After 'A Narrow Girdle of Rough Stones and Crags
In company of quite different take
The poet went out dawdling
Down by Grasmere Lake.
Dead calm the lake, no wind.
With no Joanna to mock
At the base of the rock,
All three flew fancy free,
William and Dorothy, STC,
Idled in the land of Poesy:
Osmunda fern became a Naiad Queen,
A fisherman miraged ahead
Was Freedom at his leisure.
But when up close, their fancies fled,
Self-reproach replaced their pleasure.
The fisherman was sick and gaunt,
Freedom just a taunt,
Dead the lake, no care.
POINT RASH-JUDGEMENT's what
They named the spot.
Had I put in my tuppence
The point might be COMEUPPANCE.
(STC is Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Dorothy is Wordsworth's sister)
This poem follows on from 'After 'To Joanna''
poem by Douglas Scotney
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A Narrow Girdle of Rough Stones and Crags
A narrow girdle of rough stones and crags,
A rude and natural causeway, interposed
Between the water and a winding slope
Of copse and thicket, leaves the eastern shore
Of Grasmere safe in its own privacy:
And there myself and two beloved Friends,
One calm September morning, ere the mist
Had altogether yielded to the sun,
Sauntered on this retired and difficult way.
----Ill suits the road with one in haste; but we
Played with our time; and, as we strolled along,
It was our occupation to observe
Such objects as the waves had tossed ashore--
Feather, or leaf, or weed, or withered bough,
Each on the other heaped, along the line
Of the dry wreck. And, in our vacant mood,
Not seldom did we stop to watch some tuft
Of dandelion seed or thistle's beard,
That skimmed the surface of the dead calm lake,
Suddenly halting now--a lifeless stand!
And starting off again with freak as sudden;
In all its sportive wanderings, all the while,
Making report of an invisible breeze
That was its wings, its chariot, and its horse,
Its playmate, rather say, its moving soul.
--And often, trifling with a privilege
Alike indulged to all, we paused, one now,
And now the other, to point out, perchance
To pluck, some flower or water-weed, too fair
Either to be divided from the place
On which it grew, or to be left alone
To its own beauty. Many such there are,
Fair ferns and flowers, and chiefly that tall fern,
So stately, of the queen Osmunda named;
Plant lovelier, in its own retired abode
On Grasmere's beach, than Naiad by the side
Of Grecian brook, or Lady of the Mere,
Sole-sitting by the shores of old romance.
--So fared we that bright morning: from the fields
Meanwhile, a noise was heard, the busy mirth
Of reapers, men and women, boys and girls.
Delighted much to listen to those sounds,
And feeding thus our fancies, we advanced
Along the indented shore; when suddenly,
Through a thin veil of glittering haze was seen
Before us, on a point of jutting land,
The tall and upright figure of a Man
Attired in peasant's garb, who stood alone,
Angling beside the margin of the lake.
'Improvident and reckless,' we exclaimed,
'The Man must be, who thus can lose a day
Of the mid harvest, when the labourer's hire
Is ample, and some little might be stored
Wherewith to cheer him in the winter time.'
Thus talking of that Peasant, we approached
Close to the spot where with his rod and line
He stood alone; whereat he turned his head
To greet us--and we saw a Mam worn down
By sickness, gaunt and lean, with sunken cheeks
And wasted limbs, his legs so long and lean
That for my single self I looked at them,
Forgetful of the body they sustained.--
Too weak to labour in the harvest field,
The Man was using his best skill to gain
A pittance from the dead unfeeling lake
That knew not of his wants. I will not say
What thoughts immediately were ours, nor how
The happy idleness of that sweet morn,
With all its lovely images, was changed
To serious musing and to self-reproach.
Nor did we fail to see within ourselves
What need there is to be reserved in speech,
And temper all our thoughts with charity.
