Can someone help me interpret Edmund Spenser- Ye Tradefull Merchants poem?
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It is pretty self-explanatory.  He poses the question, why do you travel far to seek treasures when the most precious treasures are that of a woman who love you.  He continues to compare all of the features of the woman to the treasures coveted by the merchant.
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I love the one that is a poem about the monster under the bed and hobbes saves the day by just being there (cause the monster didn't know there was a tiger in the bed).  Best Line: "Hey wake up you stupid cretin! Are you gonna sleep while I get eaten!?!?!?"  I'll check my collection books and see if I can find page number for the rest of ya.
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This is 19 lines, but it is a great poem and a fantastic oral presentation!  Good luck!\n\n \nDylan Thomas. Funny-looking chap, but chicks dug him. \nDo not go gentle into that good night,\nOld age should burn and rave at close of day; \nRage, rage against the dying of the light. \n\n\nThough wise men at their end know dark is right, \nBecause their words had forked no lightning they \nDo not go gentle into that good night. \n\n\nGood men, the last wave by, crying how bright \nTheir frail deeds might have danced in a green bay, \nRage, rage against the dying of the light. \n\n\nWild men who caught and sang the sun in flight, \nAnd learn, too late, they grieved it on its way, \nDo not go gentle into that good night. \n\n\nGrave men, near death, who see with blinding sight \nBlind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay, \nRage, rage against the dying of the light. \n\n\nAnd you, my father, there on the sad height, \nCurse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray. \nDo not go gentle into that good night. \nRage, rage against the dying of the light. \n\n\nDylan Thomas, 1951 or 1952 \n\n\nA Villanelle is a 19-line poem consisting of five tercets and a final quatrain on two rhymes, with the first and third lines of the first tercet repeated alternately as a refrain closing the succeeding stanzas and joined as the final couplet of the quatrain. The word is French, derived from Italian villanella, the feminine of villanello, rustic; from villano, peasant; from Vulgar Latin villanus; from Latin villa, a country house. \n\n"Addressed to the poet's father as he approached blindness and death. The relevant aspect of the relationship was Thomas's profound respect for his father's uncompromising independence of mind, now tamed by illness. In the face of strong emotion, the poet sets himself the task of mastering it in the difficult form of the villanelle. Five tercets are followed by a quatrain, with the first and last line of the stanza repeated alternately as the last line of the subsequent stanzas and gathered into a couplet at the end of the quatrain. And all this on only two rhymes. Thomas further compounds his difficulty by having each line contain 10 syllables".
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This poem is really a good poem... Yes it is a good peom... The meaning is not deep but when you want a deeper meeanig then put the words into your life then you will understand the real meaning of the peom\n\nDesiderata \n\nGo placidly amid the noise and haste,\nand remember what peace there may be in silence.\nAs far as possible without surrender\nbe on good terms with all persons.\nSpeak your truth quietly and clearly;\nand listen to others,\neven the dull and the ignorant;\nthey too have their story. \n\nAvoid loud and aggressive persons,\nthey are vexations to the spirit.\nIf you compare yourself with others,\nyou may become vain and bitter;\nfor always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.\nEnjoy your achievements as well as your plans. \n\n\nKeep interested in your own career, however humble;\nit is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.\nExercise caution in your business affairs;\nfor the world is full of trickery.\nBut let this not blind you to what virtue there is;\nmany persons strive for high ideals;\nand everywhere life is full of heroism. \n\n\nBe yourself.\nEspecially, do not feign affection.