Written by
Rudyard Kipling |
1913
These are our regulations--
There's just one law for the Scout
And the first and the last, and the present and the past,
And the future and the perfect is "Look out!"
I, thou and he, look out!
We, ye and they, look out!
Though you didn't or you wouldn't
Or you hadn't or you couldn't;
You jolly well must look out!
Look out, when you start for the day
That your kit is packed to your mind;
There is no use going away
With half of it left behind.
Look out that your laces are tight,
And your boots are easy and stout,
Or you'll end with a blister at night.
(Chorus) All Patrols look out!
Look out for the birds of the air,
Look out for the beasts of the field--
They'll tell you how and where
The other side's concealed.
When the blackbird bolts from the copse,
Or the cattle are staring about,
The wise commander stops
And (chorus) All Patrols look out!
Look out when your front is clear,
And you feel you are bound to win.
Look out for your flank and your rear--
That's where surprises begin.
For the rustle that isn't a rat,
For the splash that isn't a trout,
For the boulder that may be a hat
(Chorus) All Patrols look out!
For the innocent knee-high grass,
For the ditch that never tells,
Look out! Look out ere you pass--
And look out for everything else
A sign mis-read as you run
May turn retreat to a rout--
For all things under the sun
(Chorus) All Patrols look out!
Look out where your temper goes
At the end of a losing game;
When your boots too tight for your toes;
And you answer and argue and blame.
It's the hardest part of the Low,
But it has to be learned by the Scout--
For whining and shrinking and "jaw"
(Chorus) All Patrols look out!
|
Written by
Alec Derwent (A D) Hope |
For every bird there is this last migration;
Once more the cooling year kindles her heart;
With a warm passage to the summer station
Love pricks the course in lights across the chart.
Year after year a speck on the map, divided
By a whole hemisphere, summons her to come;
Season after season, sure and safely guided,
Going away she is also coming home.
And being home, memory becomes a passion
With which she feeds her brood and straws her nest,
Aware of ghosts that haunt the heart's possession
And exiled love mourning within the breast.
The sands are green with a mirage of valleys;
The palm tree casts a shadow not its own;
Down the long architrave of temple or palace
Blows a cool air from moorland scarps of stone.
And day by day the whisper of love grows stronger;
That delicate voice, more urgent with despair,
Custom and fear constraining her no longer,
Drives her at last on the waste leagues of air.
A vanishing speck in those inane dominions,
Single and frail, uncertain of her place,
Alone in the bright host of her companions,
Lost in the blue unfriendliness of space.
She feels it close now, the appointed season;
The invisible thread is broken as she flies;
Suddenly, without warning, without reason,
The guiding spark of instinct winks and dies.
Try as she will, the trackless world delivers
No way, the wilderness of light no sign;
Immense,complex contours of hills and rivers
Mock her small wisdom with their vast design.
The darkness rises from the eastern valleys,
And the winds buffet her with their hungry breath,
And the great earth, with neither grief nor malice,
Receives the tiny burden of her death.
|
Written by
Ella Wheeler Wilcox |
The band was playing a waltz-quadrille,
I felt as light as a wind-blown feather,
As we floated away, at the caller’s will,
Through the intricate, mazy dance together.
Like mimic armies our lines were meeting,
Slowly advancing, and then retreating,
All decked in their bright array;
And back and forth to the music’s rhyme
We moved together, and all the time
I knew you were going away.
The fold of your strong arm sent a thrill
From heart to brain as we gently glided
Like leaves on the wave of that waltz-quadrille;
Parted, met, and again divided –
You drifting one way, and I another,
Then suddenly turning and facing each other,
Then off in the blithe chasse.
Then airily back to our places swaying,
While every beat of the music seemed saying
That you were going away.
I said to my heart, ‘Let us take our fill
Of mirth, and music, and love, and laughter;
For it all must end with this waltz-quadrille,
And life will never be the same life after.
Oh that the caller might go on calling!
Oh that the music might go on falling
Like a shower of silver spray,
While we whirled on to the vast Forever,
Where no hearts break, and no ties sever,
And no one goes away!
A clamour, a crash, and the band was still,
‘Twas the end of the dream, and the end of the measure:
The last low notes of that waltz-quadrille
Seemed like a dirge o’er the death of Pleasure.
You said good-night, and the spell was over –
Too warm for a friend, and too cold for a lover –
There was nothing else to say;
But the lights looked dim, and the dancers weary,
And the music was sad and the hall was dreary,
After you went away.
|
Written by
William Butler Yeats |
A little Indian temple in the Golden Age.
