"A Child in the 80's"

A Child in the 80s

"Daddy, how old is Groucho Marx?"
"Sorry, dear boy, he's dead."
"Gosh! And Chico? Oh yes, and Harpo?"
"Dead. All of them dead."
"Daddy, is Lassie very old?"
"Dogs die young, you know."
"Will Hay's good! Is he dead too?"
"Thirty years ago."

"Daddy, if Elvis comes this way
Can we go and hear him?"
"Elvis stays in Memphis now,
Blue carnations near him."
"Sossidge is on again tonight."
"That was Joyce Grenfell, eh?"
"Was? Oh, Daddy, did she die?"
"Just the other day."

This is immortality
Never dreamed of yet:
Life because a child sits by
A television set.
"Gary Cooper's good on horses."
"That was his last ride."
"Disney must be very rich."
"Was, before he died."

But the child who's sitting there
Starts to love each day
People who at natural breaks
Death will take away.
"John Wayne--Bogey--Errol Flynn--
Are they full of lead?"
"Darling, it wasn't quite like that--
But all of them are dead."

--Derwent May

Jabberwocky, by Lewis Carroll

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought --
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
He chortled in his joy.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"The Horns Of Elfland": Favorite Poems

BLOW, BUGLE, BLOW

by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

The splendour falls on castle walls

And snowy summits old in story:

The long light shakes across the lakes,

And the wild cataract leaps in glory.

Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,

Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

O hark, O hear, how thin and clear,

And thinner, clearer, farther going!

O sweet and far from cliff and scar

The horns of Elfland faintly blowing!

Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying:

Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

O love, they die in yon rich sky,

They faint on field or hill or river:

Our echoes roll from soul to soul,

And grow for ever and for ever.

Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,

Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

Click on the picture above to enjoy the details of this Bernard Sleigh illustration.

"The Challenge of Thor": Favorite Poems

THE CHALLENGE OF THOR

I am the God Thor,

I am the War God,

I am the Thunderer!

Here in my Northland,

My fastness and fortress,

Rule I forever!

Here amid icebergs

Rule I the nations;

This is my hammer,

Miolner the mighty;

Giants and sorcerers

Cannot withstand it!

These are the gauntlets

Wherewith I wield it,

And hurl it afar off;

This is my girdle;

Whenever I brace it,

Strength is redoubled!

The light thou beholdest

Stream through the heavens,

In flashes of crimson,

Is but my red beard

Blown by the night-wind,

Affrighting the nations!

Jove is my brother;

Mine eyes are the lightning;

The wheels of my chariot

Roll in the thunder,

The blows of my hammer

Ring in the earthquake!

Force rules the war still,

Has ruled it, shall rule it;

Meekness is weakness,

Strength is triumphant,

Over the whole earth

Still it is Thor's-Day!

Thou art a God too,

O Galilean!

And thus single-handed

Unto the combat,

Gauntlet or Gospel,

Here I defy thee!

--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

I first read this poem back in middle school, without the controversial last stanza, of course. Longfellow wrote in in his famous "Hiawatha" meter, which was of course modelled on the meter of The Kalevala, the national Finnish epic collected and edited by Elias Lonnrot. Longfellow threw in just enough alliteration to give it that Anglo-Saxon/Icelandic flavor.

On A Vulgar Error: Favorite Poems

ON A VULGAR ERROR



No. It's an impudent falsehood. Men did not

Invariably think the newer way

Prosaic, mad, inelegant, or what not.

Was the first pointed arch esteemed a blot

Upon the church? Did anybody say

How modern and how ugly? They did not.

Plate-armour, or windows glazed, or verses fire-hot

With rhymes from France, or spices from Cathay,

Were these at first a horror? They were not.

If, then, our present arts, laws, houses, food

All set us hankering after yesterday,

Need this be only an archaising mood?

Why, any man whose purse has been let blood

By sharpers, when he finds all drained away

Must compare how he stands with how he stood.

