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I have an editor, but generally in Japan today, directors spend a great deal of time editing the so-called quality films.

Kaneto Shindo in Voices from the Japanese Cinema (1975)
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Would you ever believe

WOULD YOU EVER believe if I called a nondescript table of teakwood; as a vivacious bird soaring high in the sky,

Would you ever believe if I called a ruffled sheet of paper; as a chunk of glittering gold,

Would you ever believe if I called a grandiloquent watch embodied with diamonds; as a lump of bedraggled stone,

Would you ever believe if I called a mountain of compacted mud; as a switchboard of pugnacious electricity,

Would you ever believe if I called a resplendent rainbow in the sky; as a broomstick with incongruous bristles,

Would you ever believe if I called a rusty canister of dilapidated iron; as a mesmerizing rose growing in the garden,

Would you ever believe if I called a pink tablet of luxury soap; as a mosquito hovering acrimoniously in the cloistered room,

Would you ever believe if I called a boat rollicking merrily on the undulating waves; as a rustic jungle spider,

Would you ever believe if I called a valley profusely embedded with snow; as an unscrupulous dog on the street,

Would you ever believe if I called a pair of luscious lips; as a disdainfully fetid shoe,

Would you ever believe if I called a fluorescent rod of light; as a jagged bush of cactus growing in the sweltering desert,

Would you ever believe if I called the blazing sun; as a pudgy bar of delectable chocolate,
Would you ever believe if I called an angular sculptured bone; as acid bubbling in a swanky bottle,

Would you ever believe if I called a scintillating oyster; as an inarticulate matchstick coated with lead,

Would you ever believe if I called a cluster of bells jingling from the ceiling; as a sordid cockroach philandering beside the lavatory seat,

Would you ever believe if I called a fruit of succulent coconut; as a dead mans morbid tooth,

Would you ever believe If I called a steaming cup of filter coffee; as gaudily colored water emanating from the street fountains,

Would you ever believe if I called the majestic statue of a revered historian; as a slab of tangy peanut butter,

Would you ever believe if I called a vibrant shirt; as a protuberant pigeon discerningly pecking its beak at grains scattered on the floor,

Would you ever believe if I called a flocculent bud of cotton; as a camouflaged lizard transgressing through wild projections of grass,

Would you ever believe if I called a photograph depicting the steep gorges; as a gutter inundated with obnoxious sewage,

Would you ever believe if I called a lanky giraffe; as a convict nefariously lurking through solitary streets of the city,

Would you ever believe if I called a pair of flamboyant sunglasses; as a weird tattoo to be adhered to the chest,

Would you ever believe if I called a chicken’s egg; as logs of sooty charcoal abundantly stashed in the colossal warehouse,

Would you ever believe if I called a biscuit replete with golden honey; as a ominously slithering reptile in the jungles,

Would you ever believe if I called a bald man possessing a profoundly tonsured scalp; as a gas balloon floating in insipid air,

[...] Read more

poem by Nikhil Parekh
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Old Japan

In old Japan, by creek and bay,
The blue plum-blossoms blow,
Where birds with sea-blue plumage gay
Through sea-blue branches go:
Dragons are coiling down below
Like dragons on a fan;
And pig-tailed sailors lurching slow
Through streets of old Japan.

There, in the dim blue death of day
Where white tea roses grow,
Petals and scents are strewn astray
Till night be sweet enow;
Then lovers wander whispering low
As lovers only can,
Where rosy paper lanterns glow
Through streets of old Japan.

From Wonderland to Yea-or-Nay
The junks with painted prow
Dream on the purple water-way
Nor ever meet a foe;
Though still, with stiff mustachio
And crooked ataghan,
Their pirates guard with pomp and show
The ships of old Japan.

How far beyond the dawning day
The glories ebb and flow,
Where still the wonder-children play,
The witches mop and mow;
How far, how far, no chart may show,
The heart of mortal man,
The light, the splendour, and the glow
That once were old Japan!

