Forgiveness
Now bury with the dead years conflicts dead
And with fresh days let all begin anew.
Why longer amid shrivelled leaf-drifts tread,
When buds are swelling, flower-sheaths peeping through?
Seen through the vista of the vanished years,
How trivial seem the struggle and the crown,
How vain past feuds, when reconciling tears
Course down the channel worn by vanished frown.
How few mean half the bitterness they speak!
Words more than feelings keep us still apart,
And, in the heat of passion or of pique,
The tongue is far more cruel than the heart.
Since love alone makes it worth while to live,
Let all be now forgiven, and forgive.
poem by Alfred Austin

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Related quotes
Dead!
Hush! or you'll wake her. Softly tread!
She slumbers in her little bed.
What do I see? A coffin! Dead?
Yes, dead at break of morning.
No, no, it cannot, cannot be!
I know that I can wake her. See!
She only plays at sleep. Ma mie,
Kiss me, for it is morning.
Look, pretty, look! Within, without,
Snowdrops and hyacinths lie about.
Why don't you clutch them with a shout
Blither than birds of morning?
You used to clap your hands with glee,
When I brought flowers. ``Are these for me?''
Now, now, you neither scent nor see
These incense-buds of morning.
Do you not know me, pet? Speak! speak!
There is no answer in her cheek.
To find her now where shall I seek?-
Seek in the vanished morning!
What can I do to make her heed?
I am crying, love; I am indeed.
Open your eyes and see. What need
To tease me all the morning?
Look! We will sally forth and play;
Ramble, and never ask our way,
Lessons and tasks all put away,
As though it were not morning.
We will do all that you desire,
And I will never, never tire
Of romping with you by the fire,
When 'tis no longer morning.
Your favourite tales, oft told before,
I'll tell you, darling, o'er and o'er;
It never shall be bedtime more,
Will you but wake this morning.
I will not ask you to sit still;
You shall be naughty when you will;
Shall spill my ink and spoil my quill,
And squander all my morning.
Alas! Alas! it is no cheat!
Quiet she lies from face to feet!
No smile, no sigh, no hue, no heat,
No earnest of the morning.
Draw high the sheet above her head.
She liked it, so. Dead? No, not dead.
The angels, hovering round her bed,
Will greet her in the morning.
poem by Alfred Austin

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Hope Dieth: Hope Liveth
Strong are thine arms, O love, & strong
Thine heart to live, and love, and long;
But thou art wed to grief and wrong:
Live, then, and long, though hope be dead!
Live on, & labour thro’ the years!
Make pictures through the mist of tears,
Of unforgotten happy fears,
That crossed the time ere hope was dead.
Draw near the place where once we stood
Amid delight’s swift-rushing flood,
And we and all the world seemed good
Nor needed hope now cold and dead.
Dream in the dawn I come to thee
Weeping for things that may not be!
Dream that thou layest lips on me!
Wake, wake to clasp hope’s body dead!
Count o’er and o’er, and one by one
The minutes of the happy sun
That while agone on kissed lips shone,
Count on, rest not, for hope is dead.
Weep, though no hair’s breadth thou shalt move
The living Earth, the heaven above
By all the bitterness of love!
Weep and cease not, now hope is dead!
Sighs rest thee not, tears bring no ease,
Life hath no joy, and Death no peace:
The years change not, though they decrease,
For hope is dead, for hope is dead.
Speak, love, I listen: far away
I bless the tremulous lips, that say,
“Mock not the afternoon of day,
Mock not the tide when hope is dead!”
I bless thee, O my love, who say’st:
“Mock not the thistle-cumbered waste;
I hold Love’s hand, and make no haste
Down the long way, now hope is dead.
With other names do we name pain,
The long years wear our hearts in vain.
Mock not our loss grown into gain,
Mock not our lost hope lying dead.
Our eyes gaze for no morning-star,
No glimmer of the dawn afar;
Full silent wayfarers we are
Since ere the noon-tide hope lay dead.
Behold with lack of happiness
The master, Love, our hearts did bless
Lest we should think of him the less:
Love dieth not, though hope is dead!”
poem by William Morris

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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

