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Hope

Written by gerry beckley, 1994
Found on hourglass.
Theres a clock timing the world as it turns
Theres a man marking the candle as it burns
Keeping track of every minute that remains
Still we hope somehow
Its gonna be alright
Its gonna turn out fine
Theres a light shining beyond the southern cross
Burning bright for everyone of us whos lost
More than faith more than a reason to go on
Rise on up knowing
Youre gonna win the fight
Its gonna turn out fine
You gotta hope itll be alright
Come on and hope itll turn out fine
Yeah, hope itll be alright, please
When the night turns to the deepest shade of black
At that point there is no reason to turn back
High above angels are falling from the sky
Lift your heart knowing
Its gonna be alright
Its gonna turn out fine
You gotta hope itll be alright
Come on and hope itll turn out fine
Yeah, hope itll be alright, please
You gotta hope, ya gonna win the fight
Come on n hope with all your might
Yeah hope its gonna be alright, please
Millions of people alone in the dark
Awaiting a moment of hope
Please
You gotta hope (whenever times get tough) itll be alright
Come on and hope (and when the road is rough) itll turn out fine
Yeah, hope (just when youve had enough) itll be alright, please
You gotta hope (whenever times get tough) youre gonna win the fight
Come on and hope (and when the road is rough) with all your might
Yeah, hope (just when youve had enough) its gonna be alright, please
You gotta hope (whenever times get tough) itll be alright
Come on and hope (and when the road is rough) itll turn out fine
Yeah, hope (just when youve had enough) itll be alright, please
You gotta hope, youre gonna win the fight

song performed by America
Added by Lucian Velea
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Its Alright

(void)
---------------
(its alright)
(its alright)
I can hear it
(alright alright alright alright)
(alright alright alright alright)
Dictation being forced in afghanistan
Revolution in south africa taking a stand
People in eurasia on the brink of oppression
I hope its gonna be alright
cause the music plays forever
(for it goes on and on and on and on)
Yeahah
I hope its gonna be alright
(alright alright alright alright)
Generations will come and go (will come and go)
But theres one thing for sure
Music is our lifes foundation
And shall succeed all the nations to come
Yeahah
I hope its gonna be alright
cause the music plays forever
(for it goes on and on and on and on...)
(yeahah)
I hope its gonna be alright
(on and on and on...)
cause the music plays forever
(for it goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on)
The year three thousand may still come to pass
But the music shall last
I can hear it on a timeless wavelength
Never dissipating but giving us strength
I hope its gonna be alright
(alright alright alright alright)
(alright alright alright alright)
(alright alright alright alright)
I hope its gonna be alright
(pu bu dup dup pu pu du bu dup...)
(alright alright alright alright)
(alright alright alright alright)
(for it goes on and on and on and on)
(alright alright alright alright)
Let your body move tonight
cause its gonna be alright
(its alright) (it will be alright)
(its alright) (its gonna be alright)
(aaaaaaaaaaaahaaaaahaahahahahaaaaaaaaaheheheeeeehheeeeeh...)
(its gonna be)
(its gonna be)

[...] Read more

song performed by Pet Shop Boys
Added by Lucian Velea
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The Loves of the Angels

'Twas when the world was in its prime,
When the fresh stars had just begun
Their race of glory and young Time
Told his first birth-days by the sun;
When in the light of Nature's dawn
Rejoicing, men and angels met
On the high hill and sunny lawn,-
Ere sorrow came or Sin had drawn
'Twixt man and heaven her curtain yet!
When earth lay nearer to the skies
Than in these days of crime and woe,
And mortals saw without surprise
In the mid-air angelic eyes
Gazing upon this world below.

Alas! that Passion should profane
Even then the morning of the earth!
That, sadder still, the fatal stain
Should fall on hearts of heavenly birth-
And that from Woman's love should fall
So dark a stain, most sad of all!

One evening, in that primal hour,
On a hill's side where hung the ray
Of sunset brightening rill and bower,
Three noble youths conversing lay;
And, as they lookt from time to time
To the far sky where Daylight furled
His radiant wing, their brows sublime
Bespoke them of that distant world-
Spirits who once in brotherhood
Of faith and bliss near ALLA stood,
And o'er whose cheeks full oft had blown
The wind that breathes from ALLA'S throne,
Creatures of light such as still play,
Like motes in sunshine, round the Lord,
And thro' their infinite array
Transmit each moment, night and day,
The echo of His luminous word!

