Mass Bay Community College - National Poetry Month

The Lesson

2009-05-04T12:02:00.000-04:00

The Lesson by Maya Angelou

I keep on dying again.
Veins collapse, opening like the
Small fists of sleeping
Children.
Memory of old tombs,
Rotting flesh and worms do
Not convince me against
The challenge. The years
And cold defeat live deep in
Lines along my face.
They dull my eyes, yet
I keep on dying,
Because I love to live.

Bryan Hernandez

Songs of Innocence

2009-05-03T18:42:00.001-04:00

PIPING down the valleys wild,

Piping songs of peasant glee,

On a cloud I saw a child,

And he, laughing, said to me:

'Pipe a song about a lamb!'

So I piped with merry cheer.

'Piper, pipe that song again;'

So I piped: he wept to hear.

'Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe;

Sing thy songs of happy cheer!'

So I sang the same again,

While he wept with joy to hear.

'Piper, sit thee down and write

In a book, that all may read.'

So he vanished from my sight;

And I plucked a hollow reed,

And I made a rural pen,

And I stain'd the water clear,

And I wrote my happy songs

Every child may joy to hear.

By: William Blake

Submited by: Irene Tracey

When We Two Parted

2009-04-30T13:42:00.001-04:00

When We Two Parted

by George Gordon Byron

When we two parted     In silence and tears, Half broken-hearted     To sever for years, Pale grew thy cheek and cold,     Colder thy kiss; Truly that hour foretold     Sorrow to this.  The dew of the morning     Sunk chill on my brow--  It felt like the warning    Of what I feel now. Thy vows are all broken,     And light is thy fame; I hear thy name spoken,     And share in its shame.  They name thee before me,     A knell to mine ear; A shudder comes o'er me--    Why wert thou so dear? They know not I knew thee,     Who knew thee too well-- Long, long shall I rue thee,     Too deeply to tell.  In secret we met--    In silence I grieve, That thy heart could forget,     Thy spirit deceive. If I should meet thee     After long years, How should I greet thee?--    With silence and tears.

Submitted by: Jessica Clegg

As soon as fred gets out of bed

2009-04-30T13:28:00.001-04:00

Samantha Wills

As Soon as Fred Gets Out of Bed by Jack Prelutsky

As soon as Fred gets out of bed,
his underwear goes on his head.
His mother laughs, "Don't put it there,
a head's no place for underwear!"
But near his ears, above his brains,
is where Fred's underwear remains.

At night when Fred goes back to bed,
he deftly plucks it off his head.
His mother switches off the light
and softly croons, "Good night! Good night!"
And then, for reasons no one knows,
Fred's underwear goes on his toes.

One Struggle More, And I Am Free

2009-04-30T12:30:00.001-04:00

One Struggle More, And I Am Free

By Lord Byron

One struggle more, and I am free
From pangs that rend my heart in twain;
One last long sigh to love and thee,
Then back to busy life again.
It suits me well to mingle now
With things that never pleased before !
Though every joy is fled below,
What future grief can touch me more?

Then bring me wine, the banquet bring;
Man was not form'd to live alone:
I'll be that light, unmeaning thing
That smiles with all, and weeps with none.
It was not thus in days more dear,
It never would have been, but thou
Hast fled, and left me lonely here;
Thou 'rt nothing --- all are nothing now.

In vain my lyre would lightly breathe !
The smile that sorrow fain would wear
But mocks the woe that lurks beneath,
Like roses o'er a sepulchre.
Though gay companions o'er the bowl
Dispel awhile the sense of ill :
Though pleasure fires the maddening soul,
The heart, --- the heart is lonely still !

On many a lone and lovely night
It sooth'd to gaze upon the sky;
For then I deem'd the heavenly light
Shone sweetly on thy pensive eye:
And oft I thought at Cynthia's noon,
When sailing o'er the Ægean wave,
" Now Thyrza gazes on that moon " ---
Alas, it gleam'd upon her grave !

When stretch'd on fever's sleepless bed,
And sickness shrunk my throbbing veins,
" 'T is comfort still,"   I faintly said,
" That Thyrza cannot know my pains: "
Like freedom to the time-worn slave,
A boon 'tis idle then to give,
Relenting Nature vainly gave
My life, when Thyrza ceased to live !

My Thyrza's pledge in better days,
When love and life alike were new !
How different now thou meet'st my gaze !
How tinged by time with sorrow's hue !
The heart that gave itself with thee
Is silent --- ah, were mine as still !
Though cold as e'en the dead can be,
It feels, it sickens with the chill.

Thou bitter pledge !    thou mournful token !
Though painful, welcome to my breast !
Still, still preserve that love unbroken,
Or break the heart to which thou'rt press'd.
Time tempers love, but not removes,
More hallow'd when its hope is fled:
Oh !   what are thousand living loves
To that which cannot quit the dead ?

Submitted By: David Ferullo

Lyin' Larry

2009-04-30T12:16:00.001-04:00

Larry's such a liar--
He tells outrageous lies.
He says he's ninety-nine years old
Instead of only five.
He says he lives up on the moon.
He says that he once flew.
He says he's really six feet four
Instead of three feet two.
He says he had a billion dollars
'Stead of just a dime.
He says he rode a dinosaur
Back in some distant time.
He says his mother is the moon
Who taught him magic spells.
He says his father is the wind
That rings the morning bells.
He says he can take stones and rocks
And turn them into gold.
He says he can take burnin' fire
And turn it freezin' cold.
He said he'd send me seven elves
To help me with my chores.
But Larry's such a liar--
He only sent me four.

By Shel Silverstein.

Submitted by: Enoch Lee

Windows Live™ Hotmail®:…more than just e-mail. Check it out.

On Anothers Sorrow

2009-04-30T10:23:00.000-04:00

by William Blake

Can I see another's woe,
And not be in sorrow too?
Can I see another's grief,
And not seek for kind relief?

Can I see a falling tear,
And not feel my sorrow's share?
Can a father see his child
Weep, nor be with sorrow fill'd?

Can a mother sit and hear
An infant groan an infant fear?
No, no! never can it be!
Never, never can it be!

And can he who smiles on all
Hear the wren with sorrows small,
Hear the small bird's grief & care,
Hear the woes that infants bear,

And not sit beside the nest,
Pouring pity in their breast;
And not sit the cradle near,
Weeping tear on infant's tear;

And not sit both night & day,
Wiping all our tears away?
O, no! never can it be!
Never, never can it be!

He doth give his joy to all;
He becomes an infant small;
He becomes a man of woe;
He doth feel the sorrow too.

Think not thou canst sigh a sigh
And thy maker is not by;
Think not thou canst weep a tear
And thy maker is not near.

O! he gives to us his joy
That our grief he may destroy;
Till our grief is fled & gone
He doth sit by us and moan.

Home by Lisa Emry

2009-04-30T09:52:00.001-04:00

Home is the place your heart resides
Home is the place that you decide
Home is the womb that holds the soul
Home is the place where one is whole

Home is the glow you hold in your eye
Home is the emotion that makes you cry
Home is safe and a place of peace
Home is where all strivings cease

Home is protective against the others
Home is full of sisters and brothers
Home is where you find your rest
Home is where you feel your best

Home is a memory that follows your being
Home is a dream for those agreeing
Home is the place where reserves fall
Home is the place you yearn to call

Home is where the family meets
Home is a place of restful retreats
Home is the place you know you'll be heard
Home is the pace where nothing blurs

Home is all these wonderful things
Home is the place you develop wings
Home is the place that you'll find one day
Home is the place where your heart will stay

Artem Shakhramanyan (Eng 102-013)

Music by Alexis Rolon

2009-04-30T09:41:00.001-04:00

Music is my life
Music is my laughter that makes me cry
Music is the thing that changed my life
Music is my happiness I always feel in side
Music is my every thing
When you are down let music turn you around
What ever you are feeling let music take it over
Turn the music up real loud and jest scream it all out
Let the pain run write through you
Let the tears undue you
Do nothing more but sing your soul out
And tell everyone what you are about! ! !
Music is my life
Music is my laughter that makes me cry
Music is the thing that changed my life
Music is my happiness I always feel in side
Music is my every thing
Tell every one what you are all about
Jest expresses your self and let it out!
Let no one tell you ….
You can not live your dreams
If you want to sing, sing, sing the music
You like while you tell them what you are all about!
Music is my life
Music is my laughter that makes me cry
Music is the thing that changed my life
Music is my happiness I always feel in side
Music is my every thing
Music can be my heart beating for you
Music can be the sound of your voice
Music can be the butterflies in my belly when they talk about you
Music can be the cars beeping in the high way
Music is the thing that's get you off your feet
Music is my life
Music is my laughter that makes me cry
Music is the thing that changed my life
Music is my happiness I always feel in side
Music is my every thing
Music is everywhere around you! ! ! !

The Pleasures of Ordinary Life by Judith Viorst

2009-04-29T20:47:00.001-04:00

I've had my share of necessary losses,
Of dreams I know no longer can come true.
I'm done now with the whys and the becauses.
It's time to make things good, not just make do.
It's time to stop complaining and pursue
The pleasures of an ordinary life.

I used to rail against my compromises.
I yearned for the wild music, the swift race.
But happiness arrived in new disguises:
Sun lighting a child's hair. A friend's embrace.
Slow dancing in a safe and quiet place.
The pleasures of an ordinary life.

I'll have no trumpets, triumphs, trails of glory.
It seems the woman I've turned out to be
Is not the heroine of some grand story.
But I have learned to find the poetry
In what my hands can touch, my eyes can see.
The pleasures of an ordinary life.

Young fantasies of magic and of mystery
Are over. But they really can't compete
With all we've built together: A long history.
Connections that help render us complete.
Ties that hold and heal us. And the sweet,
Sweet pleasures of an ordinary life.

submitted by Julie Yu Brit Lit

NIGHT By Dong-Myung Kim

2009-04-29T14:08:00.001-04:00

Night is
A lake shrouded in blue fog.
I am a fisherman
On a sleep's sailboat,
Fishing dreams.

The author is blaming him self because he dreams independence of his country

however, there is not such a thing that he can do for.

From. LI 206 - 004 student. Jungho Kim

ROCK by Chi-Hwan Yu

2009-04-29T14:06:00.001-04:00

ROCK by Chi-Hwan Yu

When I die,
I will become a rock,
never touched
by compassion, joy or anger.
While being torn down by wind and rain,
It will only whip itself inwards
in eterenal, impersonal silence,
and at last forget its own existence;
Floating clouds, distant thunder!
Though it may dream,
it will never sing.
Though broken in pieces,
it will never utter a word.
I will become such a rock.

I think this one is interesting because it does not say anything directly

however the author wishes independence of his country Korea from Japan.

From. LI 206 - 004 student Jungho Kim.

Vincent Hayes. Poem: Sand Oasis

2009-04-29T13:52:00.001-04:00

SAND OASIS

By: Vincent John Hayes

You tell me that it's hard sometimes

To make your feet align.

I hesitate to speak

But I think you're just hopelessly inclined

And hell-bent to abide

To the taunting gestures

Of blinded strangers.

These baseless fantasies are making your mind

Ire,

Because you know damn well

That every road is a lonely one

In good time

And that's just osmosis

In its most basic nature

Taking and splitting all of your bliss

And leaves you searching for another

Sand Oasis

Pack your baggage

And sharpen your beak

Yea, I'm gona stagger

Right from this could of defeat

In the roads that are to come

I'll find someone else just like me

See them dead where they fell

And I'll scavenge

On their cathartic meat.

Did you forget to pack away

Some light?

Is that why you chase the sun around the Earth?

Hoping that it might

Someday give a home to your cruse.

You know damn well that the sun will return

On its normal course

But that's not what you need

Not right now, no, of course

So says that holy ghost

With a wanderer's blisters on his feet.

Sometimes I wonder if anything of yours

Will ever be requited

When you're so navigational and spasmodic

I know the ideas are disquieting

And I can see the urges are leaking from your

Pours

To be sensational and nomadic

Hoping that it might cure

Your ugly stasis

Yea, she's gona search for her

Sand Oasis.

Pack your baggage

And sharpen your beak

Yea, I'm gona stagger

Right from this could of defeat

In the roads that are to come

I'll find someone else just like me

See them dead where they fell

And I'll scavenge

On their cathartic meat.

Broken down and sorry

She's contemplative

And wants to know exactly why

She was never happy

She's failed to find that common purpose

And knows that this is the end of her story

But just the beginning of so many more divorces

Still to come are future remorses

And their courses for settling down

Without a sound

But now, at least, there no more reasons to be sad

Or frowning

She's picked off those scabs

Of arthritis

And has finally found her

Sand Oasis

I am Apache

2009-04-28T21:23:00.001-04:00

EN-102-006 Ian Brett

I Am Apache

by Harvey A. Mendez
Sunday, July 04, 2004

The poem won third place in 1994
in The National Library of Poetry contest.

