Genii Weblog
What I do while NOT twittering
Sun 19 Apr 2009, 07:51 PM
Tweetby Ben Langhinrichs
It may come as a bit of a surprise to some of you Twitter fans, but people have been writing short lines filled with meaning for centuries, and many of them even rhymed! Yes, I am speaking of poetry. Now, I suggested to a fellow blogger that perhaps the Lotus blogosphere is not quite ready for this sort of poetry, but he said that I should give it a try. He might have even insinuated that the blogger community could use a bit of "high brow".
So, in the interest of balance, I want to offer a wonderful poem I read by an Irish mathematician and poet, and then my response poem (back then, response poems were all the rage). If poetry doesn't suit you, think of them as Twitter storms that happen to rhyme. These are the "tweets" I read and write when NOT on Twitter.
It is not Beauty I demand - by George Darley (Dublin, 1828)
It is not Beauty I demand,
A crystal brow, the moon's despair,
Nor the snow's daughter, a white hand,
It is not Beauty I demand,
A crystal brow, the moon's despair,
Nor the snow's daughter, a white hand,
Nor mermaid's yellow pride of hair.
Tell me not of your starry eyes,
Your lips that seem on roses fed,
Your breasts where Cupid trembling lies,
Nor sleeps for kissing of his bed.
A bloomy pair of vermeil cheeks,
Like Hebe's in her ruddiest hours,
A breath that softer music speaks
Than summer winds a-wooing flowers.
These are but gauds; nay, what are lips?
Coral beneath the ocean-stream,
Whose brink when your adventurer sips
Full oft he perisheth on them.
And what are cheeks but ensigns oft
That wave hot youth to fields of blood?
Did Helen's breast though ne'er so soft,
Do Greece or Ilium any good?
Eyes can with baleful ardor burn,
Poison can breath that erst perfumed,
There's many a white hand holds an urn
With lovers' hearts to dust consumed.
For crystal brows--there's naught within,
They are but empty cells for pride;
He who the Syren's hair would win
Is mostly strangled in the tide.
Give me, instead of beauty's bust,
A tender heart, a loyal mind,
Which with temptation I could trust,
Yet never linked with error find.
One in whose gentle bosom I
Could pour my secret heart of woes.
Like the care-burdened honey-fly
That hides his murmurs in the rose.
My earthly comforter! whose love
So indefeasible might be,
That when my spirit won above
Hers could not stay for sympathy.
Tell me not of your starry eyes,
Your lips that seem on roses fed,
Your breasts where Cupid trembling lies,
Nor sleeps for kissing of his bed.
A bloomy pair of vermeil cheeks,
Like Hebe's in her ruddiest hours,
A breath that softer music speaks
Than summer winds a-wooing flowers.
These are but gauds; nay, what are lips?
Coral beneath the ocean-stream,
Whose brink when your adventurer sips
Full oft he perisheth on them.
And what are cheeks but ensigns oft
That wave hot youth to fields of blood?
Did Helen's breast though ne'er so soft,
Do Greece or Ilium any good?
Eyes can with baleful ardor burn,
Poison can breath that erst perfumed,
There's many a white hand holds an urn
With lovers' hearts to dust consumed.
For crystal brows--there's naught within,
They are but empty cells for pride;
He who the Syren's hair would win
Is mostly strangled in the tide.
Give me, instead of beauty's bust,
A tender heart, a loyal mind,
Which with temptation I could trust,
Yet never linked with error find.
One in whose gentle bosom I
Could pour my secret heart of woes.
Like the care-burdened honey-fly
That hides his murmurs in the rose.
My earthly comforter! whose love
So indefeasible might be,
That when my spirit won above
Hers could not stay for sympathy.
There, now that didn't hurt TOO much, did it. Did anybody get this far?
Copyright © 2009 Genii Software Ltd.
What has been said:
812.1. Rodney Scott (04/20/2009 11:07 PM)
Seemed horrible to demand it all
Right up until the end,
When I realized this was how best
Nontwittering time to spend.