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We can't

We can’t build permanent shelters
We can make people run helter and skater
We can go to outer space and walk
We can’t see eye to eye and talk

We can spend millions on nuclear
We may know but still not clear
Prepared to go for innocent’s kill
Unable to go for and protect the will

We may build many more dungeons
But will not go for help to regions
We can witness hunger and starvation
We have no time to go for observation

We have powerful greed to swallow
But not let others something to allow
We have systems to annihilate human beings
But no will power to make poor a king

We have everything at our disposal
But no mechanism for its addressable
We may go for or dwell at any length
But not enough courage to go with strength

We are being graced with many resources
We are equipped to meet undesirable forces
It is needed for and waiting for skillful execution
What required is human touch and firm resolution

No hunger, no starvation deaths and poverty
Movement and freedom with full liberty
We can do or achieve anything impossible
Make it worth while with trend reversible

So many things we may be unable to perform
Fully alive to the situation and readily informed
We weigh it in term of loss or gain
All good efforts should not go in vain

Think in terms what I can perform or do?
How much I can be sensitive or true?
Has that got large bearing on masses?
Have I to be sincere without making any passes?

poem by Hasmukh Amathalal
Added by Poetry Lover
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Car Crazy Cutie

Run a-run a doo run run
Wo run a-run a doo run run
Wo run a-run a doo run run
Wo run a-run a doo run run
Well my steady little doll is a real-live beauty
And everybody knows shes a car crazy cutie
Shes hip to everything man from customs to rails
And axel grease imbedded neath her fingernails
Wo yeah (run a-run a doo run run)
Wo oh oh oh (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Oh oh oh now cutie (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh (wo run a-run a doo run run)
A power shift in second and a-ridin the clutch
My car crazy cutie, man, shes just too much
I take her to the drags, man, and everyone flips
For her big blue eyes and her candy apple lips
Wo yeah (run a-run a doo run run)
Wo oh oh oh oh (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Oh oh oh now cutie (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Yeah oh
Car crazy cutie
Car crazy cutie
Car crazy cutie
Car crazy cutie
Well I guess you might say shes the rodders dream gal
Always there to help, man, when you need a pal
But when I talk of lovin man, some kisses and hugs
Says shes like to take em better clean and gap the plugs
Wo yeah (run a-run a doo run run)
Wo oh oh oh (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Oh oh oh now cutie (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Run a-run a doo run run
Wo run a-run a doo run run
Wo run a-run a doo run run
Wo oh oh oh (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Wo yeah (run a-run a doo run run)
Wo oh oh oh (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Oh oh oh now cutie (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh (wo run a-run a doo run run) [doo doo doo]
Wo yeah (run a-run a doo run run)
Wo oh oh oh (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Oh oh oh now cutie (wo run a-run a doo run run)
Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh (wo run a-run a doo run run)

song performed by Beach Boys
Added by Lucian Velea
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Run, Run, Run

I was sitting in the field, feeling the grass.
Counting the stars as they come out.
Feeling (feeling) the breeze, (feeling the breeze)
Feeling (feeling) the spring. (feeling the spring)
Suddenly I noticed there wasnt light anymore.
Run, run, run, run, run to the light,
Run, run, run, run, run for your life.
I tumbled on roots, stumbled on stones.
Lost my marbles, stepped on my glasses.
Feeling (feeling) the air, (feeling the air)
Feeling (feeling) the wind. (feeling the wind)
Suddenly I noticed it wasnt fun anymore.
Run, run, run, run, run towards the light,
Run, run, run, run, run for your life.
I came out of the darkness into the house,
The lights were left on but nobody around.
Feeling (feeling) the room, (feeling the room)
Feeling (feeling) the space. (feeling the space)
Suddenly I noticed it wasnt spring anymore.
Run, run, run, run, run through your life,
Run, run, run, run, run for your life.
(run, run, run, run, run through your life)
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)
Run, run, run, run, run through your life,
Run, run, run, run, run for your life.
(run, run, run, run, run through your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)
Run -
(run, run, run, run, run through your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run through your life)
Run, run.
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run through your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)

song performed by Yoko Ono
Added by Lucian Velea
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Run, Run, Run

