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There once was a silly old Colonel
Who read in an old battered journal,
That to keep warm in Wales
Keep out of the gales,
And make sure your undies are thermal.

limerick by John Carter Brown
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Silly, Silly Fool

(kenneth gamble / leon huff)
Such a silly, silly, silly, silly fool am i
Oh, i, just a silly, silly, silly, silly fool am i
Hey, I should have never fallen
Back in love with you
Knowin how you get a pleasure
Breaking my poor heart in two
You made it sound so convincin
When you said
Im your woman, youre my man
Now I really need you
And I sit here a loser again
I guess Im just a silly, silly, silly, silly fool am i, oh i
Im such a silly, silly, silly, silly, fool am i, mmm
I should have never trusted
In my heart to lead the way
Now my mind is all busted
Thats a fools price to pay
You made it sound so convincin
When you said youd never, never go away
I should have never listened
To anything you had to say
Im such a silly, silly, silly, silly, silly, silly fool am i, yes I am
Im such a silly, silly, silly, silly fool am i, oh
Such a silly, silly, dilly, silly, dilly fool am i, oh yeah
Im such a silly, silly, silly, silly, silly fool am i, oh yes I am
Im such a silly, silly, dilly, silly, dilly, silly fool am i, oh yeah
Im such a silly, dilly, silly, dilly, silly fool am i, oh
Silly, dilly

song performed by Dusty Springfield
Added by Lucian Velea
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The Scout Toward Aldie

The cavalry-camp lies on the slope
Of what was late a vernal hill,
But now like a pavement bare-
An outpost in the perilous wilds
Which ever are lone and still;
But Mosby's men are there -
Of Mosby best beware.

Great trees the troopers felled, and leaned
In antlered walls about their tents;
Strict watch they kept; 'twas Hark! and Mark!
Unarmed none cared to stir abroad
For berries beyond their forest-fence:
As glides in seas the shark,
Rides Mosby through green dark.

All spake of him, but few had seen
Except the maimed ones or the low;
Yet rumor made him every thing-
A farmer-woodman-refugee-
The man who crossed the field but now;
A spell about his life did cling -
Who to the ground shall Mosby bring?

The morning-bugles lonely play,
Lonely the evening-bugle calls -
Unanswered voices in the wild;
The settled hush of birds in nest
Becharms, and all the wood enthralls:
Memory's self is so beguiled
That Mosby seems a satyr's child.

They lived as in the Eerie Land-
The fire-flies showed with fairy gleam;
And yet from pine-tops one might ken
The Capitol dome-hazy-sublime-
A vision breaking on a dream:
So strange it was that Mosby's men
Should dare to prowl where the Dome was seen.

A scout toward Aldie broke the spell. -
The Leader lies before his tent
Gazing at heaven's all-cheering lamp
Through blandness of a morning rare;
His thoughts on bitter-sweets are bent:
His sunny bride is in the camp -
But Mosby - graves are beds of damp!

The trumpet calls; he goes within;
But none the prayer and sob may know:

[...] Read more

poem by Herman Melville
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Colonel Martin

THE Colonel went out sailing,
He spoke with Turk and Jew,
With Christian and with Infidel,
For all tongues he knew.
'O what's a wifeless man?' said he,
And he came sailing home.
He rose the latch and went upstairS
And found an empty room.
The Colonel went out sailing.
'I kept her much in the country
And she was much alone,
And though she may be there,' he said,
'She may be in the town.
She may be all alone there,
For who can say?' he said.
'I think that I shall find her
In a young man's bed.'
The Colonel went out sailing.

