The 6 o'clock News - Tom Leonard

this is thi

six a clock

news thi

man said n

thi reason

a talk wia

BBC accent

iz coz yi

widny wahnt

mi ti talk

aboot thi

trooth wia

voice lik

wanna yoo

scruff. if

a toktaboot

thi trooth

lik wanna yoo

scruff yi

widny thingk

it wuz troo.

jist wanna yoo

scruff tokn.

thirza right

way ti spell

ana right way

to tok it. this

is me tokn yir

right way a

spellin. this

is ma trooth.

yooz doant no

thi trooth

yirsellz cawz

yi canny talk

right. this is

the six a clock

nyooz. belt up.

- I wiz hinking aboot this alot like. I hink Leonard is trying tae say that everywan shud speak posh n that... He says if newsreaders spoke in a more common accent people would not believe the news anymore. The Glasgow-born poet is defending his roots by saying the truth is the truth regardless of how it is spoken or who it is told by.

Auguries Of Innocence - William Blake

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.

- This is an excerpt which I think holds its own as a poem. Look at the world as if it was brand new again! As we grow into adults, we become so used to the world we forget to be amazed by something as seemingly simple as a flower, even though we don't understand what makes that flower grow. It is the same Source and Energy which keeps our hearts beating and wakes us into the world each day. The sand, the flowers are a tiny spark of the divine mystery...and so are we.

All is Vanity - Lord Byron

Fame, wisdom, love, and power were mine,

And health and youth possessed me;

My goblets blushed from every vine,

And lovely forms caressed me;

I sunned my heart in beauty’ eyes,

And felt my soul grow tender;

All earth can give, or mortal prize,

Was mine of regal splendour.

I strive to number o’er what days

Remembrance can discover,

Which all that life or earth displays

Would lure me to live over.

There rose no day, there rolled no hour

Of pleasure unembittered;

And not a trapping decked my power

That galled not while it glittered.

The serpent of the field, by art

And spells, is won from harming;

But that which soils around the heart,

Oh! who hath power of charming?

It will not list to wisdom’s lore,

Nor music’s voice can lure it;

But there it stings for evermore

The soul that must endure it.

- My interpretation of this is that a life can be filled with what appears to be wonderful 'things', fame and power etc. You can feel like you have everything however 'it will not list to wisdom's lore, nor music's voice can lure it' if it is all vanity and goes no deeper in your soul. This vanity curses your life hence 'it stings for evermore the soul that must endure it'. It is better for humans to live a life which is honest and real even if it is not perfect as those who have the glamorous lives everyone so aspires to have. It is harder to determine who and what is real in a world filled with vanity.

Fiction and the Reading Public - Philip Larkin

Give me a thrill, says the reader,

Give me a kick;I don't care how you succeed, or

What subject you pick.

Choose something you know all about

That'll sound like real life:

Your childhood, your Dad pegging out,

How you sleep with your wife.

But that's not sufficient, unless

You make me feel good -

Whatever you're 'trying to express'

Let it be understood

That 'somehow' God plaits up the threads,

Makes 'all for the best',

That we may lie quiet in our beds

And not be 'depressed'.

For I call the tune in this racket:

I pay your screw,

Write reviews and the bull on the jacket -

So stop looking blue

And start serving up your sensations

Before it's too late;

Just please me for two generations -

You'll be 'truly great'.

- Larkin is brilliant! This highlights his pressure as a writer from the readers who he feels want to take something of his experience from him. He views the public as being demanding of him and I feel the poem grudges the public and how critical they can be of anothers experience. If they are not entertained somewhat by it then they don't want to hear about it.

Implications Of One Plus One - Marge Piercy

Sometimes we collide, tectonic plates merging,

continents shoving, crumpling down into the molten

veins of fire deep in the earth and raising

tons of rock into jagged crests of Sierra.

Sometimes your hands drift on me, milkweed's

airy silk, wingtip's feathery caresses,

our lips grazing, a drift of desires gathering

like fog over warm water, thickening to rain.