That land is very far away
We lost it long ago!
In old Japan the grass is grey,
The trees are white with snow;
The sea-blue bird became a crow,
The lizards leapt and ran,
No dragon mourned that overthrow,
The dream of old Japan.

In old Japan, at windows grey,
Where scents of opium flow,
Strange smiling faces, white as clay,
Nod idly to and fro;
There life and death may come and go,

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poem by Alfred Noyes
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The Third Monarchy, being the Grecian, beginning under Alexander the Great in the 112. Olympiad.

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

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poem by Anne Bradstreet
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Prince Hohenstiel-Schwangau, Saviour of Society

Epigraph

Υδραν φονεύσας, μυρίων τ᾽ ἄλλων πόνων
διῆλθον ἀγέλας . . .
τὸ λοίσθιον δὲ τόνδ᾽ ἔτλην τάλας πόνον,
. . . δῶμα θριγκῶσαι κακοῖς.

I slew the Hydra, and from labour pass'd
To labour — tribes of labours! Till, at last,
Attempting one more labour, in a trice,
Alack, with ills I crowned the edifice.

You have seen better days, dear? So have I —
And worse too, for they brought no such bud-mouth
As yours to lisp "You wish you knew me!" Well,
Wise men, 't is said, have sometimes wished the same,
And wished and had their trouble for their pains.
Suppose my Œdipus should lurk at last
Under a pork-pie hat and crinoline,
And, latish, pounce on Sphynx in Leicester Square?
Or likelier, what if Sphynx in wise old age,
Grown sick of snapping foolish people's heads,
And jealous for her riddle's proper rede, —
Jealous that the good trick which served the turn
Have justice rendered it, nor class one day
With friend Home's stilts and tongs and medium-ware,—
What if the once redoubted Sphynx, I say,
(Because night draws on, and the sands increase,
And desert-whispers grow a prophecy)
Tell all to Corinth of her own accord.
Bright Corinth, not dull Thebes, for Lais' sake,
Who finds me hardly grey, and likes my nose,
And thinks a man of sixty at the prime?
Good! It shall be! Revealment of myself!
But listen, for we must co-operate;
I don't drink tea: permit me the cigar!
First, how to make the matter plain, of course —
What was the law by which I lived. Let 's see:
Ay, we must take one instant of my life
Spent sitting by your side in this neat room:
Watch well the way I use it, and don't laugh!
Here's paper on the table, pen and ink:
Give me the soiled bit — not the pretty rose!
See! having sat an hour, I'm rested now,
Therefore want work: and spy no better work
For eye and hand and mind that guides them both,
During this instant, than to draw my pen
From blot One — thus — up, up to blot Two — thus —
Which I at last reach, thus, and here's my line
Five inches long and tolerably straight:

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poem by Robert Browning (1871)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Book IV - Part 03 - The Senses And Mental Pictures

Bodies that strike the eyes, awaking sight.
From certain things flow odours evermore,
As cold from rivers, heat from sun, and spray
From waves of ocean, eater-out of walls
Around the coasts. Nor ever cease to flit
The varied voices, sounds athrough the air.
Then too there comes into the mouth at times
The wet of a salt taste, when by the sea
We roam about; and so, whene'er we watch
The wormword being mixed, its bitter stings.
To such degree from all things is each thing
Borne streamingly along, and sent about
To every region round; and Nature grants
Nor rest nor respite of the onward flow,
Since 'tis incessantly we feeling have,
And all the time are suffered to descry
And smell all things at hand, and hear them sound.
Besides, since shape examined by our hands
Within the dark is known to be the same
As that by eyes perceived within the light
And lustrous day, both touch and sight must be
By one like cause aroused. So, if we test
A square and get its stimulus on us
Within the dark, within the light what square
Can fall upon our sight, except a square
That images the things? Wherefore it seems
The source of seeing is in images,
Nor without these can anything be viewed.

