm
As glitters gilded in thy Book of Hours.
And there was ever haunting round the palm
A lusty youth, but poor, who often saw

[...] Read more

poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson
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Fifth Book

AURORA LEIGH, be humble. Shall I hope
To speak my poems in mysterious tune
With man and nature,–with the lava-lymph
That trickles from successive galaxies
Still drop by drop adown the finger of God,
In still new worlds?–with summer-days in this,
That scarce dare breathe, they are so beautiful?–
With spring's delicious trouble in the ground
Tormented by the quickened blood of roots.
And softly pricked by golden crocus-sheaves
In token of the harvest-time of flowers?–
With winters and with autumns,–and beyond,
With the human heart's large seasons,–when it hopes
And fears, joys, grieves, and loves?–with all that strain
Of sexual passion, which devours the flesh
In a sacrament of souls? with mother's breasts,
Which, round the new made creatures hanging there,
Throb luminous and harmonious like pure spheres?–
With multitudinous life, and finally
With the great out-goings of ecstatic souls,
Who, in a rush of too long prisoned flame,
Their radiant faces upward, burn away
This dark of the body, issuing on a world
Beyond our mortal?–can I speak my verse
So plainly in tune to these things and the rest,
That men shall feel it catch them on the quick,
As having the same warrant over them
To hold and move them, if they will or no,
Alike imperious as the primal rhythm
Of that theurgic nature? I must fail,
Who fail at the beginning to hold and move
One man,–and he my cousin, and he my friend,
And he born tender, made intelligent,
Inclined to ponder the precipitous sides
Of difficult questions; yet, obtuse to me,–
Of me, incurious! likes me very well,
And wishes me a paradise of good,
Good looks, good means, and good digestion!–ay,
But otherwise evades me, puts me off
With kindness, with a tolerant gentleness,–
Too light a book for a grave man's reading! Go,
Aurora Leigh: be humble.
There it is;
We women are too apt to look to one,
Which proves a certain impotence in art.
We strain our natures at doing something great,
Far less because it's something great to do,
Than, haply, that we, so, commend ourselves
As being not small, and more appreciable
To some one friend. We must have mediators

[...] Read more

poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning from Aurora Leigh (1856)
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Paradise Regained

THE FIRST BOOK

I, WHO erewhile the happy Garden sung
By one man's disobedience lost, now sing
Recovered Paradise to all mankind,
By one man's firm obedience fully tried
Through all temptation, and the Tempter foiled
In all his wiles, defeated and repulsed,
And Eden raised in the waste Wilderness.
Thou Spirit, who led'st this glorious Eremite
Into the desert, his victorious field
Against the spiritual foe, and brought'st him thence 10
By proof the undoubted Son of God, inspire,
As thou art wont, my prompted song, else mute,
And bear through highth or depth of Nature's bounds,
With prosperous wing full summed, to tell of deeds
Above heroic, though in secret done,
And unrecorded left through many an age:
Worthy to have not remained so long unsung.
Now had the great Proclaimer, with a voice
More awful than the sound of trumpet, cried
Repentance, and Heaven's kingdom nigh at hand 20
To all baptized. To his great baptism flocked
With awe the regions round, and with them came
From Nazareth the son of Joseph deemed
To the flood Jordan--came as then obscure,
Unmarked, unknown. But him the Baptist soon
Descried, divinely warned, and witness bore
As to his worthier, and would have resigned
To him his heavenly office. Nor was long
His witness unconfirmed: on him baptized
Heaven opened, and in likeness of a Dove 30
The Spirit descended, while the Father's voice
From Heaven pronounced him his beloved Son.
That heard the Adversary, who, roving still
About the world, at that assembly famed
Would not be last, and, with the voice divine
Nigh thunder-struck, the exalted man to whom
Such high attest was given a while surveyed
With wonder; then, with envy fraught and rage,
Flies to his place, nor rests, but in mid air
To council summons all his mighty Peers, 40
Within thick clouds and dark tenfold involved,
A gloomy consistory; and them amidst,
With looks aghast and sad, he thus bespake:--
"O ancient Powers of Air and this wide World
(For much more willingly I mention Air,
This our old conquest, than remember Hell,
Our hated habitation), well ye know
How many ages, as the years of men,

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poem by John Milton
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Sohrab and Rustum

And the first grey of morning fill'd the east,
And the fog rose out of the Oxus stream.
But all the Tartar camp along the stream
Was hush'd, and still the men were plunged in sleep;
Sohrab alone, he slept not; all night long
He had lain wakeful, tossing on his bed;
But when the grey dawn stole into his tent,
He rose, and clad himself, and girt his sword,
And took his horseman's cloak, and left his tent,
And went abroad into the cold wet fog,
Through the dim camp to Peran-Wisa's tent.