III
The Colonel met a pedlar,
Agreed their clothes to swop,
And bought the grandest jewelry
In a Galway shop,
Instead of thread and needle
put jewelry in the pack,
Bound a thong about his hand,
Hitched it on his back.
The Colonel wcnt out sailing.
The Colonel knocked on the rich man's door,
'I am sorry,' said the maid,
'My mistress cannot see these things,
But she is still abed,
And never have I looked upon
Jewelry so grand.'
'Take all to your mistress,'
And he laid them on her hand.
The Colonel went out sailing.
And he went in and she went on
And both climbed up the stair,
And O he was a clever man,
For he his slippers wore.
And when they came to the top stair
He ran on ahead,
His wife he found and the rich man
In the comfort of a bed.
The Colonel went out sailing.
The Judge at the Assize Court,
When he heard that story told,
Awarded him for damages

[...] Read more

poem by William Butler Yeats
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On this silly hill

On this silly hill I remember the silly things
That we did
We were so young and we decided to pick
Some ripe mangoes on this silly
Isolated hill away from
Our teasing
Silly friends

And I really liked her a lot
My heart was trembling
Her heart too quivering
We felt we like each other
Feelings like hot chili
Heating our ears

We said we love each other
We promised to love each other
Till the end of days

And so I climbed the mango tree
And picked the most luscious
Delicious mangoes as may be gleaned
From their color and shape
Thinking all the best for her
That I could give
To her

I put all the mangoes in my shirt
And I was silly looking silly like a tray to her
And she picked them one by one
Near my chest lower to my tummy
Nearer to my bulge

I was breathless
As she took more
Ripe mangoes from me
Slowly
Gracefully
Peeling with her mouth and tongue
Licking the yellowish pulp
And she said the mangoes were all
So sweet smelling and delicious
Like me

She was craving
She was raving
I was simply receptive
Giving in
All
To what she wanted

[...] Read more

poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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The Ballad Of East And West

Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,
Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God's great Judgment Seat;
But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,
When two strong men stand face to face,
tho' they come from the ends of the earth!

Kamal is out with twenty men to raise the Border-side,
And he has lifted the Colonel's mare that is the Colonel's pride:
He has lifted her out of the stable-door between the dawn and the day,
And turned the calkins upon her feet, and ridden her far away.
Then up and spoke the Colonel's son that led a troop of the Guides:
"Is there never a man of all my men can say where Kamal hides?"
Then up and spoke Mahommed Khan, the son of the Ressaldar:
"If ye know the track of the morning-mist, ye know where his pickets are.
At dusk he harries the Abazai -- at dawn he is into Bonair,
But he must go by Fort Bukloh to his own place to fare,
So if ye gallop to Fort Bukloh as fast as a bird can fly,
By the favour of God ye may cut him off ere he win to the Tongue of Jagai.
But if he be past the Tongue of Jagai, right swiftly turn ye then,
For the length and the breadth of that grisly plain is sown with Kamal's men.
There is rock to the left, and rock to the right, and low lean thorn between,
And ye may hear a breech-bolt snick where never a man is seen."
The Colonel's son has taken a horse, and a raw rough dun was he,
With the mouth of a bell and the heart of Hell
and the head of the gallows-tree.
The Colonel's son to the Fort has won, they bid him stay to eat --
Who rides at the tail of a Border thief, he sits not long at his meat.
He's up and away from Fort Bukloh as fast as he can fly,
Till he was aware of his father's mare in the gut of the Tongue of Jagai,
Till he was aware of his father's mare with Kamal upon her back,
And when he could spy the white of her eye, he made the pistol crack.
He has fired once, he has fired twice, but the whistling ball went wide.
"Ye shoot like a soldier," Kamal said. "Show now if ye can ride."
It's up and over the Tongue of Jagai, as blown dustdevils go,
The dun he fled like a stag of ten, but the mare like a barren doe.
The dun he leaned against the bit and slugged his head above,
But the red mare played with the snaffle-bars, as a maiden plays with a glove.
There was rock to the left and rock to the right, and low lean thorn between,
And thrice he heard a breech-bolt snick tho' never a man was seen.
They have ridden the low moon out of the sky, their hoofs drum up the dawn,
The dun he went like a wounded bull, but the mare like a new-roused fawn.
The dun he fell at a water-course -- in a woful heap fell he,
And Kamal has turned the red mare back, and pulled the rider free.
He has knocked the pistol out of his hand -- small room was there to strive,
"'Twas only by favour of mine," quoth he, "ye rode so long alive:
There was not a rock for twenty mile, there was not a clump of tree,
But covered a man of my own men with his rifle cocked on his knee.
If I had raised my bridle-hand, as I have held it low,
The little jackals that flee so fast were feasting all in a row:
If I had bowed my head on my breast, as I have held it high,

