The Bough of Nonsense
AN IDYLL
Back from the Somme two Fusiliers
Limped painfully home; the elder said,
S. “Robert, I’ve lived three thousand years
This Summer, and I’m nine parts dead.”
R. “But if that’s truly so,” I cried, “quick, now,
Through these great oaks and see the famous bough
”Where once a nonsense built her nest
With skulls and flowers and all things queer,
In an old boot, with patient breast
Hatching three eggs; and the next year…”
S. “Foaled thirteen squamous young beneath, and rid
Wales of drink, melancholy, and psalms, she did.”
Said he, “Before this quaint mood fails,
We’ll sit and weave a nonsense hymn,”
R. “Hanging it up with monkey tails
In a deep grove all hushed and dim….”
S. “To glorious yellow-bunched banana-trees,”
R. “Planted in dreams by pious Portuguese,”
S. “Which men are wise beyond their time,
And worship nonsense, no one more.”
R. “Hard by, among old quince and lime,
They’ve built a temple with no floor,”
S. “And whosoever worships in that place,
He disappears from sight and leaves no trace.”
R. “Once the Galatians built a fane
To Sense: what duller God than that?”
S. “But the first day of autumn rain
The roof fell in and crushed them flat.”
R. “Ay, for a roof of subtlest logic falls
When nonsense is foundation for the walls.”
I tell him old Galatian tales;
He caps them in quick Portuguese,
While phantom creatures with green scales
Scramble and roll among the trees.
The hymn swells; on a bough above us sings
A row of bright pink birds, flapping their wings.
poem by Robert Graves
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Related quotes
I Built This House
I built this house from its foundation
It's foundation I made it strong
So that it can't be shaken
By anything
I built this house
On love
Not on lies
I built this house
I turned it into a home
And that was my vision
I built this house
Just like a wise woman
A woman who builds a house on a foundation of a rock
Not like a foolish woman
Who builds a house
On a sand
And then turns and destroys it with her hands
I won't allow anything to break it down
To break my children and my husband
With nonsense
With arguments, alcohol and unfaithfulness
So devil you better live
Cause I built this house
On top of the rock Jesus
poem by Vangile Mtyali
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Accept what You can't Change!
If sun is too hot,
accept it,
It is summer, drink water when thirsty,
one can at most keep himself cool,
Not the
entire world!
If it is raining heavy,
Either open your umbrella,
Or just move under roof,
One can't spread umbrella,
Over whole world!
If it is chilling cold of winter,
Falling snow make you sure,
Wear a coat or move near fireplace,
One can't burn whole towns or forest
to keep whole world warm!
learn limits of temporal soul,
bear it, accept it and live,
Happy with your own,
Hurricanes and storms,
Tempests or drought,
one has to transcend,
Transforming his own,
May whatever fight one has to fight,
Greatest is that fight,
fight against own,
Greatest fight ever fought!
May it to fight for living,
may it to change something,
Or may to accept things,
The fight is always on,
Fight of Self against non self,
fight of sense against nonsense,
If one wants to live fightless,
Live to learn to find sense in nonsense,
nonsense or sense that all is in you,
Chose to fight or to surrender,
One has to pay for what willfully done,
Need not pay for what is natural!
poem by Ramdas Bhandarkar
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I Wrote A Nonsense Poem
I WROTE A NONSENSE POEM
I wrote a nonsense poem
It said a nonsense thing
Yesterday is not today
And winter is not spring.
I wrote a nonsense poem
It didn’t have a name
It began and so fast finished
No wonder I’m ashamed.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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What is sense?
A fool speaks nonsense,
In which a wise one finds sense.
A wise one makes all sense
That a fool takes as nonsense.
What is sense?
21.05.2002, Pakd
poem by Rm. Shanmugam Chettiar
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The Barn
They should never have built a barn there, at all -
Drip, drip, drip! - under that elm tree,
Though when it was young. Now it is old
But good, not like the barn and me.
