Written by
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe |
In this noble ring to-day
Let my warning shame ye!
Listen to my solemn voice,--
Seldom does it name ye.
Many a thing have ye intended,
Many a thing have badly ended,
And now I must blame ye.
At some moment in our lives
We must all repent us!
So confess, with pious trust,
All your sins momentous!
Error's crooked pathways shunning.
Let us, on the straight road running,
Honestly content us!
Yes! we've oft, when waking, dream'd,
Let's confess it rightly;
Left undrain'd the brimming cup,
When it sparkled brightly;
Many a shepherd's-hour's soft blisses,
Many a dear mouth's flying kisses
We've neglected lightly.
Mute and silent have we sat,
Whilst the blockheads prated,
And above e'en song divine
Have their babblings rated;
To account we've even call'd us
For the moments that enthrall'd us,
With enjoyment freighted.
If thou'lt absolution grant
To thy true ones ever,
We, to execute thy will,
Ceaseless will endeavour,
From half-measures strive to wean us,
Wholly, fairly, well demean us,
Resting, flagging never.
At all blockheads we'll at once
Let our laugh ring clearly,
And the pearly-foaming wine
Never sip at merely.
Ne'er with eye alone give kisses,
But with boldness suck in blisses
From those lips loved dearly.
1803.*
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Written by
Carl Sandburg |
The child's wonder
At the old moon
Comes back nightly.
She points her finger
To the far silent yellow thing
Shining through the branches
Filtering on the leaves a golden sand,
Crying with her little tongue, "See the moon!"
And in her bed fading to sleep
With babblings of the moon on her little mouth.
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Written by
Carl Sandburg |
OUT of the testimony of such reluctant lips, out of the oaths and mouths of such scrupulous liars, out of perjurers whose hands swore by God to the white sun before all men,
Out of a rag saturated with smears and smuts gathered from the footbaths of kings and the loin cloths of whores, from the scabs of Babylon and Jerusalem to the scabs of London and New York,
From such a rag that has wiped the secret sores of kings and overlords across the milleniums of human marches and babblings,
From such a rag perhaps I shall wring one reluctant desperate drop of blood, one honest-to-God spot of red speaking a mother-heart.December, 1918.Christiania, Norway
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