Empty Infinite

from the 'Tao Te Ching' by Lao Tzu, an
ancient Chinese philosopher

30 spokes put together make a wheel,
only it's in the space where in that location is nothing
that the usefulness of the bicycle depends.
Clay that'southward shaped will make a pot,
but it'due south in the space where in that location is zero
that the usefulness of the pot depends.
Wood that's cutting will make a house,
merely information technology's in the space where there is nothing
that the usefulness of the firm depends.
Therefore we should value not only what is,
but also what is not.

INVITATION
Shel Silverstein
If you are a dreamer, come up in
If you lot are a dreamer, a wisher, a liar,
A hope-er. a pray-er, a magic edible bean buyer…
If you're a pretender, come sit down by the burn
For we have some flax-aureate tales to spin.
Come in!
Come in!

AN EPILOGUE
John Masefield (1878 – 1967)
I accept seen flowers come in stony places
And kind things washed past men with ugly faces,
And the golden cup won by the worst equus caballus at the races,
So I trust, likewise .

OUR LIFE IN THIS WORLD
Priest Sami Mansei (Japanese, c.720)
Our life in this world –
 to what shall I compare information technology?
 Information technology is similar a boat
 rowing out at break of day,
leaving not a trace behind.

YEARS FROM Now
Kim Sowol (Korean, 1903-1934)
Should you lot come to me
Years from now,
I shall say: "I have forgotten."
Should y'all scold me,
I shall say: "After much longing I have forgotten."
Should you persist in scolding me,
I shall say: "For lack of trust I have forgotten."
Non yesterday, not today,
But years from now,
I shall say: "I have forgotten."

Sectionalization OF LABOUR
Feyyaz Kayacan (Turkish)
I take problems
I know them well
Then know me well
We get on nicely together
I let them worry me rent-free
Sometimes when I am reading a volume
I lift my head to requite them.
The look of sustained recognition.
Sometimes when I'm eating my heart out
They lift their heads
To await at me and relax.

IN FLANDERS FIELDS
John McCrae
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our identify: and in the sky
The larks even so bravely singing fly
Deficient heard amidst the guns below.
We are the dead: Short days agone,
We lived, felt dawn, saw dusk glow,
Loved and were loved: and now we lie
In Flemish region fields!
Take up our quarrel with the foe
To you, from failing hands, we throw
The torch: exist yours to concur information technology high
If ye break faith with us who dice,
We shall non sleep, though poppies grow
In Flemish region fields.

NOTHING GOLD Can STAY
Robert Frost (1874 – 1963)
Nature's offset green is aureate,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leafage'southward a flower;
Simply only and so an hour.
So leaf subsides to leaf,
So Eden sank to grief,
And so dawn goes down to twenty-four hour period
Nothing gold can stay.

MY Eye SOARS
Chief Dan George (1899 – 1981)

The beauty of the trees,
the softness of the air,
the fragrance of the grass,
speaks to me.

The pinnacle of the mountain,
the thunder of the sky,
the rhythm of the sea,
speaks to me.

The faintness of the stars,
the freshness of the morning,
the dew drop on the flower,
speaks to me.

The strength of burn,
the taste of salmon,
the trail of the lord's day,
And the life that never goes abroad,
They speak to me.
And my heart soars.

BEFORE THE Ice
Emily Dickinson (1830 – 1886)
Before the water ice is in the pools,
Before the skaters go,
Or any cheek at nightfall
Is tarnished past the snow,
Earlier the fields take finished,
Before the Christmas tree,
Wonder upon wonder
Will arrive to me!

IF
Rudyard Kipling (1865 – 1936)
If y'all can keep your head when all virtually you lot
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men incertitude you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can expect and not be tired by waiting,
Or, beingness lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give fashion to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream — and non make dreams your master;
If you lot tin can think — and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can run across with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those ii impostors just the same:.
If you lot can conduct to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or sentinel the things you gave your life to, cleaved,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you tin make one heap of all your winnings
And run a risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your ancestry,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you lot tin force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long later they are gone,
And then agree on when there is nothing in you
Except the Volition which says to them: "Concur on!"

If you can talk with crowds and go on your virtue,
Or walk with Kings — nor lose the common touch on,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with yous, but none too much:
If yous can fill up the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And which is more; you'll exist a Man, my son!