I am Apache, rage of first rainstorm,
Child of the Water, spring of the morning.
I rise from dark hidden caves,
challenge and slay the giant beast.

I am Apache, brother to the fox,
kin to eagles, kin to bears.
I run free through deep arroyos,
on desert grasslands flush with deer.

I am Apache, lance of victory,
thunder, my chager, lightning, my shield.
I wear feathers of First Chief
avenging spirits of our dead.

I am Apache, stronghold of ambush,
enemy in mountains, twister in deserts.
My burning arrow asks no quarter
when war paint flares, war drums beat.

I am Apache, blood of battle clouds,
flesh of rawhide, dust of Mother Earth.
I ride the Great Mustang in hidden canyons,
sacred and deep, after Usen burns my wickiup.

Harvey A. Mendez

Touched by An Angel by Maya Angelou

2009-04-28T19:10:00.001-04:00

We, unaccustomed to courage
exiles from delight
live coiled in shells of loneliness
until love leaves its high holy temple
and comes into our sight
to liberate us into life.

Love arrives
and in its train come ecstasies
old memories of pleasure
ancient histories of pain.
Yet if we are bold,
love strikes away the chains of fear
from our souls.

We are weaned from our timidity
In the flush of love's light
we dare be brave
And suddenly we see
that love costs all we are
and will ever be.
Yet it is only love
which sets us free.

To Professor: whalen

From : pharah dubuisson Lefevre

A Dream Within A Dream by Edgar Allan Poe

2009-04-28T19:09:00.001-04:00

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow--
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand--
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep--while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

To professor: whalen
From : pharah dubuisson Lefevre

I carry your heart with me by E. E. Cummings

2009-04-28T19:07:00.001-04:00

I carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
I go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
I fear
no fate(for you are my fate, my sweet) I want
no world for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

I carry your heart I carry it in my heart

To;professor whalen
From : pharah dubuisson Lefevre

Start Where You Stand by Berton Braley

2009-04-28T18:55:00.001-04:00

Start where you stand and never mind the past,
The past won't help you in beginning new,
If you have left it all behind at last
Why, that's enough, you're done with it, you're through;

This is another chapter in the book,
This is another race that you have planned,
Don't give the vanished days a backward look,
Start where you stand.

The world won't care about your old defeats
If you can start anew and win success;
The future is your time, and time is fleet
And there is much of work and strain and stress;

Forget the buried woes and dead despairs,
Here is a brand-new trial right at hand,
The future is for him who does and dares,
Start where you stand.

Old failures will not halt, old triumphs aid,
To-day's the thing, to-morrow soon will be;
Get in the fight and face it unafraid,
And leave the past to ancient history,

What has been, has been; yesterday is dead
And by it you are neither blessed nor banned;
Take courage, man, be brave and drive ahead,
Start where you stand.

"Poetry's Value"

2009-04-28T15:07:00.001-04:00

"Poetry's Value"

by Xi Murong

If you ask me abruptly

Why write poetry

Why not do

Something useful

Then I won't know

How to answer you

I am like a goldsmith hammering day and night

Just so I can extend pain

Into a gold ornament as thin as a cicada's wing

I don't know if working so hard

To transform sorrows into

Shimmering words and phrases

Is also

Beautifully worthwhile

Maureen Whalen

"Do Not Throw Away"

2009-04-28T14:57:00.000-04:00

"Do Not Throw Away"

by Lin Huiyin

Do not throw away

That scoop of passion from the past

Even though passion flows softly like water

At the bottom of a cool mountain spring

In a pine grove on a dark night

And sighs an elusive sigh,

You must still preserve that truth.

The moon is still bright;

The lights below the hills are still on;

The sky is still full of stars

Hanging like dreams.

You ask the night for

Those words back---you must still believe

Their echoes

In the valley.

Maureen Whalen

Tupac Shakur - When Ure Hero Falls

2009-04-27T12:12:00.001-04:00

Tupac Shakur - Can You See the Pride in the Panther

2009-04-27T12:11:00.001-04:00

Can You See the Pride in the Panther

Can You See the Pride In the Panther
As he grows in splendor and grace
Topling obstacles placed in the way,
of the progression of his race.
Can You See the Pride In the Panther
as she nurtures her young all alone
The seed must grow regardless
of the fact that it is planted in stone.
Can You See the Pride In the Panthers
as they unify as one.
The flower blooms with brilliance,
and outshines the rays of the sun.

Tupac Shakur

Tupac Shakur- When Ure Hero Falls

2009-04-27T12:10:00.001-04:00

When Ure Hero Falls

when your hero falls from grace
all fairy tales r uncovered
myths exposed and pain magnified
the greatest pain discovered
u taught me 2 be strong
but im confused 2 c u so weak
u said never 2 give up
and it hurts 2 c u welcome defeat
when ure hero falls so do the stars
and so does the perception of tomorrow
without my hero there is only
me alone 2 deal with my sorrow
your heart ceases 2 work
and your soul is not happy at all
what r u expected 2 do
when ure only hero falls

Tupac Shakur

Tupac Shakur- And 2Morrow

2009-04-27T11:51:00.001-04:00

And 2Morrow

Today is filled with anger
fueled with hidden hate
scared of being outcast
afraid of common fate
Today is built on tragedies
which no one wants 2 face
nightmares 2 humanities
and morally disgraced
Tonight is filled with rage
violence in the air
children bred with ruthlessness
because no one at home cares
Tonight I lay my head down
but the pressure never stops
knawing at my sanity
content when I am dropped
But 2morrow I c change
a chance 2 build a new
Built on spirit intent of Heart
and ideals
based on truth
and tomorrow I wake with second wind
and strong because of pride
2 know I fought with all my heart 2 keep my
dream alive

Tupac Shakur

Tupac shakur - ambition over adversity

2009-04-27T11:46:00.001-04:00

Take one's adversity
Learn from their misfortune
Learn from their pain
Believe in something
Believe in yourself
Turn adversity into ambition
Now blossom into wealth

Tupac Shakur

A Caffeneited Haiku by Christie Basile

2009-04-26T17:45:00.001-04:00

A Caffeneited Haiku

I enjoy coffee
Not so thrilled about brown teeth
Crest strips, do they work?

-Christie Basile

Windows Live™ SkyDrive™: Get 25 GB of free online storage. Check it out.

If I Can Stop

2009-04-26T12:25:00.001-04:00

IF I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin
Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.

- Emily Dickinson

I need reminders to be patient and not hide kindness.

Submitted by Jeanne McDonald, Eng 102-013

In the Waiting Room by Elizabeth Bishop

2009-04-24T01:22:00.001-04:00

In Worcester, Massachusetts,
I went with Aunt Consuelo
to keep her dentist's appointment
and sat and waited for her
in the dentist's waiting room.
It was winter. It got dark
early. The waiting room
was full of grown-up people,
arctics and overcoats,
lamps and magazines.
My aunt was inside
what seemed like a long time
and while I waited and read
the National Geographic
(I could read) and carefully
studied the photographs:
the inside of a volcano,
black, and full of ashes;
then it was spilling over
in rivulets of fire.
Osa and Martin Johnson
dressed in riding breeches,
laced boots, and pith helmets.
A dead man slung on a pole
"Long Pig," the caption said.
Babies with pointed heads
wound round and round with string;
black, naked women with necks
wound round and round with wire
like the necks of light bulbs.
Their breasts were horrifying.
I read it right straight through.
I was too shy to stop.
And then I looked at the cover:
the yellow margins, the date.
Suddenly, from inside,
came an oh! of pain
--Aunt Consuelo's voice--
not very loud or long.
I wasn't at all surprised;
even then I knew she was
a foolish, timid woman.
I might have been embarrassed,
but wasn't. What took me
completely by surprise
was that it was me:
my voice, in my mouth.
Without thinking at all
I was my foolish aunt,
I--we--were falling, falling,
our eyes glued to the cover
of the National Geographic,
February, 1918.

I said to myself: three days
and you'll be seven years old.
I was saying it to stop
the sensation of falling off
the round, turning world.
into cold, blue-black space.
But I felt: you are an I,
you are an Elizabeth,
you are one of them.
Why should you be one, too?
I scarcely dared to look
to see what it was I was.
I gave a sidelong glance
--I couldn't look any higher--
at shadowy gray knees,
trousers and skirts and boots
and different pairs of hands
lying under the lamps.
I knew that nothing stranger
had ever happened, that nothing
stranger could ever happen.

Why should I be my aunt,
or me, or anyone?
What similarities
boots, hands, the family voice
I felt in my throat, or even
the National Geographic
and those awful hanging breasts
held us all together
or made us all just one?
How I didn't know any
word for it how "unlikely". . .
How had I come to be here,
like them, and overhear
a cry of pain that could have
got loud and worse but hadn't?

The waiting room was bright
and too hot. It was sliding
beneath a big black wave,
another, and another.

Then I was back in it.
The War was on. Outside,
in Worcester, Massachusetts,
were night and slush and cold,
and it was still the fifth
of February, 1918.

submitted by Julie Yu

Beautiful Dreamer

2009-04-23T12:06:00.001-04:00

Beautiful Dreamer by Stephen Foster

Beautiful dreamer, wake unto me,
Starlight and dewdrops are waiting for thee;
Sounds of the rude world heard in the day,
Lull'd by the moonlight have all pass'd away!

Beautiful dreamer, queen of my song,
List while I woo thee with soft melody;
Gone are the cares of life's busy throng.

Beautiful dreamer, awake unto me!
Beautiful dreamer, awake unto me!

Beautiful dreamer, out on the sea,
Mermaids are chaunting the wild lorelie;
Over the streamlet vapors are borne,
Waiting to fade at the bright coming morn.

Beautiful dreamer, beam on my heart,
E'en as the morn on the streamlet and sea;
Then will all clouds of sorrow depart,

Beautiful dreamer, awake unto me!

Submitted By Cathy Sugrue

Your Feet

2009-04-23T09:34:00.001-04:00

When I cannot look at your face
I look at your feet.

Your feet of arched bone,
your hard little feet.

I know that they support you,
and that your gentle weight
rises upon them.

Your waist and your breasts,
the doubled purple
of your nipples,
the sockets of your eyes
that have just flown away,
your wide fruit mouth,
your red tresses,
my little tower.

But I love your feet
only because they walked
upon the earth and upon
the wind and upon the waters,
until they found me.

By:
Pablo Neruda
translated from the Spanish by Donald D. Walsh

The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost

2009-04-22T22:51:00.001-04:00

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

submitted by Julie Yu brit lit

Remembrance by Maya Angelou

2009-04-22T10:39:00.001-04:00

Your hands easy
weight, teasing the bees
hived in my hair, your smile at the
slope of my cheek. On the
occasion, you press
above me, glowing, spouting
readiness, mystery rapes
my reason

When you have withdrawn
your self and the magic, when
only the smell of your
love lingers between
my breasts, then, only
then, can I greedily consume
your presence.

Submitted by LT Djaowe

Shoulders support the world

2009-04-22T09:26:00.001-04:00

Submitted by Zachary R. Butler

Shoulders Support The World

Carlos Drummond de Andrade

(Translated by Len Sousa)

There comes a time when we no longer say: my God.
A time of absolute purity.
A time when we no longer say: my love.
Because love proved useless.
And eyes don't cry.
And hands only weave in rough work.
And the heart is dry.

Women knock at the door in vain, don't open it.
You stay alone, the light goes out,
and in the dark your eyes glow enormous.
You're convinced, you no longer know suffering.
And you expect nothing from friends.

Old age matters little, what is old age?
Your shoulders support the world
and it weighs no more than a child's hand.
The wars, famines, and talks in buildings
only prove that life goes on
and not all have freed themselves yet.
Some, finding the spectacle barbarous,
prefer (the delicates) to die.
There comes a time when there's no point in dying.
There comes a time when life is an order.
Merely life, without perplexity.

_______________________________________________________________

Os Ombros Suportam o Mundo

Carlos Drummond de Andrade

Chega um tempo em que não se diz mais: meu Deus.
Tempo de absoluta depuração.
Tempo em que não se diz mais: meu amor.
Porque o amor resultou inútil.
E os olhos não choram.
E as mãos tecem apenas o rude trabalho.
E o coração está seco.

Em vão mulheres batem à porta, não abrirás.
Ficaste sozinho, a luz apagou-se,
mas na sombra teus olhos resplandecem enormes.
És todo certeza, já não sabes sofrer.
E nada esperas de teus amigos.

Pouco importa venha a velhice, que é a velhice?
Teu ombros suportam o mundo
e ele não pesa mais que a mão de uma criança.
As guerras, as fomes, as discussões dentro dos edifícios
provam apenas que a vida prossegue
e nem todos se libertaram ainda.
Alguns, achando bárbaro o espetáculo,
prefeririam (os delicados) morrer.
Chegou um tempo em que não adianta morrer.
Chegou um tempo em que a vida é uma ordem.
A vida apenas, sem mistificação.