Of Heaven they spoke and, still more oft,
Of the bright eyes that charmed them thence;
Till yielding gradual to the soft
And balmy evening's influence-
The silent breathing of the flowers-
The melting light that beamed above,
As on their first, fond, erring hours,-
Each told the story of his love,
The history of that hour unblest,
When like a bird from its high nest

[...] Read more

poem by Thomas Moore
Added by Poetry Lover
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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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XI. Guido

You are the Cardinal Acciaiuoli, and you,
Abate Panciatichi—two good Tuscan names:
Acciaiuoli—ah, your ancestor it was
Built the huge battlemented convent-block
Over the little forky flashing Greve
That takes the quick turn at the foot o' the hill
Just as one first sees Florence: oh those days!
'T is Ema, though, the other rivulet,
The one-arched brown brick bridge yawns over,—yes,
Gallop and go five minutes, and you gain
The Roman Gate from where the Ema's bridged:
Kingfishers fly there: how I see the bend
O'erturreted by Certosa which he built,
That Senescal (we styled him) of your House!
I do adjure you, help me, Sirs! My blood
Comes from as far a source: ought it to end
This way, by leakage through their scaffold-planks
Into Rome's sink where her red refuse runs?
Sirs, I beseech you by blood-sympathy,
If there be any vile experiment
In the air,—if this your visit simply prove,
When all's done, just a well-intentioned trick,
That tries for truth truer than truth itself,
By startling up a man, ere break of day,
To tell him he must die at sunset,—pshaw!
That man's a Franceschini; feel his pulse,
Laugh at your folly, and let's all go sleep!
You have my last word,—innocent am I
As Innocent my Pope and murderer,
Innocent as a babe, as Mary's own,
As Mary's self,—I said, say and repeat,—
And why, then, should I die twelve hours hence? I—
Whom, not twelve hours ago, the gaoler bade
Turn to my straw-truss, settle and sleep sound
That I might wake the sooner, promptlier pay
His due of meat-and-drink-indulgence, cross
His palm with fee of the good-hand, beside,
As gallants use who go at large again!
For why? All honest Rome approved my part;
Whoever owned wife, sister, daughter,—nay,
Mistress,—had any shadow of any right
That looks like right, and, all the more resolved,
Held it with tooth and nail,—these manly men
Approved! I being for Rome, Rome was for me.
Then, there's the point reserved, the subterfuge
My lawyers held by, kept for last resource,
Firm should all else,—the impossible fancy!—fail,
And sneaking burgess-spirit win the day.
The knaves! One plea at least would hold,—they laughed,—
One grappling-iron scratch the bottom-rock

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Undying One- Canto III

'THERE is a sound the autumn wind doth make
Howling and moaning, listlessly and low:
Methinks that to a heart that ought to break
All the earth's voices seem to murmur so.
The visions that crost
Our path in light--
The things that we lost
In the dim dark night--
The faces for which we vainly yearn--
The voices whose tones will not return--
That low sad wailing breeze doth bring
Borne on its swift and rushing wing.
Have ye sat alone when that wind was loud,
And the moon shone dim from the wintry cloud?
When the fire was quench'd on your lonely hearth,
And the voices were still which spoke of mirth?

If such an evening, tho' but one,
It hath been yours to spend alone--
Never,--though years may roll along
Cheer'd by the merry dance and song;
Though you mark'd not that bleak wind's sound before,
When louder perchance it used to roar--
Never shall sound of that wintry gale
Be aught to you but a voice of wail!
So o'er the careless heart and eye
The storms of the world go sweeping by;
But oh! when once we have learn'd to weep,
Well doth sorrow his stern watch keep.
Let one of our airy joys decay--
Let one of our blossoms fade away--
And all the griefs that others share
Seem ours, as well as theirs, to bear:
And the sound of wail, like that rushing wind
Shall bring all our own deep woe to mind!

'I went through the world, but I paused not now
At the gladsome heart and the joyous brow:
I went through the world, and I stay'd to mark
Where the heart was sore, and the spirit dark:
And the grief of others, though sad to see,
Was fraught with a demon's joy to me!