[...] Read more

poem by Rudyard Kipling
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Hongree and Mahry

The sun was setting in its wonted west,
When HONGREE, Sub-Lieutenant of Chassoores,
Met MAHRY DAUBIGNY, the Village Rose,
Under the Wizard's Oak - old trysting-place
Of those who loved in rosy Aquitaine.

They thought themselves unwatched, but they were not;
For HONGREE, Sub-Lieutenant of Chassoores,
Found in LIEUTENANT-COLONEL JOOLES DUBOSC
A rival, envious and unscrupulous,
Who thought it not foul scorn to dodge his steps,
And listen, unperceived, to all that passed
Between the simple little Village Rose
And HONGREE, Sub-Lieutenant of Chassoores.

A clumsy barrack-bully was DUBOSC,
Quite unfamiliar with the well-bred tact
That animates a proper gentleman
In dealing with a girl of humble rank.
You'll understand his coarseness when I say
He would have married MAHRY DAUBIGNY,
And dragged the unsophisticated girl
Into the whirl of fashionable life,
For which her singularly rustic ways,
Her breeding (moral, but extremely rude),
Her language (chaste, but ungrammatical),
Would absolutely have unfitted her.
How different to this unreflecting boor
Was HONGREE, Sub-Lieutenant of Chassoores.

Contemporary with the incident
Related in our opening paragraph,
Was that sad war 'twixt Gallia and ourselves
That followed on the treaty signed at Troyes;
And so LIEUTENANT-COLONEL JOOLES DUBOSC
(Brave soldier, he, with all his faults of style)
And HONGREE, Sub-Lieutenant of Chassoores,
Were sent by CHARLES of France against the lines
Of our Sixth HENRY (Fourteen twenty-nine),
To drive his legions out of Aquitaine.

When HONGREE, Sub-Lieutenant of Chassoores,
Returned, suspecting nothing, to his camp,
After his meeting with the Village Rose,
He found inside his barrack letter-box
A note from the commanding officer,
Requiring his attendance at head-quarters.
He went, and found LIEUTENANT-COLONEL JOOLES.

"Young HONGREE, Sub-Lieutenant of Chassoores,

[...] Read more

poem by William Schwenck Gilbert
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Silly Confusion

Meet me on the moon very very soon
Meet me on the stars jupiter and mars
Fly me to a star
Burning out in space shining on my face
Fly me through the night on your silver wings
Over crystal seas valleys of the kings
By the lilac shore where the dragon flies
In the diamond skies
Silly silly confusion
And tangle of wild illusion
Were living in a wonderworld of fantasy
We spent all our times in sweet living dreams
Its a silly silly confusion
Like a flower of wild profusion
You can do the things in life
You always wanted to
Within your heart you know it always will come through
Take me for a ride in your dream-machine
To a time and place where no one has been
Let me look upon worlds Ive never seen
In your dream-machine
Fly me to a star burning out in space
Let me feel the light shining on my face
Sail on solar winds sail on silver birds
Through the universe
Silly silly confusion...
Its a silly silly confusion...
Silly silly confusion...
Its a silly silly confusion...
Silly silly confusion
Silly silly confusion

song performed by Boney M.
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Sunny New South Wales

We often hear men boast about the land which gave them birth,
And each one thinks his native land the fairest spot on earth;
In beauty, riches, power, no land can his surpass;
To his, all other lands on earth cannot even hold a glass.
Now, if other people have their boasts, then, say, why should not we,
For we can drink our jovial toast and sing with three times three;
For there's not a country in the world where all that's fair prevails
As here it does in this our land, our sunny New South Wales.

