[Jim Moonan]

Lyrics are poems, right, Bob?
Here's an L. Cohen lyric that empties the soul...


Diamonds In The Mine

The woman in blue, she's asking for revenge
The man in white -- that's you -- says he has no friends
The river is swollen up with rusty cans

And the trees are burning in your promised land
And there are no letters in the mailbox
And there are no grapes upon the vine
And there are no chocolates in the boxes anymore
And there are no diamonds in the mine

Well, you tell me that your lover has a broken limb
You say you're kind of restless now and it's on account of him
Well, I saw the man in question, it was just the other night
He was eating up a lady where the lions and Christians fight

And there are no letters in the mailbox
And there are no grapes upon the vine
And there are no chocolates in the boxes anymore
And there are no diamonds in the mine

(You tell them now)

Ah, there is no comfort in the covens of the witch
Some very clever doctor went and sterilized the bitch
And the only man of energy, yes the revolution's pride
He trained a hundred women just to kill an unborn child

And there are no letters in the mailbox
Oh no, there are no, no grapes upon your vine

And there are, there are no chocolates in your boxes anymore
And there are no diamonds in your mine
And there are no letters in the mailbox
And there are no grapes upon the vine
And there are no chocolates in your boxes anymore
And there are no diamonds in your mine

[Roger Slater]

Two of my favorite Emily Dickinson poems are rather depressing, though the fact that they are so good is a countervailing force that cheers me up. The second of these in particular is quite wonderful.




The Heart asks Pleasure – first –
And then – Excuse from Pain –
And then – those little Anodynes
That deaden suffering –

And then – to go to sleep –
And then – if it should be
The will of its Inquisitor
The liberty to die –


**

Finding is the first Act
The second, loss,
Third, Expedition for
The "Golden Fleece"

Fourth, no Discovery --
Fifth, no Crew --
Finally, no Golden Fleece --
Jason -- sham -- too.

[Jim Moonan]

Nag


xxxxxIt

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxdoesn't

xxxxxxxxxmatter

[Erik Olson]

Perhaps my favorite poet to be depressing is George Crabbe; as, for instance, he is in The Village. Far from romanticizing rural swains, his poem is the antithesis of the Idyll. A few excerpts.

The village life, and every care that reigns
O'er youthful peasants and declining swains;
What labour yields, and what, that labour past,
Age, in its hour of languor, finds at last;
What form the real picture of the poor,
Demand a song — The Muse can give no more ...

Ye gentle souls, who dream of rural ease,
Whom the smooth stream and smoother sonnet please;
Go! if the peaceful cot your praises share,
Go look within, and ask if peace be there:
If peace be his — that drooping weary sire,
Or their's, that offspring round their feeble fire;
Or her's, that matron pale, whose trembling hand
Turns on the wretched hearth th' expiring brand ...

Oft may you see him when he tends the sheep,
His winter charge, beneath the hillock, weep;
Oft hear him murmur to the winds that blow
O'er his white locks and bury them in snow;
When, roused by rage and muttering in the morn,
He mends the broken hedge with icy thorn.

"Why do I live, when I desire to be
At once from life and life's long labour free?
Like leaves in spring, the young are blown away,
Without the sorrows of a slow decay;
I, like yon withered leaf, remain behind,
Nipt by the frost, and shivering in the wind;
There it abides till younger buds come on,
As I, now all my fellow-swains are gone;
Then, from the rising generation thrust,
It falls, like me, unnoticed to the dust...

Thus, groan the old, till by disease oppressed,
They taste a final woe, and then they rest.

Theirs is yon house that holds the parish poor,
Whose walls of mud scarce bear the broken door;
There, where the putrid vapours flagging, play,
And the dull wheel hums doleful through the day;
There children dwell who know no parents' care;
Parents, who know no children's love, dwell there;
Heart-broken matrons on their joyless bed,
Forsaken wives and mothers never wed;
Dejected widows with unheeded tears,
And crippled age with more than childhood-fears;
The lame, the blind, and, far the happiest they!
The moping idiot and the madman gay.

Here too the sick their final doom receive,
Here brought, amid the scenes of grief, to grieve,
Where the loud groans from some sad chamber flow,
Mixed with the clamours of the crowd below;
Here sorrowing, they each kindred sorrow scan,
And the cold charities of man to man:
Whose laws indeed for ruined age provide,
And strong compulsion plucks the scrap from pride;
But still that scrap is bought with many a sigh,
And pride embitters what it can't deny.