--Therefore, unwilling to forget that day,
My Friend, Myself, and She who then received
The same admonishment, have called the place
By a memorial name, uncouth indeed
As e'er by mariner was given to bay
Or foreland, on a new-discovered coast;
And POINT RASH-JUDGMENT is the name it bears.
poem by William Wordsworth
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The Lake Poets
You have heard of William Wordsworth he was bard of Cockermouth
And he truly was a great poet if that ever was in doubt
And with Southey and With Coleridge they became known as the lake poets
And they made the Lake District famous and some famous poems they wrote.
Robert Southey was a fine poet he was slave to poetry
And he was for awhile Poet Laureate proves the great poet he must be
And though he is not well known as Coleridge and Wordsworth's is a greater name
He tends to be under rated and deserve a better fame.
And as for Samuel Taylor Coleridge a name verse critics celebrate
His works were born of genius a poetic all time great
The Rhyme Of The Ancient Mariner his masterpiece and some say
Is even greater than the famous elegy of Gray
And as for himself Will Wordsworth his fame seem to grow and grow
He has fifty times as many readers nowadays as he had one hundred years ago
When one talks of poets and poetry Wordsworth's name can't be left out
A testimony to the greatness of the Bard of Cockermouth.
Coleridge, Southey and Wordsworth geniuses all three
Their names inscribed in glory and poetic history
They lived in the Lake District that beautiful English country side
And due to the fame of these men the Lake District is known World wide.
poem by Francis Duggan
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After 'To Joanna
In his company Joanna laughed:
Clear she thought that he was daft
When he heard the mountains laughing
In his ravishment of mind.
Now the vicar who'd upbraided him
For carving in the rock
Upon whose meditation
The ravishment occurred,
Instead of laughing loudly
At his loftiness of word,
Smiled and looked astonished
Thinking, 'Jackass of a bird.'
Realising that he'd lost him
The poet came to earth,
Told the vicar in plain language
Of Joanna's certain anguish
As she drew into his side
For fear of something that she heard
But to which could put no word.
Now she's gone back to the city,
I miss her laughter, that's the pity.
That's why 'JOANNA'S ROCK'
Is what he's chiseled,
This jackass of a bird.
I wrote this in October-November 2011 mainly in my bed in Adelaide
after reading Wordsworth's
'To Joanna'. The thought about the jackass (kookaburra) I put into
the mind of the vicar comes from an
experience in which I was camping with a friend. Our tent blew in on us one
night and we couldn't be bothered getting out to re-erect it. Instead my friend
laughed hysterically all night. Next morning I overheard the man in the
nearby caravan muttering that if he'd had an axe he'd have killed that
laughing jackass last night.
My friend was like the poet, I was like Joanna, amused by rapture, and
the guy in the caravan was the vicar.
poem by Douglas Scotney
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A Soul Dies
Sky overcast, moon was sad.
Ashes were sent to the lake.
Who killed the bird in morning rain?
Ashes were sent to the lake.
A hidden slaughterman did not die.
Ashes were sent to the lake.
The good old name now spells the doom.
Ashes were sent to the lake.
I will call you in pitch-dark night.
Ashes were sent to the lake.
Ascending gods have ruined my life.
Ashes were sent to the lake.
A child was stolen from a mother’s bed.
Ashes were sent to the lake.
poem by Satish Verma
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Mr. B's Ballroom
A victim of collision on the open sea
Nobody ever said that life was free
Sank, swam, go down with the ship
But use your freedom of choice
I'll say it again in the land of the free
Use your freedom of choice
Your freedom of choice
In ancient rome there was a poem
About a dog who found two bones
He picked at one
He licked the other
He went in circles
He dropped dead
Freedom of choice
Is what you got
Freedom of choice!
Then if you got it you don't want it
Seems to be the rule of thumb
Don't be tricked by what you see
You got two ways to go
I'll say it again in the land of the free
Use your freedom of choice
Freedom of choice
Freedom of choice
Is what you got
Freedom of choice!