Chorus

Then toast with me our happy land,
Where all that's fair prevails,
Our colour's blue and our hearts are true,
In sunny New South Wales.

Now let us take a passing glance at all that we possess.
That ours is such a wealthy land no stranger e'er would guess.
Why, we've land in store, indeed far more than ever we shall require,
And trees grow thick on every side in spite of axe and fire.
Our sheep and cattle millions count, our wool is classed A1;
In beef and mutton our fair land is not to be outdone.
Why, we've lately seen old England, who boasts her stock ne'er fails,
Has had to send for wholsome meat preserved in New South Wales.

Chorus: Then toast with me, &c.

In childhood California was to us a land of gold,
And people said its riches were so vast, immense, untold.
But time has proved that mineral wealth exists not there alone,
For New South Wales possesses gold in many, many a stone.
And when the gold is taken from out its quartzy veins
A heap of silver, copper, tin, as a residue remains.
In fact we are a mass of wealth in all our hills and dales.
There's not a country half as rich as sunny New South Wales.

Chorus: Then toast with me, &c.

Our climate's good, that all admit, our flowers are sweet and rare;
And scenes abound on every hand so marvellously fair.
Shame on the men who went away and of us wrote such lies.
Why, when Anthony Trollope came out here he nearly lost his eyes.
Our native girls are fair and good, their hearts are pure and true;
And to their colour stick like bricks, the bright Australian blue.
Some never loved a roving life, nor blest the ocean's gales;
But they bless the breeze that blew them to a life in New South Wales.

poem by Andrew Barton Paterson
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Welcome to the Prince of Wales

Lines written when the Prince of Wales
was about embarking for Canada, May, 1860.

In his long voyage o'er the sea,
To where doth grow the maple tree,
May he be blest with pleasant gales-
The coming man, the Prince of Wales.

The Maple grows but in good soil,
Where nature doth reward for toil.
The farmer, splitting his fence rails,
He welcome bids the Prince of Wales.

In the woods the axe is ringing,
And the yeoman merry singing ;
The song resounds o'er hills and dales -
Our future king, the Prince of Wales.
'Round the brow of our future chief
We'll weave a wreath of maple leaf,
For o'er broad Canada prevails
Kind feelings to the Prince of Wales.

When in this land the Prince arrives
May he have many pleasant drives,
And on our lakes have merry sails-
Great king of princes, Prince of Wales.

poem by James McIntyre
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English Bards and Scotch Reviewers: A Satire

'I had rather be a kitten, and cry mew!
Than one of these same metre ballad-mongers'~Shakespeare

'Such shameless bards we have; and yet 'tis true,
There are as mad, abandon'd critics too,'~Pope.

Still must I hear? -- shall hoarse Fitzgerald bawl
His creaking couplets in a tavern hall,
And I not sing, lest, haply, Scotch reviews
Should dub me scribbler, and denounce my muse?
Prepare for rhyme -- I'll publish, right or wrong:
Fools are my theme, let satire be my song.

O nature's noblest gift -- my grey goose-quill!
Slave of my thoughts, obedient to my will,
Torn from thy parent bird to form a pen,
That mighty instrument of little men!
The pen! foredoom'd to aid the mental throes
Of brains that labour, big with verse or prose,
Though nymphs forsake, and critics may deride,
The lover's solace, and the author's pride.
What wits, what poets dost thou daily raise!
How frequent is thy use, how small thy praise!
Condemn'd at length to be forgotten quite,
With all the pages which 'twas thine to write.
But thou, at least, mine own especial pen!
Once laid aside, but now assumed again,
Our task complete, like Hamet's shall be free;
Though spurn'd by others, yet beloved by me:
Then let us soar today, no common theme,
No eastern vision, no distemper'd dream
Inspires -- our path, though full of thorns, is plain;
Smooth be the verse, and easy be the strain.

When Vice triumphant holds her sov'reign sway,
Obey'd by all who nought beside obey;
When Folly, frequent harbinger of crime,
Bedecks her cap with bells of every clime;
When knaves and fools combined o'er all prevail,
And weigh their justice in a golden scale;
E'en then the boldest start from public sneers,
Afraid of shame, unknown to other fears,
More darkly sin, by satire kept in awe,
And shrink from ridicule, though not from law.