'I saw the inconstant lover come to take
Farewell of her he loved in better days,
And, coldly careless, watch the heart-strings break--
Which beat so fondly at his words of praise.
She was a faded, painted, guilt-bow'd thing,
Seeking to mock the hues of early spring,
When misery and years had done their worst

[...] Read more

poem by Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton
Added by Poetry Lover
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Shout & Shimmy

Do you feel alright? well do you feel alright children? do you feel alright?
Do you feel alright? well do you feel alright children? do you feel alright?
You know you make me want to shout shimmy, oh yeah you gonna shout shimmy,
You know you make me want to shout shimmy, oh yeah you gonna shout shimmy,
Oh yeah you gonna shout shimmy, oh yeah you gonna shout shimmy,
Oh yeah you gonna shout shimmy, oh yeah you gonna shout shimmy,
Oh yeah you know I walk up to the front, I try to do the flop,
Oh yeah you know I walk up to the front, I try to do the flop,
I walk up to the back, and I move on side to side,
I walk up to the back, and I move on side to side,
Then I stop, oh yeah and then I drop,
Then I stop, oh yeah and then I drop,
Oh yeah and then I drop, oh yeah and then I do a little thing ? ? ? ? ? ,
Oh yeah and then I drop, oh yeah and then I do a little thing ? ? ? ? ? ,
Do you feel alright? do you feel so good? do you feel so good?
Do you feel alright? do you feel so good? do you feel so good?
Do you feel alright? do you feel alright? tell me now, tell me now,
Do you feel alright? do you feel alright? tell me now, tell me now,
Do you feel alright? do you feel alright? everybody do you feel so good?
Do you feel alright? do you feel alright? everybody do you feel so good?
You know I feel alright, you know you make me want to shout shimmy,
You know I feel alright, you know you make me want to shout shimmy,
Oh yeah you gonna shout shimmy, oh yeah you gonna shout shimmy,
Oh yeah you gonna shout shimmy, oh yeah you gonna shout shimmy,
Oh yeah you gonna shout a little bit soft, shout a little bit quieter,
Oh yeah you gonna shout a little bit soft, shout a little bit quieter,
Shout a little bit soft, come on soft, shout a little bit soft,
Shout a little bit soft, come on soft, shout a little bit soft,
A little bit soft, cool down, cool down, come on, cool it down,
A little bit soft, cool down, cool down, come on, cool it down,
I feel so good, I feel alright, drum on, drum on, drum on drummer,
I feel so good, I feel alright, drum on, drum on, drum on drummer,
Everybody everybody everybody clap your hands, come on clap your hands,
Everybody everybody everybody clap your hands, come on clap your hands,
Clap your hands, a little bit harder, a little bit louder,
Clap your hands, a little bit harder, a little bit louder,
A little bit harder, a little bit louder, a little bit louder,
A little bit harder, a little bit louder, a little bit louder,
Come on and shout, everybody, come on and shout, come on and shout baby,
Come on and shout, everybody, come on and shout, come on and shout baby,
Come on and shout baby, do you feel alright? do I feel so good?
Come on and shout baby, do you feel alright? do I feel so good?
Do you feel alright? do I feel so good? call a doctor, call a doctor,
Do you feel alright? do I feel so good? call a doctor, call a doctor,
Do you feel alright? do you feel alright? do you feel alright?
Do you feel alright? do you feel alright? do you feel alright?
Do you feel alright? do you feel alright?
Do you feel alright? do you feel alright?
You know I feel so good Im gonna shout and shimmy all night,
You know I feel so good Im gonna shout and shimmy all night,

[...] Read more

song performed by Who
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Senseless

Go ahead, get captivated
Will you ever give your secrets away?
My mind says its gonna drive me senseless
But its only tunnel vision
Its only state of mind
Its alright
Its alright to make the move
Its alright
Get there, stay there
Babe its alright
Its alright to feel the mood
Its alright
So good, so fine
Babe its alright
There has to be
Some kind of harmony
To keep the maddening
Silence away
So hang on, well be moving on
cause its only your confusion
Thats keeping us behind
Its alright
Its alright to make the move
Its alright
Get there, stay there
Babe its alright
Its alright to feel the mood
Its alright
So good, so fine
Babe its alright
Its alright
Its alright to make the move
Its alright
Get there, stay there
Babe its alright
Its alright to feel the mood
Its alright
So good, so fine
Babe its alright
Got there, babe better stop there
Inhibitions slipping away
Stay there, got a lot that we can share
I found out the secret
Was only state of mind
Its alright
Its alright to make the move
Its alright
Get there, stay there
Babe its alright
Its alright to feel the mood

[...] Read more

song performed by Erasure
Added by Lucian Velea
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Its Alright

