As citizens we have to be more thoughtful and more educated and more informed. I turn on the TV and I see these grown people screaming at each other, and I think, well, if we don't get our civility back, we're in trouble.
quote by Emmylou Harris
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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
[...] Read more
poem by Gert Strydom
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Trouble
No attorneys
To plead my case
No orbits
To send me into outta space
And my fingers
Are bejeweled
With diamonds and gold
But that ain't gonna help me now
I'm trouble
Yeah trouble now
I'm trouble ya'll
I disturb my town
I'm trouble
Yeah trouble now
I'm trouble ya'll
I got trouble in my town
You think your right
But you were wrong
You tried to take me
But I knew all along
You can take me
For a ride
I'm not a fool out
So you better run and hide
I'm trouble
Yeah trouble now
I'm trouble ya'll
I got trouble in my town
I'm trouble
Yeah trouble now
I'm trouble ya'll
I got trouble in my town
If you see me coming
Down the street then
You know it's time to
Go (and you know it's time to go
cause here comes trouble)
No attorneys
To plead my case
No orbits
To send me into outta space
And my fingers
Are bejeweled
With diamonds and gold
But that ain't gonna help me now
You think your right
But you were wrong
You tried to take me
But I knew all along
You can take me
[...] Read more
song performed by Pink
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Percys Song
Bad news, bad news,
Come to me where I sleep,
Turn, turn, turn again.
Sayin one of your friends
Is in trouble deep,
Turn, turn to the rain
And the wind.
Tell me the trouble,
Tell once to my ear,
Turn, turn, turn again.
Joliet prison
And ninety-nine years,
Turn, turn to the rain
And the wind.
Oh whats the charge
Of how this came to be,
Turn, turn, turn again.
Manslaughter
In the highest of degree,
Turn, turn to the rain
And the wind.
I sat down and wrote
The best words I could write,
Turn, turn, turn again.
Explaining to the judge
Id be there on wednesday night,
Turn, turn to the rain
And the wind.
Without a reply,
I left by the moon,
Turn, turn, turn again.
And was in his chambers
By the next afternoon,
Turn, turn to the rain
And the wind.
Could ya tell me the facts?
I said without fear,
Turn, turn, turn again.
That a friend of mine
Would get ninety-nine years,
Turn, turn to the rain
And the wind.
A crash on the highway
Flew the car to a field,
Turn, turn, turn again.
There was four persons killed
And he was at the wheel,
Turn, turn to the rain
And the wind.
But I knew him as good
[...] Read more
song performed by Bob Dylan
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Trouble
Trouble in the city, trouble in the farm,
You got your rabbits foot, you got your good-luck charm.
But they cant help you none when theres trouble.
Trouble,
Trouble, trouble, trouble,
Nothin but trouble.
Trouble in the water, trouble in the air,
Go all the way to the other side of the world, youll find trouble there.
Revolution even aint no solution for trouble.
Trouble,
Trouble, trouble, trouble,
Nothin but trouble.
Drought and starvation, packaging of the soul,
Persecution, execution, governments out of control.
You can see the writing on the wall inviting trouble.
Trouble,
Trouble, trouble, trouble,
Nothin but trouble.
Put your ear to the train tracks, put your ear to the ground,
You ever feel like youre never alone even when theres nobody else around?
Since the beginning of the universe mans been cursed by trouble.
Trouble,
Trouble, trouble, trouble,
Nothin but trouble.
Nightclubs of the broken-hearted, stadiums of the damned,
Legislature, perverted nature, doors that are rudely slammed.
Look into infinity, all you see is trouble.
Trouble,
Trouble, trouble, trouble,
Nothin but trouble.
song performed by Bob Dylan
Added by Lucian Velea
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No More Trouble (feat. Erykah Badu)
[Bob Marley]
(We don't need) No, we don't need (no more trouble) no more trouble!
(We don't need no more trouble)
Wo! Oh-oh-oh!
(We don't need) We don't need no (no more) trouble!
We don't need no trouble!
(We don't need no more trouble)
Make love and not war! 'Cause we don't need no trouble.