Os versos acima foram publicados originalmente no livro "Sentimento do Mundo", Irmãos Pongetti - Rio de Janeiro, 1940. Foram extraídos do livro "Nova Reunião", José Olympio Editora - Rio de Janeiro, 1985, pág. 78.

The Conqueror Worm

2009-04-20T15:34:00.003-04:00

Lo! 'tis a gala night
Within the lonesome latter years!
An angel throng, bewinged, bedight
In veils, and drowned in tears,
Sit in a theatre, to see
A play of hopes and fears,
While the orchestra breathes fitfully
The music of the spheres.

Mimes, in the form of God on high,
Mutter and mumble low,
And hither and thither fly-
Mere puppets they, who come and go
At bidding of vast formless things
That shift the scenery to and fro,
Flapping from out their Condor wings
Invisible Woe!

That motley drama- oh, be sure
It shall not be forgot!
With its Phantom chased for evermore,
By a crowd that seize it not,
Through a circle that ever returneth in
To the self-same spot,
And much of Madness, and more of Sin,
And Horror the soul of the plot.

But see, amid the mimic rout
A crawling shape intrude!
A blood-red thing that writhes from out
The scenic solitude!
It writhes!- it writhes!- with mortal pangs
The mimes become its food,
And seraphs sob at vermin fangs
In human gore imbued.

Out- out are the lights- out all!
And, over each quivering form,
The curtain, a funeral pall,
Comes down with the rush of a storm,
While the angels, all pallid and wan,
Uprising, unveiling, affirm
That the play is the tragedy, "Man,"
And its hero the Conqueror Worm.

By Edgar Allan Poe

Submitted by Kevin Stewart

Another Day Has Dawned

2009-04-19T23:52:00.001-04:00

Amidst our chaos and confusion;
Amidst our anguish and despair;
Amidst our never-ending questions and blame;
… Lies a world of lessons.

Through our tears and astonishment;
Through our hopelessness and depression;
Through our anxiety and grief;
… Lies a world of shame.

For it is our world that is responsible;
It is our world that allowed this sadness;
It is our world that has lost its youth;
… And it is our world that needs to change.

It is a warning for those who would isolate it;
It is a warning for those who would bury it;
It is a warning for those who think it will not touch them;
… It is we, who need to address it.

For this is the birth of our own generation;
This is the birth of our own problems;
This is the birth of our own past mistakes;
… It is we, who needed to watch over them.

A new generation who have hopes and dreams;
A new generation who have life and laughter;
A new generation who deserve a chance at peace;
… It is we who need to make them secure.

It is time to stop talking in circles;
It is time to stop blaming and pointing;
It is time to stop questioning and guessing;
… It is time to accept the burden and act.

We are not blameless;
We are not above reproach;
We are not perfect role models;
… For we are the generation they emulate.

Look beyond your own your circle of life;
Look beyond your picket fences and chained doors;
Look beyond your own backyard;
… And admit your frailties and failures.

Did you not once look the other way?
Did you not once stay quiet when you should have spoken?
Did you not once say I cannot change it?
… Do you know that we can make a difference?

One small voice can begin to move mountains;
One caring gesture can begin to enlighten others;
One shoulder to lean on, can ease another’s pain;
… Did you know that you are that one?

Listen to those who are in jeopardy;
Listen to that small voice whispering that they are in trouble;
Listen to that child with the wayward, furtive glance;
… And be prepared to take part in their future.

For if you do not listen and talk;
If you do not participate and take responsibility;
If you do not guide and offer them your heart and wisdom;
… It is we, who will join in their misery.

It reaches beyond your own immediate children;
It reaches beyond their friends and peers;
It reaches beyond your nieces and nephews;
… For it is every child you come in contact with.

Positive action begins in our own backyards;
Positive action flows through your own neighborhood;
Positive action can encompass your own small town or city;
… And through this, we are all connected.

Be a mentor when others fail to counsel;
Be a counselor when others fail to listen;
Be a listener when others fail to notice;
… Be a positive experience with every child you meet.

For yesterday, someone looked the other way;
Yesterday, someone pretended they did not see;
Yesterday, someone passed by without offering help;
… But today, it is not too late.

Today, you can make a difference in someone’s life;
Today, you can offer your love and guidance;
Today, you can choose to be a positive influence for another;
… And then maybe, just maybe, our world will change with you.

By Kit McCallum

(Bruno Horst)

FORGIVING

2009-04-19T23:12:00.001-04:00

How can we forgive a person we hate?
When they lie and cheat for their own sake.
Never stopping for a moment or two.
To see the sorrow they brought to you.
Just remember our Savior who came.
And He died on the cross oh what a shame.
and the ones that nailed Him to that cross.
the ones that we know that are to blame.
And Jesus Christ He knew everyone.
But Yet Jesus said, "Forgive them Father for they know not what they have done."
But our great and loving Father He knew.
For Jesus was sent to die for me and for you.
And when those nails were driven in.
Only Our Master would know in the end.
For God sent His only begotten son.
To die on that cross for all the LOST ONES.
So now do you think it's so hard to FORGIVE?
Could you sacrifice your ONLY child so others could live?
so with every breath you take, just remember
it is easier to LOVE than it is to HATE!

By Tracy Scroggins, Arkansas

(Bruno Horst)

Don't You Quit

2009-04-19T23:02:00.001-04:00

When things go wrong as they sometimes will,
When the road you're trudging seems all up hill,
When the funds are low, and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest if you must, but don't you quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns
As everyone of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about,
When he might have won, had he stuck it out.
Don't give up though the pace seems slow,
You may succeed with another blow.

Success is failure turned inside out,
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far,
So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit,
It's when things seem worse,
that you must not quit.

Author unknown

____________________

(Bruno Horst)

Keep Your Head Up

2009-04-18T23:38:00.001-04:00

since we all came from a woman
Got our name from a woman and our game from a woman
I wonder why we take from our women
Why we rape our women, do we hate our women?
I think it's time to kill for our women
Time to heal our women, be real to our women
And if we don't we'll have a race of babies
That will hate the ladies, that make the babies
And since a man can't make one
He has no right to tell a woman when and where to create one
So will the real men get up
I know you're fed up ladies, but keep your head up.

Keep your Head Up - 2pac
submitted by: Ali Al Oraifan

See all the ways you can stay connected to friends and family

Madonna Mia

2009-04-16T15:11:00.001-04:00

A LILY-GIRL, not made for this world's pain,

With brown, soft hair close braided by her ears,

And longing eyes half veiled by slumberous tears

Like bluest water seen through mists of rain:

Pale cheeks whereon no love hath left its stain,

Red underlip drawn in for fear of love,

And white throat, whiter than the silvered dove,

Through whose wan marble creeps one purple vein.

Yet, though my lips shall praise her without cease,

Even to kiss her feet I am not bold,

Being o'ershadowed by the wings of awe,

Like Dante, when he stood with Beatrice

Beneath the flaming Lion's breast, and saw

The seventh Crystal, and the Stair of Gold.

By: Oscar Wilde

Submited by: Irene Tracey

Jose

2009-04-15T17:48:00.001-04:00

José
by: Carlos Drummond de Andrade (With translation)
Posted by: Gregory Sartori

José

E agora, José?
A festa acabou,
a luz apagou,
o povo sumiu,
a noite esfriou,
e agora, José?
e agora, você?
você que é sem nome,
que zomba dos outros,
você que faz versos,
que ama, protesta?
e agora, José?

Está sem mulher,
está sem discurso,
está sem carinho,
já não pode beber,
já não pode fumar,
cuspir já não pode,
a noite esfriou,
o dia não veio,
o bonde não veio,
o riso não veio,
não veio a utopia
e tudo acabou
e tudo fugiu
e tudo mofou,
e agora, José?

E agora, José?
Sua doce palavra,
seu instante de febre,
sua gula e jejum,
sua biblioteca,
sua lavra de ouro,
seu terno de vidro,
sua incoerência,
seu ódio Â– e agora?

Com a chave na mão
quer abrir a porta,
não existe porta;
quer morrer no mar,
mas o mar secou;
quer ir para Minas,
Minas não há mais.
José, e agora?

Se você gritasse,
se você gemesse,
se você tocasse
a valsa vienense,
se você dormisse,
se você cansasse,
se você morresse...
Mas você não morre,
você é duro, José!

Sozinho no escuro
qual bicho-do-mato,
sem teogonia,
sem parede nua
para se encostar,
sem cavalo preto
que fuja a galope,
você marcha, José!
José, para onde?

---------------
José

What now, José?
The party’s over,
the lights are off,
the crowd’s gone,
the night’s gone cold,
what now, José?
what now, you?
you without a name,
who mocks the others,
you who write poetry
who love, protest?
what now, José?

You have no wife,
you have no speech
you have no affection,
you can’t drink,
you can’t smoke,
you can’t even spit,
the night’s gone cold,
the day didn’t come,
the tram didn’t come,
laughter didn’t come
utopia didn’t come
and everything ended
and everything fled
and everything rotted
what now, José?

what now, José?
Your sweet words,
your instance of fever,
your feasting and fasting,
your library,
your gold mine,
your glass suit,
your incoherence,
your hate—what now?

Key in hand
you want to open the door,
but no door exists;
you want to die in the sea,
but the sea has dried;
you want to go to Minas
but Minas is no longer there.
José, what now?

If you screamed,
if you moaned,
if you played
a Viennese waltz,
if you slept,
if you tired,
if you died…
But you don’t die,
you’re stubborn, José!

Alone in the dark
like a wild animal,
without tradition,
without a naked wall
to lean against,
without a black horse
that flees galloping,
you march, José!
José, where to?

An Old Irish Blessing

2009-04-15T16:58:00.001-04:00

An Old Irish Blessing

May the road rise up to meet you.

May the wind always be at your back.

May the sun shine warm upon your face,

and rains fall soft upon your fields.

And until we meet again,

May God hold you in the palm of His hand.

By : Anonymous

Submitted by:Tyler Perry

Love

2009-04-14T00:52:00.001-04:00

Love is patient, love is kind.

It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.

It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

1 Corinthians 13

Bruna Ferreira

Eulalie by Edgar Allan Poe

2009-04-13T20:00:00.001-04:00

Eulalie

I dwelt alone
In a world of moan,
And my soul was a stagnant tide,
Till the fair and gentle Eulalie became my blushing bride—
Till the yellow-haired young Eulalie became my smiling bride.
Ah, less—less bright
The stars of the night
Than the eyes of the radiant girl!
That the vapor can make
With the moon-tints of purple and pearl,
Can vie with the modest Eulalie’s most unregarded curl—
Can compare with the bright-eyed Eulalie’s most humble and careless curl.
Now Doubt—now Pain
Come never again,
For her soul gives me sigh for sigh,
And all day long
Shines, bright and strong,
Astarte within the sky,
While ever to her dear Eulalie upturns her matron eye—
While ever to her young Eulalie upturns her violet eye.

To : professor Whalen
From: Pharah Dubuisson lefevre
Class 206 British Literature

A Divine Rapture by Francis Quarles

2009-04-13T19:56:00.001-04:00

Divine Rapture
E'en like two little bank-dividing brooks,
That wash the pebbles with their wanton streams,
And having ranged and search'd a thousand nooks,
Meet both at length in silver-breasted Thames,
Where in a greater current they conjoin:
So I my Best-beloved's am; so He is mine.
E'en so we met; and after long pursuit,
E'en so we joined; we both became entire;
No need for either to renew a suit,
For I was flax, and He was flames of fire:
Our firm-united souls did more than twine;
So I my Best-beloved's am; so He is mine.
If all those glittering Monarchs, that command
The servile quarters of this earthly ball,
Should tender in exchange their shares of land,
I would not change my fortunes for them all:
Their wealth is but a counter to my coin:
The world 's but theirs; but my Beloved's mine.

To :Professor Whalen
From: Pharah Dubuisson Lefevre
Class: 206 British literature

My lady's presence makes the roses red by Henry Constable's

2009-04-13T19:54:00.001-04:00

My lady's presence makes the roses red,
Because to see her lips they blush for shame.
The lily's leaves, for envy, pale became,
And her white hands in them this envy bred.
The marigold the leaves abroad doth spread,
Because the sun's and her power is the same.
The violet of purple color came.
Dyed in the blood she made my heart to shed.
In brief: all flowers from her their virtue take;
From her sweet breath their sweet smells do proceed;
The living heat which her eyebeams doth make
Warmth the ground and quickened the seed.
The rain, wherewith she watered the flowers,
Falls from mine eyes, which she dissolves in showers.

