The Tory: Perspectives and Poems: Dr Pratt Datta

The Wasteland by Thomas Stearns Eliot, Part I: The Burial of the Dead

The Waste Land

BY T. S. ELIOT

 

                                  FOR EZRA POUND
                                IL MIGLIOR FABBRO

I. The Burial of the Dead

 

  April is the cruellest month, breeding

Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing

Memory and desire, stirring

Dull roots with spring rain.

Winter kept us warm, covering

Earth in forgetful snow, feeding

A little life with dried tubers.

Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee

With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,

And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,

And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.

Bin gar keine Russin, stamm’ aus Litauen, echt deutsch.

And when we were children, staying at the arch-duke’s,

My cousin’s, he took me out on a sled,

And I was frightened. He said, Marie,

Marie, hold on tight. And down we went.

In the mountains, there you feel free.

I read, much of the night, and go south in the winter.

 

  What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow

Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,

You cannot say, or guess, for you know only

A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,

And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,

And the dry stone no sound of water. Only

There is shadow under this red rock,

(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),

And I will show you something different from either

Your shadow at morning striding behind you

Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;

I will show you fear in a handful of dust.

                      Frisch weht der Wind

                      Der Heimat zu

                      Mein Irisch Kind,

                      Wo weilest du?

“You gave me hyacinths first a year ago;

“They called me the hyacinth girl.”

—Yet when we came back, late, from the Hyacinth garden,

Your arms full, and your hair wet, I could not

Speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither

Living nor dead, and I knew nothing,

Looking into the heart of light, the silence.

Oed’ und leer das Meer.

 

  Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyante,

Had a bad cold, nevertheless

Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe,

With a wicked pack of cards. Here, said she,

Is your card, the drowned Phoenician Sailor,

(Those are pearls that were his eyes. Look!)

Here is Belladonna, the Lady of the Rocks,

The lady of situations.

Here is the man with three staves, and here the Wheel,

And here is the one-eyed merchant, and this card,

Which is blank, is something he carries on his back,

Which I am forbidden to see. I do not find

The Hanged Man. Fear death by water.

I see crowds of people, walking round in a ring.

Thank you. If you see dear Mrs. Equitone,

Tell her I bring the horoscope myself:

One must be so careful these days.

 

  Unreal City,

Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,

A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,

I had not thought death had undone so many.

Sighs, short and infrequent, were exhaled,

And each man fixed his eyes before his feet.

Flowed up the hill and down King William Street,

To where Saint Mary Woolnoth kept the hours

With a dead sound on the final stroke of nine.

There I saw one I knew, and stopped him, crying: “Stetson!

“You who were with me in the ships at Mylae!

“That corpse you planted last year in your garden,

“Has it begun to sprout? Will it bloom this year?

“Or has the sudden frost disturbed its bed?

“Oh keep the Dog far hence, that’s friend to men,

“Or with his nails he’ll dig it up again!

“You! hypocrite lecteur!—mon semblable,—mon frère!”

 

N'est ce pas qu'il est doux or Is It Not Pleasant by Baudelaire

"N'est ce pas qu'il est doux"

by Charles Baudelaire

Is it not pleasant, now we are tired,
and tarnished, like other men, to search for those fires
in the furthest East, where, again, we might see
morning's new dawn, and, in mad history,
hear the echoes, that vanish behind us, the sighs
of the young loves, that God gives us, at the start of our lives?

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Parts I and II by Coleridge

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (text of 1834) 

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Argument 

How a Ship having passed the Line was driven by storms to the cold Country towards the South Pole; and how from thence she made her course to the tropical Latitude of the Great Pacific Ocean; and of the strange things that befell; and in what manner the Ancyent Marinere came back to his own Country.

 

PART I 

It is an ancient Mariner, 

And he stoppeth one of three. 

'By thy long grey beard and glittering eye, 

Now wherefore stopp'st thou me? 

 

The Bridegroom's doors are opened wide, 

And I am next of kin; 

The guests are met, the feast is set: 

May'st hear the merry din.' 

 

He holds him with his skinny hand, 

'There was a ship,' quoth he. 

'Hold off! unhand me, grey-beard loon!' 

Eftsoons his hand dropt he. 

 

He holds him with his glittering eye— 

The Wedding-Guest stood still, 

And listens like a three years' child: 

The Mariner hath his will. 

 

The Wedding-Guest sat on a stone: 

He cannot choose but hear; 

And thus spake on that ancient man, 

The bright-eyed Mariner. 

 

'The ship was cheered, the harbour cleared, 

Merrily did we drop 

Below the kirk, below the hill, 

Below the lighthouse top. 

 

The Sun came up upon the left, 

Out of the sea came he! 

And he shone bright, and on the right 

Went down into the sea. 

 

Higher and higher every day, 

Till over the mast at noon—' 

The Wedding-Guest here beat his breast, 

For he heard the loud bassoon. 

 

The bride hath paced into the hall, 

Red as a rose is she; 

Nodding their heads before her goes 

The merry minstrelsy. 