What we need is love (love)
To guide and protect us on. (on)
If you hope good down from above, (love)
Help the weak if you are strong now. (love)
We don't need no trouble;
What we need is love. Oh, no!
We don't need - we don't need - no more trouble!
Lord knows, we don't need no trouble!
(We don't need) We don't need trouble (no more trouble) -
no more trouble - no more trouble!
Seek happiness! (...) Oh, ...!
Come on, you all and speak of love. (...) Oh, yeah!
We don't need no trouble;
What we need is love, now. (What we need is love!)
(We don't need) Oh, we don't need no more trouble!
We don't need, no - we don't need no trouble!
We don't (need) - no, brothers and sisters ... (no more trouble!)
We don't need no trouble; we don't need no trouble!
We don't need no trouble!
What we need is love!
We don't need - we don't need no more - we don't need -
no more trouble - we don't need no more trouble!
Trouble we don't need (we don't need),
(We don't need) Lord, knows! -
we don't need no more war (no more trouble).
No more trouble - we don't need no more - more trouble! /fadeout/
song performed by Bob Marley
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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
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Salut Au Monde
O TAKE my hand, Walt Whitman!
Such gliding wonders! such sights and sounds!
Such join'd unended links, each hook'd to the next!
Each answering all--each sharing the earth with all.
What widens within you, Walt Whitman?
What waves and soils exuding?
What climes? what persons and lands are here?
Who are the infants? some playing, some slumbering?
Who are the girls? who are the married women?
Who are the groups of old men going slowly with their arms about each
other's necks?
What rivers are these? what forests and fruits are these?
What are the mountains call'd that rise so high in the mists?
What myriads of dwellings are they, fill'd with dwellers?
Within me latitude widens, longitude lengthens;
Asia, Africa, Europe, are to the east--America is provided for in the
west;
Banding the bulge of the earth winds the hot equator,
Curiously north and south turn the axis-ends;
Within me is the longest day--the sun wheels in slanting rings--it
does not set for months;
Stretch'd in due time within me the midnight sun just rises above the
horizon, and sinks again;
Within me zones, seas, cataracts, plants, volcanoes, groups,
Malaysia, Polynesia, and the great West Indian islands.
What do you hear, Walt Whitman?
I hear the workman singing, and the farmer's wife singing;
I hear in the distance the sounds of children, and of animals early
in the day;
I hear quick rifle-cracks from the riflemen of East Tennessee and
Kentucky, hunting on hills;
I hear emulous shouts of Australians, pursuing the wild horse;
I hear the Spanish dance, with castanets, in the chestnut shade, to
the rebeck and guitar;
I hear continual echoes from the Thames;
I hear fierce French liberty songs;
I hear of the Italian boat-sculler the musical recitative of old
poems;
I hear the Virginia plantation-chorus of negroes, of a harvest night,
in the glare of pine-knots;
I hear the strong baritone of the 'long-shore-men of Mannahatta;
I hear the stevedores unlading the cargoes, and singing;
I hear the screams of the water-fowl of solitary north-west lakes;
I hear the rustling pattering of locusts, as they strike the grain
and grass with the showers of their terrible clouds;
I hear the Coptic refrain, toward sundown, pensively falling on the
[...] Read more
poem by Walt Whitman
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Turn It Up
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
My signal's gettin' kinda weak
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
I know U got 2 be a freak, ooh
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
I'm still waiting by the knob
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
I'm ready 4 the heavy stuff, oh yeah
CHORUS:
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Come and play with my controls
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Work me like a radio (oh, oh)
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Work it 'til I start 2 groove, ooh
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
I know U know what 2 do (Girl, U know what 2 do)
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Work it 'til my clothes are wet
Turn it up, turn it up
I wanna drown in your body's sweat! (Oh yeah)
CHORUS
Now turn it up!
Come here
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Give me everything U got
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
U know I know U got a lot (Oh yeah)
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
I'll play what U want me 2 play
Turn it up, turn it up
It ain't no good unless U turn it up all the way - yeah, yeah!
