No matter where I came from, I say,
No matter where I go,
To me what matter is where I am on this day
Let me identify myself now
Songsters both and both clad in brown
The hermit thrush and I dwell far out of town
Death, when you come to me,
May you come to me swiftly
I would rather not linger, not linger.
Driving with air doctor one day for the air
He recircled the square before he taught me
How to square the very same circle.
You are opportunist the very worst way
Therefore, I pray,
Let it pay for you to know me.
I do not dress as I do to attract attention,
I attract attention because I dress as I do.
You the vandal plunder the village as you will
The earthworm will pillage you the vandal,
When you are under.
I would bow down before just one:
One who bows down before none.
I should know who that one might be,
Who would do that to me.
I am that one
And I bow down before me.
Since the hunter is the hunted,
Surely, he knows what it is to listen in ecstatic dread
To some oncoming hunter's tread.
Such and such is a star
That filters through the starry blue alone
A burning star, turning in an orbit all of its own
Such and such as I.
Beasts were always great trail-blazing engineers.
Modern engineering would do well to do as well today,
As well as beasts have done.
If on this rock I stand alone,
Loneliness will turn heel as he turns to stone.
Each today is yesterday's tomorrow,
Which is now.
Now is all I have, now is all I need,
Now is all I want,
Now.
Better I go when you would that I stay, that I stay on,
Than stay when you would that I would go.
Better I go than stay.
Ebb and flow of the ocean,
Love and hate of emotion,
Nothing lasts is my refrain,
As the moon is my feelings wax and wane,
I remain calm.
I was just everything until I fell,
And was just nothing.
Then, worming up half-way,
I found with pleasure:
I was just something.
Standing at the door of my departure I observed
That your eyes belie all that you have said,
For you are still in love with me.
Then, when recognition comes,
You will take my muse, take her to his bed of ease,
Have his will, have his fill,
And strangle her.
My tiny butterfly butters my bread,
My browny flutterby keeps me well-fed,
Why should I mutter?
Stung by this last rebuff,
I rebound
On the way back I hear me saying to myself,
Dwell in your shell.
One thing about life be it said,
It feeds upon itself over and over
And of itself is fed.
Should I love you the way I love myself,
Suppose I hate myself,
I would be as free to hate you, too.
I am never quite educated,
Never quite so,
But I am ever in the painful process
Of becoming so.
You remember me and my song.
Only such immortality strikes creative sparks from my soul,
Because of you.
Who could wear out their welcome there,
Where there is no welcome there to wear out.
There is where it is,
Here on earth.
I would advise you not to generalize as a rule,
A-hoo to be!
I have just entered a generalization,
Ah-me!
Down is up and so up is down.
Because the earth is round,
There is no such a thing as up or down.
This one wish is ever so near to my heart,
But oh, so far away from my tongue.
Sadness was so mixed with gladness that she wept for joy,
She was so sad.
Tear-filled eyes but enhanced a smile on her face.
She was so glad.
Think of all of the thoughts that I think.
They are naught to me, compared with just one fleeting thought of you.
How could I fear for my last day when I am dying daily,
And have been since my first day?
Thus, the clown wore cap and gown
For she lived by degrees while she died by degrees
With a frown.
Voices of spring were in chorus,
Each voice was singing a song.
I could not sing in that chorus
Until I wrote me a song.
I wrote my song and joined the throng.
Why besiege my liege still further?
For my wooing is turning your majesty's royal head
And turning toward me.
Though I climbed up the highest mountain in view,
Yet contentment was not mine,
For beyond, a mountain still higher was looming.
Now is that painful moment of parting we dreaded.
Saying goodbye is plural indemnity, truly,
Of having said hello.