En.Citatepedia^®.ro

Chosen

The lot of love is chosen. I learnt that much
Struggling for an image on the track
Of the whirling Zodiac.
Scarce did he my body touch,
Scarce sank he from the west
Or found a subtetranean rest
On the maternal midnight of my breast
Before I had marked him on his northern way,
And seemed to stand although in bed I lay.
I struggled with the horror of daybreak,
I chose it for my lot! If questioned on
My utmost pleasure with a man
By some new-married bride, I take
That stillness for a theme
Where his heart my heart did seem
And both adrift on the miraculous stream
Where -- wrote a learned astrologer --
The Zodiac is changed into a sphere.

poem by William Butler Yeats
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A Woman Young And Old

I
FATHER AND CHILD
SHE hears me strike the board and say
That she is under ban
Of all good men and women,
Being mentioned with a man
That has the worst of all bad names;
And thereupon replies
That his hair is beautiful,
Cold as the March wind his eyes.

II
BEFORE THE WORLD WAS MADE

IF I make the lashes dark
And the eyes more bright
And the lips more scarlet,
Or ask if all be right
From mirror after mirror,
No vanity's displayed:
I'm looking for the face I had
Before the world was made.
What if I look upon a man
As though on my beloved,
And my blood be cold the while
And my heart unmoved?
Why should he think me cruel
Or that he is betrayed?
I'd have him love the thing that was
Before the world was made.

III
A FIRST CONFESSION

I ADMIT the briar
Entangled in my hair
Did not injure me;
My blenching and trembling,
Nothing but dissembling,
Nothing but coquetry.
I long for truth, and yet
I cannot stay from that
My better self disowns,
For a man's attention
Brings such satisfaction
To the craving in my bones.
Brightness that I pull back
From the Zodiac,
Why those questioning eyes
That are fixed upon me?
What can they do but shun me
If empty night replies?

IV
HER TRIUMPH

I DID the dragon's will until you came
Because I had fancied love a casual
Improvisation, or a settled game
That followed if I let the kerchief fall:
Those deeds were best that gave the minute wings
And heavenly music if they gave it wit;
And then you stood among the dragon-rings.
I mocked, being crazy, but you mastered it
And broke the chain and set my ankles free,
Saint George or else a pagan Perseus;
And now we stare astonished at the sea,
And a miraculous strange bird shrieks at us.

V

CONSOLATION

O BUT there is wisdom
In what the sages said;
But stretch that body for a while
And lay down that head
Till I have told the sages
Where man is comforted.
How could passion run so deep
Had I never thought
That the crime of being born
Blackens all our lot?
But where the crime's committed
The crime can be forgot.

VI
CHOSEN

THE lot of love is chosen. I learnt that much
Struggling for an image on the track
Of the whirling Zodiac.
Scarce did he my body touch,
Scarce sank he from the west
Or found a subtetranean rest
On the maternal midnight of my breast
Before I had marked him on his northern way,
And seemed to stand although in bed I lay.
I struggled with the horror of daybreak,
I chose it for my lot! If questioned on
My utmost pleasure with a man
By some new-married bride, I take
That stillness for a theme
Where his heart my heart did seem
And both adrift on the miraculous stream
Where -- wrote a learned astrologer --
The Zodiac is changed into a sphere.

VII
PARTING
i{He.} Dear, I must be gone
While night Shuts the eyes
Of the household spies;
That song announces dawn.
i{She.} No, night's bird and love's
Bids all true lovers rest,
While his loud song reproves
The murderous stealth of day.
i{He.} Daylight already flies
From mountain crest to crest
i{She.} That light is from the moom.
i{He.} That bird...
i{She.} Let him sing on,
I offer to love's play
My dark declivities.

VIII
HER VISION IN THE WOOD

DRY timber under that rich foliage,
At wine-dark midnight in the sacred wood,
Too old for a man's love I stood in rage
Imagining men. Imagining that I could
A greater with a lesser pang assuage
Or but to find if withered vein ran blood,
I tore my body that its wine might cover
Whatever could rccall the lip of lover.
And after that I held my fingers up,
Stared at the wine-dark nail, or dark that ran
Down every withered finger from the top;
But the dark changed to red, and torches shone,
And deafening music shook the leaves; a troop
Shouldered a litter with a wounded man,
Or smote upon the string and to the sound
Sang of the beast that gave the fatal wound.
All stately women moving to a song
With loosened hair or foreheads grief-distraught,
It seemed a Quattrocento painter's throng,
A thoughtless image of Mantegna's thought --
Why should they think that are for ever young?
Till suddenly in grief's contagion caught,
I stared upon his blood-bedabbled breast
And sang my malediction with the rest.
That thing all blood and mire, that beast-torn wreck,
Half turned and fixed a glazing eye on mine,
And, though love's bitter-sweet had all come back,
Those bodies from a picture or a coin
Nor saw my body fall nor heard it shriek,
Nor knew, drunken with singing as with wine,
That they had brought no fabulous symbol there
But my heart's victim and its torturer.