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Come and play with my controls (oh, oh)
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Work me like a radio (Come on, baby, turn it up)
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Come and play with my controls (oh)
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Work me like a radio (Listen 2 me now)
Come on baby, what's it gonna be?
Are U gonna do it or are U gonna leave it up 2 me?
Are U gonna stop? Are U gonna drop?
Kiss me, kiss me! Yeah!
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Come and play with my controls (oh)
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Work me like a radio (Come on, gotta, gotta, gotta..) (Oh yeah)
Turn it up, turn it up, baby
Come and play with my controls (oh)
[...] Read more
song performed by Prince
Added by Lucian Velea
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Trouble
I got a letter in the mail sayin' I'm gonna go to jail
Someone's got an axe
Lookin' it out for me
Well I was feelin' pretty nice didn't have to think twice
Finders keepers baby, keep it away from me
You got nothin' that I need
Stay away from me
I'll quicken your pace to heaven
You try to give me your lot
Well I hope you rot
Gonna tell the devil about you
You're gettin' me in trouble
You're gettin' me in trou...
Gettin' me in trouble
Every day and night
I'm alright
Well I'm a high speed king I never think about a thing
All I can do is moan
Everybody takes a turn from the trash I have learned
But why the hard way for me, I don't know
I'm gonna get you back
Stab you in the fat
I'll make you wish you never met me
I gonna make you sing the blues
You're gonna lose
Show you what you got yourself into
You're gettin' me in trouble
You're Gettin' me in trouble
Gettin' me in trouble
Every day and night
I'm all...
You try to put the weight of the world
On top of my shoulders
You got to know that you're a little girl
Who wants to feel older, feel older (watch out)
Trouble, yeah
Trouble, yeah yeah
I'm in trouble baby (oh yeah)
You're gettin' me in trouble
Gettin' me in trouble
Gettin' me in trouble
Every day and night
I'm in trouble, trouble, trouble (alright)
I'm in trouble, trouble, trouble
Trouble, trouble, trouble
Trouble, trouble, trouble
song performed by Quiet Riot
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Canto the First
I
I want a hero: an uncommon want,
When every year and month sends forth a new one,
Till, after cloying the gazettes with cant,
The age discovers he is not the true one;
Of such as these I should not care to vaunt,
I'll therefore take our ancient friend Don Juan—
We all have seen him, in the pantomime,
Sent to the devil somewhat ere his time.
II
Vernon, the butcher Cumberland, Wolfe, Hawke,
Prince Ferdinand, Granby, Burgoyne, Keppel, Howe,
Evil and good, have had their tithe of talk,
And fill'd their sign posts then, like Wellesley now;
Each in their turn like Banquo's monarchs stalk,
Followers of fame, "nine farrow" of that sow:
France, too, had Buonaparté and Dumourier
Recorded in the Moniteur and Courier.
III
Barnave, Brissot, Condorcet, Mirabeau,
Petion, Clootz, Danton, Marat, La Fayette,
Were French, and famous people, as we know:
And there were others, scarce forgotten yet,
Joubert, Hoche, Marceau, Lannes, Desaix, Moreau,
With many of the military set,
Exceedingly remarkable at times,
But not at all adapted to my rhymes.
IV
Nelson was once Britannia's god of war,
And still should be so, but the tide is turn'd;
There's no more to be said of Trafalgar,
'T is with our hero quietly inurn'd;
Because the army's grown more popular,
At which the naval people are concern'd;
Besides, the prince is all for the land-service,
Forgetting Duncan, Nelson, Howe, and Jervis.
V
Brave men were living before Agamemnon
And since, exceeding valorous and sage,
A good deal like him too, though quite the same none;
But then they shone not on the poet's page,
And so have been forgotten:—I condemn none,
But can't find any in the present age
Fit for my poem (that is, for my new one);
So, as I said, I'll take my friend Don Juan.
[...] Read more
poem by Byron from Don Juan (1824)
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II. Half-Rome
What, you, Sir, come too? (Just the man I'd meet.)
Be ruled by me and have a care o' the crowd:
This way, while fresh folk go and get their gaze:
I'll tell you like a book and save your shins.
