From The Italian
AS a little child whom his mother has chidden,
Wrecked in the dark in a storm of weeping,
Sleeps with his tear-stained eyes closed hidden
And, with fists clenched, sobs still in his sleeping,
So in my breast sleeps Love, O white lady,
What does he care though the rest are playing,
With rattles and drums in the woodlands shady,
Happy children, whom Joy takes maying!
Ah, do not wake him, lest you should hear him
Scolding the others, breaking their rattles,
Smashing their drums, when their play comes near him--
Love who, for me, is a god of battles!
poem by Edith Nesbit
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Related quotes
My Baby Sleeps
The wind is loud in the west to-night,
But Baby sleeps;
The wild wind blows with all its might,
But Baby sleeps;
My Baby sleeps, and he does not hear
The noise of the storm in the pine trees near.
The snow is drifting high to-night,
But Baby sleeps;
The bitter world is cold and white,
But Baby sleeps;
My Baby sleeps, so fast, so fast,
That he does not heed the wintry blast.
The cold snows drift, and the wild winds rave,
But Baby sleeps;
And a white cross stands by his little grave,
While Baby sleeps;
And the storm is loud in the rocking pine,
But its moan is not so deep as mine.
poem by George A. Mackenzie
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Serenade from “The Spanish Student”
STARS of the summer night!
Far in yon azure deeps,
Hide, hide your golden light!
She sleeps!
My lady sleeps!
Sleeps!
Moon of the summer night!
Far down yon western steeps,
Sink, sink in silver light!
She sleeps!
My lady sleeps!
Sleeps!
Wind of the summer night!
Where yonder woodbine creeps,
Fold, fold thy pinions light!
She sleeps!
My lady sleeps!
Sleeps!
Dreams of the summer night!
Tell her, her lover keeps
Watch! while in slumbers light
She sleeps!
My lady sleeps!
Sleeps!
poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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While The City Sleeps
What goes on behind closed doors, private wounds, open sores
Youre your own worst enemy and cheap thrills bring you to your knees
Its thumbs down for someone you know, and its easy come and easy go
Chorus:
Burn your bridges, take what you can get
Go for the throat cause you paid your debt
Livin well is the best revenge, so give em hell
While the city sleeps - its all there in black and white
While the city sleeps - through the eye of the needle, gotta thread your life
While the city sleeps - while the city sleeps
Its a hit or miss, an eye for an eye, live for today, and dont ask why
For better or worse, you bought and sold
They love you while youre hot and leave you when youre cold
Chorus
While the city sleeps - yeah, better run for your life
Take your troubles to the night
While the city sleeps - yeah, beggars, thieves and losers, theres no relief
While the city sleeps - theres no relief, while the city sleeps
While the city sleeps - yeah
Chorus
While the city sleeps - while the city sleeps
While the city sleeps - while the city sleeps
While the city sleeps - yeah, theres no relief
While the city sleeps
song performed by by Kiss
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Dead Boys Poem
The child sits and weeps,
How could this be all that matters,
Why did this have to hurt so deep,
How could this be life?
The child sits with the pain inside,
He sits with his heart in his chest,
‘How could I have died? ’
Is all he thinks, he forgets the rest.
The child’s eyes closed so tight,
His fists clenched so strong
He feels the night,
He knows everything that happened was wrong.
The child stands and looks into the houses light
He stares at not the window,
Not at the sight,
Yet only for the weeping widow.
The child stands holding the gun,
The gun he died holding,
As he remembers his father killing him, his only son
He remembers his father scolding.
He knows he took a life,
Yet he knows his father took his,
He remembers not the taking of his father’s life,
Only the pain of his father stealing his.
His eyes so dark,
His mind so lost,
His hand tracing deaths mark,
As he remembers it’s cost.
He remembers the scene, the time,
He remembers the look in his father’s face,
He remembers doing the crime,
He remembers seeing the pain in his father’s face.
But then his memory stops,
And reality takes place,
For this is when he dropped,
This is when life left his face.
He walks past,
To eternity; to roam
Of all his memories this shall be his last
For this is the dead boy’s poem.
poem by Bethany Maxwell
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The Drums of Ages
Drums of all that’s right and wrong—of love and hate and scorn,
And the new-born baby hears them and it wails when it is born.
