I Don't Like This Poem
This poem unveils me
Dissecting my whole
Cutting assunder my hopes
I don't like this poem
This poem lays me bare
Exposing my true nakedness
Weaknesses, failings, stumbles
I don't like this poem
This poem writes my story
Taking me where I began
Showing my life's mediocre stages
Gazing at all my actions
I don't like this poem!
Wednesday,22nd April,2009
Huyton, Liverpool, UK
poem by Isaac Maliya
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Wednesday's Child (Sheffield Wednesday Soccer Club)
It eats soccer. It breathes soccer. It lives soccer. It fades when it's team fades and it blooms when it's team blooms. It has the letters S.W. permanently etched upon it's brain and it probably even arranges it's Monopoly money in S.W. formations. What is it, you ask? It's a soccer fan. You knew that, didn't you? But it isn't just any soccer fan. It is specifically a Sheffield Wednesday soccer fan. Or addict, for want of a better word.
Yes, of course, even I know about Liverpool, Everton, Arsenal and Man. United fans. They're the normal, run-of-the-mill type but Owls supporters are really Something Else!
I have had the somewhat dubious good fortune of becoming rather well acquainted with one of these strange 'animals' but until today, I'd managed to evade any one-to-one discourse on the merits or demerits of one man's passion for his team. On the face of it, you could say I asked for it. In a weak moment, I queried how his team had fared over the past week or so. It was like asking a hypochondriac the state of his health.
Well, there I was, supposedly having a cup of tea with his wife, my friend Sheila. But Sheila knew the signs and, together with two equally clued-up daughters, had opportunely beaten a hasty retreat into the garden. They had long since paid their dues. Now, it was my turn.
It was a reasonably tentative beginning. It is more than probable that Ken, the addict, suspected I would never stay the course but feeling somewhat emotionally trapped by the knowledge that he had no sons with whom to share his enthrallment of the game, what else could I do but don my interested-looking mask, take a deep breath and settle back to hear him out. By tacit consent, we both knew that I was a victim of sorts. Destiny rides again!
My heart sunk a little when I realised that he was starting from scratch. From the actual day when his team first started playing. His enthusiasm was boundless but somehow I found myself becoming absorbed in what he was saying. His eyes took on a bright, azure sparkle and his mouth was motoring at twice the speed of sound as it travelled back and forth in time. I stared in mute fascination. This was for real! This was the guy's life. Dear Lord, where was I when enthusiasm for anything was dished out? I raised my eyes Heavenwards and found myself looking straight into those of a grey, woolly owl who was peering down at me from a built-in show-case. The Sheffield Wednesday Football Club mascot. I knew I was a gonner when I found myself asking how the Club had come to be so named.
Sheffield Wednesday, as we know it today, Ken told me, came into being in 1867 as the football section of the Wednesday Cricket Club, which had been in existence since 1820. The cricket club had been the creation of a group of Sheffield craftsmen who gave it the name 'Wednesday' for the simple reason that that was the day when they took regular afternoons off to pursue their sporting enthusiasms.
Not surprisingly, perhaps, the meeting at which the football section was formed took place on a Wednesday and this, at a local sporting pub, The Adelphi. Members of the cricket club called the meeting because they wanted a way of keeping everybody together during the winter months but the step was probably partly inspired by the dramatic increase in football's popularity in the town over the previous ten years.
Ken's eyes misted over somewhat as he proudly told me that it had been Sheffield who had led the way in organised football even before the birth of the national FA in 1863. So Wednesday no doubt felt it appropriate to have their own football section. At the very least, it would mean that their players would not be tempted to drift off to other clubs at the end of the summer and forget to return in the following spring.
The founders could not have imagined that the infant football section would become the dominant partner. So strong, in fact, that within sixteen years it would break free and Wednesday Football Club would become one of the most famous names in English football - and a force in the professional game to boot (no pun intended!) Would they also have believed that the Cricket Club would survive only until 1924 and then die through lack of support, so that today, it is all but forgotten.