I was sitting in the field, feeling the grass.
Counting the stars as they come out.
Feeling (feeling) the breeze, (feeling the breeze)
Feeling (feeling) the spring. (feeling the spring)
Suddenly I noticed there wasnt light anymore.
Run, run, run, run, run to the light,
Run, run, run, run, run for your life.
I tumbled on roots, stumbled on stones.
Lost my marbles, stepped on my glasses.
Feeling (feeling) the air, (feeling the air)
Feeling (feeling) the wind. (feeling the wind)
Suddenly I noticed it wasnt fun anymore.
Run, run, run, run, run towards the light,
Run, run, run, run, run for your life.
I came out of the darkness into the house,
The lights were left on but nobody around.
Feeling (feeling) the room, (feeling the room)
Feeling (feeling) the space. (feeling the space)
Suddenly I noticed it wasnt spring anymore.
Run, run, run, run, run through your life,
Run, run, run, run, run for your life.
(run, run, run, run, run through your life)
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)
Run, run, run, run, run through your life,
Run, run, run, run, run for your life.
(run, run, run, run, run through your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)
Run -
(run, run, run, run, run through your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run through your life)
Run, run.
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run through your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)
For your life.
(run, run, run, run, run for your life)

song performed by Yoko Ono
Added by Lucian Velea
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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

[...] Read more

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

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning (1871)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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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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Innocent World

I used to live in an innocent world
I had a car and a pretty blond girlfriend
We was too young to know what we were doing
And anyway I was just fooling around
Innocent innocent innocent world
Innocent innocent innocent world
Innocent innocent innocent world
With a cute little monkey on my back
And a total disregard for the facts
Id run away and never get back
From my innocent world
There aint no reason to tell no lie
When youre young and youve got a lot of pie
Now I slink around like a killer
The things they say are just a lot of filler
In my mind, in my mind
Innocent innocent innocent world
Innocent innocent innocent world
Innocent innocent innocent world
Running, laughing in the sun
And always having lots of fun
Smoking dope and just being young
In my innocent world
Innocent innocent innocent world
Innocent innocent innocent world
Innocent innocent innocent world
With a cute little monkey on my back
And a total disregard for the facts
Id run away and never get back
From my innocent world
Innocent innocent innocent world
Innocent innocent innocent world
Innocent innocent innocent world
Innocent innocent innocent world

song performed by Iggy Pop
Added by Lucian Velea
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Randall

1, 2, 3, 4,
My name is Randall,
No I don't think I've met you before my friend,
I don't really know you,
But I heard your message on the answering machine,
Think it went something like this,
"Hello Randall,
Heard that you wrote a big hit,
And you're rich now,
Hope you remember the promise you made,
When I taught you everything that you know"
Do run run, do run run,
Randall here they come,
Do run run, do run run,
Randall here they come,
Do run run, do run run,
Randall here they come,
Do run run, do run run,
Randall here they come.
My name is rock star,
Tell me aren't you sick of me yet, my friends,
Cos I am the asshole,
Who thinks that his advise is all you need to survive,
Give me the sound of the crowd,
Give me the people who know all the lyrics,
Give me the face of the kid in the front,
When he realises what the song is about.
Do run run, do run run,
Randall here they come,
Do run run, do run run,
Randall here they come,
Do run run, do run run,
Randall here they come,
Do run run, do run run,
Randall here they come,
Here they come.
Time to tell the truth now Randall,
Time to give it up now Randall,
Time to let us know now Randall,
Please, Randall please,
My name is Randall,
And that can be anything you want it to be,
Woo!
Do run run, do run run,
Randall here they come,
Do run run, do run run,
Randall here they come,
Do run run, do run run,
Randall here they come,
Do run run, do run run,

[...] Read more

song performed by Wheatus
Added by Lucian Velea
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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
Added by Poetry Lover
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Slime Creatures From Outer Space

Things just havent been the same
Since the flying saucer came
Now the aliens are on the loose
Well, we tried to hold em back
Tried to ward off their attack
But our atom bombs were just no use
They were ugly, they were mean
Biggest heads I ever seen
They made everybody scream and shout
First they leveled tokyo
Then new york was next to go
Boy I really wish theyd cut it out
They wasted everybody on my block
There goes the neighborhood
Theyll zap you with their death ray eyes
And blow you up real good
Run for your lives
(slime creatures from outer space)
(slime creatures from outer space)
Theyre not very nice to the human race
(slime creatures from outer space)
Theres more comin every day
And they just wont go away
Now theyre reproducing in the sewers
They got slimy lizard skin
And an evil lookin grin
And they sure could use some manicures
They got hands all covered with fungus
They got eyes like some kinda bug
I sure hope they dont come in here
I just shampooed the rug
Run for your lives
(slime creatures from outer space)
(slime creatures from outer space)
Theyre really makin a mess of this place.
(slime creatures)
(slime creatures)
(slime creatures from outer space)
(slime creatures from outer space)
(slime creatures from outer space)
(slime creatures from outer space)
(slime creatures from outer space)
(slime creatures from outer space)
Theyll rip your head off just for fun
Theyll paralyze your mind
Theyre wearin out their welcome
I dont think I like their kind
Theyll suck your brain out through a straw
You just cant trust those guys
So hide the children, lock the doors