To-morrow they cut it down. They will leave
The barn, as I shall be left, maybe.
What holds it up? 'Twould not pay to pull down.
Well, this place has no other antiquity.
No abbey or castle looks so old
As this that Job Knight built in '54,
Built to keep corn for rats and men.
Now there's fowls in the roof, pigs on the floor.
What thatch survives is dung for the grass,
The best grass on the farm. A pity the roof
Will not bear a mower to mow it. But
Only fowls have foothold enough.
Starlings used to sit there with bubbling throats
Making a spiky beard as they chattered
And whistled and kissed, with heads in air,
Till they thought of something else that mattered.
But now they cannot find a place,
Among all those holes, for a nest any more.
It's the turn of lesser things, I suppose.
Once I fancied 'twas starlings they built it for.
poem by Edward Thomas
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It's A Queer Time
It's hard to know if you're alive or dead
When steel and fire go roaring through your head.
One moment you'll be crouching at your gun
Traversing, mowing heaps down half in fun:
The next, you choke and clutch at your right breast -
No time to think - leave all - and off you go…
To Treasure Island where the Spice winds blow,
To lovely groves of mango, quince and lime -
Breathe no good-bye, but ho, for the Red West!
It's a queer time.
You're charging madly at them yelling 'Fag!'
When somehow something gives and your feet drag.
You fall and strike your head; yet feel no pain
And find… you're digging tunnels through the hay
In the Big Barn, 'cause it's a rainy day.
Oh, springy hay, and lovely beams to climb!
You're back in the old sailor suit again.
It's a queer time.
Or you'll be dozing safe in your dug-out -
A great roar-the trench shakes and falls about
You're struggling, gasping, struggling, then… hullo!
Elsie comes tripping gaily down the trench,
Hanky to nose-that lyddite makes a stench -
Getting her pinafore all over grime.
Funny! because she died ten years ago!
It's a queer time.
The trouble is, things happen much too quick;
Up jump the Boches, rifles thump and click,
You stagger, and the whole scene fades away:
Even good Christians don't like passing straight
From Tipperary or their Hymn of Hate
To Alleluiah-chanting, and the chime
Of golden harps… and… I'm not well to-day…
It's a queer time.
poem by Robert Graves
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If every trace of any single religion were wiped out and nothing were passsed on, it would never be created exactly that way again. There might be some other nonsense in its place, but not that exact nonsense. If all of science were wiped out, it would still be true and someone would find a way to figure it all out again.
quote by Penn Jillette
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The nonsense woman
The nonsense woman lives in our street
She really is not a pleasure to meet
She goes on and on about her cat Mylogie
And makes our day quite foggy
The nonsense woman went to the shops
That was just before she drops
Her cat Mylogie
And got quite soggy
The nonsense woman found another cat
The cat sat on her mat
She called it Tinker
Who was a bit of a stinker
The nonsense woman lay in bed
But to her lonliness and dread
Tinker and Mylogie were both gone
So these days she won't even eat a scone
Very much to our relief
She has got so much grief
She won't even come out her house
And all day is a quiet as a mouse
poem by by unknown author
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This House
(nile rodgers)
This house is built
On a foundation of love
This house is built
On a foundation of love
Our toys are in the attic baby
Pictures on the wall
We can see our memories
From the days past in the mirror
Down the hall, oh yeah
Our love will survive in our own little paradise
So inspired, so inspired
Palatial it may not be
But its a home and a castle to me
A dream from a magazine
And well never give it up cause
This house is built
On a foundation of love
This house is built
On a foundation of love
Ill try to comfort you baby
You try to comfort me yeah
I know you love me
With all your heart, oh yeah
cause you say you do
You know that when you are sad
Ill be there in a flash
At the drop of a hat, oh yeah
cause I want you to feel love
And you dont have to say a thing
You dont have to ask, cause baby
This house is built
On a foundation of love
This house is built
On a foundation of love
Maybe well strike it rich
One day really make it big
And I know because our love is so strong
Well always have a home
This house is built
On a foundation of love
This house is built
On a foundation of love
This house is built
On a foundation of love
This house is built
On a foundation of love
This house is built
On a foundation of love
This house is built
On a foundation of love
song performed by by Diana Ross
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Sense
Sense
Which makes some sense
Other than nonsense
Supreme sense
Is civic sense.
