Little Exercise
For Thomas Edwards Wanning
Think of the storm roaming the sky uneasily
like a dog looking for a place to sleep in,
listen to it growling.
Think how they must look now, the mangrove keys
lying out there unresponsive to the lightning
in dark, coarse-fibred families,
where occasionally a heron may undo his head,
shake up his feathers, make an uncertain comment
when the surrounding water shines.
Think of the boulevard and the little palm trees
all stuck in rows, suddenly revealed
as fistfuls of limp fish-skeletons.
It is raining there. The boulevard
and its broken sidewalks with weeds in every crack,
are relieved to be wet, the sea to be freshened.
Now the storm goes away again in a series
of small, badly lit battle-scenes,
each in "Another part of the field."
Think of someone sleeping in the bottom of a row-boat
tied to a mangrove root or the pile of a bridge;
think of him as uninjured, barely disturbed.
poem by Elizabeth Bishop
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Related quotes
Winter (in answer to D. J. Opperman)
Through dark nights I am alone,
I am still missing you in this bleak season
while the storm wind blows strong in the rain,
I forget everything that love could do,
while I hear the storm moaning like a beast,
when the weather trembles wet against the windows,
then the naked trees do not have any leaves
and then suddenly everything around me gets silent,
over your life so completely wasted.
[Reference: "Voorwinter" "Pre-winter" by D. J. Opperman.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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Norse lullaby
The sky is dark and the hills are white
As the storm-king speeds from the north to-night,
And this is the song the storm-king sings,
As over the world his cloak he flings:
"Sleep, sleep, little one, sleep;"
He rustles his wings and gruffly sings:
"Sleep, little one, sleep."
On yonder mountain-side a vine
Clings at the foot of a mother pine;
The tree bends over the trembling thing,
And only the vine can hear her sing:
"Sleep, sleep, little one, sleep;
What shall you fear when I am here?
Sleep, little one, sleep."
The king may sing in his bitter flight,
The tree may croon to the vine to-night,
But the little snowflake at my breast
Liketh the song I sing the best,--
Sleep, sleep, little one, sleep;
Weary thou art, anext my heart
Sleep, little one, sleep.
poem by Eugene Field
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The Day I Got My Finger Stuck Up My Nose
When I got my finger stuck up my nose
I went to a doctor, who said,
"Nothing like this has happened before,
We will have to chop off your head."
"It's only my finger stuck up my nose,
It's only my finger!" I said.
"I see what it is," the doctor replied,
"But we'll still have to chop off your head."
He went to the cabinet and took out an axe.
I watched with considerable dread.
"But it's only my finger stuck up my nose.
It's only a finger!" I said.
"Perhaps we can yank it out with a hook
Tied to some surgical thread.
Maybe we can try that," he replied
"Rather than chop off your head."
"I'm never going to pick it again.
I've now learned my lesson," I said.
"I won't stick my finger up my nose -
I'll stick it in my ear instead."
poem by Brian Patten
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The White Woman At Sunset Boulevard
she was the woman who left me.
She hands me the back of her bones.
she does not bother looking anymore at the past.
she hates me. she detests
every word that i say.
she will not answer my call.
She says i am a liar and had always been lying to her.
The dirt in my arms are terrible, she says, these arms
that used to hold her too tightly that she cannot breathe
are broken branches of the rotten tree.
She walks away towards the dark side of the sunset boulevard, that place unreachable by the night lights. Beyond the hold of my arms, beyond the grasp of my lips.
she already loosened all the screws and bolts of the bicycle
that we used to ride together every afternoon on this sunset boulevard.
all the parts are scattered near the shore of the sea.
The waves reached them and they all get too rusty.
She does not talk to me anymore, this white woman at sunset boulevard.
She walks fast.
She runs.
Her eyes sharp, and flaming with anger against the rage of the dark,
away from the city lights, away from my lies, away from the
warmth of my whisper.
I am her wrath.
I am the source and cause of her anger.
Her pains, her sorrows for years and years when i left her
without leaving any word.
When my name was finally eaten by the waves of the sea in
sunset boulevard. When she drowned.
she left rushing like a storm towards another island.
she destroys houses and
fell the trees.
She goes away just like that, as quickly as suddenly
as a gnashing teeth of the cyclone.
I whispered her name to calm her down.
She hurriedly left.
She did not see that tears too that fell to the sand. They are mine. Salty, fresh tears. Hidden inside my bags for years. Twenty-five years of solitude.