If a quack doctor's breezy ineptitude

Has cost me a leg, must I forget straightway

All that I can't do now, all that I could?

So, when our guides unanimously decry

The backward glance, I think we can guess why.

--C. S. Lewis, 1898-1963.

A Vagabond Song: Favorite Poems

A VAGABOND SONG



There is something in the Autumn that is native to my blood--

Touch of manner, hint of mood;

And my heart is like a rhyme,

With the yellow and the purple and the crimson keeping time.



The scarlet of the maples can shake me like a cry

Of bugles going by.

And my lonely spirit thrills

To see the frosty asters like smoke upon the hills.



There is something in October sets the gypsy blood astir,

We must rise and follow her,

When from every hill of flame

She calls and calls each vagabond by name.



--Bliss Carman(1861-1929).



Bliss Carman (born William Bliss Carman; "Bliss" was his mother's maiden name), the "unofficial poet laureate of Canada," or Alan Rickman in another life?

A Man Of Words: Favorite Poems

A man of words and not of deeds
Is like a garden full of weeds;
And when the weeds begin to grow,
It's like a garden full of snow;
And when the snow begins to fall,
It's like a bird upon the wall;
And when the bird away does fly,
It's like an eagle in the sky;
And when the sky begins to roar,
It's like a lion at the door;
And when the door begins to crack,
It's like a stick across your back;
And when your back begins to smart,
It's like a penknife in your heart;
And when your heart begins to bleed,
You're dead, and dead, and dead indeed.

Sailing To Byzantium: Favorite Poems

SAILING TO BYZANTIUM

That is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees
--Those dying generations-- at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unaging intellect.

An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.

O sages standing in God's holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is: and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.

Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enameling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.

--William Butler Yeats, 1865-1939

The Fool's Prayer: Favorite Poems

THE FOOL'S PRAYER

The royal feast was done; the King
Sought some new sport to banish care,
And to his jester cried: "Sir Fool,
Kneel now, and make for us a prayer!"

The jester doffed his cap and bells,
And stood the mocking court before;
They could not see the bitter smile
Behind the painted grin he wore.

He bowed his head, and bent his knee
Upon the monarch's silken stool;
His pleading voice arose: "O Lord,
Be merciful to me, a fool!

"No pity, Lord, could change the heart
From red with wrong to white as wool;
The rod must heal the sin: but, Lord,
Be merciful to me, a fool!

"'Tis not by guilt the onward sweep
Of truth and right, O Lord, we stay;
'Tis by our follies that so long
We hold the earth from heaven away.

"These clumsy feet, still in the mire,
Go crushing blossoms without end:
These hard, well-meaning hands we thrust
Amid the heart-strings of a friend.

"The ill-timed truth we might have kept--
Who knows how sharp it pierced and stung?
The word we had not sense to say--
Who knows how grandly it had rung?

"Our faults no tenderness should ask,
The chastening stripes must cleanse them all;
But for our blunders--oh, in shame
Before the eyes of heaven we fall.

"Earth bears no balsam for mistakes.
Men crown the knave, and scourge the tool
That did his will; but Thou, O Lord,
Be merciful to me, a fool!"

The room was hushed; in silence rose
The King, and sought his gardens cool,
And walked apart, and murmured low,
"Be merciful to me, a fool!"

--Edward Rowland Sill, 1841-1887


I first read this poem back in middle school, and it moved me then. Many years later I bought an anthology volume at a library sale and found that it had belonged to a teacher at our old grade school, a Mr. Bonarden, who had a reputation of being a bluff tough kind of guy. The two poems particularly marked in the book were "Little Orphant Annie" and "The Fool's Prayer", which lead me to wonder about the inner life of people we think we had figured out.

John Mouldy: Favorite Poems

JOHN MOULDY

I spied John Mouldy in his cellar,
Deep down twenty steps of stone;
In the dusk he sat a-smiling,
A-smiling there alone.