Sometimes we go to it heartily, digging,

burrowing, grunting, tossing up covers

like loose earth, nosing into the other's

flesh with hot nozzles and wallowing there.

Sometimes we are kids making out, silly

in the quilt, tickling the xylophone spine,

blowing wet jokes, loud as a whole

slumber party bouncing till the bed breaks.

I go round and round you sometimes, scouting,

blundering, seeking a way in, the high boxwood

maze I penetrate running lungs bursting

toward the fountain of green fire at the heart.

Sometimes you open wide as cathedral doors

and yank me inside. Sometimes you slither

into me like a snake into its burrow.

Sometimes you march in with a brass band.

Ten years of fitting our bodies together

and still they sing wild songs in new keys.

It is more and less than love: timing,

chemistry, magic and will and luck.

One plus one equal one, unknowable except

in the moment, not convertible into words,

not explicable or philosophically interesting.

But it is. And it is. And it is. Amen.

- This really caught my eye...implications of one plus one suggests a mathematical equation where she tries to understand the consequence of adding two human beings together and what this can equate too. The poem suggests she knows deep down that love goes beyond maths "chemistry, magic and will and luck"... The one word "Amen" at the end is very poignant...a prayer cannot be rationialised, when we pray we have faith in a higher power. When we fall in love we also have faith in a power beyond ourselves...love it...I also love the powerful sexual imagery throughout.

Funeral Blues - W.H. Auden

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,

Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,


Silence the pianos and with muffled drum


Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.





Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead


Scribbling on the sky the message He is Dead.


Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,


Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.





He was my North, my South, my East and West,


My working week and my Sunday rest,


My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;


I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong.





The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,


Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun,


Pour away the ocean and sweep up the woods;


For nothing now can ever come to any good.





- Beautifully tragic. This poem captures the unbearable feeling of loss which consumes every fibre of our being. Auden has rawness that could bring me to tears and portrays loss as gut-wrenchingly horrific as it feels...

Giving Up Smoking - Wendy Cope

There’s not a Shakespeare sonnet

Or a Beethoven quartet

That’s easier to like than you

Or harder to forget.

You think that sounds extravagant?

I haven’t finished yet –

I like you more than I would like

To have a cigarette.

- Cope says that no-one can understand what an intense love poem this is unless they have been addicted to nicotine and I totally agree.

November Rain by Guns 'N' Roses

When I look into your eyes

I can see a love restrained

But darlin' when I hold you

Don't you know I feel the same

Nothin' lasts forever

And we both know hearts can change

And it's hard to hold a candle

In the cold November rain

We've been through this such a long long time

Just tryin' to kill the pain

But lovers always come and lovers always go

An no one's really sure who's lettin' go today

Walking away

If we could take the time to lay it on the line

I could rest my head

Just knowin' that you were mine

All mine

So if you want to love me then darlin' don't refrain

Or I'll just end up walkin'

In the cold November rain

Do you need some time...on your own

Do you need some time...all alone

Everybody needs some time... on their own

Don't you know you need some time...all alone

I know it's hard to keep an open heart

When even friends seem out to harm you

But if you could heal a broken heart

Wouldn't time be out to charm you

Sometimes I need some time...on my own

Sometimes I need some time...all alone

Everybody needs some time... on their own

Don't you know you need some time...all alone

And when your fears subside

And shadows still remain

I know that you can love me

When there's no one left to blame

So never mind the darkness

We still can find a way Nothin' lasts forever

Even cold November rain

Don't ya think that you need somebody

Don't ya think that you need someone

Everybody needs somebody

You're not the only one

You're not the only one

- A brilliant song - reminds me of the heartbreaking moments in life - still love it...

Strings In The Earth and Air - James Joyce

Strings in the earth and air
Make music sweet;
Strings by the river where
The willows meet.
There's music along the river
For Love wanders there,
Pale flowers on his mantle,
Dark leaves on his hair.
All softly playing,
With head to the music bent,
And fingers straying
Upon an instrument.

- A beautiful appreciation of nature - there is poetry in everything you just have to see it.