 

The Wedding-Guest he beat his breast, 

Yet he cannot choose but hear; 

And thus spake on that ancient man, 

The bright-eyed Mariner. 

 

And now the STORM-BLAST came, and he 

Was tyrannous and strong: 

He struck with his o'ertaking wings, 

And chased us south along. 

 

With sloping masts and dipping prow, 

As who pursued with yell and blow 

Still treads the shadow of his foe, 

And forward bends his head, 

The ship drove fast, loud roared the blast, 

And southward aye we fled. 

 

And now there came both mist and snow, 

And it grew wondrous cold: 

And ice, mast-high, came floating by, 

As green as emerald. 

 

And through the drifts the snowy clifts 

Did send a dismal sheen: 

Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken— 

The ice was all between. 

 

The ice was here, the ice was there, 

The ice was all around: 

It cracked and growled, and roared and howled, 

Like noises in a swound! 

 

At length did cross an Albatross, 

Thorough the fog it came; 

As if it had been a Christian soul, 

We hailed it in God's name. 

 

It ate the food it ne'er had eat, 

And round and round it flew. 

The ice did split with a thunder-fit; 

The helmsman steered us through! 

 

And a good south wind sprung up behind; 

The Albatross did follow, 

And every day, for food or play, 

Came to the mariner's hollo! 

 

In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud, 

It perched for vespers nine; 

Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke white, 

Glimmered the white Moon-shine.' 

 

'God save thee, ancient Mariner! 

From the fiends, that plague thee thus!— 

Why look'st thou so?'—With my cross-bow 

I shot the ALBATROSS. 

 

PART II 

The Sun now rose upon the right: 

Out of the sea came he, 

Still hid in mist, and on the left 

Went down into the sea. 

 

And the good south wind still blew behind, 

But no sweet bird did follow, 

Nor any day for food or play 

Came to the mariner's hollo! 

 

And I had done a hellish thing, 

And it would work 'em woe: 

For all averred, I had killed the bird 

That made the breeze to blow. 

Ah wretch! said they, the bird to slay, 

That made the breeze to blow! 

 

Nor dim nor red, like God's own head, 

The glorious Sun uprist: 

Then all averred, I had killed the bird 

That brought the fog and mist. 

'Twas right, said they, such birds to slay, 

That bring the fog and mist. 

 

The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew, 

The furrow followed free; 

We were the first that ever burst 

Into that silent sea. 

 

Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down, 

'Twas sad as sad could be; 

And we did speak only to break 

The silence of the sea! 

 

All in a hot and copper sky, 

The bloody Sun, at noon, 

Right up above the mast did stand, 

No bigger than the Moon. 

 

Day after day, day after day, 

We stuck, nor breath nor motion; 

As idle as a painted ship 

Upon a painted ocean. 

 

Water, water, every where, 

And all the boards did shrink; 

Water, water, every where, 

Nor any drop to drink. 

 

The very deep did rot: O Christ! 

That ever this should be! 

Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs 

Upon the slimy sea. 

 

About, about, in reel and rout 

The death-fires danced at night; 

The water, like a witch's oils, 

Burnt green, and blue and white. 

 

And some in dreams assurèd were 

Of the Spirit that plagued us so; 

Nine fathom deep he had followed us 

From the land of mist and snow. 

 

And every tongue, through utter drought, 

Was withered at the root; 

We could not speak, no more than if 

We had been choked with soot. 

 

Ah! well a-day! what evil looks 

Had I from old and young! 

Instead of the cross, the Albatross 

About my neck was hung. 

L'Albatros by Baudelaire

L'Alabatros from Fleurs du Mal 

Charles Baudelaire

Often our sailors, for an hour of fun,
Catch albatrosses on the after breeze
Through which these trail the ship from sun to sun
As it skims down the deep and briny seas.

Scarce have these birds been set upon the deck,
Than, awkward now, they, the sky's emperors,
Piteous and shamed, let their great white wings droop
Beside them like a pair of idle oars.

These wingèd voyagers, how gauche their gait!
Once noble, now how ludicrous to view!
One sailor bums them with his pipe, his mate
Limps, mimicking these cripples who once flew.

Poets are like these lords of sky and cloud,
Who ride the storm and mock the bow's taut strings,
Exiled on earth amid a jeering crowd,
Prisoned and palsied by their giant wings.

— Jacques LeClercq, Flowers of Evil (Mt Vernon, NY: Peter Pauper Press, 1958)

Sonnet 130 by William Shakespeare

SONNET 130
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.

Tonight I can Write the Saddest Lines by Pablo Neruda

Tonight I Can Write (The Saddest Lines)

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write, for example, 'The night is starry and the stars are blue and shiver in the distance.'

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.

To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is starry and she is not with me.

This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

My sight tries to find her as though to bring her closer.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.

The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.

I no longer love her, that's certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.

Another's. She will be another's. As she was before my kisses.
Her voice, her bright body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, that's certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.

Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.

Danny Deever by Rudyard Kipling

Danny Deever

BY RUDYARD KIPLING

‘What are the bugles blowin’ for?' said Files-on-Parade.   

