bishop and moore flashcards

In Distrusts of Merit - opening line

Strengthened to live, strengthened to die for / medals and positioned victories?

In Distrusts of Merit - enslaver

‘man who thinks he sees, - / who cannot see that the enslaver is / enslaved; the hater, harmed’

In Distrusts of Merit - crown and death

‘there is hate’s crown beneath which all is / Death; there’s love without which none /  is king’

In Distrusts of Merit - defences

‘and we devour / ourselves. The enemy could not / have made a greater breach in our / defences’

In Distrusts of Merit - vow

we / vow, we make this promise, // to the fighting – it’s a promise – “we’ll / never hate black, white, red, yellow, Jew / Gentile, untouchable.’ We are / not competent to make our vows’

In Distrusts of Merit - orphan

the world’s an orphan’s home

in distrusts of merit - dyings

‘if these great patient / dyings – all these agonies / and wound bearings and blood shed - / can teach is how to live, these / dyings were not wasted’

In Distrusts of Merit - iron

‘o heart of iron / iron is iron till it is rust’

In Distrusts of Merit - inward war

‘there never was a war that was / not inward; I must / fight til I have conquered in myself what / causes war’

In Distrusts of Merit - closing line

beauty is everlasting and dust is for a time

What Are Years? opening line

‘what is our innocence, / what is our guilt? All are / naked, none is safe’

What Are Years? - imprisonment

‘in his imprisonment rises / upon himself as / the sea in a chasm / struggling to be / free and unable to be’

What Are Years? - bird

‘the very bird… though he is captive / his might singing / says satisfaction is a lowly / thing / how pure a thing joy is’

What Are Years? - closing lines

this is mortality; this is eternity

poetry - opening line

I too, dislike it: there are things that are important beyond all this fiddle

poetry - hands, eyes, hair

Hands that can grasp, eyes / that can dilate, hair that can rise / if it must, these things are important not because a // high-sounding interpretation can be put upon them but because they are / useful.

poetry - cannot understand

we do not admire what / we cannot understand: the bat holding on upside down or in quest of something to / eat, elephants pushing, a wild horse taking a roll, a tireless wolf under / a tree, the immovable critic twitching his skin like a horse that feels a flea

poetry - not poetry

One must make a distinction / however: when dragged into prominence by half poets, the result is not poetry, / nor till the poets among us can be / "literalists of / the imagination"

poetry - description of poetry

imaginary gardens with real toads in them

poetry - raw materialism / closing lines

In the meantime, if you demand on the one hand, / the raw material of poetry in / all its rawness and / that which is on the other hand / genuine, you are interested in poetry.

keeping their world large - opening

extract from New York Times - ‘all too literally, their flesh and their spirit are our shield’

keeping their world large - piano

‘a noiseless piano / an innocent war, the heart that can act against itself’

keeping their world large - ground to walk on

‘stumbling, falling, multiplied / till bodies lay as ground to walk on’

keeping their world large - forest

‘’the forest of white crosses; the / vision makes us faint’

keeping their world large - isaac, mute

‘while // the knife was lifted, Isaac the offering lay mute’

keeping their world large - animals, isaac

‘like animals for sacrifice, like isaac on the mount’

keeping their world large - marching

‘marching to death / marching to life; it was like the cross, is like the cross’

keeping their world large - shield

‘whose spirits and whose bodies all too literally were our shield, are still our shield’

keeping their world large - closing lines

‘shine, o shine, / unfalsifying sun on this sick scene’

roosters - window

gun metal blue window

roosters - fence

‘then one from the backyard fence / then one, with horrible insistence’

roosters - water closet

‘cries galore / come from the water-closet door’

roosters - cruel feet

‘the roosters brace their cruel feet and glare // with stupid eyes’

roosters - chests

‘deep from protruding chests / in green gold medals dressed’

roosters - greek

‘you whom the greeks elected / to shoot on a post who struggled / when sacrificed’

roosters - war and conceit

‘wake us here where are / unwanted love, conceit and war?’

roosters - crown of red

‘the crown of red / set on your little head / is charged with all your fighting blood.’

roosters - heroism

raging heroism defying / even the sensation of dying

roosters - st peter

‘st peter’s sin / was worse than that of magdalen’

roosters - sun

The sun climbs in, / following “to see the end,” / faithful as enemy, or friend.

the armadillo - opening lines

‘this is the time of year / when almost every night / the frail, illegal fire balloon appear’

the armadillo - saint

rising toward a saint still honoured in these parts

the armadillo - wind

‘with a wind, / they flare and falter, wobble and toss’

the armadillo - egg of fire

‘last night another big one fell. / it splattered like an egg of fire’

the armadillo - closing

O falling fire and piercing cry / and panic, and a weak mailed fist / clenched ignorant against the sky!’

the armadillo - cute rabbit

‘a handful of intangible ash / with fixed, ignited eyes’

crusoe in england - poor old island

‘my poor old island’s still / un-rediscovered, un-renamable. / none of the books has ever got it right.’

crusoe in england - glittering

‘closing and closing in, but never quite, / glittering and glittering, through the sky / was mostly overcast.’

crusoe in england - lava

the folds of lava, running out to sea, / would hiss

crusoe in england - advancing and retreating

‘they’d come and go, advancing and retreating, / their heads in clouds’

crusoe in england - company

‘beautiful, yes, but not much company’

crusoe in england - pity

‘the more / pity I felt, the more I felt at home’

crusoe in england - question

do i deserve this? i suppose i must

crusoe in england - home made

home-made! home-made! but aren’t we all?

crusoe in england - my ears

‘baa… shriek… ba… I still cant shake / them from my ears; they’re hurting now’

crusoe in england - baby goat

One day I dyed a baby goat bright red / with my red berries, just to see / something a little different. / And then his mother wouldn’t recognize him.

crusoe in england - one day

an then one day they came and took us off

crusoe in england - living soul

the living soul has dribbled away. / my eyes rest on it and pass on

crusoe in england - question

how can anyone want such things?