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Dead In Sight Of Fame
DIED--Early morning of September 5, 1876, and
in the gleaming dawn of 'name and fame,'
Hamilton J. Dunbar.
Dead! Dead! Dead!
We thought him ours alone;
And were so proud to see him tread
The rounds of fame, and lift his head
Where sunlight ever shone;
But now our aching eyes are dim,
And look through tears in vain for him.
Name! Name! Name!
It was his diadem;
Nor ever tarnish-taint of shame
Could dim its luster--like a flame
Reflected in a gem,
He wears it blazing on his brow
Within the courts of Heaven now.
Tears! Tears! Tears!
Like dews upon the leaf
That bursts at last--from out the years
The blossom of a trust appears
That blooms above the grief;
And mother, brother, wife and child
Will see it and be reconciled.
poem by James Whitcomb Riley

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Limbo Leaf
Mr.Leaf, Lays still on the
Misty Soil has
A story to narrate
A song to sing
A poem to recite
Of the plants, of the trees
Of the herbs and
Of the shrubs...
Mr.Leaf began...
Past went apart; Leaving me alone
Present presented tears; For me to wipe out
Future away from nature; To turn me to a corpse
Tear droplets sat on leaf
Which appeared alike dewdrops
The half dead leaf sheds tears
Yes! A pinch of life
Stays awake
In this pale & yellow leaf
Striving to say more
Mr.Leaf realised: -
Time to leave the plant
Time to accompany the land
Time to dissolve in the soil
It flew away
With the rythm of the wind
Dancing & dazzling
To the blacky-rocky land
There it lies cold & still
Waiting to be vanished
Down the soil pores.
poem by Mariya M. Jos

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On the March
So the time seems come at last,
And the drums go rolling past,
And above them in the sunlight Labour's banners float and flow;
They are marching with the sun,
But I look in vain for one
Of the men who fought for freedom more than fifteen years ago.
They were men who did the work
Out at Blackall, Hay, and Bourke –
They were men who fought the battle that the world shall never know;
And they vanished one by one
When their bitter task was done –
Men who worked and wrote for freedom more than fifteen years ago.
Some are scattered, some are dead,
By the shanty and the shed,
In the lignum and the mulga, by the river running low;
And I often wish in vain
I could call them back again –
Mates of mine who fought for freedom more than fifteen years ago.
From the country of their birth
Some have sailed and proved their worth;
Some have died on distant deserts, some have perished in the snow.
Some are gloomy, bitter men,
And I meet them now and then –
Men who'd give their lives for Labour more than fifteen years ago.
Oh, the drums come back to me,
And they beat for victory,
But my heart is scarcely quickened, and I never feel the glow;
For I've learnt the world since then,
And the hopelessness of men,
And the fire it burnt too fiercely more than fifteen years ago.
Lucky you who still are young,
When the rebel war-hymn's sung,
And the sons of slaves are marching with their faces all aglow,
When the revolution comes
And the blood is on the drums –
Oh! I wish the storm had found me more than fifteen years ago!
Bear the olden banner still!
Let the nations fight who will!
'Tis the flag of generations – the flag that all the peoples know;
And they'll bear it, brave and red,
Over ancient rebel dead,
In the future to the finish as a thousand years ago!
poem by Henry Lawson

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Elegy On The Death Of A Church Mouse
‘Colonel Gaddafi is dead; long live Gaddafi’,
- whose words those are?
don’t shoot, don’t shoot,
enough blood is spilled!
Gaddafi,
a leaf from the tree is dead;
leaf sprouts, leaf eats, leaf sleeps in the sky,
leaf waves the world in the cheer of palm,
makes no sand out of storm,
no beating themselves by the horse drain,
no hanging noose by the cock’s strain.
Leaf feeds the tree with green
when upon it’s tender face, the horrid-sun shine,
leaf, bearer of flower, bearer of seed,
never the taster of the sap from earth
till drops dead in the paleness of red,
‘don't shoot, don't shoot,
upon the sand is blood,
for the Colonel is dead’,
said, the tree,
and said, ‘Long live Gaddafi!
poem by Saranyan Bee