Empty Space
Lao Tzu

Xxx spokes put together brand a wheel,
but it's in the space where at that place is cypher
that the usefulness of the bicycle depends.
Clay that's shaped will make a pot,
but information technology's in the infinite where at that place is nothing
that the usefulness of the pot depends.
Wood that's cut volition brand a business firm,
but it'southward in the space where in that location is goose egg
that the usefulness of the house depends.
Therefore we should value not just what is,
just also what is not.

Walkers with the Dawn
Langston Hughes

Being walkers with the dawn and forenoon,
Walkers with the sun and morning time,
We are non afraid of night,
Nor days of gloom,
Nor darkness —
Being walkers with the sun and morning time.

Goldwing Moth
Carl Sandburg

A goldwing moth is betwixt the pair of scissors
and the ink canteen on the desk-bound.
Last dark it flew hundred of circles
around a glass bulb and a flame wire.
The wings are a soft gold;
information technology is the golden of illuminated initials
in manuscripts of the medieval monks.

Summer Morning
Carl Sandburg

A wagonload of radishes on a summer morn.
Sprinkles of dew on the cerise-regal balls.
The farmer on the seat dangles the reins
on the rumps of dapple-grayness horses.
The farmer's daughter with a basket of eggs
dreams  of a new chapeau to wear to the county off-white.

'Our revels now are concluded'
William Shakespeare

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 material of this vision,
The cloud-capped tow'rs, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great earth itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Exit non a rack backside. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our niggling life
Is rounded with a picayune sleep.

My People
Langston Hughes

The dark is beautiful,
and so the faces of my people.
The stars are beautiful,
so the eyes of my people.
Beautiful, likewise, is the sun.
Beautiful, likewise, are the souls of my people.

April Rain Vocal
Langston Hughes

Allow the rain buss y'all.
Allow the rain shell upon your head with silver liquid drops.
Let the rain sing you a lullaby.
The pelting makes still pools on the sidewalk.
The rain makes running pools in the gutter.
The rain plays a piddling sleep-song on our roof at night—
And I love the pelting.

The Rainy Day
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The day is cold, and night, and dreary;
It rains, and the wind is never weary;
The vine still clings to the mouldering wall,
Simply at every gust more than dead leaves fall,
And the day is dark and dreary.

My life is cold and dark and dreary;
It rains and the wind is never weary;
My thoughts still cling to the mouldering Past,
And youth's fond hopes fall thick in the nail,
And my life is dark and dreary.

Be however, sad heart! and cease repining;
Behind the clouds is the sun still shining;
Thy fate is the common fate of all,
Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must exist dark and dreary.

This Is Just to Say
William Carlos Williams

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were and so succulent
and so sweet
and so cold

Dear That Boy
Walter Dean Myers

Love that boy,
similar a rabbit loves to run
I said I dearest that male child
similar a rabbit loves to run
Love to phone call him in the morning
love to call him
"Hey there, son!"

The Silent Ones
 Robert William Service

I'm just an ordinary chap
Who comes home to his tea,
And mostly I don't intendance a rap
What people retrieve of me;
I do my job and take my pay,
And honey of peace expound;
But equally I go my patient manner,
–Don't push me round.

Though I respect authorisation
And club never flout,
When Constabulary and Justice disagree
You tin can include me out.
The Welfare State I tolerate
If information technology is kept in spring,
Simply if you wish to rouse my detest
–Just push me round.

And that's the way with lots of us:
We want to feel we're free;
And so labour governments nosotros cuss
And mock at monarchy.
Yea, we are men of secret mirth,
And fury seldom audio;
But if you value peace on earth
–Don't push button us circular.

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

I wandered lone as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Abreast the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky manner,
They stretched in never-ending line
Forth the margin of the bay:
10 thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves abreast them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee
A poet could non but be gay,
In such a jocund visitor
I gazed — and gazed — but footling idea
What wealth the show to me had brought:
For often, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inwards center
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And so my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

 EARTH IS LIKE A VESSEL
Laozi (6th c. BCE, Tao Te Ching)

Those who would take over the World
And shape it to their volition
Never, I notice, succeed.

