Fire and Ice by Robert Frost

Fire and Ice
by Robert Frost

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great,
And would suffice.

The Lie by Walter Raleigh

The Lie.
by Walter Raleigh

Go, soul, the body's guest, Upon a thankless errand; Fear not to touch the best; The truth shall be thy warrant: Go, since I needs must die, And give the world the lie. Say to the court it glows And shines like rotten wood, Say to the church it shows What's good, and doth no good: If church and court reply, Then give them both the lie. Tell potentates, they live Acting, by others' action; Not lov'd unless they give; Not strong, but by affection. If potentates reply, Give potentates the lie. Tell men of high condition, That manage the estate, Their purpose is ambition; Their practice only hate. And if they once reply, Then give them all the lie. Tell them that brave it most, They beg for more by spending, Who in their greatest cost Like nothing but commending. And if they make reply, Then give them all the lie. Tell zeal it wants devotion; Tell love it is but lust; Tell time it meets but motion; Tell flesh it is but dust: And wish them not reply, For thou must give the lie. Tell age it daily wasteth; Tell honour how it alters; Tell beauty how she blasteth; Tell favour how it falters: And as they shall reply, Give every one the lie. Tell wit how much it wrangles In fickle points of niceness; Tell wisdom she entangles Herself in over-wiseness: And when they do reply, Straight give them both the lie. Tell physic of her boldness; Tell skill it is prevention; Tell charity of coldness; Tell law it is contention: And as they do reply, So give them still the lie. Tell fortune of her blindness; Tell nature of decay; Tell friendship of unkindness; Tell justice of delay: And if they will reply, Then give them all the lie. Tell arts they have no soundness, But vary by esteeming; Tell schools they want profoundness, And stand too much on seeming. If arts and schools reply, Give arts and schools the lie. Tell faith it's fled the city; Tell how the country erreth; Tell manhood, shakes off pity; Tell virtue, least preferred. And if they do reply, Spare not to give the lie. So when thou hast, as I Commanded thee, done blabbing; Because to give the lie Deserves no less than stabbing: Stab at thee, he that will, No stab thy soul can kill!

Richard Cory by Edwin Arlington Robinson

Richard Cory
by Edwin Arlington Robinson

Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
We people on the pavement looked at him:
He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
Clean favored, and imperially slim.

And he was always quietly arrayed,
And he was always human when he talked;
But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
"Good-morning," and he glittered when he walked.

And he was rich, richer than a king,
And admirably schooled in every grace:
In fine, we thought that he was everything
To make us wish that we were in his place.

So on we worked, and waited for the light,
And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;
And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
Went home and put a bullet through his head.

I Think We are Too Ready to Complaint by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I Think We are Too Ready to Complaint

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I think we are too ready with complaint
In this fair world of God's. Had we no hope
Indeed beyond the zenith and the slope
Of yon gray blank of sky, we might be faint
To muse upon eternity's constraint
Round our aspirant souls. But since the scope
Must widen early, is it well to droop
For a few-days consumed in loss and taint?
O pusillanimous Heart, be comforted, --
And, like a cheerful traveller, take the road,
Singing beside the hedge. What if the bread
Be bitter in thine inn, and thou unshod
To meet the flints? -- At least it may be said,
Because the way is short, I thank thee, -- God!

The Fish by Elizabeth Bishop

The Fish
by Elizabeth Bishop

I caught a tremendous fish
and held him beside the boat
half out of water, with my hook
fast in a corner of his mouth.
He didn't fight.
He hadn't fought at all.
He hung a grunting weight,
battered and venerable
and homely. Here and there
his brown skin hung in strips
like ancient wallpaper,
and its pattern of darker brown
was like wallpaper:
shapes like full-blown roses
stained and lost through age.
He was speckled and barnacles,
fine rosettes of lime,
and infested
with tiny white sea-lice,
and underneath two or three
rags of green weed hung down.
While his gills were breathing in
the terrible oxygen
--the frightening gills,
fresh and crisp with blood,
that can cut so badly--
I thought of the coarse white flesh
packed in like feathers,
the big bones and the little bones,
the dramatic reds and blacks
of his shiny entrails,
and the pink swim-bladder
like a big peony.
I looked into his eyes
which were far larger than mine
but shallower, and yellowed,
the irises backed and packed
with tarnished tinfoil
seen through the lenses
of old scratched isinglass.
They shifted a little, but not
to return my stare.
--It was more like the tipping
of an object toward the light.
I admired his sullen face,
the mechanism of his jaw,
and then I saw
that from his lower lip
--if you could call it a lip
grim, wet, and weaponlike,
hung five old pieces of fish-line,
or four and a wire leader
with the swivel still attached,
with all their five big hooks
grown firmly in his mouth.
A green line, frayed at the end
where he broke it, two heavier lines,
and a fine black thread
still crimped from the strain and snap
when it broke and he got away.
Like medals with their ribbons
frayed and wavering,
a five-haired beard of wisdom
trailing from his aching jaw.
I stared and stared
and victory filled up
the little rented boat,
from the pool of bilge
where oil had spread a rainbow
around the rusted engine
to the bailer rusted orange,
the sun-cracked thwarts,
the oarlocks on their strings,
the gunnels--until everything
was rainbow, rainbow, rainbow!
And I let the fish go.