By now, there was no doubt that Ken knew he had my attention for I was leaning forward in my chair, hanging onto every word. Vortex-like, my concentration was being pulled and drawn into the centre of what could only be described as the secret world of the soccer-addict; a passionate and breathtaking intensity which would encompass anything related thereto, from a humble soccer boot to a moth-eaten ticket to some long-ago and memorable match played.
'Look! ' he said, paging through a well-thumbed book, 'here's a picture of Wednesday's first match at Olive Grove. This site was bought from the Duke of Norfolk. Did you know that? ' As if I would! But no reply was necessary as he pressed on regardless to tell me about how officials at the time were unable to persuade either Preston or Aston Villa to provide the opposition for a match but Blackburn Rovers did decide to accept the invitation to play. Things weren't going too well but I wanted to fall off my chair to show him how thrilled I was too when Wednesday recovered from a three-goal deficit to draw 4-4 but he wouldn't have noticed. He was in another world.
And then he was down in the depths again as he showed me pictures of headlines proclaiming how Dooley had broken his leg at Deepdale way back in 1953. It was to be the end of the big centre-forward's career. Oh, shame, Ken, I said. And I really meant it.
1954-55 proved to be a disastrous season with Wednesday finishing bottom of the table, nine points below relegation companions Leicester City. The Owls won only 8 games, losing 24 and conceding 100 goals. However, Ken assured me, they won the Second Division Championship in 1955-56 with three points to spare and in the following season they finished mid-table. But, oh dear, by 1957-58 they were down again. The Addict's voice faded and I thought he had been called by the angels.
'And then....? ' I encouraged. Momentarily, he seemed to surface.
'Go on, get along with you, ' he said with a half-smile, 'you're not really interested.'
'Oh, I am, I am, ' I protested gamely, whereupon he went on to tell me all about the so-called bribes scandal or betting-coup revelations which broke in the Sunday newspapers of 1964. Not only did Wednesday suffer in terms of its reputation but it also lost two of its best players.
The situation sounded sufficiently grave for me to try my mournful-look but no, it wasn't necessary as The Addict changed course and went on to tell me the good news about how in 1971, that bloke Dooley, (who'd broken his leg 18 years or so earlier and subsequently had to have it amputated) had been made manager of the club. He was still an idol in the city and the folk-hero of Hillsborough. But his magic was limited and he proved that he was as human as anyone else in his lack of anticipated performance.
But Sheila was rattling crockery in the kitchen and the thought of a nice cup of tea was becoming more and more enticing. Escape was out of the question. We still had about twenty years more to work through! There's a limit to a body's endurance and a feminine mind's appreciation of a predominantly masculine interest.
So, a little less stoically now, I went 'up' with the Owls and 'down' with the Owls as we travelled through from one Division to another over a timespan of many years. But much of their pain was to dissolve in relief when in 1985, they reached their highest position for 25 years by coming fifth in the FA Cup semi-Final. Even if they did lose to Everton.
In that same year, Wednesday were to equalise in the dying seconds of the match with Chelsea. They were 3-O up at half-time and I can well imagine how Ken had nearly fallen off his chair when hearing on the BBC World Service later that evening that the game had ended at 4-4. He still hasn't got over the sheer horror of it all.
There was no stopping him now and I just had to give in and hear about how the next time round, Chelsea lost the toss with the Owls' Chairman tossing the coin and the replay going to Stamford Bridge. Wednesday lost 2-1 proving that the Chelsea bogey had struck again. 'We can't even beat a bunch of pensioners, ' the Addict grinned. I was impressed by his ability not to take himself and his beloved team too seriously.
'And last year, you actually visited the Club, didn't you? ' I asked, determined to hastily gobble up the few remaining years so that I could go and have my tea. I knew of course that the highlight of his addicthood had been when Wednesday were promoted to First Division by beating Man. United in the Rumbelows League Cup Final at Wembley and didn't want to go into all that lot again. Like I said, there's a limit........
'Ah yes, ' he replied dreamily. Even he was beginning to tire. But no, not yet. I had a feeling we were about to move into extra time. More like injury-time, one would say.