For the Globe is like a vessel and so sacred
That at the merest touch on of the profane—
It is marred,
And when they attain out their hands to grasp it—
It is gone.

For a fourth dimension some forcefulness themselves ahead
And some are left backside,
For a time some make a corking noise
And some are held silent,
For a time some are puffed fatty
And some are kept hungry,
For a time some are held up
And some are destroyed.

Merely at no time volition a homo who is sane:
Over-attain himself,
Over-spend himself,
Over-rate himself.

John Donne (1572-1631)
No man is an island,
Unabridged of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be done away by the bounding main,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manner of thine ain
Or of thine friend'southward were.
Each man's decease diminishes me,
For I am involved in flesh.
Therefore, send non to know
For whom the bong tolls,
It tolls for thee.

A TIME TO TALK
Robert Frost (1874 – 1963)
When a friend calls to me from the road
And slows his horse to a pregnant walk,
I don't stand still and await effectually
On all the hills I haven't hoed,
And shout from where I am, What is information technology?
No, not as there is a time to talk.
I thrust my hoe in the mellow ground,
Blade-end up and five feet alpine,
And plod: I get up to the rock wall
For a friendly visit.

THE DREAMER
Langston Hughes (1902 – 1967)
Bring me all of your dreams,
You dreamer,
Bring me all your
Heart melodies
That I may wrap them
In a blue cloud-cloth
Away from the likewise-rough fingers
Of the world.

HOLD FAST TO YOUR DREAMS
Louise Driscoll (1875 – 1957)
Agree fast to your dreams!
Within your heart
Proceed one still, surreptitious spot
Where dreams may go,
And sheltered so,
May thrive and grow –
Where doubtfulness and fright are not.
Oh, keep a identify apart
Within your heart,
For lilliputian dreams to get.

Mother TO SON
Langston Hughes  (1902 – 1967)
Well, son, I'll tell yous:
Life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
It's had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the flooring—
Bare.
Simply all the time
I'se been a-climbin' on,
And reachin' landin'south,
And turnin' corners,
And sometimes goin' in the dark
Where there ain't been no calorie-free.
Then, boy, don't you plough dorsum.
Don't y'all ready down on the steps.
'Cause you finds information technology's kinder hard.
Don't you autumn at present—
For I'se still goin', honey,
I'se still climbin',
And life for me ain't been no crystal stair.

CLOTHS OF Sky
William Butler Yeats (1839 – 1922)
Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver low-cal,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-lite,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your anxiety;
Tread softly because you lot tread on my dreams.

DUST OF SNOW
Robert Frost (1874 – 1963)
The style a crow
Shook downward on me
The dust of snowfall
From a hemlock tree
Has given my center
A alter of mood
And saved some part
Of a 24-hour interval I had rued.

THE SHIPS OF YULE
Bliss Carman (1861 – 1929)

When I was just a petty boy,
Earlier I went to school,
I had a armada of forty canvass
I chosen the Ships of Yule;

Of every rig, from rakish brig
And gallant barkentine,
To little Fundy fishing boats
With gunwales painted green.
They used to go on trading trips
Around the world for me,
For though I had to stay on shore
My heart was on the sea.

They stopped at every port to call
From Babylon to Rome,
To load with all the lovely things
We never had at home;

With elephants and ivory
Bought from the Male monarch of Tyre,
And shells and silks and sandal-forest
That sailor men admire;

With figs and dates from Samarcand,
And squatty ginger-jars,
And scented silver amulets
From Indian bazaars;

With saccharide-cane from Port of Spain,
And monkeys from Ceylon,
And paper lanterns from Pekin
With painted dragons on;

With cocoanuts from Zanzibar,
And pines from Singapore;
And when they had unloaded these
They could go back for more.

And even later on I was big
And had to go to school,
My mind was often far away
Aboard the Ships of Yule.

JABBERWOCKY
Lewis Carroll (1832 – 1898)

Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the horogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jujub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersatch.

slithy = slimy + lithe        frumious = furious + fuming    gyre = whirl effectually

THE THOUSANDTH MAN
Rudyard Kipling (1865 – 1936)
One man in a thousand, Solomon says,
Volition stick more close than a brother.
And information technology's worth while seeking him half your days
If you detect him before the other.
9 hundred and ninety-nine depend
On what the world sees in you,
But the Thousandth Homo will stand up your friend
With the whole round world adverse yous.

