We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it--and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove lid. She will never sit on a hot stove lid again--and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one anymore.
quote by Mark Twain
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Related quotes
Sestina
September rain falls on the house.
In the failing light, the old grandmother
sits in the kitchen with the child
beside the Little Marvel Stove,
reading the jokes from the almanac,
laughing and talking to hide her tears.
She thinks that her equinoctial tears
and the rain that beats on the roof of the house
were both foretold by the almanac,
but only known to a grandmother.
The iron kettle sings on the stove.
She cuts some bread and says to the child,
It's time for tea now; but the child
is watching the teakettle's small hard tears
dance like mad on the hot black stove,
the way the rain must dance on the house.
Tidying up, the old grandmother
hangs up the clever almanac
on its string. Birdlike, the almanac
hovers half open above the child,
hovers above the old grandmother
and her teacup full of dark brown tears.
She shivers and says she thinks the house
feels chilly, and puts more wood in the stove.
It was to be, says the Marvel Stove.
I know what I know, says the almanac.
With crayons the child draws a rigid house
and a winding pathway. Then the child
puts in a man with buttons like tears
and shows it proudly to the grandmother.
But secretly, while the grandmother
busies herself about the stove,
the little moons fall down like tears
from between the pages of the almanac
into the flower bed the child
has carefully placed in the front of the house.
Time to plant tears, says the almanac.
The grandmother sings to the marvelous stove
and the child draws another inscrutable house.
poem by Elizabeth Bishop
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I used to get on a stove wood pile at 5-6 years old and I would have a piece of stove wood and kindling bark as a pick, and I was a star.
quote by Jerry Reed
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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After A Morning Quarrel
After a morning quarrel with his wife
A husband has got a terrible life.
After work, coming back home,
He finds a warning syndrome.
It’s a note lying on the table:
Honey, I think you are able to heat up the food,
Today I am in a bad mood,
So, to cheer me up I went to my friend
To watch the film with a happy end.
The food is already on the stove.
The stove is in the restaurant The Fat Duck.
I wish you a good luck!
poem by Larisa Rzhepishevska
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Forefathers
Force the design of a matter of doubt
To be useless.
The lessening of your number of people
Is like a fire of wood crackling
With heat.
The hot stove is cooking my meat of venison,
Relished by my children of the woods.
The design of food is exceptional by the maker of us,
He is the forefather, and she is the foremother,
Reaching our hearts with the stove and the woods
And the sylvan animals of beauty and belief.
poem by Naveed Akram
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An Invitation to Mr Liu
Green ant new unstrained beer
Red clay small fire stove
Evening come sky almost snow
Can drink one cup not?
Green lees of beer that's newly brewed,
A little stove of red clay burns.
As evening comes, the sky's about to snow,
Can you drink one cup with me?
A Small Elegy
My friends have left. Far away, my darling is asleep.
Outside, it's as dark as pitch.
I'm saying words to myself, words that are white
in the lamplight and when I'm half-asleep I begin
to think about my mother. Autumnal recollection.
Really, under the cover of winter, it's as if I know
everything---even what my mother is doing now.
She's at home in the kitchen. She has a small child's stove
toward which the wooden rocking horse can trot,
she has a small child's stove, the sort nobody uses today, but
she basks in its heat. Mother. My diminutive mom.
She sits quietly, hands folded, and thinks about
my father, who died years ago.
And then she is skinning fruit for me. I am
in the room. Sitting right next to her. You've got to see us,
God, you bully, who took so much. How
dark it is outside! What was I going to say?
Oh, yes, now I remember. Because
of all those hours I slept soundly, through calm
nights, because of all those loved ones who are deep
in dreams---Now, when everything's running short,
I can't stand being here by myself. The lamplight's too strong.
I am sowing grain on the headland.
I will not live long.
poem by Jirí Orten
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Szynborska
'Somewhere out there the world must have an end.'
and then my wife throws out the last porcelain
out of the window
and then i stop writing an unfinished poem
because the gas stove is not
giving its flame
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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When Father Shook The Stove
'Twas not so many years ago,
Say, twenty-two or three,
When zero weather or below
Held many a thrill for me.
Then in my icy room I slept
A youngster's sweet repose,
And always on my form I kept
My flannel underclothes.
Then I was roused by sudden shock
Though still to sleep I strove,
I knew that it was seven o'clock
When father shook the stove.
I never heard him quit his bed
Or his alarm clock ring;
I never heard his gentle tread,
Or his attempts to sing;
The sun that found my window pane
On me was wholly lost,
Though many a sunbeam tried in vain
To penetrate the frost.
To human voice I never stirred,
But deeper down I dove
Beneath the covers, when I heard
My father shake the stove.
To-day it all comes back to me
And I can hear it still;
He seemed to take a special glee
In shaking with a will.
He flung the noisy dampers back,
Then rattled steel on steel,
Until the force of his attack
The building seemed to feel.
Though I'd a youngster's heavy eyes
All sleep from them he drove;
It seemed to me the dead must rise
When father shook the stove.
Now radiators thump and pound
And every room is warm,
And modern men new ways have found
To shield us from the storm.
The window panes are seldom glossed
The way they used to be;
The pictures left by old Jack Frost
Our children never see.