'Come, ' he said, leading me towards a cupboard filled with everything and anything that could have any association whatsoever with his team. I'd seen it all before and I would see it again, but there's an indisputable thrill of sharing both old-time and current mementoes and memorabilia of a soccer club, some six thousand miles away, right here in the living room of one of its most ardent supporters.
[...] Read more
poem by Margaret Kollmer
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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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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,
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poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Seasonable Retour-Knell
SEASONABLE RETOUR KNELL
Variations on a theme...
SEASONABLE ROUND ROBIN ROLE REVERSALS
Author notes
A mirrored Retourne may not only be read either from first line to last or from last to first as seen in the mirrors, but also by inverting the first and second phrase of each line, either rhyming AAAA or ABAB for each verse. thus the number of variations could be multiplied several times.- two variations on the theme have been included here but could have been extended as in SEASONABLE ROUND ROBIN ROLE REVERSALS robi03_0069_robi03_0000
In respect of SEASONABLE ROUND ROBIN ROLE REVERSALS
This composition has sought to explore linguistic potential. Notes and the initial version are placed before rather than after the poem.
Six variations on a theme have been selected out of a significant number of mathematical possibilities using THE SAME TEXT and a reverse mirror for each version. Mirrors repeat the seasons with the lines in reverse order.
For the second roll the first four syllables of each line are reversed, and sense is retained both in the normal order of seasons and the reversed order as well... The 3rd and 4th variations offer ABAB rhyme schemes retaining the original text. The 5th and 6th variations modify the text into rhyming couplets.
Given the linguistical structure of this symphonic composition the score could be read in inversing each and every line and each and every hemistitch. There are minor punctuation differences between versions.
One could probably attain sonnet status for each of the four seasons and through partioning in 3 groups of 4 syllables extend the possibilites ad vitam.
Seasonable Round Robin Roll Reversals
robi03_0069_robi03_0000 QXX_DNZ
Seasonable Retour-Knell
robi03_0070_robi03_0069 QXX_NXX
26 March 1975 rewritten 20070123
lllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll lllllllllllllllllll
For previous version see below
_______________________________________
SPRING SUMMER
Life is at ease Young lovers long
Land under plough; To hold their dear;
Whispering trees, Dewdrops among,
Answering cow. Bold, know no fear.
Blossom, the bees, Life full of song,
Burgeoning bough; Cloudless and clear;
Soft-scented breeze, Days fair and long,
Spring warms life now. Summer sends cheer.
AUTUMN WINTER
Each leaf decays, Harvested sheaves
Each life must bow; And honeyed hives;
Our salad days Trees stripped of leaves,
Are ending now. Jack Frost has knives.
Fruit heavy lays Time, Prince of thieves,
Bending the bough, - Onward he drives,
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poem by Jonathan Robin
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Wednesday Morning
Written by gerry beckley, 1998
Found on human nature.
Wednesday morning was the last time we talked
I guess she figured it was better if she walked
It couldve been me just the same
Theres no winner in this game
Oh, wednesday morning was the last time we talked
Wednesday evening was the first time she cried
It couldve turned out different if Id lied
Something deep within us all
Sees the writing on the wall
Oh, wednesday evening we didnt talk at all
Ive been waiting every evening
Wondering what Im gonna say
Sometimes life can be deceiving
Wednesday wont go away
It couldve been me just the same
Theres no winner in this game
Oh, wednesday evening and nothing is the same
(oh) Ive been waiting every evening
Wondering what Im gonna say
Sometimes life can be deceiving
Wednesday wont go away
Wednesday morning, yeah
Sometimes life can be deceiving
Wednesday wont go away
Ive been waiting every evening
Wondering what Im gonna say
Sometimes life can be deceiving
Wednesday wont go away, yeah
Wednesday morning, yeah
Sometimes life can be deceiving
Wednesday wont go away
Wednesday morning, yeah
song performed by America
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
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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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The Hind And The Panther, A Poem In Three Parts : Part III.
Much malice, mingled with a little wit,
Perhaps may censure this mysterious writ;
Because the muse has peopled Caledon
With panthers, bears, and wolves, and beasts unknown,
As if we were not stocked with monsters of our own.
