Busytown: A Thought Went Up My Mind To-day
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(I use "memorable" as opposed to "good" advisedly. People are always impressed that Coleridge - if he is to be believed - composed Kubla Khan in a dream. I believe him. It shows. It's awful!)
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On the other hand, without it we don't get Frankie Goes to Hollywood's Welcome to the Pleasuredome. So, there's that.
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Yes, but also the Rush song Xanadu. They cancel each other out to say the least.
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Ah, but wait! This makes up for it:
In fact, it might actually make up for everything bad that has ever happened in the world.
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If the mere name "Xanadu" is enough to constitute credit, then there's Citizen Kane I suppose.
Now excuse me while I go and wash my eyes.
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Giovanni, careful with your insults of Coleridge. My father always claimed he was ancestral whanau (not quite sure of the link but I think he had at least one sibling who had children).
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3410,
I also like haiku
Much like Islander
I also like haiku
Mainly in winter -
Giovanni, careful with your insults of Coleridge
His literary criticism is fantastic. Also apparently he was a demon in the kitchen.
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Also apparently he was a demon in the kitchen.
You sure you aren't thinking of Coalrange?
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Colander?
Lettuce praise you like we should.
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@Danielle OMG made my day. I love Xanadu. ONJ had such great hair in that.
And I've just made the connection that the young guy was the guy from Warriors.
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3410-haiku are
what reads best by fire
with deep frost outside showing
the bright inside blessed- -
Deep frost ...
I know it well, Islander.
Thirty five years
On the volcanic plateau!
Now in Whangarei,
Winter has lost its bite.:)
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Death and Dickinson: was talking to my sister, a long-time lover of Dickinson's poems, and she set me straight on Dickinson's epitaph. On her gravestone, apparently, it simply says E D Called Back. To the point, but a little too close to ET :)
She did write a poem called Epitaph:Step lightly on this narrow spot!
The broadest land that grows
Is not so ample as the breast
These emerald seams enclose.Step lofty; for this name is told
As far as cannon dwell,
Or flag subsist, or fame export
Her deathless syllable.I always imagined her epitaph to be was the perfect first two lines of this poem (probably one of her best-known):
Because I could not stop for Death--
He kindly stopped for me--
The Carriage held but just Ourselves--
And Immortality.
We slowly drove--he knew no haste
And I had put away
My labor and my leisure too,
For his Civility.
We passed the School, where Children strove
At Recess -- in the Ring --
We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain --
We passed the Setting Sun --
Or rather -- He passed Us --
The Dews drew quivering and chill --
For only Gossamer, my Gown --
My Tippet -- only Tulle--
We paused before a House that seemed
A Swelling of the Ground --
The Roof was scarcely visible --
The Cornice -- in the Ground --
Since then --'tis Centuries -- and yet
Feels shorter than the Day
I first surmised the Horses Heads
Were toward Eternity --Perfect for a still afternoon, sitting in the winter sun, the frost hesitating in shady spots, the bellbirds letting out their slow, melancholy three-note afternoon call.
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Thanks for the above, Rob. Never been a fan of Dickinson but had never made the effort. I've always liked the title of the below and can't resist adding it. Enough already!:
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all,And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
— Emily Dickinson, "Hope is the thing with feathers" -
3410,
@ Islander,
You win. ;) -
"Hope is not the 'thing with feathers.' The thing with feathers has turned out be my nephew. I must take him to a specialist in Zurich." —Woody Allen
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Heh.
Still, great title and a great poem, thanks Cecilia.
And more thanks Jolisa for the tip re the Eurovision Song Quest. Deep mirth, in a sort of ouch! more please! way.
Sadly not online- but Woody still has some of that zing. -
3410- the really enhancing thing
about the old haiku exchanges was - nobody won! Everyone gained!
As - thanks Jolisa,Rob, Cecelia, everyone - we have- -
The thing with feathers has turned out be my nephew...
or Rene Auberjonois in Brewster McCloud
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3410,
the really enhancing thing
about the old haiku exchanges was - nobody won! Everyone gained!Yes, of course (hence my wink).
In this case I, for example, gained both enjoyment in reading yours and an appreciation of how much room I have for improvement. ;)
I think I shall study it a bit and return next time with less facetiousness.
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3410 - ;) Hey, I enjoy facetiousness!
Do you read Issa?
I have poetry heroes, and he is one of the foremost.
"He did not "see life steadily and see it whole"...He saw it unsteadily, and in its parts, but perhaps this is all anyone can do." (R. H. Blythe.)
He's up there with Clare & Thoreau in my pantheon-
"Just being here
I am here
And the snow falls"(Tada oreba
0ra tote yuki no
furi ni keri)and, written when he was 61, 2 years younger than myself, his wife and all children dead, and he stroke-stricken)
"Outliving them
Outliving them all-
Ah! The cold!"(Ikinokori
Ikinokoritaru
samusa kana)He didnt write much ribtickle-ing mirthful stuff- but his verses on flies and their equivalent humans are pretty humorous-
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Ian, another Brewster McCloud fan? About my second favourite movie of all time after Harold and Maude which I recently re-watched, and it is still excellent.
I'm enjoying the haiku and poetry, thanks everyone.
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another Brewster McCloud fan
RIP, Houston Astrodome.
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Ah, but wait! This makes up for it:
There really should be more music videos with dancing roller skaters. It does add a whole 'nother level of awesome.
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