Around it a garden;
around that the forest.
Anashuya, the young priestess, kneeling
within the temple.
Anashuya.
Send peace on all the lands and flickering
corn.
-
O, may tranquillity walk by his elbow
When wandering in the forest, if he love
No other.
- Hear, and may the indolent flocks
Be plentiful.
- And if he love another,
May panthers end him.
- Hear, and load our king
With wisdom hour by hour.
- May we two stand,
When we are dead, beyond the setting suns,
A little from the other shades apart,
With mingling hair, and play upon one lute.
Vijaya [entering and throwing a lily at her].
Hail! hail, my
Anashuya.
Anashuya.
No: be still.
I, priestess of this temple, offer up
prayers for the land.
Vijaya.
I will wait here, Amrita.
Anashuya.
By mighty Brahma's ever-rustling robe,
Who is Amrita? Sorrow of all sorrows!
Another fills your mind.
Vijaya.
My mother's name.
Anashuya [sings, coming out of the temple].
A sad, sad thought went by me slowly:
Sigh, O you little stars.
! O sigh and shake your blue apparel!
The sad, sad thought has gone from me now wholly:
Sing, O you little stars.
! O sing and raise your rapturous
carol
To mighty Brahma, be who made you many as the sands,
And laid you on the gates of evening with his quiet hands.
[Sits down on the steps of the temple.
]
Vijaya, I have brought my evening rice;
The sun has laid his chin on the grey wood,
Weary, with all his poppies gathered round him.
Vijaya.
The hour when Kama, full of sleepy laughter,
Rises, and showers abroad his fragrant arrows,
Piercing the twilight with their murmuring barbs.
Anashuya.
See-how the sacred old flamingoes come.
Painting with shadow all the marble steps:
Aged and wise, they seek their wonted perches
Within the temple, devious walking, made
To wander by their melancholy minds.
Yon tall one eyes my supper; chase him away,
Far, far away.
I named him after you.
He is a famous fisher; hour by hour
He ruffles with his bill the minnowed streams.
Ah! there he snaps my rice.
I told you so.
Now cuff him off.
He's off! A kiss for you,
Because you saved my rice.
Have you no thanks?
Vijaya [sings].
Sing you of her, O first few stars,
Whom Brahma, touching with his finger, praises, for you hold
The van of wandering quiet; ere you be too calm and old,
Sing, turning in your cars,
Sing, till you raise your hands and sigh, and from your car-
heads peer,
With all your whirling hair, and drop many an azure tear.
Anashuya.
What know the pilots of the stars of tears?
Vijaya.
Their faces are all worn, and in their eyes
Flashes the fire of sadness, for they see
The icicles that famish all the North,
Where men lie frozen in the glimmering snow;
And in the flaming forests cower the lion
And lioness, with all their whimpering cubs;
And, ever pacing on the verge of things,
The phantom, Beauty, in a mist of tears;
While we alone have round us woven woods,
And feel the softness of each other's hand,
Amrita, while --
Anashuya [going away from him].
Ah me! you love another,
[Bursting into tears.
]
And may some sudden dreadful ill befall her!
Vijaya.
I loved another; now I love no other.
Among the mouldering of ancient woods
You live, and on the village border she,
With her old father the blind wood-cutter;
I saw her standing in her door but now.
Anashuya.
Vijaya, swear to love her never more.
Vijaya.
Ay, ay.
Anashuya.
Swear by the parents of the gods,
Dread oath, who dwell on sacred Himalay,
On the far Golden peak; enormous shapes,
Who still were old when the great sea was young;
On their vast faces mystery and dreams;
Their hair along the mountains rolled and filled
From year to year by the unnumbered nests
Of aweless birds, and round their stirless feet
The joyous flocks of deer and antelope,
Who never hear the unforgiving hound.
Swear!
Vijaya.
By the parents of the gods, I swear.
Anashuya [sings].
I have forgiven, O new star!
Maybe you have not heard of us, you have come forth so newly,
You hunter of the fields afar!
Ah, you will know my loved one by his hunter's arrows
truly,
Shoot on him shafts of quietness, that he may ever keep
A lonely laughter, and may kiss his hands to me in sleep.
Farewell, Vijaya.
Nay, no word, no word;
I, priestess of this temple, offer up
Prayers for the land.
[Vijaya goes.