Mummy! mummy! mummy!
Uh-hmm?
Mummy!
Uh-hmm?
Mummy! you have to wake up!
Yes, yes, I know...
Ma, you have to wake up!
I know...
Sometimes its such a drag,
I dont feel like getting up in the morning.
Then something happens, it clicks in my head,
I feel like crying,
But I know its gonna be alright.
Its alright, its alright, its alright,
I know its gonna be alright.
Sometimes, Im so afraid, (Im so, Im so scared)
I dont feel like facing the world.
Then something happens, it clicks in my head,
I feel like crying,
I know its gonna be alright.
Its alright, its alright, its alright,
I know its gonna be alright.
I guess Im not the only one, (not the only one in misery)
There many of us around.
So when youre feeling down, (down)
Hold your heart and say, its gonna be alright.
Hold your heart and itll be alright.
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,
Yes, yes, yes, its gonna be, its gonna be alright,
Its gonna be alright, yes.
I guess Im not the only one, (not the only one in history)
There many of us in history.
So when youre feeling down, (down)
Hold your heart and say, its gonna be alright.
Its alright, its alright, its alright,
I know its gonna be alright.
Its alright, its alright, its alright,
I know its gonna be alright.
Its alright, its alright, its alright,
Were gonna make it, alright.
(its alright, its alright, its alright, alright)
(its alright, its alright, its alright, alright).

song performed by Yoko Ono
Added by Lucian Velea
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Its Alright

Mummy! mummy! mummy!
Uh-hmm?
Mummy!
Uh-hmm?
Mummy! you have to wake up!
Yes, yes, I know...
Ma, you have to wake up!
I know...
Sometimes its such a drag,
I dont feel like getting up in the morning.
Then something happens, it clicks in my head,
I feel like crying,
But I know its gonna be alright.
Its alright, its alright, its alright,
I know its gonna be alright.
Sometimes, Im so afraid, (Im so, Im so scared)
I dont feel like facing the world.
Then something happens, it clicks in my head,
I feel like crying,
I know its gonna be alright.
Its alright, its alright, its alright,
I know its gonna be alright.
I guess Im not the only one, (not the only one in misery)
There many of us around.
So when youre feeling down, (down)
Hold your heart and say, its gonna be alright.
Hold your heart and itll be alright.
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,
Yes, yes, yes, its gonna be, its gonna be alright,
Its gonna be alright, yes.
I guess Im not the only one, (not the only one in history)
There many of us in history.
So when youre feeling down, (down)
Hold your heart and say, its gonna be alright.
Its alright, its alright, its alright,
I know its gonna be alright.
Its alright, its alright, its alright,
I know its gonna be alright.
Its alright, its alright, its alright,
Were gonna make it, alright.
(its alright, its alright, its alright, alright)
(its alright, its alright, its alright, alright).

song performed by Yoko Ono
Added by Lucian Velea
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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
Added by Poetry Lover
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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 Victories Of Love. Book I

I
From Frederick Graham

Mother, I smile at your alarms!
I own, indeed, my Cousin's charms,
But, like all nursery maladies,
Love is not badly taken twice.
Have you forgotten Charlotte Hayes,
My playmate in the pleasant days
At Knatchley, and her sister, Anne,
The twins, so made on the same plan,
That one wore blue, the other white,
To mark them to their father's sight;
And how, at Knatchley harvesting,
You bade me kiss her in the ring,
Like Anne and all the others? You,
That never of my sickness knew,
Will laugh, yet had I the disease,
And gravely, if the signs are these:

As, ere the Spring has any power,
The almond branch all turns to flower,
Though not a leaf is out, so she
The bloom of life provoked in me;
And, hard till then and selfish, I
Was thenceforth nought but sanctity
And service: life was mere delight
In being wholly good and right,
As she was; just, without a slur;
Honouring myself no less than her;
Obeying, in the loneliest place,
Ev'n to the slightest gesture, grace
Assured that one so fair, so true,
He only served that was so too.
For me, hence weak towards the weak,
No more the unnested blackbird's shriek
Startled the light-leaved wood; on high
Wander'd the gadding butterfly,
Unscared by my flung cap; the bee,
Rifling the hollyhock in glee,
Was no more trapp'd with his own flower,
And for his honey slain. Her power,
From great things even to the grass
Through which the unfenced footways pass,
Was law, and that which keeps the law,
Cherubic gaiety and awe;
Day was her doing, and the lark
Had reason for his song; the dark
In anagram innumerous spelt
Her name with stars that throbb'd and felt;

