Plagued by Particularly Persistent Poem in Pursuit

[gamba]

Just from nowhere & without motive, a few lines from a poem, author unknown enter my head.

I don't want them, they annoy me, but they simply will not go away.

I feel sure I'm not alone & so to ensure myself of this fact I intend sharing them with you - so there !!!


' Slowly the poison the whole bloodstream fills,
The waste remains,
The waste remains,
The waste remains and kills'.


Why should I be the only one to suffer, your nasty, horrid, vengeful gamba.



( only joking but would be glad to hear from other fellow - sufferers ).

[vinteuil]

Missing Dates



Slowly the poison the whole blood stream fills.
It is not the effort nor the failure tires.
The waste remains, the waste remains and kills.

It is not your system or clear sight that mills
Down small to the consequence a life requires;
Slowly the poison the whole blood stream fills.

They bled an old dog dry yet the exchange rills
Of young dog blood gave but a month's desires.
The waste remains, the waste remains and kills.

It is the Chinese tombs and the slag hills
Usurp the soil, and not the soil retires.
Slowly the poison the whole blood stream fills.

Not to have fire is to be a skin that shrills.
The complete fire is death. From partial fires
The waste remains, the waste remains and kills.

It is the poems you have lost, the ills
From missing dates, at which the heart expires.
Slowly the poison the whole blood stream fills.
The waste remains, the waste remains and kills.


William Empson

[gamba]

Vinteuil,

Oh dear, & what a great poet - my shame now obliterates my annoyance

Thank you & may my gratitude o'rweigh my ignorance

Yours, much humbled, gamba

[arthroceph]

I think the moral is clear: try at all costs to stick to your deadlines.