]
O Brahma, guard in sleep
The merry lambs and the complacent kine,
The flies below the leaves, and the young mice
In the tree roots, and all the sacred flocks
Of red flamingoes; and my love, Vijaya;
And may no restless fay with fidget finger
Trouble his sleeping: give him dreams of me.
|
Written by
Elizabeth Bishop |
The brown enormous odor he lived by
was too close, with its breathing and thick hair,
for him to judge.
The floor was rotten; the sty
was plastered halfway up with glass-smooth dung.
Light-lashed, self-righteous, above moving snouts,
the pigs' eyes followed him, a cheerful stare--
even to the sow that always ate her young--
till, sickening, he leaned to scratch her head.
But sometimes mornings after drinking bouts
(he hid the pints behind the two-by-fours),
the sunrise glazed the barnyard mud with red
the burning puddles seemed to reassure.
And then he thought he almost might endure
his exile yet another year or more.
But evenings the first star came to warn.
The farmer whom he worked for came at dark
to shut the cows and horses in the barn
beneath their overhanging clouds of hay,
with pitchforks, faint forked lightnings, catching light,
safe and companionable as in the Ark.
The pigs stuck out their little feet and snored.
The lantern--like the sun, going away--
laid on the mud a pacing aureole.
Carrying a bucket along a slimy board,
he felt the bats' uncertain staggering flight,
his shuddering insights, beyond his control,
touching him.
But it took him a long time
finally to make up his mind to go home.
|
Written by
Philip Levine |
1
We live here because the houses
are clean, the lawns run
right to the street
and the streets run away.
No one walks here.
No one wakens at night or dies.
The cars sit open-eyed
in the driveways.
The lights are on all day.
2
At home forever, she has removed
her long foreign names
that stained her face like hair.
She smiles at you, and you think
tears will start from the corners
of her mouth.
Such a look
of tenderness, you look away.
She's your sister.
Quietly she says,
You're a ****, I'll get you for it.
3
Money's the same, he says.
He brings it home in white slabs
that smell like soap.
Throws them down
on the table as though
he didn't care.
The children hear
and come in from play glowing
like honey and so hungry.
4
With it all we have
such a talent for laughing.
We can laugh at anything.
And we forget no one.
She listens to mother
on the phone, and he remembers
the exact phrasing of a child's sorrows,
the oaths taken by bear and tiger
never to forgive.
5
On Sunday we're having a party.
The children are taken away
in a black Dodge, their faces erased
from the mirrors.
Outside a scum
is forming on the afternoon.
A car parks but no one gets out.
Brother is loading the fridge.
Sister is polishing and spraying herself.
Today we're having a party.
6
For fun we talk about you.
Everything's better for being said.
That's a rule.
This is going to be some long night, she says.
How could you? How could you?
For the love of mother, he says.
There will be no dawn
until the laughing stops.
Even the pines
are burning in the dark.
7
Why do you love me? he says.
Because.
Because.
You're best to me, she purrs.
In the kitchen, in the closets,
behind the doors, above the toilets,
the calendars are eating it up.
One blackened one watches you
like another window.
Why
are you listening? it says.
8
No one says, There's a war.
No one says, Children are burning.
No one says, Bizniz as usual.
But you have to take it all back.
You have to hunt through your socks
and dirty underwear
and crush each word.
If you're serious
you have to sit in the corner
and eat ten new dollars.
Eat'em.
9
Whose rifles are brooding
in the closet? What are
the bolts whispering
back and forth? And the pyramids
of ammunition, so many
hungry mouths to feed.
When you hide in bed
the revolver under the pillow
smiles and shows its teeth.
10
On the last night the children
waken from the same dream
of leaves burning.
Two girls in the dark
knowing there are no wolves
or bad men in the room.
Only electricity on the loose,
the television screaming at itself,
the dishwasher tearing its heart out.
11
We're going away.
The house
is too warm.
We disconnect
the telephone.
Bones, cans, broken dolls, bronzed shoes,
ground down to face powder.
Burn
the toilet paper collected in the basement.
Take back the bottles.
The back stairs are raining glass.
Cancel the milk.
12
You may go now, says Cupboard.
I won't talk,
says Clock.
Your bag is black and waiting.
How can you leave your house?
The stove hunches its shoulders,
the kitchen table stares at the sky.
