Written by
Ogden Nash |
Once upon a time there was an Italian,
And some people thought he was a rapscallion,
But he wasn't offended,
Because other people thought he was splendid,
And he said the world was round,
And everybody made an uncomplimentary sound,
But he went and tried to borrow some money from Ferdinand
But Ferdinand said America was a bird in the bush and he'd rather have a berdinand,
But Columbus' brain was fertile, it wasn't arid,
And he remembered that Ferdinand was married,
And he thought, there is no wife like a misunderstood one,
Because if her husband thinks something is a terrible idea she is bound to think it a good one,
So he perfumed his handkerchief with bay rum and citronella,
And he went to see Isabella,
And he looked wonderful but he had never felt sillier,
And she said, I can't place the face but the aroma is familiar,
And Columbus didn't say a word,
All he said was, I am Columbus, the fifteenth-century Admiral Byrd,
And, just as he thought, her disposition was very malleable,
And she said, Here are my jewels, and she wasn't penurious like Cornelia the mother of the Gracchi, she wasn't referring to her children, no, she was referring to her jewels, which were very very valuable,
So Columbus said, Somebody show me the sunset and somebody did and he set sail for it,
And he discovered America and they put him in jail for it,
And the fetters gave him welts,
And they named America after somebody else,
So the sad fate of Columbus ought to be pointed out to every child and every voter,
Because it has a very important moral, which is, Don't be a discoverer, be a promoter.
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Written by
Oscar Wilde |
Rid of the world's injustice, and his pain,
He rests at last beneath God's veil of blue:
Taken from life when life and love were new
The youngest of the martyrs here is lain,
Fair as Sebastian, and as early slain.
No cypress shades his grave, no funeral yew,
But gentle violets weeping with the dew
Weave on his bones an ever-blossoming chain.
O proudest heart that broke for misery!
O sweetest lips since those of Mitylene!
O poet-painter of our English Land!
Thy name was writ in water - it shall stand:
And tears like mine will keep thy memory green,
As Isabella did her Basil-tree.
ROME.
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Written by
Craig Raine |
The sun rose like a tarnished
looking-glass to catch the sun
and flash His hot message
at the missionaries below--
Isabella and the Rev. Roger Price,
and the Helmores with a broken axle
left, two days behind, at Fever Ponds.
The wilderness was full of home:
a glinting beetle on its back
struggled like an orchestra
with Beethoven. The Hallé,
Isabella thought and hummed.
Makololo, their Zulu guide,
puzzled out the Bible, replacing
words he didn't know with Manchester.
Spikenard, alabaster, Leviticus,
were Manchester and Manchester.
His head reminded Mrs. Price
of her old pomander stuck with cloves,
forgotten in some pungent tallboy.
The dogs drank under the wagon
with a far away clip-clopping sound,
and Roger spat into the fire,
leaned back and watched his phlegm
like a Welsh rarebit
bubbling on the brands. . .
When Baby died, they sewed her
in a scrap of carpet and prayed,
with milk still darkening
Isabella's grubby button-through.
Makololo was sick next day
and still the Helmores didn't come.
The outspanned oxen moved away
at night in search of water,
were caught and goaded on
to Matabele water-hole--
nothing but a dark stain on the sand.
Makololo drank vinegar and died.
Back they turned for Fever Ponds
and found the Helmores on the way. . .
Until they got within a hundred yards,
the vultures bobbed and trampolined
around the bodies, then swirled
a mile above their heads
like scalded tea leaves.
The Prices buried everything--
all the tattered clothes and flesh,
Mrs. Helmore's bright chains of hair,
were wrapped in bits of calico
then given to the sliding sand.
'In the beginning was the Word'--
Roger read from Helmore's Bible
found open at St. John.
Isabella moved her lips,
'The Word was Manchester.'
Shhh, shhh, the shovel said. Shhh. . .
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Written by
Robert Burns |
RAVING winds around her blowing,
Yellow leaves the woodlands strowing,
By a river hoarsely roaring,
Isabella stray’d deploring—
“Farewell, hours that late did measure
Sunshine days of joy and pleasure;
Hail, thou gloomy night of sorrow,
Cheerless night that knows no morrow!
“O’er the past too fondly wandering,
On the hopeless future pondering;
Chilly grief my life-blood freezes,
Fell despair my fancy seizes.
“Life, thou soul of every blessing,
Load to misery most distressing,
Gladly how wouldlI resign thee,
And to dark oblivion join thee!”
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