[...] Read more

song performed by Weird Al Yankovic
Added by Lucian Velea
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Help Me Ronda

Well since she put me down I 've been out doin' in my head
Come in late at night and in the mornin' I just lay in bed
Well, Ronda you look so fine (look so fine)
And I know it wouldn't take much time
For you to help me Ronda
Help me get her out of my heart
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda yeah
Get her out of my heart
She was gonna be my wife
And I was gonna be her man
But she let another guy come between us
And it ruined our plan
Well, Ronda you caught my eye (caught my eye)
And I can give you lotsa reasons why
You gotta help me Ronda
Help me get her out of my heart
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda yeah
Get her out of my heart
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda
Help me Ronda
Help, help me Ronda

[...] Read more

song performed by Beach Boys
Added by Lucian Velea
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Help Me, Rhonda

Well since she put me down Ive been out doin in my head
Come in late at night and in the mornin I just lay in bed
Well, rhonda you look so fine (look so fine)
And I know it wouldnt take much time
For you to help me rhonda
Help me get her out of my heart
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda yeah
Get her out of my heart
She was gonna be my wife
And I was gonna be her man
But she let another guy come between us
And it ruined our plan
Well, rhonda you caught my eye (caught my eye)
And I can give you lotsa reasons why
You gotta help me rhonda
Help me get her out of my heart
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda yeah
Get her out of my heart
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda
Help me rhonda
Help, help me rhonda

[...] Read more

song performed by Beach Boys
Added by Lucian Velea
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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,—

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Tower Beyond Tragedy

I
You'd never have thought the Queen was Helen's sister- Troy's
burning-flower from Sparta, the beautiful sea-flower
Cut in clear stone, crowned with the fragrant golden mane, she
the ageless, the uncontaminable-
This Clytemnestra was her sister, low-statured, fierce-lipped, not
dark nor blonde, greenish-gray-eyed,
Sinewed with strength, you saw, under the purple folds of the
queen-cloak, but craftier than queenly,
Standing between the gilded wooden porch-pillars, great steps of
stone above the steep street,
Awaiting the King.
Most of his men were quartered on the town;
he, clanking bronze, with fifty
And certain captives, came to the stair. The Queen's men were
a hundred in the street and a hundred
Lining the ramp, eighty on the great flags of the porch; she
raising her white arms the spear-butts
Thundered on the stone, and the shields clashed; eight shining
clarions
Let fly from the wide window over the entrance the wildbirds of
their metal throats, air-cleaving
Over the King come home. He raised his thick burnt-colored
beard and smiled; then Clytemnestra,
Gathering the robe, setting the golden-sandaled feet carefully,
stone by stone, descended
One half the stair. But one of the captives marred the comeliness
of that embrace with a cry
Gull-shrill, blade-sharp, cutting between the purple cloak and
the bronze plates, then Clytemnestra:
Who was it? The King answered: A piece of our goods out of
the snatch of Asia, a daughter of the king,
So treat her kindly and she may come into her wits again. Eh,
you keep state here my queen.
You've not been the poorer for me.- In heart, in the widowed
chamber, dear, she pale replied, though the slaves
Toiled, the spearmen were faithful. What's her name, the slavegirl's?
AGAMEMNON Come up the stair. They tell me my kinsman's
Lodged himself on you.
CLYTEMNESTRA Your cousin Aegisthus? He was out of refuge,
flits between here and Tiryns.
Dear: the girl's name?
AGAMEMNON Cassandra. We've a hundred or so other
captives; besides two hundred
Rotted in the hulls, they tell odd stories about you and your
guest: eh? no matter: the ships
Ooze pitch and the August road smokes dirt, I smell like an
old shepherd's goatskin, you'll have bath-water?
CLYTEMNESTRA
They're making it hot. Come, my lord. My hands will pour it.