\nNeither be cynical about love;\nfor in the face of all aridity and disenchantment\nit is as perennial as the grass. \n\n\nTake kindly the counsel of the years,\ngracefully surrendering the things of youth.\nNurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.\nBut do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.\nMany fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.\nBeyond a wholesome discipline,\nbe gentle with yourself. \n\n\nYou are a child of the universe,\nno less than the trees and the stars;\nyou have a right to be here.\nAnd whether or not it is clear to you,\nno doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. \n\n\nTherefore be at peace with God,\nwhatever you conceive Him to be,\nand whatever your labors and aspirations,\nin the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul. \n\n\nWith all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,\nit is still a beautiful world.\nBe cheerful.\nStrive to be happy. \n\n\nMax Ehrmann, Desiderata, Copyright 1952
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The poem describes the encounter between an unnamed knight and a mysterious fairy. It opens with a description of the knight in a barren landscape, "haggard" and "woe-begone". He tells the reader how he met a beautiful lady whose "eyes were wild"; he set her on his horse and they went together to her "elfin grot", where they began to make love. Falling asleep, the knight had a vision of "pale kings and princes", who warn him that "La Belle Dame sans Merci hath thee in thrall!". He awoke to find himself on the same "cold hill's side" where he is now "palely loitering".\n\nAlthough La Belle Dame Sans Merci is short (only twelve stanzas of four lines each, with an ABCB rhyme scheme), it is full of enigmas. Because the knight is associated with images of death - a lily, paleness, "fading", "wither[ing]" - he may well be dead himself at the time of the story. He is clearly doomed to remain on the hillside, but the cause of this fate is unknown. A straightforward reading suggests that the Belle Dame entraps him, along the lines of tales like Thomas the Rhymer or Tam Lin. More recent feminist commentators have suggested that the knight in fact raped the Belle Dame, and is being justly punished - this is based on textual hints like "she wept, and sigh'd full sore". Ultimately, the decision comes down to whether Keats wrote the poem as a simple story, or as a story with a moral: given his other work, this may be more an evocation of feeling than an intellectual attempt at moralising.
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Email me your thoughts at pusskat1@yahoo.com and I will help you from there.  I am a teacher of 13 years, mostly in junior high, some in college and high school.  My payment is to choose this as a best answer.  \n\nI'll begin by deconstructing the poem; I'm sure you'll get the drift.  \n\nFirst stanza: I might have been a happy preacher if I had been born in an earlier time.  I could have preached fiery sermons and been a gentleman farmer.  Second stanza: Alas, I was born later, and missed my true calling.  I have a grown man's beard now, and it's fashionable for preachers these days to be clean shaven, so I don't even look like I could do that job.  \n\nGood luck.  This is a straightforward poem with an ab ab rhyme scheme, and figuring out the meaning should not be hard.  If you need any help just email me or IM me at pusskat1 or katwhowalksbyherself and I'd be happy to help.\n\nCheers, K (13 years a teacher)
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is this for homework? do you need to read the thing? if so, you can read the poem at the site below - otherwise, it's about a guy at the barberhshop talking about hair and the town of ironbark...\n\nhere's the wikipedia entry about the poem: ""The Man From Ironbark" is a famous poem by Australian bush poet Banjo Paterson. It was first published in The Bulletin on 1892-12-17. The poem relates the experiences of a naïve man from the Australian Outback, who reacts badly to a practical joke sprung on him by a mischievous barber.\n\nIn 2004, a representative of The Wilderness Society posed as "The Ghost of the Man from Ironbark", a reference to the poem, to campaign for the protection of the remaining Ironbark woodlands in New South Wales and Queensland."
