ASF Poetry Thread

and this above all, If you go into politics,
resist the call, and sniff you not on seats.

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http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/08/04/2323421.htm
Buswell announces resignation

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LORD POLONIUS: Yet here, Laertes! aboard, aboard, for shame!
The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail,
And you are stay'd for. There; my blessing with thee!
And these few precepts in thy memory
See thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue,
Nor any unproportioned thought his act.
Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment
Of each new-hatch'd, 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 of a most select and generous chief 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 ownself be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Farewell: my blessing season this in thee!

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TYPICAL OLD FASHIONED LOVE AFFAIR - 16th CENTRURY.

they Met in their teens when the world was green, and their Heads were impetuous yet,
and the Sad forebodings to them unseen, of Montague and Capulet,
and it Grew from fling to zing to keen, to Flames of eternal debt,
till those Flaming brothers intervene, on behalf of the the Gang and the Jet.

at Threat from the mother, of pain to the other, they Parted reluctant sad,
one Day had elapsed - how they missed one another, to a frenzy bordering mad!!,
"THIS SHOULDER", he pleaded to bullying brothers, "CUT IT OFF!! if you so abhore them !!
for it's Wet from her teardrops cried in her blubbering, Sobs - and I ADORE THEM!"

"Cut off my hands!" he insisted again, for they Only want to mould her!
"Cut off my arms!" while I'm locked in this den, for they only want to enfold her!,
"CUT OUT MINE EYES!! poor excuses of men, for they only want to behold her,
"and Do it all now in preference to then - 'fore I Get another hour older."

.............
Well.. she Pictured it all in her fair young mind , that he'd Been severely reduced,
Legless, shoulderless, armless, blind - and she'd STILL NOT been seduced !!
"Poison me brothers!", she said to her kin -.... "ahhh Give that cup here you great NONG!"
then she gulped it - twas real !! - the poison went in !!,
THEN ...the trick knife didn't go "sprong" !!!!!.

Bleeding and pleading and dying and dead, pitied and sorely shaken up,
her Last dying gasp as he leant o'er her bed..
............."Today too late I have waken up"
"Of COURSE they were right !! I now confess, when they Said it would all end in strife,
and i TRIED to tell you - but oh NOOO, you knew best!!....Bloody men, bloody mess, bloody life.!!"

After which ...HE leant back, bellowed "HELL WITH THE REST, SAINT PETER!! who needs formal wife!!
Please mate - best honeymoon suite - two guests!!!" ,
......... and he plunged in his heart with his knife.

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An Essay on Criticism (1711), line 225
Alexander Pope

So pleas'd at first, the towring Alps we try,
Mount o'er the Vales, and seem to tread the Sky;
Th' Eternal Snows appear already past,
And the first Clouds and Mountains seem the last:
But those attain'd, we tremble to survey
The growing Labours of the lengthen'd Way,
Th' increasing Prospect tires our wandring Eyes,
Hills peep o'er Hills, and Alps on Alps arise!

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Succubus
In Western medieval legend, a succubus (plural succubi) is a demon, who takes the form of a beautiful woman to seduce men, especially monks[1], in dreams to have sexual intercourse. They draw energy from the men to sustain themselves, often until the point of exhaustion .... of the victim.

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HOW I BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS FROM AIX TO GHENT (OR VICE VERSA) = Parady
RJ Yeatman & W C Sellar

I sprang to the rollocks and Jorrocks and me
And I galloped, you galloped, he galloped, we galloped all three...
Not a word to each other; we kept changing place,
Neck to neck, back to front, ear to ear, face to face;
And we yelled once or twice, when we heard a clock chime,
'Would you kindly oblige us, Is that the right time?'
As I galloped, you galloped, he galloped, we galloped, ye galloped, they two shall have galloped; etc

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CLANCY OF THE OVERFLOW - A.B. "Banjo" Paterson

I had written him a letter which I had, for want of better
Knowledge, sent to where I met him down the Lachlan, years ago,
He was shearing when I knew him, so I sent the letter to him,
Just "on spec", addressed as follows: "Clancy, of The Overflow".

And an answer came directed in a writing unexpected,
(And I think the same was written in a thumbnail dipped in tar)
'Twas his shearing mate who wrote it, and verbatim I will quote it:
"Clancy's gone to Queensland droving, and we don't know where he are."

In my wild erratic fancy visions come to me of Clancy
Gone a-droving "down the Cooper" where the western drovers go;
As the stock are slowly stringing, Clancy rides behind them singing,
For the drover's life has pleasures that the townsfolk never know.

And the bush hath friends to meet him, and their kindly voices greet him
In the murmur of the breezes and the river on its bars,
And he sees the vision splendid of the sunlit plains extended,
And at night the wondrous glory of the everlasting stars.

I am sitting in my dingy little office, where a stingy
Ray of sunlight struggles feebly down between the houses tall,
And the foetid air and gritty of the dusty, dirty city
Through the open window floating, spreads its foulness over all.

And in place of lowing cattle, I can hear the fiendish rattle
Of the tramways and the buses making hurry down the street,
And the language uninviting of the gutter children fighting,
Comes fitfully and faintly through the ceaseless tramp of feet.

And the hurrying people daunt me, and their pallid faces haunt me
As they shoulder one another in their rush and nervous haste,
With their eager eyes and greedy, and their stunted forms and weedy,
For townsfolk have no time to grow, they have no time to waste.

And I somehow fancy that I'd like to change with Clancy,
Like to take a turn at droving where the seasons come and go,
While he faced the round eternal of the cashbook and the journal -
But I doubt he'd suit the office, Clancy, of "The Overflow".

The Bulletin, 21 December 1889.

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