And now that he has gone to rest
In God's great slumber grove,
I often think those days were best
When father shook the stove.
poem by Edgar Albert Guest
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Were Gonna Move
(words & music by vera matson - elvis presley)
Well theres a leak in this old building
Yes, theres a leak in this old building
Well theres a leak in this old building
Were gonna move to a better home
We got no pane in this old window
We got no pane in this old window
We got no pane in this old window
Were gonna move to a better home
Well theres a hole in the roof where the rain pours in
A hole in the floor where it drops right out again
Well theres a leak in this old building
Well theres a leak in this old building
Well theres a leak in this old building
Were gonna move to a better home
Well theres a crack across the ceiling
Yes theres a crack across the ceiling
Well theres a crack across the ceiling
Were gonna find us a better home
Weve gotta stove without a chimney
Weve gotta stove without a chimney
What goods a stove without a chimney
Were gonna move to a better home
Pulling down window shades is no use at all
The kids and the neighbor can peep right through the wall
Well theres a leak in this old building
Well theres a leak in this old building
Well theres a leak in this old building
Were gonna move to a better, move to a better
Move to a better home
song performed by by Elvis Presley
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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When I was a kid of six or seven, I used to get up on the stove woodpile for a stage and I'd put on the wildest show.
quote by Jerry Reed
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Lost River
Theres a lost river that flows
In a valley where no on e goes,
Where the wild waters rush
Rumbles deep in the hush.
Gone far from there now,
Lord Ill be back somehow
To where the lost river winds
In the shadow of the pines
Oh, lost river, now Im coming back
To the pot-belly stove, where the firewoods all stacked
Oh Quebec girl, go with me,
Oh my bell, my fleur de lis,
Where the lost river winds
In the shadow of the pines
Now every body knows
Where that lost river flows
Its someplace hes lost
Behind bridges that hes crossed
Well, hed like to return,
But his bridges are all burned
And hes much too far down
To return to higher ground
Oh, lost river, now Im coming back
To the pot-belly stove, where the firewoods all stacked
Oh Quebec girl, go with me,
Oh my bell, my fleur de lis,
Where the lost river winds
In the shadow of the pines
Oh lost river, far over ther ridge
Now is it too late for me to build me a new bridge?
To the bright golden time
When her love was still mine
And the world was still wild
Like the heart of a child
Oh, lost river, now Im coming back
To the pot-belly stove, where the firewoods all stacked
Oh Quebec girl, go with me,
Oh my bell, my fleur de lis,
Where the lost river winds
In the shadow of the pines
Where the lost river winds
In the shadow of the pines
song performed by by Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Darkness
Cold darkness charged in
Killed off the warming light
Notify the next of kin
Sun fell victim to night
Man-in-the-moon jeers
Peaking through a cloud
Last ray of day disappears
Never crying out loud
It's good to be near the stove
Keeping the cold night air at bay
Trusty ol' blanket is hand wove
Believe it's time to hit the hay
Another day came and went
Never to be another one like it
Though it's a reoccurring event
Sun will get its revenge bit by bit
So I kiss my woman goodnight
Pray to Jesus Christ that I awaken
For one more morning and twilight
Oh, and coffee, eggs, and bacon
poem by Charles Hancock
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Stray Dogs Lapping
stray dogs lapping
at the bloody tracks
the homeless leave in the snow.
burnt out Marlboro fingers
shaking with the cold...
small children's big eyes screaming
with silent stinking fear!
and the halls and the walls
of the traders vibrate with smoke...
nothing gained, nothing lost,
in the land of nothing....
my grandmother's Bible lays by
the stove that was never empty...
my father sits and stares at the walls,
listening for the echo of....
my mother's voice....
and all the things we believed in
are lost,
forgotten....
stray dogs lapping
at the bloody tracks
the homeless leave in the snow...
poem by Eric Cockrell
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Old Man's Nursery Rhyme
I.
In the jolly winters
Of the long-ago,
It was not so cold as now--
O! No! No!
Then, as I remember,
Snowballs, to eat,
Were as good as apples now,
And every bit as sweet!
II.
In the jolly winters
Of the dead-and-gone,
Bub was warm as summer,
With his red mitts on,--
Just in his little waist-
And-pants all together,
Who ever heard him growl
About cold weather?
III.
In the jolly winters of the long-ago--
Was it _half_ so cold as now?
O! No! No!
Who caught his death o' cold,
Making prints of men
Flat-backed in snow that now's
Twice as cold again?
IV.
In the jolly winters
Of the dead-and-gone,
Startin' out rabbit-hunting
Early as the dawn,--
Who ever froze his fingers,
Ears, heels, or toes,--
Or'd a cared if he had?
Nobody knows!
V.
Nights by the kitchen-stove,
Shelling white and red
Corn in the skillet, and
Sleepin' four abed!
Ah! the jolly winters
Of the long-ago!
We were not so old as now--
O! No! No!
poem by James Whitcomb Riley
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The Feel Good Sublet
Its the feel-good sublet of the summer
The leaseholder left their cigars in the drawer
This place will hold us for one whole summer
Dont use the stove, refrigerator, or door
Feel-good sublet of the summer
The leaseholder left their cigars in the drawer
Feel-good sublet of the summer
Dont use the stove, refrigerator, or door
Killer sublet
For the summer
Chessboard missing all of the pawns
Four flight up and
Find yourself knowing
Feel-good sublet forevermore
If you only sublet one apartment
Let it be this one
song performed by by They Might Be Giants
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Feel Good Sublet
Its the feel-good sublet of the summer
The leaseholder left their cigars in the drawer
This place will hold us for one whole summer
Dont use the stove, refrigerator, or door
Feel-good sublet of the summer
The leaseholder left their cigars in the drawer
Feel-good sublet of the summer
Dont use the stove, refrigerator, or door
Killer sublet
For the summer
Chessboard missing all of the pawns
Four flight up and
Find yourself knowing
Feel-good sublet forevermore
If you only sublet one apartment
Let it be this one
song performed by by They Might Be Giants
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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