It Ain't What You Do, It's What It Does To You - Simon Armitage

I have not bummed across America

with only a dollar to spare, one pair

of busted Levi's and a bowie knife.

I have lived with thieves in Manchester.

I have not padded through the Taj Mahal,

barefoot, listening to the space between

each footfall picking up and putting down
its print against the marble floor. But I

skimmed flat stones across Black Moss on a day

so still I could hear each set of ripples

as they crossed. I felt each stone's inertia

spend itself against the water; then sink.

I have not toyed with a parachute cord

while perched on the lip of a light-aircraft;

but I held the wobbly head of a boy

at the day centre, and stroked his fat hands.

And I guess that the tightness in the throat

and the tiny cascading sensation

somewhere inside us are both part of that

sense of something else. That feeling, I mean.

- Amazing, love it. It isn't those grand experiences that make us who we are but rather what we make of each experience and how we let them touch our lives. Incredible poem.

The Final Analysis - Mother Teresa

People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered;

Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind,

People may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives;

Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies;

Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you;

Be honest and frank anyway.

What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight;

Build anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous;

Be happy anyway.

The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow;

Do good anyway.

Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough;

Give the world the best you've got anyway.

You see, in the FINAL analysis, it is between you and God;

It was never between you and them anyway.

- I may not believe in 'God' as such but I believe the most challenging relationship you can have in life is the relationship you have with yourself. This poem is amazing. Its how I try to live my life. It's an incredible and inspiring example to anyone...

May I Feel Said He - E.E Cummings

may i feel said he

(i'll squeal said she

just once said he)

it's fun said she

(may i touch said he

how much said she

a lot said he)

why not said she

(let's go said he

not too far said she

what's too far said he

where you are said she)

may i stay said he

(which way said she

like this said he

if you kiss said she

may i move said he

is it love said she)

if you're willing said he

(but you're killing said she

but it's life said he

but your wife said she

now said he)

ow said she

(tiptop said he

don't stop said she

oh no said he)

go slow said she

(cccome?said he

ummm said she)

you're divine! said he

(you are Mine said she)

- The rhythm of the poem echoes the rhythm of the sex, very erotic!

Time Does Not Bring Relief - Edna St. Vincent Millay

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied

Who told me time would ease me of my pain!

I miss him in the weeping of the rain;

I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
The old snows melt from every mountain-side,

And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane;

But last year's bitter loving must remain

Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide!
There are a hundred places where I fear

To go, ... so with his memory they brim!

And entering with relief some quiet place

Where never fell his foot or shone his face.
I say, "There is no memory of him here!"

And so stand stricken, so remembering him!

- I think this is so well-written, especially the final lines where she goes somewhere that he has never been...believing this will bring some kind of relief. However, she does this consciously and thus thinks of him in the process of doing it and so remembers him in her conscious effort to try and forget him! I think there is irony of 'remembering to forget' here! Great!

Give Yourself A Hug - Grace Nichols

Give yourself a hug
when you feel unloved
Give yourself a hug
when people put on airs
to make you feel a bug
Give yourself a hug
when everyone seems to give you
a cold-shoulder shrug
Give yourself a hug –
a big big hug
And keep on singing
‘Only one in a million like me
Only one in a million-billion-trillion-zillion
like me.’

- I love this 'feel good' poem, its so easy to forget that your a tiny little miracle in the universe...this poem reminds me there's only one of me!

If I Can Stop One Heart From Breaking - Emily Dickinson

If I can stop one heart from breaking,

I shall not live in vain;

If I can ease one life the aching,

Or cool one pain,

Or help one fainting robin

Unto his nest again,

I shall not live in vain.

- In the beginning of the poem nothing is wrong quite yet - "If I can stop"- meaning if she can prevent one heart from breaking, as the poem progresses Dickinson talks of 'easing' and 'cooling' pain so there becomes an awareness that you can't stop a heart from breaking...to help a fainting robin unto his nest suggests helping someone get back to being themselves and catching them before they fall. She would like to be able to stop a heart from breaking - however equally feels just as purposeful by soothing someones broken heart...

