I'd rather have my verses win
A place in common people's hearts,
Who, toiling through the strife and din
Of life's great thoroughfares, and marts,

May read some line my hand has penned;
Some simple verse, not fine, or grand,
But what their hearts can understand
And hold me henceforth as a friend,--

I'd rather win such quiet fame
Than by some fine thought, bolished so
But those of learned minds would know,
Just what the meaning of my song,--
To have the critics sound my name
In high-flown praises, loud and long.

I think you're wonderful and so does everyone else.

Just as Jackie Kennedy has a baby boy, so will you--even bigger.

You will meet a tall beautiful blonde stranger, and you will not say hello.

You will take a long trip and you will be very happy, though alone.

You will marry the first person who tells you your eyes are like scrambled eggs.

In the beginning there was YOU--there will always be YOU, I guess.

You will write a great play and it will run for three performances.

When the Norn Mother saw the Whirlwind Hour
Greatening and darkening as it hurried on,
She left the Heaven of Heroes and came down
To make a man to meet the mortal need.
She took the tried clay of the common road --
Clay warm yet with the genial heat of Earth,
Dashed through it all a strain of prophecy;
Tempered the heap with thrill of human tears;
Then mixed a laughter with the serious stuff.
Into the shape she breathed a flame to light
That tender, tragic, ever-changing face.
Here was a man to hold against the world,

I am riding on a limited express, one of the crack trains
of the nation.
Hurtling across the prairie into blue haze and dark air
go fifteen all-steel coaches holding a thousand people.
(All the coaches shall be scrap and rust and all the men
and women laughing in the diners and sleepers shall
pass to ashes.)
I ask a man in the smoker where he is going and he
answers: "Omaha."

I was the daughter of Lambert Hutchins,
Born in a cottage near the grist-mill,
Reared in the mansion there on the hill,
With its spires, bay-windows, and roof of slate.
How proud my mother was of the mansion!
How proud of father's rise in the world!
And how my father loved and watched us,
And guarded our happiness.
But I believe the house was a curse,
For father's fortune was little beside it;
And when my husband found he had married
A girl who was really poor,
He taunted me with the spires,
And called the house a fraud on the world,

Light is more important than the lantern,
The poem more important than the notebook,
And the kiss more important than the lips.
My letters to you
Are greater and more important than both of us.
The are the only documents
Where people will discover
Your beauty
And my madness.


Translated by B. Frangieh And C. Brown


Submitted by Noele Aabye

Jeri, a la Pulinara, un colleggiale
Doppo fatta una predica in todesco,
Setacciò tutt'er popolo in du' sale,
E a la ppiù mejo vorze dà er rifresco.

In quella fece entracce er Cardinale
Co l'amichi der Micco e ppadron Fiesco;
E nell'antra la gente duzzinale
Che viaggia cor caval de san Francesco.

Pe sta sala che qui de li spedati
Comincionno a ppassà li cammorieri
Pieni de sottocoppe de gelati.

Ma che! a la sala delli cavajeri
Un cazzo ciarrivò: ché st'affamati
Se sparinno inzinenta li bicchieri.

Senti sto fatto. Un giorno de st'istate
Lavoravo ar convento de Genzano,
E ssentivo de sopra ch'er guardiano
Tirava giù biastime a carrettate;

Perché, essenno le gente aridunate
Per cantà la novena a ssan Cazziano,
Cerca qua, chiama là, quer zagristano
Drento a le celle nun trovava un frate.

Era vicino a notte, e un pispillorio
Già se sentiva in de la chiesa piena,
Quanno senti che ffa ppadre Grigorio.

Curze a intoccà la tevola de cena,
E appena che fu empito er refettorio

I was thinking of letters,
We all have a lot in our life
A few good - a few sad
But mostly run of the mill-
I suppose that's my fault
For writing to run of the mill people.
I've never had a letter
I really wanted
It might come one day
But then, it will be just too late,
And that's when I don't want it.

I never dreamed we’d meet that day
In our old haunts down Fricourt way,
Plotting such marvellous journeys there
For jolly old “Après-la-guerre.”

Well, when it’s over, first we’ll meet
At Gweithdy Bach, my country seat
In Wales, a curious little shop
With two rooms and a roof on top,
A sort of Morlancourt-ish billet
That never needs a crowd to fill it.
But oh, the country round about!
The sort of view that makes you shout
For want of any better way
Of praising God: there’s a blue bay