After I'm dead I'd rather have people ask why I have no monument than why I have one.
Related quotes
I started studying what the nature of a monument is and what a monument should be. And for the World War III memorial I designed a futile, almost terrifying passage that ends nowhere.
Naturally Superior
An ancient Cypress tree still stands
Beside a ruined monument.
Outlasts the works of human hands.
Nothing man made is permanent.
The tree is self sufficient.
It needs no other maintenance.
Apart from the nourishment.
The soil provides and rains enhance.
The builders of the monument.
Erected by them to impress
Are long since dead that's evident.
Outlasted by this grand Cypress.
The ancient tree's content to be.
Just what it is a simple tree.
Saturday,03 March 2012
poem by Ivor Or Ivor.e Hogg
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The Fever Monument
I walked across the park to the fever monument.
It was in the center of a glass square surrounded
by red flowers and fountains. The monument
was in the shape of a sea horse and the plaque read
We got hot and died.
poem by Richard Brautigan
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Dead End Street
Theres a crack up in the ceiling,
And the kitchen sink is leaking.
Out of work and got no money,
A sunday joint of bread and honey.
What are we living for?
Two-roomed apartment on the second floor.
No money coming in,
The rent collectors knocking, trying to get in.
We are strictly second class,
We dont understand,
(dead end!)
Why we should be on dead end street.
(dead end!)
People are living on dead end street.
(dead end!)
Gonna die on dead end street.
Dead end street (yeah)
Dead end street (yeah)
On a cold and frosty morning,
Wipe my eyes and stop me yawning.
And my feet are nearly frozen,
Boil the tea and put some toast on.
What are we living for?
Two-roomed apartment on the second floor.
No chance to emigrate,
Im deep in debt and now its much too late.
We both want to work so hard,
We cant get the chance,
(dead end!)
People live on dead end street.
(dead end!)
People are dying on dead end street.
(dead end!)
Gonna die on dead end street.
Dead end street (yeah)
Dead end street (yeah)
(dead end!)
People live on dead end street.
(dead end!)
People are dying on dead end street.
(dead end!)
Gonna die on dead end street.
Dead end street (yeah)
Dead end street (yeah)
Dead end street (yeah)
Head to my feet (yeah)
Dead end street (yeah)
Dead end street (yeah)
Dead end street (yeah)
Hows it feel? (yeah)
Hows it feel? (yeah)
Dead end street (yeah)
Dead end street (yeah)
song performed by by Kinks
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
An Epitaph On Her Self.
When I am Dead, few Friends attend my Hearse,
And for a Monument, I leave my VERSE.
poem by Anne Killigrew
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Your Head
That's the logical explanation
Destruction might assume charge or feed belief
Passing time again, fun out on the street
That's still juvenile preoccupation
Standing buttholes, the line goes down the block
Familiarity is more convincing
Funds available erect the monument
Dead is dead i guess
What's the cost of a head?
That fills your head but you're good for that
song performed by by Helmet
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
Tombs are the clothes of the dead and a grave is a plain suit; while an expensive monument is one with embroidery.
quote by R. Buckminster Fuller
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
Cynicism Is an Art
Come you little children- people
Children-people of the future
For soon you will be people-people
What sort of people-people will you be?
It doesn't really matter, really, because
Soon you won't be people-people
Soon you will be dead-people
Dead-people of so long ago
What sort of dead-people will you be?
poem by Bobby Crawford
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Herman Altman
Did I follow Truth wherever she led,
And stand against the whole world for a cause,
And uphold the weak against the strong?
If I did I would be remembered among men
As I was known in life among the people,
And as I was hated and loved on earth,
Therefore, build no monument to me,
And carve no bust for me,
Lest, though I become not a demi-god,
The reality of my soul be lost,
So that thieves and liars,
Who were my enemies and destroyed me,
And the children of thieves and liars,
May claim me and affirm before my bust
That they stood with me in the days of my defeat.
