Anyone here had to recite?

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 26 Sep 00 - 07:09 PM

On Ozymandias - pass - only ever learned the two lines quoted!!

Somethng that came out of the dim and distant depths today - a poem that ends - and the slow steady work of 200 years, is ended in less than two hours.

It's called Throwing a tree, by Thomas Hardy, and is one of the few things of his that I can stomach.... anyone else ever heard of it? Can anyone point me to a copy of it - it doesn't appear in the anthologies I have, and the one book I know has it (the complete poems of TH) is out of print.

LTS

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: A Wandering Minstrel
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 08:56 AM

Naemenson:

Its not so much a poem as an anecdote. you start with some sort of plausible reason for discarding the scotch (past its sellby date or whatever) then you go through the repitition becoming more visibly drunken with each repetition

so:

I opened up the first bottle, thought I had better try it so I had a glass, then I threw the rest away down the sink

I opened up the nex bo'le, Had a glass(hic) and threw the rest away down the, down the ...sink

about bottle 5 its:

I oped...opend the next glass, thought I better try... , drank a sink and poured it down a bottle (hic)

Ultimately the reciter is clearly smashed out of their brain and still trying to go through the repitition. you can end by either collapsing or quitting the stage to the accompaniement of violent retching. It's all in the way you tell it, if you can have a correspondingly deteriorating repeated sequence of opening, drinking and pouring which is at odds to the words it helps

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 11:11 AM

To see this sort of thing done RIGHT, you need to see the old Red Skelton sketch, "Smoooooth!". He's supposedly going to do a television spot for Guzzler's Gin, and after a short snort he says, "Smooth! Guzzler's Gin!" But there has to be a retake. and a retake. et cetera. He gets progressively more smashed, and of course the punch line to each stage is Smooth".."SMOOTH!"... Smooooth!"... and finally "Schmoooooooo-oooo-ooth!" and he collapses, as I recall.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 11:19 AM

Come to think more about about it, the name of the sketch was "Guzzler's Gin", not "Smoooth!" A distinction without a difference, I guess, but I thought I'd set it straight.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: NightWing
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 12:58 PM

*LOL* (Bawdy story warning)

A funny story about recitation: I've memorized numerous bits and pieces here and there. (This member of the Borogoves is resting under the Tum-Tum Tree in uffish thought. *G*) About a year ago I wanted to put together a performance piece for an oddball sort of club I belong to.

And I memorized "Eskimo Nell".

  When a man grows old and his balls grow cold
  And the tip of his tool turns blue
  And it bends in the middle like a one-stringed fiddle,
  He can tell you a tale or two.
  
  So pull up a chair and stand me a drink
  And a tale to you I'll tell ...
  Of Mexican Pete and Dead-Eye Dick
  And a harlot called Eskimo Nell.
  
  .
  .
  .
  [100 verses or so later]
  When a man grows old and his balls grow cold
  And the tip of his tool turns blue
  And the hole in the middle refuses to piddle,
  Well, I'd say he was f***ed, wouldn't you?
  

If anyone doesn't know it, "Eskimo Nell" is a LOOOOONG poem (rather Service-esque, but I don't know who wrote it) about a sexual contest between Dead-eye Dick and Eskimo Nell. (Nell wins.)

Thing of it is, this oddball sort of club is the Hash House Harriers. We call ourselves "the drinking club with a running problem." If you've never heard of it, think of a rugby club for runners.

Memorizing a poem this long well enough that you can do it drunk takes some SERIOUS memorization, and I worked at it for nearly six months before I had the nerve to try it. I got it off okay, though.

About two months AFTER my first try with it, I had surgery on my foot. It was out-patient surgery, so I didn't see the doctor or his staff for several days after they cut on me. When I went back into the doctor's office for my first checkup after, the nurses were sort of chuckling at me. I asked why and one of them explained that under the sedative I had recited poetry. I asked what and she blushed. So I guessed what it must have been and started in on "Eskimo Nell"; she blushed scarlet and practically ran out of the room giggling.

So I figure that's what it probably was. But I still wonder: I got it right when I was dead drunk. Did I get it right even under sedation?

NightWing

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: NightWing
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 01:02 PM

Whoops! Forgot you need line breaks in a pre block:

    When a man grows old and his balls grow cold
    And the tip of his tool turns blue
    And it bends in the middle like a one-stringed fiddle,
    He can tell you a tale or two.
  
    So pull up a chair and stand me a drink
    And a tale to you I'll tell ...
    Of Mexican Pete and Dead-Eye Dick
    And a harlot called Eskimo Nell.
  