Valentine - Wendy Cope

My heart has made its mind up

And I'm afraid it's you.

Whatever you've got lined up,

My heart has made its mind up

And if you can't be signed up

This year, next year will do.

My heart has made its mind up

And I'm afraid it's you.

- I love the rhythm of this poem, very witty, I love how her heart seems to have its own mind. It really is a battle sometimes between the head and the heart when it comes to love. She almost sounds like she's rationalising with her heart - yet she knows her heart is a force to be reckoned with - hence the repeated lines "My heart has made its mind up and I'm afraid it's you." Like it or not - the heart rules the head!

Fire and Ice - Robert Frost

Some say the world will end in fire;

Some say in ice.

From what I've tasted of desire

I hold with those who favor fire.

But if it had to perish twice,

I think I know enough of hate

To know that for destruction ice

Is also great

And would suffice.

- 'Fire' is desire, 'Ice' is hate. Both emotions are equally destructive - however Frost would side with those who favour fire...because he feels desire is more necessary to humanity than hate. Both emotions are strong enough to destroy. Good.

Love Poem - Vicki Feaver

Sharing one umbrella,

We have to hold each other,

Round the waist to keep together,

You ask me why I'm smiling-

It's because I'm thinking,

I want it to rain forever.

- Very beautiful. After I had read this poem I saw a couple under and umbrella holding each other and laughing...I actually cried! I'm such a woman!

A Wish for My Children - Evangeline Paterson

On this doorstep I stand

year after year

to watch you going

and think: May you not

skin your knees. May you

not catch your fingers

in car doors. May

your hearts not break.

May tide and weather

wait for your coming

and may you grow strong

to break

all webs of my weaving.

- I quite simply just like this poem, especially the ending "may you grow strong and break all the webs of my weaving". Paterson is saying that although she wants her child(dren) to be protected from worldly dangers - she also wants them to become strong enough to explore and experience the world...

Notes - Paul Engle

Butterfly trembles when the wind blows.

You walk near me.

The dog barks at the loud moon.

When you come to me,I speak softly, softly,

Until we are silent together.

For two hundred years

This pine tree has been trained to grow sideways.

I have known you only one week,

But I bend as you walk toward me.

- I love Engles analogy of how he bends towards the object of his affection in the same way as a tree which has spent years growing bends. He suggests that sometimes the connection we have with someone can be so natural (like a tree that grows in the wood) and also that it can feel like you've know that peron forever, no matter how long it has been (two hundred years or one week!) - you will bend in a way you yourself may not even understand...

Loss - Wendy Cope

The day he moved was terrible-

That evening she went through hell.

His absence wasn't a problem

But the corkscrew had gone as well.

- I think this is sharp and witty, I love how flippant she is, saying it is more of a problem that she can't have wine, rather than that she misses him!

Sometimes - Sir Edwin Arnold

Somewhere there waiteth in this world of ours

For one lone soul, another lonely soul-

Each chasing each through all the weary hours,

And meeting strangely at one sudden goal;

Then blend they- like green leaves with golden flowers,

Into one beautiful and perfect whole-

And life's long night is ended, and the way

Lies open onward to eternal day.

- How beautiful! I love the way he says each soul is chasing the other. I think thats true love when two people feel that same way about each other and they blend into one...

Che Fece… Il Gran Rifiuto - C.P Cavafy

For some people the day comes

when they have to declare the great Yes

or the great No. It’s clear at once who has the Yes

ready within him; and saying it,

he goes from honor to honor, strong in his conviction.

He who refuses does not repent. Asked again,

he’d still say no. Yet that no—the right no—

drags him down all his life.

- The title translated means "Who made...the great refusal". I really like this though I'm struggling slightly with it. I would say the "right no" is about doing what appears to be the right thing - if we ALWAYS do we will be dragged down our whole lives by not listening to our hearts. Sometimes we have to take a chance and declare the great YES...from this we become stronger...