Drums of all that is to be, and all that has gone by,
And we hear them when we’re dreaming, and we hear them while we die.
Drums of martyred innocence and drums of driven guilt
Beating backward from the future when the first rude town was built;
Beating louder through the slave days and the dark and hungry nights,
While the hovels filled the valleys and the castles crowned the heights;
Beating louder while the mansions shifted east from miles of slums—
Don’t you hear them? Don’t you hear them? Don’t you hear the alley drums?
Drums of human sacrifice and drums of war at home—
While the Romans conquered nations they were beating loud in Rome.
Children heard them through the ages, mothers paused and glanced behind,
Madmen saw and heard the drummers, but the rest were deaf and blind.
Peasants starved on fields of plenty, workmen rotted in the slums—
Till the drummers came to Paris and the nations heard the drums.
Drums of hope and bursting hearts—the drums of Westward Ho!—
From the homes of generations and their native land they go.
’Groom and bride and grey-haired mother, bent old men who go alone—
Fleeing bitter persecution for the terrible unknown:
Seeking freedom, rest, or justice—and the peace that never comes—
And the wilderness was conquered when the pilgrims beat their drums.
Drums of Greed that followed fast where men had made the way,
Waking drums of stern rebellion when the exiles turned at bay,
Spreading death and desolation, breeding old-world hells anew,
Until England lost a nation for the blindness of a few.
Still the dirty Jewish talon reached from palaces and slums
Till a hundred thousand English died to stop the farmers’ drums.
Drums of tortured hearts o’ men—the drums that never ceased—
Throbbing through the British Empire from the heart of London East;
Growling louder still wherever, in the wake of those who lead,
Comes the murmur of the board-room and the stealthy steps of greed;
Growling through the Southern cities, murmuring in the Western gums,
Till the Empire falls to pieces at the beating of the drums!
Drums of all that’s right and wrong—of love and hate and scorn;
And the new-born baby hears them, and he wails when he is born.
Drums of all that is to be, and all that has gone by—
And we hear there when we’re dreaming, and we hear then while we die.
poem by Henry Lawson
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By example
A mother sings a lullaby
To let her baby know
that she is near no need to cry.
The babe is sleeping peacefully
In safety warm and dry
Still mother listens carefully.
As baby sleeps her mother rests.
Relaxed but vigilant,
the mother love which she invests.
Will in time pay rich dividends
at compound interest.
Mutual love which never ends.
The child becomes a woman grown.
A daughter and a friend
When she has children of her own.
She knows exactly what to do
to care for her baby.
Do what her mother taught her to.
poem by Ivor Or Ivor.e Hogg
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The Philosophical Egotist
Hast thou the infant seen that yet, unknowing of the love
Which warms and cradles, calmly sleeps the mother's heart above--
Wandering from arm to arm, until the call of passion wakes,
And glimmering on the conscious eye--the world in glory breaks?
And hast thou seen the mother there her anxious vigil keep?
Buying with love that never sleeps the darling's happy sleep?
With her own life she fans and feeds that weak life's trembling rays,
And with the sweetness of the care, the care itself repays.
And dost thou Nature then blaspheme--that both the child and mother
Each unto each unites, the while the one doth need the other?--
All self-sufficing wilt thou from that lovely circle stand--
That creature still to creature links in faith's familiar band?
Ah! dar'st thou, poor one, from the rest thy lonely self estrange?
Eternal power itself is but all powers in interchange!