More than that for my loneliness on an unknown island where i was stranded beyond my power. There was not a single boat to take me to her.
She did not
look back. She would not believe me.
But she is right.
My tears are not as salty as the whole sea that she swallowed when she drowned on that very day when i left her.
I have not
given her the reason. I have them ready from the bottom of my heart.
She tells her friends:
She does not want to be duped again. One of me, is enough.She is gone.
I happened to her once in her lifetime. She, is likewise.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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The Runcorn Ferry
On the banks of the Mersey, o'er on Cheshire side,
Lies Runcorn that's best known to fame
By Transporter Bridge as takes folks over t'stream,
Or else brings them back across same.
In days afore Transporter Bridge were put up,
A ferryboat lay in the slip,
And old Ted the boatman would row folks across
At per tuppence per person per trip.
Now Runcorn lay over on one side of stream,
And Widnes on t'other side stood,
And, as nobody wanted to go either place,
Well, the trade wasn't any too good.
One evening, to Ted's superlative surprise,
Three customers came into view:
A Mr and Mrs Ramsbottom it were,
And Albert, their little son, too.
"How much for the three?" Mr Ramsbottom asked,
As his hand to his pocket did dip.
Ted said: "Same for three as it would be for one,
Per tuppence per person per trip."
"You're not charging tuppence for that little lad?"
Said Mother, her eyes flashing wild.
"Per tuppence per person per trip", answered Ted,
"Per woman, per man, or per child".
"Fivepence for three, that's the most that I'll pay",
Said Father, "Don't waste time in talk".
"Per tuppence per person per trip", answered Ted,
"And them, as can't pay, 'as to walk!"
"We can walk, an' all", said Father. "Come Mother,
It's none so deep, weather's quite mild".
So into the water the three of them stepped:
The father, the mother, the child.
The further they paddled, the deeper it got,
But they wouldn't give in, once begun.
In the spirit that's made Lancashire what she is,
They'd sooner be drownded than done.
Very soon, the old people were up to their necks,
And the little lad clean out of sight.
Said Father: "Where's Albert?" And Mother replied:
"I've got hold of his hand, he's all right!"
Well, just at that moment, Pa got an idea
And, floundering back to old Ted, He said:
"We've walked half-way. Come, tak' us the rest
For half-price -- that's a penny a head."
But Ted wasn't standing for none of that there,
And, making an obstinate lip,
"Per tuppence per person per trip", Ted replied,
"Per trip, or per part of per trip".
"All right, then", said Father, "let me tak' the boat,
And I'll pick up the others half-way.
I'll row them across, and I'll bring the boat back,
And thruppence in t'bargain I'll pay".
T'were money for nothing. Ted answered: "Right-ho",
And Father got hold of the sculls.
With the sharp end of boat towards middle of stream,
He were there in a couple of pulls.
He got Mother out -- it were rather a job,
With the water, she weighed half a ton --
Then, pushing the oar down the side of the boat,
Started fishing around for his son.
When poor little Albert came up to the top,
His collars were soggy and limp.
And, with holding his breath at the bottom so long,
His face were as red as a shrimp.
Pa took them across, and he brought the boat back,
And he said to old Ted on the slip:
"Wilt' row me across by me'sen?" Ted said:
"Aye, at per tuppence per person per trip".
When they got t'other side, Father laughed fit to bust.
He'd got best of bargain, you see.
He'd worked it all out, and he'd got his own way,
And he'd paid nobbut fivepence for three!
poem by Marriott Edgar
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Seascape
This celestial seascape, with white herons got up as angels,
flying high as they want and as far as they want sidewise
in tiers and tiers of immaculate reflections;
the whole region, from the highest heron
down to the weightless mangrove island
with bright green leaves edged neatly with bird-droppings
like illumination in silver,
and down to the suggestively Gothic arches of the mangrove roots
and the beautiful pea-green back-pasture
where occasionally a fish jumps, like a wildflower
in an ornamental spray of spray;
this cartoon by Raphael for a tapestry for a Pope:
it does look like heaven.
But a skeletal lighthouse standing there
in black and white clerical dress,
who lives on his nerves, thinks he knows better.
He thinks that hell rages below his iron feet,
that that is why the shallow water is so warm,
and he knows that heaven is not like this.