Embedded with moral sense
Inject sense
In this universe
Oozing with nonsense.
poem by Sanjay Mehta
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Forgive me my nonsense, as I also forgive the nonsense of those that think they talk sense.
quote by Robert Frost
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Forgive me my nonsense as I also forgive the nonsense of those who think they talk sense.
quote by Robert Frost
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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All philosophies, if you ride them home, are nonsense, but some are greater nonsense than others.
quote by Samuel Butler
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A Child's Nightmare
Through long nursery nights he stood
By my bed unwearying,
Loomed gigantic, formless, queer,
Purring in my haunted ear
That same hideous nightmare thing,
Talking, as he lapped my blood,
In a voice cruel and flat,
Saying for ever, "Cat! ... Cat! ... Cat!..."
That one word was all he said,
That one word through all my sleep,
In monotonous mock despair.
Nonsense may be light as air,
But there's Nonsense that can keep
Horror bristling round the head,
When a voice cruel and flat
Says for ever, "Cat! ... Cat! ... Cat!..."
He had faded, he was gone
Years ago with Nursery Land,
When he leapt on me again
From the clank of a night train,
Overpowered me foot and head,
Lapped my blood, while on and on
The old voice cruel and flat
Says for ever, "Cat! ... Cat! ... Cat!..."
Morphia drowsed, again I lay
In a crater by High Wood:
He was there with straddling legs,
Staring eyes as big as eggs,
Purring as he lapped my blood,
His black bulk darkening the day,
With a voice cruel and flat,
"Cat! ... Cat! ... Cat! ... Cat!..." he said, "Cat! ... Cat!..."
When I'm shot through heart and head,
And there's no choice but to die,
The last word I'll hear, no doubt,
Won't be "Charge!" or "Bomb them out!"
Nor the stretcher-bearer's cry,
"Let that body be, he's dead!"
But a voice cruel and flat
Saying for ever, "Cat! ... Cat! ... Cat!"
poem by Robert Graves
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It is all nonsense, to be sure; and so much the greater nonsense inasmuch as the true interpretation of many dreams - not by any means of all dreams - moves, it may be said, in the opposite direction to the method of psycho-analysis.
quote by Arthur Machen
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Built To Last
There are times when you must beckon,
There are times when you must fall.
You can take a lot of wrecking,
But you cant take it all.
There are times when I can help you out,
And times when you must fall.
There are times when you must live in doubt,
And I cant help at all.
Two blue stars, shine oer the hill.
Plead no more, now just be still.
Through the night, now safely there.
Show me something built to last.
Been held by the fire,
Yes and im, held by the ring.
You can walk on balls of fire,
But sometimes you might bleed.
There are times when I have begged you
And you do the same to me.
If you cant or wont admit it,
At least we pulled you through.
Three blue stars, set oer the hill.
Call them back; you never will.
All these trials, soon be dead.
We all need something built to last.
Built to last till time of seven,
Falls tumbling from the sky.
Built to last till lightness fades,
And darkness falls on all.
Built to last till years roll back
Our couch perched in the sky
Show me something different,
Or something built to try.
There are times when you get hit up on,
Try hard but you cannot give.
Other times, youd gladly go
With what you need to give.
Dont be afraid to save your face,
When you have done your best
Now I wont forget,
Next day try the rest.
All the stars, are gone but one.
Morning dreams, we found the sun.
Show me something built to last
Two blue stones, shine oer the hill.
Call it back; you never will
All these trials, now are dead.
