Inspiration
O hoary sculptor, stay thy hand:
I fain would view the lettered stone.
What carvest thou?-perchance some grand
And solemn fancy all thine own.
For oft to know the fitting word
Some humble worker God permits.
'Jain Ann Meginnis,
Agid 3rd.
He givith His beluved fits.'
poem by Ambrose Bierce
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Omnes Vanitas
Alas for ambition's possessor!
Alas for the famous and proud!
The Isle of Manhattan's best dresser
Is wearing a hand-me-down shroud.
The world has forgotten his glory;
The wagoner sings on his wain,
And Chauncey Depew tells a story,
And jackasses laugh in the lane.
poem by Ambrose Bierce
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An Average
I ne'er could be entirely fond
Of any maiden who's a blonde,
And no brunette that e'er I saw
Had charms my heart's whole
warmth to draw.
Yet sure no girl was ever made
Just half of light and half of shade.
And so, this happy mean to get,
I love a blonde and a brunette.
poem by Ambrose Bierce
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A Fish Commissioner
Great Joseph D. Redding-illustrious name!
Considered a fish-horn the trumpet of Fame.
That goddess was angry, and what do you think?
Her trumpet she filled with a gallon of ink,
And all through the Press, with a devilish glee,
She sputtered and spattered the name of J.D.
poem by Ambrose Bierce
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Y'e Foe To Cathaye
O never an oathe sweares he,
And never a pig-taile jerkes;
With a brick-batte he ne lurkes
For to buste y'e crust, perdie,
Of y'e man from over sea,
A-synging as he werkes.
For he knows ful well, y's youth,
A tricke of exceeding worth:
And he plans withouten ruth
A conflagration's birth!
poem by Ambrose Bierce
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An Example
They were two deaf mutes, and they loved and they
Resolved to be groom and bride;
And they listened to nothing that any could say,
Nor ever a word replied.
From wedlock when warned by the married men,
Maintain an invincible mind:
Be deaf and dumb until wedded-and then
Be deaf and dumb and blind.
poem by Ambrose Bierce
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The New 'Ulalume
The skies they were ashen and sober,
The leaves they were crisped and sere,
' ' ' withering ' '
It was night in the lonesome October
Of my most immemorial year;
It was hard by the dim lake of Auber,
' ' down ' ' dark tarn ' '
In the misty mid region of Weir,
' ' ghoul-haunted woodland ' '
poem by Ambrose Bierce
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In Contumaciam
Och! Father McGlynn,
Ye appear to be in
Fer a bit of a bout wid the Pope;
An' there's divil a doubt
But he's knockin' ye out
While ye're hangin' onto the rope.
An' soon ye'll lave home
To thravel to Rome,
For its bound to Canossa ye are.
Persistin' to shtay
When ye're ordered away
Bedad! that is goin' too far!
poem by Ambrose Bierce
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Novum Organum
In Bacon see the culminating prime
Of Anglo-Saxon intellect and crime.
He dies and Nature, settling his affairs,
Parts his endowments among us, his heirs:
To every one a pinch of brain for seed,
And, to develop it, a pinch of greed.
Each thrifty heir, to make the gift suffice,
Buries the talent to manure the vice.
poem by Ambrose Bierce
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Art
For Gladstone's portrait five thousand pounds
Were paid, 't is said, to Sir John Millais.
I cannot help thinking that such fine pay
Transcended reason's uttermost bounds.
For it seems to me uncommonly queer
That a painted British stateman's price
Exceeds the established value thrice
Of a living statesman over here.
poem by Ambrose Bierce
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