Heaven is not like flying or swimming,
but has something to do with blackness and a strong glare
and when it gets dark he will remember something
strongly worded to say on the subject.
poem by Elizabeth Bishop
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The Pity Of It
I walked in loamy Wessex lanes, afar
From rail-track and from highway, and I heard
In field and farmstead many an ancient word
Of local lineage like "Thu bist," "Er war,"
"Ich woll," "Er sholl," and by-talk similar,
Nigh as they speak who in this month's moon gird
At England's very loins, thereunto spurred
By gangs whose glory threats and slaughters are.
Then seemed a Heart crying: "Whosoever they be
At root and bottom of this, who flung this flame
Between kin folk kin tongued even as are we,
Sinister, ugly, lurid, be their fame;
May their familiars grow to shun their name,
And their brood perish everlastingly."
poem by Thomas Hardy
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The Shag
"What is that great bird, sister, tell me,
Perched high on the top of the crag?"
"'T is the cormorant, dear little brother;
The fishermen call it the shag."
"But what does it there, sister, tell me,
Sitting lonely against the black sky?"
"It has settled to rest, little brother;
It hears the wild gale wailing high."
"But I am afraid of it, sister,
For over the sea and the land
It gazes, so black and so silent!"
"Little brother, hold fast to my hand."
"Oh, what was that, sister? The thunder?
Did the shag bring the storm and the cloud,
The wind and the rain and the lightning?"
"Little brother, the thunder roars loud.
"Run fast, for the rain sweeps the ocean;
Look! over the light-house it streams;
And the lightning leaps red, and above us
The gulls fill the air with their screams."
O'er the beach, o'er the rocks, running swiftly,
The little white cottage they gain;
And safely they watch from the window
The dance and the rush of the rain.
But the shag kept his place on the headland,
And when the brief storm had gone by,
He shook his loose plumes, and they saw him
Rise splendid and strong in the sky.
Clinging fast to the gown of his sister,
The little boy laughed as he flew;
"He is gone with the wind and the lightning!
And -- I am not frightened, -- are you?"
poem by Celia Thaxter
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Crack The Sky
the thunder outside
echoing across this land,
a voice of reason across insane minds
and stable hearts
the lightning crack
that tears the sky,
as if thousands of screaming voices
lamenting their tormentations in hell,
they split the sky
a crack a bolt a jolt
of thunderous lightning
Zap to the soul what youth has lost
and rewrite our chemistry
filling the blood with seeping hot plasma,
oh lightning you crack the sky
and bring about the new
it's raining, it's raining,
oh it's raining
and the lightning splits the sky
a crack a bolt a jolt
of thunderous applause,
as the kingdoms of man go out of style
and the retrocity of our species
begins a new,
it's raining, it's raining,
oh it is raining,
and the lightning cracks the sky
so that one day we will know to fly.
poem by David Thomas
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Dancin, Shaggin On The Boulevard
Written by randy owen, teddy gentry, and greg fowler
Well the magic attics where the music rolls
And the army-navys got ol jackie soul
Down on peaches corner there are good ol boys
And mother fletchers makin lots of noise
Theyre dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
Dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
Well the tams are playin at the port-o-call
And the drifters underneath the boardwalk
At the sapnish galleon and ol fat jacks
Jukebox playin and the place is packed
You bet theyre dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
You know theyre dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
Got the top down and the traffics slow
Sun fun week and, we all go
Where the girls are sunnin and lookin good
Well I never met em but I wish I could
And wed go dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
Wed go dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
Well the embers singin up on ocean drive
And the castaways are gettin loud tonight
At the electric circus they all getin down
And the carousels spinnin round and round
See them dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
I see em dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
Well Im hangin out down at sloppy joes
They may doze but they never close
And the bama boys at the bowery
They cant dance but they play for free
But they like dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
They know dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
They wrote dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
Dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
Dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
Shaggin on the boulevard
Dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
Dancin, shaggin on the boulevard
song performed by by Alabama
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Quarrel
Our quarrel seemed a giant thing,
It made the room feel mean and small,
The books, the lamp, the furniture,
The very pictures on the wall--
Crowded upon us as we sat
Pale and terrified, face to face.
"Why do you stay?" she said, "my room
Can never be your resting place."
"Katinka, ere we part for life,
I pray you walk once more with me."
So down the dark, familiar road
We paced together, silently.
The sky--it seemed on fire with stars!
I said:--"Katinka dear, look up!"
Like thirsty children, both of us
Drank from the giant loving cup.
