Stand away (... from the fire!)

George Frederic Watts: Love and Death

Stand away the dreaded burning fire

Will leave its mark for those with no desire

Stand in front of the whole creation

Face the people starved like worms

Still I'm begging for comprehension

From the ones who rules us all

In this field the dying embers soil

All around we mourn

Oh, here they come again

(Now they're coming more agressive

Tearing down our only chances)

The stars can't find the purple sky

(Loneliness will find its reason

treasured seed for every season)

Long for the day be back someday

And the church

(Church is selling consolation

killing Jesus for salvation)

Don't let us die

Let me rest in peace

Away, a while

Our smile taken from

The hearts of broken souls

Stand away from the fire

Destined by the fate

Let those sinners pay how they steal

For on the judgement day

How they yield

Stand in front of the whole creation

Face the people starved like worms

Still I'm begging for comprehension

From the ones who rules us all

On this field the dying embers soil

All around we mourn

Oh, here they come again

[Now they're coming more agressive

Tearing down our only chances]

The stars can't find the purple sky

[Loneliness will find its reason

treasured seed for every season]

Long for the day be back someday

And the church

[Church is selling consolation

killing Jesus for salvation]

Don't let us die

[Taking all in desperation

leave me now to rest in peace]

Rest in peace

Let me rest in peace...

Your weary steps...

Sir Frank Dicksee: The Symbol (Is it nothing to you all ye that pass by)

(Last night in Arcadia - Vlaherna:)

Isolation

Luis Royo:  The needles of joy

(And the following - not being my style - but can't forget I was there at the rehearsal somewhere in Kallithea 25 years ago... :) : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIL0eSFEhzU )

The passing of Arthur

Sir William Russel flint: The passing of Arthur

Then murmured Arthur, "Place me in the barge."

So to the barge they came. There those three Queens

Put forth their hands, and took the King, and wept.

But she, that rose the tallest of them all

And fairest, laid his head upon her lap,

And loosed the shattered casque, and chafed his hands,

And called him by his name, complaining loud,

And dropping bitter tears against a brow

Striped with dark blood: for all his face was white

And colourless, and like the withered moon

Smote by the fresh beam of the springing east;

And all his greaves and cuisses dashed with drops

Of onset; and the light and lustrous curls--

That made his forehead like a rising sun

High from the daïs-throne--were parched with dust;

Or, clotted into points and hanging loose,

Mixed with the knightly growth that fringed his lips.

So like a shattered column lay the King;

Not like that Arthur who, with lance in rest,

From spur to plume a star of tournament,

Shot through the lists at Camelot, and charged

Before the eyes of ladies and of kings.

(Alfred Lord Tennyson - The passing of Arthur extract)

(Beethoven Symphony no 3 - Marcia Funebre)

On a storytellers night...

Rodney Matthews: On a storytellers night

Don't place your trust in foolish promises sworn

Nor cryptic message scrawled upon every wall

Street corner justice beware

The spirit will find you always be fair

The shallow verse once read means nothing at all

Nor fearful gestures made for instant recall

In lies your heart will not share

The spirit inside used without care

The spirit that guides you follow it through

To the spirit inside you always be true

You know you'll despair

If the spirit inside is used without care

The battlefield of glory pales into rust

The river flows much thicker fed by each thrust

No beast alive does compare

The spirit beside you everywhere

Let not your head be turned by tainted reward

And dreams of fortune won forever to hoard

Your conscience could not repair

The spirit inside used without care

'Cause it will be your shelter, help you how to decide

And it will be your helper should your loyalties divide

The ash of pages swept before the cruel wind

The loss of choices praises no-one will sing

No clues to how you will fare

The spirit implores you tread where you dare

The dust lies thick on casket rich or quite poor

Distinction disappears the worm both deplore

The candle burns out once more

But the spirit inside you won't be ignored

(Magnum - The spirit)


(Magnum - Soldier of the line)

A thousand kisses deep

Arthur Hughes:  A Music Party

The ponies run, the girls are young,

The odds are there to beat.

You win a while, and then it's done --

Your little winning streak.

And summoned now to deal

With your invincible defeat,

You live your life as if it's real,

A Thousand Kisses Deep.