Fie, what a roaring day we've had! Whose fault?
Lorenzo in Lucina,—here's a church
To hold a crowd at need, accommodate
All comers from the Corso! If this crush
Make not its priests ashamed of what they show
For temple-room, don't prick them to draw purse
And down with bricks and mortar, eke us out
The beggarly transept with its bit of apse
Into a decent space for Christian ease,
Why, to-day's lucky pearl is cast to swine.
Listen and estimate the luck they've had!
(The right man, and I hold him.)
Sir, do you see,
They laid both bodies in the church, this morn
The first thing, on the chancel two steps up,
Behind the little marble balustrade;
Disposed them, Pietro the old murdered fool
To the right of the altar, and his wretched wife
On the other side. In trying to count stabs,
People supposed Violante showed the most,
Till somebody explained us that mistake;
His wounds had been dealt out indifferent where,
But she took all her stabbings in the face,
Since punished thus solely for honour's sake,
Honoris causâ, that's the proper term.
A delicacy there is, our gallants hold,
When you avenge your honour and only then,
That you disfigure the subject, fray the face,
Not just take life and end, in clownish guise.
It was Violante gave the first offence,
Got therefore the conspicuous punishment:
While Pietro, who helped merely, his mere death
Answered the purpose, so his face went free.
We fancied even, free as you please, that face
Showed itself still intolerably wronged;
Was wrinkled over with resentment yet,
Nor calm at all, as murdered faces use,
Once the worst ended: an indignant air
O' the head there was—'t is said the body turned
Round and away, rolled from Violante's side
Where they had laid it loving-husband-like.
If so, if corpses can be sensitive,
Why did not he roll right down altar-step,
Roll on through nave, roll fairly out of church,
Deprive Lorenzo of the spectacle,
[...] Read more
poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
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Trouble
Trouble came around here
Here in the south we fix something to eat
Steam risin up off the greenery
And we welcome the strangers we meet
Alien sick growing in these walls
Like moss in a crack that time made
I brush a guy in the airport
Whistling its a small world after all
And the prices are higher
But the kids still selling lemonade
Get to the point of it
(get to the point of it)
Get to the sense of it
(get to the sense of it)
Im in a hurry
To get through it
I am in trouble
(I am in trouble)
I am in trouble
(I am in trouble)
A hurricane flag flappin in a bad storm
Same color of the spider underneath my nail that bit me in my dream
And who would take out the dominican republic
And send gods sweet children floating down a poison stream
A secret society of conference rooms
I pledge my allegiance to the dollar
And when the clergy take a vote oh the gays will pay again
Yeah cause theres more than one kind of criminal white collar
So get to the point of it
(get to the point of it)
Get to the sense of it
(get to the sense of it)
Im in a hurry to get through it
One day the war will stop
And well grow a peaceful crop
And a girl can get a wife
And we can bring you back to life
Sacks of flour and rice or poker chips
Greasy palms or systems underhanding
(...shelter...)
And maybe well take a walk on pluto
Yeah but be no closer to the understanding
(...what I wish...)
Get to the point of it
(get to the point of it)
Get to the sense of it
(get to the sense of it)
Im in a hurry to get through it
Yeah
I am in trouble
[...] Read more
song performed by Indigo Girls
Added by Lucian Velea
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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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The Fee
This tree has no trouble
And I have no trouble.
I have no trouble
With this trouble-free tree.
This trouble-free tree
has no trouble
With a trouble-free me.
This trouble-free tree
has no trouble. This tree
has no trouble.
And I have no trouble
With a trouble-free me.
But were I to be free
Of a trouble-free me,
This trouble-free tree
Spells trouble for me.
Were this tree to be free
Of this trouble-free tree,
There might even be
A real trouble-spree.
This is to say, “See,
Trouble exacts a fee:
A price (in fact) to see
This trouble-free tree.”
[5-23-07 Berkeley]
poem by David Floren
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Double Trouble
They got a line on you,
Little bit of trouble too,
You got, some jets inside,
Cherry lips, and delirious eyes.
You get in trouble,
And it keeps you down,
Double trouble.