        .
        .
        .
      [100 verses or so later]
  
    When a man grows old and his balls grow cold
    And the tip of his tool turns blue
    And the hole in the middle refuses to piddle,
    Well, I'd say he was f***ed, wouldn't you?
  

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: rabbitrunning
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 02:55 PM

Being drunk and being sedated are very similar actually. (Which is why alcoholics give anaesthestists fits.) So you probably got it just as "right" in the one state as in the other.

Now, where do I find the rest of the verses?

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: NightWing
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 03:42 PM

Somebody in the Humorous Sex Songs thread posted this URL and I found it there.

The Index ...
... And Eskimo Nell herself

This version has several verses not in the version I memorized. Back to it, I guess.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 28 Sep 00 - 03:29 AM

It has been attributed to Robert Service. It was cetainly written by a poet of sorts, and not a rugger player!

Steve

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: sian, west wales
Date: 28 Sep 00 - 05:55 AM

If we're talkin' monologues as well as poems, I'm rather partial to Whose on First? and Niagara Falls! - neither of which raise a glimmer of understanding on this side (Europe) of the Atlantic. (sigh)

sian

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: sian, west wales
Date: 28 Sep 00 - 05:56 AM

oops. Quick self-correction: those two are actually dialogues, aren't they? Takes two...

sian

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: The Walrus at work
Date: 28 Sep 00 - 01:06 PM

AAAAARRRRGGGHHHH!!!!!

Ever since I read this thread, I've had the piece I was forced to recite at school trying to force its way out of its locked down quarentine area buried in the depths of my memory.

"Slowly, silently, now the Moon "Walks the night in her silver shoon, "This way and that, she peers and sees "Silver fruit upon silver trees......"

An appalling piece (IMHO) made worse by never being explained, it was years before I discovered that "silver shoon" were shoes and not a description of moon light.

Give me Kipling every time.

Regards

Walrus

Subject: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: Joe Offer
Date: 28 Sep 00 - 02:06 PM

This is a continuation of this thread (click)

---

A peculiar bird is the pelican
His beak can hold more than his belly can
He stores food in his beak
That's enough for a week
And I don't see how in the hell he can.

---

I always thought this was written by Ogden Nash, but this site (click) contends otherwise.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 28 Sep 00 - 04:39 PM

Moses supposes his toeses are roses
But Moses supposes erroneously.
For Moses, he knowses his toeses aren't roses
As Moses supposes his toeses to be!

and another:

The breezes, the breezes, they blow through the treeses
They blow the girls' skirtses above the girls' kneeses.
The college man seeses and does what he pleases
And spreads the diseases--oh Jeezes, oh Jeezes!!

The things you learn in eighth grade!

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: Micca
Date: 28 Sep 00 - 05:14 PM

Liz, just for you as a sort of belated Birthday prezzie

OZYMANDIAS OF EGYPT
By P.B. Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert: Near them on the sand
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survived stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal these words appear:
'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings;
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 28 Sep 00 - 07:28 PM

Just what I've always wanted....

Gnarly and bent and deaf as a post,
Poor ol' Hezekiah Purvis
Goeth slowly up the hill,
And to the communion service.

Then tippy tappy up the isle,
With knobby stick and brassy furile,
And Pa'son has to croopy down,
An' holler in his yer'ole.

No idea who wrote it, had to learn it for school, got a gold star and a funny look - everyone else did something about daffodils.

LTS

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: GUEST,sybil
Date: 28 Sep 00 - 08:18 PM

Rats! They fought the dogs and killed the cats. And killed the babies in their cradles, And ate the cheese out of the vats, And drank the soup from the cooks own ladles. Split open the kegs of salted sprats, Made nests inside men's Sunday hats And even spoiled the women's meeting By drowning their speaking in shrieking and squeaking In fifty different sharps and flats.

Grade 5 and it still rolls off the tongue full of sibilants. Robert Browning from the Pied Piper of Hamelyn. We did the daffodils of course. But what I really like from those days are the clapping, skipping and other rhymes from the schoolyard like-

Nobody likes me Everybody hates me Think I'll go and eat some worms Big ones, small ones, skinny ones fat ones Worms that squiggle and squirm Rip their heads off Suck their blood and throw their skins away Nobody knows how I enjoy eating worms three times a day.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: GUEST,me
Date: 02 Apr 06 - 11:39 PM

hey, look! I'm getting involved with this conversation six years after it happened! It's like the twilight zone!