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Song V
THE sunshine of your presence lies
On the glad garden of my heart
And bids the leaves of silence part
To show the flowers to your dear eyes,
And flower on flower blooms there and dies
And still new buds awakened spring,
For sunshine makes the garden wise,
To know the time for blossoming.
Night is no time for blossoming,
Your garden then dreams otherwise,
Of vanished Summer, vanished Spring,
And how the dearest flower first dies.
Yet from your ministering eyes
Though night hath drawn me far apart
On the still garden of my heart
The moonlight of your memory lies.
poem by Edith Nesbit

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To Primroses Filled With Morning Dew
Why do ye weep, sweet babes? can tears
Speak grief in you,
Who were but born
just as the modest morn
Teem'd her refreshing dew?
Alas, you have not known that shower
That mars a flower,
Nor felt th' unkind
Breath of a blasting wind,
Nor are ye worn with years;
Or warp'd as we,
Who think it strange to see,
Such pretty flowers, like to orphans young,
To speak by tears, before ye have a tongue.
Speak, whimp'ring younglings, and make known
The reason why
Ye droop and weep;
Is it for want of sleep,
Or childish lullaby?
Or that ye have not seen as yet
The violet?
Or brought a kiss
From that Sweet-heart, to this?
--No, no, this sorrow shown
By your tears shed,
Would have this lecture read,
That things of greatest, so of meanest worth,
Conceived with grief are, and with tears brought forth.
poem by Robert Herrick

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Heritage
Now the dead past seems vividly alive,
And in this shining moment I can trace,
Down through the vista of the vanished years,
Your faun-like form, your fond elusive face.
And suddenly some secret spring's released,
And unawares a riddle is revealed,
And I can read like large, black-lettered print,
What seemed before a thing forever sealed.
I know the magic word, the graceful thought,
The song that fills me in my lucid hours,
The spirit's wine that thrills my body through,
And makes me music-drunk, are yours, all yours.
I cannot praise, for you have passed from praise,
I have no tinted thoughts to paint you true;
But I can feel and I can write the word;
The best of me is but the least of you.
poem by Claude McKay

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Ghosts of Dreams
We are all of us dreamers of dreams,
On visions our childhood is fed;
And the heart of a child is unhaunted, it seems,
By ghosts of dreams that are dead.
From childhood to youth's but a span,
And the years of our life are soon sped;
But the youth is no longer a youth, but a man,
When the first of his dreams is dead.
'Tis a cup of wormwood and gall,
When the doom of a great man is said;
And the best of a man is under a pall
When the best of his dreams is dead.
He may live on by compact and plan
When the fine bloom of living is shed,
But God pity the little that's left of a man
When most of his dreams are dead.
Let him show a brave face if he can;
Let him woo fame and fortune instead;
Yet there's not much to do, but to bury a man
When the last of his dreams is dead.
poem by William Herbert Carruth

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For No One
Your day breaks,
Your mind aches,
You find that all her words of kindness linger on
When she no longer needs you
She wakes up,
She makes up,
She takes her time and doesn't feel she has to hurry
She no longer needs you
And in her eyes you see nothing,
No sign of love behind the tears cried for no one,
A love that should have lasted years
You want her,
You need her,
And yet you don't believe her when she says her love is dead
You think she needs you
And in her eyes you see nothing
No sign of love behind the tears cried for no one,
A love that should have lasted years
You stay home,
She goes out,
She says that long ago she knew someone, but no ne's gone
She doesn't need him
Your day breaks,
Your mind aches,
There will be times when all the things you said will fill your head
You won't forget her
And in her eyes you see nothing
No sign of love behind the tears cried for no one,
A love that should have lasted years
song performed by by Paul McCartney

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Through The Years
Written: kylie minogue/ dave ball/ ingo vauk
This fever I have is because of you
My body is blazing
The flames alight and lick at my ear
So that I can only hear
Muddled words of you
Through the years
Too many a trusted word was said
My body was porous
I savoured every drop of you
Took me it all as true
Now I wonder my way
Through the years
Through the years
Ooh you blinded me with all your light
I wish I could see now
Promises and lies ignite the fire
And I wonder why
I believed in you
Through the years
Through the years
Through the years of joy and laughter
Of tears and sadness
Of hopes and heart
Through the years of love and loving
Of hurt and healing
Falling apart
I believed in you
And I wonder wonder why
Im no longer fooled by your disguise
Im sorry that you are
I pity all the pretensions of you
And now I start anew
I wish my way
Through the years
song performed by by Kylie Minogue