Lines Composed in a Wood on a Windy Day - Anne Bronte

My soul is awakened, my spirit is soaring

And carried aloft on the wings of the breeze;

For above and around me the wild wind is roaring,

Arousing to rapture the earth and the seas.

The long withered grass in the sunshine is glancing,

The bare trees are tossing their branches on high;

The dead leaves beneath them are merrily dancing,

The white clouds are scudding across the blue sky

I wish I could see how the ocean is lashing

The foam of its billows to whirlwinds of spray;

I wish I could see how its proud waves are dashing,

And hear the wild roar of their thunder to-day!

- I love this totally beautiful genuine appreciation of nature and a sense of her being 'at one'.

Drinking Song - James Kenneth Stephen

There are people, I know, to be found,

Who say, and apparently think,

That sorrow and care may be drowned

By a timely consumption of drink.

Does not man, these enthusiasts ask,

Most nearly approach the divine,

When engaged in the soul-stirring task

Of filling his body with wine?

Have not beggars been frequently known,

When satisfied, soaked, and replete,

To imagine their bench was a throne

And the civilised world at their feet?

Lord Byron has finely described

The remarkably soothing effect

Of liquor, profusely imbibed,

On a soul that is shattered and wrecked.

In short, if your body or mind

Or your soul or your purse come to grief,

You need only get drunk, and you'll find

Complete and immediate relief.

For myself, I have managed to do

Without having recourse to this plan,

So I can't write a poem for you,

And you'd better get someone who can.

- I love how Stephen observes the changes that take place when people drink - beggars believe their bench is a throne, a shattered soul becomes enlightened by the profound effect of alcohol. I percieve the ending as quite witty - he is being sarcastic saying he hasn't had to resort to drink therefore he cannot be as profound and insightful as someone who drinks...yet he wrote the poem!

Vitae summa brevis spem nos vetat incohare longam - Ernest Dowson

They are not long, the weeping and the laughter,

Love and desire and hate:

I think they have no portion in us after

We pass the gate.

They are not long, the days of wine and roses:

Out of a misty dream

Our path emerges for a while, then closes

Within a dream.

- The title translated is "The brief sum of life forbids us the hope of enduring long". I'm into all different kinds of poetry for all different kinds of reasons. I will always feel compelled to add poetry which deals with the issues of life and death - especially those which highlight that life is just too short.

The Golden Rules of Conduct - William Shakespeare

Give thy thoughts no tongue,

Nor any unproportion'd thought his act.

Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.

Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tries,

Grapple them to thy soul with hopes of steel;

But do not dull thy palm with entertainment

Of each new-hatched, unfledged comrade. Beware

Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in,

Bear't that the opposed may beware of thee,

Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice:

Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment.

Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,

But not express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy;

For the apparel oft proclaims the man,

And they in France of the best rank and station

Are most select and generous thief in that.

Neither a borrower nor a lender be;

For loan oft loses both itself and friend,

And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.

This above all: to thine own self be true.

And it must follow, as the night the day,

Thou canst not then be false to any man.

- This monologue is taken from Hamlet. In my opinion it could almost be the original version of 'If' by Kipling. It carries strong messages about the ways in which one should live life. I love "This above all: to thine own self be true" - I believe as long as you are true to yourself you can't go wrong or be false to anyone else.

Poetry - Pablo Neruda

And it was at that age ... Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent firesor returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.

I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names,
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire,
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating plantations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.

And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke loose on the wind.

- I only need one word to describe how I feel about this poem...GENIUS!

i carry your heart with me - E.E Cummings

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

- What a romantic poem, the epitome of true love.

Leisure - William Henry Davies

What is this life if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

No time to stand beneath the boughs

And stare as long as sheep or cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,

Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight,

Streams full of stars like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty’s glance,

And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can

Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

- Pretty well-known poem, why? Because its bloody good. It points out that we are always rushing around - so busy in life that we don't take time to appreciate nature and the beauty of the universe. We are full of care for so many other things that we don't stop and just be 'at one' for a while. It makes me think of the famous John Lennon quote "Life is what happens when you're making other plans"...