poem by Friedrich Schiller
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Dr Livingstone
Steam ship, sail down the river
Fight the mosquitoes that fly in a swarm
White smoke covers the jungle
See Dr. Livingston land with a thunk
Down where the sad willows gather
Young women weep for their dying babies
I am a white man in Africa
If I were to stay here
There'd be no one to save me
I hear the drums
I know it's urgent
I hear survival in his hands
Switch to record
I get the picture
But I will never understand
Mad world, invisible army
Blow up the bridges and come like a storm
Young girl, eyes full of promise
Carry the baby and keeping it warm
Down where the sad willows gather
Young men go down on their knees
I am a white man in Africa
With more than just my god to appease
I hear the drums
I know it's urgent
I hear survival in his hands
Switch to record
I get the picture
But I will never understand
How there is love in his face
'Midst of all this waste
In the Mozambique sun
Under the gun
I hear the drums
I hear survival in his hands
I hear the drums
There is a curse upon this land
I hear the drums
I know it's urgent
I hear survival in his hands
Hit record
Get the picture
I will never understand
Carry the sound and the fury
Left all alone in a war zone
Carry the sound and the fury
Hours later
Thoughts of my bed
Leave me tired and ready for sleep
So tell me about all the places you go
All the lives that you swallow, the people you keep
Deep in a monastery
That's where I want to be
Wrestle my soul
song performed by by Crowded House
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A Poem Written While A Grandchild Sleeps
A POEM WRITTEN WHILE A GRANDCHILD SLEEPS
A poem written while a grandchild sleeps
Knows it does not have that much time
Knows it is interrupted
Checking whether or not the eyes are still closed
And the baby still at rest-
Knows it cannot capture the angelic innocence
Of the child's peaceful face-
Knows it will never have words of beauty
Comparable to the calm and happiness
Transmitted to an old man
Who all day in pain
Recovers in these moments
His love of life.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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Dirge For A Soldier
In the east the morning comes,
Hear the rollin' of the drums
On the hill.
But the heart that beat as they beat
In the battle's raging day heat
Lieth still.
Unto him the night has come,
Though they roll the morning drum.
What is in the bugle's blast?
It is: 'Victory at last!
Now for rest.'
But, my comrades, come behold him,
Where our colors now enfold him,
And his breast
Bares no more to meet the blade,
But lies covered in the shade.
What a stir there is to-day!
They are laying him away
Where he fell.
There the flag goes draped before him;
Now they pile the grave sod o'er him
With a knell.
And he answers to his name
In the higher ranks of fame.
There's a woman left to mourn
For the child that she has borne
In travail.
But her heart beats high and higher,
With the patriot mother's fire,
At the tale.
She has borne and lost a son,
But her work and his are done.
Fling the flag out, let it wave;
They 're returning from the grave--
'Double quick!'
And the cymbals now are crashing,
Bright his comrades' eyes are flashing
From the thick
Battle-ranks which knew him brave,
No tears for a hero's grave.
In the east the morning comes,
Hear the rattle of the drums
Far away.
Now no time for grief's pursuing,
Other work is for the doing,
Here to-day.
He is sleeping, let him rest
With the flag across his breast.
poem by Paul Laurence Dunbar
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Sound Of Drums
I hear the sound of drums on a melody
I hear the sound of drums
Well, singing the names above in the city
Yeah, revolution for fun
I feel the time has come like a remody
I feel the time has come
Were shaking the spear of love in the city
Yeah, I hear the sound of drums
Yeah, can you feel the love for me, yeah yeah
I feel the time has come
I hear the sound of drums
I hear the sound of drums on a melody,
Calling me to return
Well, I laugh and catch the sun
cause its gonna be revolution for fun
Yeah, can you feel the love for me, yeah yeah
I feel the time has come
I hear the sound of drums..oh oohh...
Well, I feel the time has come with the melody
I see the golden one
Well, Im not the only one with the remedy
Im not the only one
I feel the time has come
I hear the sound of drums
song performed by by Kula Shaker
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Oh! That We Two Were Maying
1 Oh! that we two were Maying
2 Down the stream of the soft spring breeze;
3 Like children with violets playing
4 In the shade of the whispering trees.
5 Oh! that we two sat dreaming
6 On the sward of some sheep-trimmed down,
7 Watching the white mist steaming
8 Over river and mead and town.
9 Oh! that we two lay sleeping
10 In our nest in the churchyard sod,
11 With our limbs at rest on the quiet earth's breast,
12 And our souls at home with God!
poem by Charles Kingsley
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The Sidewinder Sleep Tonight
This here is the place I will be staying.
There isn't a number. You can call the pay phone.
Let it ring a long, long, long, long time.
If I don't pick up, hang up, call back, let it ring some more.