Let Æsop answer, who has set to view
Such kinds as Greece and Phrygia never knew;
And Mother Hubbard, in her homely dress,
Has sharply blamed a British lioness;
That queen, whose feast the factious rabble keep,
Exposed obscenely naked, and asleep.
Led by those great examples, may not I
The wonted organs of their words supply?
If men transact like brutes, 'tis equal then
For brutes to claim the privilege of men.
Others our Hind of folly will indite,
To entertain a dangerous guest by night.
Let those remember, that she cannot die,
Till rolling time is lost in round eternity;
Nor need she fear the Panther, though untamed,
Because the Lion's peace was now proclaimed;
The wary savage would not give offence,
To forfeit the protection of her prince;
But watched the time her vengeance to complete,
When all her furry sons in frequent senate met;
Meanwhile she quenched her fury at the flood,
And with a lenten salad cooled her blood.
Their commons, though but coarse, were nothing scant,
Nor did their minds an equal banquet want.
For now the Hind, whose noble nature strove
To express her plain simplicity of love,
Did all the honours of her house so well,
No sharp debates disturbed the friendly meal.
She turned the talk, avoiding that extreme,
To common dangers past, a sadly-pleasing theme;
Remembering every storm which tossed the state,
When both were objects of the public hate,
And dropt a tear betwixt for her own children's fate.
Nor failed she then a full review to make
Of what the Panther suffered for her sake;
Her lost esteem, her truth, her loyal care,
Her faith unshaken to an exiled heir,
Her strength to endure, her courage to defy,
Her choice of honourable infamy.
On these, prolixly thankful, she enlarged;
Then with acknowledgments herself she charged;
For friendship, of itself an holy tie,
Is made more sacred by adversity.
Now should they part, malicious tongues would say,
They met like chance companions on the way,
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poem by John Dryden
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David
My thought, on views of admiration hung,
Intently ravish'd and depriv'd of tongue,
Now darts a while on earth, a while in air,
Here mov'd with praise and mov'd with glory there;
The joys entrancing and the mute surprize
Half fix the blood, and dim the moist'ning eyes;
Pleasure and praise on one another break,
And Exclamation longs at heart to speak;
When thus my Genius, on the work design'd
Awaiting closely, guides the wand'ring mind.
If while thy thanks wou'd in thy lays be wrought,
A bright astonishment involve the thought,
If yet thy temper wou'd attempt to sing,
Another's quill shall imp thy feebler wing;
Behold the name of royal David near,
Behold his musick and his measures here,
Whose harp Devotion in a rapture strung,
And left no state of pious souls unsung.
Him to the wond'ring world but newly shewn,
Celestial poetry pronounc'd her own;
A thousand hopes, on clouds adorn'd with rays,
Bent down their little beauteous forms to gaze;
Fair-blooming Innocence with tender years,
And native Sweetness for the ravish'd ears,
Prepar'd to smile within his early song,
And brought their rivers, groves, and plains along;
Majestick Honour at the palace bred,
Enrob'd in white, embroider'd o'er with red,
Reach'd forth the scepter of her royal state,
His forehead touch'd, and bid his lays be great;
Undaunted Courage deck'd with manly charms,
With waving-azure plumes, and gilded arms,
Displaid the glories, and the toils of fight,
Demanded fame, and call'd him forth to write.
To perfect these the sacred spirit came,
By mild infusion of celestial flame,
And mov'd with dove-like candour in his breast,
And breath'd his graces over all the rest.
Ah! where the daring flights of men aspire
To match his numbers with an equal fire;
In vain they strive to make proud Babel rise,
And with an earth-born labour touch the skies.
While I the glitt'ring page resolve to view,
That will the subject of my lines renew;
The Laurel wreath, my fames imagin'd shade,
Around my beating temples fears to fade;
My fainting fancy trembles on the brink,
And David's God must help or else I sink.
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poem by Thomas Parnell
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Leszko The Bastard
``Why do I bid the rising gale
To waft me from your shore?
Why hail I, as the vultures hail,
The scent of far-off gore?
