3:09 AM
Back in January I mentioned that I'd picked up some Yeats at the bookstore.
Here's Lucy Palermo's favorite:
"Her Praise"
She is foremost of those that I would hear praised.
I have gone about the house, gone up and down
As a man does who has published a new book,
Or a young girl dressed out in her new gown,
And though I have turned the talk by hook or crook
Until her praise should be the uppermost theme,
A woman spoke of some new tale she had read,
A man confusedly in a half dream
As though some other name ran in his head.
She is foremost of those that I would hear praised.
I will talk no more of books or the long war
But walk by the dry thorn until I have found
Some beggar sheltering from the wind, and there
Manage the talk until her name come round.
If there be rags enough he will know her name
And be well pleased remembering it, for in the old days,
Though she had young men's praise and old men's blame,
Among the poor both old and young gave her praise.
Here's Lucy Palermo's favorite:
"Her Praise"
She is foremost of those that I would hear praised.
I have gone about the house, gone up and down
As a man does who has published a new book,
Or a young girl dressed out in her new gown,
And though I have turned the talk by hook or crook
Until her praise should be the uppermost theme,
A woman spoke of some new tale she had read,
A man confusedly in a half dream
As though some other name ran in his head.
She is foremost of those that I would hear praised.
I will talk no more of books or the long war
But walk by the dry thorn until I have found
Some beggar sheltering from the wind, and there
Manage the talk until her name come round.
If there be rags enough he will know her name
And be well pleased remembering it, for in the old days,
Though she had young men's praise and old men's blame,
Among the poor both old and young gave her praise.
3 Comments:
Ahhhh... Yeats. *happy sigh* As I mentioned, Doc, I'm a poet, so I love to hear the classics recited/see them discussed. :-) I also adore music, so, along with your beautiful piano playing, you're hitting all my 'soft spots.' LOL Yeats wrote some gorgeous poems... and I'm also a huge pushover for the work of poets like John Keats and Robert Burns.
BTW, on the art front, I checked out the neo-Impressionistic and slightly abstract style of LeRoy Neiman. Very passionate, high energy, colorful works--and I can see how the sports figures, 'pop' culture elements and musicians depicted would appeal to you. :-)
Sanlin
Follow-up post:
Here's a link to Neiman's latest work: http://www.leroyneiman.com/merchant.ihtml?pid=591&lastcatid=7&step=4
Sanlin
Didja get the exquisite facsimile that ole Luke had? Cause if you're gonna get The Wild Swans at Coole, why not go all out? It's not his best, sure, but really, why not? It's got a poem about a *squirrel* in it, nevermind that poem about the swans. Who wouldn't want to see the manuscript of that?!?
Yeats in a nutshell. *cough*
To a Squirrel at Kyle-na-gno
Come play with me;
Why should you run
Through the shaking tree
As though I'd a gun
To strike you dead?
When all I would do
Is to scratch your head
And let you go.
Not a bad way to approach patients, eh? They do tend to be a little squirrely, or a little nutty, pick your pun. Though something tells me you're packin' heat....
Oh yeah, and Yeats? Another untreated schizophrenic. The man had visions--VISIONS--and believed that the year 2000 or so would see the reincarnation of a pagan mode of thought, displacing that of Christianity, because history works in 2,000 year cycles. Ehem. "That twenty centuries of stony sleep / Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, / And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, / Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?" He was in the Crazy Occult Friendship Society for Barking, Nutter Irishmen. COFSBNI. Catchy, no? Splinter group of the IRA's evil twin.
This is good, though. This is the money shot here:
"Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold"
Seem relevent?
Well, maybe not.
The man *was* crazy, after all. Go read the one about the swans...or fight space monkeys, it's all the same, really.
Boing!
-Stephen "The Bird" Dedalus, son of sy, another crazy, syphallitic Irishman
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