In ancient rome
There was a poem
About a dog
Who found two bones
He picked at one
He licked the other
He went in circles
He dropped dead
Freedom of choice
Is what you got
Freedom from choice
Is what you want
(repeat)
song performed by by Devo
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Freedom Of Choice
A victim of collision on the open sea
Nobody ever said that life was free
Sank, swam, go down with the ship
But use your freedom of choice
Ill say it again in the land of the free
Use your freedom of choice
Your freedom of choice
In ancient rome there was a poem
About a dog who found two bones
He picked at one
He licked the other
He went in circles
He dropped dead
Freedom of choice
Is what you got
Freedom of choice!
Then if you got it you dont want it
Seems to be the rule of thumb
Dont be tricked by what you see
You got two ways to go
Ill say it again in the land of the free
Use your freedom of choice
Freedom of choice
Freedom of choice
Is what you got
Freedom of choice!
In ancient rome
There was a poem
About a dog
Who found two bones
He picked at one
He licked the other
He went in circles
He dropped dead
Freedom of choice
Is what you got
Freedom from choice
Is what you want
(repeat)
song performed by by Devo
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Voodoo Lake
(johnny vanzant -- chris eddy -- bob britt)
Way down yonder you can hear the wind blow
Through the tall grass growing in the old bayou
The old bayou
Theres a dark haired woman that looks so fine
Wearing hand me down clothes, drinking homemade wine
No one ever knew who her daddy was
The people down here say its all because
Shes the daughter of the devil, the sister of a snake
The keeper of souls down on vodoo lake
Theres a city boy across the county line
Came looking for the legend of the girl so fine
Well the stories that he heard, well they had to be lies
But he found out different when he looked inher eyes
Well he tried to run away but she had control
Hes findin out now what everybody knows
He knew it was over when she started to shake
Now theres one more soul down on voodoo lake
Theres an eerie silence at the break of dawn
A chill in the air, something wrong
When a shadow crosses the ground
Those long lost souls never make a sound
Youd think by now theyd realize
Shell never break her bayou ties
Shes the daughter of the devil, the sister of a snake
The keeper of souls down on voodoo lake
Voodoo lake, voodoo lake
Daughter of the devil, sister of a snake
Voodoo lake
Down on voodoo lake, down on voodoo lake
You can see her down on voodoo lake
song performed by by Lynyrd Skynyrd
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Land of the Free (c) 3-29-08
Land of the Free home of the brave
Land of disease home of the slave
Freedom of religion Freedom of speech
Freedom of press and freedom to breach
Freedom to steal freedom to take
Freedom to carry guns and Freedom to break
The laws of the man and the laws of the word
Freedom from peace but to still use the bird
The only home of brave and Land of the Free
The land who rules based off democracy
Freedom to starve and Freedom to be poor
Freedom to break and enter someone’s door
Freedom to lay off workers and close off jobs
Freedom to take what they want and to rob
Freedom of abortion Freedom of extortion
Freedom to own land and give everyone their portion
Freedom for action by any means necessary
But what their picture of that can really be scary
Freedom to wage war without our consent for our hours to be spent
Freedom to take our money then make us pay rent
Land of the prospering riches and of those who don’t care for the
People who live in the FREE old America
Copyright 3-29-08 ©® Corey Threet
PLEASE COMMENT!
poem by Corey Threet
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The Lake
In spring of youth it was my lot
To haunt of the wide world a spot
The which I could not love the less-
So lovely was the loneliness
Of a wild lake, with black rock bound,
And the tall pines that towered around.
But when the Night had thrown her pall
Upon that spot, as upon all,
And the mystic wind went by
Murmuring in melody-
Then- ah then I would awake
To the terror of the lone lake.
Yet that terror was not fright,
But a tremulous delight-
A feeling not the jewelled mine
Could teach or bribe me to define-
Nor Love- although the Love were thine.