Such is the force of wit! but not belong
To me the arrows of satiric song;
The royal vices of our age demand
A keener weapon, and a mightier hand.

[...] Read more

poem by Byron
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Tale XXI

The Learned Boy

An honest man was Farmer Jones, and true;
He did by all as all by him should do;
Grave, cautious, careful, fond of gain was he,
Yet famed for rustic hospitality:
Left with his children in a widow'd state,
The quiet man submitted to his fate;
Though prudent matrons waited for his call,
With cool forbearance he avoided all;
Though each profess'd a pure maternal joy,
By kind attention to his feeble boy;
And though a friendly Widow knew no rest,
Whilst neighbour Jones was lonely and distress'd;
Nay, though the maidens spoke in tender tone
Their hearts' concern to see him left alone,
Jones still persisted in that cheerless life,
As if 'twere sin to take a second wife.
Oh! 'tis a precious thing, when wives are dead,
To find such numbers who will serve instead;
And in whatever state a man be thrown,
'Tis that precisely they would wish their own;
Left the departed infants--then their joy
Is to sustain each lovely girl and boy:
Whatever calling his, whatever trade,
To that their chief attention has been paid;
His happy taste in all things they approve,
His friends they honour, and his food they love;
His wish for order, prudence in affairs,
An equal temper (thank their stars!), are theirs;
In fact, it seem'd to be a thing decreed,
And fix'd as fate, that marriage must succeed:
Yet some, like Jones, with stubborn hearts and

hard,
Can hear such claims and show them no regard.
Soon as our Farmer, like a general, found
By what strong foes he was encompass'd round,
Engage he dared not, and he could not fly,
But saw his hope in gentle parley lie;
With looks of kindness then, and trembling heart,
He met the foe, and art opposed to art.
Now spoke that foe insidious--gentle tones,
And gentle looks, assumed for Farmer Jones:
'Three girls,' the Widow cried, 'a lively three
To govern well--indeed it cannot be.'
'Yes,' he replied, 'it calls for pains and care:
But I must bear it.'--'Sir, you cannot bear;
Your son is weak, and asks a mother's eye:'
'That, my kind friend, a father's may supply.'

[...] Read more

poem by George Crabbe
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Silence is Deafening

Hush, silly girl, stop breathing.
Hush, silly girl, keep it inside.

Stop, silly girl, wipe you tears.
Stop, silly girl, your crying.

Quit, silly girl, stay still.
Quit, silly girl, don’t move.

Close, silly girl, your eyes.
Close, silly girl, your mouth.

Don't, silly girl, bite my hand.
Don't, silly gril, kick my side.

Yes, silly girl, you’re mine.
Yes, silly girl, you’re mine.

I am before you.
I won’t adore you.
I control you.
You are mine.

Hush.

poem by Lyndee Michelle
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A Fable For Critics

Phoebus, sitting one day in a laurel-tree's shade,
Was reminded of Daphne, of whom it was made,
For the god being one day too warm in his wooing,
She took to the tree to escape his pursuing;
Be the cause what it might, from his offers she shrunk,
And, Ginevra-like, shut herself up in a trunk;
And, though 'twas a step into which he had driven her,
He somehow or other had never forgiven her;
Her memory he nursed as a kind of a tonic,
Something bitter to chew when he'd play the Byronic,
And I can't count the obstinate nymphs that he brought over
By a strange kind of smile he put on when he thought of her.
'My case is like Dido's,' he sometimes remarked;
'When I last saw my love, she was fairly embarked
In a laurel, as _she_ thought-but (ah, how Fate mocks!)
She has found it by this time a very bad box;
Let hunters from me take this saw when they need it,-
You're not always sure of your game when you've treed it.
Just conceive such a change taking place in one's mistress!
What romance would be left?-who can flatter or kiss trees?
And, for mercy's sake, how could one keep up a dialogue
With a dull wooden thing that will live and will die a log,-
Not to say that the thought would forever intrude
That you've less chance to win her the more she is wood?
Ah! it went to my heart, and the memory still grieves,
To see those loved graces all taking their leaves;
Those charms beyond speech, so enchanting but now,
As they left me forever, each making its bough!
If her tongue _had_ a tang sometimes more than was right,
Her new bark is worse than ten times her old bite.'