Why wear I with defiant pride
The Paynim's badge and gear,
Though I am vowed to Christ that died,
And fain would staunch the gaping side
That felt the sceptic spear?
And why doth one in whom there runs
The blood of Sclavic sires and sons,
In those but find a foe,
That onward march with sword and flame,
To vindicate the Sclavic name,
From the fringe of Arctic snows,
To the cradle of the rose,
Where the Sweet Waters flow?
Strange! But 'twere stranger yet if I,
When Turk and Tartar splinters fly,
Lagged far behind the van.
While the wind dallies with my sail,
Listen! and you shall hear my tale;
Then marvel, if you can!
``Nothing but snow! A white waste world,
Far as eye reached, or voice could call!
Motion within itself slept furled;
The earth was dead, and Heaven its pall!
Now nothing lived except the wind,
That, moaning round with restless mind,
Seemed like uncoffined ghost to flit
O'er vacant tracts, that it might find
Some kindred thing to speak with it.
Nothing to break the white expanse!
No far, no near, no high, no low!
Nothing to stop the wandering glance!
One smooth monotony of snow!
I lifted the latch, and I shivered in;
My mother stood by the larch-log blaze,
My mother, stately, and tall, and thin,
With the shapely head and the soft white skin,
And the sweetly-sorrowing gaze.
She was younger than you, aye, you who stand
In matron prime by your household fire,
A happy wife in a happy land,
And with all your heart's desire.
But though bred, like you, from the proud and brave,
Her hair was blanched and her voice was grave.
If you knew what it is to be born a slave,
And to feel a despot's ire!
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poem by Alfred Austin
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Hudibras: Part 3 - Canto II
THE ARGUMENT
The Saints engage in fierce Contests
About their Carnal interests;
To share their sacrilegious Preys,
According to their Rates of Grace;
Their various Frenzies to reform,
When Cromwel left them in a Storm
Till, in th' Effigy of Rumps, the Rabble
Burns all their Grandees of the Cabal.
THE learned write, an insect breeze
Is but a mungrel prince of bees,
That falls before a storm on cows,
And stings the founders of his house;
From whose corrupted flesh that breed
Of vermin did at first proceed.
So e're the storm of war broke out,
Religion spawn'd a various rout
Of petulant Capricious sects,
The maggots of corrupted texts,
That first run all religion down,
And after ev'ry swarm its own.
For as the Persian Magi once
Upon their mothers got their sons,
That were incapable t' enjoy
That empire any other way;
So PRESBYTER begot the other
Upon the good old Cause, his mother,
Then bore then like the Devil's dam,
Whose son and husband are the same.
And yet no nat'ral tie of blood
Nor int'rest for the common good
Cou'd, when their profits interfer'd,
Get quarter for each other's beard.
For when they thriv'd, they never fadg'd,
But only by the ears engag'd:
Like dogs that snarl about a bone,
And play together when they've none,
As by their truest characters,
Their constant actions, plainly appears.
Rebellion now began, for lack
Of zeal and plunders to grow slack;
The Cause and covenant to lessen,
And Providence to b' out of season:
For now there was no more to purchase
O' th' King's Revenue, and the Churches,
But all divided, shar'd, and gone,
That us'd to urge the Brethren on;
Which forc'd the stubborn'st for the Cause,
[...] Read more
poem by Samuel Butler
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His Story
Yo, this is a story of a male female threat to society
You know being misjudged and not respected for what we are
But I want to send this special shout out to my girl tawana brawley
Cause no matter what we say or what we do
Theyll always believe his story (ow)
Chorus:
His story (yeahee, yeahee, yeahee)
Hist story (ow)
Theyre gonna believe
His story
His story
Why does it have to be that we get labeled for what we do
Its hard enough for us to be ourselves without being used
Girls have an image too
But when they get mad at you
There is no telling what theyll say to hurt you
This is a story of a male female threat to society
Why you wanna go and tell a lie on me? (yeahee, yeah, oooh)
His story over mine his story will be his story
And my story is a waste of time (aaaah-aah-aah)
Theyre gonna believe
Chorus
Sometimes I feel like there is no reason for me to explain
No matter how much we complain
You know it all stays the same
They try to call us freaks
Why does it have to be
We cant get justified until we speak up (oooh)
This is a story of a male female threat to society
Why you wanna go and tell a lie on me? (yeahee, yeah, oooh)
His story over mine his story will be his story
And my story is a waste of time (aaaah-aah-aah)
(you know its just a waste of my time)
Theyre gonna believe
His story over mine
So what you gonna do
Dont let it take over you (hey)
My story is a waste of time
Its hard enough to be ourselves without being used
So yo take it from me
Dont be a victim of society
You cant put yourself in a position to be neglected
And disrespected
You have to do whats not expected
Alright
Or all be his story
His story over mine
His story will be his story
(this is a story of) how could you do this to us
Theyre gonna believe
[...] Read more
song performed by TLC
Added by Lucian Velea
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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)
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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The Bear and the Hare
The bear is always bare. I have never seen a bear who was not bare. Or does he or she wear a coat of hair? Where does he or she go to buy a coat of hair so that he or she won't be a bare bear? Coats cost money. Bare bears have no money.
