Posted on 01/15/2002 8:59:57 AM PST by StoneColdGOP
My loss.
Excellent literature , but pray tell me, what is the purpose of this ? No offense but am I missing something ?:):)
Go Steelers!
Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherised upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question . . .
Oh, do not ask, 'What is it?'
Let us go and make our visit.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.
The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes,
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.
And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.
And indeed there will be time
To wonder, 'Do I dare?' and, 'Do I dare?'
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair--
(They will say: 'How his hair is growing thin!')
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin--
(They will say: 'But how his arms and legs are thin!')
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.
For I have known them all already, known them all--
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?
And I have known the eyes already, known them all--
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?
And I have known the arms already, known them all--
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
(But in the moonlight, downed with light brown hair!)
Is it perfume from a dress
That makes me so digress?
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.
And should I then presume?
And how should I begin?
. . . . .
Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets
And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes
Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows? . . .
I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.
. . . . .
And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!
Smoothed by long fingers,
Asleep . . . tired . . . or it malingers,
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon
a platter,
I am no prophet--and here's no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And, in short, I was afraid.
And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it towards some overwhelming question,
To say: 'I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all'--
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say: 'That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all.'
And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail
along the floor--
And this, and so much more?--
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a
screen:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
'That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all.'
. . . . .
No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous--
Almost, at times, the Fool.
I grow old . . . I grow old . . .
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.
Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.
I do not think that they will sing to me.
I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.
We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.
BTW: "tha" => "thy" in two places
Tony the Tiger
Tiger, Tiger, burning bright,
Like the Kellogg's mascot might
If made devoid of teeth and claw
And doused with petrochemicals.
Auguries of Innocence
TO see a world in a grain of sand, | |
And a heaven in a wild flower, | |
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, | |
And eternity in an hour. | |
A robin redbreast in a cage | 5 |
Puts all heaven in a rage. | |
A dove-house filld with doves and pigeons | |
Shudders hell thro all its regions. | |
A dog starvd at his masters gate | |
Predicts the ruin of the state. | 10 |
A horse misused upon the road | |
Calls to heaven for human blood. | |
Each outcry of the hunted hare | |
A fibre from the brain does tear. | |
A skylark wounded in the wing, | 15 |
A cherubim does cease to sing. | |
The game-cock clipt and armd for fight | |
Does the rising sun affright. | |
Every wolfs and lions howl | |
Raises from hell a human soul. | 20 |
The wild deer, wandring here and there, | |
Keeps the human soul from care. | |
The lamb misusd breeds public strife, | |
And yet forgives the butchers knife. | |
The bat that flits at close of eve | 25 |
Has left the brain that wont believe. | |
The owl that calls upon the night | |
Speaks the unbelievers fright. | |
He who shall hurt the little wren | |
Shall never be belovd by men. | 30 |
He who the ox to wrath has movd | |
Shall never be by woman lovd. | |
The wanton boy that kills the fly | |
Shall feel the spiders enmity. | |
He who torments the chafers sprite | 35 |
Weaves a bower in endless night. | |
The caterpillar on the leaf | |
Repeats to thee thy mothers grief. | |
Kill not the moth nor butterfly, | |
For the last judgment draweth nigh. | 40 |
He who shall train the horse to war | |
Shall never pass the polar bar. | |
The beggars dog and widows cat, | |
Feed them and thou wilt grow fat. | |
The gnat that sings his summers song | 45 |
Poison gets from slanders tongue. | |
The poison of the snake and newt | |
Is the sweat of envys foot. | |
The poison of the honey bee | |
Is the artists jealousy. | 50 |
The princes robes and beggars rags | |
Are toadstools on the misers bags. | |
A truth thats told with bad intent | |
Beats all the lies you can invent. | |
It is right it should be so; | 55 |
Man was made for joy and woe; | |
And when this we rightly know, | |
Thro the world we safely go. | |
Joy and woe are woven fine, | |
A clothing for the soul divine. | 60 |
Under every grief and pine | |
Runs a joy with silken twine. | |
The babe is more than swaddling bands; | |
Throughout all these human lands | |
Tools were made, and born were hands, | 65 |
Every farmer understands. | |
Every tear from every eye | |
Becomes a babe in eternity; | |
This is caught by females bright, | |
And returnd to its own delight. | 70 |
The bleat, the bark, bellow, and roar, | |
Are waves that beat on heavens shore. | |
The babe that weeps the rod beneath | |
Writes revenge in realms of death. | |
The beggars rags, fluttering in air, | 75 |
Does to rags the heavens tear. | |
The soldier, armd with sword and gun, | |
Palsied strikes the summers sun. | |
The poor mans farthing is worth more | |
Than all the gold on Africs shore. | 80 |
One mite wrung from the labrers hands | |
Shall buy and sell the misers lands; | |
Or, if protected from on high, | |
Does that whole nation sell and buy. | |
He who mocks the infants faith | 85 |
Shall be mockd in age and death. | |
He who shall teach the child to doubt | |
The rotting grave shall neer get out. | |
He who respects the infants faith | |
Triumphs over hell and death. | 90 |
The childs toys and the old mans reasons | |
Are the fruits of the two seasons. | |
The questioner, who sits so sly, | |
Shall never know how to reply. | |
He who replies to words of doubt | 95 |
Doth put the light of knowledge out. | |
The strongest poison ever known | |
Came from Caesars laurel crown. | |
Nought can deform the human race | |
Like to the armours iron brace. | 100 |
When gold and gems adorn the plow, | |
To peaceful arts shall envy bow. | |
A riddle, or the crickets cry, | |
Is to doubt a fit reply. | |
The emmets inch and eagles mile | 105 |
Make lame philosophy to smile. | |
He who doubts from what he sees | |
Will neer believe, do what you please. | |
If the sun and moon should doubt, | |
Theyd immediately go out. | 110 |
To be in a passion you good may do, | |
But no good if a passion is in you. | |
The whore and gambler, by the state | |
Licensed, build that nations fate. | |
The harlots cry from street to street | 115 |
Shall weave old Englands winding-sheet. | |
The winners shout, the losers curse, | |
Dance before dead Englands hearse. | |
Every night and every morn | |
Some to misery are born, | 120 |
Every morn and every night | |
Some are born to sweet delight. | |
Some are born to sweet delight, | |
Some are born to endless night. | |
We are led to believe a lie | 125 |
When we see not thro the eye, | |
Which was born in a night to perish in a night, | |
When the soul slept in beams of light. | |
God appears, and God is light, | |
To those poor souls who dwell in night; | 130 |
But does a human form display | |
To those who dwell in realms of day. | |
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