Days - Philip Larkin

What are days for?

Days are where we live.

They come, they wake us

Time and time over.

They are to be happy in:

Where can we live but days?



Ah, solving that question

Brings the priest and the doctor

In their long coats

Running over the fields.



- As always Larkin uses such simple language and yet makes me think about something pretty complex. "Days are where we live!" - amazingly straightforward yet thought-provoking. When attempting to solve the riddle of life and being philiosophical we run the risk of people thinking there is something wrong with us.

Child - Sylvia Plath

Your clear eye is the one absolutely beautiful thing.

I want to fill it with color and ducks,

The zoo of the new

Whose name you meditate --

April snowdrop, Indian pipe,

Little

Stalk without wrinkle,

Pool in which images

Should be grand and classical

Not this troublous

Wringing of hands, this dark

Ceiling without a star.

- I love the vivid imagery here, when talking of her child's eye "I want to fill it with color and ducks", "little stalk without wrinkle"...I think this is beautiful. However, she sees herself as "this dark ceiling without star" - limited in her own world. Very sad.

I'm nobody! Who are you? - Emily Dickinson

I'm nobody! Who are you?

Are you nobody, too?

Then there's a pair of us — don't tell!

They'd banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!

How public, like a frog

To tell your name the livelong day

To an admiring bog!

- Great. She highlights that it is more favourable to remain away from the spotlight where people constantly are uttering who and what they are all day long - like frogs croaking in a swamp. She recognises the luxury there is in being a nobody.

Resume - Dorothy Parker

Razors pain you;

Rivers are damp;

Acids stain you;

And drugs cause cramp.

Guns aren't lawful;

Nooses give;

Gas smells awful;

You might as well live.

- I think this is very clever. Parker is being very flippant sounding out all the reasons why sucide is 'just too much hassle' while also exposing an underlying pain within her which suggests her own several attempts at suicide.

Last Lines - Emily Bronte

No coward soul is mine,
No trembler in the world's storm-troubled sphere:
I see Heaven's glories shine,
And faith shines equal, arming me from fear.

O God within my breast,
Almighty, ever-present Deity!
Life--that in me has rest,
As I--undying Life--have power in Thee!

Vain are the thousand creeds
That move men's hearts: unutterably vain;
Worthless as wither'd weeds,
Or idlest froth amid the boundless main,

To waken doubt in one
Holding so fast by Thine Infinity;
So surely anchor'd on
The steadfast rock of immortality.

With wide-embracing love
Thy Spirit animates eternal years,
Pervades and broods above,
Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears.

Though earth and man were gone,
And suns and universes ceased to be,
And Thou were left alone,
Every existence would exist in Thee.

There is not room for Death,
Nor atom that his might could render void:
Thou--Thou art Being and Breath,
And what Thou art may never be destroyed.

- These were the last lines ever written by Emily Bronte. I especially love "There is no room for Death, Nor atom that his might could render void". When something has existed, it can never die - something cannot turn into nothing - even death is not powerful enough to do this. She highlights immortality perfectly.

First Fig - Edna St. Vincent Millay

My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends---
It gives a lovely light!

- Love this. Makes me think of me writing or partying all night long.

Ignorance - Philip Larkin

Strange to know nothing, never to be sure

Of what is true or right or real,

But forced to qualify or so I feel,

Or Well, it does seem so:

Someone must know.

Strange to be ignorant of the way things work:

Their skill at finding what they need,

Their sense of shape, and punctual spread of seed,

And willingness to change;

Yes, it is strange,

Even to wear such knowledge - for our flesh

Surrounds us with its own decisions -

And yet spend all our life on imprecisions,

That when we start to die

Have no idea why.

- I always find Larkin's poetry very thought-provoking - he uses such simple language and makes such interesting observations about life. When I read this it reminds me how ignorant we are as human beings without even realising.

All the world's a stage - William Shakespeare

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side,
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

- This poem/monologue makes me think of my grandpa and the moments before he died - the ending is so apt.