To: professor
From: pharah Dubuisson Lefevre
Class 206 British literature

The Gladness of Nature

2009-04-13T09:35:00.001-04:00

The Gladness of Nature

Is this a time to be cloudy and sad, When our mother Nature laughs around; When even the deep blue heavens look glad, And gladness breathes from the blossoming ground?  There are notes of joy from the hang-bird and wren, And the gossip of swallows through all the sky; The ground-squirrel gaily chirps by his den, And the wilding bee hums merrily by.  The clouds are at play in the azure space And their shadows at play on the bright-green vale, And here they stretch to the frolic chase, And there they roll on the easy gale.  There's a dance of leaves in that aspen bower, There's a titter of winds in that beechen tree, There's a smile on the fruit, and a smile on the flower, And a laugh from the brook that runs to the sea.  And look at the broad-faced sun, how he smiles On the dewy earth that smiles in his ray, On the leaping waters and gay young isles; Ay, look, and he'll smile thy gloom away.

written by William Cullen Bryant

submitted by Jonathan Corkum

National Poetry Month

2009-04-12T23:07:00.001-04:00

Submitted by Jason Ribeiro

I know why the caged bird sings by Maya Angelou

A free bird leaps on the back
Of the wind and floats downstream
Till the current ends and dips his wing
In the orange suns rays
And dares to claim the sky.

But a BIRD that stalks down his narrow cage
Can seldom see through his bars of rage
His wings are clipped and his feet are tied
So he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings with a fearful trill
Of things unknown but longed for still
And his tune is heard on the distant hill for
The caged bird sings of freedom.

The free bird thinks of another breeze
And the trade winds soft through
The sighing trees
And the fat worms waiting on a dawn-bright
Lawn and he names the sky his own.

But a caged BIRD stands on the grave of dreams
His shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
His wings are clipped and his feet are tied
So he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings with
A fearful trill of things unknown
But longed for still and his
Tune is heard on the distant hill
For the caged bird sings of freedom.

The Best Thing in the World

2009-04-10T21:04:00.001-04:00

Written by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

What’s the best thing in the World?

June-rose, by may-dew impearled;

Sweet south-wind, that mean’s no rain;

Truth, not cruel to a friend;

Pleasure, not in haste to end;

Beauty, not self-decked and curled

Till its pride is over-plain;

Light, that never makes you wink;

Memory, that gives no pain;

Love, when, so, you’re loved again.

What’s the best thing in the world?

--Something out of it, I think.

Submitted by Jeanne McDonald, Eng 102-013

Slow Dance

2009-04-10T18:18:00.003-04:00

This is a poem written by a teenager with cancer. She wants to see how many people get her poem. It is quite the poem. Please pass it on. This poem was written by a terminally ill young girl in a New York Hospital.

SLOW DANCE

Have you ever
watched kids
On a merry-go-round?

Or listened to
the rain

Slapping on the ground?

Ever followed a
butterfly's erratic flight?

Or gazed at the sun into the fading
night?

You better slow down.

Don't dance so
fast.

Time is short.

The music won't
last.

Do you run through each day

On the
fly?

When you ask How are you?

Do you hear the
reply?

When the day is done

Do you lie in your
bed

With the next hundred chores

Running through
your head?

You'd better slow down

Don't dance so
fast.

Time is short.

The music won't
last..

Ever told your child,

We'll do it
tomorrow?

And in your haste,

Not see
his
sorrow?

Ever lost touch,

Let a good
friendship die

Cause you never had time

To call
and say,'Hi'

You'd better slow down.

Don't dance
so fast.

Time is short.

The music won't
last.

When you run so fast to get somewhere

You
miss half the fun of getting there.

When you worry and hurry
through your day,

It is like an unopened
gift.....

Thrown away.

Life is not a
race.

Do take it slower

Hear the
music

Before the song is over.

release

2009-04-10T09:50:00.001-04:00

Inner breathlessness, outer restlessness
By the time I caught up to freedom I was out of breath
Grandma asked me what I'm running for
I guess I'm out for the same thing the sun is sunning for
What mothers birth their youngens for
And some say Jesus coming for
For all I know the earth is spinning slow
Suns at half mast 'cause masses ain't aglow
On bended knee, prostrate before an altered tree
I've made the forest suit me
Tables and chairs
Papers and prayers
Matter versus spirit
A metal ladder
A wooden cross
A plastic bottle of water
A mandala encased in glass
A spirit encased in flesh
Sound from shaped hollows
The thickest of mucus released from heightened passion
A man that cries in his sleep
A truth that has gone out of fashion
A mode of expression
A paint splattered wall
A carton of cigarettes
A bouquet of corpses
A dying forest
A nurtured garden
A privatized prison
A candle with a broken wick
A puddle that reflects the sun
A piece of paper with my name on it
I'm surrounded
I surrender
All
All that I am I have been
All I have been has been a long time coming
I am becoming all that I am
The spittle that surrounds the mouth-piece of the flute
Unheard, yet felt
A gathered wetness
A quiet moisture
Sound trapped in a bubble
Released into wind
Wind fellows and land merchants
We are history's detergent
Water soluble, light particles, articles of cleansing breath
Articles amending death
These words are not tools of communication
They are shards of metal
Dropped from eight story windows
They are waterfalls and gas leaks
Aged thoughts rolled in tobacco leaf
The tools of a trade
Barbers barred, barred of barters
Catch phrases and misunderstandings
But they are not what I feel when I am alone
Surrounded by everything and nothing
And there isn't a word or phrase to be caught
A verse to be recited
A man to de-fill my being in those moments
I am blankness, the contained center of an "O"
The pyramidic containment of an "A"
I stand in the middle of all that I have learned
All that I have memorized
All that I've known by heart
Unable to reach any of it
There is no sadness
There is no bliss
It is a forgotten memory
A memorable escape route that only is found by not looking
There, in the spine of the dictionary the words are worthless
They are a mere weight pressing against my thoughtlessness
But then, who else can speak of thoughtlessness with such confidence
Who else has learned to sling these ancient ideas
like dead rats held by their tails
so as not to infect this newly oiled skin
I can think of nothing heavier than an airplane
I can think of no greater conglomerate of steel and metal
I can think of nothing less likely to fly
There are no wings more weighted
I too have felt a heaviness
The stare of man guessing at my being
Yes I am homeless
A homeless man making offerings to the after-future
Sculpting rubber tree forests out of worn tires and shoe soles
A nation unified in exhale
A cloud of smoke
A native pipe ceremony
All the gathered cigarette butts piled in heaps
Snow covered mountains
Lipsticks smeared and shriveled
Offerings to an afterworld
Tattoo guns and plastic wrappers
Broken zippers and dead eyed dolls
It's all overwhelming me, oak and elming me
I have seeded a forest of myself
Little books from tall trees
It matters not what this paper be made of
Give me notebooks made of human flesh
Dried on steel hooks and nooses
Make uses of use, uses of us
It's all overwhelming me, oak and elming me
I have seeded a forest of myself
Little books from tall trees
On bended knee
Prostrate before an altered tree
I've made the forest suit me
Tables and chairs
Papers and prayers
Matter vs. spirit, through meditation
I program my heart to beat breakbeats and hum basslines on exhalation

written by Saul Williams

submitted by Samantha Kirby-Dixon

On the Beach at Night

2009-04-10T09:21:00.001-04:00

On the Beach at Night, by Walt Whitman

On the beach at night,

Stands a child with her father,

Watching the east, the autumn sky.

Up through the darkness,

While ravening clouds, the burial clouds, in black masses

spreading,

Lower sullen and fast athwart and down the sky,

Amid a transparent clear belt of ether yet left in the east,

Ascends large and calm the lord-star Jupiter,

And nigh at hand, only a very little above,

Swim the delicate sisters the Pleiades.

From the beach the child holding the hand of her father,

Those burial-clouds that lower victorious soon to devour all,

Watching, silently weeps.

Weep not, my child,

Weep not, my darling,

With these kisses let me remove your tears,

The ravening clouds shall not long be victorious,

They shall not long possess the sky, they devour the stars only

in apparition,

Jupiter shall emerge, be patient, watch again another night, the

Pleiades shall emerge,

They are immortal, all those stars both silvery and golden shall

shine out again,

The great stars and the little ones shall shine out again, they

endure,

The vast immortal suns and the long-enduring pensive moons

shall again shine.

Then dearest child mournest thou only for Jupiter?

Considerest thou alone the burial of the stars?

Something there is,

(With my lips soothing thee, adding I whisper,

I give thee the first suggestion, the problem and indirection,)

Something there is more immortal than the stars,

(Many the burials, many the days and night, passing away,)

Something that shall endure longer even than lustrous Jupiter,

Longer than sun or any revolving satellite,

Or the radiant sisters the Pleiades.

Submitted by Elana Abrams

The Assignation

2009-04-09T21:57:00.001-04:00

After the winter thawed, I rose,

Remembering what you said. Below the field

Where I was dead, the crinkled leaf and blade

Summoned my body, told me I must go.

Across the road I saw some other dead

Revive their little fires, and bow the head

To someone still alive and long ago.

Low in the haze a pall of smoke arose

You sat beside the bed, you took my hands;

And when I lay beyond all speech, you said,

You swore to love me after I was dead,

To meet me in the grove and love me still,

Love the white air, the shadow where I lay.

Dear love, I called your name in air today,

I saw the picnic vanish down the hill,

And waved the moon awake, with empty hands.

The first and last stanzas of James Wrights poem The Assignation

Posted by: Shanna Giampietro

The Perfect Friend

2009-04-09T20:48:00.001-04:00

The Perfect Friend
by Shannen Wrass

Today I found a friend
who knew everything I felt
she knew my weakness
and the problems I've been dealt.
She understood my wonders
and listened to my dreams,
she listened to how I felt about life and love
and knew what it all means.
Not once did she interrupt me
or tell me I was wrong
she understood what I was going through
and promised she'd stay long.
I reached out to this friend,
to show her that I care
to pull her close and let her know
how much I need her there.
I went to hold her hand
to pull her a bit nearer
and I realized this perfect friend I found
was nothing but a mirror.

British Lit.-- Kathy Vieira

michael nelson's poem i also sent a rose that grew from concrete(tupac) and drams(langston hughs)

2009-04-09T19:20:00.001-04:00

Alone

Lying, thinking
Last night
How to find my soul a home
Where water is not thirsty
And bread loaf is not stone
I came up with one thing
And I don't believe I'm wrong
That nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

There are some millionaires
With money they can't use
Their wives run round like banshees
Their children sing the blues
They've got expensive doctors
To cure their hearts of stone.
But nobody
No, nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Now if you listen closely
I'll tell you what I know
Storm clouds are gathering
The wind is gonna blow
The race of man is suffering
And I can hear the moan,
'Cause nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Maya Angelou

Dialética & Brighter and Clearer

2009-04-09T11:44:00.001-04:00

Dialética by Vinicius de Moraes (with my rough translation)

É claro que a vida é boa
E a alegria, a única indizível emoção
É claro que te acho linda
Em ti bendigo o amor das coisas simples
É claro que te amo
E tenho tudo para ser feliz
Mas acontece que eu sou triste...

Of course life is good
And happiness, the only indescribable emotion
Of course I think you are beautiful
You bless me with the love of the little things
Of course I love you
And I have everything to be happy
But it happens that I am sad

---------------

Brighter and Clearer by Ellen Kennedy

After I have an orgasm my body feels like a sombrero-shaped galaxy slowly expanding in the eyepiece of a 4^th grader's telescope

After I watch a family of lions tear apart the body of a large deer on the Discovery Channel I feel a calming sense of inferiority

After I watch a horror movie I can't go to the bathroom without you holding my hand while I pee

After I take my vegan dietary supplement my piss is brighter and clearer

After I kiss your eyelids my lungs squeeze out through my ribs, then through my belly button and slowly fly to your face and push very lightly on your cheeks

After I forget something I said I would remember my brain becomes a roll of vegetable futomaki that an obese chinchilla is trying to eat all in one bite

After I make you cry one of my organs melts into a runny paste that trickles down the inside of my body and collects at the bottom of my feet

After I make you feel indifferent towards me my heart turns into a small desert hamster running very quickly on an exercise wheel and then tripping and then spinning around in distress until the wheel stops and the hamster can get up and try running again, but in a more conscious and concerned way

------------

Submitted by Vinny DaSilva... and some thoughts below

Vinicius de Moraes is a very well known Brazilian Poet and Composer - Probably best known for writing the original Portuguese lyrics to "Girl from Ipanema". To me, a lot of his poetry feels very magical and lovely, this one piece stuck out to me because it feels as if the poet wants to be in a positive state of enjoying all that love has to offer, but is hit with the realization that his deep and true emotion is not aligned with it.

Ellen Kennedy is a young American poet just starting her career. She just had her first book (Sometimes my Heart Pushes my Ribs) published this year via an independent publishing company, Muumuu House. Her poetry carries a certain amount of awkwardness or bareness that can be hard to find, yet it is always around us. I feel that sort of writing makes it so the reader can really relate to the emotions because the emotions are so "human"... it's not perfect and gracious, it's just raw and bare and I think that "Brighter and Clearer" is a great example of what I like about Kennedy's poetry... its personal, true, and does not try to be pretty with flowery words. I also enjoy how Kennedy goes through a range of emotions before landing on what it really is that she wants to express, tying in the entire poem into one coherant thought, when at first read the lines all seem to be sepperate and almost self-sufficient.