IX
A LAST CONFESSION

WHAT lively lad most pleasured me
Of all that with me lay?
I answer that I gave my soul
And loved in misery,
But had great pleasure with a lad
That I loved bodily.
Flinging from his arms I laughed
To think his passion such
He fancied that I gave a soul
Did but our bodies touch,
And laughed upon his breast to think
Beast gave beast as much.
I gave what other women gave
'That stepped out of their clothes.
But when this soul, its body off,
Naked to naked goes,
He it has found shall find therein
What none other knows,
And give his own and take his own
And rule in his own right;
And though it loved in misery
Close and cling so tight,
There's not a bird of day that dare
Extinguish that delight.

X
MEETING

HIDDEN by old age awhile
In masker's cloak and hood,
Each hating what the other loved,
Face to face we stood:
'That I have met with such,' said he,
'Bodes me little good.'
'Let others boast their fill,' said I,
'But never dare to boast
That such as I had such a man
For lover in the past;
Say that of living men I hate
Such a man the most.'
'A loony'd boast of such a love,'
He in his rage declared:
But such as he for such as me --
Could we both discard
This beggarly habiliment --
Had found a sweeter word.

XI
FROM THE 'ANTIGONE'

OVERCOME -- O bitter sweetness,
Inhabitant of the soft cheek of a girl --
The rich man and his affairs,
The fat flocks and the fields' fatness,
Mariners, rough harvesters;
Overcome Gods upon Parnassus;
Overcome the Empyrean; hurl
Heaven and Earth out of their places,
That in the Same calamity
Brother and brother, friend and friend,
Family and family,
City and city may contend,
By that great glory driven wild.
Pray I will and sing I must,
And yet I weep -- Oedipus' child
Descends into the loveless dust.

poem by William Butler Yeats
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We need not feel ashamed of flirting with the zodiac. The zodiac is well worth flirting with.

quote by Lillian Smith
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Year's Awakening

How do you know that the pilgrim track
Along the belting zodiac
Swept by the sun in his seeming rounds
Is traced by now to the Fishes' bounds
And into the Ram, when weeks of cloud
Have wrapt the sky in a clammy shroud,
And never as yet a tinct of spring
Has shown in the Earth's apparelling;
O vespering bird, how do you know,
How do you know?

How do you know, deep underground,
Hid in your bed from sight and sound,
Without a turn in temperature,
With weather life can scarce endure,
That light has won a fraction's strength,
And day put on some moments' length,
Whereof in merest rote will come,
Weeks hence, mild airs that do not numb;
O crocus root, how do you know,
How do you know?

poem by Thomas Hardy
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A Mirage

Were I thy bride,
Then the whole world beside
Were not too wide
To hold my wealth of love -
Were I thy bride!
Upon thy breast
My loving head would rest,
As on her nest
The tender turtle-dove -
Were I thy bride!

This heart of mine
Would be one heart with thine,
And in that shrine
Our happiness would dwell -
Were I thy bride!
And all day long
Our lives should be a song:
No grief, no wrong
Should make my heart rebel -
Were I thy bride!

The silvery flute,
The melancholy lute,
Were night-owl's hoot
To my low-whispered coo -
Were I thy bride!
The skylark's trill
Were but discordance shrill
To the soft thrill
Of wooing as I'd woo -
Were I thy bride!

The rose's sigh
Were as a carrion's cry
To lullaby
Such as I'd sing to thee -
Were I thy bride!
A feather's press
Were leaden heaviness
To my caress.
But then, unhappily,
I'm not thy bride!

poem by William Schwenck Gilbert
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Lily Of The West

When first I came to louisville, some pleasure there to find
A damsel there from lexington was pleasing to my mind
Her rosy cheeks, her ruby lips, like arrows pierced my breast
And the name she bore was flora, the lily of the west.
I courted lovely flora some pleasure for to find
But she turned unto another man whose sore distressed my mind
She robbed me of my liberty, deprived me of my rest
Then go, my lovely flora, the lily of the west.
Away down in yonder shady grove, a man of high degree
Conversin with my flora there, it seemed so strange to me
And the answer that she gave to him it sore did me oppress
I was betrayed by flora, the lily of the west.
I stepped up my rival, dagger in my hand
I seized him by the collar, and bodly made him stand
Seing mad by desperation I pierced him to the breast
All this for lovely flora, the lily of the west.
I had to stand my trial, I had to make my plea
They placed me in the witness box and then commenced on me
Although she swore my life away, deprived me of my rest
Still I love my faithless flora, the lily of the west.

song performed by by Bob Dylan
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Send Them Home Tenderly

Send them home tenderly,
The sleepers at rest,
With hands meekly folded
On each silent breast;
Let them come back to slumber
Beneath northern skies,
Where true hearts may weep o’er them,
And prayer incense rise.