PIED BEAUTY
 Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844 – 1889)

Glory be to God for dappled things—
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal anecdote-falls; finches' wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.

THE FOG
Carl Sandburg (1878 – 1967)

The fog comes
on little cat anxiety.

It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and so moves on.

POEMS OF Alone DELIGHTS
Tachibana Akemi (1812 – 1868)

What a delight it is
When on the bamboo matting
In my grass-thatched hut,
All on my own,
I make myself at ease.

What a delight it is
When, skimming through the pages
Of a book, I notice
A man written there
Who is just like me.

What a please information technology is
When anybody admits
It'southward a very hard book,
And I understand it
With no problem at all.

What a please it is
When a guest you cannot stand
Arrives, then says to you
"I'm afraid I can't stay long,"
And soon goes home.

IF I CAN End 1 HEART FROM BREAKING
Emily Dickinson (1830 – 1886)

If I can end one Heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease ane Life the Aching,
Or absurd one Hurting,

Or help 1 fainting Robin
Unto his Nest over again,
I shall not alive in Vain.

FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS
John Donne (1572 – 1632)
No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A function of the main.
If a clod be washed abroad by the body of water,
Europe is the less.
Every bit well as if a promontory were.
Equally well every bit if a mode of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man'due south death diminishes me,
For I am involved in flesh.
Therefore, send non to know
For whom the bell tolls,
Information technology tolls for thee.

A RED, RED ROSE
Robbie Burns (1759 – 1796)

O my Luve's similar a red, red rose
That'southward newly sprung in June;
O my Luve's like the melodie
That's sweetly played in melody.

Equally fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in luve am I;
And I volition luve thee still, my dear,
Till a' the seas gang dry:

Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi' the sun;
I will luve thee notwithstanding, my dearest,
While the sands o' life shall run.

And fare thee weel, my just Luve,
And fare thee weel awhile!
And I will come over again, my Luve,
Tho' it ware x one thousand mile.

HARLEM
Langston Hughes (1902 – 1967)

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore—
And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and saccharide over—
similar a syrupy sugariness?

Maybe it simply sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

Winter Pond
Jang Seok-Nam (translated from Korean by Brother Anthony of Taize)

I walk beyond a frozen pond.
Here is where the water-lilies were.
Under here was the black rock where the catfish would hide.
Occasionally a cracking sound equally if information technology is splitting
as love grows deeper.

All the irises are bent over.
My shoulders, knees, anxiety, that all summer long I saw reflected, sitting on this rock, have frozen like the irises.
They too show no sign of having watched the reflection of something before this.
Although the fourteenth-24-hour interval moon comes in its course, icily
all remain silent.

Suppose someone comes along,
loud steps treading on the pond,
and addresses me anxiously, maxim:
"This is where I used to be."
"This is where that star used to come."

MISSING
Lee Jang-Wook
I was gradually delivered to you.
I was born outside of myself.
I could recall nothing, yet
without the to the lowest degree mistake
I began to vanish.
As I walked forth the street
the memory of someone
made my hair stand on end.
Passers-by watched the sight
of my anxiety leaving the ground.
When my eyebrows and lips and fifty-fifty my shoulders
were vanishing impetuously still quietly
someone all of a sudden
in some utterly remote place
looked back.
In the sunlight
I stretched both artillery wide.

THE HIGHWAYMAN (Alfred Noyes)