Deja Vu

2009-04-09T10:53:00.001-04:00

Déjà vu

The rich golden meadow

Glistens with crystal beads from the nights sweat, which

Cling to my desiccated shoes like a newborn grasps the finger of her Mother.

Or, perhaps like chunky peanut butter in curly locks.

And there she is.

What are you doing here?

Driftwood lips land stranded on the sandy beach.

Thirsty for the salty water of the ocean, they part thinly upon my presence.

Wild grey stallion eyes devour their foal and,

Gallop with defiance, as any free beast should.

She buries herself, remaining unseen, as

Delicate, muddied raindrops of an acid shower cascade down a weathered cheek.

And delusions,vibrant with the crimsons of anger.

And those eyes, diluted with molten marble fuming from bygones.

And the past is the present, and her future is the past.

But present is nothing but an unwanted gift, anyway.

She had a dream once… No, many times!

But dreams are often had to be broken.

So, she envisioned another, which became her life, and

Now she dreams of living.

The wind wisps between two worlds, twirling carelessly amongst them.

It speaks to her, whispering stories of her past and

Mine, hints at rumors and words of gossip and fantasies that must be true.

I don’t speak the language of the Wind, a dialect as old as Father Time.

But she interprets for me, incidents I cannot recollect and oh,

My! What a delightful day! What a striking sun, and

How the autumn air cools my skin! Do I have my homework? I should

Probably get her something to eat, but wait…

What are you doing here?

I won’t go back.

It took me two days to walk here, and I am not going back

Stephanie Nguyen

Stephanie Nguyen EN102-006

Poem (Bruno Horst)

2009-04-09T06:52:00.001-04:00

PERSEVERANCE

When the veil of darkness has draped itself around your life and concealed the tears of your pain and despair, when the destiny you had envisaged has all but faded like water amongst the golden sands of the desert, when you stand alone in your hour of adversity and need and no-one is willing to stand beside you, when the battles within your life are on the verge of defeat and ruin, when you are in exile within your own mind, when your heart is empty and is merely watered by the tears of your agonized and anguished soul.

When you feel like a bird caged behind bars which once flew high above snow capped mountains free and unhindered and now reach out to touch the essence of your dreams, when tears and sorrow have embraced your soul, when the temples of your dreams lie in ashes like the ruins of an ancient age gone by and there are no traces of your footsteps within the valley of your dreams.

When the haunting silence of the darkness hangs like a shadow within the depths of your heart. When you cling like a child to the dreams of yesterday, when the light of dawn refuses to appear and the sun refuses to shine, when each day has become an eternal struggle to survive.

When there is no light amongst the darkness within your existence, when your wounds cry out to be healed, when fear has held courage ransom, when your soul stands in solitude and loneliness choking on its tears of isolation under a moon which no longer smiles and no longer yearns to gaze at his children; the stars, when all those around you have betrayed you, when love has left your heart and refuses to return.

When you no longer believe in yourself, when pain and grief are your constant companions, when there is no vision within the mists of your agony, when no one is willing to listen to and understand you, when peace seems to be in a distant world, when life no longer has the belief to run within your veins, when you have become a fugitive within your own mind and shackled like a slave within your own insanity, refuse with every last drop of sacred blood within your bruised and battered body, to surrender your soul to the pains of your existence.

You must believe in yourself-even if all those around you doubt you and in your ability to rise from within the insanity in which your life now finds itself and to stand tall against the obstacles and challenges within your life-and you will conquer all that you believe cannot be conquered and all that which you believed you had lost within your life.

It is from the darkest hours of our lives, from the depths of our despair and pain and in our greatest hour of adversity that we find an inner strength, an inner courage and an inner meaning so vast that it enables us to rise from our knees and stand tall and fight that which has made us weak.

Just as water runs from a stream, as the oak tree grows strong and upright, as snow-the softest and most peaceful of natures elements-covers the most fierce of mountains and tames its anger portraying it merely as a pawn within the hands of nature so new life and meaning will emerge from your own inner source.

Do not at any cost surrender your life to the weaknesses within your life. Do not surrender your life to the mediocre thoughts of others; do not surrender the belief you hold in yourself and in your abilities, do not surrender the dreams that you have worked so hard to hold within the palms of your hands. For what right do others have to judge another's dreams for they have not walked a mile in your shoes! There are no limits to your courage and determination. The only limitations are those that we place upon ourselves. Our thoughts make the world what we want it to be. Mold your thought into a weapon of immense power.

Wipe away the tears from your heart and let your life be brushed by the fingertips of your immortal soul, breathe deep, with purpose and a deep held conviction. There is an inner strength and an inner peace within us all, which the world cannot penetrate and the hypocrisy and ignorance of the human mind cannot poison. Embrace that inner source of strength and you will become fearless and the obstacles within your life will seem insignificant.

You must be undisturbed and stern in your resolve that you are a creature so versatile and resilient that you cannot be defeated and you must hold firm in the conviction that you will not be defeated. You are a creature of boundless beauty and perseverance. You are a creature which can and which will endure. There is nothing that you cannot achieve and there is nothing that you do not have the ability to overcome within your life. Harness the power of your mind for it is your greatest barrier.

You are an individual of immense courage within the battlefield of life and there is no greater battle than that which will be fought with your own life. You must not, despite the pain, the despair, the grief, the intensity, the loneliness within your life, surrender the very essence of your dignity and hope to the enemy which hovers around you in pursuit of conquering both your mind and your soul.

I do not believe in defeat because defeat does not believe in me. I do not believe in fear for I am fearless. I do not believe in pain for I find strength in the weaknesses of my enemies. Within the mist of your despair and the obstacles and challenges that life presents before you be calm and peaceful. An angry and misguided mind will make decisions and judgment based on haste and anger which in the long run will continue to merely add to your suffering whereas the peaceful mind within that moment of insanity will have the ability to bring forth a clear, reasoned judgment and solution to the challenges at hand.

No one owns you so you have not lost anything. Only you can give away or surrender all that you hold to the challenges within your life. Control your mind from its aimless wandering within your own insanity-guide it to think positively and with purpose. Once you have conquered your mind you will also introduce yourself to an inner peace, which will bring meaning and a freedom to both your life and thought.

Do not kneel before anyone for your knees were not made for such purposes, they were made for the purpose of enabling you to stand upright! Be like an elephant, which once upright will not easily be brought to its knees! Adapt your mind, thinking, actions and life to the challenges, which have surrounded your existence.

You and you alone hold the foundations of your dreams and your destiny in the way you approach the challenges and obstacles within your life. Do not falter in the face of adversity; rise to the challenge however difficult it may be. Your difficulties will only be difficult if you believe them to be difficult. How can you fear that which you have never challenged?

Endure and challenge the pains of your existence for freedom will wait for you and it will eventually embrace you. In defeating the challenges within your life continue to be a good person, do not become like your enemies for to do so will deprive your soul of the peace it desires.

You must be like the seasons of the year ever changing, ever adapting, ever growing, and ever challenging. Nature is always in constant change, the old give way to the new, and this is the course of life. Yet within this existence life continues, it evolves and continues to grow despite its pains.

Your time has not yet come to let nature embrace you in its totality, so go forth into the wilderness of your life and reclaim what mother nature granted you at birth; the right to dream, the right to live and the right to be who you want to be. Challenge with the might of your mind and your inner strength all the barriers that your existence places at the gates of your destiny. If you don't risk anything, you risk even more!

For within the midst of our suffering there is a meaning!

Carl Jung

Copyright © 2001 Naresh Jhali (England)

(Bruno Horst)

ON THE PULSE OF MORNING

2009-04-08T23:48:00.001-04:00

On the Pulse of Morning

A Rock, A River, A Tree
Hosts to species long since departed,
Marked the mastodon.

The dinosaur, who left dry tokens
Of their sojourn here
On our planet floor,
Any broad alarm of their hastening doom
Is lost in the gloom of dust and ages.

But today, the Rock cries out to us, clearly, forcefully,
Come, you may stand upon my
Back and face your distant destiny,
But seek no haven in my shadow.

I will give you no more hiding place down here.

You, created only a little lower than
The angels, have crouched too long in
The bruising darkness,
Have lain too long
Face down in ignorance.

Your mouths spilling words
Armed for slaughter.

The Rock cries out today, you may stand on me,
But do not hide your face.

Across the wall of the world,
A River sings a beautiful song,
Come rest here by my side.

Each of you a bordered country,
Delicate and strangely made proud,
Yet thrusting perpetually under siege.

Your armed struggles for profit
Have left collars of waste upon
My shore, currents of debris upon my breast.

Yet, today I call you to my riverside,
If you will study war no more. Come,

Clad in peace and I will sing the songs
The Creator gave to me when I and the
Tree and the stone were one.

Before cynicism was a bloody sear across your
Brow and when you yet knew you still
Knew nothing.

The River sings and sings on.

There is a true yearning to respond to
The singing River and the wise Rock.

So say the Asian, the Hispanic, the Jew
The African and Native American, the Sioux,
The Catholic, the Muslim, the French, the Greek
The Irish, the Rabbi, the Priest, the Sheikh,
The Gay, the Straight, the Preacher,
The privileged, the homeless, the Teacher.
They hear. They all hear
The speaking of the Tree.

Today, the first and last of every Tree
Speaks to humankind. Come to me, here beside the River.

Plant yourself beside me, here beside the River.

Each of you, descendant of some passed
On traveller, has been paid for.

You, who gave me my first name, you
Pawnee, Apache and Seneca, you
Cherokee Nation, who rested with me, then
Forced on bloody feet, left me to the employment of
Other seekers--desperate for gain,
Starving for gold.

You, the Turk, the Swede, the German, the Scot ...
You the Ashanti, the Yoruba, the Kru, bought
Sold, stolen, arriving on a nightmare
Praying for a dream.

Here, root yourselves beside me.

I am the Tree planted by the River,
Which will not be moved.

I, the Rock, I the River, I the Tree
I am yours--your Passages have been paid.

Lift up your faces, you have a piercing need
For this bright morning dawning for you.

History, despite its wrenching pain,
Cannot be unlived, and if faced
With courage, need not be lived again.

Lift up your eyes upon
The day breaking for you.

Give birth again
To the dream.

Women, children, men,
Take it into the palms of your hands.

Mold it into the shape of your most
Private need. Sculpt it into
The image of your most public self.
Lift up your hearts
Each new hour holds new chances
For new beginnings.

Do not be wedded forever
To fear, yoked eternally
To brutishness.

The horizon leans forward,
Offering you space to place new steps of change.
Here, on the pulse of this fine day
You may have the courage
To look up and out upon me, the
Rock, the River, the Tree, your country.

No less to Midas than the mendicant.

No less to you now than the mastodon then.

Here on the pulse of this new day
You may have the grace to look up and out
And into your sister's eyes, into
Your brother's face, your country
And say simply
Very simply
With hope
Good morning.

By Maya Angelou

Liana Arakelyan

A Friend

2009-04-08T18:07:00.001-04:00

What is a true friend?

One you don't always mend.

You can't change the past,

Kick it under the grass.

Friends are there for you,

not there to hurt you.

They should know when wrong

then sing your favorite song.

Telling lies and rumor spreading,

then sleeping in their bedding.

I find sleeping hard now,

hope they took a bow.

True frends don't hurt me,

They're always there, unconditionally.

Kate Glencross, Whalen EN102

"Butterfly"

2009-04-08T18:05:00.001-04:00

She had beautiful eyes,

Eyes I'd never seen cry.

August 7, day to die?

Woken up, tears in eyes.

Was delerious the entire day,

How's there such a way?

The age was only sixteen,

First we all felt mean.

Confusion and headaches were there,

Friends can't let YOU tear.

Well, don't cry Ms. Butterfly,

Our hearts you'll never die.

Kate Glencross, Whalen EN102

"I'll Never Hurt You"

2009-04-08T18:03:00.001-04:00

It's been almost eight months

Mostly the times were fun.

There were things we did,

and a bunch we hid.

Now am I the one,

To smile or be dumb?

I'm told it's not right.

Please come to my sight.

Fights followed with many screams,

Following them are bad dreams.

Guess I'm used to lies,

and those types of guys.

My father was to begin,

I'm letting him now win.

Told I'd never get hurt,

embarassed to wear a skirt.

Don't know the right path,

cannot do the simple math.

So, you'll never hurt me?

Alright, well, woe is me.

Kate Glencross, Whalen EN102

A Poem Traveled Down My Arm by Alice Walker

2009-04-08T16:48:00.001-04:00

not be

miracle

affliction

the

world.