Now, Daphne-before she was happily treeified-
Over all other blossoms the lily had deified,
And when she expected the god on a visit
('Twas before he had made his intentions explicit),
Some buds she arranged with a vast deal of care,
To look as if artlessly twined in her hair,
Where they seemed, as he said, when he paid his addresses,
Like the day breaking through, the long night of her tresses;
So whenever he wished to be quite irresistible,
Like a man with eight trumps in his hand at a whist-table
(I feared me at first that the rhyme was untwistable,
Though I might have lugged in an allusion to Cristabel),-
He would take up a lily, and gloomily look in it,
As I shall at the--, when they cut up my book in it.

Well, here, after all the bad rhyme I've been spinning,
I've got back at last to my story's beginning:
Sitting there, as I say, in the shade of his mistress,
As dull as a volume of old Chester mysteries,

[...] Read more

poem by James Russell Lowell
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The Ballad of the White Horse

DEDICATION

Of great limbs gone to chaos,
A great face turned to night--
Why bend above a shapeless shroud
Seeking in such archaic cloud
Sight of strong lords and light?

Where seven sunken Englands
Lie buried one by one,
Why should one idle spade, I wonder,
Shake up the dust of thanes like thunder
To smoke and choke the sun?

In cloud of clay so cast to heaven
What shape shall man discern?
These lords may light the mystery
Of mastery or victory,
And these ride high in history,
But these shall not return.

Gored on the Norman gonfalon
The Golden Dragon died:
We shall not wake with ballad strings
The good time of the smaller things,
We shall not see the holy kings
Ride down by Severn side.

Stiff, strange, and quaintly coloured
As the broidery of Bayeux
The England of that dawn remains,
And this of Alfred and the Danes
Seems like the tales a whole tribe feigns
Too English to be true.

Of a good king on an island
That ruled once on a time;
And as he walked by an apple tree
There came green devils out of the sea
With sea-plants trailing heavily
And tracks of opal slime.

Yet Alfred is no fairy tale;
His days as our days ran,
He also looked forth for an hour
On peopled plains and skies that lower,
From those few windows in the tower
That is the head of a man.

But who shall look from Alfred's hood

[...] Read more

poem by Gilbert Keith Chesterton
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The Relief of Mafeking

Success to Colonel Baden-Powell and his praises loudly sing,
For being so brave in relieving Mafeking,
With his gallant little band of eight hundred men,
They made the Boers fly from Mafeking like sheep escaping from a pen.

'Twas in the year of 1900 and on the 18th of May,
That Colonel Baden-Powell beat the Boers without dismay,
And made them fly from Mafeking without delay,
Which will be handed down to posterity for many a day.

Colonel Baden-Powell is a very brave man,
And to deny it, I venture to say, few men can;
He is a noble hero be it said,
For at the siege of Mafeking he never was afraid.

And during the siege Colonel Baden was cheerful and gay,
While the starving population were living on brawn each day;
And alas! the sufferings of the women and children were great,
But they all submitted patiently to their fate.

For seven months besieged they fought the Boers without dismay,
Until at last the Boers were glad to run away;
Because Baden-Powell's gallant band put them to flight
By cannon shot and volleys of musketry to the left and right.

Then long live Baden-Powell and his brave little band,
For during the siege of Mafeking they made a bold stand
Against yelling thousands of Boers who were thirsting for their blood,
But as firm as a rock against them they fearlessly stood.

Oh! think of them living on brawn extracted from horse hides,
While the inhuman Boers their sufferings deride,
Knowing that the women's hearts with grief were torn
As they looked on their children's faces that looked sad and forlorn.

