Written by
Robert Burns |
WHILE Europe’s eye is fix’d on mighty things,
The fate of Empires and the fall of Kings;
While quacks of State must each produce his plan,
And even children lisp the Rights of Man;
Amid this mighty fuss just let me mention,
The Rights of Woman merit some attention.
First, in the Sexes’ intermix’d connection,
One sacred Right of Woman is, protection.—
The tender flower that lifts its head, elate,
Helpless, must fall before the blasts of Fate,
Sunk on the earth, defac’d its lovely form,
Unless your shelter ward th’ impending storm.
Our second Right—but needless here is caution,
To keep that right inviolate’s the fashion;
Each man of sense has it so full before him,
He’d die before he’d wrong it—’tis decorum.—
There was, indeed, in far less polish’d days,
A time, when rough rude man had naughty ways,
Would swagger, swear, get drunk, kick up a riot,
Nay even thus invade a Lady’s quiet.
Now, thank our stars! those Gothic times are fled;
Now, well-bred men—and you are all well-bred—
Most justly think (and we are much the gainers)
Such conduct neither spirit, wit, nor manners.
For Right the third, our last, our best, our dearest,
That right to fluttering female hearts the nearest;
Which even the Rights of Kings, in low prostration,
Most humbly own—’tis dear, dear admiration!
In that blest sphere alone we live and move;
There taste that life of life—immortal love.
Smiles, glances, sighs, tears, fits, flirtations, airs;
’Gainst such an host what flinty savage dares,
When awful Beauty joins with all her charms—
Who is so rash as rise in rebel arms?
But truce with kings, and truce with constitutions,
With bloody armaments and revolutions;
Let Majesty your first attention summon,
Ah! ça ira! THE MAJESTY OF WOMAN!
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Written by
Andrew Marvell |
Nempe sic innumero succrescunt agmine libri,
Saepia vix toto ut jam natet una mari.
Fortius assidui surgunt a vulnere praeli:
Quoque magis pressa est, auctior Hydra redit.
Heu quibus Anticyris, quibus est sanabilis herbis
Improba scribendi pestis, avarus amor!
India sola tenet tanti medicamina morbi,
Dicitur & nostris ingemuisse malis.
Utile Tabacci dedit illa miserta venenum,
Acci veratro quod meliora potest.
Jamque vides olidas libris fumare popinas:
Naribus O doctis quam pretiosus odor!
Hac ego praecipua credo herbam dote placere,
Hinc tuus has nebulas Doctor in astra vehit.
Ah mea quid tandem facies timidissima charta?
Exequias Siticen jam parat usque tuas.
Hunc subeas librum Sansti ceu limen asyli,
Quem neque delebit flamma, nec ira fovis.
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Written by
Robert Lowell |
(I.R.A. Bombing)
The British Army now carries two rifles,
one with rubber rabbit-pellets for children,
the other's of course for the Provisionals....
'When they first showed me the boy, I thought oh good,
it's not him because he's blonde—
I imagine his hair was singed dark by the bomb.
He had nothing on him to identify him,
except this box of joke trick matches;
he liked to have them on him, even at mass.
The police were unhurried and wonderful,
they let me go on trying to strike a match...
I just wouldn't stop—you cling to anything—
I couldn't believe I couldn't light one match—
only joke matches... Then I knew he was Richard.'
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
[Pg 137] SONNET CVII. Fontana di dolore, albergo d' ira. HE ATTRIBUTES THE WICKEDNESS OF THE COURT OF ROME TO ITS GREAT WEALTH. Spring of all woe, O den of curssed ire,Scoole of errour, temple of heresye;Thow Pope, I meane, head of hypocrasye,Thow and thie churche, unsaciat of desyre,Have all the world filled full of myserye;Well of disceate, thow dungeon full of fyre,That hydes all truthe to breed idolatrie.Thow wicked wretche, Chryste cannot be a lyer,Behold, therefore, thie judgment hastelye;Thye first founder was gentill povertie,But there against is all thow dost requyre.Thow shameless beaste wheare hast thow thie trust,In thie whoredome, or in thie riche attyre?Loe! Constantyne, that is turned into dust,Shall not retourne for to mayntaine thie lust;But now his heires, that might not sett thee higher,For thie greate pryde shall teare thye seate asonder,And scourdge thee so that all the world shall wonder. (?) Wyatt.[U] Fountain of sorrows, centre of mad ire,Rank error's school and fane of heresy,Once Rome, now Babylon, the false and free,Whom fondly we lament and long desire.O furnace of deceits, O prison dire,Where good roots die and the ill-weed grows a treeHell upon earth, great marvel will it beIf Christ reject thee not in endless fire.Founded in humble poverty and chaste,Against thy founders lift'st thou now thy horn,Impudent harlot! Is thy hope then placedIn thine adult'ries and thy wealth ill-born?Since comes no Constantine his own to claim,The vext world must endure, or end its shame. Macgregor.
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
SONNET CXCVI. Vincitore Alessandro l' ira vinse. THE EVIL RESULTS OF UNRESTRAINED ANGER. What though the ablest artists of old timeLeft us the sculptured bust, the imaged formOf conq'ring Alexander, wrath o'ercameAnd made him for the while than Philip less?Wrath to such fury valiant Tydeus droveThat dying he devour'd his slaughter'd foe;Wrath made not Sylla merely blear of eye,But blind to all, and kill'd him in the end.Well Valentinian knew that to such painWrath leads, and Ajax, he whose death it wrought.Strong against many, 'gainst himself at last.Wrath is brief madness, and, when unrestrain'd,Long madness, which its master often leadsTo shame and crime, and haply e'en to death.
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