If I don't pick up, pick up... The sidewinder sleeps, sleeps, sleeps in a coil
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
There are scratches all around the coin slot
like a heartbeat, baby trying to wake up,
but this machine can only swallow money.
You can't lay a patch by computer design.
It's just a lot of stupid, stupid signs.
Tell her,
tell her she can kiss my ass, then laugh and say that you were only kidding.
That way she'll know that it's really, really, really, really me.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
Baby, instant soup doesn't really grab me.
Today I need something more sub-sub-sub-substantial.
A can of beans or blackeyed peas, some Nescafe and ice,
a candy bar, a falling star, or a reading of Doctor Seuss;
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
The cat in the hat came back, wrecked a lot of havoc on the way,
always had a smile and a reason to pretend.
But their world has flat backgrounds and little need to sleep but to dream.
The sidewinder sleeps on his back.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
I can always sleep standing up. Call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
I can always sleep standing up. Call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. Call me when you try to wake her.
I can always sleep standing up. Call me when you try to wake her.
I can always sleep standing up. Call me when you try to wake her.
We've got to moogie, moogie, move on this one
song performed by by REM
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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How Do You Keep Love Alive?
Lord, I miss that girl
On the day we met the sun was shining down
Down on the valley
Riddled with horses running
Crushing them with flowers
I would have picked for her
On the day she was born
She runs through my veins like a long black river
And rattles my cage like a thunderstorm
Oh my soul
What does it mean?
What does it mean?
What does it mean to be so sad?
When someone you love
Someone you love is supposed to make you happy
What do you do
How do you keep love alive?
When it won't
What, what are the words
They use when they know it's over
"We need to talk," or
"I'm confused, maybe later you can come over"
I would've held your mother's hand
On the day you was born
She runs through my veins
Like a long black river and rattles my cage
Like a thunderstorm
Oh, my soul
What does it mean?
What does it mean?
What does it mean to be so sad?
When someone you love
Someone you love is supposed to make you happy
What do you do
How do you keep love alive?
When it won't
How do you keep love alive?
song performed by by Ryan Adams
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Sweet Child
Your sweet child is sleeping but,
My sweet child is on the way;
So swift be thy flight oh my little one,
And like fresh shower for the thirsty flowers.
To rest on their mothers breasts and,
To feed on their mothers breasts;
And from love's shining circles on this issue,
But listen to the springs like a flowing music.
When friendship decays, true love lies withered;
But i will swing along with my child on the wings of love!
And like the blossom of the heavens with the gates of light.
Oh Isles of perfume,
In a vale of flowers to seek for your children;
And like a gift that is wrapped with love than hate,
For my muse will find a way to touch your hearts.
Life is like a child at play when her mother sleeps,
But in the land of roses i have found my love;
And with beautiful flowers singing to us for peace,
For in a humble prayer i will come to you with joy.
Oh lights of lovely scent afar,
Hymns of joy and sweet bed of flowers;
I married very late but,
I will like to see my grandchild before i die.
poem by Edward Kofi Louis
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Below Her Window
Where she sleeps, no moonlight shines
No pale beam unbidden creeps.
Darkest shade the place enshrines
Where she sleeps.
Like a diamond in the deeps
Of the rich unopened mines
There her lovely rest she keeps.
Though the jealous dark confines
All her beauty, Love's heart leaps.
His unerring thought divines
Where she sleeps.
poem by Robert Fuller Murray
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The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight
This here is the place I will be staying.
There isnt a number. you can call the pay phone.
Let it ring a long, long, long, long time.
If I dont pick up, hang up, call back, let it ring some more.
If I dont pick up, pick up... the sidewinder sleeps, sleeps, sleeps in a coil
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
There are scratches all around the coin slot
Like a heartbeat, baby trying to wake up,
But this machine can only swallow money.
You cant lay a patch by computer design.
Its just a lot of stupid, stupid signs.
Tell her,
Tell her she can kiss my ass, then laugh and say that you were only kidding.
That way shell know that its really, really, really, really me.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
Baby, instant soup doesnt really grab me.
Today I need something more sub-sub-sub-substantial.