Now these same films I name are borne about
And tossed and scattered into regions all.
But since we do perceive alone through eyes,
It follows hence that whitherso we turn
Our sight, all things do strike against it there
With form and hue. And just how far from us
Each thing may be away, the image yields
To us the power to see and chance to tell:
For when 'tis sent, at once it shoves ahead
And drives along the air that's in the space
Betwixt it and our eyes. And thus this air
All glides athrough our eyeballs, and, as 'twere,
Brushes athrough our pupils and thuswise
Passes across. Therefore it comes we see
How far from us each thing may be away,
And the more air there be that's driven before,
And too the longer be the brushing breeze
Against our eyes, the farther off removed
Each thing is seen to be: forsooth, this work
With mightily swift order all goes on,
So that upon one instant we may see

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poem by Lucretius
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Nuclear Is Safe? No They Lied To You

A list of non classified nuclear disasters
chalk one up for Chalk River Canada
rating 5 a “reactor shutoff rod failure,

combined with several operator errors,
led to a major power excursion of more
than double the reactor's rated output
at AECL's NRX reactor” then a big deal.1952

Entrant two Windscale Pile United Kingdom
rating 5 a “Release of radioactive material to
the environment following a fire in a reactor
core.” Toast a good year for nuclear disasters.1957

graphite core of a British nuclear “[weapons
programme] reactor at Windscale, Cumberland
(now Sellafield, Cumbria) caught fire, releasing
substantial amounts of radioactive contamination
into the surrounding area.” Radioactive fire.

A warm welcome to entrant three. Kyshtym
Russia rating 6 a “Significant release of
radioactive material to the environment
from explosion of a high activity waste tank.” 1957

Please all welcome contestant one back
Chalk River Canada (rating?) “Due to
inadequate cooling a damaged uranium
fuel rod caught fire and was torn in two.” 1958

Champagne pops cheer another good year
Vinč a Yugoslavia (rating?) “During
a subcritical counting experiment a power
buildup went undetected - six scientists
received high doses.” What detailed detail? 1958

Applause please for our first American entry
Santa Susana Field Laboratory US (rating?)
“Partial core meltdown.” Sounds serious.
Tick one deep operations public cover up.1959

Time to take a nice country waltz in a US county
Westinghouse Waltz Mill Westmoreland County
(rating?) a core melt accident in a test reactor? 1960

Looks like American is going for a hat trick
Charlestown US (rating?) “Error by a worker
at a United Nuclear Corporation fuel facility
led to an accidental criticality”. Human error? 1964

[...] Read more

poem by Terence George Craddock
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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)
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The quality of mercy (conditions apply)

The quality of mercy,
Portia declared,

the quality of mercy is
suspended during the present conflict

the quality of mercy is
not the business of a Minister of Justice

the quality of mercy is
not a matter of individual conscience

the quality of mercy is
too subtle for public discussion
or law

the quality of mercy is
only for Shakespeare and stuff

the quality of mercy is
less stimulating than revenge

the quality of mercy is
no business of yours

the quality of mercy is
no concern of religious authorities
who should stay silent

the quality of mercy is
an outdated concept

the quality of mercy is
nothing to do with forgiveness
or circumstantial evidence
or the remission of sins

the quality of mercy is
no longer a matter of pride

the quality of mercy is
no longer a mark of humanity

the quality of mercy
would be OK if Obama said so

the quality of mercy
is one hell of a hot potato
cooked in oil

[...] Read more

poem by Michael Shepherd
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XI. Guido