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Silence
silence is when you simply
read the lines of the person you miss
and stop right there
you remember the past
with no regret you say
she was your first love
the first penetrating love that you cannot ever forget
like an arrow from a bow with a string stretched that far
shooting deep into the chambers of your heart
that you can hardly breathe
you almost die because of too much bliss
you stay there
like a vacant chair outside unkind for the night
thinking some more
what if you did not say the words which hurt her
you could have been together still
happy with each other
you could have given her children
there would have been laughter and chasing and playing
in the room of your house
you stare at the window which is open
to a place far away
there is no regret
you keep on saying that
there are no possibilities anymore for the chains of love to reconnect
there is no more bond
to a past left to rot in the gutters
to your wise judgment
she is dead
and she must be dead forever
you are honest enough to admit that at one time you love her
and you gave her that love without expecting something in return
it is sad
she never loved you
she felt nothing
even with the feeling of the smallest grain of sand
facts and facts of a broken heart healing itself with years and years
of bitterness
it is alright now that you have survived in that faraway land
with some autumns and winters
and summers and springs
do you feel better now? no regrets, bury her and say some prayers too
like you were one of the merry men without sighs because their
wives left them
and they felt it was for their own
good and that at the end
all will be
back at their right places
poem by Ric S. Bastasa

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A Prayer For The King's Majesty
22nd January, 1901.
THE Queen is dead. God save the King,
In this his hour of grief,
When sorrow gathers memories in a sheaf
To lay them on his shoulders as he stands
Inheriting her glories and her lands--
First gain of his at which his Mother's voice
Has not been first to bless and to rejoice--
A man, set lonely between gain and loss.
(O words of love the heart remembereth,
O mighty loss outweighing every gain!)
A Son whose kingdom Death's arm lies across,
A King whose Mother lies alone with Death
Wrapped in the folds of white implacable sleep.
O God, who seest the tears Thy children weep,
O God, who countest each sad heart-beat, see
How our King needs the grace we ask of Thee!
Thou knowest how little and how vain a thing
Is Empire, when the heart is sick with pain--
God, save the King!
The Queen is dead. The splendour of her days,
The sorrow of them both alike merge now
In the new aureole that lights her brow.
The clamour of her people's voice in praise
Must hush itself to the still voice that prays
In the holy chamber of Death. Tread softly here,
A mighty Queen lies dead.
Her people's heart wears black,
The black bells toll unceasing in their ear,
And on the gold sun's track
The great world round
Like a black ring the voice of mourning goes,
Till even our ancient foes
With eyes downbent, and brotherly bared head,
Keep mourning watch with us. This is the hour
When Love lends all his power
To speed grief's arrows from the bow of Death,
When sighs are idle breath,
When tears are fountains vain.
She will not wake again,
Not now, not here.
O great and good and infinitely dear,
O Mother of your people, sleep is sweet,
No more Life's thorny ways will wound your feet.
O Mother dear, sleep sound!
When you shall wake,
Your brows freed from the crown that made them ache
So many a time, and wear the heavenly crown,
Then, then you will look down
On us who love you, and, remembering,
The love of earth will breathe with us our prayer,
Our prayer prayed here, joined to your prayer prayed there:
Who knows what radiant answer it may bring?
'God save the King!'
The Queen is dead. God save the King!
From all ill thought and deed,
From heartless service and from selfish sway,
From treason, and the vain imagining
Of evil counsellors, and the noisome breed
Of flatterers who eat the soul away,
God save the King!
From loss and pain and tears
Such as her many years
Brought her; from battle and strife,
And the inmost hurt of life,
The wounds that no crown can heal,
No ermine robes conceal,
God save the King!
God, by our memories of his Mother's face,
By the love that makes our heart her dwelling-place,
Grant to our sorrow this desired grace:
God save the King!
* * * * * * * * *
The Queen is dead. God save the King.
This is no hour when joy has leave to sing;
Only, amid our tears, we are bold to pray,
More boldly, in that we pray sorrowing,
In this most sorrowful day.
God, who wast of a mortal Mother born,
Who driest the tears with which Thy children mourn,
God, save the King!
Look down on him whose crown is wet with tears
In which its splendour fades and disappears--
His tears, our tears, tears out of all her lands.
The Queen is dead.
God! strengthen the King's hands!
God, save the King!
poem by Edith Nesbit