But bears eat honey. Even bare bears eat honey. And this bear had a honey who wanted a coat of hair. So when she said to her honey, 'Honey, I want a coat of hair, but I have no money.', her honey replied, 'Honey, I have no money to buy a coat of hair. But I do have honey. Maybe I can sell my honey for money.' So he sold his honey for money so that his honey could have some money to buy a coat of hair and not be a bare bear.
This bear had a friend who was a hare. This hare has hair. Is he bare? He is not a bare bear but a hare and hares have hair. But he is a funny bunny and likes a sunny spot even when it is hot because he like to have fun in the sun. But this funny bunny could not find a sunny spot to go to have fun in the sun until one day a fair came to town.
The bear and hare of course went to the fair. What a pair! The fair was quite far so the bare bear and the hare with the hair decided to ride the street car. To ride the street car, they had to pay a fare. I say that was quite an affair - to see the bare bear and the hair paying for their fare. The bare bear had no pockets in which to carry any fare. The funny bunny had no honey to sell to get some money to pay the fare so that he could go to the fair. The fare cost ten cents. But that makes no sense. It isn't fair to make a bear who is bare and has no pockets to hold a fare or a funny bunny who has no honey to get money to pay a fare to go to the fair.
Subsequently, the bare bear barely got on the street car after the funny bunny hopped on, the bare bear and the hair were there sitting in chairs riding in the street car to the fair without paying any fare. Along the way they saw a mare. They did not care about the mare. They wanted to get to the fair. Have you every seen a bare bear sitting in a chair? I once saw a bare bear sitting in a chair at a fair but he wasn't bare.
To get into the fair the bare bear and the hair had to pay another fare. And still the bare bear had no money to pay any fare to get into the fair. And the funny bunny had no money to pay any fare to get into the fair. So what did they do? How did they get into the fair? As I said, I saw the bare bear sitting in a chair at the fair but he wasn't bare.
Tell me if this is a poem. Thanks.
poem by Ben Gieske
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The Dream
'TWAS summer eve; the changeful beams still play'd
On the fir-bark and through the beechen shade;
Still with soft crimson glow'd each floating cloud;
Still the stream glitter'd where the willow bow'd;
Still the pale moon sate silent and alone,
Nor yet the stars had rallied round her throne;
Those diamond courtiers, who, while yet the West
Wears the red shield above his dying breast,
Dare not assume the loss they all desire,
Nor pay their homage to the fainter fire,
But wait in trembling till the Sun's fair light
Fading, shall leave them free to welcome Night!
So when some Chief, whose name through realms afar
Was still the watchword of succesful war,
Met by the fatal hour which waits for all,
Is, on the field he rallied, forced to fall,
The conquerors pause to watch his parting breath,
Awed by the terrors of that mighty death;
Nor dare the meed of victory to claim,
Nor lift the standard to a meaner name,
Till every spark of soul hath ebb'd away,
And leaves what was a hero, common clay.