You are the Cardinal Acciaiuoli, and you,
Abate Panciatichi—two good Tuscan names:
Acciaiuoli—ah, your ancestor it was
Built the huge battlemented convent-block
Over the little forky flashing Greve
That takes the quick turn at the foot o' the hill
Just as one first sees Florence: oh those days!
'T is Ema, though, the other rivulet,
The one-arched brown brick bridge yawns over,—yes,
Gallop and go five minutes, and you gain
The Roman Gate from where the Ema's bridged:
Kingfishers fly there: how I see the bend
O'erturreted by Certosa which he built,
That Senescal (we styled him) of your House!
I do adjure you, help me, Sirs! My blood
Comes from as far a source: ought it to end
This way, by leakage through their scaffold-planks
Into Rome's sink where her red refuse runs?
Sirs, I beseech you by blood-sympathy,
If there be any vile experiment
In the air,—if this your visit simply prove,
When all's done, just a well-intentioned trick,
That tries for truth truer than truth itself,
By startling up a man, ere break of day,
To tell him he must die at sunset,—pshaw!
That man's a Franceschini; feel his pulse,
Laugh at your folly, and let's all go sleep!
You have my last word,—innocent am I
As Innocent my Pope and murderer,
Innocent as a babe, as Mary's own,
As Mary's self,—I said, say and repeat,—
And why, then, should I die twelve hours hence? I—
Whom, not twelve hours ago, the gaoler bade
Turn to my straw-truss, settle and sleep sound
That I might wake the sooner, promptlier pay
His due of meat-and-drink-indulgence, cross
His palm with fee of the good-hand, beside,
As gallants use who go at large again!
For why? All honest Rome approved my part;
Whoever owned wife, sister, daughter,—nay,
Mistress,—had any shadow of any right
That looks like right, and, all the more resolved,
Held it with tooth and nail,—these manly men
Approved! I being for Rome, Rome was for me.
Then, there's the point reserved, the subterfuge
My lawyers held by, kept for last resource,
Firm should all else,—the impossible fancy!—fail,
And sneaking burgess-spirit win the day.
The knaves! One plea at least would hold,—they laughed,—
One grappling-iron scratch the bottom-rock

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poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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V. Count Guido Franceschini

Thanks, Sir, but, should it please the reverend Court,
I feel I can stand somehow, half sit down
Without help, make shift to even speak, you see,
Fortified by the sip of … why, 't is wine,
Velletri,—and not vinegar and gall,
So changed and good the times grow! Thanks, kind Sir!
Oh, but one sip's enough! I want my head
To save my neck, there's work awaits me still.
How cautious and considerate … aie, aie, aie,
Nor your fault, sweet Sir! Come, you take to heart
An ordinary matter. Law is law.
Noblemen were exempt, the vulgar thought,
From racking; but, since law thinks otherwise,
I have been put to the rack: all's over now,
And neither wrist—what men style, out of joint:
If any harm be, 't is the shoulder-blade,
The left one, that seems wrong i' the socket,—Sirs,
Much could not happen, I was quick to faint,
Being past my prime of life, and out of health.
In short, I thank you,—yes, and mean the word.
Needs must the Court be slow to understand
How this quite novel form of taking pain,
This getting tortured merely in the flesh,
Amounts to almost an agreeable change
In my case, me fastidious, plied too much
With opposite treatment, used (forgive the joke)
To the rasp-tooth toying with this brain of mine,
And, in and out my heart, the play o' the probe.
Four years have I been operated on
I' the soul, do you see—its tense or tremulous part—
My self-respect, my care for a good name,
Pride in an old one, love of kindred—just
A mother, brothers, sisters, and the like,
That looked up to my face when days were dim,
And fancied they found light there—no one spot,
Foppishly sensitive, but has paid its pang.
That, and not this you now oblige me with,
That was the Vigil-torment, if you please!
The poor old noble House that drew the rags
O' the Franceschini's once superb array
Close round her, hoped to slink unchallenged by,—
Pluck off these! Turn the drapery inside out
And teach the tittering town how scarlet wears!
Show men the lucklessness, the improvidence
Of the easy-natured Count before this Count,
The father I have some slight feeling for,
Who let the world slide, nor foresaw that friends
Then proud to cap and kiss their patron's shoe,
Would, when the purse he left held spider-webs,
Properly push his child to wall one day!