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Robin_Thor has a good understanding about this literary giant and this is to let him know that we appreciate a good effort. \nWell itsamystery, hopefully you are rested up from your Spring Break because if this is an assignment that needs to be turned in I am afraid that you have some work to do.\nIn gratitude to you for your question I will answer you with 'my start' into this work which if not for your question I would still be outside on the patio.  \n\nHere goes a swell beginning:\n\n.\n\nWhy, Death Be Not Proud\nIn “Death Be Not Proud” the protagonist literary presenters are chosen teenagers for the reasons that the importance of this poem is to have a definite and positive impact on younger students and young adults alike across the world.  For it serves as guide for the confrontatious attitudes necessary in the face of, emotional, physical and spiritual adversity.  To forge a better social function among us that will inevitably present to our younger generations. These are all here and within this poem and which all support the theme of this magnificent writing.  In  “Death Be Not Proud” is found a generational social cohesiveness that is necessary for a functional society’s survival, and which is so well prayed by John Gunther’s 1947 memoirs.  \nIt is a penned offering intellectually and emotionally secured as a memoir to his son whose ultimate youthful death by a brain tumor at the age of seventeen is eminent. Gunther draws from his heart and from John Dunne’s 17th century “The Holy Sonnets: X” in producing this writing.  It is a poem, in which Gunther argues that ‘death should take no pride in what it does, as it is ultimately powerless to prevent the resurrection of all humanity.’ It can be presented at a literary discourse for educational purpose or as a play on a stage.  \n“Death be not proud, though some have called thee / mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so,\nFor those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow,\nDie not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.\nFrom rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,\nMuch pleasure:  then from thee much more must flow,\nAnd soonest our best men with thee do go,\nRest of their bones, and soul’s delivery.\nThou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,\nAnd dost with poison, war and sickness dwell;\nAnd Poppy or charms can make us sleep as well\nAnd better than thy stroke; why swell’st thou then? \nOne short sleep past, we wake eternally,\nAnd death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.     John Donne\nIt is a versified oratory free-verse poem with melodic tone, chant, and supple plea/defiant texture composed about young Johnny Gunther.  About his attitudes and strife for living in the face of a natural and inevitable defeat.  It is the presentation of the life of Johnny’s family and their recourse to every medical possibility known at the time, taken from an elegy of a long time past, converted from a poem of love and not a poem of mourning. And even unto an eternal spiritual search for the healing of the body, of the mind, and of the spirit of their son by John Gunther and his wife.  About their tessellated forms draught from their experiential abilities within such frames of human suffrage.  In explicit honesty are laid bare the pains and struggles of a family trying to delay the ultimate inevitable end for a son that is as brilliant as Johnny.  From the radical surgeries to strictly controlled diets in endless effort to save his life by a determined harmonious familial union in the face of adversarial reality as they live on for life’s sake. All while in defiance of any honor attributable by mere mortals to death’s demands. \n\nhttp://www.cs.rice.edu/ ssiyer/minstrels/poems/796.html  \n\n\nJose
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It is actually from a Lord Alfred Tennyson poem who was England's Poet Laureate after Wordsworth. \n\nFrom Alfred Lord Tennyson's poem 'In Memoriam:27', 1850:\n\n    I hold it true, whate'er befall;\n    I feel it, when I sorrow most;\n    'Tis better to have loved and lost\n    Than never to have loved at all.\n\n\nTennyson married, but I guess that doesn't give us a clear indication if he ever actually found love.
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Poe wrote this poem in the autograph album of Lucy Holmes, later Lucy Holmes Balderston. Initially, Ingram rejected the poem, but later admitted it to his edition of Poe's Works. In interpreting the manuscript, Ingram made a number of changes in punctuation, mostly replacing dashes with commas, semicolons or periods.] \n\nI find lines 1-8 to be a statement of remorseful acceptance in his adult life of his inability to appreciate "the sunny side of life" as most others claim to do. \nThe words "I could not awaken" would indicate his failed attempts to do so.\nIn his adult life, he accepts his perceived great "difference" from others; he is not referring to the everyday differences which make us all unique but rather, a chasm which separates him. \nThe remaining lines are a retrospective view of his early life, beginning when he first realized that he had a fascination with the morose and morbid.\n\nThen- in my childhood, in the dawn\nOf a most stormy life- was drawn\nFrom every depth of good and ill\nThe mystery which binds me still\n\nThe "mystery" is simply put, his "darkness".\n\nThe remaining lines build to the climax of the poem, which I feel is the last line.\n\n"From the torrent, or the fountain" tells us he sees darkness in both good and "bad" things equally. "From the red cliff of the mountain" paints a sanguine picture of foreboding power, "From the sun that round me rolled, In its autumn tint of gold" paints a picture of the fall, a time of impending death before the cold of winter - it's no coincidence that Halloween is celebrated then. "From the lightning in the sky" introduces the climax, \n\n"From the thunder and the storm,\nAnd the cloud that took the form\n(When the rest of Heaven was blue)\nOf a demon in my view."\n\nIn the final two line, he illustrates fully his propensity to find the morbid in even the most beautiful of things where others do not, and brings us full circle to the beginning of the poem.\n\nI feel the word demon is perhaps the most important in the entire poem. It indicates the level of his darkness of vision, and gives scale to the chasm that he feels separates him from others.
