Alphabet Game 2021

[Cancer]

hate blows a bubble of despair into
hugeness world system universe and bang
-fear buries a tomorrow under woe
and up comes yesterday most green and young
 
pleasure and pain are merely surfaces
(one itself showing,itself hiding one)
life's only and true value neither is
love makes the little thickness of the coin
 
comes here a man would have from madame death
nevertheless now and without winter spring?
she'll spin that spirit her own fingers with
and give him nothing (if he should not sing)
 
how much more than enough for both of us
darling.  And if i sing you are my voice,

 

((Yes, it ends with that comma.  It's by e. e. cummings.))

[death tribble]

The Iliad

 

Despite the length, it is a poem.

[Pariah]

"Jerusalem", a song by Sir Hubert Parry, based on a poem by William Blake

 

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?

 

And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among these dark Satanic mills?

 

Bring me my bow of burning gold:
Bring me my arrows of desire:
Bring me my spear: O clouds unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire.

 

I will not cease from mental fight,
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England's green and pleasant land.

 

[Old Man]

The Kalevala

 

 

[Cancer]

The Last Days of John Brown

[dmjalund]

Mr. Mistoffelees

[Pariah]

The Night Before Christmas 

[death tribble]

Well I didn't think I would get away with it but

 

The Odyssey

 

Despite it's length is a poem

[Old Man]

The Purloined Letter

[death tribble]

Questions and Answers by Oliver Wendall Holmes

 

Where are the Marys, and Anns, and Elizas
Loving and lovely of yore ?
Look in the columns of old Advertisers, 
Married and dead by the score.

[Pariah]

"Rubber Soul", a short story by Spider Robinson included in the Melancholy Elephants collection. Yes, it's Beatles-related. 

[Cancer]

Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled,

Scots, wham Bruce has aften led;

Welcome to your gory bed,

         Or to victory!

 

Now's the day, and now's the hour;

See the front o' battle lour;

See approach proud Edward's power—

         Chains and slavery!

 

Wha will be a traitor knave?

Wha can fill a coward's grave!

Wha sae base as be a slave?

         Let him turn and flee!

 

Wha for Scotland's king and law

Freedom's sword will strongly draw,

Freeman stand, or freeman fa',

         Let him follow me!

 

By oppression's woes and pains!

By your sons in servile chains!

We will drain our dearest veins,

         But they shall be free!

 

Lay the proud usurpers low!

Tyrants fall in every foe!

Liberty's in every blow!—

         Let us do or die!

 

Edited December 1, 2023 by Cancer

[Old Man]

"They're made out of meat."

  "Meat?"

"Meat. They're made out of meat."

  "Meat?"

"There's no doubt about it. We picked several from different parts of the planet, took them aboard our recon vessels, probed them all the way through. They're completely meat."

  "That's impossible. What about the radio signals? The messages to the stars."

"They use the radio waves to talk, but the signals don't come from them. The signals come from machines."

  "So who made the machines? That's who we want to contact."

"They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat made the machines."

  "That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're asking me to believe in sentient meat."

"I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are the only sentient race in the sector and they're made out of meat."

  "Maybe they're like the Orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that goes through a meat stage."

"Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them for several of their life spans, which didn't take too long. Do you have any idea the life span of meat?"

  "Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like the Weddilei. A meat head with an electron plasma brain inside."

"Nope. We thought of that, since they do have meat heads like the Weddilei. But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through."

  "No brain?"

"Oh, there is a brain all right. It's just that the brain is made out of meat!"

  "So... what does the thinking?"

"You're not understanding, are you? The brain does the thinking. The meat."

  "Thinking meat! You're asking me to believe in thinking meat!"

"Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat is the whole deal! Are you getting the picture?"

  "Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat."

"Finally, Yes. They are indeed made out meat. And they've been trying to get in touch with us for almost a hundred of their years."

  "So what does the meat have in mind."

"First it wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore the universe, contact other sentients, swap ideas and information. The usual."

  "We're supposed to talk to meat?"

"That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio. 'Hello. Anyone out there? Anyone home?' That sort of thing."

  "They actually do talk, then. They use words, ideas, concepts?"

"Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat."

  "I thought you just told me they used radio."

"They do, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You know how when you slap or flap meat it makes a noise? They talk by flapping their meat at each other. They can even sing by squirting air through their meat."

  "Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do you advise?"

"Officially or unofficially?"

  "Both."

"Officially, we are required to contact, welcome, and log in any and all sentient races or multibeings in the quadrant, without prejudice, fear, or favor. Unofficially, I advise that we erase the records and forget the whole thing."

  "I was hoping you would say that."

"It seems harsh, but there is a limit. Do we really want to make contact with meat?"

  "I agree one hundred percent. What's there to say?" `Hello, meat. How's it going?' But will this work? How many planets are we dealing with here?"

"Just one. They can travel to other planets in special meat containers, but they can't live on them. And being meat, they only travel through C space. Which limits them to the speed of light and makes the possibility of their ever making contact pretty slim. Infinitesimal, in fact."

  "So we just pretend there's no one home in the universe."

"That's it."

  "Cruel. But you said it yourself, who wants to meet meat? And the ones who have been aboard our vessels, the ones you have probed? You're sure they won't remember?"

"They'll be considered crackpots if they do. We went into their heads and smoothed out their meat so that we're just a dream to them."

  "A dream to meat! How strangely appropriate, that we should be meat's dream."

"And we can marked this sector unoccupied."

  "Good. Agreed, officially and unofficially. Case closed. Any others? Anyone interesting on that side of the galaxy?"

"Yes, a rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence in a class nine star in G445 zone. Was in contact two galactic rotation ago, wants to be friendly again."

  "They always come around."

"And why not? Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the universe would be if one were all alone."

 

Terry Bisson, 1991

[death tribble]

Under the Greenwood Tree by Shakespeare

[Old Man]

“The Vaporization Enthalpy of a Peculiar Pakistani Family” by Usman T. Malik

[death tribble]

When Napoleon was Flying by Thomas Campbell

 

When Napoleon was flying
From the field of Waterloo,
A British soldier dying
To his brother bade adieu !

 

And take, he said, this token
To the maid that owns my faith,
With the words that I have spoken
In affection's latest breath.

 

Sore mourn'd the brother's heart,
When the youth beside him fell;
But the trumpet warn'd to part,
And they took a sad farewell.

 

There was many a friend to lose him,
For that gallant soldier sigh'd;
But the maiden of his bosom
Wept when all their tears were dried.

[L. Marcus]

Xanadu 

[Starlord]

Yellow Snow by Shaun Cronick

 

A tinkle on fresh snow

Oh so welcoming and oh so white

A man can write his name

With content and relieved delight

[dmjalund]

Zion, Or The City Of God

 

next. Christmas songs

[death tribble]

Angels we have Heard on High

[Psybolt]

Blue Christmas

[Pariah]

 

[Old Man]

Do You Hear What I Hear

 

Quote

"Do You Hear What I Hear?" is a song written in October 1962, with lyrics by Noël Regney and music by Gloria Shayne.^[1] The pair, married at the time, wrote it as a plea for peace during the Cuban Missile Crisis.^[2]

 

 

edit: Wait I found another one

 

Deck the Halls with Pepperoni

 

 

Edited December 4, 2023 by Old Man

[Psybolt]

Egg Nog by the Ramsey Lewis Trio

 

 

[dmjalund]

Feliz Navidad