Death was in that poisonous wave,
And in its gulf a fitting grave
For him who thence could solace bring
To his lone imagining-
Whose solitary soul could make
An Eden of that dim lake.
poem by Edgar Allan Poe
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Like the lake a Chinese poet sits beside in a painting
Who cares about
the weight of a lake?
Who would care to weigh it?
Who cares about
the colour of a lake
without the light of the sky
to reflect in it?
Who notices its modesty,
reflecting all, but silent of itself?
Who observes that the lake
remains unaffected,
not pained by loss,
not pleased by gain?
Who notices its wisdom,
obeying every law?
Who names its generosity,
among the fish, the birds,
the animals who drink?
Who knows whether the tree
leaning over it, sees its own reflection?
Who notices its love?
It bonds with earth,
It flows when needed,
as love does.
Who asks where the lake came from,
seeing it there?
Who wonders how old that lake is?
It is without age today.
Who wonders whether the lake
knows itself water,
or if water knows itself lake?
Who does not go to seek it,
for its stillness, for its silence,
as if it understands the mind’s needs,
the heart’s nourishment?
He is like that.
poem by Michael Shepherd
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Across the Lake Unto the Sky
Across the lake
Unto the sky
There bloomed a rainbow
To feast my eye
That late afternoon
After a brief spell of rain
When my heart was still
Entangled with the lake's heart
There the sun rushed in
Leaving the lake half-thirsty
The archer hiding deep under the lake
Aimed and shot an arrow
At the unruly sun and left
His bow across the sky
As if telling the sun 'beware! '
Lo, vanished the sun in fright
The lake had its fill!
Do you hear the clouds applaud?
poem by Indira Babbellapati
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Across The Lake Unto The Sky
Across the lake
Unto the sky
There bloomed a rainbow
To feast my eye
That late afternoon
After a brief spell of rain
When my heart was still
Entangled with the lake's heart
There the sun rushed in
Leaving the lake half-thirsty
The archer hiding deep under the lake
Aimed and shot an arrow
At the unruly sun and left
His bow across the sky
As if telling the sun 'beware! '
Lo, vanished the sun in fright
The lake had its fill!
Do you hear the clouds applaud?
poem by Indira Babbellapati
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Did You Say That Your Only Freedom From Pain Is Death?
sad indeed,
there are other freedoms
still
freedom from having no ideas, from this dryness,
freedom from having you
as a poet on forced wit and half-cooked cleverness
freedom from a reader
who has nothing to offer
except his own loneliness
his having nothing to do
freedom from beng bored
to death
freedom from having nothing
to say and comment
freedom from this feeling of emptiness
this bigotry
this indigestion of dumb thoughts
freedom
from impertinence, immateriality, irrelevance,
freedom from thinking about freedom
freedom from freedom itself
there are more
freedom from pain
is useless now
that you are dead.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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And What About Freedom?
sad indeed,
there are other freedoms still
freedom from having no ideas, from this dryness,
freedom from having you
as a poet on forced wit and half-cooked cleverness
freedom from a reader
who has nothing to offer
except his own loneliness
his having nothing to do
freedom from long bored
to death
freedom from having nothing
to say and comment
freedom from this feeling of emptiness
this bigotry
this indigestion of dumb thoughts
freedom from impertinence, immateriality, irrelevance,
freedom from thinking about freedom
freedom from freedom itself
there are more
freedom from pain
is useless now
that you are dead.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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352
sad indeed,
there are other freedoms
still
freedom from having no ideas, from this dryness,
freedom from having you
as a poet on forced wit and half-cooked cleverness
freedom from a reader
who has nothing to offer
except his own loneliness
his having nothing to do
freedom from beng bored
to death
freedom from having nothing
to say and comment
freedom from this feeling of emptiness
this bigotry
this indigestion of dumb thoughts
freedom
from impertinence, immateriality, irrelevance,
freedom from thinking about freedom
freedom from freedom itself
there are more
freedom from pain
is useless now
that you are dead.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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The Lake of the Thousand Isles
(For Music.)