Build me no monument
Lest my memory be perverted to the uses
Of lying and oppression.
My lovers and their children must not be dispossessed of me;
I would be the untarnished possession forever
Of those for whom I lived.
poem by Edgar Lee Masters
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Sonnet: After Death
A dead person never requires praise,
Nor does rebuking help to change his ways;
What if he wins or loses any case?
His earthly tenure, none can ev’r efface.
The soul that’s dead needs no awards/rewards,
Or posthumous citations, or birthdays;
What does it matter if they be kings/ bards?
No monument, his achievements repays.
And statues, paintings too will not suffice,
To glorify his works or laud great souls;
Just prayers for the dead souls will be wise,
And pleas to God to save souls from hell’s coals.
Death is a full-stop to our life’s sentence!
Where use we must, our sense and common sense.
9-12-2002
poem by John Celes
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Natural Beauty
On the roller coaster ride
That my emotions have to take me on
I heard a newborn baby cry
Through the night.
I heard a perfect echo die
Into an anonymous wall of digital sound
Somewhere deep inside
Of my soul.
A natural beauty should be preserved like a monument to nature
Dont judge yourself too harsh, my love
Or someday you might find your soul endangered
A natural beauty should be preserved like a monument to nature.
Amazon
You had so much and now so much is gone
What are you gonna do
With your life?
What a lucky man.
To see the earth before it touched his hand
What an angry fool
To condemn.
One more night to go
One more sleep upon your burning banks
A greedy man never knows
What hes done.
A natural beauty should be preserved like a monument to nature
Dont start yourself too short, my love
Or someday you might find your soul endangered
A natural beauty should be preserved like a monument to nature.
Went to the rodeo today
I saw the cowgirls lined up on the fence
A brand new chevrolet
A brand new pair of seamless pants.
We watched the moment of defeat
Played back over on the video screen
Somewhere deep inside
Of my soul.
A natural beauty should be preserved like a monument to nature.
song performed by by Neil Young
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
Ballade Of Cleopatra's Needle
Ye giant shades of RA and TUM,
Ye ghosts of gods Egyptian,
If murmurs of our planet come
To exiles in the precincts wan
Where, fetish or Olympian,
To help or harm no more ye list,
Look down, if look ye may, and scan
This monument in London mist!
Behold, the hieroglyphs are dumb
That once were read of him that ran
When seistron, cymbal, trump, and drum
Wild music of the Bull began;
When through the chanting priestly clan
Walk'd Ramses, and the high sun kiss'd
This stone, with blessing scored and ban -
This monument in London mist.
The stone endures though gods be numb;
Though human effort, plot, and plan
Be sifted, drifted, like the sum
Of sands in wastes Arabian.
What king may deem him more than man,
What priest says Faith can Time resist
While THIS endures to mark their span -
This monument in London mist?
ENVOY.
Prince, the stone's shade on your divan
Falls; it is longer than ye wist:
It preaches, as Time's gnomon can,
This monument in London mist!
poem by Andrew Lang
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
All Dead, All Dead
Memories, my memories
How long can you stay
To haunt my days
She came without a farthing
A babe without a name
So much ado about nothing
Is what shed try to say
So much ado my lover
So many games we played
Through every fleeted summer
Through every precious day
All dead all dead
All the dreams we had
And I wonder why I still live on
All dead all dead
And alone Im spared
My sweeter half instead
All dead
And gone
All dead...
