Nothing is so commonplace has the wish to be remarkable.
quote by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The characteristic of the hour is that the commonplace mind, knowing itself to be commonplace, has the assurance to proclaim the rights of the commonplace and to impose them wherever it will.
quote by Jose Ortega y Gasset
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Electric Nation
Electricity is remarkable, enlightening,
I ask of you what is commonplace and rude,
And I state the obvious, the blatant saying
Of an industrial nation:
Electricity is a miracle of our generation -
You deserve it as much as God.
poem by Naveed Akram
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Remarkable Women
We women are remarkable
and we all know that's true.
We look for the bright side
in most that we do.
We birth our babies
and stand the pain.
We heal their wounds
and still remain
able to focus on our man
and do for him all we can.
We women are remarkable
and that's why we're here.
We can cry uncontrollably
and still dry our tears.
We all stand together
shoulder to shoulder
and keep all our friends
as we grow older
and are able to focus on one another
as if they were our sister or brother.
We women are remarkable
and can always be counted on
to lend a helping hand
'til your troubles are gone.
So don't ever change ladies.
Remember why you're here.
You become more remarkable
with every passing year.
poem by Edwina Reizer
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As a rule, said Holmes, the more bizarre a thing is the less mysterious it proves to be. It is your commonplace, featureless crimes which are really puzzling, just as a commonplace face is the most difficult to identify.
quote by Arthur Conan Doyle
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A Remarkable World
A remarkable world of new friends
A remarkable world of sorrow
A remarkable world of yesterday
A remarkable world of tomorrow
What a nuisance
And yet what a place
These days are dreadful
Because they provide a race
A race of time, a race of one desire
Everyone has a need
Even if they are leaving
They've made a choice to succeed
Still the race continues on
We never want it to end
It seems like no one is going to win this
Until the very last bend
Through the years we've been higher and higher
Towering above what the world knows
Still we keep on moving
Until someone slows
But everyone is thinking,
That isn't going to be me
Someone else will do it
But no one ever takes the lead
So this race continues
Because we all refuse
To quit the race
Where no one wins
Until the very last bend
Which is out of sight
The strike of the miners in Arizona was one of the most remarkable strikes in the history of the American labor movement. Its peaceful character, its successful outcome, were due to that most remarkable character, Governor Hunt.
quote by Mary Harris Jones
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Seeking Class Not Pizzazz
The only thing people can declare
Rightfully theirs
Without a doubt
Is their debt
And nothing else they possess
Can be claimed to have achieved
Such greatness as they have been taught
To perceive
Such endeavors as these
Without a hint of guilt expressed
And that is a remarkable sign of...
Of...
Of...
'Longevity? '
No!
'Self centered idealism? '
No!
Although I 'feel' your sentiments!
But no!
'Gluttony, Greed, deceit, dishonesty? '
No.
That has already been determinded,
By those staring at the mummified remains
Of Egyptians during the last museum tours.
'I think I've got it!
Listen to this...
'Without a hint of guilt expressed
And that is a remarkable sign of...'
A lack of lust for life! '
I can see why you are not a writer.
That sits no where near being profound!
Oh,
Here we go...
'Without a hint of guilt expressed
And that is a remarkable sign of...
Sadness! '
'Of what?
SADNESS?
That has no pizzazz! '
I'm seeking class not pizzazz.
And there 'is' a difference!
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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The New Fiction
Little Blue-Fits has lost his wits,
And doesn't know where to find them;
Leave them alone and they'll come home,
And leave their tales behind them.
The remarkable tales, with remarkable sales,
And Bonnets and Bees in disorder;
For the Bonnets we view are exceedingly Blue,
And decidedly over the Border.
poem by G.K. Chesterton
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Remerkable Process Of Success
Remarkable process of success
Destiny awaits the victor
Lucks and fates are all traitors
Effort is the real life shaper
Hard work and determination makes a score
Success is what a strong will bore
And the Remarkable process of success is a secret no more
xainub nasir
poem by Xainub Nasir
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The New Fiction
('Leave them alone', we seem to hear Mr. Galsworthy say of his Young People.
--From a Review by Mr. Bettany)
Little Blue-Fits has lost his wits,
And doesn't know where to find them;
Leave them alone and they'll come home,
And leave their tales behind them.
The remarkable tales, with remarkable sales,
And Bonnets and Bees in disorder;
For the Bonnets we view are exceedingly Blue,
And decidedly over the Border.
poem by Gilbert Keith Chesterton
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Remarkable
Have you ever had a taste of cake,
So remarkable...
As to not leave a crumb on the plate?
And have you ever eaten chips,
Believing quitting would be...
Just unstoppable to do it?
Have you ever kissed lips...
To find them irresistible,
To leave unkissed?
And then you wish just a little bit,
To get down...
To that 'business'!
Have you ever had a taste of cake,
So remarkable?
And have you ever eaten chips,
Believing quitting would be...
Just unstoppable?
And then with a licking of lips,
You get down...
To that business.
With no rushing of it!
That business.
Thinking it a gift.
That business!
And then with a licking of lips,
You get down...