You're heaving yourself out in the snow
groping toward the front door.
|
Written by
William Topaz McGonagall |
'Twas in the village of Ruily there lived a bonnie lass
With red, pouting lips which few lasses could surpass,
And her eyes were as azure the blue sky,
Which caused Donald McNeill to heave many a love sigh
Beyond the township of Ruily she never had been,
This pretty maid with tiny feet and aged eighteen;
And when Donald would ask her to be his wife,
"No," she would say, "I'm not going to stay here all my life.
"
"I'm sick of this life," she said to Donald one day,
"By making the parridge and carrying peats from the bog far away.
"
"Then marry me, Belle, and peats you shall never carry again,
And we might take a trip to Glasgow and there remain.
"
Then she answered him crossly, "I wish you wouldn't bother me,
For I'm tired of this kind of talk, as you may see.
"
So at last there came a steamer to Ruily one day,
So big that if almost seemed to fill the bay.
Then Belle and Effie Mackinnon came to the door with a start,
While Belle's red, pouting lips were wide apart;
But when she saw the Redcoats coming ashore
She thought she had never seen such splendid men before.
One day after the steamer "Resistless" had arrived,
Belle's spirits seemed suddenly to be revived;
And as Belle was lifting peats a few feet from the door
She was startled by a voice she never heard before.
The speaker wore a bright red coat and a small cap,
And she thought to herself he is a handsome chap;
Then the speaker said, "'Tis a fine day," and began to flatter,
Until at last he asked Belle for a drink of watter.
Then she glanced up at him shyly, while uneasy she did feel,
At the thought of having to hoist the peat-creel;
And she could see curly, fair hair beneath his cap,
Still, she thought to herself, he is a good-looking chap.
And his eyes were blue and sparkling as the water in the bay,
And he spoke in a voice that was pleasant and gay;
Then he took hold of the peat-creel as he spoke,
But Belle only laughed and considered it a joke.
Then Belle shook her head and lifted the peats on her back,
But he followed her home whilst to her he did crack;
And by and by she brought him a drink of watter,
While with loving words he began Belle to flatter.
And after he had drank the watter and handed back the jug,
He said, "You are the sweetest flower that's to be found in Ruily";
And he touched her bare arm as he spoke,
Which proved to be sailor Harry's winning stroke.
But it would have been well for Belle had it ended there,
But it did not, for the sailor followed her, I do declare;
And he was often at old Mackinnon's fireside,
And there for hours on an evening he would abide.
And Belle would wait on him with love-lit eyes,
While Harry's heart would heave with many love sighs.
At last, one night Belle said, "I hear you're going away.
"
Then Harry Lochton said, "'Tis true, Belie, and I must obey.
But, my heather Belle, if you'll leave Ruily with me
I'll marry you, with your father's consent, immediately.
"
Then she put her arms around his neck and said, "Harry, I will.
"
Then Harry said, "You'll be a sailor's wife for good or ill.
"
In five days after Belie got married to her young sailor lad,
And there was a grand wedding, and old Mackinnon felt glad;
And old Mackinnon slapped his son-in-law on the back
And said, "I hope good health and money you will never lack.
"
At last the day came that Harry had to go away,
And Harry said, "God bless you, Belle, by night and day;
But you will come to Portsmouth and I will meet you there,
Remember, at the railway platform, and may God of you take care.
"
And when she arrived in Portsmouth she was amazed at the sight,
But when she saw Harry her heart beat with delight;
And when the train stopped, Harry to her quickly ran,
And took her tin-box from the luggage van.
Then he took her to her new home without delay,
And the endless stairs and doors filled her heart with dismay;
But for that day the hours flew quickly past,
Because she knew she was with her Harry at last.
But there came a day when Harry was ordered away,
And he said, "My darling, I'll come back some unexpected day.
"
Then he kissed her at parting and "Farewell" he cries,
While the tears fell fast from her bonnie blue eyes.
Then when Harry went away she grew very ill,
And she cried, "If Harry stays long away this illness will me kill.
"
At last Harry came home and found her ill in bed,
And he cried, "My heather Belle, you're as pale as the dead.
"
Then she cried, "Harry, sit so as I may see your face,
Beside me here, Harry, that's just the place.
"
Then on his shoulder she gently dropped her head;
Then Harry cried, "Merciful heaven, my heather Belle is dead!"
|
Written by
Henry Van Dyke |
Oh, why are you shining so bright, big Sun,
And why is the garden so gay?
Do you know that my days of delight are done,
Do you know I am going away?