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poem by Robinson Jeffers
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IV. Tertium Quid

True, Excellency—as his Highness says,
Though she's not dead yet, she's as good as stretched
Symmetrical beside the other two;
Though he's not judged yet, he's the same as judged,
So do the facts abound and superabound:
And nothing hinders that we lift the case
Out of the shade into the shine, allow
Qualified persons to pronounce at last,
Nay, edge in an authoritative word
Between this rabble's-brabble of dolts and fools
Who make up reasonless unreasoning Rome.
"Now for the Trial!" they roar: "the Trial to test
"The truth, weigh husband and weigh wife alike
"I' the scales of law, make one scale kick the beam!"
Law's a machine from which, to please the mob,
Truth the divinity must needs descend
And clear things at the play's fifth act—aha!
Hammer into their noddles who was who
And what was what. I tell the simpletons
"Could law be competent to such a feat
"'T were done already: what begins next week
"Is end o' the Trial, last link of a chain
"Whereof the first was forged three years ago
"When law addressed herself to set wrong right,
"And proved so slow in taking the first step
"That ever some new grievance,—tort, retort,
"On one or the other side,—o'ertook i' the game,
"Retarded sentence, till this deed of death
"Is thrown in, as it were, last bale to boat
"Crammed to the edge with cargo—or passengers?
"'Trecentos inseris: ohe, jam satis est!
"'Huc appelle!'—passengers, the word must be."
Long since, the boat was loaded to my eyes.
To hear the rabble and brabble, you'd call the case
Fused and confused past human finding out.
One calls the square round, t' other the round square—
And pardonably in that first surprise
O' the blood that fell and splashed the diagram:
But now we've used our eyes to the violent hue
Can't we look through the crimson and trace lines?
It makes a man despair of history,
Eusebius and the established fact—fig's end!
Oh, give the fools their Trial, rattle away
With the leash of lawyers, two on either side—
One barks, one bites,—Masters Arcangeli
And Spreti,—that's the husband's ultimate hope
Against the Fisc and the other kind of Fisc,
Bound to do barking for the wife: bow—wow!
Why, Excellency, we and his Highness here
Would settle the matter as sufficiently

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poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
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September on Jessore Road

Millions of babies watching the skies
Bellies swollen, with big round eyes
On Jessore Road--long bamboo huts
Noplace to shit but sand channel ruts

Millions of fathers in rain
Millions of mothers in pain
Millions of brothers in woe
Millions of sisters nowhere to go

One Million aunts are dying for bread
One Million uncles lamenting the dead
Grandfather millions homeless and sad
Grandmother millions silently mad

Millions of daughters walk in the mud
Millions of children wash in the flood
A Million girls vomit & groan
Millions of families hopeless alone

Millions of souls nineteenseventyone
homeless on Jessore road under grey sun
A million are dead, the million who can
Walk toward Calcutta from East Pakistan

Taxi September along Jessore Road
Oxcart skeletons drag charcoal load
past watery fields thru rain flood ruts
Dung cakes on treetrunks, plastic-roof huts

Wet processions Families walk
Stunted boys big heads don't talk
Look bony skulls & silent round eyes
Starving black angels in human disguise

Mother squats weeping & points to her sons
Standing thin legged like elderly nuns
small bodied hands to their mouths in prayer
Five months small food since they settled there

on one floor mat with small empty pot
Father lifts up his hands at their lot
Tears come to their mother's eye
Pain makes mother Maya cry

Two children together in palmroof shade
Stare at me no word is said
Rice ration, lentils one time a week
Milk powder for warweary infants meek

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poem by Allen Ginsberg
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Sir Peter Harpdon's End

In an English Castle in Poictou. Sir Peter Harpdon, a Gascon knight in the English service, and John Curzon, his lieutenant.

John Curzon

Of those three prisoners, that before you came
We took down at St. John's hard by the mill,
Two are good masons; we have tools enough,
And you have skill to set them working.

Sir Peter

So-
What are their names?

John Curzon

Why, Jacques Aquadent,
And Peter Plombiere, but-

Sir Peter

What colour'd hair
Has Peter now? has Jacques got bow legs?

John Curzon

Why, sir, you jest: what matters Jacques' hair,
Or Peter's legs to us?

Sir Peter

O! John, John, John!
Throw all your mason's tools down the deep well,
Hang Peter up and Jacques; they're no good,
We shall not build, man.

John Curzon

going.

Shall I call the guard
To hang them, sir? and yet, sir, for the tools,
We'd better keep them still; sir, fare you well.

