If of all words of tongue and pen,
The saddest are, "It might have been,"
More sad are these we daily see:
"It is, but hadn't ought to be."
Francis Brett Hart (or John Greenleafe Whittier, "Maud Muller")
Death be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;
For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,
Much pleasure, then from thee much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee do go,
Rest of their bones, and souls' delivery.
Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,
And poppy, or charms can make us sleep as well,
And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.
John Donne (1572-1631)
Holy Sonnets, no. 10
We pray for one last landing
On the globe that gave us birth;
Let us rest our eyes on fleecy skies
And the cool green hills of Earth.
Robert A. Heinlein
You can be a king or a street-sweeper, but everybody dances with the grim reaper.
The air was alive with the rush and flutter of wings; it was ripped by screaming shells, hissing like tons of molten metal plunging suddenly into water, there was the blast and concussion of their explosion, men smashed, obliterated in sudden eruptions of earth, rent and strewn in bloody fragments, shells that were like hell-cats humped and spitting, little sounds, unpleasantly close, lie the plucking of tense strings, and something tangling his feet, tearing at his trousers and puttees as he stumbled over it, and then a face suddenly, an inconceivably disorted face, which raved and sobbed at him as he fell with it into a shell-hole.
Frederic Manning, Middle Parts of Fortune
(Accounts of The Great War)
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings; Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth Of sun-split clouds-and done a hundred things You have not dreamed of - wheeled and soared and swung High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace, Where never the lark, nor even eagle flew - And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod The high, untrespassed sanctity of space, Put out my hand and touched the face of God.
John Gillespie Magee (1922-1941)
A Canadian Spitfire pilot in the Battle of Britian
We penetrated deeper and deeper into the heart of darkness. It was very quiet there. At night sometimes the roll of the drums behind the curtain of trees would run up the river and remain sustained faintly, as if hovering in the air high over our heads, till the first break of day ... The dawn were heralded by a chill stillness; the wood-cutters slept, their fires burned low; the snapping of a twig would make you start. We were wanderers on a prehistoric planet ... But suddenly, as we struggled round a bend, there would be a glimpse of rush walls, of peaked grass-roof, a burst of yells, a whirl of black limbs, a mass of hands clapping, of feet stamping, of bodies swaying, of eyes rolling, under the droops of heavy and motionless foliage.
Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness
Oh god of earth and altar, bow down and hear our cry!
We chase misprinted lies
We face the path of time
And yet I fight
And yet I fight
This battle all alone
No one to cry to
No place to call home
Alice in Chains, "Nutshell"
Don't stand beside my grave and weep,
For I'm not there, I do not sleep,
I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond's glint on snow,
I am the sunlight on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn's rain.
When you awaken in morning's hush,
I am the swift uplifting rush,
of quiet birds in circle flight,
I am soft stars that shine at night,
Don't stand beside my grave and cry,
I am not there. I did not die.
It seems like I'm always getting stuck
Between the handshake and the fuck
Foo Fighters, "My Poor Brain"
Ring around the rosey
a pocket full of poseies
Ashes, Ashes
We all fall down
Childrens song about the Black Plague during the Middle Ages
Forgiveness is the fragrance the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it
Mark Twain
There is a silence where hath been no sound
There is a silence where no sound may be
In the cold grave, under the deep deep sea
Thomas Hood
When God comes to me I will be shaking. Gun loaded on my knee, my fingers waiting. Gonna tell him I was born, mistaken, then I´m gonna let my fingers slip. God help my shaking hand, I can see your light, they´re lining up the dead. Gonna take another sip of your soul, my favourite sinner.
Drugstore
There is a place with four suns in the sky-red, white, blue, and yellow; two of them are so close together that they touch, and star-stuff flows between them. I know of a world with a million moons. I know of a sun the size of the Earth-and made of diamond....The universe is vast and awesome, and for the first time we are becoming part of it.
Carl Sagan, The Cosmic Connection
There are some hundred billion (10^11) galaxies, each with, on the average, a hundred billion stars. In all the galaxies, there are perhaps as many planets as stars, 10^11 x 10^11 = 10^22, ten billion trillion. In the face of such overpowering numbers, what is the likelihood that only one ordinary star, the Sun, is accompanied by an inhabited planet? Why should we, tucked away in some forgotten corner of the Cosmos, be so fortunate? To me, it seems far more likely that the universe is brimming over with life. But we humans do not yet know. We are just beginning our explorations. The only planet we are sure is inhabited is a tiny speck of rock and metal, shining feebly by reflected sunlight, and at this distance utterly lost."
Carl Sagan, "The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean," Cosmos"
On the view of earth from 3.7 billion miles away:
"Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home, That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every 'superstar,' every 'supreme leader,' every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. [...] There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known."
Carl Sagan, "Pale Blue Dot"
You're everything i never knew I always wanted
Lit
Dreams are the eraser dust I blow off my page.