Alice Walker

Diane

Diane Harper

Professor

Humanities Department

Writing and Literature Department

another poem

2009-04-08T01:37:00.001-04:00

Dreams

Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.

Langston Hughes

poem

2009-04-08T01:30:00.001-04:00

The Rose that Grew from Concrete

Did you hear about the rose that grew
from a crack in the concrete?
Proving nature's law is wrong it
learned to walk with out having feet.
Funny it seems, but by keeping it's dreams,
it learned to breathe fresh air.
Long live the rose that grew from concrete
when no one else ever cared.

Tupac Shakur

The Last Rose

2009-04-07T18:27:00.000-04:00

The Last Rose

If I die, I want this rose on my grave,

Down below, trapped in a cave.

You look at me for one last time,

Everyone standing in a crippled line.

You look at me with such sorrow,

You won’t see me tomorrow.

It’s where I shall rest for all eternity,

Down below with my dignity.

So goodbye my friend, do not cry,

I won’t be returning, I will not lie.

Do not be sad, do not worry,

I’ve taken all my heart could carry.

Smile for me, for one last time,

For I’ll remember our memories down the line.

We’ll meet again, some day, some time,

Trust me when I say you’ll be fine.

Till then, my friend,

Till the, I’ll send,

Hugs and kisses,

And the best times we’ve spent.

- Ani Keshishyan

An Irish Airman Foresees his Death.

2009-04-07T18:11:00.001-04:00

I know that I shall meet my fate
Somewhere among the clouds above;
Those that I fight I do not hate
Those that I guard I do not love;

My country is Kiltartan Cross,
My countrymen Kiltartan’s poor,
No likely end could bring them loss
Or leave them happier than before.

Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,
Nor public man, nor cheering crowds,
A lonely impulse of delight
Drove to this tumult in the clouds;

I balanced all, brought all to mind,
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind
In balance with this life, this death.

Poem by W.B.Yeats

Interesting tidbits-This was written in response to the death in World War One of Major Robert Gregory who was a friend of Yeats.

-This poem was also adapted by the band, Keane in their 2006 song, A Bad Dream. The poem was read before each performance of the song during their recent tours.

Submitted by Geoffrey Farrell

The New Jerusalem

2009-04-07T16:35:00.001-04:00

The New Jerusalem
William Blake

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?
And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builder here
Among these dark Satanic Mills?
Bring me my bow of burning gold!
Bring me my arrows of desire!
Bring me my spear! O clouds, unfold!
Bring me my charriot of fire!
I will not cease from mental fight,
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England's green and pleasant land.

British literature 206
Professor Whalen
From: Pharah dubuisson Lefevre

Inaugural Poem

2009-04-07T16:29:00.001-04:00

Inaugural Poem
Maya Angelou
A Rock, A River, A Tree
Hosts to species long since departed,
Marked the mastodon.
The dinosaur, who left dry tokens
Of their sojourn here
On our planet floor,
Any broad alarm of their hastening doom
Is lost in the gloom of dust and ages.
But today, the Rock cries out to us, clearly, forcefully,
Come, you may stand upon my
Back and face your distant destiny,
But seek no haven in my shadow.
I will give you no more hiding place down here.
You, created only a little lower than
The angels, have crouched too long in
The bruising darkness,
Have lain too long
Face down in ignorance.
Your mouths spilling words
Armed for slaughter.
The Rock cries out today, you may stand on me,
But do not hide your face.
Across the wall of the world,
A River sings a beautiful song,
Come rest here by my side.
Each of you a bordered country,
Delicate and strangely made proud,
Yet thrusting perpetually under siege.
Your armed struggles for profit
Have left collars of waste upon
My shore, currents of debris upon my breast.
Yet, today I call you to my riverside,
If you will study war no more. Come,
Clad in peace and I will sing the songs
The Creator gave to me when I and the
Tree and the stone were one.
Before cynicism was a bloody sear across your
Brow and when you yet knew you still
Knew nothing.
The River sings and sings on.
There is a true yearning to respond to
The singing River and the wise Rock.
So say the Asian, the Hispanic, the Jew
The African and Native American, the Sioux,
The Catholic, the Muslim, the French, the Greek
The Irish, the Rabbi, the Priest, the Sheikh,
The Gay, the Straight, the Preacher,
The privileged, the homeless, the Teacher.
They hear. They all hear
The speaking of the Tree.
Today, the first and last of every Tree
Speaks to humankind. Come to me, here beside the River.
Plant yourself beside me, here beside the River.
Each of you, descendant of some passed
On traveler, has been paid for.
You, who gave me my first name, you
Pawnee, Apache and Seneca, you
Cherokee Nation, who rested with me, then
Forced on bloody feet, left me to the employment of
Other seekers--desperate for gain,
Starving for gold.
You, the Turk, the Swede, the German, the Scot ...
You the Ashanti, the Yoruba, the Kru, bought
Sold, stolen, arriving on a nightmare
Praying for a dream.
Here, root yourselves beside me.
I am the Tree planted by the River,
Which will not be moved.
I, the Rock, I the River, I the Tree
I am yours--your Passages have been paid.
Lift up your faces, you have a piercing need
For this bright morning dawning for you.
History, despite its wrenching pain,
Cannot be unlived, and if faced
With courage, need not be lived again.
Lift up your eyes upon
The day breaking for you.
Give birth again
To the dream.
Women, children, men,
Take it into the palms of your hands.
Mold it into the shape of your most
Private need. Sculpt it into
The image of your most public self.
Lift up your hearts
Each new hour holds new chances
For new beginnings.
Do not be wedded forever
To fear, yoked eternally
To brutishness.
The horizon leans forward,
Offering you space to place new steps of change.
Here, on the pulse of this fine day
You may have the courage
To look up and out upon me, the
Rock, the River, the Tree, your country.
No less to Midas than the mendicant.
No less to you now than the mastodon then.
Here on the pulse of this new day
You may have the grace to look up and out
And into your sister's eyes, into
Your brother's face, your country
And say simply
Very simply
With hope
Good morning.
From: Pharah Dubuisson
British literature 206
Professor Whalen

Dear Mama

2009-04-07T14:10:00.001-04:00

Now ain't nobody tell us it was fair
No love from my daddy cause the coward wasn't there
He passed away and I didn't cry, cause my anger
wouldn't let me feel for a stranger
They say I'm wrong and I'm heartless, but all along
I was lookin for a father he was gone
I love payin rent when the rent's due
I hope ya got the diamond necklace that I sent to you
Cause when I was low you was there for me
And never left me alone because you cared for me
And I could see you comin home after work late
You're in the kitchen tryin to fix us a hot plate
Ya just workin with the scraps you was given
And mama made miracles every Thanksgivin
But now the road got rough, you're alone
You're tryin to raise two bad kids on your own
And there's no way I can pay you back
But my plan is to show you that I understand
You are appreciated

By: 2pac shakur aka Lesane Parish Crooks
Submitted by Ali Al Oraifan

See all the ways you can stay connected to friends and family

Adieu Mon Pays

2009-04-07T11:05:00.000-04:00

Adieu Mon Pays

J'ai quitté mon pays, j'ai quitté ma maison
Ma vie, ma triste vie se traîne sans raison
J'ai quitté mon soleil, j'ai quitté ma mer bleue
Leurs souvenirs se reveillent, bien après mon adieu
Soleil, soleil de mon pays perdu
La ville blanche que j'aimais, des filles que j'ai jadis connu
J'ai quitté une amie, je vois encore ses yeux
ses yeus mouillés de pluie, de la pluie de l'adieu
Je revois son sourire, s y près de mon visage
Il faisait resplendir les soires de mon village
Mais du bord du bateau, qui m'éloignait du quai
Une chaîne dans l'eau a claqué comme un foet
J'ai longtemps regardé ses yeux bleus qui fouillent
La mer les a noyé dans le flot du regret

Goodbye My Country

I left my country, I left my house
My life, my sad life, drags without reason.
I left my sun, I left my blue sea -
Their memories reawaken in me, well after my good-bye.
Sun, sun of my lost country,
White cities which I loved, girls that I used to know…
I left a friend, I still see her eyes,
Her eyes rainy wet, with the rain of good-bye
I see her smile again, so close to my face
As it illumined the evenings of my village.
But on board the boat, which took me away from the quay
A chain in the water beat the water like mad
While I looked intently at her blue eyes which plumbed the sea
Drowned in the flood of regret…
Enrico Macias (1962)

Domenica Rizza
Prof. Whalen EN102 013

When i think of you

2009-04-07T11:00:00.001-04:00

When I Think Of You

When I think of intelligence, I think of you

When I think of beauty, I think of you

When I think of a Diva, I think of you

What can I say, 100 percent perfection.

The part that is so amazing, is that you are all mines

Like Biggie said “it was all a dream” and guess what, being with you I am living it. When I think of you, all I can think about is how lucky I am. When I think of Sade, all I can say is

Sexy Ass Diva Extraordinaire

Deshawn Gibbons

Redondillas

2009-04-07T10:31:00.001-04:00

Original spanish version :

Hombres necios que acusáis
a la mujer, sin razón,
sin ver que sois la ocasión
de lo mismo que culpáis;

si con ansia sin igual
solicitáis su desdén,
por qué queréis que obren bien
si las incitáis al mal?

Combatís su resistencia
y luego, con gravedad,
decís que fue liviandad
lo que hizo la diligencia.

Parecer quiere el denuedo
de vuestro parecer loco,
al niño que pone el coco
y luego le tiene miedo.

Queréis, con presunción necia,
hallar a la que buscáis
para prentendida, Thais,
y en la posesión, Lucrecia.

¿Qué humor puede ser más raro
que el que, falto de consejo,
él mismo empaña el espejo
y siente que no esté claro?

Con el favor y el desdén
tenéis condición igual,
quejándoos, si os tratan mal,
burlándoos, si os quieren bien.

Opinión, ninguna gana,
pues la que más se recata,
si no os admite, es ingrata,
y si os admite, es liviana.

Siempre tan necios andáis
que, con desigual nivel,
a una culpáis por cruel
y a otra por fácil culpáis.

¿Pues como ha de estar templada
la que vuestro amor pretende?,
¿si la que es ingrata ofende,
y la que es fácil enfada?

Mas, entre el enfado y la pena
que vuestro gusto refiere,
bien haya la que no os quiere
y quejaos en hora buena.

Dan vuestras amantes penas
a sus libertades alas,
y después de hacerlas malas
las queréis hallar muy buenas.

¿Cuál mayor culpa ha tenido
en una pasión errada:
la que cae de rogada,
o el que ruega de caído?

¿O cuál es de más culpar,
aunque cualquiera mal haga;
la que peca por la paga
o el que paga por pecar?

¿Pues, para qué os espantáis
de la culpa que tenéis?
Queredlas cual las hacéis
o hacedlas cual las buscáis.

Dejad de solicitar,
y después, con más razón,
acusaréis la afición
de la que os fuere a rogar.

Bien con muchas armas fundo
que lidia vuestra arrogancia,
pues en promesa e instancia
juntáis diablo, carne y mundo.

Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz

English version :

Silly, you men-so very adept
at wrongly faulting womankind,
not seeing you're alone to blame
for faults you plant in woman's mind.

After you've won by urgent plea
the right to tarnish her good name,
you still expect her to behave--
you, that coaxed her into shame.

You batter her resistance down
and then, all righteousness, proclaim
that feminine frivolity,
not your persistence, is to blame.

When it comes to bravely posturing,
your witlessness must take the prize:
you're the child that makes a bogeyman,
and then recoils in fear and cries.

Presumptuous beyond belief,
you'd have the woman you pursue
be Thais when you're courting her,
Lucretia once she falls to you.

For plain default of common sense,
could any action be so queer
as oneself to cloud the mirror,
then complain that it's not clear?

Whether you're favored or disdained,
nothing can leave you satisfied.
You whimper if you're turned away,
you sneer if you've been gratified.

With you, no woman can hope to score;
whichever way, she's bound to lose;
spurning you, she's ungrateful--
succumbing, you call her lewd.

Your folly is always the same:
you apply a single rule
to the one you accuse of looseness
and the one you brand as cruel.

What happy mean could there be
for the woman who catches your eye,
if, unresponsive, she offends,
yet whose complaisance you decry?

Still, whether it's torment or anger--
and both ways you've yourselves to blame--
God bless the woman who won't have you,
no matter how loud you complain.

It's your persistent entreaties
that change her from timid to bold.
Having made her thereby naughty,
you would have her good as gold.

So where does the greater guilt lie
for a passion that should not be:
with the man who pleads out of baseness
or the woman debased by his plea?

Or which is more to be blamed--
though both will have cause for chagrin:
the woman who sins for money
or the man who pays money to sin?

So why are you men all so stunned
at the thought you're all guilty alike?
Either like them for what you've made them
or make of them what you can like.

If you'd give up pursuing them,
you'd discover, without a doubt,
you've a stronger case to make
against those who seek you out.