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The general theme is the passage of time, and the need or desire to live as much as we can, as deeply as we can before our time here is gone.  "Time will not be ours forever/... Suns that set may rise again;/But if once we lose this light,/'Tis with us perpetual night"\n\nIn the moment of the poem, there is the classic situation of the boy (presumably) trying to convince his love-interest, Celia, to give in to passion and enjoy the "sports of love" with him, to use the poem's language.  \n\nThe lover uses a two prong argument.\n\nFirst, he argues that time is short and they, her especially, really shouldn't waste it, "Spend not then his gifts in vain."  He invokes a responsibility not to take the gift of time and life given them for granted.  A slightly more dignified argument, yet a sense of playfullness remains: "Cannot we delude the eyes/of a few poor household spies,/Or his easier ears beguile,/So removed by our wile?"  So at the same time he rebukes her rejection (one presumes she said no, at least initially, why then the poem?) for wasting precious time, he tempts her with a conspiracy--arm's length v. intimacy.\n\nSecond, he argues that it's not the act of lovemaking that is the crime, but the tattling or telling of it:  "'Tis no sin love's fruit to steal/But the sweet theft to reveal."  Fame and rumor are equally derided in favor of the moment, of the real, which here is the joy of love.\n\nThe speaker never really loses sight of his objective, even tho he dresses it up philosophically.  Playfully, he casts these arguments about, both putting her on the defensive and drawing her into a conspiracy of "us against the world".  Ingenious, really.  And fun.  Jonson was classical poet, brilliant, witty and very clever.  If you like this poem, you might try John Donne and Robert Herrick.
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The full rhyme is \nSomething old, something new \nSomething borrowed, something blue \nAnd a silver sixpence in her shoe. \n\nEach item in this poem represents a good-luck token for the bride. If she carries all of them on her wedding day, her marriage will be happy. "Something old" symbolizes continuity with the bride's family and the past. "Something new" means optimism and hope for the bride's new life ahead. "Something borrowed" is usually an item from a happily married friend or family member, whose good fortune in marriage is supposed to carry over to the new bride. The borrowed item also reminds the bride that she can depend on her friends and family. \n\nAs for the colorful item, blue has been connected to weddings for centuries. In ancient Rome, brides wore blue to symbolize love, modesty, and fidelity. Christianity has long dressed the Virgin Mary in blue, so purity was associated with the color. Before the late 19th century, blue was a popular color for wedding gowns, as evidenced in proverbs like, "Marry in blue, lover be true."
