#douglas
“I fear that many people are put off by poetry because they don’t know where to start. If I have any advice for them, it is this: find what you like.
Who is to say what guides this process?
In my own case, it has simply been the fact that certain phrases, poems, and figures have acted like flare-lights along the path of my own life. Sometimes you see a flicker in the darkness and know that it is saying something—often something of great importance—and you sense that you have to go toward it, to get near to it, all the time looking out for other lights.
My love of certain poets stems from a single phrase they wrote that hit me like a great freight train of truth.
At other times, I have been attracted to a poem or a poet because I am taken by that feeling of recognition that someone else has felt or thought exactly the way I did. As C.S. Lewis says, as a character in the film Shadowlands, “We read to know we’re not alone.”
Sometimes, we read poets because we want to be like them, or because they are arbiters of good taste, or have been through something we want to know about. Literature—poetry, in particular—offers us a way to become different from what we are or might have been otherwise.
In the end, I suppose the question is: What is the purpose of all this? Why is it worth making our heads into a well-furnished room?
I think it’s because what we have up here—in our heads—is the only thing that cannot be taken. So long as we have memory, we cannot be made into automatons by man or machine…”
Which brings me back to Shakespeare.
The Tempest is the last play Shakespeare wrote on his own. And because of that—and because we know so little about his life that we always look for clues in his work—a lot of autobiography has always been read into the play.
It is about a magician, Prospero, at the end of his magical days. At the end of the play, he promises to drown his magic book and break his staff. It is impossible not to read a certain amount of biography into this, Shakespeare’s farewell to the stage.
Every now and then, somebody comes up with a new theory about Shakespeare. All have been heard before—for example, the vivid description of the sea in The Tempest indicates Shakespeare must have spent time as a sailor.
My response to this? In that case, Shakespeare must also have been a Roman emperor, several English and Scottish kings, a Danish prince, a shepherd boy, a teenage girl in love, a murderer, and almost every other person who ever lived. It is a reductive argument, because it forgets that in the realm of the imagination, you can be all things without actually being them.
And, in any case, at the end, it all disappears, falls apart, and comes together again somewhere else.
This speech, by Prospero, in the fourth act of The Tempest, is the finest farewell of any I know, and one I hope to keep in my own head for many years to come.
**Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits and
Are melted into air, into thin air:
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capp’d towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep**
Feb 29, 2024
Feb 29, 2024 at 10:51 AM UTC
Dearest Douglas,
Is it strange, we meet in a moment of chaos?
The mystic forces of fate pull us together,
In a time where our life path is full of woes
Fate calls us to fight against the stormy weather
So this encounter, is it what heaven has bestowed?
For years my heart hid behind the gates of darkness
As memories of the past burned with resentment
I felt the sinister shadows of life’s bleakness,
Where the affection of my father had been absent,
The stains of sin had taught me to become heartless.
Yet in this fleeting moment of life, our paths meet,
My heart burns passionately by your gentle grace
The ravenous linger thoughts of you taste so sweet
As I felt sense of peace when I glance at your face-
I am lost by your eyes that glow with gracious heat.
In an autumn’s day where solemn truths were revealed,
Your dad’s poor health had left you to feel dejected.
Tears of pain touched my soul so that it can be healed-
To release grudges that had been infected
By the violent past - a new hope has been sealed-
Three different people’s lives have been affected!
Though our life paths moved in opposite direction,
Forces of fate push us to an uncertain life!
In a distant sky there is a strange connection,
An alliance formed when the world is full of strife,
We enter into journey of introspection!
In this moment of personal revelation,
You haunt me in my thoughts; you haunt me in my sleep.
I think I am a fool to have such affection
Yet this fate left a lasting impact that runs deep
My heart smiles to see your caring complexion!
Time wafts like Mother Nature changing its season,
Yet in this uncertain world we reunite again.
This fate is strange but there is a divine reason
We are to meet as there is a lot we have gained
At least for me I can feel the love of the Son.
I know these tender feelings you can’t reciprocate
I look at the sky and thank him for his full bless
To have met you in my frail vulnerable state.
I feel the moonlight embrace me with full caress,
Maybe it is time for us to depart on this date.
Do not feel these feelings I have is of sorrow
As one day I will meet a General of great might.
This strange fate has allowed my soul to heal and grow.
Wherever you may be, I wish you to shine so bright!
I don’t know what destiny beholds tomorrow,
But fond thoughts of you will drift my soul with delight!
(c)2018 Joanne Chang
Sep 26, 2018
Sep 26, 2018 at 4:43 AM UTC
we are not gathered here in memory
of the 17 who lost their beautiful smiles
and laughs and futures to your
precious laws that may have applied to the seventeen hundreds
but now? we don't need these machines
this danger.
we don't need this fear inside of us
the feeling of being stalked
in the hallways of the same building you
previously walked before without a second thought
but now it could happen. and it's more real than
ever before.
those 17 could have been me and
my friends and peers. they were a mere drive away from
that place i go everyday where i see the people
i love. to know that one day they could be on the floor
next to my desk or my still
lifeless
body.
that terrifies me.
tell me, how are you not
terrified? how does it not scare you, that your
next wave of voters are terrified of your inability to act after
the nightmare that became our reality.
we are gathered here to tell you that
we
demand
change.
