Rudyard Kipling's Thoughts on WWI

If any ask you why we died,
Tell them, because our fathers lied.

Something I Had Lying around

I will not try you more; you have said "No."
Hope does no credit to herself where she
Gives lies to shield us from the final blow
Of what must pass, as you have passed from me.

-Thomas Banks, 2005-

The Vampire

A fool there was and he made his prayer
(Even as you and I!)
To a rag and a bone and a hank of hair
(We call her a woman who did not care)
But the fool he called her his lady fair
(Even as you and I!)

Oh the years we waste and the tears we waste
And the work of our head and hand,
Belong to the woman who did not know
(And now we know that she never could know)
And did not understand.

A fool there was and his goods he spent
(Even as you and I!)
Honor and faith and a sure intent
But a fool must follow his natural bent
(And it wasn't the least what his lady meant)
(Even as you and I!)

Oh the toil we lost and the spoil we lost
And the excellent things we planned,
Belong to the woman who didn't know why
(And now we know she never knew why)
And did not understand.

The fool we stripped to his foolish hide
(Even as you and I!)
Which she might have seen when she threw him aside-
(But it isn't on record the lady tried)
So some of him lived but the most of him died-
(Even as you and I!)

And it isn't the shame and it isn't the blame
That stings like a white hot brand;
It's coming to know that she never knew why
(Seeing at last she could never know why)
And never could understand.

-Rudyard Kipling-

Horace, Ode 4.7

The snows are fled away, leaves on the shaws
And grasses in the mead renew their birth,
The river to the river-bed withdraws,
And altered is the fashion of the earth.

The Nymphs and Graces three put off their fear
And unapparelled in the woodland play.
The swift hour and the brief prime of the year
Say to the soul, Thou wast not born for aye.

Thaw follows frost; hard on the heel of spring
Treads summer sure to die, for hard on hers
Comes autumn with his apples scattering;
Then back to wintertide, and nothing stirs.

But oh, whate'er the sky-led seasons mar,
Moon upon moon rebuilds it with her beams;
Come we where Tullus and where Ancus are
And good Aeneas, we are dust and dreams.

Torquatus, if the gods in heaven shall add
The morrow to the day, what tongue has told?
Feast then thy heart, for what the heart has had
The fingers of no heir will ever hold.

When thou descendest once the shades among,
The stern assize and equal judgment o'er,
Not thy long lineage nor thy golden tongue,
No, nor thy righteousness, shall friend thee more.

Night holds Hippolytus the pure of stain,
Diana steads him nothing, he must stay;
And Theseus leaves Pirithous in the chain
The love of comrades cannot take away.

-Translated by A.E. Housman-

Plotinus

As one who would draw through the node of things,
Back sweeping to the vortex of the cone,
Cloistered about with memories,
Alone in chaos, while the waiting silence sings,
Obliviate of cycles wanderings,
I was an atom on creation's throne,
And counted nothing mine unconquered own.
God! Should I be the hand upon the strings?
But I was lonely as a lonely child,
I cried amid the void and heard no cry,
And then, for utter loneliness made I
New thoughts as crescent images of me.
And in them was my image reconciled,
And fear went forth from mine eternity.

-Ezra Pound-

The Goodly Fere (Simon Zelotes Speaks after the Crusifixion)

"Fere" = Mate, Companion

Ha' we lost the goodliest fere o' all
For the priest and the gallows tree?
Aye lover he was of brawny men,
O' ships and the open sea.

When they came wi' a host to take Our Man
His smile was good to see,
"First let these go!" quo' our Goodly Fere,
"Or I'll see ye damned," says he.

Aye he sent us out through the crossed high spears
And the scorn of his laugh rang free,
"Why took ye me not when I walked about
Alone in the town?" says he.

Oh we drank his "Hale" in the good red wine
When we last made company,
No capon priest was the Goodly Fere
But a man o' men was he.

I ha' seen him drive a hundred men
Wi' a bundle of cords swung free,
That they took the high and holy house
For their pawn and treasury.

They'll no' get him a' in a book I think
Though they write it cunningly;
No mouse of the scrolls was the Goodly Fere
But aye loved the open sea.

If they think they ha' snared our Goodly Fere
They are fools to the last degree.
"I'll go to the feast," quo' our Goodly Fere,
"Though I go to the gallows tree."

"Ye ha' seen me heal the lame and blind,
And wake the dead," says he,
"Ye shall see one thing to master all:
"Tis how a brave man dies on the tree."

A son of God was the Goodly Fere
That bade us brothers be.
I ha' seen him cow a thousand men.
I have seen him upon the tree.

He cried no cry when they drave the nails
And the blood gushed hot and free,
The hounds of the crimson sky gave tongue
But never a cry cried he.

I ha' seen him cow a thousand men
On the hills o' Galilee,
They whined as he walked out calm between,
Wi' his eyes like the grey o' the sea,

Like the sea that brooks no voyaging
With the winds unleashed and free,
Like the sea that he cowed at Genseret
Wi' twey words spoke suddently.

A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea,
If they think they ha' slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.

I ha' seen him eat o' the honey-comb
Sin' they nailed him to the tree.

-Ezra Pound-

Best Overheard Freudian Slip Ever, from Work Today

"Here's your change. Have a straight gay."