I well know what powerful arms
you wield in pressing for evil:
your arrogance is allied
with the world, the flesh, and the devil!

Juana Inés de la Cruz (1651-1695)

Domenica Rizza
Prof. Whalen EN102 013

I Specialist

2009-04-07T10:08:00.001-04:00

There are those who give little of the much

Which they have – and they give it for

Recognition and their hidden desire make

Their gifts unwholesome

Kahlil Gibran

I SPECIALIST

Blurred vision- Indistinct outlines of reality

Cross eyed- Everything turns toward each other

Cataract- Lens becomes opaque causing

Partial blindness

Detached retina- Images stop forming at the back

Of the eyes

Blindness- Lacks perception or judgment

Without the power of sight

He suffers from a severe malady – It is his I

Unable to see beyond himself – Performing in a team sport

We appreciate his talents – Not his selfishness

Mad and angry at everyone – Believing the world owes him a living

There is no joy in watching him – Just disgust at wasted potential

Guarding his soul from all eyes

He pushes away any hand that reaches out

We regret he will never know the experience of friendship

He is an I specialist

Fails to see in giving there is receiving

Grumbles and walks away from those who ask to share

Looks at people

Does not see them

We hope he gets better with time

Which is supposed to heal all wounds?

A very talented young man

Who has not found out how to form a partnership with others

We is only a word in French to him

There is no I in team – it is an old expression

Until he realizes that he will remain angry and selfish

He is a pair of brown shoes

The team a tuxedo

He is an I specialist!

__________________________________________

Bill Raynor

MassBay CC

Director of Athletics, Recreation and Wellness

50 Oakland st.

Wellesley Hills, Ma. 02481

braynor@massbay.edu

781-239-2664 (office)

781-239-2669 (Fax)

A Dream

2009-04-07T08:44:00.001-04:00

A Dream

In visions of the dark night
        I have dreamed of joy departed-
      But a waking dream of life and light
        Hath left me broken-hearted.

      Ah! what is not a dream by day
        To him whose eyes are cast
      On things around him with a ray
        Turned back upon the past?

      That holy dream- that holy dream,
        While all the world were chiding,
      Hath cheered me as a lovely beam
        A lonely spirit guiding.

      What though that light, thro' storm and night,
        So trembled from afar-
      What could there be more purely bright
        In Truth's day-star?

EDGAR ALLEN POE

Courage By Anne Sexton

2009-04-06T21:01:00.001-04:00

Courage
Anne Sexton

It is in the small things we see it.
The child's first step,
as awesome as an earthquake.
The first time you rode a bike,
wallowing up the sidewalk.
The first spanking when your heart
went on a journey all alone.
When they called you crybaby
or poor or fatty or crazy
and made you into an alien,
you drank their acid
and concealed it.

Later,
if you faced the death of bombs and bullets
you did not do it with a banner,
you did it with only a hat to
comver your heart.
You did not fondle the weakness inside you
though it was there.
Your courage was a small coal
that you kept swallowing.
If your buddy saved you
and died himself in so doing,
then his courage was not courage,
it was love; love as simple as shaving soap.

Later,
if you have endured a great despair,
then you did it alone,
getting a transfusion from the fire,
picking the scabs off your heart,
then wringing it out like a sock.
Next, my kinsman, you powdered your sorrow,
you gave it a back rub
and then you covered it with a blanket
and after it had slept a while
it woke to the wings of the roses
and was transformed.

Later,
when you face old age and its natural conclusion
your courage will still be shown in the little ways,
each spring will be a sword you'll sharpen,
those you love will live in a fever of love,
and you'll bargain with the calendar
and at the last moment
when death opens the back door
you'll put on your carpet slippers
and stride out.

Poetry month - Poem: Lullaby

2009-04-06T16:32:00.001-04:00

Lay your sleeping head, my love, Human on my faithless arm; Time and fevers burn away Individual beauty from Thoughtful children, and the grave Proves the child ephemeral: But in my arms till break of day Let the living creature lie, Mortal, guilty, but to me The entirely beautiful. Soul and body have no bounds: To lovers as they lie upon Her tolerant enchanted slope In their ordinary swoon, Grave the vision Venus sends Of supernatural sympathy, Universal love and hope; While an abstract insight wakes Among the glaciers and the rocks The hermit's carnal ecstasy. Certainty, fidelity On the stroke of midnight pass Like vibrations of a bell And fashionable madmen raise Their pedantic boring cry: Every farthing of the cost, All the dreaded cards foretell, Shall be paid, but from this night Not a whisper, not a thought, Not a kiss nor look be lost. Beauty, midnight, vision dies: Let the winds of dawn that blow Softly round your dreaming head Such a day of welcome show Eye and knocking heart may bless, Find our mortal world enough; Noons of dryness find you fed By the involuntary powers, Nights of insult let you pass Watched by every human love. Student : Aline Garcia
Professor : Whalen
English 102-006

Inside My Cocoon

2009-04-06T16:31:00.001-04:00

Inside of My Cocoon

By: Corinne Kennedy

Inside of my cocoon, nothing will ever change.

I have grown and now I wait,

Wait for something to change.

But inside of my cocoon, nothing will ever change.

I do what I must to survive,

And that will never change.

Nothing inside of my cocoon, nothing will ever change.

Change, change, change. I wait for a change.

And one day, something will change.

I will be a butterfly, how strange.

How strange the world will seem,

Once so big and tall,

But I’ll be able to float amongst the stars,

And I will see it all.

My 16 year old daughter

Roy

Roy Kennedy

Professor of Chemistry

Massachusetts Bay Community College

50 Oakland Street

Wellesley Hills, MA 02481

(781) 239-2236

rkennedy@massbay.edu

Pieces of Janice Joplin

2009-04-06T15:23:00.001-04:00

On cotton cushion coddled by songs of brittle lace

Loose gray shirt, raw damp with fog's baggy chill

Bitter rain keeps snapping at a rotting windowsill

Her visage, a wavering light on warped glass vase

Anguish of words dissolves in throat without truce

Limp lips of dying green leaves can't get their fill

Sloshing Southern Comfort igniting notes that kill

Face sings thumping tears, heart drenched in abuse

Vocal cords screaming for love into air's deaf ear

Notes constricting around torso, stomach strained

Wanting love's rich plate, ingesting needle's peace

Reframes cannot wipe away her wet sheeting fear

Bulbous purple veins punctured dry, arms drained

Dry mouth, heart lost, body ripped into the release

Tom Parsons

Kate Glencross

2009-04-02T18:48:00.001-04:00

Kate Glencross
Creative, Unique, Hyper
Brother or sister of Bob and Mike
Who loves family, friends, and happiness

Who feels compassionate about others
Who needs music, friends, and love
Who gives advice, trust, and honesty
Who fears loss, bridges, and
Who'd like to see the world
Who dreams of my personal dreams
A student of Mass Bay Community College in Wellesley, MA
Kate Glencross

EN102-006 Whalen

The Square Root of Three

2009-04-02T13:04:00.001-04:00

"The Square Root of Three"
By: David Feinberg
Submitted by Diego Pena
I'm sure that I will always be
A lonely number like root three
The three is all that's good and right,
Why must my three keep out of sight
Beneath the vicious square root sign,
I wish instead I were a nine
For nine could thwart this evil trick,
with just some quick arithmetic
I know I'll never see the sun, as 1.7321
Such is my reality, a sad irrationality
When hark! What is this I see,
Another square root of a three
As quietly co-waltzing by,
Together now we multiply
To form a number we prefer,
Rejoicing as an integer
We break free from our mortal bonds
With the wave of magic wands
Our square root signs become unglued
Your love for me has been renewed

Quick access to your favorite MSN content and Windows Live with Internet Explorer 8. Download FREE now!

Beach chairs

2009-04-01T21:17:00.000-04:00

Beach Chairs

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching the setting sun
holding hands and reminiscing
how it all begun

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching the ships out on the sea
holding hands and smiling
together we're meant to be

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching people walking past
holding hands and knowing
that our love will always last

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching the waves along the shore
holding hands we realize
our love is stronger than before

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching the changing tide
holding hands with happiness
to be by each others side

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching the sunrise
holding hands with tears of joy
there are no more good-byes

By : Joyce Ebrecht

Submitted By: Holly Cavanaugh

Never Knowing

2009-04-01T20:27:00.001-04:00

Some things come in three's
Found out new year, January.
The day being the fourteenth,
A month before lovers meet.
A week before was tragic,
Something happened leaving no magic.
Things became hard that week,
Leaving me lost, confused, weak.
Third week was January twenty-first,
Only you know when it's worse.
All that was seen was blood
Not believed at first, no hug.
I was with two friends,
Didn't want this to mend.
Couldn't go home right then,
so I went to Mom; a friend.
I had a picture to remember,
She hugged me as we knew
it wouldn't be in September.
Now that three months passed
I still can't deal with the last.
I'll never know what could have been
Doesn't everything happen for a reason?

Kate Glencross EN102-006

Friend

2009-04-01T16:46:00.000-04:00

A friend is like a flower,
a rose to be exact,
Or maybe like a brand new gate
that never comes unlatched.
A friend is like an owl,
both beautiful and wise.
Or perhaps a friend is like a ghost,
whose spirit never dies.
A friend is like a heart that goes
strong until the end.
Where would we be in this world
if we didn't have a friend. - By Emma Guest

Artem Shakhramanyan (EN 102, 013)

A Dream

2009-04-01T15:03:00.001-04:00

In visions of the dark night
I have dreamed of joy departed-
But a waking dream of life and light
Hath left me broken-hearted.

Ah! what is not a dream by day
To him whose eyes are cast
On things around him with a ray
Turned back upon the past?

That holy dream- that holy dream,
While all the world were chiding,
Hath cheered me as a lovely beam
A lonely spirit guiding.

What though that light, thro' storm and night,
So trembled from afar-
What could there be more purely bright
In Truth's day-star?

Edgar Allan Poe

Brian P. Jacques
April 1, 2009

Dance with me

2009-04-01T13:24:00.005-04:00

I close my eyes so I can look
Into yours.
I fall asleep so I can dream about your smile
And your laugh.
My heart beats to the rhythm of your voice
And the melody of your words is the sound I dance to.
So dance with me...
Let me see your beauty with my eyes open;
Let me smile at the sight of you and me laughing
Let me rock your heart with a word from mine,
And I will take you to that place
In my dreams
Where you and I can dance
Together
To the music of Love...

Charles-Olivier Jumelle

"Scaling the Peak"

2009-04-01T11:02:00.000-04:00

The feat is remarkable, surely.

Opening upward,

And pouring a kind of holiness into the sky.

Some largest breath from a brief human gasp.

But is that what the people see

As they scuttle into the cavern shadows,

Arms warm around their sides,

And imagine what it could be like,

Up,

Up there?

Sitting close, very close to the fire,

Eyes sealed to make the colors dance,

Can they see him in that distance,

The small, bedeviled straggler, contending with the wind,

Numb fingers on the ropes,

Blinking ice from frantic lashes?

Can they feel the burn of frosted breath,

As he grapples with a traitor ledge,

Gaining footing

Just in time?

Think of the danger, they mutter through soft breathing.

What could craze a one to such a risk?

And slowly,

Slowly the climber fades,

Tousled hair blowing yellow in the fire.

But as embers flicker into dust,

And heads grow weary with the want of sleep,

He stands silent one moment more,

Head bowed, blowing golden

On the windy peak.

Original from Luisa Cahill in the MassBay Communications Office

iv. i say goodbye.

2009-04-01T10:57:00.001-04:00

Trying to hold onto you

Is like holding back a coursing brook

With just my hand

You flow too fast

And from the beginning

This parting was always just a matter

Of time

But you of the great understanding

You of the permissible

You of the echo and the ripple

You of head and heart

May I keep just a little of you

For myself

So that you don’t just slip away

Into that dark sad place

Where all my hurts go

And even as I say goodbye

I also whisper

Please

Stay

And help me

See.

n Original from Luisa Cahill (in Communications Office)

"Beloved"

2009-04-01T10:54:00.001-04:00

Quicksilver one,

Tell us your secrets.

How do you tame dragons to a purr?

How do you shed light with rays of laughter?

How do you dance pirouettes of mind?

How do you walk the dark wood without fear?

How do you hold lightning in your pale hand?

How does your garden grow green

In the cold winters of sorrow?

How does your well of love stay full

When you give us all to drink?

-- Original from Luisa Cahill

Dreams - by Langston Hughes

2009-03-31T22:57:00.001-04:00

Hold fast to dreams

For if dreams die

Life is a broken-winged bird

That cannot fly.

Hold fast to dreams

For when dreams go

Life is a barren field

Frozen with snow.

Uploaded by: Ali Al Oraifan

See all the ways you can stay connected to friends and family

A HUNTING MORNING By Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

2009-03-31T20:34:00.001-04:00

Put the saddle on the mare,
For the wet winds blow;
There's winter in the air,
And autumn all below.
For the red leaves are flying
And the red bracken dying,
And the red fox lying
Where the oziers grow.