To that business.
Unstoppable.
That business!
Remarkable.
That business!
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Stanzas In Meditation: Stanza II
I think very well of Susan but I do not know her name
I think very well of Ellen but which is not the same
I think very well of Paul I tell him not to do so
I think very well of Francis Charles but do I do so
I think very well of Thomas but I do not not do so
I think very well of not very well of William
I think very well of any very well of him
I think very well of him.
It is remarkable how quickly they learn
But if they learn and it is very remarkable how quickly they learn
It makes not only but by and by
And they may not only be not here
But not there
Which after all makes no difference
After all this does not make any does not make any difference
I add added it to it.
I could rather be rather be here.
poem by Gertrude Stein
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A Commonplace Song
Ebbs and flows the restless river
In the city street
Where the great nerve centres quiver,
Where the pulses beat.
Where the human waves are driving
Drifts a woman’s face,
White and worn by ceaseless striving
With the commonplace.
Want has written strange inscriptions
On the brow and cheek;
Pain could weave some weird descriptions
If the lips would speak;
Toil has touched the lines of beauty
And, the curves of grace.
Comeliness is good, but duty
Rules the commonplace.
Thick-soled shoes and shabby bonnet,
Dingy cotton gloves,
Old turned dress with darns upon it
(Not what woman loves),
Gaunt umbrella, green with weather—
One must self efface
To keep home and bairns together
In the commonplace.
Late and early, never shirking
Tub and scrub and broom,
Late at night with needle working
In the dwelling-room;
Yet when week’s receipts are thinner
Grocers’ bills to face—
Tenpence means three children’s dinner
In the commonplace!
Poets sing their wild Iambics—
Love and War and Gods—
Let us sing of humble women
Fighting fearful odds,
Not where steel and bullets rattle
And the squadrons race,
But the grim unending battle
With the commonplace.
Now they shriek the creeds are dying!
Faith is of the air!
Wailfully their lyres are sighing
Sonnets of despair!
All the scheme of things evolving
Somehow out of Space!
Darken then, instead of solving,
This grim commonplace!
Rogues may win success and glory,
Beauty pride of fame,
Statesmen make a nation’s story,
Poets deathless name.
But the patient woman Toiler
What is hers to win?
On the one hand—Want, the Spoiler,
On the other—Sin!
Ye who swear and strut and bluster,
So-called manly pride,
When you answer at the muster
On the other side,
Will the courage you have vaunted
Stand you in such grace
As weak hands that fought undaunted
With the commonplace?
Noblest worth works ever humbly,
Oftest is unseen,
Half the world is toiling dumbly
In the gray routine.
Sing, O Poet of the Morrow!
Cheer the weary face
Where brave women moil and sorrow
In the commonplace!
poem by George Essex Evans
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The Computer Said That I'd Find You Bewitching
9/7/12
We haven't led remarkable lives.
We once went off to college.
Since then, we have worked
Amid earth-colored cubicles,
Bald-pated guys, adding numbers
Which never assumed much
Importance. We marked
Anniversaries, married, and
Even made children, and
Split up, and, now, in our
Loneliness, meet in a bar
In a hotel downtown to do
What? Make a future of pasts
Which are pitiful? You've
Proven boring, as, surely,
Am I. If only I'd gone
Behind lines in Cambodia,
If you'd embezzled some
Plutocrat's dough, and you
Told me your name is a
Pseudonym because you're
Being pursued by someone.
You're not, and the evening
Grows dreary. The pad Thai
Is bad. I'm beginning to
Wish for a movie and bed,
By myself. It's remarkable
How even loneliness seems
To be better than coerced
Companionship. (This, then,
Would be when I go.)
poem by Lawrence Beck
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Space is going to be commonplace.
quote by Christa McAuliffe
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Let us dig our furrow in the fields of the commonplace.
quote by Jean Henri Fabre
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Men are seldom more commonplace than on supreme occasions.
quote by Samuel Butler
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Nature is commonplace. Imitation is more interesting.
quote by Gertrude Stein
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Big Books
Big Books are commonplace
In the big bookcase
Written by big persons
Now on my television
poem by Tom Thompson
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Miracle Fair
Commonplace miracle:
that so many commonplace miracles happen.
An ordinary miracle:
in the dead of night
the barking of invisible dogs.
One miracle out of many:
a small, airy cloud
yet it can block a large and heavy moon.
Several miracles in one:
an alder tree reflected in the water,
and that it's backwards left to right
and that it grows there, crown down
and never reaches the bottom,
even though the water is shallow.
An everyday miracle:
winds weak to moderate
turning gusty in storms.
First among equal miracles:
cows are cows.
Second to none:
just this orchard
from just that seed.
A miracle without a cape and top hat:
scattering white doves.
A miracle, for what else could you call it:
today the sun rose at three-fourteen
and will set at eight-o-one.
A miracle, less surprising than it should be:
even though the hand has fewer than six fingers,
it still has more than four.
A miracle, just take a look around:
the world is everywhere.
An additional miracle, as everything is additional:
the unthinkable
is thinkable.
poem by Wislawa Szymborska
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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