User:Moonraker/V

Horace
Albius, give up this extravagant grieving For a sweetheart turned sour. Why was she deceiving? You ask, and then whimper long elegies on The theme of the older man being outshone.

Lycoris, whose forehead is nearly all curls, Is burning for Cyrus. His favourite girl’s Pholoe. She in turn throws him a frown Meaning "Does and Apulian wolves will bed down

Sooner than I with a peasant like him." That’s Venus’s method. According to whim She puts bodies and minds to work her brass yoke In incongruous pairs — and enjoys the bad joke.

I know. When a far better chance was presented I stayed with my freedwoman, chained and contented, Though she handed out stormier treatment to me Than dented Calabria gets from the sea. Horace, Ode 1.33 (tr. James Michie)

Blake

 * I Asked a Thief to Steal Me a Peach

I asked a thief to steal me a peach: He turn'd up his eyes. I ask'd a lithe lady to lie her down: Holy and meek she cries.

As soon as I went an angel came: He wink'd at the thief And smil'd at the dame, And without one word spoke Had a peach from the tree, And 'twixt earnest and joke Enjoy'd the Lady.

William Blake

Yeats

 * The Fiddler of Dooney

WHEN I play on my fiddle in Dooney, Folk dance like a wave of the sea; My cousin is priest in Kilvarnet, My brother in Moharabuiee. I passed my brother and cousin: They read in their books of prayer; I read in my book of songs I bought at the Sligo fair. When we come at the end of time, To Peter sitting in state, He will smile on the three old spirits, But call me first through the gate; For the good are always the merry, Save by an evil chance, And the merry love the fiddle And the merry love to dance: And when the folk there spy me, They will all come up to me, With ‘Here is the fiddler of Dooney!’ And dance like a wave of the sea.
 * William Butler Yeats

Christina Rossetti

 * Goblin Market

Eliot

 * Little Gidding

What we call the beginning is often the end And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from. And every phrase And sentence that is right (where every word is at home, Taking its place to support the others, The word neither diffident nor ostentatious, An easy commerce of the old and the new, The common word exact without vulgarity, The formal word precise but not pedantic, The complete consort dancing together) Every phrase and every sentence is an end and a beginning, Every poem an epitaph. And any action Is a step to the block, to the fire, down the sea's throat Or to an illegible stone: and that is where we start. We die with the dying: See, they depart, and we go with them. We are born with the dead: See, they return, and bring us with them. The moment of the rose and the moment of the yew-tree Are of equal duration. A people without history Is not redeemed from time, for history is a pattern Of timeless moments. So, while the light fails On a winter's afternoon, in a secluded chapel History is now and England.

With the drawing of this Love and the voice of this Calling

We shall not cease from exploration And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive where we started And know the place for the first time. Through the unknown, unremembered gate When the last of earth left to discover Is that which was the beginning; At the source of the longest river The voice of the hidden waterfall And the children in the apple-tree Not known, because not looked for But heard, half-heard, in the stillness Between two waves of the sea. Quick now, here, now, always-- A condition of complete simplicity (Costing not less than everything) And all shall be well and All manner of things shall be well When the tongues of flames are in-folded Into the crowned knot of fire And the fire and the rose are one.
 * T. S. Eliot

Lewis

 * The Prodigality of Firdausi

Firdausi the strong Lion among poets, lean of purse And lean with age, had finished his august mountain of verse, The great Shah Nameh gleaming-glaciered with demon wars, Bastioned with Rustem's bitter labours and Isfendiyar's, Shadowed with Jamshid's grief and glory as with eagles' wings, Its foot-hills dewy-forested with the amours of kings, Clashing with rhymes that rush like snow-fed cataracts blue and cold; And the king commanded to be given him an elephant's burden of gold.

Firdausi the carved Pillar among poets was not dear To government. They smiled at the king's word. The Grand Vizier Twisted his pale face, making parsimonious mouths, and said 'Send the old rhymer thirty thousand silver pounds instead - The price of ten good vineyards and a fine Circassian girl.' This pleased them and they called a secretarial shape, a churl, A pick-thank without understanding and of base descent, And bade it deliver their bounty, and with mincing paces it went.

It found the Cedar amoung poets in the baths that day, At ease, discoursing with his friends. Exalted men were they, Taking their wine and sugared roseleaves in an airy hall, Poets or theologians or saints or warriors all Or lovers or astronomers. Like honey-drops the speech Distilled in apophthegms or verses from the lips of each, On roses and presdestination and heroic wars And rhetoric, and the brevity of the life of man, and the stars.

With courtesy the Lily among poets asked its will. The bearers laid the silver at his feet. The hall was still, The churl grew pale. Firdausi beckoned to the Nubian slave Who had dried their feet; to him the first ten thousand coins he gave. Ten thousand more immediately he gave the fair-haired boy Who waved the fan, saying 'My son, may Allah send you joy; And in your grandson's house in unbelieving Frangistan Make it your boast that once you spoke with the splendour of Iran.'