Show me something built to last.
All the stars, are gone but one.
Morning dreams. here comes the sun.
Through the night, now sinking fast.
Show me something built to last.
song performed by by Grateful Dead
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Why Do You Think That I Am Ambitious?
you met me a long time ago,
20 years ago, i counted the passing years
i did not know what your impression of me
was.
when our paths met a few days ago
you wrote me a letter
telling me that i am an ambitious man
there is nothing wrong with ambition
it is a positive trait
to go forward in life
but i am not really ambitious
i live a very simple life
not that kind that Basho lived when he was once here
on this very place of a simple dwelling
a leaking roof where drops of rain serve as count
for the rhythm of
a poem
banana leaves to five space for something green
a perfectly opened window the one that does not close even at night
because we all want to see the hills and trees
the landscape of flowers and grass
we even want to take the roof out
so we can see all the stars.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The Birds Of Passage
Birds, joyous birds of the wandering wing!
Whence is it ye come with the flowers of spring?
–'We come from the shores of the green old Nile,
From the land where the roses of Sharon smile,
From the palms that wave thro' the Indian sky,
From the myrrh-trees of glowing Araby.
'We have swept o'er cities in song renown'd,–
Silent they lie with the deserts round!
We have cross'd proud rivers, whose tide hath roll'd
All dark with the warrior-blood of old;
And each worn wing hath regain'd its home,
Under peasant's roof-tree, or monarch's dome.'
And what have ye found in the monarch's dome,
Since last ye travers'd the blue sea's foam?
–'We have found a change, we have found a pall,
And a gloom o'ershadowing the banquet's hall,
And a mark on the floor as of life-drops spilt,–
Nought looks the same, save the nest we built!'
Oh! joyous birds, it hath still been so;
Thro' the halls of kings doth the tempest go!
But the huts of the hamlet lie still and deep,
And the hills o'er their quiet a vigil keep.–
Say what have ye found in the peasant's cot,
Since last ye parted from that sweet spot?
'A change we have found there–and many a change!
Faces, and footsteps, and all things strange!
Gone are the heads of the silvery hair,
And the young that were, have a brow of care,
And the place is hush'd where the children play'd,–
Nought looks the same, save the nest we made!'
Sad is your tale of the beautiful earth,
Birds that o'ersweep it in power and mirth!
Yet thro' the wastes of the trackless air,
Ye have a Guide, and shall we despair?
Ye over desert and deep have pass'd,–
So may we reach our bright home at last!
poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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Forests of the Heart
Deep within the forests of the heart,
Resides a town lit by fireflies.
Dwellings built within the trees,
All beneath the starry skies.
Homely lights amongst the foliage,
Bridges and ladders a plenty.
Rustling leaves cure the soul,
As the beams creak gently.
Hark, the herald sparrow sings!
It twitters from Oak's limb.
The river gurgles round the bend,
And along it the fish do swim.
But with the song of the stream,
comes the whisper of the trees.
With the tale of the undergrowth,
Comes the ballad of the breeze.
The moonlight reaches the forest floor,
To show the fairies atop the stools.
With leaves for their rowboats,
They sail across the silver pools.
Deep within the forests of the heart,
Resides a town lit by fireflies.
Dwellings built within the trees,
All beneath the starry skies.
poem by Stephanie Dower
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Prolific
he will not be a river
that runs dry
come drought
he will be the sea
as always
deep and blue
and mysterious
and he will speak
everything
interesting or not
from continent to
continent
from shore to shore
till everything
becomes the sea
till all the islands
are erased
till all the glaciers melt
till the world
becomes eaten by
the mouth of the
big water
he will never have
the writer's block
for in all truth
he will be everything
but sense and
nonsense
with the domination
of the latter of course
and you
who is curious shall read
till the last word
because you too
expects much
and then you make a sigh
you relate
and say i am also what i am
sense and nonsense
wise and otherwise.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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