PART One
I
The current of air was a torrent of darkness amidst the gusty trees,
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,
And the highwayman came riding—
Riding—riding—
The highwayman came riding, upwards to the old inn-door.
II
He'd a French cocked-chapeau on his forehead, a bunch of lace at his chin,
A coat of the claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe-skin;
They fitted with never a wrinkle: his boots were up to the thigh!
And he rode with a jewelled twinkle,
His pistol butts a-twinkle,
His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jewelled heaven.
III
Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark inn-yard,
And he tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was locked and barred;
He whistled a tune to the window, and who should exist waiting there
But the landlord's blackness-eyed daughter,
Bess, the landlord's daughter,
Plaiting a dark cerise dear-knot into her long black hair.
IV
And nighttime in the dark former inn-one thousand a stable-wicket creaked
Where Tim the ostler listened; his face was white and peaked;
His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like mouldy hay,
But he loved the landlord'south daughter,
The landlord's scarlet-lipped daughter,
Dumb as a dog he listened, and he heard the robber say—
V
'One buss, my bonny sweetheart, I'm after a prize to-night,
But I shall be dorsum with the yellow aureate earlier the morning light;
Yet, if they press me sharply, and harry me through the day,
Then look for me by moonlight,
Lookout for me past moonlight,
I'll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way.'
VI
He rose upright in the stirrups; he deficient could reach her hand,
But she loosened her hair i' the casement! His face burnt like a make
As the black cascade of perfume came tumbling over his breast;
And he kissed its waves in the moonlight,
(Oh, sweet, black waves in the moonlight!)
Then he tugged at his rein in the moonliglt, and galloped abroad to the Westward.
Part 2
I
He did not come in the dawning; he did not come at noon;
And out o' the tawny sunset, before the rise o' the moon,
When the route was a gypsy's ribbon, looping the purple moor,
A red-coat troop came marching—
Marching—marching—
King George's men came matching, upward to the old inn-door.
II
They said no word to the landlord, they drank his ale instead,
Merely they gagged his daughter and bound her to the pes of her narrow bed;
Two of them knelt at her casement, with muskets at their side!
At that place was death at every window;
And hell at one dark window;
For Bess could see, through her casement, the road that he would ride.
III
They had tied her up to attention, with many a sniggering jest;
They had bound a musket beside her, with the barrel beneath her breast!
'At present, proceed good watch!' and they kissed her.
She heard the expressionless man say—
Look for me by moonlight;
Spotter for me by moonlight;
I'll come to thee past moonlight, though hell should bar the style!
4
She twisted her easily behind her; but all the knots held proficient!
She writhed her hands till her fingers were wet with sweat or claret!
They stretched and strained in the darkness, and the hours crawled past like years,
Till, at present, on the stroke of midnight,
Cold, on the stroke of midnight,
The tip of i finger touched it! The trigger at least was hers!
5
The tip of ane finger touched information technology; she strove no more for the rest!
Up, she stood up to attention, with the barrel beneath her breast,
She would not risk their hearing; she would not strive again;
For the road lay bare in the moonlight;
Blank and bare in the moonlight;
And the claret of her veins in the moonlight throbbed to her love's refrain .
VI
Tlot-tlot; tlot-tlot! Had they heard it? The horse-hoofs ringing clear;
Tlot-tlot, tlot-tlot, in the altitude? Were they deaf that they did non hear?
Down the ribbon of moonlight, over the brow of the colina,
The highwayman came riding,
Riding, riding!
The red-coats looked to their priming! She stood up, straight and still!

VII

Tlot-tlot, in the frosty silence! Tlot-tlot, in the echoing night!
Nearer he came and nearer! Her face was like a light!
Her eyes grew wide for a moment; she drew 1 last deep jiff,
Then her finger moved in the moonlight,
Her musket shattered the moonlight,
Shattered her chest in the moonlight and warned him—with her death.
8
He turned; he spurred to the West; he did not know who stood
Bowed, with her head o'er the musket, drenched with her own red blood!
Not till the dawn he heard it, his face grew grey to hear
How Bess, the landlord'southward daughter,
The landlord'south black-eyed girl,
Had watched for her love in the moonlight, and died in the darkness there.
Ix
Dorsum, he spurred like a madman, shrieking a curse to the sky,
With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier brandished loftier!
Claret-cherry were his spurs i' the aureate noon; wine-crimson was his velvet coat,
When they shot him down on the highway,
Down like a canis familiaris on the highway,
And he lay in his blood on the highway, with the bunch of lace at his throat.
X
And all the same of a wintertime'due south night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,
When the moon is a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
When the road is a ribbon of moonlight over the imperial moor,
A highwayman comes riding—
Riding—riding—
A highwayman comes riding, upward to the former inn-door.
Xi
Over the cobbles he clatters and clangs in the dark inn-yard;
He taps with his whip on the shutters, merely all is locked and barred;
He whistles a tune to the window, and who should be waiting in that location
But the landlord's black-eyed daughter,
Bess, the landlord's girl,
Plaiting a night red dear-knot into her long black hair.

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