Send them home tenderly,
The noble and true,
Scarce gone from their hearthstones -
Scarce whispered 'Adieu'
Gone forth for their country,
It’s rights to sustain,
But, all bleeding and lifeless,
Returning again.

Send them home tenderly,
Our martyr'd and brave,
With the stripes and stars round them,
All robed for the grave.
Bereaved mothers shall clasp them
In pride to their breast,
And the good of our nation
Shall weep where they rest.

Send them home tenderly,
Each wound gaping wide
Shall send myriads of voices
From the dark purple tide;
And strong hands shall be grasping
The bright, unsheath'd sword,
With fresh fervor to battle
For right and the Lord.

poem by Anonymous Americas
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Serranilla

FROM Calatrava as I took my way
At holy Mary's shrine to kneel and pray,
And sleep upon my eyelids heavy lay,
There where the ground was very rough and wild,
I lost my path and met a peasant child:
From Finojosa, with the herds around her,
There in the fields I found her.

Upon a meadow green with tender grass,
With other rustic cowherds, lad and lass,
So sweet a thing to see I watched her pass:
My eyes could scarce believe her what they found her,
There with the herds around her.

I do not think that roses in the Spring
Are half so lovely in their fashioning:
My heart must needs avow this secret thing,
That had I known her first as then I found her,
From Finojosa, with the herds around her,
I had not strayed so far her face to see
That it might rob me of my liberty.

I questioned her, to know what she might say:
'Has she of Finojosa passed this way? '
She smiled and answered me: 'In vain you sue,
Full well my heart discerns the hope in you:
But she of whom you speak, and have not found her.
Her heart is free, no thought of love has bound her,
Here with the herds around her.'

poem by Íñigo López de Mendoza
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Stand Back

I see him coming
Hes out to get you
Hell get us fooling your door
Youve got a letter
From the sisters of mercy
They cant have you no more
Temptation, such sweet song
That burns inside
One rhythm, one power
One drain of blood left you dry
I see you there
Before the dancin visions
So many stars in your eyes
Youve got it all
But you aint seen nothing
How can you be so blind
Stand back
Make way for the zodiac boy
Stand back
Im gonna take you
To the other side
Stand back
Make way for the zodiac boy
Stand back
Youve gotta listen to
The power of the future
Its so easy, its a chain reaction
Every step of the way
There are places
Youve been dreaming of
But never knew the way
Temptation, such a good thing
That burns inside
One rhythm, one power
One drain left you dry

song performed by by Uriah Heep
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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His Gippsland Girl

Now, money was scarce and work was slack
And love to his heart Crept in,
And he rode away on the Northern track
To war with the world and win;
And he vowed by the locket upon his breast
And its treasure, one red gold curl,
To work with with a will in the fartherest West
For the sake of his Gippsland girl.

The hot wind blows on the dusty plain
And the red sun burns above,
But he sees her face at his side again,
And he strikes each blow for love.
He toils by the light of one far-off star
For the winning of one white pearl,
And the swinging pick and the driving bar
Strike home for the Gippsland girl.

With an aching wrist and a back that's bent,
With salt sweat blinding eyes,
'Tis little he'd reek if his life were spent
In the winning so grand a prize.
His shear blades flash and over his hand
The folds of the white fleece curl,
And all day long he sticks to his stand
For the love of his Gippsland girl.

When the shearing's done and the shed's cut out
On Barwon and Narran and Bree;
When the shearer mates with the rouseabout
And the Union man with the free;
When the doors of the shanty, open wide,
An uproarious welcome hurl,
He passes by on the other side
For the sake of his gippsland girl.

When summer lay brown on the Western Land
He rode once more to the South,
Athirst for the touch of a lily hand
And the kiss of a rosebud mouth;
And he sang the songs that shorten the way,
And he envied not king or earl,
And he spared not the spur in his dappled grey
For the sake of his Gippsland girl.