Lastly the Heaven of poets to the churl himself returned The remnant. 'You look pale, my friend,' he said. 'Well have you earned This trifle for your courtesy and for the heat of the day.' Clutching his silver, silently, the creature slunk away, And dogs growled as he passed and beggars spat. Laughter and shame Wait upon all his progeny; on him, Gehenna's flame. Immediately the discourse in the baths once more began On the beauty of women and horses and the brevity of the life of man.


 * C. S. Lewis


 * A cliché came out of its cage

You said 'The world is going back to Paganism'. Oh bright Vision! I saw our dynasty in the bar of the House Spill from their tumblers a libation to the Erinyes, And Leavis with Lord Russell wreathed in flowers, heralded with flutes, Leading white bulls to the cathedral of the solemn Muses To pay where due the glory of their latest theorem. Hestia's fire in every flat, rekindled, burned before The Lardergods. Unmarried daughters with obedient hands Tended it. By the hearth, the white-armd venerable mother Domum servabat, lanam faciebat. At the hour Of sacrifice their brothers came, silent, corrected, grave Before their elders; on their downy cheeks easily the blush Arose (it is the mark of freemen's children) as they trooped, Gleaming with oil, demurely home from the palaestra or the dance. Walk carefully, do not wake the envy of the happy gods, Shun Hubris. The middle of the road, the middle sort of men, Are best. Aidos surpasses gold. Reverence for the aged Is wholesome as seasonable rain, and for a man to die Defending the city in battle is a harmonious thing.

Thus with magistral hand the Puritan Sophrosune Cooled and schooled and tempered our uneasy motions; Heathendom came again, the circumspection and the holy fears ... You said it. Did you mean it? Oh inordinate liar, stop.

Or did you mean another kind of heathenry? Think, then, that under heaven-roof the little disc of the earth, Fortified Midgard, lies encircled by the ravening Worm. Over its icy bastions faces of giant and troll Look in, ready to invade it. The Wolf, admittedly, is bound; But the bond will break, the Beast run free. The weary gods, Scarred with old wounds, the one-eyed Odin, Tyr who has lost a hand, Will limp to their stations for the Last defence. Make it your hope To be counted worthy on that day to stand beside them; For the end of man is to partake of their defeat and die His second, final death in good company. The stupid, strong Unteachable monsters are certain to be victorious at last, And every man of decent blood is on the losing side. Take as your model the tall women with yellow hair in plaits Who walked back into burning houses to die with men, Or him who as the death spear entered into his vitals Made critical comments on its workmanship and aim. Are these the Pagans you spoke of? Know your betters and crouch, dogs; You that have Vichy water in your veins and worship the event Your goddess History (whom your fathers called the strumpet Fortune).

Belloc

 * Tarantella

Do you remember an Inn, Miranda? Do you remember an Inn? And the tedding and the spreading of the straw for a bedding, And the fleas that tease in the High Pyrenees, And the wine that tasted of tar, And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers Under the vine of the dark veranda? Do you remember an Inn, Miranda? Do you remember an Inn? And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers Who hadn't got a penny, And who weren't paying any, And the hammer at the doors and the din; And the Hip! Hop! Hap! Of the clap Of the hands to the twirl and the swirl Of the girl gone chancing, Glancing, Dancing, Backing and advancing, Snapping of the clapper to the spin, Out and in And the Ting! Tong! Tang! of the guitar? Do you remember an Inn, Miranda? Do you remember an Inn? Never more; Miranda, Never more. Only the high peaks hoar: And Aragon a torrent at the door. No sound In the walls of the Halls where falls The tread Of the feet of the dead to the ground No sound: But the boom Of the far Waterfall like Doom.

Sassoon

 * The General

“Good-morning, good-morning!” the General said When we met him last week on our way to the line. Now the soldiers he smiled at are most of 'em dead, And we're cursing his staff for incompetent swine. “He's a cheery old card,” grunted Harry to Jack As they slogged up to Arras with rifle and pack.

But he did for them both by his plan of attack.

Frost

 * The Road not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.


 * Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know. His house is in the village though; He will not see me stopping here To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer To stop without a farmhouse near Between the woods and frozen lake The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake To ask if there is some mistake. The only other sound's the sweep Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep.


 * Mending Wall

Something there is that doesn’t love a wall, That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it, And spills the upper boulders in the sun; And makes gaps even two can pass abreast. The work of hunters is another thing: I have come after them and made repair Where they have left not one stone on a stone, But they would have the rabbit out of hiding, To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean, No one has seen them made or heard them made, But at spring mending-time we find them there. I let my neighbor know beyond the hill; And on a day we meet to walk the line And set the wall between us once again. We keep the wall between us as we go. To each the boulders that have fallen to each. And some are loaves and some so nearly balls We have to use a spell to make them balance: ‘Stay where you are until our backs are turned!’ We wear our fingers rough with handling them. Oh, just another kind of out-door game, One on a side. It comes to little more: There where it is we do not need the wall: He is all pine and I am apple orchard. My apple trees will never get across And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him. He only says, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.’ Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder If I could put a notion in his head: ‘Why do they make good neighbors? Isn’t it Where there are cows? But here there are no cows. Before I built a wall I’d ask to know What I was walling in or walling out, And to whom I was like to give offense. Something there is that doesn't love a wall, That wants it down.’ I could say ‘Elves’ to him, But it’s not elves exactly, and I’d rather He said it for himself. I see him there Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed. He moves in darkness as it seems to me, Not of woods only and the shade of trees. He will not go behind his father’s saying, And he likes having thought of it so well He says again, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.’

