I went out to the hazel wood, Because a fire was in my head, And cut and peeled a hazel wand, And hooked a berry to a thread; And when white moths were on the wing, And moth-like stars were flickering out, I dropped the berry in a stream And caught a little silver trout.
When I had laid it on the floor I went to blow the fire a-flame, But something rustled on the floor, And someone called me by my name: It had become a glimmering girl With apple blossom in her hair
Fle fro the pres, and dwelle with sothefastnesse, Suffise thin owen thing, thei it be smal; For hord hath hate, and clymbyng tykelnesse, Prees hath envye, and wele blent overal. Savour no more thanne the byhove schal; Reule weel thiself, that other folk canst reede; And trouthe schal delyvere, it is no drede.
As I was going down impassive Rivers, I no longer felt myself guided by haulers: Yelping redskins had taken them as targets And had nailed them naked to colored stakes.
The wintry west extends his blast, And hail and rain does blaw; Or, the stormy north sends driving forth The blinding sleet and snaw: While tumbling brown, the burn comes down, And roars frae bank to brae; And bird and beast in covert rest, And pass the heartless day.
The sweeping blast, the sky o’ercast, The joyless winter-day, Let others fear, to me more dear Than all the pride of May: The tempest’s howl, it soothes my soul, My griefs it seems to join;
Colin, why this mistake? Why plead thy foolish love? My heart shall sooner break Than I a minion prove; Nor care I half a rush, No snare I spread for thee: Go home, my friend, and blush For love and liberty.
(from As You Like It, spoken by Jaques)
All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms; And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
The country lies flat, expressionless as the face of a stranger. Not one hillock shelters a buried bone. The city: a scene thin as a theater backdrop, where no doors open, no streets extend beyond the view from the corner.
Only the railroad embankment is high, shaggy with grass. Only the freight, knuckling a red sun under its wheels, drags familiar box-car shapes down long perspectives of childhood meals and all crossings at sunset.
Out of a high meadow where flowers bloom above cloud, come down; pursue me with reasons for smiling without malice.
Bring mimic pride like that of the seedling fir, surprise in the perfect leg-stems and queries unstirred by recognition or fear pooled in the deep eyes.
It lies not in our power to love or hate, For will in us is overruled by fate. When two are stripped, long ere the course begin, We wish that one should lose, the other win; And one especially do we affect Of two gold ingots, like in each respect: The reason no man knows; let it suffice What we behold is censured by our eyes. Where both deliberate, the love is slight: Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight?
If we could get the hang of it entirely It would take too long; All we know is the splash of words in passing And falling twigs of song, And when we try to eavesdrop on the great Presences it is rarely That by a stroke of luck we can appropriate Even a phrase entirely.
From golden showers of the ancient skies, On the first day, and the eternal snow of stars, You once unfastened giant calyxes For the young earth still innocent of scars:
Young gladioli with the necks of swans, Laurels divine, of exiled souls the dream, Vermilion as the modesty of dawns Trod by the footsteps of the seraphim;
(from Julius Caesar, spoken by Marc Antony)
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious:
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
I’ll tell thee now (dear Love) what thou shalt do To anger destiny, as she doth us, How I shall stay, though she esloygne me thus And how posterity shall know it too; How thine may out-endure Sybil’s glory, and obscure Her who from Pindar could allure, And her, through whose help Lucan is not lame, And her, whose book (they say) Homer did find, and name.
Study our manuscripts, those myriads Of letters, which have past twixt thee and me, Thence write our annals, and in them will be To all whom love’s subliming fire invades, Rule and example found;
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