At the garden gate when the shadows fell
His hopes in the dusk lay dead;
'Nelli? Oh! Surely you heard that Nell
Is married a month' they said.
He spoke no word; with a dull, dumb pain
At his heart, and his brain awhirl
He turned his grey to the North again
For the sake of his Gippsland girl.

And he rung the board in a Paroo shed
By the sweat of his aching brow,
But he blued his cheque, for he grimly said,
'There is nothing to live for now.'
And out and away where the big floods start
And the Darling dust-showers swirl,
There's a drunken shearer who broke his heart
Over a Gippsland girl!

William H Ogilvie

poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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Prelude

OUT of the west when the sun was dying
Clouds of white wings came flying, flying,
Wheeling and whirling they swept away
Into the heart of the eastern gray;
But one white dove came straight to my breast
Out of the west.

Into the west when the dawn was pearly
Clouds of white wings went, dewy-early,
Straight from the world of the waning stars;
O beating pinions! O prison bars!
My dove flies free no more with the rest
Into the west.

poem by Edith Nesbit
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Sonnet XXX: Last Fire

Love,through your spirit and mine what summer eve
Now glows with glory of all things possess'd,
Since this day's sun of rapture filled the west
And the light sweetened as the fire took leave?
Awhile now softlier let your bosom heave,
As in Love's harbour, even that loving breast,
All care takes refuge while we sink to rest,
And mutual dreams the bygone bliss retrieve.
Many the days that Winter keeps in store,
Sunless throughout, or whose brief sun-glimpses
Scarce shed the heaped snow through the naked trees,
This day at least was Summer's paramour,
Sun-coloured to the imperishable core
With sweet well-being of love and full heart's ease.

poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
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First Date

Whatever happened
To the teenage romance
Is it hidden in a tacky magazine
Everybodys talking
Saying trash is neat
You think its good fun
But its never that free
Who is the man of the moment
Does his image stand ten feet tall
Or is he just a cardboard hero
Staring down at you from your wall
You can dream but you cant touch
You can dream but not too much
You can dream but you cant touch
You can dream but not too much
Friday night
Out on the town
Its a special date
First time around
You read all about the story book romance
He stands there waiting
And you want to hold his hand
Saturday
Youre broken down
Your heart is lying somewhere
Is it lost or found
You can dream but you cant touch
You can dream but not too much
You can dream but you cant touch
If this is love its not enough
You can dream but you cant touch
You can dream but not too much
You can dream but you cant touch
You want a love that costs too much
You can dream but you cant touch
If this is love its not enough
You can dream of tender touch
Dont let your heart be lost to love

song performed by by Cliff Richard
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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At Love's Beginning.

I might not have it then — I might not, yet
She was so near to me, could I forget
She might be nearer? There was in her eyes —
What shall I say? — a hint of the sunrise
Of her heart's day: would it then break on me
In my life's glory, or should I but see
The malediction of that morning pour
Disaster on my heart for evermore?
I did not know, and all I was became
A hush, a wonder. I scarce breathed her name,
Scarce dared to read her eyes too deeply, lest
Wrath in their tenderness should be exprest;
When suddenly love's lightning ran a streak
Up the white throat into the pallid cheek;
Her eyes took wonder too — and even thus
What we to either were, revealed to us,
Rose like God's heaven, at once, in such a way
For aye; and her eyes fell as mine took sway
Upon the moment when she knew it all,
And knew in knowing it beyond recall
Was the confession which her heart had made
With eyes, not lips, ere lips to mine were laid —
That mystic moment, when all she was drew
Out of herself, as all that I was too,
Emptied of self, then found itself in her.

poem by Robert Crawford
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The Wild Old Wicked Man

BECAUSE I am mad about women
I am mad about the hills,'
Said that wild old wicked man
Who travels where God wills.
'Not to die on the straw at home.
Those hands to close these eyes,
That is all I ask, my dear,
From the old man in the skies.
Daybreak and a candle-end.

'Kind are all your words, my dear,
Do not the rest withhold.
Who can know the year, my dear,
when an old man's blood grows cold? '
I have what no young man can have
Because he loves too much.
Words I have that can pierce the heart,
But what can he do but touch?'
Daybreak and a candle-end.

Then Said she to that wild old man,
His stout stick under his hand,
'Love to give or to withhold
Is not at my command.
I gave it all to an older man:
That old man in the skies.
Hands that are busy with His beads
Can never close those eyes.'
Daybreak and a candle-end.

'Go your ways, O go your ways,
I choose another mark,
Girls down on the seashore
Who understand the dark;
Bawdy talk for the fishermen;
A dance for the fisher-lads;
When dark hangs upon the water
They turn down their beds.
Daybreak and a candle-end.

