Kat, that's hilarious! Just what I needed... a laugh. I just had to speak to the ***** of a secretary at my son's school, and now I'm in tears. I've tried to get her moved or fired, but their damned union is just too strong. Shouldn't a school secretary have some social skills?
I know this is a bit morbid, but I really like it.
Dirge Without Music
I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.
So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:
Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned
With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.
Lovers and thinkers, into the earth with you.
Be one with the dull, the indiscriminate dust.
A fragment of what you felt, of what you knew,
A formula, a phrase remains -- but the best is lost.
The answers quick and keen, the honest look, the laughter, the love --
They are gone. They are gone to feed the roses. Elegant and curled
Is the blossom. Fragrant is the blossom. I know. But I do not approve.
More precious was the light in your eyes than all the roses in the world.
Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave,
Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;
Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.
I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.
-- Edna St. Vincent Millay
Gee, you're good. That sounds ummm, vaguely familiar....
THE FOOL
Since the wise men have not spoken, I speak that am only a fool;
A fool that hath loved his folly,
Yea, more than the wise men their books
or their counting houses, or their quiet homes,
Or their fame in men’s mouths;
A fool that in all his days hath done never a prudent thing,
Never hath counted the cost, nor recked if another reaped
The fruit of his mighty sowing, content to scatter the seed;
A fool that is unrepentant, and that soon at the end of all
Shall laugh in his lonely heart as the ripe ears fall to the reaping hooks
And the poor are filled that were empty,
Tho’ he go hungry.
......
I have squandered the splendid years
that the Lord God gave to my youth
In attempting impossible thins, deeming them alone worth the toil.
Was it folly or grace? Not men shall judge me, but God.
.........
I have squandered the splendid years:
Lord, if I had the years I would squander them over again,
Aye, fling them from me!
For this I have heard in my heart, that a man shall scatter, not hoard,
Shall do the deed of to-day, nor take thought of to-morrow’s teen,
Shall not bargain or huxter with God; or was it a jest of Christ’s
And is this my sin before men, to have taken Him at his word?
.......
The lawyers have sat in council, the men with the keen, long faces,
And said, ‘This man is a fool,’ and others have said,
'He blasphemeth;’
And the wise have pitied the fool that hath striven to give a life
In the world of time and space among the bulks of actual things,
To a dream that was dreamed in the heart,
And that only the heart could hold.
.........
O wise men, riddle me this: what if the dream come true?
What if the dream come true? And if millions unborn shall dwell
In the house that I shaped in my heart,
the noble house of my thought?
Lord, I have staked my soul, I have staked the lives of my kin
On the truth of Thy dreadful word. Do not remember my failures,
But remember this my faith.
.......
And so I speak.
Yes, ere my hot youth pass, I speak to my people and say:
Ye shall be foolish as I; ye shall scatter, not save;
Ye shall venture your all, lest ye lose what is more than all;
Ye shall call for a miracle, taking Christ at His word.
And for this I will answer, O people, answer here and hereafter,
O people that I have loved shall we not answer together?
Just what I needed... a laugh. I just had to speak to the ***** of a secretary at my son's school, and now I'm in tears. I've tried to get her moved or fired, but their damned union is just too strong. Shouldn't a school secretary have some social skills? 
