Wednesday, June 13, 2018

Poets United Midweek Motif ~ Lust



 
 “Curiosity is the lust of the mind.” — Thomas Hobbes

SOURCE


“There is a lust in man no
charm can tame: Of loudly
publishing his neighbor’s
shame: On eagles wings
immortal scandals fly, while
virtuous actions are born and die.” — William Harvey


            “Society drives people crazy with lust and calls it advertising.” — John Lahr



             Midweek Motif ~ Lust



 To me the meaning of ‘lust’ changed forever when I first read Irving Stone’s ‘Lust For Life’, a biographical novel based on Van Gogh’s life.
                 

Today I want you to write about whatever ‘Lust’ means to you. It may be a special ardor, desire, passion, libido, fancy, craving and all the meanings referring to ‘lust’ in the dictionary J



 The Spur
by William Butler Yeats

You think it horrible that lust and rage
Should dance attendance upon my old age;
They were not such a plague when I was young;
What else have I to spur me into song?




Mystery

by D.H. Lawrence


Now I am all
One bowl of kisses,
Such as the tall
Slim votaresses
Of Egypt filled
For a God's excesses.

I lift to you
My bowl of kisses,
And through the temple's
Blue recesses
Cry out to you
In wild caresses.

And to my lips'
Bright crimson rim
The passion slips,
And down my slim
White body drips
The shining hymn.

And still before
The altar I
Exult the bowl
Brimful, and cry
To you to stoop
And drink, Most High.

Oh drink me up
That I may be
Within your cup
Like a Mystery,
Like wine that is still
In ecstasy.

Glimmering still
In ecstasy,
Commingled wines
Of you and me
In One fulfill,...
The Mystery. 



Tourists
by Yehuda Amichai
                      
Visits of condolence is all we get from them.
They squat at the Holocaust Memorial,
They put on grave faces at the Wailing Wall
And they laugh behind heavy curtains
In their hotels.
They have their pictures taken
Together with our famous dead
At Rachel's Tomb and Herzl's Tomb
And on Ammunition Hill.
They weep over our sweet boys
And lust after our tough girls
And hang up their underwear
To dry quickly
In cool, blue bathrooms.


Blood Guilt
by Georg Trakl

Night threatens at the bed of our kisses.

Somewhere a whisper: who absolves your guilt?

Still trembling from the sweetness of nefarious lust

We pray: forgive us, Mary, in your mercy.

Out of flower vases greedy scents climb,

Wheedling our foreheads pale with guilt.

Exhausting under the waft of sultry air

We dream: forgive us, Mary, in your mercy.

But the well of the sirens rushes louder,

And the sphinx rises darker before our guilt,

So that our hearts sound again more sinfully,

We sob: forgive us, Mary, in your mercy. 


Please share your new poem using Mr. Linky below and visit others in the spirit of the community—
                (Next week Susan’s Midweek Motif will be ~ Human / Homo sapiens)
          

                                   

17 comments:

  1. Your opening quote is a delight, Sumana. And the bit from Yeats, yum. I can't wait to see what every one else will offer.

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  2. A very interesting prompt Sumana. Thanks for hosting today

    much love...

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  3. Hello everyone! Have a wonderful time poeming here :)

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  4. Thanks for inspiring us to write about 'lust'.
    Would have stayed away, but couldn't escape the thrust :)

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  5. What a great bouquet of stimulting blooms, Sumana! Most impressive prompt! Have a great day.

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  6. I can't believe it! But it's not your fault. All over the web, I have just discovered, the Yeats piece is misquoted as 'dance attention' – and one writer even attempts to work out what Yeats meant by it. I guess one person did it and it just proliferated. Maybe it was even an auto-correct mistake to begin with

    It's 'dance attendance', I promise you! An expression which is out of fashion now, but was quite common when Yeats wrote. Excuse me please if I go in and fix it.

    Otherwise, a terrific prompt, full of wonderful writings, and I'll hope to come up with something.

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    Replies
    1. Hmmm, well I'd better not fix it. I just checked my copy of Yeats and found 'attention' there too. But it's a fairly recent edition, not the one I first had. Has anyone got an old edition of his Collected, circa 1950s?

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    2. Please do Rosemary. Thank you so, so much.

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    3. Oh, our replies have crossed. I'm hanging fire until I find out for certain. But I am SO sure!

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    4. "Dance attendance" is correcct. My eyes skimmed over it so familiar am I ... Here's "proof" if texts are sacred to the internet: https://books.google.com/books?id=7bmZQTGbJo4C&pg=PA485&lpg=PA485&dq=dance+attendance+yeats&source=bl&ots=yeV0iOUpqk&sig=RcQKsrVDIeqmMKy-vrRt_rSJq_s&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjq-J7SpNHbAhWCWrwKHT5iAV4Q6AEINzAC#v=onepage&q=dance%20attendance%20yeats&f=false

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    5. Thanks, Susan. Hooray, to be vindicated! And for poor Yeats to be edited with what he actually wrote, which makes so much more sense.

      Sumana, have fixed it for you now. (Smile.)

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    6. Thanks a bunch Rosemary and Susan :)

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  7. Good morning, kids. I have always heard the phrase "dance attendance" as well, but things do change in these days of proliferation on the internet. They should not change one comma of the old masters though.

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  8. Hello everyone, glad to have made it here. May take me a couple days to get to everyone, but I will get there. :-)

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  9. Anyone else having trouble with Mr. Linky?

    Here's mine: http://mamaneedsshoes.blogspot.com/2018/06/its-lust-that-lays-you-down.html

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  10. Never mind. I forgot to click the privacy policy. Ooops!

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  11. And I finally came uo with a poem too, having sorted out Mr Yeats with some help from my friends (LOL).

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