Through the black Tartar tents he pass'd, which stood
Clustering like bee-hives on the low flat strand
Of Oxus, where the summer-floods o'erflow
When the sun melts the snows in high Pamere
Through the black tents he pass'd, o'er that low strand,
And to a hillock came, a little back
From the stream's brink--the spot where first a boat,
Crossing the stream in summer, scrapes the land.
The men of former times had crown'd the top
With a clay fort; but that was fall'n, and now
The Tartars built there Peran-Wisa's tent,
A dome of laths, and o'er it felts were spread.
And Sohrab came there, and went in, and stood
Upon the thick piled carpets in the tent,
And found the old man sleeping on his bed
Of rugs and felts, and near him lay his arms.
And Peran-Wisa heard him, though the step
Was dull'd; for he slept light, an old man's sleep;
And he rose quickly on one arm, and said:--

"Who art thou? for it is not yet clear dawn.
Speak! is there news, or any night alarm?"

But Sohrab came to the bedside, and said:--
"Thou know'st me, Peran-Wisa! it is I.
The sun is not yet risen, and the foe
Sleep; but I sleep not; all night long I lie
Tossing and wakeful, and I come to thee.
For so did King Afrasiab bid me seek
Thy counsel, and to heed thee as thy son,
In Samarcand, before the army march'd;
And I will tell thee what my heart desires.
Thou know'st if, since from Ader-baijan first
I came among the Tartars and bore arms,
I have still served Afrasiab well, and shown,
At my boy's years, the courage of a man.
This too thou know'st, that while I still bear on
The conquering Tartar ensigns through the world,

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poem by Matthew Arnold (1853)
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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!

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poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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The Evil Saga

----
This Evil
----
This evil inside of me
Is trying get out.
It wants pain,
It wants misery.

I can't fight it,
I can't hide it.
No, No, No!

Freedom,
Terminal fate is coming.
It's nightmare is stunning.
Heathen,
The darkness in my head
Sees you all dead.
Pagan,
Ritual sacrifice
Going on tonight.

Civilizations predict the end of the world,
But death is too easy an out for us all.
This evil will test our might
It will make us suffer, make us fall.

I can't fight it,
I can't hide it.
No, No, No!

----
He Cried Evil
----

'Dark mind proposes a question,
Voices in his head form a suggestion
'I'll kill them all, ' he said to them.'

His desperate soul and his lonely heart
Screamed into the night.
Preying on ignorant fools and greedy buffoons,
He said he'd make it right.

It was his obsession
To see their final expression.
He had to teach them a lesson.

He Cried Evil!
He Cried Evil!

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poem by Timothy Lee Hollandsworth Jr.
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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.

[...] Read more

poem by Byron from Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (1818)
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Quatrains Of Life

What has my youth been that I love it thus,
Sad youth, to all but one grown tedious,
Stale as the news which last week wearied us,
Or a tired actor's tale told to an empty house?

What did it bring me that I loved it, even
With joy before it and that dream of Heaven,
Boyhood's first rapture of requited bliss,
What did it give? What ever has it given?

'Let me recount the value of my days,
Call up each witness, mete out blame and praise,
Set life itself before me as it was,
And--for I love it--list to what it says.

Oh, I will judge it fairly. Each old pleasure
Shared with dead lips shall stand a separate treasure.
Each untold grief, which now seems lesser pain,
Shall here be weighed and argued of at leisure.

I will not mark mere follies. These would make
The count too large and in the telling take
More tears than I can spare from seemlier themes
To cure its laughter when my heart should ache.

Only the griefs which are essential things,
The bitter fruit which all experience brings;
Nor only of crossed pleasures, but the creed
Men learn who deal with nations and with kings.

All shall be counted fairly, griefs and joys,
Solely distinguishing 'twixt mirth and noise,
The thing which was and that which falsely seemed,
Pleasure and vanity, man's bliss and boy's.

So I shall learn the reason of my trust
In this poor life, these particles of dust
Made sentient for a little while with tears,
Till the great ``may--be'' ends for me in ``must.''

My childhood? Ah, my childhood! What of it
Stripped of all fancy, bare of all conceit?
Where is the infancy the poets sang?
Which was the true and which the counterfeit?

I see it now, alas, with eyes unsealed,
That age of innocence too well revealed.
The flowers I gathered--for I gathered flowers--
Were not more vain than I in that far field.

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poem by Wilfrid Scawen Blunt
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