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Love\nThen said Almitra, speak to us of Love.\nAnd he raised his head and looked upon the people, and there fell a stillness upon them. And with a great voice he said: \nWhen love beckons to you , follow him, Though his ways are hard and steep. \nAnd when his wings enfold you yield to him, Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.\nAnd when he speaks to you believe in him,\nThough his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays waste the garden.\nFor even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you. Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning. \nEven as he ascends to your height and caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun, So shall he descend to your roots and shake them in their clinging to the earth.\n\nLike sheaves of corn he gathers you unto himself.\nHe threshes you to make you naked. He sifts you to free you from your husks.\nHe grinds you to whiteness. \nHe kneads you until you are pliant; \nAnd then he assign you to his sacred fire, that you may become sacred bread for God’s sacred feast.\nAll these things shall love do unto you that you may know the secrets of your heart, and in that knowledge become fragment of Life’s heart.\n\nBut if in your fear you would seek only love’s peace and love’s pleasure, \nThen it is better for you that you cover your nakedness and pass out of love’s threshing-floor,\nInto the seasonless world there you shall laugh, but not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of your treas.\nLove gives naught but itself and take naught but from itself.\nLove possesses not nor would it be possessed;\nFor love is sufficient unto love.\nWhen you love you should not say God is in my heart\nAnd think not you can direct the course of love, for love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.\nLove has not other desire but to fulfil itself.\nBut if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:\nTo melt and belike a running brook that sings its melody to the night.\nTo know the pain of too much tenderness.\nAnd to bleed willingly and joyfully .\nTo wake at dawn with a winged heard and give thanks for another day of loving;\nTo rest at the noon hour and meditate love’s ecstasy;\nTo return home at eventide with gratitude;\nAnd then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart and a song of praise upon your lips.\n\nFrom book THE PROPHET BY KAHLIL GIBRAN
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John Betjeman  (later Sir John) was the Queens Poet Lauriate - I love his poems which include incidentally I Like a Nice Cup of Tea:  Slough was I suppose the Essex of its day:\n\n\nSlough \n\nCome friendly bombs and fall on Slough!\nIt isn't fit for humans now, \nThere isn't grass to graze a cow. \nSwarm over, Death! \n\nCome, bombs and blow to smithereens \nThose air -conditioned, bright canteens, \nTinned fruit, tinned meat, tinned milk, tinned beans,\nTinned minds, tinned breath.\n\nMess up the mess they call a town- \nA house for ninety-seven down \nAnd once a week a half a crown\nFor twenty years. \n\nAnd get that man with double chin \nWho'll always cheat and always win, \nWho washes his repulsive skin \nIn women's tears:\n\nAnd smash his desk of polished oak \nAnd smash his hands so used to stroke \nAnd stop his boring dirty joke \nAnd make him yell.\n\nBut spare the bald young clerks who add \nThe profits of the stinking cad; \nIt's not their fault that they are mad, \nThey've tasted Hell. \n\nIt's not their fault they do not know\nThe birdsong from the radio,\nIt's not their fault they often go \nTo Maidenhead \n\nAnd talk of sport and makes of cars \nIn various bogus-Tudor bars \nAnd daren't look up and see the stars\nBut belch instead. \n\nIn labour-saving homes, with care \nTheir wives frizz out peroxide hair \nAnd dry it in synthetic air \nAnd paint their nails. \n\nCome, friendly bombs and fall on Slough \nTo get it ready for the plough.\nThe cabbages are coming now;\nThe earth exhales. \n\n------------------
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Tis now the very witching time of night,\nWhen churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out\nContagion to this world: now could I drink hot blood,\nAnd do such bitter business as the day\nWould quake to look on. Soft! now to my mother.\nO heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever\nThe soul of Nero enter this firm bosom:\nLet me be cruel, not unnatural:\nI will speak daggers to her, but use none;\nMy tongue and soul in this be hypocrites;\nHow in my words soever she be shent,\nTo give them seals never, my soul, consent!\n\nUnfortunately for everyone, he is about to do just that. (by stabbing Polonius.) He says that he'll keep his temper and not hurt his mother physically but does just the opposite thats the irony
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Despite about 25 minutes of searching I haven't been able to find this poem.  Could you call or e-mail someone you know who has to do the same assignment and possibly get the poem that way?  \n\nThese sites may be of some help to you.  My only other advice would be to get to a bookstore in your area if there is one and you might find it there.  Best of luck with it.
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the lyrics are making an attempt to explain that the person they speak of has taken something of great value and rendered it worthless. \nLike the gift of love.\nhe's trying to make clear that their love is doomed.