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poem by William Morris
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Song of Wink Star

The Song of Wink Star
a happy story for children of all ages
story and text © Raj Arumugam, June 2008

☼ ☼

☼ Preamble

Come…children all, children of all ages…sit close and listen…
Come and listen to this happy story of the stars and of life…
Come children of the universe, children of all nations and of all races, and of all climates and of all kinds of space and dimensions and universes…
Come, dearest children of all beings of the living universe, come and listen to The Song of Wink Star…

Come and listen to this story, this happy story…listen, as the story itself sings to you…

Sit close then, and listen to the story that was not made by any, or written by a poet, or fashioned by grandfathers and grandmothers warming themselves at the fire of burning stars…

O dearest children all, come and listen to the story that lives
of itself, and that glows bright and happy….

Come…children all, children of all ages, come and listen to this happy story, the story so natural and smooth as life, as it sings itself to you….

☼ The Song of Wink Star
a happy story for children of all ages

☼ 1

Night Child, always so light and gentle, slept on a flower.
And every night, before he went to sleep, he would look up at the sky.
He would look at the eastern corner, five o’clock.

And there he would see all the stars in near and distant galaxies that were only visible to the People of Star Eyes.

Night Child was one of the People of Star Eyes. And so he could see the stars. And of all the stars he could see, he loved to watch Wink Star.

Wink Star twinkled and winked and laughed.
Every night Wink Star did that. Winked and laughed.

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poem by Raj Arumugam
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Sixth Book

THE English have a scornful insular way
Of calling the French light. The levity
Is in the judgment only, which yet stands;
For say a foolish thing but oft enough,
(And here's the secret of a hundred creeds,–
Men get opinions as boys learn to spell,
By re-iteration chiefly) the same thing
Shall pass at least for absolutely wise,
And not with fools exclusively. And so,
We say the French are light, as if we said
The cat mews, or the milch-cow gives us milk:
Say rather, cats are milked, and milch cows mew,
For what is lightness but inconsequence,
Vague fluctuation 'twixt effect and cause,
Compelled by neither? Is a bullet light,
That dashes from the gun-mouth, while the eye
Winks, and the heart beats one, to flatten itself
To a wafer on the white speck on a wall
A hundred paces off? Even so direct,
So sternly undivertible of aim,
Is this French people.
All idealists
Too absolute and earnest, with them all
The idea of a knife cuts real flesh;
And still, devouring the safe interval
Which Nature placed between the thought and act,
They threaten conflagration to the world
And rush with most unscrupulous logic on
Impossible practice. Set your orators
To blow upon them with loud windy mouths
Through watchword phrases, jest or sentiment,
Which drive our burley brutal English mobs
Like so much chaff, whichever way they blow,–
This light French people will not thus be driven.
They turn indeed; but then they turn upon
Some central pivot of their thought and choice,
And veer out by the force of holding fast.
–That's hard to understand, for Englishmen
Unused to abstract questions, and untrained
To trace the involutions, valve by valve,
In each orbed bulb-root of a general truth,
And mark what subtly fine integument
Divides opposed compartments. Freedom's self
Comes concrete to us, to be understood,
Fixed in a feudal form incarnately
To suit our ways of thought and reverence,
The special form, with us, being still the thing.
With us, I say, though I'm of Italy
My mother's birth and grave, by father's grave
And memory; let it be,–a poet's heart

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poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning from Aurora Leigh (1856)
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Through the eyes of a Field Coronet (Epic)

Introduction

In the kaki coloured tent in Umbilo he writes
his life’s story while women, children and babies are dying,
slowly but surely are obliterated, he see how his nation is suffering
while the events are notched into his mind.

Lying even heavier on him is the treason
of some other Afrikaners who for own gain
have delivered him, to imprisonment in this place of hatred
and thoughts go through him to write a book.

Prologue

The Afrikaner nation sprouted
from Dutchmen,
who fought decades without defeat
against the super power Spain

mixed with French Huguenots
who left their homes and belongings,
with the revocation of the Edict of Nantes.
Associate this then with the fact

that these people fought formidable
for seven generations
against every onslaught that they got
from savages en wild animals

becoming marksmen, riding
and taming wild horses
with one bullet per day
to hunt a wild antelope,

who migrated right across the country
over hills in mass protest
and then you have
the most formidable adversary
and then let them fight

in a natural wilderness
where the hunter,
the sniper and horseman excels
and any enemy is at a lost.

Let them then also be patriotic
into their souls,
believe in and read
out of the word of God

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poem by Gert Strydom
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