[...] Read more

poem by Coventry Patmore
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I. The Ring and the Book

Do you see this Ring?
'T is Rome-work, made to match
(By Castellani's imitative craft)
Etrurian circlets found, some happy morn,
After a dropping April; found alive
Spark-like 'mid unearthed slope-side figtree-roots
That roof old tombs at Chiusi: soft, you see,
Yet crisp as jewel-cutting. There's one trick,
(Craftsmen instruct me) one approved device
And but one, fits such slivers of pure gold
As this was,—such mere oozings from the mine,
Virgin as oval tawny pendent tear
At beehive-edge when ripened combs o'erflow,—
To bear the file's tooth and the hammer's tap:
Since hammer needs must widen out the round,
And file emboss it fine with lily-flowers,
Ere the stuff grow a ring-thing right to wear.
That trick is, the artificer melts up wax
With honey, so to speak; he mingles gold
With gold's alloy, and, duly tempering both,
Effects a manageable mass, then works:
But his work ended, once the thing a ring,
Oh, there's repristination! Just a spirt
O' the proper fiery acid o'er its face,
And forth the alloy unfastened flies in fume;
While, self-sufficient now, the shape remains,
The rondure brave, the lilied loveliness,
Gold as it was, is, shall be evermore:
Prime nature with an added artistry—
No carat lost, and you have gained a ring.
What of it? 'T is a figure, a symbol, say;
A thing's sign: now for the thing signified.

Do you see this square old yellow Book, I toss
I' the air, and catch again, and twirl about
By the crumpled vellum covers,—pure crude fact
Secreted from man's life when hearts beat hard,
And brains, high-blooded, ticked two centuries since?
Examine it yourselves! I found this book,
Gave a lira for it, eightpence English just,
(Mark the predestination!) when a Hand,
Always above my shoulder, pushed me once,
One day still fierce 'mid many a day struck calm,
Across a Square in Florence, crammed with booths,
Buzzing and blaze, noontide and market-time,
Toward Baccio's marble,—ay, the basement-ledge
O' the pedestal where sits and menaces
John of the Black Bands with the upright spear,
'Twixt palace and church,—Riccardi where they lived,
His race, and San Lorenzo where they lie.

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poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
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The Troubadour. Canto 2

THE first, the very first; oh! none
Can feel again as they have done;
In love, in war, in pride, in all
The planets of life's coronal,
However beautiful or bright,--
What can be like their first sweet light?

When will the youth feel as he felt,
When first at beauty's feet he knelt?

As if her least smile could confer
A kingdom on its worshipper;
Or ever care, or ever fear
Had cross'd love's morning hemisphere.
And the young bard, the first time praise
Sheds its spring sunlight o'er his lays,
Though loftier laurel, higher name,
May crown the minstrel's noontide fame,
They will not bring the deep content
Of his lure's first encouragement.
And where the glory that will yield
The flush and glow of his first field
To the young chief? Will RAYMOND ever
Feel as he now is feeling?--Never.

The sun wept down or ere they gain'd
The glen where the chief band remain'd.

It was a lone and secret shade,
As nature form'd an ambuscade
For the bird's nest and the deer's lair,
Though now less quiet guests were there.
On one side like a fortress stood
A mingled pine and chesnut wood;
Autumn was falling, but the pine
Seem'd as it mock'd all change; no sign
Of season on its leaf was seen,
The same dark gloom of changeless green.
But like the gorgeous Persian bands
'Mid the stern race of northern lands,
The chesnut boughs were bright with all
That gilds and mocks the autumn's fall.

Like stragglers from an army's rear
Gradual they grew, near and less near,
Till ample space was left to raise,
Amid the trees, the watch-fire's blaze;
And there, wrapt in their cloaks around,
The soldiers scatter'd o'er the ground.

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poem by Letitia Elizabeth Landon
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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.

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poem by Wilfrid Scawen Blunt
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The Forest Sanctuary - Part II.

I.
Bring me the sounding of the torrent-water,
With yet a nearer swell-fresh breeze, awake!
And river, darkening ne'er with hues of slaughter
Thy wave's pure silvery green,-and shining lake,
Spread far before my cabin, with thy zone
Of ancient woods, ye chainless things and lone!
Send voices through the forest aisles, and make
Glad music round me, that my soul may dare,
Cheer'd by such tones, to look back on a dungeon's air!