You get in trouble,
And you come to town,
Double trouble,
Oh yea
They better chain your hands,
And you, spread some evil,
Pick and pan.
Hey, you sure got,
Some jets inside,
But you got a little,
With those empty eyes
You get in trouble,
And it keeps you down,
Double trouble,
You get in trouble
And you come to town,
Double trouble,
Oh yea
Youve got (got),
Some jets inside,
Baby, broken promises,
Broken pride
You get in trouble
And it keeps you down,
Double trouble.
You get in trouble,
And you come to town,
Double trouble,
Oh yeah,
You got some trouble,
(double trouble)
And it keeps you down,
Double trouble,
You get in trouble,
And you come to town
Double trouble,
That double trouble,
Oh yeah.
song performed by Cars
Added by Lucian Velea
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Satan Absolved
(In the antechamber of Heaven. Satan walks alone. Angels in groups conversing.)
Satan. To--day is the Lord's ``day.'' Once more on His good pleasure
I, the Heresiarch, wait and pace these halls at leisure
Among the Orthodox, the unfallen Sons of God.
How sweet in truth Heaven is, its floors of sandal wood,
Its old--world furniture, its linen long in press,
Its incense, mummeries, flowers, its scent of holiness!
Each house has its own smell. The smell of Heaven to me
Intoxicates and haunts,--and hurts. Who would not be
God's liveried servant here, the slave of His behest,
Rather than reign outside? I like good things the best,
Fair things, things innocent; and gladly, if He willed,
Would enter His Saints' kingdom--even as a little child.
[Laughs. I have come to make my peace, to crave a full amaun,
Peace, pardon, reconcilement, truce to our daggers--drawn,
Which have so long distraught the fair wise Universe,
An end to my rebellion and the mortal curse
Of always evil--doing. He will mayhap agree
I was less wholly wrong about Humanity
The day I dared to warn His wisdom of that flaw.
It was at least the truth, the whole truth, I foresaw
When He must needs create that simian ``in His own
Image and likeness.'' Faugh! the unseemly carrion!
I claim a new revision and with proofs in hand,
No Job now in my path to foil me and withstand.
Oh, I will serve Him well!
[Certain Angels approach. But who are these that come
With their grieved faces pale and eyes of martyrdom?
Not our good Sons of God? They stop, gesticulate,
Argue apart, some weep,--weep, here within Heaven's gate!
Sob almost in God's sight! ay, real salt human tears,
Such as no Spirit wept these thrice three thousand years.
The last shed were my own, that night of reprobation
When I unsheathed my sword and headed the lost nation.
Since then not one of them has spoken above his breath
Or whispered in these courts one word of life or death
Displeasing to the Lord. No Seraph of them all,
Save I this day each year, has dared to cross Heaven's hall
And give voice to ill news, an unwelcome truth to Him.
Not Michael's self hath dared, prince of the Seraphim.
Yet all now wail aloud.--What ails ye, brethren? Speak!
Are ye too in rebellion? Angels. Satan, no. But weak
With our long earthly toil, the unthankful care of Man.
Satan. Ye have in truth good cause.
Angels. And we would know God's plan,
His true thought for the world, the wherefore and the why
Of His long patience mocked, His name in jeopardy.
[...] Read more
poem by Wilfrid Scawen Blunt
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Keep Me Informed
Keep me informed,
When you think you see dawn.
And you are through with darkness
That supplied subdued restlessness.
And you wish to move on!
Yes...
Keep me informed.
Keep me informed,
When you're hopelessness has gone.
I will be there,
To chip aware what is left of your despair.
And you are prepared to sing songs!
Yes...
Please keep me informed.
Keep me informed,
If you feel you've been wronged.
With me I will help you undo...
Bitterness I have felt too!
And we will build a love...
Recognized and true.
Yes...
That is what we will do.
If you keep me informed.
Just keep me informed,
Take your time...
But don't take that time too long!
I've been searching for you.
You are someone who sees through...
Clouds you wish to lift!
And I am here,
To assist with the lifting of it!
Yes...
Keep me informed.
I know together we belong!
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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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
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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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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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