Put the bridle on the mare,
For my blood runs chill;
And my heart, it is there,
On the heather-tufted hill,
With the gray skies o'er us,
And the long-drawn chorus
Of a running pack before us
From the find to the kill.

Then lead round the mare,
For it's time that we began,
And away with thought and care,
Save to live and be a man,
While the keen air is blowing,
And the huntsman holloing,
And the black mare going
As the black mare can.

Send By: Denis Mandel

A Moment of Intimacy

2009-03-31T08:59:00.006-04:00

I know you are there
I need to see you
I need to look into your eyes
I need to feel your presence beside me
I want to feel the tickle of your whisper in my ear

I want you to accept my complement for what it is
I want to see you eat your food the way you like to eat it when nobody is watching

I dream of touching you, physically, yes - but not just physically
I want to be hugged by you while I am fulfilling you desire to be hugged by me
I want to hear your thoughts and feel your passion
I want all of you while you are wanting all of me

We're not nearly as far away as you might think

C. Daniele

Keats' Sonnet (When I Have Fears That I May Cease to Be...)

2008-05-02T20:55:00.001-04:00

Here’s a sonnet written by John Keats, with a theme that rings true even today. –Jeff Calzaloia

When I have fears that I may cease to be

Before my pen has glean’d my teeming brain,

Before high-piled books, in charact’ry,

Hold like rich garners the full-ripened grain;

When I behold, upon the night’s starr’d face,

Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,

And think that I may never live to trace

Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;

And when I feel, fair creature of an hour!

That I shall never look upon thee more,

Never have relish in the faery power

Of unreflecting love!—then on the shore

Of the wide world I stand alone, and think

Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink.

"Stars in Water" by Cleopatra Mathis

2008-04-30T19:59:00.001-04:00

We were walking through the shadows
of the Adirondacks. I saw so clearly
that unfamiliar country, our sudden friendship.
You said it couldn't be that way again,
walking that field, the small hands of birch leaves
fluttering in the still line of sunset.

The one night without a moon
seems now the end of summer. We walked
down the narrow road to the pond,
apart even from that separate world.
The water was bright with stars,
a crowd of lights gleamed on black.
You said some of those stars
had already burned themselves out,
yet still they lived on the glass surface
of the pond. And I thought, even this landscape
is accidental.

On the last day the weather changed.
We walked past pond and field,
watched the stream mirror the cloudy sky,
variations of sun turning in the water.
The movement of light and shadow changed the rocks
as if by years. We left unexplained
whatever changes in ourselves
and walked back to our deliberate lives.

America's on Sale by Alix Olson

2008-04-30T19:53:00.001-04:00

ATTENTION SHOPPERS!!!
attention 9 to 5 folk, cell-phone masses,
the up and coming classes.
attention sports-utility,
plastic-surgery suburbanites,
viagra-popping, gucci-shopping urbanites.
attention george-clooney loonies,
promise-keeper sheep,
stockbroker sleep-walkers,
big investment talkers,
ricki lake-watchers.
attention walmart congregation,
shop til you drop generation,
ATTENTION NATION!
AMERICA’S ON SALE!

We’ve unstocked the welfare pantry
to restock the wall street gentry
it’s economically elementary
because values don’t pay,
yes, american dreams are on permanent layaway!
(there was limited availability anyway)
the statue of liberty is being dismantled,
ten dollars a piece to sit on your mantle
or hang on your wall
by the small somalian child
you bought from sally struthers
sisters and brothers, it’s now or never,
these deals won’t last forever-
AMERICA’S ON SALE!
(restrictions may apply if you’re black, gay or female)

And shoppers!
global perspective is ninety-ninety percent off
cause most of the world don’t count to us.
our ethic inventory is low
because moral business has been slow,
the values-company is moving to mexico--
and ALL ETHICS MUST GO!

It’s a remote control America that’s on sale
because standing up for justice can’t compare
to clicking through it from a lazy chair--
Answer: jerry, montel, oprah
Question: folks who really care!
for a million dollars!
in this new mcveggie burger world order
where the mainstream scene has an alternative theme.
where national health care is one hundred percent off!
and medicare is in the fifty percent bin,
so you can buy--half an operation
when AMERICA’S ON SALE!
There’s a close-out bid to determine
which religion will win
all the neon flashing signs of sin.
the Christian Coalition is bidding high
shoppers, you ask WHY?!
who needs a higher power when you’ve got
the purchasing power
to corner and market
one human mold.
That’s right - Real family values
are being UNDERSOLD!!

And it’s open hunting season for the NRA!
there’s a special oozie discount-- only today!
Gun control?! We say--
Fuck it! Blow it all away!

Because inflation is up on the CEO ego
and power is deflated as far as we go:
Nike bought the revolution,
and law schools bought the constitution!
Tommy Hilfiger bought the red, white, and blue,
(a flag shirt for fifty dollars,
the one being burned is you!)
Marlboro bought what it means to be a man,
Lexus equals power- so get it while you can.
Maybelline bought beauty,
New York bought Rudy Guiliani,
Mastercard Gold bought the national soul
Broadway bought talent and called it CATS!
the Republicans bought out the Democrats-
they liquidated all asses in a fat white donkey sale-
now it’s buy one shmuck, get one shmuck free
in the capitalist party!
And there’s nothing left to get in the way
of a full blue-light blow-out
of the U.S. of A!
there’s a no-nothing back guarantee,
a zero-year warranty,
when you buy this land of the fritos, ruffles, lays..
this home of the braves, the chiefs, the reds, the slaves!
so call 1-800- i don’t care about shit
or www.FUCK ALL OF IT!
to receive your credit for the fate of our nation-
(call now! Interest is at an all-time low)

But hurry shoppers!
because america’s being downsized, citizens,
and you’re all fired.

"little words" by dorothy parker

2008-04-30T19:47:00.001-04:00

When you are gone, there is nor bloom nor leaf,
Nor singing sea at night, nor silver birds;
And I can only stare, and shape my grief
In little words.

I cannot conjure loveliness, to drown
The bitter woe that racks my cords apart.
The weary pen that sets my sorrow down
Feeds at my heart.

There is no mercy in the shifting year,
No beauty wraps me tenderly about.
I turn to little words- so you, my dear,
Can spell them out.

submitted by naomi lansing (in addition to "annabel lee" by edgar allan poe)

Poetry Appreciation

2008-04-30T19:06:00.000-04:00

Poetry Appreciation

By Adam Freed

Why a poem? And a sonnet too?

What makes you special?

Why analyze you?

I might inquire, I'll give it a try:

You sing babes to sleep,

Such a soft lullaby.

Is it merely the meaning you hold?
Symbol and imagery,

Enigmas untold.

Or the fantasy contained within,

A pillar-like maze,

Stacket up end-to-end?

Alas! Alack! None will suffice.

The answer my friend,

Is in this advice:

Writing a poem is giving to others,

So go off and write one,

For someone to discover.

The Hollow Men

2008-04-30T18:32:00.001-04:00

Written by T.S. Eliot

Submitted by Adam Freed

Mistah Kurtz--he dead.

A penny for the Old Guy

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom
Remember us--if at all--not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.

Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death's dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind's singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.

Let me be no nearer
In death's dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat's coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer--

Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom

III

This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man's hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.

Is it like this
In death's other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.

The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

In this last of meeting places
We grope together
and avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river

Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.

Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o'clock in the morning.

Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom

Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow

Life is very long

Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
and the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom

For thine is
Life is
For Thine is the

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

Song by John Donne

2008-04-30T15:53:00.001-04:00

Even though this poem is almost 400 years old, it still seems fresh and amazing...

It is one of my favorites...Enjoy

SONG.
by John Donne

GO and catch a falling star,
Get with child a mandrake root,
Tell me where all past years are,
Or who cleft the devil's foot,
Teach me to hear mermaids singing,
Or to keep off envy's stinging,
And find
What wind
Serves to advance an honest mind.

If thou be'st born to strange sights,
Things invisible to see,
Ride ten thousand days and nights,
Till age snow white hairs on thee,
Thou, when thou return'st, wilt tell me,
All strange wonders that befell thee,
And swear,
No where
Lives a woman true and fair.

If thou find'st one, let me know,
Such a pilgrimage were sweet;
Yet do not, I would not go,
Though at next door we might meet,
Though she were true, when you met her,
And last, till you write your letter,
Yet she
Will be
False, ere I come, to two, or three.

Source:
Donne, John. Poems of John Donne. vol I.
E. K. Chambers, ed.
London: Lawrence & Bullen, 1896. 4-5.

Jos Graham, Campus Police Officer at MassBay

A Soul Missing

2008-04-30T14:47:00.001-04:00

A Soul Missing

My heart bleeds

for you,

because of you

and the

words

you spew

onto me…

To know you is to know

Nothing…

your chest is hollow

no beating heart

just a cavity

that houses the many

lies you tell

stores the many

faces you show…

except your real face

you save that special one for

me…

Lucifer

cries as he looks at you

no remorse

no apologies

a vacant body

missing a

Soul

by Jocelyne Jouki 2008

Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now.

A Soldiers Poem Karen Curtis

2008-04-30T12:55:00.000-04:00

This poem touched my heart, I know what it is like to be away from home...
Karen Curtis

A Soldiers Poem...

TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS,
THEY LIVED ALL ALONE,
IN A ONE BEDROOM HOUSE MADE OF
PLASTER AND STONE.

I HAD COME DOWN THE CHIMNEY
WITH PRESENTS TO GIVE,
AND TO SEE JUST WHO
IN THIS HOME DID LIVE.

I LOOKED ALL ABOUT,
A STRANGE SIGHT I DID SEE,
NO TINSEL, NO PRESENTS,
NOT EVEN A TREE.

NO STOCKING BY MANTLE,
JUST BOOTS FILLED WITH SAND,
ON THE WALL HUNG PICTURES
OF FAR DISTANT LANDS.

WITH MEDALS AND BADGES,
AWARDS OF ALL KINDS,
A SOBER THOUGHT
CAME THROUGH MY MIND.

FOR THIS HOUSE WAS DIFFERENT,
IT WAS DARK AND DREARY,
I FOUND THE HOME OF A SOLDIER,
ONCE I COULD SEE CLEARLY.

THE SOLDIER LAY SLEEPING,
SILENT, ALONE,
CURLED UP ON THE FLOOR
IN THIS ONE BEDROOM HOME.

THE FACE WAS SO GENTLE,
THE ROOM IN SUCH DISORDER,
NOT HOW I PICTURED
A UNITED STATES SOLDIER.

WAS THIS THE HERO
OF WHOM I'D JUST READ?
CURLED UP ON A PONCHO,
THE FLOOR FOR A BED?

I REALIZED THE FAMILIES
THAT I SAW THIS NIGHT,
OWED THEIR LIVES TO THESE SOLDIERS
WHO WERE WILLING TO FIGHT.

SOON ROUND THE WORLD,
THE CHILDREN WOULD PLAY,
AND GROWNUPS WOULD CELEBRATE
A BRIGHT CHRISTMAS DAY.

THEY ALL ENJOYED FREEDOM
EACH MONTH OF THE YEAR,
BECAUSE OF THE SOLDIERS,
LIKE THE ONE LYING HERE.

I COULDN'T HELP WONDER
HOW MANY LAY ALONE,
ON A COLD CHRISTMAS EVE
IN A LAND FAR FROM HOME.

THE VERY THOUGHT
BROUGHT A TEAR TO MY EYE,
I DROPPED TO MY KNEES
AND STARTED TO CRY.

THE SOLDIER AWAKENED
AND I HEARD A ROUGH VOICE,
"SANTA DON'T CRY,
THIS LIFE IS MY CHOICE;

I FIGHT FOR FREEDOM,
I DON'T ASK FOR MORE,
MY LIFE IS MY GOD,
MY COUNTRY, MY CORPS."

THE SOLDIER ROLLED OVER
AND DRIFTED TO SLEEP,
I COULDN'T CONTROL IT,
I CONTINUED TO WEEP.

I KEPT WATCH FOR HOURS,
SO SILENT AND STILL
AND WE BOTH SHIVERED
FROM THE COLD NIGHT'S CHILL.

I DIDN'T WANT TO LEAVE
ON THAT COLD, DARK, NIGHT,
THIS GUARDIAN OF HONOR
SO WILLING TO FIGHT.

THEN THE SOLDIER ROLLED OVER,
WITH A VOICE SOFT AND PURE,
WHISPERED, "CARRY ON SANTA,
IT'S CHRISTMAS DAY, ALL IS SECURE."

ONE LOOK AT MY WATCH,
AND I KNEW HE WAS RIGHT.
"MERRY CHRISTMAS MY FRIEND,
AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT,"

This poem is a reworked version from the original which was written by Lance Corporal James M. Schmidt stationed in Washington DC in 1986.