Whiskey in the Jar

As I was goin' over the Cork and Kerry Mountains

I saw Captain Farrell and his money, he was countin'

I first produced my pistol and then produced my rapier

I said, "Stand and deliver or the devil he may take ya"

I took all of his money and it was a pretty penny

I took all of his money, yeah, and I brought it home to Molly

She swore that she loved me, no, never would she leave me

But the devil take that woman, yeah, for you know she tricked me easy

Musha rain dum a doo, dum a da

Whack for my daddy, oh

Whack for my daddy, oh

There's whiskey in the jar, oh

Being drunk and weary I went to Molly's chamber

Takin' Molly with me but I never knew the danger

For about six or maybe seven, yeah, in walked Captain Farrell

I jumped up, fired my pistols and I shot him with both barrels

Yeah, musha rain dum a doo, dum a da, ha, yeah

Whack for my daddy, oh

Whack for my daddy, oh

There's whiskey in the jar, oh

Yeah, whiskey, yo, whiskey

Oh, oh, yeah

Oh, oh, yeah

Now some men like a fishin' but some men like the fowlin'

Some men like to hear, to hear the cannonball roarin'

But me, I like sleepin', 'specially in my Molly's chamber

But here I am in prison, here I am with a ball and chain, yeah

Musha rain dum a doo, dum a da, heh, heh

Whack for my daddy, oh

Whack for my daddy, oh

There's whiskey in the jar, oh, yeah

Whiskey in the jar, oh

Musha rain dum a doo, dum a da

Musha rain dum a doo, dum a da, hey

Musha rain dum a doo, dum a da

Musha rain dum a doo, dum a da, yeah

Before the light

Donato Giancola: The Reluctant Knight

(Sarissa - Before the light)

Ta Eis Eafton (Anthem for the nations)

William Russell Flint: O Cithaeeron 

"The Thoughts of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus"

• If thou art pained by any external thing, it is not this that disturbs thee, but thy own judgment about it. And it is in thy power to wipe out this judgment now.

• A cucumber is bitter. Throw it away. There are briars in the road. Turn aside from them. This is enough. Do not add, "And why were such things made in the world?" 

• Soon you'll be ashes or bones. A mere name at most—and even that is just a sound, an echo. The things we want in life are empty, stale, trivial.

• Never regard something as doing you good if it makes you betray a trust or lose your sense of shame or makes you show hatred, suspicion, ill-will or hypocrisy or a desire for things best done behind closed doors. (III. 7, trans. Gregory Hays)

• Not to feel exasperated or defeated or despondent because your days aren't packed with wise and moral actions. But to get back up when you fail, to celebrate behaving like a human—however imperfectly—and fully embrace the pursuit you've embarked on.

• Let opinion be taken away, and no man will think himself wronged. If no man shall think himself wronged, then is there no more any such thing as wrong.

• (...) As for others whose lives are not so ordered, he reminds himself constantly of the characters they exhibit daily and nightly at home and abroad , and of the sort of society they frequent; and the approval of such men, who do not even stand well in their own eyes has no value for him. 

• Shame on the soul, to falter on the road of life while the body still perseveres.

• Take away your opinion, and there is taken away the complaint, [...] Take away the complaint, [...] and the hurt is gone 

• Whatever happens to you has been waiting to happen since the beginning of time. The twining strands of fate wove both of them together: your own existence and the things that happen to you. 

• Words that everyone once used are now obsolete, and so are the men whose names were once on everyone's lips: Camillus, Caeso, Volesus, Dentatus, and to a lesser degree Scipio and Cato, and yes, even Augustus, Hadrian, and Antoninus are less spoken of now than they were in their own days. For all things fade away, become the stuff of legend, and are soon buried in oblivion. Mind you, this is true only for those who blazed once like bright stars in the firmament, but for the rest, as soon as a few clods of earth cover their corpses, they are 'out of sight, out of mind.' In the end, what would you gain from everlasting remembrance? Absolutely nothing. So what is left worth living for? This alone: justice in thought, goodness in action, speech that cannot deceive, and a disposition glad of whatever comes, welcoming it as necessary, as familiar, as flowing from the same source and fountain as yourself. 

• Do not then consider life a thing of any value. For look at the immensity of time behind thee, and to the time which is before thee, another boundless space. In this infinity then what is the difference between him who lives three days and him who lives three generations? 

• When you wake up in the morning, tell yourself: The people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous, and surly. They are like this because they can't tell good from evil. But I have seen the beauty of good, and the ugliness of evil, and have recognized that the wrongdoer has a nature related to my own—not of the same blood or birth, but the same mind, and possessing a share of the divine.

• Do not act as if thou wert going to live ten thousand years! Death hangs over thee! While thou livest, while it is in thy power, be good!

(Jack Starr - Anthem for the nations)

Going to a town

Walter Crane: America

I really need to know

I may just never see you again, or might as well

You took advantage of a world that loved you well

I'm going to a town that has already been burnt down

I'm so tired of you, America