Though Missouri'stide may majestic glide,
There's a curse on the soil it laves;
The Ohio, too, may be fair, but who
Would sojourn in the land of slaves?
Be my prouder lot a Canadian cot
And the bread of a freeman's toils;
Then hurrah for the land of the forests grand,
And the Lake of the Thousand Isles!
I would seek no wealth, at the cost of health,
'Mid the city's din and strife;
More I love the grace of fair nature's face,
And the calm of a woodland life;
I would shun the road by ambition trod,
And the lore which the heart defiles;--
Then hurrah for the land of the forests grand,
And the Lake of the Thousand Isles!
O away, away! I would gladly stray
Where the freedom I love is found;
Where the pine and oak by the woodman's stroke
Are disturbed in their ancient bound;
Where the gladsome swain reaps the golden grain,
And the trout from the stream beguiles;
Then hurrah for the land of the forests grand,
And the Lake of the Thousand Isles.
poem by Evan MacColl
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Poets of Great Renown
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
and William Wordsworth were
eighteenth-nineteenth Century
British Poets of renown...
they collaborated in fine
lyrical ballad style, both
loving the rhythm and rhyme
of Shakespeare, his sonnets
and his plays.
In seventeen ninety six
Wordsworth and Coleridge met,
becoming 'poetry' friends,
but sadly with time their
friendship ended.
I quote just four lines from their
lengthy poem of imagination..
The Ancient Mariner.
'He prayeth best, who loveth best
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made ~ and loveth all'
poem by Joyce Hemsley
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Memorials of A Tour In Scotland, 1803 I. Departure From The Vale Of Grasmere, August 1803
THE gentlest Shade that walked Elysian plains
Might sometimes covet dissoluble chains;
Even for the tenants of the zone that lies
Beyond the stars, celestial Paradise,
Methinks 'twould heighten joy, to overleap
At will the crystal battlements, and peep
Into some other region, though less fair,
To see how things are made and managed there.
Change for the worse might please, incursion bold
Into the tracts of darkness and of cold;
O'er Limbo lake with aery flight to steer,
And on the verge of Chaos hang in fear.
Such animation often do I find,
Power in my breast, wings growing in my mind,
Then, when some rock or hill is overpast,
Perhance without one look behind me cast.
Some barrier with which Nature, from the birth
Of things, has fenced this fairest spot on earth.
O pleasant transit, Grasmere! to resign
Such happy fields, abodes so calm as thine;
Not like an outcast with himself at strife;
The slave of business, time, or care for life,
But moved by choice; or, if constrained in part,
Yet still with Nature's freedom at the heart;--
To cull contentment upon wildest shores,
And luxuries extract from bleakest moors;
With prompt embrace all beauty to enfold,
And having rights in all that we behold.
--Then why these lingering steps?--A bright adieu,
For a brief absence, proves that love is true;
Ne'er can the way be irksome or forlorn
That winds into itself for sweet return.
poem by William Wordsworth
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Shelley
England had triplets at a birth,
Coleridge, Southy and Wordsworth,
And these three were widely famed,
And the 'Lake Poets' they were named.
With joy they did pursue their themes,
'Mong England's lakes, and hills and streams;
From there with gladness they could view
The distant Scottish mountains blue.
poem by James McIntyre
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The Moon, how definite its orb! (fragment)
The Moon, how definite its orb!
Yet gaze again, and with a steady gaze--
'Tis there indeed,--but where is it not?--
It is suffused o'er all the sapphire Heaven,
Trees, herbage, snake-like stream, unwrinkled Lake,
Whose very murmur does of it partake
And low and close the broad smooth mountain
Is more a thing of Heaven than when
Distinct by one dim shade and yet undivided from the universal cloud
In which it towers, finite in height.
poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
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