They fade into the emptiness, another dark gray day.
Dreams are only memories of the plans I had back then.
Dreams are eraser dust and now I use a pen.
To open your eyes and see the sky is not enough. To open your ears is still not enough. For only if you open your mind will you hear the clouds whispering love's sweet songs and dancing together accross the noisy sea.
Well I've been bound and gagged and I've been terrorized
And I've been castrated and I've been lobotomized
But never has my tormenter come in such a cunning disguise
I let love in
I let love in
[...]
So if you're sitting all alone and hear a-knocking at you door
and the air is full of promises, well
buddy, you've been warned
Far worse to be Love's lover than the lover that Love has scorned
I let love in
I let love in
Nick Cave, "Let Love In"
I don't care what consequence it brings, I have been a fool for lesser things.
Billy Joel's "The Longest Time"
I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints.
Billy Joel
Only when I grew to love you did I understand the relativity of time; then, I wished to embrace you forever, hoping that eternity would last just a few minutes more.
Anthony Constantino
Today is only yesterday's tomorrow. Don't be too sure that things aren't what they seem. Alternatives are hard to find for sorrow. So use your head to muffle all your screams.
Lothar and the Hand People
I couldn't tell fact from fiction,
Or if the dream was true
My only sure prediction
In this world was you.
I'd touch your features inchly
Beard love and dared the cost,
The sented spiel reeled me unreal
And I found my senses lost.
Maya Angelou, "I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings"
It only gets to me in times like these, and times like these are getting to me.
Seven Mary Three 'Times Like These'
Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?
William Shakespeare
Kissing is a habit,
fucking is a game,
boys get all the pleasure,
girls get all the pain.
When he says he loves you,
and you believe its true,
but when you stomach starts to swell,
he says the hell with you!!
16 minutes of pleasure,
9 months of pain,
3 days in a hospital,
a baby with no name.
The baby is a bastard,
the mother is a whore
it never would have happened,
if the rubber hadn't tore.
The end is the beginning and yet you go on
Samuel Beckett,
My skin is kind of sort of brownish Pinkish yellowish white. My eyes are greyish blueish green, But I'm told they look orange in the night. My hair is reddish blondish brown, But it's silver when it's wet. And all the colors I am inside Have not been invented yet.
Shel Silverstein
I ran up the door and opened the stairs, I said my pajamas & put on my prayers, I turned off the bed & tumbled into the light, All because you kissed me good night!
Love to be loved,
Hate to be hated,
Love not to be hated,
Hate not to be loved.
We may not have it all together, but together we have it all.
If you were here,
I would buy you a beer.
But since you're not,
I will drink the lot.
Katie Santo
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
T.S. Eliot's The Hollow Men
Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and ignorant; they too have their story. Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexations to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble, it's a real possession in the changing fortunes of time. Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism. Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantement, it is as perrenial as the grass. Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth. Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive him to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.
Desiderata, Max Ehrmann 1927
When life itself seems lunatic, who knows where madness lies? Too much sanity may be madness. To seek treasure where there is only trash. Perhaps to be practiced is madness. And madness of all, to see life as it is and not as it ought to be.
Miguel de Cervantes, "Don Quixote"
I've learned that goodbyes will always hurt, pictues never replace having been there, memories good or bad will always bring tears, and words can never replace feelings.
If I could paint in harmony and colors were words I had sung, If I could climb way up in the sky where the stars are carefully hung, There are flowers in her backyard that resemble the spots of the sun, And there are times I look into her eyes and see the woman and God as one.
Goo Goo Dolls, inside-cover poem
In the madness of a silent eternity
We'd find solace in
False visions that protect us
from reality.
Jim Matheos (Fates Warning), The ivory gates of dream
In LA the blood dries at night. The streets never cool down. The sound of helicopters fills the ears and sends knee jerk shots of panic, paranoia and animal savagery through the veins of the shuffled extras too numbed by glamour overload to notice that there's not a single intersection in the entire city where you can stand and not be an animal waiting to see your own intestines slide down your leg from a stray bullet. In this city they kill for the fuck of it, fuck for the hell of it and live for no reason. If I could have a nickel for every siren I've heard go screaming into the distance to some scene, I'd still be here, still be looking out the window of my room, still laughing at the fact that I can't get my window open very far because the security bars get in the way.
Henry Rollins
When you get the choice to sit it out or dance, I hope you dance.
Leanne Womack, "I Hope You Dance"
If wishes were stars, there would be no night.
J. Aaron Board
Oh, I wish upon a star And let this wish come true. I want for love to come to me, But wish is all I do.
I'm nobody, who are you?
Are you nobody too?
Then there is two of us,
Don't tell, they would banish us, you know.
How dreary to be somebody
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the live long day
To an admiring bog.
You will hear thunder and remember me,
And think: she wanted storms.