He read no book, he snuffed no candle;
The rats ran in, the rats ran out;
And far and near the drip of water
Went whisp'ring about.

The dusk was still, with dew a-falling,
I saw the Dog Star bleak and grim,
I saw a slim brown rat of Norway
Creep over him.

I spied John Mouldy in his cellar,
Deep down twenty steps of stone;
In the dusk he sat a-smiling,
A-smiling there alone.

--Walter De la Mare.

Winter: Favorite Poems

Winter

When icicles hang by the wall,

And Dick the shepherd blows his nail,

And Tom bears logs into the hall,

And milk comes frozen home in pail;

When blood is nipped, and ways be foul,

Then nightly sings the staring owl.

Tu-whit, to-who! a merry note,

While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

When all aloud the wind doth blow,

And coughing drowns the parson's saw,

And birds sit brooding in the snow,

And Marian's nose looks red and raw;

When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl,

Then nightly sings the staring owl.

Tu-whit, to-who! a merry note,

While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

--William Shakespeare (1564-1616).

A lovely little gem on country life in the winter; most of the details still apply, from bad roads ("ways be foul") to coughing during the Sunday sermon ("parson's saw"). One particularly Christmasy detail are the "roasted crabs", which aren't seafood but roasted crab-apples, cooked in the wassail-bowl. And "greasy Joan" who "keels" (cools by stirring and skimming the top of) the pot is not greasy with food: she's sweating from working near the hot cooking pot. The keen little illustration is by Pauline Baynes, Lor' bless 'er.

A Ballade Of Suicide: Favorite Poems

A Ballade Of Suicide

The gallows in my garden, people say,
Is new and neat and adequately tall;
I tie the noose on in a knowing way
As one that knots his necktie for a ball;
But just as all the neighbors--on the wall--
Are drawing a long breath to shout "Hurray!"
The strangest whim has seized me...After all
I think I will not hang myself to-day.

Tomorrow is the time I get my pay--
My uncle's sword is hanging in the hall--
I see a little cloud all pink and grey--
Perhaps the rector's mother will not call--
I fancy that I heard from Mr. Gall
That mushrooms could be cooked another way--
I never read the works of Juvenal--
I think I will not hang myself to-day.

The world will have another washing-day;
The decadents decay; the pedants pall;
And H. G. Wells has found that children play,
And Bernard Shaw discovered that they squall,
Rationalists are growing rational--
And through thick woods one finds a stream astray
So secret that the very sky seems small--
I think I will not hang myself to-day.

ENVOI:

Prince, I can hear the trumpet of Germinal,
The tumbrels toiling up the terrible way;
Even to-day your royal head may fall,
I think I will not hang myself to-day.

--G. K. Chesterton, 1874-1936.

G. K. Chesterton was probably the man who would be voted the least likely to commit suicide, and in this poem mocking the idea, he gives several reasons why. It is written in the ballade form, which he and his friends took up with glee after seeing it demonstrated in the play Cyrano DeBergerac. Sometimes they would compose them together, taking alternate lines and trying to top each other in preposterous rhymes. The "envoi" always concludes with disparaging remarks addressed to the "Prince", who represents the acme of all that is contemptible. Chesterton was friends with both Wells and Shaw, but always thought their grand analyses never took into account the ordinary life of ordinary people.

The Way Through The Woods: Favorite Poems

The Way Through The Woods

They shut the road through the woods
Seventy years ago.
Weather and rain have undone it again,
And now you would never know
There was once a road through the woods
Before they planted the trees.
It is underneath the coppice and heath,
And the thin anemones.
Only the keeper sees
That, where the ring-dove broods,
And the badgers roll at ease,
There was once a road through the woods.

Yet, if you enter the woods
Of a summer evening late,
When the night-air cools on the trout-ringed pools
Where the otter whistles his mate
(They fear not men in the woods
Because they see so few),
You will hear the beat of a horses feet
And the swish of a skirt in the dew,
Steadily cantering through
The misty solitudes,
As though they perfectly knew
The old lost road through the woods...
But there is no road through the woods!