II.
Oh, Indian hunter of the desert's race!
That with the spear at times, or bended bow,
Dost cross my footsteps in thy fiery chase
Of the swift elk or blue hill's flying roe;
Thou that beside the red night-fire thou heapest,
Beneath the cedars and the star-light sleepest,
Thou know'st not, wanderer-never may'st thou know!-
Of the dark holds wherewith man cumbers earth,
To shut from human eyes the dancing seasons' mirth.

III.
There, fetter'd down from day, to think the while
How bright in Heaven the festal sun is glowing,
Making earth's loneliest places, with his smile,
Flush like the rose; and how the streams are flowing
With sudden sparkles through the shadowy grass,
And water-flowers, all trembling as they pass;
And how the rich dark summer-trees are bowing
With their full foliage;-this to know, and pine
Bound unto midnight's heart, seems a stern lot-'twas mine.

IV.
Wherefore was this?-Because my soul had drawn
Light from the book whose words are grav'd in light!
There, at its well-head, had I found the dawn,
And day, and noon of freedom:-but too bright
It shines on that which man to man hath given,
And call'd the truth-the very truth, from Heaven!
And therefore seeks he, in his brother's sight,
To cast the mote; and therefore strives to bind
With his strong chains to earth, what is not earth's-the mind!

V.
It is a weary and a bitter task
Back from the lip the burning word to keep,
And to shut out Heaven's air with falsehood's mask,
And in the dark urn of the soul to heap
Indignant feelings-making even of thought

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poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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Drive

Whos gonna tell you when,
Its too late,
Whos gonna tell you things,
Arent so great.
You cant go on, thinkin,
Nothings wrong, but bye,
Whos gonna drive you home,
Tonight.?
Whos gonna pick you up,
When you fall?
Whos gonna hang it up,
When you call?
Whos gonna pay attention,
To your dreams?
And whos gonna plug their ears,
When you scream?
You cant go on, thinkin
Nothings wrong, but bye,
(whos gonna drive you)
(whos gonna drive you)
Whos gonna drive you home, tonight?
(whos gonna drive you home)
(bye baby)
(bye baby)
(bye baby)
(bye baby)
Whos gonna hold you down,
When you shake?
Whos gonna come around,
When you break?
You cant go on, thinkin,
Nothins wrong, but bye,
(whos gonna drive you)
(whos gonna drive you)
Whos gonna drive you home, tonight?
(whos gonna drive you home)
Oh, you know you cant go on, thinkin,
Nothins wrong,
(whos gonna drive you)
(whos gonna drive you home)
Whos gonna drive you home, tonight?
(bye baby)
(bye baby)
(bye baby)

song performed by Cars
Added by Lucian Velea
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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.

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poem by Byron from Don Juan (1824)
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The Zenana

WHAT is there that the world hath not
Gathered in yon enchanted spot?
Where, pale, and with a languid eye,
The fair Sultana listlessly
Leans on her silken couch, and dreams
Of mountain airs, and mountain streams.
Sweet though the music float around,
It wants the old familiar sound;

And fragrant though the flowers are breathing,
From far and near together wreathing,
They are not those she used to wear,
Upon the midnight of her hair.—

She's very young, and childhood's days
With all their old remembered ways,
The empire of her heart contest
With love, that is so new a guest;
When blushing with her Murad near,
Half timid bliss, half sweetest fear,
E'en the beloved past is dim,
Past, present, future, merge in him.
But he, the warrior and the chief,
His hours of happiness are brief;
And he must leave Nadira's side
To woo and win a ruder bride;

Sought, sword in hand and spur on heel,
The fame, that weds with blood and steel.
And while from Delhi far away,
His youthful bride pines through the day,
Weary and sad: thus when again
He seeks to bind love's loosen'd chain;
He finds the tears are scarcely dry
Upon a cheek whose bloom is faded,
The very flush of victory
Is, like the brow he watches, shaded.
A thousand thoughts are at her heart,
His image paramount o'er all,
Yet not all his, the tears that start,
As mournful memories recall
Scenes of another home, which yet
That fond young heart can not forget.
She thinks upon that place of pride,
Which frowned upon the mountain's side;

While round it spread the ancient plain,
Her steps will never cross again.
And near those mighty temples stand,
The miracles of mortal hand,

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poem by Letitia Elizabeth Landon
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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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