The Spirit (Magnum)

Link:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AaJbdmc0U3c

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

Talent (Carol Ann Duffy)

This is the word tightrope. Now imagine
a man, inching across it in the space
between our thoughts. He holds our breath.

There is no word net.

You want him to fall, don't you?
I guessed as much; he teeters but succeeds.
The word applause is written all over him. 

 

Poetry (Neruda)

And it was at that age ... Poetry arrived

in search of me. I don't know, I don't know
where it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no, they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.

I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating planations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.

And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
I felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke free on the open sky. 

Reading: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5Wa1_0Whps