There's already a discussion under-way in the Ukraine thread mate. http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=267851&page=12
Me, I love poetry and I'd be down with a poetry thread, but it probably wants to go in General if it does happen.
Flowers open, then they fall. Life is but a sheen of dew on petals. Mayflies dance on a lake. Greatfully I accept this moment of life.
That's the haiku thread, where Nexxo should have posted or Kidmod will convert this one too. God I hate Haikus!
"How can seventeen Syllables say something deep? God, I hate Haikus!" Look: with one brush stroke he paints a picture; restraint reveals the master.
"Who would himself with shadows entertain, Or gild his life with lights that shine in vain, Or nurse false hopes that do but cheat the true?-- Though with my dream my heaven should be resigned-- Though the free-pinioned soul that once could dwell In the large empire of the possible, This workday life with iron chains may bind, Yet thus the mastery o'er ourselves we find, And solemn duty to our acts decreed, Meets us thus tutored in the hour of need, With a more sober and submissive mind! How front necessity--yet bid thy youth Shun the mild rule of life's calm sovereign, truth." So speakest thou, friend, how stronger far than I; As from experience--that sure port serene-- Thou lookest;--and straight, a coldness wraps the sky, The summer glory withers from the scene, Scared by the solemn spell; behold them fly, The godlike images that seemed so fair! Silent the playful Muse--the rosy hours Halt in their dance; and the May-breathing flowers Fall from the sister-graces' waving hair. Sweet-mouthed Apollo breaks his golden lyre, Hermes, the wand with many a marvel rife;-- The veil, rose-woven, by the young desire With dreams, drops from the hueless cheeks of life. The world seems what it is--a grave! and love Casts down the bondage wound his eyes above, And sees!--He sees but images of clay Where he dreamed gods; and sighs--and glides away. The youngness of the beautiful grows old, And on thy lips the bride's sweet kiss seems cold; And in the crowd of joys--upon thy throne Thou sittest in state, and hardenest into stone.
Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll 'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogoves, And the mome raths outgrabe. "Beware the Jabberwock, my son! The jaws that bite, the claws that catch! Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun The frumious Bandersnatch!" He took his vorpal sword in hand: Long time the manxome foe he sought So rested he by the Tumtum tree, And stood a while in thought. And, as in uffish thought he stood, The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame, Came whiffling through the tulgey wood, And burbled as it came! One two! One two! And through and through The vorpal blade went snicker-snack! He left it dead, and with its head He went galumphing back. "And hast thou slain the Jabberwock? Come to my arms, my beamish boy! Oh frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!" He chortled in his joy. 'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogoves, And the mome raths outgrabe.
^^^ Classic. When you are old and grey and full of sleep, And nodding by the fire, take down this book, And slowly read, and dream of the soft look Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep; How many loved your moments of glad grace, And loved your beauty with love false or true, But one man loved the pilgrim Soul in you, And loved the sorrows of your changing face; And bending down beside the glowing bars, Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled And paced upon the mountains overhead And hid his face amid a crowd of stars. --William Butler Yeats
A poetry thread would be really cool if it has enough support. I've been reading quite a bit of Sylvia Plath of late but I often feel I need study notes to go with them to actually work out the more subtle meanings going on in her poems. She was a complicated human being for sure. Anyway this one might be quite well known to any Portal fans: The Reaper And The Flowers There is a Reaper, whose name is Death, And, with his sickle keen, He reaps the bearded grain at a breath, And the flowers that grow between. "Shall I have naught that is fair?" Saith he; "Having naught but the bearded grain? Though the breath of these flowers is sweet to me, I will give them all back again," He gazed at the flowers with tearful eye, He kissed their drooping leaves; It was for the Lord of Paradise He bound them in his sheaves. "My Lord has need of these floweretsgay," The Reaper said, and smiled: "Dear tokens of the earth are they, Where he was once a child." "They shall all bloom in fields of light, Transplanted by my care, And saints, upon their garments white, These sacred blossoms wear." And the mother gave, in tears and pain, The flowers she most did love: She knew she should find them all again In the fields of light above. O, not in cruelty, not in wrath, The Reaper came that day; 'Twas an angel visited the green earth, And took the flowers away.
By William Ernest Henley Invictus Out of the night that covers me, Black as the Pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be For my unconquerable soul. In the fell clutch of circumstance I have not winced nor cried aloud. Under the bludgeonings of chance My head is bloody, but unbowed. Beyond this place of wrath and tears Looms but the Horror of the shade, And yet the menace of the years Finds, and shall find, me unafraid. It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.
I don't know if it qualifies, but I feel it should: Roger Waters & Pink Floyd - Time Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day Fritter and waste the hours in an off-hand way Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town Waiting for someone or something to show you the way Tired of lying in the sunshine, staying home to watch the rain You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today And then one day you find ten years have got behind you No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun And you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking Racing around to come up behind you again The sun is the same in a relative way, but you're older Shorter of breath and one day closer to death Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way The time is gone, the song is over, thought I'd something more to say Home, home again I like to be here when I can When I come home cold and tired It's good to warm my bones beside the fire Far away, across the field The tolling of the iron bell Calls the faithful to their knees To hear the softly spoken magic spell The problem with my only poem to date is that (in keeping with tradition) I wrote it for a girl, and it seems to me it would be bad form to disperse it, like it might lose its significance.