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These Words Too Say What Love Was
ATHESE WORDS TOO SAY WHAT LOVE WAS
These words too say what Love was-
Though I am long from that love and those feelings-
Once there were songs in the night and great passion
And we were a kind of happiness that only the very blessed know-
I had dreamed of such love for so long
And you in your beauty were all Beauty could ever be-
We loved for a long time
And in that love I learned forever that Love is real-
But somehow in a way I will never understand
For you that love died-
And I was left loving without being loved
And had to go a long time in the pain of longing for you again-
But that was long long ago
And now where our love is no one can ever know
For it is only in memories that cannot truly capture what it really was-
Love it is true is the most beautiful thing we know
And I knew this with you
And will be grateful for it forever-
Though the nights the many years of nights in the long time that has passed say
There are other feelings by which we live and kinder quieter loves also -
O passion of my life oh destiny long gone oh Love I will never know again,
Do you blame yourself at all as I long ago have forgiven you
For abandoning the Beauty of our Life for long sad years of concentrated mindfilled gladnesses?
poem by Shalom Freedman

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The Dead End
THE DEAD END
The dead end
The road no longer open
Years to live
With nothing to do in them.
So many years wasted writing my works
No one will ever want them
More and more the sense
No one should.
poem by Shalom Freedman

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Wildwood Flower
I will twine with your mingles of raven black hair
With the roses so red and the lilies so fair
With myrtle as bright as the emerald dew
The pale and the lyd-er and eyes of light blue
Oh he promised to love me; he promised to love
And to cherish me always all others above.
I woke from my dream and my idol was clay
My passion for loving had vanished away.
Oh he taught me to love him; he called me his flower
A blossom to cheer him through lifes weary hour
But now he is gone and left me alone
The wild flowers to weep and the wild birds to mourn.
I will dance and Ill sing and my life shall be gay
I will charm every heart and each crown I shall sway
Though my heart now is breaking he never shall know
How his name makes me tremble, my pale cheeks to glow.
I will dance and Ill sing and my heart will be gay
Ill banish this weeping, drive troubles away.
Ill live yet to see him regret this dark hour
When we won and neglected this frail wildwood flower.
song performed by by 10000 Maniacs

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Taste
it is a matter of taste
years of bitterness
cannot teach you
in a day what sweetness is
years of searching
cannot give you an hour
of a solution to the problems
you are grappling with
you mellow down through the years
what tastes so sweet to them
in your discriminating expertise
is never sweet to you
you keep a glass of your favorite concoction
the one that makes you live
she takes the courage of taking a sip
her face changes and she vomits
what makes you live is always
the exquisite taste of bitterness
the one that strengthens your mind
and that makes a lot of difference
poem by Ric S. Bastasa

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From California
Sunday night in the house.
The blinds drawn, the phone dead.
The sound of the kettle, the rain.
Supper: cheese, celery, bread.
For company, old letters
In the same disjointed script.
Old love wells up again,
All that I thought had slipped
Through the sieve of long absence
Is here with me again:
The long stone walls, the green
Hillsides renewed with rain.
The way you would lick your finger
And touch your forehead, the way
You hummed a phrase from the flute
Sonatas, or turned to say,
"Larches--the only conifers
That honestly blend with Wales."
I walk with you again
Along these settled trails.
It seems I started this poem
So many years ago
I cannt follow its ending
And must begin anew.
Blame, some bitterness,
I recall there were these.
Yet what survives is Bach
And a few blackberries
Something of the "falling starlight",
In the phrase of Wang Wei,
Falls on my shadowed self.
I thank you that today
His words are open to me.
How much you have inspired
You cannot know. The end
Left much to be desired.
"There is a comfort in
The strength of love." I quote
Another favourite
You vouchsafed me. Please note
The lack of hope or faith:
Neither is justified.
I have closed out the night.
The random rain outside
Rejuvenates the parched
Foothills along the Bay.
Anaesthetised by years
I think of you today
Not with impassionedness
So much as half a smile
To see the weathered past
Still worth my present while.
poem by Vikram Seth

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