For 217 days the Boers tried to obtain Mafeking's surrender,
But their strategy was futile owing to its noble defender,
Colonel Baden-Powell, that hero of renown,
Who, by his masterly generalship, saved the town.

Methinks I see him and his gallant band,
Looking terror to the foe: Oh! The sight was really grand,
As he cried, "Give it them, lads; let's do or die;
And from Mafeking we'll soon make them fly,
And we'll make them rue their rash undertaking
The day they laid siege to the town of Mafeking."

Long life and prosperity to Colonel Baden-Powell,
For there's very few generals can him excel;
And he is now the Hero of Mafeking, be it told,

[...] Read more

poem by William Topaz McGonagall
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Welsh Landscape

To live in Wales is to be conscious
At dusk of the spilled blood
That went into the making of the wild sky,
Dyeing the immaculate rivers
In all their courses.
It is to be aware,
Above the noisy tractor
And hum of the machine
Of strife in the strung woods,
Vibrant with sped arrows.
You cannot live in the present,
At least not in Wales.
There is the language for instance,
The soft consonants
Strange to the ear.
There are cries in the dark at night
As owls answer the moon,
And thick ambush of shadows,
Hushed at the fields' corners.
There is no present in Wales,
And no future;
There is only the past,
Brittle with relics,
Wind-bitten towers and castles
With sham ghosts;
Mouldering quarries and mines;
And an impotent people,
Sick with inbreeding,
Worrying the carcase of an old song. To live in Wales is to be conscious
At dusk of the spilled blood
That went into the making of the wild sky,
Dyeing the immaculate rivers
In all their courses.
It is to be aware,
Above the noisy tractor
And hum of the machine
Of strife in the strung woods,
Vibrant with sped arrows.
You cannot live in the present,
At least not in Wales.
There is the language for instance,
The soft consonants
Strange to the ear.
There are cries in the dark at night
As owls answer the moon,
And thick ambush of shadows,
Hushed at the fields' corners.
There is no present in Wales,
And no future;
There is only the past,

[...] Read more

poem by Ronald Stuart Thomas
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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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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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Silly Boy Blue

Mountains of lhasa are feeling the rain
People are walking the botella lanes
Preacher takes the school
One boy breaks a rule
Silly boy blue, blue
Silly boy blue
Yak butter statues that melt in the sun
Cannot dissolve all the work youve not done
A chela likes to feel
That his overself pays the bill
Silly boy blue, blue
Silly boy blue
You wish and wish, and wish again
Youve tried so hard to fly
Youll never leave your body now
Youve got to wait to die
La la la la la , la la , la la la la
La la la la la , la la , la la la la
La la la , la la
La la la , la la
Silly boy blue, blue
Silly boy blue
Child of tibet, youre a gift from the sun
Reincarnation of one better man
The homeward road is long
Youve left your prayers and song
Silly boy blue , blue
Silly boy blue
Silly boy blue
Silly boy blue

song performed by David Bowie
Added by Lucian Velea
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Embarrassed And Battered

Embarrassed and battered.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Nothing you have done is deserving of that.

Embarrassed and battered.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Nothing you have done is deserving of that.

Some people bring home their tempers to leave.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
While others show their hearts hanging on their sleeves.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Nothing you have done is deserving of that.

Dragging on their backs every burden to keep.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Bringing on their moodiness when they turn the key.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Nothing you have done is deserving of that.

Keeping everybody up so they can't sleep.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Nothing you have done is deserving of that.

Embarrassed and battered.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Nothing you have done is deserving of that.

Embarrassed and battered.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Nothing you have done is deserving of that.

Some people bring home their tempers to leave.
Bringing on their moodiness when they turn the key.
Dragging on their backs every burden to keep.
While others show their hearts hanging on their sleeves.
Keeping everybody up so they can't sleep.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Nothing you have done is deserving of that.

Embarrassed and battered.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Embarrassed and battered.
And nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Nothing you have done is deserving of that.
Embarrassed and battered.

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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