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 Feb 07 - 02:21 PM

refresh - some great stuff in this thread!

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Feb 07 - 04:32 PM

Yes indeed! I had almost forgotten that Joe had found the recitation my father did. Copied & saved...now I have to finish learning it.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 Feb 07 - 05:40 PM

It is a wonderful one, Bill, but I think, sadly, the references would be lost to so many of the younger folks. Maybe not...I may be too melancholy for it, today.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: Gurney
Date: 12 Feb 07 - 01:51 AM

I used to do lots of monologues, of the sort associated with Stanley Holloway. The audience preferred them to my singing.


Funny, that.

Think I'll go and see if Paul's site on monologues is still up.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: GUEST,Darowyn
Date: 12 Feb 07 - 04:45 AM

I can do "Albert and the Lion" from memory- I've always found memorising poems and lyrics very easy though.
The only problem came when I was sitting in on a session where some friends going to sing "Black Velvet Band", and I lead off with
"There's a famous seaside place called Blackpool,
That's noted for fresh air and fun...."
Cheers
Dave

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: Folkiedave
Date: 12 Feb 07 - 05:16 AM

There was a man in Huddersfield
Who had a cow that wouldn't yield
The reason why it wouldn't yield,
It didn't like its udders feeled.

Heard from John Foreman.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: GUEST,Mark Dowding at work
Date: 12 Feb 07 - 08:19 AM

Following on from "Daffodils" in the previous thread, Peter Maloney - a Liverpool teacher who did talks about language came up with this parody which my dad does on occasions after first reciting the original:

I wandered dozy with my cart
Up Brownlow hill to take me welt
When of a sudden I seed a tart
That almost made my eyeballs melt

Hey dere girl be my bird
My throat went dry like at the word
What other Judy could I take in through the ale house door each night
What other guy would not go all green with envy at the sight

Jet white of hair with orange gob
Cheeks a rosy purple blob
No more sexy she could look
Than pictures in a drawing book

And as she walked her hips were rockin'
My heart was pounding something shockin'
I looked and looked - oh what a twit
It surely learned me - didn' it
That whilst this Judy stole my heart
Some other swine had robbed my cart!

(Best recited in a scouse accent)

At junior school, the teacher used to put poems on the board for us to copy into our books - some of them stuck - or bits of them which makes me go looking for them 35 years later!

Cheers
Mark

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: Alec
Date: 12 Feb 07 - 08:37 AM

The North wind doth blow
And we shall have snow
And what shall the Robin do then,poor thing?
He'll hide in a barn
And keep himself warm
With his head tucked under his wing
Poor thing.
My public speaking debut.Aged 4

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: mack/misophist
Date: 12 Feb 07 - 09:43 AM

There were three wise men of Gotham
Who went to sea in a bowl...








If the bowl had been stronger,
The storey'd be longer.



For those with poor memories.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: Fliss
Date: 12 Feb 07 - 10:00 AM

When I was in the VI form at Shrewsbury High School we had an eccentric master from Shrewsbury School who taught us for the university entrance English exam. We did 'spells'- words for the sounds rather than meaning. We had a poem a week to learn. Then 'volunteered' to recite standing on a chair. We learned a lot of Auden and TS Elliot also ee cummings.

Ive always loved poetry and have written my own since those days.

Beware! Beware!
his flashing eyes! his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
and close your eyes with holy dread!
for he on honey-dew hath fed,
and drunk the milk of Paradise.

XANADU- THE BALLAD OF KUBLA KHAN

Poem by SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE

Only we said her instead of him.
---------------------------------
Anyone lived in a pretty how town
-- E. E. Cummings

anyone lived in a pretty how town
(with up so floating many bells down)
spring summer autumn winter
he sang his didn't he danced his did.

Women and men(both little and small)
cared for anyone not at all
they sowed their isn't they reaped their same
sun moon stars rain

children guessed(but only a few
and down they forgot as up they grew
autumn winter spring summer)
that noone loved him more by more

when by now and tree by leaf
she laughed his joy she cried his grief
bird by snow and stir by still
anyone's any was all to her

someones married their everyones
laughed their cryings and did their dance
(sleep wake hoe and then)they
said their nevers and they slept their dream

stars rain sun moon
(and only the snow can begin to explain
how children are apt for forget to remember
with up so floating many bells down)

one day anyone died i guess
(and noone stooped to kiss his face)
busy folk buried them side by side
little by little and was by was

all by all and deep by deep
and more by more they dream their sleep
noone and anyone earth by april
wish by spirit and if by yes.