A can of beans or blackeyed peas, some nescafe and ice,
A candy bar, a falling star, or a reading of doctor seuss;
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
The cat in the hat came back, wrecked a lot of havoc on the way,
Always had a smile and a reason to pretend.
But their world has flat backgrounds and little need to sleep but to dream.
The sidewinder sleeps on his back.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
I can always sleep standing up. call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
I can always sleep standing up. call me when you try to wake her.
Call me when you try to wake her up. call me when you try to wake her.
I can always sleep standing up. call me when you try to wake her.
I can always sleep standing up. call me when you try to wake her.
Weve got to moogie, moogie, move on this one.
song performed by by REM
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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All I ever wanted to do was play the drums; I felt good about myself when I played the drums. So I worked anywhere and everywhere I could lug my drums in.
quote by Max Weinberg
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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D Is For Drums
JL: Hey John.
JF: Oh, hey John.
JL: What's going on?
JF: Man, I'm confused.
JL: You're confused? Why?
JF: I'm no good at remembering stuff.
JL: Really?
JF: Yeah.
JL: Like what?
JF: I can't remember what 'D' is for.
JL: You can't remember what 'D' is for?
JF: I think it's for an instrument that you play in a band.
JL: I'm surprised you can't remember what 'D' is for.
JF: I can't remember there's too much noise.
JL: Put your Thinking Cap on John, I'll give you a hint.
JF: See, I can't find my Thinking Cap.I think it's lost.
JL: John, come on, tell me. 'D' is for what?
JF: 'D' is for something that you play with sticks.
JL: That's right, that's right. You're getting close.
JF: 'D' is for drums!
Both: Yes, 'D' is for drums!
'D' is for drums!
Yes, 'D' is for drums!
JL: Well, I'm glad we got that straight.
JF: Hey John.
JL: Yeah.
JF: I need some juice.
JL: I got some juice.
JF: Well, let's go to your house.
JL: Okay, I'll meet you over there.
JF: Okay.
'D' is for drums! 'D' is for drums!
song performed by by They Might Be Giants
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Drums of Battersea
They can’t hear in West o’ London, where the worst dine with the best—
Deaf to all save lies and laughter, they can’t hear in London West—
Tailored brutes and splendid harlots, and the parasites that be—
They can’t hear the warning thunder of the Drums of Battersea.
More drums! War drums!
Drums of Misery—
Beating from the hearts of men—the Drums of Battersea.
Where the hearses hurry ever, and where man lives like a beast,
They can feel the war-drums beating—men of Hell! and London East.
And the far-off foreign farmers, fighting fiercely to be free,
Found new courage in the echo of the Drums of Battersea.
More drums! War drums!
Beating for the free—
Beating on the hearts of men—the Drums of Battersea.
And the drummers! Ah! the drummers!—stern and haggard men are those
Standing grimly at their meetings; and their washed and mended clothes
Speak of worn-out wives behind them and of grinding poverty—
But the English of the English beat the Drums of Battersea!
More drums! War drums!
Drums of agony—
The big bruised heart of England’s in the Drums of Battersea.
Where in fields slave Englishwomen, Oh! the sound of drums is there:
I have heard it in the laughter of the nights of Leicester Square—
Sailing southward with the summer, London but a dream to me,
Still I feel the distant thunder of the Drums of Battersea!
More drums! War drums!
Drums of Liberty—
Rolling round the English world—the Drums of Battersea.
Oh! I heard them in the Queen’s Hall—aye! and London heard that night—
While we formed up round the leaders while they struck one blow for right!
And the old strength, that old fire, that I thought was dead in me,
Blazed up fiercely at the beating of the Drums of Battersea!
More drums! War drums!
They beat for victory—
When above the roar of Jingoes rolled the Drums of Battersea.
And where’er my feet may wander, and howe’er I lay my head,
I shall hear them while I’m dreaming—I shall hear them when I’m dead!
For they beat for men and women, beat for Christ, and you and me:
There is hope and there is terror in the Drums of Battersea!
More drums! War drums!
Drums of destiny—
There’s hope!—there’s hope for England in the Drums of Battersea.
poem by Henry Lawson
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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