For us, with calming winds came late,
     we know not their pain;
The seas and tides had taken care
     not even left a stain—
Of all the broken things there were,
     I still have yet to see one;
But veldts of green and daffodils,
     in which to play and run—
They say to me in a whisper soft,
     “Do not dwell on us below."
So we dance among the fields above
     those forgotten long ago.

I've never lived in Nebraska.
     God knows why anyone would ever want to.
One or two days without Alaska
     and I'm already about to lose my ****.

—

I wish she would visit soon, Alaska,
     It's been a couple months now.
But the more I think about it
     She'll never see Nebraska;
Where violets and lilacs are trampled
     And hold no more value to me;
Where technicolor has no place,
     And is a broken concept;
Where people merely exist,
     And nothing more.

—

I was here for a three years
     And now I'm leaving Nebraska.
With little to show for it
     And I have not a memory left of Alaska.
I never lived in Nebraska.
     I probably could have tried.

From the front door of my home
     there is not much to see;
Puddles scatter the corrugated soil,
     reflecting back the image of me.

The houses all sit silent and still
     as if they could've been happier someday;
Paint peeling, shedding faded colours;
     I can only watch their slow decay.

The people in them live like spectres
     who I always see but never talk to;
Is it naive that I fear getting to know them?
     (I still like to think they're interesting too.)

The wind whips though the snowy grass,
     speckled white from my house's dead skin;
And I retain the same composure as them,
    trying to mimic the norms of my neighbours just to fit in.

From the front door of my home
     there is not much to see;
I lift my head just to find everything
     reflecting back the image of me.

Where is the dawn?
I've felt the warmth,
          yet have seen no light.

Where have I gone?
Deep into darkness,
          and I've become the night.

Am I still heartbroken?
Searching for loves,
          like the ones I've known.

I'm waiting to be awoken.
Until the day,
          I'll dream alone.

I've fallen away from the beautiful,
     And lost the light of day;
The night now claims my wither'd soul,
     My heart will silence pay.
Part the seas which sway'd me so,
     Sailed the golden course, I did not;
Swallowed whole into the depths below,
     For greed then had me caught.

Where may lie my body still,
     If nowhere I am found?
In deep waters She'll take the ****,
     No grave within the ground!
Alas, my time is all but spent,
Life so swiftly came and went.

Lovers all are soldiers, and Cupid has his campaigns:
I tell you, Atticus, lovers all are soldiers.
Youth is fit for war, and also fit for Venus.
Imagine an aged soldier, an elderly lover!
A general looks for spirit in his brave soldiery;
a pretty girl wants spirit in her companions.
Both stay up all night long, and each sleeps on the ground;
one guards his mistress's doorway, one his general's.
The soldier's lot requires far journeys; send his girl,
the zealous lover will follow her anywhere.
He'll cross the glowering mountains, the rivers swollen with storm;
he'll tread a pathway through the heaped-up snows;
and never whine of raging Eurus when he sets sail
or wait for stars propitious for his voyage.
Who but lovers and soldiers endure the chill of night,
and blizzards interspersed with driving rain?
The soldier reconnoiters among the dangerous foe;
the lover spies to learn his rival's plans.
Soldiers besiege strong cities; lovers, a harsh girl's home;
one storms town gates, the other storms house doors.
It's clever strategy to raid a sleeping foe
and slay an unarmed host by force of arms.
(That's how the troops of Thracian Rhesus met their doom,
and you, O captive steeds, forsook your master.)
Well, lovers take advantage of husbands when they sleep,
launching surprise attacks while the enemy snores.
To slip through bands of guards and watchful sentinels
is always the soldier's mission - and the lover's.
Mars wavers; Venus flutters: the conquered rise again,
and those you'd think could never fall, lie low.
So those who like to say that love is indolent
should stop: Love is the soul of enterprise.
Sad Achilles burns for Briseis, his lost darling:
Trojans, smash the Greeks' power while you may!
From Andromache's embrace Hector went to war;
his own wife set the helmet on his head;
and High King Agamemnon, looking on Priam's child,
was stunned (they say) by the Maenad's flowing hair.
And Mars himself was trapped in The Artificer's bonds:
no tale was more notorious in heaven.
I too was once an idler, born for careless ease;
my shady couch had made my spirit soft.
But care for a lovely girl aroused me from my sloth
and bid me to enlist in her campaign.
So now you see me forceful, in combat all night long.
If you want a life of action, fall in love.

As I pull the daggers from my heart,
The memories of home in my mind,
The person inside begins to fall apart,
And like the ****** past, is left behind.