there’s a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I’m too tough for him,
I say, stay in there, I’m not going
to let anybody see
you.
there’s a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I pour whiskey on him and inhale
cigarette smoke
and the whores and the bartenders
The winter it is past, and the summer comes at last
And the small birds, they sing on ev’ry tree;
Now ev’ry thing is glad, while I am very sad,
Since my true love is parted from me.
The rose upon the breer, by the waters running clear,
May have charms for the linnet or the bee;
Heinrich, bring us three bottles of wine —
What shall it be, boys? Sherry or port?
Cheers for old Bacchus, god of the vine,
Jolly old rounder, the Greeks report.
Sherry, sherry, bring us sherry,
Fill the glasses, don’t be chary.
Bolt the door on frowning care,
Draw the cork and tilt your chair;
Drink and sing the night away
I went into a public-‘ouse to get a pint o’ beer,
The publican ‘e up an’ sez, “We serve no red-coats here.”
The girls be’ind the bar they laughed an’ giggled fit to die,
I outs into the street again an’ to myself sez I:
O it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ “Tommy, go away”;
But it’s “Thank you,
Dear land of Jesse
Upon the city of excellence and enterprise
There I heard the wailing of your children
Tremble like echo of antelope inside inferno
Shrieking voices: painful, tearful and pathetic
Calamity makes your history hoodoo and mournful
Land of culture and natural endowments
Are seen consumed by the anger of a laughing fire
A wall is like a knife
It slices a city in half
One half is on the east
The other half is on the west
How tall is this wall?
How thick is it?
How long is it?
Even if it were taller, thicker and longer
It couldn’t be as tall, as thick and as long
The deep parts of my life pour onward,
as if the river shores were opening out.
It seems that things are more like me now,
That I can see farther into paintings.
I feel closer to what language can’t reach.
With my senses, as with birds, I climb
into the windy heaven, out of the oak,
in the ponds broken
COME away, come away, death,
And in sad cypres let me be laid;
Fly away, fly away, breath;
I am slain by a fair cruel maid.
My shroud of white, stuck all with yew,
O prepare it!
My part of death, no one so true
Did share it.
Not a flower, not a flower sweet,
On my black coffin let there
Come, madam, come, all rest my powers defy,
Until I labor, I in labor lie.
The foe oft-times having the foe in sight,
Is tired with standing though he never fight.
Off with that girdle, like heaven’s zone glistering,
But a far fairer world encompassing.
Unpin that spangled breastplate which you wear,
That th’ eyes of busy fools may be
He who meet beauty and does not look at it will
soon be poor:
Red feathers are the pride of the parrot,
Young leaves are the pride of the palm-tree,
White flower are pride of the leaves,
A well-swept verandah is the pride of the
householder,
A straight tree is the pride of the forest,
The fast deer is the
Wrote a mother to her child:
Why do you say, I don’t understand,
I’ve brought you all way braving,
The scorching sun and blistering sand.
I have heard your heartbeats,
When none could see you in me,
I have felt your heartbeats,
Whenever you have felt lonely.
Farewell to the Highlands, farewell to the North,
The birth-place of Valour, the country of Worth;
Wherever I wander, wherever I rove,
The hills of the Highlands for ever I love.
My heart’s in the Highlands, my heart is not here;
My heart’s in the Highlands a-chasing the deer;
A-chasing the wild-deer, and following the roe,
My heart’s in the Highlands
Brave lodgings for one, brave lodgings for one,
A few feet of cold earth, when life is done;
A stone at the head, a stone at the feet;
A rich, juicy meal for the worms to eat;
Rank grass overhead, and damp clay around,
Mammy’s baby, go ter sleep,
Hush-er-by, hush-er-by, my honey;
Cross de hyarf de cricket creep,
Hush-er-by, hush-er-by, my honey.
Hoot owl callin’ f’um de ol’ sycamo’
‘Way down yon’er in de holler;
While de whip-po’-will an’ de li’l’ screech owl
Dey des try dey bes’ ter foller.
Hush-er-by, hush-er-by, hush-er-by, my deah,
Hush-er-by, hush-er-by, my honey;
Shet yo’ eyes an’ drap
If every woman is a concubine of pain
My mother is that everyone –
A shepherdess flocks of pain.
Barely each day gone by without her back
Become animal skin that pastes on a mahogany tree
And beat every day with maestro-stroke of shame.
When you ask who can dance most in public places
Set a cause of rev for her
Singing songs of expectation
The earth pilgrim band goes
Marching to the Promised Land
Rides upon the storming Wind
Till the faithful beneath its shade.
The earth beauty fades
The sun is sinking fast
The daylight dies
The end of toil and gloom has come.
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.
Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly
Elephant, death-bringer!
Elephant, spirit of the bush!
With his one hand he brings two trees to the ground.
If he had two hands, he would tear the sky like an
old rag.
Spirit who eat dog!
Spirit who eat ram!
Spirit who eats palm-fruit, thorns `and all!
With four pestle-legs he flattens the grass,
Where he walks, the grass cannot
I came to know I am so bad,
This is the reason why I am sad.
I hurt them and I always fight,
That’s why my days are not so bright.
I can’t feel what others feel
And want them under my heels.
I am selfish, I am harsh
Break intentions and their hearts.
I misunderstand, I misbehave,
I speak
First, suicide notes should be
(not long) but written
second,
all suicide notes
should be signed
in blood
by hand
and to the point—
that point being, perhaps,
that there is none.