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poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
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VII. Pompilia

I am just seventeen years and five months old,
And, if I lived one day more, three full weeks;
'T is writ so in the church's register,
Lorenzo in Lucina, all my names
At length, so many names for one poor child,
—Francesca Camilla Vittoria Angela
Pompilia Comparini,—laughable!
Also 't is writ that I was married there
Four years ago: and they will add, I hope,
When they insert my death, a word or two,—
Omitting all about the mode of death,—
This, in its place, this which one cares to know,
That I had been a mother of a son
Exactly two weeks. It will be through grace
O' the Curate, not through any claim I have;
Because the boy was born at, so baptized
Close to, the Villa, in the proper church:
A pretty church, I say no word against,
Yet stranger-like,—while this Lorenzo seems
My own particular place, I always say.
I used to wonder, when I stood scarce high
As the bed here, what the marble lion meant,
With half his body rushing from the wall,
Eating the figure of a prostrate man—
(To the right, it is, of entry by the door)
An ominous sign to one baptized like me,
Married, and to be buried there, I hope.
And they should add, to have my life complete,
He is a boy and Gaetan by name—
Gaetano, for a reason,—if the friar
Don Celestine will ask this grace for me
Of Curate Ottoboni: he it was
Baptized me: he remembers my whole life
As I do his grey hair.

All these few things
I know are true,—will you remember them?
Because time flies. The surgeon cared for me,
To count my wounds,—twenty-two dagger-wounds,
Five deadly, but I do not suffer much—
Or too much pain,—and am to die to-night.

Oh how good God is that my babe was born,
—Better than born, baptized and hid away
Before this happened, safe from being hurt!
That had been sin God could not well forgive:
He was too young to smile and save himself.
When they took two days after he was born,
My babe away from me to be baptized
And hidden awhile, for fear his foe should find,—

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poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
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Can You Deal With It?

(words and music: duran duran)
There must be somebody
Wholl make love to me.
Blow the rules away
And trash these yesterdays.
Live in simpathy
Use psychology.
To find the twist in me (ah-ha)
Can you deal with it?
Recent enquiry
Showed now boundry.
Loves the only way
Can you handle it?
Can you deal with it? (oowa)
Can you deal with it?
Can you deal with it? (oowa)
Can you deal with it?
Can you deal with it?
When you aint sorry? (can you deal with it? )
For all that you appologise (can you deal with it? )
Working up to something,
I know youre up to something...
Yeahhhh...
Can you deal with it? (somethings got to happen)
Can you deal with it? (somethings got to get me up)
Say you deal with it? (but nothing never happens)
Can you deal with it? (cos nothings ever good enough)
Say you deal with it?
Can you deal with it? (somethings got to happen)
Can you deal with it? (somethings got to get me up)
Say you deal with it? (but nothings gonna happen)
Can you deal with it? (cos nothings ever good enough)
Say you deal with it?

song performed by Duran Duran
Added by Lucian Velea
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The Eternal Circle

Now, a visitor from somewhere right outside this Mundane Ball
Do not ask me where he came from, for that point's not clear at all;
For he might have been an angel, or he might have come from Mars,
Or from any of the other of the fixed or unfixed stars.
As regards his mental make-up he was much like you or me;
And he toured about the country, just to see what he could see.

Well, this superhuman person was of most inquiring mind,
And 'twas noted, from his questions, he was very far from blind,
And the striking thing about him was his stern, compelling eye,
That demanded Truth ungarbled when he paused for a reply.
And, despite the mental wriggles of the folk he interviewed,
When they placed the Truth before him she was ab-so-lutely nude.

At our Civilised Society he stared in some amaze,
As he muttered his equivalent for 'Gosh!' or 'Spare me days!'
For our cherished modes and customs knocked him sideways, so to speak.
'To solve,' said he, 'this mystery, now whither shall I seek?
For a sane and sound solution I must question those on high,'
Said this extra-mundane being with the stern, compelling eye.