Oh! Twilight! Spirit that dost render birth
To dim enchantments; melting Heaven with Earth,
Leaving on craggy hills and rumning streams
A softness like the atmosphere of dreams;
Thy hour to all is welcome! Faint and sweet
Thy light falls round the peasant's homeward feet,
Who, slow returning from his task of toil,
Sees the low sunset gild the cultured soil,
And, tho' such radliance round him brightly glows,
Marks the small spark his cottage window throws.
Still as his heart forestals his weary pace,
Fondly he dreams of each familiar face,
Recalls the treasures of his narrow life,
His rosy children, and his sunburnt wife,
To whom his coming is the chief event
Of simple days in cheerful labour spent.
The rich man's chariot hath gone whirling past,
And those poor cottagers have only cast
One careless glance on all that show of pride,
Then to their tasks turn'd quietly aside;
But him they wait for, him they welcome home,
Fond sentinels look forth to see him come;
The fagot sent for when the fire grew dim,
The frugal meal prepared, are all for him;
For him the watching of that sturdy boy,
[...] Read more
poem by Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton
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You Can't Top Me!
You can't top me!
Like you did when you did it.
And you did and you hit it,
With a beggin' not to miss it!
.
You can't top me,
Like you did when you did it.
And you did and you hit it,
With a beggin' not to miss it!
You can't top me,
With a beggin' not to miss it!
You can't top me,
With a beggin' not to miss it!
You can't top me,
With a beggin' not to miss it!
With a beggin' not to miss it if you could.
And when we move our hips...
In the nakedness,
Feeling all around and casting shadows.
And in the nakedness,
The rhythm over heats.
And in the nakedness,
We do it with passion
And in the nakedness,
We do it with passion...
In the nakedness.
The rhythm over heats.
You can't top me!
Like you did when you did it.
And you did and you hit it,
With a beggin' not to miss it!
.
You can't top me,
Like you did when you did it.
And you did and you hit it,
With a beggin' not to miss it!
That 'nakedness'...
You can't top me!
And in the nakedness,
The rhythm over heats.
And in the nakedness,
The rhythm over heats.
And in the nakedness,
The rhythm over heats.
And in the nakedness,
The rhythm over heats.
[...] Read more
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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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.
[...] Read more
poem by Anne Bradstreet
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People Mediocre Later Weep
Give up your best,
To the one you are sure will catch it.
Don't just give it up...
To anyone who 'might' fetch it!
Give up your best,
To the one you are sure will catch it.
Don't just give it up...
To anyone who 'might' fetch it!
People undecided don't know what it is they want.
So don't give up your best...
To anyone to fetch,
It.
People mediocre will choose anything to flaunt,
Without a knowing what they want.
Thinking anything that gleems,
Is a 'keeper'.
People undecided don't know what it is they want.
So don't give up your best...
To anyone to fetch,
It.
Give up your best,
To the one you are sure will catch it.
Don't just give it up...
To anyone who 'might' fetch it!
People mediocre will choose anything to flaunt,
Without a knowing what they want.
Thinking anything that gleems,
Is a 'keeper'...
To later weep.
People mediocre will choose anything to flaunt,
Without a knowing what they want...
To later weep.
In their misery.
People mediocre,
Later weep...
Without a sleeping.
People mediocre,
Later weep.
People mediocre,
Can not sleep.
And...
[...] Read more
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Cutting It Fine
The door swings open but you wont go it
You hate the movie that you havent seen
You couldnt see what I have in mind
I see you laughing but youre
Cutting it, cutting it fine
You never should have done those things to me
Theres one thread left tween you and history
And while our temperature is rising high
Im warning you that you are
Cutting it, cutting it fine
Cutting it, cutting it fine...
You gambled all on one important game
Now take the debt and dont complain
Your game was up, I saw it all the time
I saw that vice, girl, youre
Cutting it, cutting it fine
Your sole advisor watch out for yourself
You never listen to anyone else
You were the one who ignored the signs
Dancing on a fine line
Cutting it, cutting it fine
Cutting it, cutting it fine...
song performed by Asia
Added by Lucian Velea
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