Women and men(both dong and ding)
summer autumn winter spring
reaped their sowing and went their came
sun moon stars rain


enjoy fxx

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 12 Feb 07 - 10:18 AM

When I was about ten years old, every kid in the class of 30 had to recite the Storming of Ratisbon. (Talk about tedious!) I believe it was by Browning. I'm sure most of us had no understanding of what the poem was actually about.

We got our revenge by doing this. The poet wrote:

"I'm killed, sire!" and with his chief beside,
Smiling the boy fell dead.

We recited:

"I'm killed, sire!" and with his chief beside, smiling.
The boy fell dead.

Feeble, yes, but we were doing what we could.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: Gurney
Date: 13 Feb 07 - 02:31 AM

Darowyn, it might be a good idea to mug up 'Albert comes back.' I've had a couple of tots get quite concerned.

Like the amalgam, though. Wonder if I can think of a chorus.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite - Part 2
From: JennyO
Date: 13 Feb 07 - 06:02 AM

I remember a poem we had to recite in primary school, and I vividly remember exactly the singsong way we used to say it:

A Greeeen Cornfield.

Byyyyyyyyee

Christiiina Ro-ssetti

AAAAAAAAARRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!!

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: GUEST,Frank proctor
Date: 19 May 11 - 06:30 PM

brilliant thank Q this as bin wi me for so meny years av tort mi famly it in a scous aksent i herd it on a LP HOW TO TALK SCOUS PROPER av bin lookin for it for over 35 yer once agen tar very much frank    [brownlow hill] xxx

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: MorwenEdhelwen1
Date: 19 May 11 - 06:45 PM

In drama lessons at my school, recitation is part of developing acting skills. I took drama lessons after school in Year 7.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: MorwenEdhelwen1
Date: 19 May 11 - 07:10 PM

And there was also a time when the whole class had to recite poems. I recited this:
Excerpts from The Song of Beren and Luthien (JRR Tolkien). The last few stanzas in fact.
Yes, I am a huge Tolkien fan! That's how I got my username:).
Found in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, in the chapter "A Knife In The Dark" in Book 1.

He sought her ever, wandering far,
Where leaves of years were thickly strewn,
By light of moon and ray of star
In frosty heavens shivering.
Her mantle glinted in the moon
As on a hill-top high and far,
She danced, and at her feet was strewn,
A mist of silver quivering.

When winter passed, she came again,
And her song released the sudden spring,
Like rising lark and falling rain,
And melting water bubbling.
He saw the Elven-flowers spring
About her feet, and healed again,
He longed by her to dance and sing,
Upon the grass untroubling.

Again she fled, but swift he came,
Tinuviel! Tinuviel!
He called her by her elvish name;
And there she halted listening;
One moment stood she, and then a spell
His voice laid on her; Beren came,
And doom fell on Tinuviel
That in his arms lay glistening.

As Beren looked into her eyes,
Within the shadows of her hair,
The trembling starlight of the skies
He saw there mirrored shimmering.
Tinuviel the elven-fair,
Immortal maiden elven-wise;
About him cast her shadowy hair
And arms like silver glimmering.

Long was the way that fate them bore,
O'er stony mountains cold and grey,
Through halls of iron and darkling door,
and woods of nightshade morrowless.
The Sundering Seas between them lay,
And yet at last they met once more,
And long ago they passed away
In the forest singing sorrowless.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: MorwenEdhelwen1
Date: 19 May 11 - 07:29 PM

In Australia, at least, recitation of poems has not died out. However, students are not required to recite specific poems.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: LadyJean
Date: 19 May 11 - 11:08 PM

Like my father, I am afflicted with an eidetic memory and a fondness for performing.

Dad, as a grade school student was told to memorize and recite so many lines of poetry. He learned a part of Rudyard Kipling's "The Ballad of East and West", ending his recitation on and.

In 1989, I recited most of "Barbara Frietchie" in honor of the centennial of the Carnegie Library of Braddock, Pa. Which was Andrew Carnegie's first library.

Being dubiously blessed as I am, there is a lot of verse stored between my ears. I once learned a rude limerick while sitting on a friend's toilet. I still know it. I still know "Mrs. Ocean Takes In Washing" that I had to learn in the third grade, and the several poems I memorized in grade school because I liked them. Oh yeah, I still know Barbar Freitchie, and all my lines from "Our Town" that we did in high school.