Now, his methods were intelligent - I confess,
For he started with our Politics, religion and the Press.
Thus, he read a morning paper through, intently, ev'ry leaf,
Then hied him out to interview the editor-in-chief:
'They say that Truth lives in a well,' he muttered as he went;
'But her well is not an inkwell, I will lay my last lone cent.'

It chanced he found the editor unguarded and alone
At the office of the paper - 'twas the MORNING MEGAPHONE.
'Now, I take it,' said the visitor, 'you represent the Press,
That great Public Educator?' And the pressman murmured, 'Yes.'
'Yet in yesterday's edition I perceived a glaring lie!
How's this?' He fixed the pressman with his stern, compelling eye.

Then the editor he stammered, and the editor he 'hemmed'
And muttered things like 'Gracious me!' and likewise, 'Well, I'm demned!'
But the lady Truth came tripping, all undressed and unashamed;
'Oh, I own it!' cried the editor. 'But how can I be blamed?
There's our blighted advertisers and our readers - Spare my grief!
But we've got to please the public!' moaned the editor-in-chief.

'Now to interview a statesman and consider his reply,'
Said this strange Select Committee with the stern, compelling eye.
And the Honorable Member for Mud Flat he chanced to find
In a noble Spring-street building of a most palatial kind.
And the Honorable Member viewed his visitor with awe,
For he surely had the most compelling eye you ever saw.

'Now, then, tell me,' said the visitor; 'you are a man of State,

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poem by Clarence Michael James Stanislaus Dennis
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Rock Me, Roll Me

Have you ever been in love before
With a beautiful woman?
Does she have insecurities?
And have you ever been in love before
With a needy woman?
Is she too controlling?
She only wants you to
Rock me (she only wants you to)
Roll me (she only needs you to)
Spend a little more time
Spend a little more time
Rock me (she only wants you to)
Roll me (she only needs you to)
Spend a little more time
Spend a little more time with me
I need ya babe
I need ya babe
Have you ever been in love before with a cheatin woman?
Is she always lying?
Now, you ever been in love before with a crazy woman?
Does she make you crazy?
She only wants you to
Rock me (she only wants you to)
Roll me (she only needs you to)
Spend a little more time
Spend a little more time
Rock me (she only wants you to)
Roll me (she only needs you to)
Spend a little more time
Spend a little more time with me
Thats all I wanrt you to do with me, baby
Love me
Spend a little more time
Spend a little more time
Oh yeah, yeah
Spend a little more time
Spend a little more time
And I only wanna know
I only want to know your loves for real
Be your only girl in this whole wide world, yeah
All of these things are just a part of me
So that you can see what women really need
And I need to be loved
Rock me (she only wants you to)
Roll me (she only needs you to)
Spend a little more time
Spend a little more time
Rock me (she only wants you to)
Roll me (she only needs you to)
Spend a little more time

[...] Read more

song performed by Toni Braxton
Added by Lucian Velea
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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
Added by Poetry Lover
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Na Tian Piet's Sha'er Of The Late Sultan Abu Bakar Of Johor

In the name of God, let his word begin:
Praise be to God, let praises clear ring;
May our Lord, Jesus Christ's[8] blessings
Guide my pen through these poetizings!

This sha'er is an entirely new composition
Composed by myself, no fear of imitation.
It's Allah's name, I will keep calling out
While creating this poem to avoid confusion.

This story I'm relating at the present moment
I copy not, nor is it by other hands wrought;
Nothing whatsoever is here laid out
That hereunder is not clearly put forth.

Not that I am able to create with much ease,
To all that's to come I'm yet not accustomed;
Why, this sha'er at this time is being composed
Only to console my heart which is heavily laden.

I'm a peranakan[9], of Chinese origin,
Hardly perfect in character and mind;
I find much that I can not comprehend,
I'm not a man given to much wisdom.

Na Tian Piet[10] is what I go by name
I have in the past composed stories and poems;
Even when explained to - most stupid I remain
The more I keep talking the less I understand.