"Who were those dolls?" Katinka said
"What were their stupid, vague alarms?"
And suddenly we turned and laughed
And rushed into each other's arms.
poem by Katherine Mansfield
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At Lulworth Cove a Century Back
Had I but lived a hundred years ago
I might have gone, as I have gone this year,
By Warmwell Cross on to a Cove I know,
And Time have placed his finger on me there:
"You see that man?" -- I might have looked, and said,
"O yes: I see him. One that boat has brought
Which dropped down Channel round Saint Alban's Head.
So commonplace a youth calls not my thought."
"You see that man?" -- "Why yes; I told you; yes:
Of an idling town-sort; thin; hair brown in hue;
And as the evening light scants less and less
He looks up at a star, as many do."
"You see that man?" -- "Nay, leave me!" then I plead,
"I have fifteen miles to vamp across the lea,
And it grows dark, and I am weary-kneed:
I have said the third time; yes, that man I see!"
"Good. That man goes to Rome -- to death, despair;
And no one notes him now but you and I:
A hundred years, and the world will follow him there,
And bend with reverence where his ashes lie."
poem by Thomas Hardy
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The ABC
'Twas midnight in the schoolroom
And every desk was shut
When suddenly from the alphabet
Was heard a loud "Tut-Tut!"
Said A to B, "I don't like C;
His manners are a lack.
For all I ever see of C
Is a semi-circular back!"
"I disagree," said D to B,
"I've never found C so.
From where I stand he seems to be
An uncompleted O."
C was vexed, "I'm much perplexed,
You criticise my shape.
I'm made like that, to help spell Cat
And Cow and Cool and Cape."
"He's right" said E; said F, "Whoopee!"
Said G, "'Ip, 'Ip, 'ooray!"
"You're dropping me," roared H to G.
"Don't do it please I pray."
"Out of my way," LL said to K.
"I'll make poor I look ILL."
To stop this stunt J stood in front,
And presto! ILL was JILL.
"U know," said V, "that W
Is twice the age of me.
For as a Roman V is five
I'm half as young as he."
X and Y yawned sleepily,
"Look at the time!" they said.
"Let's all get off to beddy byes."
They did, then "Z-z-z."
poem by Spike Milligan
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About Last Night
the boat was small
the glass window is round
like an eyeball
looking out to the
vast sea
it is dark
the black shark is a shadow
inside the dark
blueness of the
night water
there is a storm
a man stands
waiting for what comes next
he must jump
to the water
if needs be
the big eye of the fish
stares at him
with fury
that night
they were eye to eye
and then the fish
passes away
opposite the boat's
direction
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Our Captain's Last Words
Where the foremost flag was flying,
Pierce'd by manny a shot and shell,
Where the bravest men were dying,
There our gallant captain fell.
"Boys! you follow now another;
Follow till the foe shall yield;"
Then he whisper'd, "Tell my mother
Stephen died upon the field."
"Mother!"
"Moth er!"
"Stephen died upon the field."
Through the battle they bore him,
But his words were growing wild;
Heeding not the scenes before him,
Stephen was once more a child.
"Ah, she comes! there is no other
Speaks my name with such a joy;
Press me to your bosom, mother,
Call my still your darling joy."
"Mother!"
"Mother !"
"Call my still your darling joy."
Men who were not used to weeping,
Turn'd aside to hide a tear,
When they saw the pallor creeping,
That assured them death was near.
Kindly as he were a brother,
Strangers caught his parting breath,
Laden with the mumur "mother"
Last upon his lips in death.
"Mother!"
"Mother!&qu ot;
Last upon his lips in death.
poem by Henry Clay Work
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Sonnet V: Nothing But No
Nothing but "No," and "Aye," and "Aye," and "No"?
How falls it out so strangely you reply?
I tell ye, Fair, I'll not be answer'd so,
With this affirming "No," denying "Aye."
I say, "I love," you slightly answer "Aye";
I say, "You love," you pule me out a "No";
I say, "I die," you echo me an "Aye";
"Save me," I cry, you sigh me out a "No";
Must woe and I have nought but "No" and "Aye"?
No I am I, if I no more can have;
Answer no more, with silence make reply,
And let me take myself what I do crave.
Let "No" and "Aye" with I and you be so;
Then answer "No," and "Aye," and "Aye" and "No."
poem by Michael Drayton
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What Goes Around . . .