Say ye, oppressed by some fantastic woes,
Some jarring nerve that baffles your repose;
Who press the downy couch, while slaves advance
With timid eye, to read the distant glance;
Who with sad prayers the weary doctor tease
To name the nameless ever-new disease;
Who with mock patience dire complaints endure,
Which real pain, and that alone can cure;
How would ye bear in real pain to lie,
Despised, neglected, left alone to die?
How would ye bear to draw your latest breath,
Where all that's wretched paves the way for death?

Such is that room which one rude beam divides,
And naked rafters form the sloping sides;
Where the vile bands that bind the thatch are seen,
And lath and mud is all that lie between;
Save one dull pane, that, coarsely patched, gives way
To the rude tempest, yet excludes the day:
Here, on a matted flock, with dust o'erspread,
The drooping wretch reclines his languid head;
For him no hand the cordial cup applies,
Or wipes the tear that stagnates in his eyes;
No friends with soft discourse his pain beguile,
Or promise hope till sickness wears a smile.

But soon a loud and hasty summons calls,
Shakes the thin roof, and echoes round the walls;
Anon, a figure enters, quaintly neat,
All pride and business, bustle and conceit;
With looks unaltered by these scenes of woe,
With speed that entering, speaks his haste to go;
He bids the gazing throng around him fly,
And carries fate and physic in his eye;
A potent quack, long versed in human ills,
Who first insults the victim whom he kills;
Whose murd'rous hand a drowsy bench protect,
And whose most tender mercy is neglect.

[RCL]

My Missing Muse

Asking her to sing again
makes my words mere wind
that is yet to move again
as if I've somehow sinned.

And then when my words move again
they barely rise as sound
and I invoke my Muse again
who’s nowhere to be found!

[William A. Baurle]

For the Ten Billionth Time

We're born, we live, we die, we're dust.
It isn't just, or unjust, just
the way it is, and that is it.
We're all wormfood. Who gives a shit?

[Erik Olson]

Dark Quatrain

The chamber’s mouth turns things around,
six shots, six echoed blasts rebound
to balance out each last affront
against ourselves. We seem to hunt;

foregoing words, our shots resound.
The chamber’s mouth turns things around,
tongue-hammering hollow points, a ton
till justice is seen to be done.

The Wild West turned into law,
on any thief, a man may draw,
the chamber’s mouth turns things around,
the loser’s voice is all but drowned.

The tension on the schoolboy heightens
until his trigger finger tightens
and bully falls dead on the ground,
the chamber’s mouth turned things around.

f

[William A. Baurle]

Impressive, Erik.

[William A. Baurle]

The saddest things ever written were put to song. Here are three VERY sad and ultimately depressing works:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kSrV_CubiQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iN9CjAfo5n0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3dapDTDJzk

The Gary Moore (last link, with the amazing Bob Daisley - who composed most of Ozzy's first album and didn't get credit, thanks to Sharon Osbourne) is particularly sad. And he was an incredible songwriter and guitarist, who went virtually unnoticed.

[Ann Drysdale]

If I should die

I shall try not to die. This is a given.
Part of the basic programme of instruction
Built into me with the accreting cells
At the beginning.

But I will have to in the end. Things do.
Meanwhile I try from time to time to guess
How it will come and what will happen, after
The lights go out.

I don’t do souls. I work in certainties
Although I wouldn’t rule out altogether
The interesting possibility.
One never knows.

I live alone, along with a small dog.
If I am taken unexpectedly
He won’t know how to jury-rig a flag
Or use the phone.

I don’t believe he’ll grieve. He’ll whine a bit
When he wants out. He’ll feel the need for food.
My immobility will represent
A broken promise.

Flesh will cool, stiffen, soften, become meat
And deliquesce into the irresistible.
Dog will decide I have at last provided
And will partake.

When famine follows feast, he will succumb;
Probably at my side. Nature, who wastes nothing
Will send in other, smaller, needy things
To tidy up.

However the end ends – Bailiffs, Police –
We will be waiting in the dusty dark;
A rough pile of assorted spillikins
And a hairy biscuit.