--Rudyard Kipling, from Rewards and Fairies.

There Was An Old Lady All Skin And Bones

There Was An Old Lady All Skin And Bones

There was an old lady all skin and bones,

Sure such a lady was never known.

It happened upon a certain day,

This lady went to church to pray.

When she came to the church stile

There she did rest a little while;

When she came to the church yard,

There the bells so loud she heard.

When she came to the church door,

She stopped to rest a little more;

When she came the church within,

The parson prated 'gainst pride and sin.

On looking up, on looking down,

She saw a dead man on the ground;

And from his nose unto his chin,

The worms crawled out, the worms crawled in.

Then she unto the parson said,

"Shall I be so when I am dead?"

"O yes! O yes!" the parson said,

"You will be so when you are dead."

--First printed in Gammer Gurton's Garland, 1784. Ancestor of the American version, "The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out." Traditionally the last line is shrieked to scare the young'uns, all in good fun. In some versions it is the corpse that answers her. Said to have driven the poet Robert Southey (author of "The Three Bears") to hysterics whenever his family members recited it.

The Lyke Wake Dirge: Favorite Poems

The Lyke Wake Dirge

This ae nighte, this ae nighte,

Every nighte and alle,

Fire and fleet and candle-lighte,

And Christe receive thy saule.

When thou from hence away art past,

Every nighte and alle,

To Whinny-muir thou com'st at last;

And Christe receive thy saule.

If ever thou gavest hosen and shoon,

Every nighte and alle,

Sit thee down and put them on;

And Christe receive thy saule.

If hosen and shoon thou ne'er gav'st nane,

Every nighte and alle,

The whinnes sall prick thee to the bare bane;

And Christe receive thy saule.

From Whinny-muir whence thou may'st pass,

Every nighte and alle,

To Brig o'Dread thou com'st at last;

And Christe receive thy saule.

If ever thou gav'st silver and gold,

Every nighte and alle,

At t'Brig o'Dread thou'lt find foothold,

And Christe receive thy saule.

But if silver and gold Thou never gav'st nane,

Every night and alle,

Down thou tumblest to Hell flame;

And Christe receive thy saule.

From Brig o'Dread whence thou may'st pass,

Every night and alle,

To Purgatory fire thou com'st at last;

And Christe receive thy saule.

If ever thou gav'st meat or drink,

Every nighte and alle,

The fire sall never make thee shrink;

And Christe receive thy saule.

If meat or drink thou ne'er gav'st nane,

Every nighte and alle,

The fire will burn thee to the bare bane;

And Christe receive thy saule.

This ae nighte, this ae nighte,

Every nighte and alle,

Fire and fleet and candle-lighte,

And Christe receive thy saule.

This is a very old song from the Midlands of England. "Lyke wake" translates as "corpse watch"; it is literally a dirge to be sung while watching over the dead before burial. It tells the departed what to expect on his journey through the afterlife. For the one night of the wake--"this ae night"--he can still enjoy benefits of human life, warmth and shelter ("fleet") and light. But then he must fare forth, and his deeds while alive will determine how he fares.

According to the dirge, first the soul comes to Whinny-muir, a vast moor covered with thorns (whins). If he gave shoes and leggings to the poor in life, he can put them on and pass safely over the moor. If not, he shall be "pricked to the bare bone". If he gave money in charity he can then pass safely over the "Brig (Bridge) o'Dread". In folklore this is sometimes depicted as a huge sword laid edge up ("no broader than a thread") over a vast gulf. Finally he reaches Purgatory which he can pass safely if he has fed the poor. Traditionally after Purgatory you reach Heaven, "and Christe receive thy saule".

All in all a rather creepy song, not unsuitable for the All Hallows' Eve spirit.