I was born in times gone by
In the country known as Bencoolen[11];
Indeed, I am more than stupid:
Ashamed am I composing this lay.

Twenty-four years have gone by
Since I moved to the island of Singapore;
My wife and children accompanied me
To Singapore, a most lovely country.

I stayed in Riau[12] for some time
Together with my wife and children;
Two full years in Riau territory,
Back to Singapore my legs carried me.

At the time when Acheh[13] was waging war
I went there with goods to trade,
I managed to sell them at exhorbitant prices:
Great indeed were the profits I made.

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poem by T. Wignesan
Added by Poetry Lover
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VI. Giuseppe Caponsacchi

Answer you, Sirs? Do I understand aright?
Have patience! In this sudden smoke from hell,—
So things disguise themselves,—I cannot see
My own hand held thus broad before my face
And know it again. Answer you? Then that means
Tell over twice what I, the first time, told
Six months ago: 't was here, I do believe,
Fronting you same three in this very room,
I stood and told you: yet now no one laughs,
Who then … nay, dear my lords, but laugh you did,
As good as laugh, what in a judge we style
Laughter—no levity, nothing indecorous, lords!
Only,—I think I apprehend the mood:
There was the blameless shrug, permissible smirk,
The pen's pretence at play with the pursed mouth,
The titter stifled in the hollow palm
Which rubbed the eyebrow and caressed the nose,
When I first told my tale: they meant, you know,
"The sly one, all this we are bound believe!
"Well, he can say no other than what he says.
"We have been young, too,—come, there's greater guilt!
"Let him but decently disembroil himself,
"Scramble from out the scrape nor move the mud,—
"We solid ones may risk a finger-stretch!
And now you sit as grave, stare as aghast
As if I were a phantom: now 't is—"Friend,
"Collect yourself!"—no laughing matter more—
"Counsel the Court in this extremity,
"Tell us again!"—tell that, for telling which,
I got the jocular piece of punishment,
Was sent to lounge a little in the place
Whence now of a sudden here you summon me
To take the intelligence from just—your lips!
You, Judge Tommati, who then tittered most,—
That she I helped eight months since to escape
Her husband, was retaken by the same,
Three days ago, if I have seized your sense,—
(I being disallowed to interfere,
Meddle or make in a matter none of mine,
For you and law were guardians quite enough
O' the innocent, without a pert priest's help)—
And that he has butchered her accordingly,
As she foretold and as myself believed,—
And, so foretelling and believing so,
We were punished, both of us, the merry way:
Therefore, tell once again the tale! For what?
Pompilia is only dying while I speak!
Why does the mirth hang fire and miss the smile?
My masters, there's an old book, you should con
For strange adventures, applicable yet,

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Affirmations(2002-2004)

Today, I will get up before my alarm
Today, I won't close my eyes until dusk
Today, I will not get a speeding ticket
Today, I will count this day as a first
Today, I will enjoy the life that has been left to me
Today, I won't frown over the may-have-beens
Today, I won't cry over the should-have-beens
Today, I won't wonder about the could-have-beens

Today, I'll smile.......Today, I'll Laugh.... Today, I'll relax

Today, I won't feel alone because I don't see you
Today, I'll find something new that wasn't true of you
Today, I won't be afraid to look upon a new face
Today, I'll step up and take my place
Today, I won't think about what I've lost
Today, I'll look forward instead of behind
Today, I'll find some piece of mind

Today, I'll hope.... Today, I'll pray... Today, I'll believe

Today, I'll dream as if I always did
Today, I'll wish on a star the way I used to
Today, I'll reach for the heavens and sigh
Today, My heart will start to heal
Today, the biggest miracle is ME.
Today, Yesterday's problems ceased to be
Today, the rain has stopped and the sun has returned
Today, the breath of kindness is found in words

Today, I wonder.... Today, I am a child.

poem by Lillian B. Rose
Added by Poetry Lover
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III. The Other Half-Rome