'A young man in the dark am I,
But a wild old man in the light,
That can make a cat laugh, or
Can touch by mother wit
Things hid in their marrow-bones
From time long passed away,
Hid from all those warty lads
That by their bodies lay.
Dayhreak and a candle-end.

'All men live in suffering,
I know as few can know,
Whether they take the upper road
Or stay content on the low,
Rower bent in his row-boat
Or weaver bent at his loom,
Horseman erect upon horseback
Or child hid in the womb.
Daybreak and a candlc-cnd.

'That some stream of lightning
From the old man in the skies
Can burn out that suffering
No right-taught man denies.
But a coarse old man am I,
I choose the second-best,
I forget it all awhile
Upon a woman's breast.'
Daybreak and a candlc-end.

poem by William Butler Yeats
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Round Midnight (feat. Andy Summers)

It begins to tell
Round midnight, round midnight
I do pretty well
'Til after sundown
Supper time, I'm feelin' sad
But it really gets bad
Round midnight
Mem'ries always start
Round midnight, round midnight
Haven't got the heart
To stand those memories
When my heart is still with you
And old midnight
Knows it too.
When some quarrel we've had needs mending
Does that mean that our love is ending?
Darling, I need you
Lately I find
You're out of my arms
And I'm out of my mind.
Let our hearts take wing
Round midnight, round midnight
Let the angels sing
For your returning
Let our love be safe and sound
'Til old midnight
Comes around

song performed by by Sting
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Eve- Song

I span and Eve span
A thread to bind the heart of man;
But the heart of man was a wandering thing
That came and went with little to bring:
Nothing he minded what we made,
As here he loitered, and there he stayed.
I span and Eve span
A thread to bind the heart of man;
But the more we span the more we found
It wasn't his heart but ours we bound.
For children gathered about our knees:
The thread was a chain that stole our ease.
And one of us learned in our children's eyes
That more than man was love and prize.
But deep in the heart of one of us lay
A root of loss and hidden dismay.

He said he was strong. He had no strength
But that which comes of breadth and length.
He said he was fond. But his fondness proved
The flame of an hour when he was moved.
He said he was true. His truth was but
A door that winds could open and shut.

And yet, and yet, as he came back,
Wandering in from the outward track,
We held our arms, and gave him our breast,
As a pillowing place for his head to rest.
I span and Eve span,
A thread to bind the heart of man!

poem by Dame Mary Gilmore
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Between The Two Of Them

They married back in '32
They were young and love was new
And every day the feeling grew
Between the two of them
When work grew scarce and times got bad
The hope would chase away the sad
And hope was sometimes all they had
Between the two of them
The 40's came and the 50's went
And the mortgage replaced the rent
They made the most of each day spent
Between the two of them
Their children all turned out just fine
So he retired in '69
And left with oh so, little time
Between the two of them
Today I brave the graveyard rain
And placed a rose between their names
Now that's the most that ever came
Between the two of them
And though I miss them oh so much
His crooked smile her gentle touch
And the pleasure of just growing up
Between the two of them...

song performed by by Alabama
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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He looks in my heart and the image there

He looks in my heart and the image there
Is himself, himself, than himself more fair.
And he thinks of my heart as a mirror clear
To reflect the image I hold most dear.
But my heart is much more like a stream, I think,
Where my lover may come when he needs to drink.
And my heart is a stream that seems asleep
But the tranquil waters run strong and deep;
They reflect the image that seems most fair
But their meaning and purpose are otherwhere.
He may come, my lover, and lie on the brink
And gaze at his image and smile and drink
While the hidden waters run strong and free,
Unheeded, unguessed at, the soul of me.

poem by Lesbia Harford
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Round Midnight

It begins to tell,
round midnight, midnight.
I do pretty well, till after sundown,
Suppertime Im feelin sad;
But it really gets bad,
round midnight.
Memories always start round midnight
Havent got the heart to stand those memories,
When my heart is still with you,
And ol midnight knows it, too.
When a quarrel we had needs mending,
Does it mean that our love is ending.
Darlin I need you, lately I find
Youre out of my heart,
And Im out of my mind.
Let our hearts take wings
round midnight, midnight
Let the angels sing,
For your returning.
Till our love is safe and sound.
And old midnight comes around.
Feelin sad,
Really gets bad
Round.....round.......round....mid.....night....

song performed by by Ella Fitzgerald
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Never

In this world today
Love is scarce and far away
And your heart gets so afraid
To trust someone
All the times he let you down
There was no love to be found
Well it's not the end
There'll be time to mend
And you'll love again

[Chorus:]
Never

song performed by by Boyz II Men from Evolution
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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