4/7-F. Scott Fitzgerald-

Rain Before Dawn

The dull, faint patter in the drooping hours 
Drifts in upon my sleep and fills my hair 

With damp; the burden of the heavy air 
Is strewn upon me where my tired soul cowers, 
Shrinking like some lone queen in empty towers 
Dying. Blind with unrest I grow aware: 
The pounding of broad wings drifts down the stair 
And sates me like the heavy scent of flowers. 

I lie upon my heart. My eyes like hands 
Grip at the soggy pillow. Now the dawn 
Tears from her wetted breast the splattered blouse 
Of night; lead-eyed and moist she straggles o'er the lawn, 
Between the curtains brooding stares and stands 
Like some drenched swimmer -- Death's within the house!

4/6-Classical Poetry-or-Lost in Translation

I'm finding it difficult to find a classical poet (or a classical poem) I can use for this. I've looked through Ovid and just now through Horace. The particular selection I was looking for in Metamorphosis wasn't translated very prettily...in Horace I again found the translations lacking. I'm fairly certain Horace never used the phrase "Holy Moses" for example.

So, wearily I give you this poem from a book of classical love poetry (wherein a verse by Plautus describes kissing that is well and truly French.  Annoying.)

From your lips darts lovliness, flowers from your face.

Love fires from both your eyes, your hands shoot music's grace.

With your looks you rob their sight, their ears you stop with song.

Poor men!  Pursued from every side, the hunt will not last long.

Macedonius, Anthologia Palatina v 231

4/5-Dorothy Parker-

DISTANCE

Were you to cross the world, my dear,
To work or love or fight,
I coud be calm and wistful here,
And close my eyes at night.

It were a sweet and gallant pain
To be a sea apart;
But, oh, to have you down the lane
Is bitter to my heart.

Taken from:
The Portable Dorothy Parker; Penguin Classics 2006

4/4 -Dylan Thomas-

Dylan Thomas (http://www.dylanthomas.com/) is described as Wales' greatest poet. Not knowing enough about either Wales or poetry, I cannot disagree.

I first heard this poem in High School. Being a typical angsty teen, I loved it. It has a particularly special meaning to me now still recovering from my mother's passing:

Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on that sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Thomas Wyatt

Thomas Wyatt is said to be the father of the English sonnet:

My heart I gave thee, not to do it pain;
But to preserve, it was to thee taken.
I served thee, not to be forsaken,
But that I should be rewarded again.
I was content thy servant to remain
But not to be paid under this fashion.
Now since in thee is none other reason,
Displease thee not if that I do refrain,
Unsatiate of my woe and thy desire,
Assured by craft to excuse thy fault.
But since it please thee to feign a default,
Farewell, I say, parting from the fire:
For he that believeth bearing in hand,
Plougheth in water and soweth in the sand.

He was also thought to be the lover of Anne Boleyn (before her marriage to King Henry VIII) and was later imprisoned for having carnal knowledge of the queen but released because of his friendship with those in the king's court. Upon witnessing the beheading of the queen he wrote this:

V. Innocentia
Veritas Viat Fides
Circumdederunt
me inimici mei ¹

by Sir Thomas Wyatt, the Elder

Who list his wealth and ease retain,
Himself let him unknown contain.
Press not too fast in at that gate
Where the return stands by disdain,
For sure, circa Regna tonat.²

The high mountains are blasted oft
When the low valley is mild and soft.
Fortune with Health stands at debate.
The fall is grievous from aloft.
And sure, circa Regna tonat.

These bloody days have broken my heart.
My lust, my youth did them depart,
And blind desire of estate.
Who hastes to climb seeks to revert.
Of truth, circa Regna tonat.

The bell tower showed me such sight
That in my head sticks day and night.
There did I learn out of a grate,
For all favour, glory, or might,
That yet circa Regna tonat.

By proof, I say, there did I learn:
Wit helpeth not defence too yerne,
Of innocency to plead or prate.
Bear low, therefore, give God the stern,
For sure, circa Regna tonat.

1. The Latin title adapts Psalm 16.9: "My enemies surround my soul."
Wyatt's name ("Viat") in the title is surrounded by Innocence, Truth,
and Faith.

2. "It thunders through the realms," Seneca, Phaedra, 1.1140.
The first two stanzas paraphrase lines from that play.


[AJ Note: It is generally thought Wyatt wrote this poem after witnessing
the execution of Anne Boleyn and her "accomplices" from the window
grate of his cell in the Bell Tower at the Tower of London.]

4-for1: Limericks

Last year I went to an Irish Pub in town and an Irish band was performing...not that any of them were Irish. They were performing Irish music, though. They had a thing where you could submit limericks to them and they'd read them between songs. The folks at my table and I decided to submit them as a group effort. They ended up being significantly less interesting than we had hoped.

But anyway, from The Penguin Book of Limericks, 1986:

[Ophleia]
Poor Ophelia sighed: 'I deplore
The fact that young Hamlet's a bore.
He just talks to himself;
I'll be left on the shelf,
or go mad by the end of Act IV.'
Frank Richards

I once knew a spinster of Staines,
And a spinster that lady remains;
She's no figure, no looks,
Neither dances nor cooks -
And, most ghastly of all, she has brains.
Plaiwon

Said Old Father William: 'I'm humble,
And getting too old for a tumble,
But produce me a blonde,
And I'm still not beyond
An attempt at an interesting fumble.'
Conrad Aiken

If no Pain were, how judge we of Pleasure?
If no Work, where's the solace of Leisure?
What's White, if no Black?
What's Wealth, if no Lack?
If no Loss, how our Gain could be measure?
William Bliss

Sound and Sense--Alexander Pope

I thought I'd start off with a poem about the art of poetry:

Sound and Sense by Alexander Pope

True ease in writing comes from art, not chance,
As those move easiest who have learned to dance.
'Tis not enough no harshness gives offense,
The sound must seem an echo to the sense:
Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows,
And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows;
But when loud surges lash the sounding shore,
The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar;
When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw,
The line too labors, and the words move slow;
Not so, when swift Camilla scours the plain,
Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skims along the main.
Hear how Timotheus' varied lays surprise,
And bid alternate passions fall and rise!