‘To turn you out, to turn you out,’ the Colour-Sergeant said.

‘What makes you look so white, so white?’ said Files-on-Parade.

‘I’m dreadin’ what I’ve got to watch,’ the Colour-Sergeant said.

      For they’re hangin’ Danny Deever, you can hear the Dead March play,

      The Regiment’s in ’ollow square—they’re hangin’ him to-day;

      They’ve taken of his buttons off an’ cut his stripes away,

      An’ they're hangin’ Danny Deever in the mornin’.

 

‘What makes the rear-rank breathe so ’ard?’ said Files-on-Parade.

‘It’s bitter cold, it's bitter cold,’ the Colour-Sergeant said.

‘What makes that front-rank man fall down?’ said Files-on-Parade.

‘A touch o’ sun, a touch o’ sun,’ the Colour-Sergeant said.

      They are hangin’ Danny Deever, they are marchin’ of ’im round,

      They ’ave ’alted Danny Deever by ’is coffin on the ground;

      An’ ’e’ll swing in ’arf a minute for a sneakin’ shootin’ hound—

      O they’re hangin’ Danny Deever in the mornin!’

 

‘’Is cot was right-’and cot to mine,’ said Files-on-Parade.

‘’E’s sleepin’ out an’ far to-night,’ the Colour-Sergeant said.

‘I’ve drunk ’is beer a score o’ times,’ said Files-on-Parade.

‘’E’s drinkin’ bitter beer alone,’ the Colour-Sergeant said.

      They are hangin’ Danny Deever, you must mark ’im to ’is place,

      For ’e shot a comrade sleepin’—you must look ’im in the face;

      Nine ’undred of ’is county an’ the Regiment’s disgrace,   

      While they’re hangin’ Danny Deever in the mornin’.

 

‘What’s that so black agin the sun?’ said Files-on-Parade.   

‘It’s Danny fightin’ ’ard for life,’ the Colour-Sergeant said.   

‘What’s that that whimpers over’ead?’ said Files-on-Parade.

‘It’s Danny’s soul that’s passin’ now,’ the Colour-Sergeant said.

      For they’re done with Danny Deever, you can ’ear the quickstep play,

      The Regiment’s in column, an’ they’re marchin’ us away;

      Ho! the young recruits are shakin’, an’ they’ll want their beer to-day,

      After hangin’ Danny Deever in the mornin’!

Kubla Khan by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Kubla Khan

BY SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE

 

Or, a vision in a dream. A Fragment. 

 

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan 

A stately pleasure-dome decree: 

Where Alph, the sacred river, ran 

Through caverns measureless to man 

   Down to a sunless sea. 

So twice five miles of fertile ground 

With walls and towers were girdled round; 

And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills, 

Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree; 

And here were forests ancient as the hills, 

Enfolding sunny spots of greenery. 

 

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted 

Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover! 

A savage place! as holy and enchanted 

As e’er beneath a waning moon was haunted 

By woman wailing for her demon-lover! 

And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething, 

As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing, 

A mighty fountain momently was forced: 

Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst 

Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail, 

Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher’s flail: 

And mid these dancing rocks at once and ever 

It flung up momently the sacred river. 

Five miles meandering with a mazy motion 

Through wood and dale the sacred river ran, 

Then reached the caverns measureless to man, 

And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean; 

And ’mid this tumult Kubla heard from far 

Ancestral voices prophesying war! 

   The shadow of the dome of pleasure 

   Floated midway on the waves; 

   Where was heard the mingled measure 

   From the fountain and the caves. 

It was a miracle of rare device, 

A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice! 

 

   A damsel with a dulcimer 

   In a vision once I saw: 

   It was an Abyssinian maid 

   And on her dulcimer she played, 

   Singing of Mount Abora. 

   Could I revive within me 

   Her symphony and song, 

   To such a deep delight ’twould win me, 

That with music loud and long, 

I would build that dome in air, 

That sunny dome! those caves of ice! 

And all who heard should see them there, 

And all should cry, Beware! Beware! 

His flashing eyes, his floating hair! 

Weave a circle round him thrice, 

And close your eyes with holy dread 

For he on honey-dew hath fed, 

And drunk the milk of Paradise.

A Little Boy Lost by William Blake

A Little Boy Lost

Willam Blake

Nought loves another as itself,
Nor venerates another so,
Nor is it possible to thought
A greater than itself to know.

'And, father, how can I love you 
Or any of my brothers more? 
I love you like the little bird
That picks up crumbs around the door.'

The Priest sat by and heard the child; 
In trembling zeal he seized his hair,
He led him by his little coat,
And all admired the priestly care. 

And standing on the altar high,
'Lo, what a fiend is here! said he:
'One who sets reason up for judge
Of our most holy mystery.'

The weeping child could not be heard,
The weeping parents wept in vain:
They stripped him to his little shirt,
And bound him in an iron chain,

And burned him in a holy place
Where many had been burned before; 
The weeping parents wept in vain.
Are such thing done on Albion's shore? 

Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course, untrimmed;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,
Nor shall death brag thou wand’rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to Time thou grow’st.
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.