Hemingway

 * Advice to a Son

Never trust a white man, Never kill a Jew, Never sign a contract, Never rent a pew. Don't enlist in armies; Nor marry many wives; Never write for magazines; Never scratch your hives. Always put paper on the seat, Don't believe in wars, Keep yourself both clean and neat, Never marry whores. Never pay a blackmailer, Never go to law, Never trust a publisher, Or you'll sleep on straw. All your friends will leave you All your friends will die So lead a clean and wholesome life And join them in the sky.

Auden

 * O where are you going?

"O where are you going?" said reader to rider, "That valley is fatal where furnaces burn, Yonder's the midden whose odours will madden, That gap is the grave where the tall return."

"O do you imagine," said fearer to farer, "That dusk will delay on your path to the pass, Your diligent looking discover the lacking, Your footsteps feel from granite to grass?"

"O what was that bird," said horror to hearer, "Did you see that shape in the twisted trees? Behind you swiftly the figure comes softly, The spot on your skin is a shocking disease."

"Out of this house" — said rider to reader, "Yours never will" — said farer to fearer. "They're looking for you" — said hearer to horror, As he left them there, as he left them there.


 * Musee des Beaux Arts

About suffering they were never wrong, The old Masters: how well they understood Its human position: how it takes place While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along; How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting For the miraculous birth, there always must be Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating On a pond at the edge of the wood: They never forgot That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse Scratches its innocent behind on a tree.

In Breughel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry, But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green Water, and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky, Had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

Graves
When all is over and you march for home The spoils of war are easily disposed of: Standards, weapons of combat, helmets, drums May decorate a staircase or a study, While lesser gleanings of the battlefield– Coins, watches, wedding-rings, gold teeth, and such Are sold anonymously for solid cash.
 * Spoils

The spoils of love present a different case, When all is over and you march for home: That lock of hair, these letters and the portrait May not be publicly displayed; nor sold; Nor burned; nor returned (the heart being obstinate)- Yet never dare entrust them to a safe For fear they burn a hole through two-foot steel.


 * A frosty night

Mother: Alice, dear, what ails you, Dazed and white and shaken? Has the chill night numbed you? Is it fright you have taken?

Alice: Mother I am very well, I felt never better; Mother, do not hold me so, Let me write my letter.

Mother: Sweet, my dear, what ails you?

Alice: No, but I am well. The night was cold and frosty, There's no more to tell.

Mother: Ay, the night was frosty, Coldly gaped the moon, Yet the birds seemed twittering Through green boughs of June.

Soft and thick the snow lay, Stars danced in the sky. Not all the lambs of May-day Skip so bold and high.

Your feet were dancing, Alice, Seemed to dance on air, You looked a ghost or angel In the starlight there.

Your eyes were frosted starlight, Your heart, fire, and snow. Who was it said 'I love you'?

Alice: Mother, let me go!

John T. Baker

 * A porpoise with a purpose

A porpoise with a purpose Ventured forth one fateful day To take a trip behind a ship Away across the bay.

The purpose of the porpoise Was to find a bite to eat Among the scraps that just perhaps Might well provide a treat.

The Captain spied the porpoise But was not at all concerned; His years at sea were guarantee Of lessons he had learned.

The Captain was uncertain What the porpoise planned to do But nonetheless he made a guess And notified the crew.

"Now hear your Captain speaking!" He informed them with a shout, "Right dead astern you will discern A creature with a snout.

"That creature is a porpoise And its purpose I don't know, But I respect its intellect - We'll take it nice and slow."

"Don't be so cautious, Captain," Loud a bold young fellow cried, "We'll simply shoot the bloomin' brute!" The Captain quick replied:

"You NEVER shoot a porpoise Till its purpose you perceive; To improvise would be unwise And frightfully naive.

"The creature might be wounded And incited to attack; We must refrain and ascertain If it would like a snack.

"We'll just placate the porpoise Till its purpose is revealed; Now go, good chaps, fetch galley scraps; THEY'LL be our battlefield."

The crew obeyed the Captain And dumped out into the sea The food they found they had not downed, A tasty potpourri.

"Well done, brave lads, look hearty!" The Captain gave a cheer; "We'll soon find out - just watch its snout - If it will disappear."

The puzzled porpoise pondered What the fuss was all about But just adored the smorgasbord The sailors had tossed out.

Its purpose thus accomplished Quick the porpoise then withdrew As in its ears long rang the cheers Of that triumphant crew.

The Captain proudly postured And proposed a pithy rhyme: "The proper bait propitiates A porpoise every time."