Another day that finds her living yet,
Little Pompilia, with the patient brow
And lamentable smile on those poor lips,
And, under the white hospital-array,
A flower-like body, to frighten at a bruise
You'd think, yet now, stabbed through and through again,
Alive i' the ruins. 'T is a miracle.
It seems that, when her husband struck her first,
She prayed Madonna just that she might live
So long as to confess and be absolved;
And whether it was that, all her sad life long
Never before successful in a prayer,
This prayer rose with authority too dread,—
Or whether, because earth was hell to her,
By compensation, when the blackness broke
She got one glimpse of quiet and the cool blue,
To show her for a moment such things were,—
Or else,—as the Augustinian Brother thinks,
The friar who took confession from her lip,—
When a probationary soul that moved
From nobleness to nobleness, as she,
Over the rough way of the world, succumbs,
Bloodies its last thorn with unflinching foot,
The angels love to do their work betimes,
Staunch some wounds here nor leave so much for God.
Who knows? However it be, confessed, absolved,
She lies, with overplus of life beside
To speak and right herself from first to last,
Right the friend also, lamb-pure, lion-brave,
Care for the boy's concerns, to save the son
From the sire, her two-weeks' infant orphaned thus,
And—with best smile of all reserved for him—
Pardon that sire and husband from the heart.
A miracle, so tell your Molinists!

There she lies in the long white lazar-house.
Rome has besieged, these two days, never doubt,
Saint Anna's where she waits her death, to hear
Though but the chink o' the bell, turn o' the hinge
When the reluctant wicket opes at last,
Lets in, on now this and now that pretence,
Too many by half,—complain the men of art,—
For a patient in such plight. The lawyers first
Paid the due visit—justice must be done;
They took her witness, why the murder was.
Then the priests followed properly,—a soul
To shrive; 't was Brother Celestine's own right,
The same who noises thus her gifts abroad.
But many more, who found they were old friends,
Pushed in to have their stare and take their talk

[...] Read more

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

Elaine the fair, Elaine the loveable,
Elaine, the lily maid of Astolat,
High in her chamber up a tower to the east
Guarded the sacred shield of Lancelot;
Which first she placed where the morning's earliest ray
Might strike it, and awake her with the gleam;
Then fearing rust or soilure fashioned for it
A case of silk, and braided thereupon
All the devices blazoned on the shield
In their own tinct, and added, of her wit,
A border fantasy of branch and flower,
And yellow-throated nestling in the nest.
Nor rested thus content, but day by day,
Leaving her household and good father, climbed
That eastern tower, and entering barred her door,
Stript off the case, and read the naked shield,
Now guessed a hidden meaning in his arms,
Now made a pretty history to herself
Of every dint a sword had beaten in it,
And every scratch a lance had made upon it,
Conjecturing when and where: this cut is fresh;
That ten years back; this dealt him at Caerlyle;
That at Caerleon; this at Camelot:
And ah God's mercy, what a stroke was there!
And here a thrust that might have killed, but God
Broke the strong lance, and rolled his enemy down,
And saved him: so she lived in fantasy.

How came the lily maid by that good shield
Of Lancelot, she that knew not even his name?
He left it with her, when he rode to tilt
For the great diamond in the diamond jousts,
Which Arthur had ordained, and by that name
Had named them, since a diamond was the prize.

For Arthur, long before they crowned him King,
Roving the trackless realms of Lyonnesse,
Had found a glen, gray boulder and black tarn.
A horror lived about the tarn, and clave
Like its own mists to all the mountain side:
For here two brothers, one a king, had met
And fought together; but their names were lost;
And each had slain his brother at a blow;
And down they fell and made the glen abhorred:
And there they lay till all their bones were bleached,
And lichened into colour with the crags:
And he, that once was king, had on a crown
Of diamonds, one in front, and four aside.
And Arthur came, and labouring up the pass,
All in a misty moonshine, unawares

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poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson
Added by Poetry Lover
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