Daddy - Sylvia Plath

You do not do, you do not do
Any more, black shoe
In which I have lived like a foot
For thirty years, poor and white,
Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.

Daddy, I have had to kill you.
You died before I had time--
Marble-heavy, a bag full of God,
Ghastly statue with one gray toe
Big as a Frisco seal

And a head in the freakish Atlantic
Where it pours bean green over blue
In the waters off beautiful Nauset.
I used to pray to recover you.
Ach, du.

In the German tongue, in the Polish town
Scraped flat by the roller
Of wars, wars, wars.
But the name of the town is common.
My Polack friend

Says there are a dozen or two.
So I never could tell where you
Put your foot, your root,
I never could talk to you.
The tongue stuck in my jaw.

It stuck in a barb wire snare.
Ich, ich, ich, ich,
I could hardly speak.
I thought every German was you.
And the language obscene

An engine, an engine
Chuffing me off like a Jew.
A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen.
I began to talk like a Jew.
I think I may well be a Jew.

The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna
Are not very pure or true.
With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luck
And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack
I may be a bit of a Jew.

I have always been scared of you,
With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo.
And your neat mustache
And your Aryan eye, bright blue.
Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You--

Not God but a swastika
So black no sky could squeak through.
Every woman adores a Fascist,
The boot in the face, the brute
Brute heart of a brute like you.

You stand at the blackboard, daddy,
In the picture I have of you,
A cleft in your chin instead of your foot
But no less a devil for that, no not
Any less the black man who

Bit my pretty red heart in two.
I was ten when they buried you.
At twenty I tried to die
And get back, back, back to you.
I thought even the bones would do.

But they pulled me out of the sack,
And they stuck me together with glue.
And then I knew what to do.
I made a model of you,
A man in black with a Meinkampf look

And a love of the rack and the screw.
And I said I do, I do.
So daddy, I'm finally through.
The black telephone's off at the root,
The voices just can't worm through.

If I've killed one man, I've killed two--
The vampire who said he was you
And drank my blood for a year,
Seven years, if you want to know.
Daddy, you can lie back now.

There's a stake in your fat black heart
And the villagers never liked you.
They are dancing and stamping on you.
They always knew it was you.
Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I'm through.

- My all-time favourite Sylvia Plath poem (along with 'Cut'!) So powerful. You get a real sense that her father played such a pivotal role in her life despite his total absence. Incredible imagery. I listened to her reading the poem aloud on You-Tube and it made the hairs on my neck stand up, very emotional.

Beatrix is Three - Adrian Mitchell

At the top of the stairs

I ask for her hand. O.K.

She gives it to me.

How her fist fits my palm,

A bunch of consolation.

We take our time

Down the steep carpetway

As I wish silently

That the stairs were endless.

- Pretty simple. This poem makes me imagine the tough job a parent must face in letting there children grow-up, make their own mistakes and venture off out into the world...

Reasons for Attendance - Philip Larkin

The trumpet's voice, loud and authoritative,
Draws me a moment to the lighted glass
To watch the dancers - all under twenty-five -
Solemnly on the beat of happiness.

-Or so I fancy, sensing the smoke and sweat,
The wonderful feel of girls. Why be out there?
But then, why be in there? Sex, yes, but what
Is sex ? Surely to think the lion's share
Of happiness is found by couples - sheer

Inaccuracy, as far as I'm concerned.
What calls me is that lifted, rough-tongued bell
(Art, if you like) whose individual sound
Insists I too am individual.
It speaks; I hear; others may hear as well,

But not for me, nor I for them; and so
With happiness. Therefor I stay outside,
Believing this, and they maul to and fro,
Believing that; and both are satisfied,
If no one has misjudged himself. Or lied.

- I feel I have been in both positions of being inside and outside (as most people probably do) I love what calls him is "that lifted, rough-tongued bell (Art, if you like)" suggesting he has a profound appreciation for the music on an almost spiritual level - something the dancers do not. The ending shows neither he or the dancers are "right or wrong" as long as everyone is true to themselves...