All dead all dead
At the rainbows end
And still I hear her own sweet song
All dead all dead
Take me back again
You know my little friends
All dead
And gone
All dead and gone
Her ways are always with me
I wander all the while
But please you must forgive me
I am old but still a child
All dead all dead
But I should not grieve
In time it comes to everyone
All dead all dead
But in hope I breathe
Of course I dont believe
Youre dead
And gone
All dead
And gone
song performed by by Queen
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
To My Bones
In my sleep it rips through
my meagre skin
throws off the red bandage of the flesh
and goes strolling through the room
my monument a little incomplete
one can be prodigal
with tears and blood
what will endure here the longest
must be thoughtfully provided for
better (than with a priest's dry finger
to the rains which drip from a cloud of sand)
to give one's monument to the academey
they will prop it up in a glass display case
and in Latin they will pray before
the little altar made from an os frontalis
they will reckon the bones and surfaces
they will not forget not overlook
happily I will give my color of eyes
pattern of nails and curve of eyelids
I the perfectly objective
made from white crystals of anatomy
can for thoughts
heart cage
bony pile
and two shins
you my little monument not quite complete
poem by Zbigniew Herbert
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
And the wind shall say: "Here were decent godless people. Their only monument the asphalt road. And a thousand lost golf balls".
quote by T.S. Eliot
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy! | In Romanian
To Either
Back further than
I know, in San
Francisco dwelt a wealthy man.
So rich was he
That none could be
Wise, good and great in like degree.
'Tis true he wrought,
In deed or thought,
But few of all the things he ought;
But men said: 'Who
Would wish him to?
Great souls are born to be, not do!'
One thing, indeed,
He did, we read,
Which was becoming, all agreed:
Grown provident,
Ere life was spent
He built a mighty monument.
For longer than
I know, in San
Francisco lived a beggar man;
And when in bed
They found him dead
'Just like the scamp!' the people said.
He died, they say,
On the same day
His wealthy neighbor passed away.
What matters it
When beggars quit
Their beats? I answer: Not a bit.
They got a spade
And pick and made
A hole, and there the chap was laid.
'He asked for bread,'
'Twas neatly said:
'He'll get not even a stone instead.'
The years rolled round:
His humble mound
Sank to the level of the ground;
And men forgot
That the bare spot
Was like (and was) the beggar's lot.
Forgotten, too,
Was t'other, who
Had reared the monument to woo
Inconstant Fame,
Though still his name
Shouted in granite just the same.
That name, I swear,
They both did bear
The beggar and the millionaire.
That lofty tomb,
Then, honored-whom?
For argument here's ample room.
I'll not debate,
But only state
The scamp first claimed it at the Gate.
St. Peter, proud
To serve him, bowed
And showed him to the softest cloud.
poem by Ambrose Bierce
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
On a hillock outside the city
On a hillock outside the city
a monument build from marble and stone
guards forevermore,
catching the sun’s
rays one new day dutifully.
It tells true stories
of a nation’s struggle to survive and be free
from oppression and a great trek
across the veldt and over high mountains,
of vicious wild men
and the belief
in the creator God
who came to aid
to save from total annihilation
when they called on Him.
[Reference: Voortrekker monument just outside Pretoria.]
poem by Gert Strydom
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Op ‘n koppie buite die stad
On a hillock outside the city
a monument build from marble and stone
guards forevermore,
catching the sun’s
rays one new day dutifully.
It tells true stories
of a nation’s struggle to survive and be free
from oppression and a great trek
across the veldt and over high mountains,
of vicious wild men
and the belief
in the creator God
who came to aid
to save from total annihilation
when they called on Him.
[Reference: Voortrekker monument just outside Pretoria.]
poem by Gert Strydom
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Monuments
In our lands are monuments
for the dear and departed.
Some are for some daring deeds;
others are put in someone’s favourite place,
hoping someone else will enjoy
all the beauty that they gazed upon.
Some monuments serve as a warning,
erected about some evil deed
to remember all that perished.
So the next time you pass a monument
read the inscription there,
learn a little of its presentation.
Become a little wiser to its stature
and the one it is dedicated to,
for you never know in the future
someone may erect a monument to honour you.
24 September 2008
poem by David Harris
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Well, I think everybody's a little jealous of the Vietnam Wall, even people from wars that already have good monuments. You have a monument like the Wall and nobody ever forgets your war, you can bet on that.
quote by Bruce Jackson
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!