Mar 14, 2018
Mar 14, 2018 at 8:59 PM UTC
I dreamed I stood upon a little hill,
And at my feet there lay a ground, that seemed
Like a waste garden, flowering at its will
With buds and blossoms. There were pools that dreamed
Black and unruffled; there were white lilies
A few, and crocuses, and violets
Purple or pale, snake-like fritillaries
Scarce seen for the rank grass, and through green nets
Blue eyes of shy peryenche winked in the sun.
And there were curious flowers, before unknown,
Flowers that were stained with moonlight, or with shades
Of Nature's wilful moods; and here a one
That had drunk in the transitory tone
Of one brief moment in a sunset; blades
Of grass that in an hundred springs had been
Slowly but exquisitely nurtured by the stars,
And watered with the scented dew long cupped
In lilies, that for rays of sun had seen
Only God's glory, for never a sunrise mars
The luminous air of Heaven. Beyond, abrupt,
A grey stone wall, o'ergrown with velvet moss
Uprose; and gazing I stood long, all mazed
To see a place so strange, so sweet, so fair.
And as I stood and marvelled, lo! across
The garden came a youth; one hand he raised
To shield him from the sun, his wind-tossed hair
Was twined with flowers, and in his hand he bore
A purple bunch of bursting grapes, his eyes
Were clear as crystal, naked all was he,
White as the snow on pathless mountains frore,
Red were his lips as red wine-spilith that dyes
A marble floor, his brow chalcedony.
And he came near me, with his lips uncurled
And kind, and caught my hand and kissed my mouth,
And gave me grapes to eat, and said, 'Sweet friend,
Come I will show thee shadows of the world
And images of life. See from the South
Comes the pale pageant that hath never an end.'
And lo! within the garden of my dream
I saw two walking on a shining plain
Of golden light. The one did joyous seem
And fair and blooming, and a sweet refrain
Came from his lips; he sang of pretty maids
And joyous love of comely girl and boy,
His eyes were bright, and 'mid the dancing blades
Of golden grass his feet did trip for joy;
And in his hand he held an ivory lute
With strings of gold that were as maidens' hair,
And sang with voice as tuneful as a flute,
And round his neck three chains of roses were.
But he that was his comrade walked aside;
He was full sad and sweet, and his large eyes
Were strange with wondrous brightness, staring wide
With gazing; and he sighed with many sighs
That moved me, and his cheeks were wan and white
Like pallid lilies, and his lips were red
Like poppies, and his hands he clenched tight,
And yet again unclenched, and his head
Was wreathed with moon-flowers pale as lips of death.
A purple robe he wore, o'erwrought in gold
With the device of a great snake, whose breath
Was fiery flame: which when I did behold
I fell a-weeping, and I cried, 'Sweet youth,
Tell me why, sad and sighing, thou dost rove
These pleasant realms? I pray thee speak me sooth
What is thy name?' He said, 'My name is Love.'
Then straight the first did turn himself to me
And cried, 'He lieth, for his name is Shame,
But I am Love, and I was wont to be
Alone in this fair garden, till he came
Unasked by night; I am true Love, I fill
The hearts of boy and girl with mutual flame.'
Then sighing, said the other, 'Have thy will,
I am the Love that dare not speak its name.'
Dec 4, 2016
Dec 4, 2016 at 10:34 AM UTC
I wear my heart on my sleeve
Where it's easily broken
I'd rather be made of steel
Or just a girl sitting around tokin
So many emotions
And I'm bloated
Just full of ****
And a belief of something fake
But I'll revamp my ways
My precious heart to take
I don't need it anymore anyways
(Douglas Scheurn wrote this part)
Keep it,
Incase it deep within your soul.
Put the key in,
Make the latch whole.
Don't let someone steal it quickly,
They have to thoroughly plan the heist.
Now this is tricky,
But wait out to see the lines.
Doesn't matter much anyways
My heart ain't worth the fuss
I held on a long time
Even longer for the lucrative "us"
My hearts shattered
Not that it mattered
Pieces are too small
Not worth making whole
No body would want
This emptiness y'all call a soul
There is no need for a lock
And certainly not a key
The last one inside
Has proven me no longer worthy
If the last one who had a piece
Is reading this now
Give urself a pat on the back
And a raise of ur brow
Congratulations is in order
You finally completed ur mission
My heart is finally free
You, no longer in my vision
Emptied my soul
And cleared the fog
**** being a *****
I'll be the alpha dog
Chewing up smiles
Gnawing on hearts
Spitting back up tears
And unimportant parts
Then run away, still intact
Leaving the rest to the hounds
Never looking back
Smile on my face and hell bound
Jun 17, 2014
Jun 17, 2014 at 11:02 AM UTC