If you covered your face with a cloud, I 'd dream
You were sorry for me in my pain,
And the heads of the flowers all bowed would seem
To be weeping with me in the rain.
But why is your head so low, sweet heart,
And why are your eyes overcast?
Are they clouded because you know we must part,
Do you think this embrace is our last?
Then kiss me again, and again, and again,
Look up as you bid me good-bye!
For your face is too dear for the stain of a tear,
And your smile is the sun in my sky.
|
Written by
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe |
[To the memory of an excellent and beautiful
girl of 17, belonging to the village of Brienen, who perished on
the 13th of January, 1809, whilst giving help on the occasion of
the breaking up of the ice on the Rhine, and the bursting of the
dam of Cleverham.
]
THE DAM BREAKS DOWN, THE ICE-PLAIN GROWLS,
THE FLOODS ARISE, THE WATER HOWLS.
"I'll bear thee, mother, across the swell,
'Tis not yet high, I can wade right well.
"
"Remember us too! in what danger are we!
Thy fellow-lodger, and children three!
The trembling woman!--Thou'rt going away!"
She bears the mother across the spray.
"Quick! haste to the mound, and awhile there wait,
I'll soon return, and all will be straight.
The mound's close by, and safe from the wet;
But take my goat too, my darling pet!"
THE DAM DISSOLVES, THE ICE-PLAIN GROWLS,
THE FLOODS DASH ON, THE WATER HOWLS.
She places the mother safe on the shore;
Fair Susan then turns tow'rd the flood once more.
"Oh whither? Oh whither? The breadth fast grows,
Both here and there the water o'erflows.
Wilt venture, thou rash one, the billows to brave?"
"THEY SHALL, AND THEY MUST BE PRESERVED FROM THE WAVE!"
THE DAM DISAPPEARS, THE WATER GROWLS,
LIKE OCEAN BILLOWS IT HEAVES AND HOWLS.
Fair Susan returns by the way she had tried,
The waves roar around, but she turns not aside;
She reaches the mound, and the neighbour straight,
But for her and the children, alas, too late!
THE DAM DISAPPEAR'D,--LIKE A SEA IT GROWLS,
ROUND THE HILLOCK IN CIRCLING EDDIES IT HOWLS.
The foaming abyss gapes wide, and whirls round,
The women and children are borne to the ground;
The horn of the goat by one is seized fast,
But, ah, they all must perish at last!
Fair Susan still stands-there, untouch'd by the wave;
The youngest, the noblest, oh, who now will save?
Fair Susan still stands there, as bright as a star,
But, alas! all hope, all assistance is far.
The foaming waters around her roar,
To save her, no bark pushes off from the shore.
Her gaze once again she lifts up to Heaven,
Then gently away by the flood she is driven.
NO DAM, NO PLAIN! TO MARK THE PLACE
SOME STRAGGLING TREES ARE THE ONLY TRACE.
The rushing water the wilderness covers,
Yet Susan's image still o'er it hovers.
--
The water sinks, the plains re-appear.
Fair Susan's lamented with many a tear,--
May he who refuses her story to tell,
Be neglected in life and in death as well!
1809.
|
Written by
Ella Wheeler Wilcox |
I knew it the first of the summer,
I knew it the same at the end,
That you and your love were plighted,
But couldn’t you be my friend?
Couldn’t we sit in the twilight,
Couldn’t we walk on the shore
With only a pleasant friendship
To bind us, and nothing more?
There was not a word of folly
Spoken between us two,
Though we lingered oft in the garden
Till the roses were wet with dew.
We touched on a thousand subjects –
The moon and the worlds above, -
And our talk was tinctured with science,
And everything else, save love.
A wholly Platonic friendship
You said I had proven to you
Could bind a man and a woman
The whole long season through,
With never a thought of flirting,
Though both were in their youth,
What would you have said, my lady,
If you had known the truth!
What would you have done, I wonder,
Had I gone on my knees to you
And told you my passionate story,
There in the dusk and the dew?
My burning, burdensome story,
Hidden and hushed so long –
My story of hopeless loving –
Say, would you have thought it wrong?
But I fought with my heart and conquered,
I hid my wound from sight;
You were going away in the morning,
And I said a calm goodnight.
But now when I sit in the twilight,
Or when I walk by the sea
That friendship, quite Platonic,
Comes surging over me.
And a passionate longing fills me
For the roses, the dusk, the dew;
For the beautiful summer vanished,
For the moonlight walks – and you.
|