In position and out of sight,
hiding until the time was right,
the cat crawled forward with such skill,
the bird could not escape the "kill." It happened almost every day.
The cat would never miss its prey.
So many kills against its name,
it loved to play that "pouncing" game. But then one day, the cat outside,
not chasing birds, no need to hide,
just lying in the grass to rest,
and dreaming of that new found nest. But suddenly, an angry cry,
the sound of many birds nearby.
Like bombers on a bombing run,
they started "swooping" one by one. The battle on, surprise attack,
the cat "pinned down," could not fight back.
The "message" on that battleground,
what goes around does come around.
poem by Art Milkes
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Faithless Sally Brown
Young Ben he was a nice young man,
A carpenter by trade;
And he fell in love with Sally Brown,
That was a lady's maid.
But as they fetch'd a walk one day,
They met a press-gang crew;
And Sally she did faint away,
Whilst Ben he was brought to.
The Boatswain swore with wicked words,
Enough to shock a saint,
That though she did seem in a fit,
'Twas nothing but a feint.
"Come, girl," said he, "hold up your head,
He'll be as good as me;
For when your swain is in our boat,
A boatswain he will be."
So when they'd made their game of her,
And taken off her elf,
She roused, and found she only was
A coming to herself.
"And is he gone, and is he gone?"
She cried, and wept outright:
"Then I will to the water side,
And see him out of sight."
A waterman came up to her,--
"Now, young woman," said he,
"If you weep on so, you will make
Eye-water in the sea."
"Alas! they've taken my beau Ben
To sail with old Benbow;"
And her woe began to run afresh,
As if she'd said Gee woe!
Says he, "They've only taken him
To the Tender ship, you see";
"The Tender-ship," cried Sally Brown
"What a hard-ship that must be!"
"O! would I were a mermaid now,
For then I'd follow him;
But Oh!--I'm not a fish-woman,
And so I cannot swim.
"Alas! I was not born beneath
The virgin and the scales,
So I must curse my cruel stars,
And walk about in Wales."
Now Ben had sail'd to many a place
That's underneath the world;
But in two years the ship came home,
And all her sails were furl'd.
But when he call'd on Sally Brown,
To see how she went on,
He found she'd got another Ben,
Whose Christian-name was John.
"O Sally Brown, O Sally Brown,
How could you serve me so?
I've met with many a breeze before,
But never such a blow":
Then reading on his 'bacco box
He heaved a bitter sigh,
And then began to eye his pipe,
And then to pipe his eye.
And then he tried to sing "All's Well,"
But could not though he tried;
His head was turn'd, and so he chew'd
His pigtail till he died.
His death, which happen'd in his berth,
At forty-odd befell:
They went and told the sexton, and
The sexton toll'd the bell.
poem by Thomas Hood
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Burial of Sarah
He stood before the sons of Heth,
And bowed his sorrowing head;
"I've come," he said, "to buy a place
Where I may lay my dead.
"I am a stranger in your land,
My home has lost its light;
Grant me a place where I may lay
My dead away from sight."
Then tenderly the sons of Heth
Gazed on the mourner's face,
And said, "Oh, Prince, amid our dead,
Choose thou her resting-place.
"The sepulchres of those we love,
We place at thy command;
Against the plea thy grief hath made
We close not heart nor hand."
The patriarch rose and bowed his head,
And said, "One place I crave;
'Tis at the end of Ephron's field,
And called Machpelah's cave.
"Entreat him that he sell to me
For her last sleep that cave;
I do not ask for her I loved
The freedom of a grave."
The son of Zohar answered him,
"Hearken, my lord, to me;
Before our sons, the field and cave
I freely give to thee."
"I will not take it as a gift,"
The grand old man then said;
"I pray thee let me buy the place
Where I may lay my dead."
And with the promise in his heart,
His seed should own that land,
He gave the shekels for the field
He took from Ephron's hand.
And saw afar the glorious day
His chosen seed should tread,
The soil where he in sorrow lay
His loved and cherished dead.
poem by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper
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Will there really be a "Morning"?
101
Will there really be a "Morning"?
Is there such a thing as "Day"?
Could I see it from the mountains
If I were as tall as they?
Has it feet like Water lilies?
Has it feathers like a Bird?
Is it brought from famous countries
Of which I have never heard?
Oh some Scholar! Oh some Sailor!
Oh some Wise Men from the skies!
Please to tell a little Pilgrim
Where the place called "Morning" lies!
poem by Emily Dickinson
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