Late Summer: Favorite Poems

LATE SUMMER

I, dusty and bedraggled as I am,
Pestered with wasps and weeds and making jam,
Blowzy and stale, my welcome long outstayed,
Proved false in every promise that I made,
At my beginning I believed, like you,
Something would come of all my green and blue.
Mortals remember, looking on the thing
I am, that I, even I, was once a spring.

--C. S. Lewis, 1898-1963.

The Hosts of Faery: Favorite Poems

White shields they carry in their hands,

With emblems of pale silver;

With glittering blue swords,

With mighty stout horns.

With well-devised battle array,

Ahead of their fair chieftain

They march amid blue spears,

Pale-visaged, curly-headed bands.

They scatter the battalion of the foe,

They ravage every land they attack,

Splendidly they march to combat,

A swift, distinguished, avenging host!

No wonder though their strength be great:

Sons of queens and kings are one and all;

On their heads are

Beautiful golden-yellow manes.

With smooth comely bodies,

With bright blue-starred eyes,

With pure crystal teeth,

With thin red lips.

Good they are at man-slaying,

Melodious in the ale-house,

Masterly at making songs,

Skilled at playing draughts.

--Kuno Meyer (1859-1919), from the 12th Century Irish.

This is how the dwellers in the Hidden Realm were originally conceived. J. R. R. Tolkien was just restoring them to their ancient dignity. The picture above is of Prince Nuada in the court of Bethmoora from Hellboy 2: The Golden Army.

The Latest Decalogue: Favorite Poems

THE LATEST DECALOGUE

Thou shalt have only one God; who
Would be at the expense of two?

No graven images may be
Worshipped, except the currency:

Swear not at all: for for thy curse
Thine enemy is none the worse.

At church on Sunday to attend
Will serve to keep the world thy friend:

Honour thy parents; that is, all
From whom advancement may befall:

Thou shalt not kill; but need'st not strive
Officiously to keep alive:

Do not adultery commit;
Advantage rarely comes of it:

Thou shalt not steal; an empty feat
When 'tis so lucrative to cheat:

Bear not false witness; let the lie
Have time on its own wings to fly:

Thou shalt not covet; but tradition
Approves all forms of competition.

--Arthur Hugh Clough, 1819-1861

"I Saw A Peacock With A Fiery Tail": Favorite Poems

I saw a peacock with a fiery tail
I saw a blazing comet drop down hail
I saw a cloud wrapped with ivy round
I saw an oak creep upon the ground
I saw a pismire swallow up a whale
I saw the sea brimful of ale
I saw a Venice glass full fifteen feet deep
I saw a well full of men's tears that weep
I saw red eyes all of a flaming fire
I saw a house bigger than the moon and higher
I saw the sun at twelve o'clock at night
I saw the man that saw this wondrous sight.

Anonymous.

This is a kind of puzzle poem, a sort of lesson on the importance of punctuation. As you can see, it only has one period. But if you punctuate it with a period or a comma in the middle of each line, it makes perfect sense. ("I saw a peacock. With a fiery tail/ I saw a comet. etc.) It seems to date from the 16th or 17th Century. But the images that are generated are visionary.

"Pismire" is an old word for ant. The picture is actually of a Russian firebird, but fits well, I think.

There is a Lady sweet and kind: Favorite poems

THERE IS A LADY SWEET AND KIND

There is a Lady sweet and kind,
Was never face so pleased my mind:
I did but see her passing by,
And yet I love her till I die.

Her gesture, motion, and her smiles,
Her wit, her voice my heart beguiles,
Beguiles my heart, I know not why,
And yet I love her till I die.

Cupid is winged, and doth range,
Her country so my love doth change:
But change she earth, or change she sky,
Yet will I love her till I die.

Anonymous, from Thomas Ford's Music of Sundry Kinds, 1607

Descriptive of an experience that has happened to me twice. When I heard James Blunt's song You're Beautiful I recognized it as a modern re-working of this theme.