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 19 May 11 - 11:24 PM

On April 22 (Earth Day) the local Catholic school invited me to read for the eighth grade for the Read Across America program. I was honored, since I heard that Michelle Obama was reading in the same program. I read a selection of poetry (Ogden Nash, Robert W. Service, Edwin Arlington Robinson, Arlo Guthrie, et al.), along with a short story by Isaac Bashevis Singer. The kids loved it, and I had a wonderful time.
-Joe-

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: Kent Davis
Date: 20 May 11 - 11:30 PM

Here are some of the recitations which my homeschooled daughters (ages 10 and 16) have learned: "When the Frost is on the Punkin", "Barbara Frietchie", "The Weather", "What is Pink", "Who Has Seen The Wind", "The Little Turtle", "Jemima" (There Was a Little Girl), "Psalm 1" (Blessed Is the Man), "Psalm 23" (The Lord Is My Shepherd), and Deuteronomy 6:4-9 (the Shema).

Kent

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: GUEST,Desi C
Date: 21 May 11 - 02:54 PM

Having once suffered from Chronic stage fright, these days I could probably sing in front of any audience. But though I enjoy poetry and have had some poems published, I don't think I could recite a poem or a monologue in front of an audience! odd eh. Anyone else like that?

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: SINSULL
Date: 29 May 11 - 09:06 AM

Quick as it fell from the broken staff
Dame Barbara grabbed the silken scarf
She leaned far out on the window sill and
Shook it forth with a royal will. "Shoot if you must this old grey head
But spare your country's flag" she said.
A shade of sadness
A touch of shame
Over the face of the leader came.
"Who touches a hair on yon grey head
Dies like a dog
March on!" he said.

Barbara Fritchie

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Sep 16 - 06:45 PM

an anonymous brow beaten, clubbed, denigrated, emasculated, fiend fashioned, geeky homeboy, ill lust traded, jabbering, kooky, liberal minded nonestablishmentarian:
--------------------------------------------------------------------

America boastfulness? capitalistic depravity? egoistic fanaticism? glorified hucksterism? indomitable gerrymandering?
and the list goes on...tracing and bending backward in time when might equaled right, and those debonair, powered/ pomaded hair, leer ring kings of leon drove a stake into the heart of innocence and purity, when ruthless, selfish, and treachery wrenched indigenous occupants of these lands,

THUS....

Touchdown for Colin Kaepernick

noah rant, rave or rabid byte zing
er, from yet another web cruiser
   so, i haint another B52, 747, nor boo wing
brouhaha against your choice against salute ting
the Stars and Stripes, where many
   online patriot game watchers wanna swing
you with a sucker punch or pistol whip ya over the head
   until each ear doth ring
heard all the way back to reign of the Qing
Dynasty, where ye might be revered
   cuz ja got tackled as a traitor with endless har ping
from many another maniacal mechanical motormouth
   from a New Yawk borough, or the enclave of Ossining
freely tossing in their two sense like nattering
nabobs of negativity from....across the states mandating
that ye (WHO OWN the INALIENABLE RIGHT of
   FREE EXPRESSION - non verbal or otherwise)
   once the storied, paraded, mollycoddled dar ling
now ardent fans fanatically go berserk and rogue
   with raucous, obnoxious and libelous king
   size bully tactics demanding
   you plant right hand over left breast
   (and play by the unspoken rules of JINGOISM)
   i.e. unquestioned obeisance toupee hair raising homage
   like discordant jangling
which personal preference suddenly dominate ing
jamming mass media communication -
   with billions of dollars riding buckshot revering Old Glory,
    newscasters getting a run for their money to the end zone
unsolicited absolute horror at such blatant traitorous actions
   when such a decorated, gussied, kickstarter undeserving
to be held in high esteem, BUT I APPLAUD self expression
   (and if in the klieg lights, i would act likewise) giving
thee nonestablishmentarian stance of mine a forwarding
pass, that got hurled around the globe exploding
wrathful gripes sullying America especially during
a poignant moment to such bonobo monkeys that cling
for dear life to false sense of grandeur AND exploitation bing
blithe to the turf wars imposed by fore fathers long since aging
   in mausoleums, who did rent asunder plunder, pillage and rape
   under the aegis of imperialism.
   YOU GO COLIN!

Subject: RE: Anyone here had to recite?
From: Jeri
Date: 02 Sep 16 - 08:32 PM

Two things:
1) I think this deserves its own thread, and
2) It's really, really good. If you don't like what it says, it's still an amazingly good poem.
...end of things.

Guest did you write this or find it?