The rim of the sky will be the colour of hard crimson,
And your heart, as it was then, will be on fire.
That day in Moscow, it will all come true, when, for the last time, I take my leave, And hasten to the heights that I have longed for, Leaving my shadow still to be with you.
Anna Akhmatova - You Will Hear Thunder
I inhale the sweet breeze that comes from thy mouth, I contemplate thy beauty every day. It’s my desire to hear thy lovely voice like the north wind’s whiff. Love will rejuvenate my limbs. Give me thy hands that hold thy soul, I shall embrace and live by it. Call me by name again, again, forever, and never will it sound without response.
On An Ancient Egyptian Tomb
We couldn't all be cowboys, some of us are clowns
and some of us are dancers in the midway...
Adam Duritz of Counting Cows, Goodnight Elizabeth
My heart to joy at the same tone; and all I loved, I loved alone.
Edgar Allen Poe
Whatever is done from love always occurs beyond good and evil.
Friedrich Nietzsche
May the road be free for the journey,
May it lead where it promised it would,
May the stars that gave ancient bearings
Be seen, still be understood
May every aircraft fly safely,
May every traveler be found,
May sailors in crossing the ocean
Not hear the cried of the drowned
May gardens be wild, like jungles,
May nature never be tamed,
May dangers create of us heroes,
May fears always have names,
May the mountains stand to remind us,
Of what it mean to be young
May we be outlived by our daughters,
May we be outlived by our sons
May the bombs rust away in the bunkers,
And the doomsday clock not be rewound
May the solitary scientists, working
Remember the holes in the ground
May the knife remain in the holder,
May the bullet stay in the gun,
May those who live in the shadows
Be seen by those in the sun
John Marsden - Prayer for the 21st century
Sometimes its a whole lot of oysters, but no pearls - then all at once you look across a crowded room and see the way the light attaches to a girl.
Counting Crows, A Long December
Maybe they'll not love the voice or the instrument, but they'll love the fire inside.
Anonymous
Change my life into nickels and dimes... then no one will mind all my lost time.
college desk
There are no monuments dedicated to me and my name will soon be forgotten, but I've loved another with all my heart and soul, and to me, that has always been enough.
Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook
What of the hunting, hunter bold? Brother, the watch was long and cold. What of the quarry ye went to kill? Brother, he crops in the jungle still. Where is the power that made your pride? Brother, it ebbs from my flank and side. Where is the haste that ye hurry by? Brother, I go to my lair – to die.
Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book
The weight of this sad time we must obey, Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say. The oldest hath borne most; we that are young Shall never see so much, nor live so long.
Shakespeare's 'King Lear'
Benedick: What, my dear Lady Disdain! Are you yet living?
Beatrice: Is it possible that disdain should die while she hath such meet food to feed it as Signior Benedick? Courtesy itself must convert to disdain if you come in her presence.
Benedick: Then is courtsey a turncoat. But it is certain that I am loved of all ladies, only you excepted; and I would I could find in my heart that I had not a hard heart for, truly, I love none.
Beatrice: A dear happiness to women! They would else have been bothered with a pernicious suitor...
'Much Ado About Nothing', William Shakespeare
No crooked leg, no bleared eye,
No part deformed out of kind,
Nor yet so ugly half can be
As is the inward suspicious mind.
Queen Elizabeth I
If I had the chance, love I would not hesitate
To tell you all the things I never said before
Don't tell me it's too late
Cause I've relied on my illusions
To keep me warm at night
But I denied in my capacity to love
I am willing, to give up this fight.
Sarah McLachlan
I wrote your name in the sand , but the waves washed it away. I worte your name on my hand , but I washed it the next day. I wrote your name on a piece of paper but I accidentally threw it away. I wrote your name in my heart and forever it will stay.
No more angels, No more dreams, Only rain and wind, The coldness of steel. The end of my Chapter, But the story goes on, Pages turned and forgotten, I'll read yours when I'm gone. No glory in death, No heaven or hell, Just a void which is empty, Where nothingness dwells.
Michael Patrick Carson
Moonlight falls on the gravestone like death the gravestone is mine... a crow caws so close to my ear, i taste a bitter taste and it smells like death i see nothing but utter stillness i can see my fear run through the yard i see the ghost of curt cobain run through the yard and i chase after him there is a taste of sweet dew on my tongue in my bedroom there are posters on the wall i read a note over and over again and the words 'sup loser' haunt me... the giants peer over the midgets intimidating he loves everything about me, why does he had me so? the dull pencil of life tried to write on the soul and failed. i am as happy as a dull face in the dark my eyes go from ice blue to pitch black in the blink of an eye Lydia is dead in her mind. in the next months i'll walk through in a daze the hazy fog echoes as she lives for death she dies everyday and lives for tomorow elle amour mort mais elles deteste vie her pen writes on the pages of her heart a sweet song she will end the wait of life with the death of spirits.
Beth McGraa
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