I am not immortal. Faustus and I are the also-ran.

quote by Anne Sexton
Added by Lucian Velea
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Faust: What wilt from me, Base Spirit, say? Brass, marble, parchment, paper, clay? The terms with graver, quill, or chisel, stated? I freely leave the choice to thee.

classic line from Faust by Goethe (1808), translated by Bayard Taylor
Added by Dan Costinaş
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A very Faustian choice is upon us: whether to accept our corrosive and risky behavior as the unavoidable price of population and economic growth, or to take stock of ourselves and search for a new environmental ethic.

quote by E.O. Wilson
Added by Lucian Velea
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From Faust - VI. Scene--A Garden

Margaret. Faust.

MARGARET.

DOST thou believe in God?

FAUST.

Doth mortal live

Who dares to say that he believes in God?
Go, bid the priest a truthful answer give,

Go, ask the wisest who on earth e'er trod,--
Their answer will appear to be
Given alone in mockery.

MARGARET.

[...] Read more

poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Sed Non Satiata (Unslakeable Lust)

Bizarre déité, brune comme les nuits,
Au parfum mélangé de musc et de havane,
Oeuvre de quelque obi, le Faust de la savane,
Sorcière au flanc d'ébène, enfant des noirs minuits,

Je préfère au constance, à l'opium, au nuits,
L'élixir de ta bouche où l'amour se pavane;
Quand vers toi mes désirs partent en caravane,
Tes yeux sont la citerne où boivent mes ennuis.

Par ces deux grands yeux noirs, soupiraux de ton âme,
Ô démon sans pitié! verse-moi moins de flamme;
Je ne suis pas le Styx pour t'embrasser neuf fois,

Hélas! et je ne puis, Mégère libertine,
Pour briser ton courage et te mettre aux abois,
Dans l'enfer de ton lit devenir Proserpine!

Unslakeable Lust

[...] Read more

poem by Charles Baudelaire
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Dante can be understood only within the context of Italian thought, and Faust would be unthinkable if divorced from its German background; but both are part of our common cultural heritage.

quote by Gustav Stresemann
Added by Lucian Velea
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Before God`s Grace

After a mournful funeral
My soul was summoned before God`s throne
Bewildered, abject and all alone
Verily the scene was achy and sore
Couldn't expect that of more

God disclosed all of my guiltless crimes
In a harsh and grim rhymes
'So Mr. John
You claimed that sin is nothing but ignorance*
Like a Faustus* followed the Renaissance*

What I revealed unto Mortal minds
Are desperate thoughts of Hearts` confined?
Those sacred letters to you were hoaxed
Just the gentles to coax'

'You were blamed from a Satan`s clan
Of rude upon my Holy man
You have had an evil spirit John

[...] Read more

poem by Gulsher john
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The Trial

Stagger like the drunken dead
Washed of innocence
Caressed by dreams of Voltaire
French palettes of chaos
Sweet charnel pastels
Framed in the art of self destruction
We light the streetlamps of poetry
Deeper into the abyss of the lived
Barter your time with Faustian beauty
Draped in silk skulls
Dance the moon dance of choice
Everything stops in frozen preservation
Cradles and graves awakened
Our words and deeds
Wings of self-indulgence
All the rules shine forever
Conscience
Choice
Arbitration
Advocate

[...] Read more

poem by Joseph Narusiewicz
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Faust: Now I have studied philosophy,
medicine and the law,
and unfortunately, theology,
wearily sweating, yet I stand now,
poor fool, no wiser than I was before;
I am called Master, even Doctor,
and for these last ten years have led
my students by the nose - up, down,
crosswise and crooked. Now I see
that we know nothing finally.

line from Faust by Goethe (1808)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Don't Forgive Him

Men of clan kill those they love for money,
Blood of brothers can't be cleanse
from their memory
Hades, get thee behind me!
Who knows when Christ is coming?
.
Faustus sold his soul for love of magic
And had them all to his means,
From scholarly, he went to trickery,
Who knows what else could it be?
.
Mephastophilis, dont you forgive him,
Your time at his service is finished
You kill him, you burn him
you slaughter him,
His soul you take with you to Hades
Till he realises there is no escape
from nemesis.
.
Oh ye who think Nigerians are fraudsters,

[...] Read more

poem by Efe Benjamin
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On Looking Through an old Punishment Book [At Eurunderee School]

I took the book of punishment,
And ran its columns down;
I started with an open brow
And ended with a frown;
I noted long-forgotten names –
They took me unaware;
I noted old familiar names.
But my names wasn’t there!

I thought of what I might have been,
And Oh! My heart was pained
To find, of all the scholars there,
That I was never caned!
I thought of wasted childhood hours,
And a tear rolled down my cheek –
I must have been a model boy,
Which means a little sneak!

“Oh, give me back my youth again!”
Doc Faustus used to say –

[...] Read more

poem by Henry Lawson
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The Cranes of Ibicus

Here was a man who watched the river flow
Past the huge town, one gray November day.
Round him in narrow high-piled streets at play
The boys made merry as they saw him go,
Murmuring half-loud, with eyes upon the stream,
The immortal screed he held within his hand.
For he was walking in an April land
With Faust and Helen. Shadowy as a dream
Was the prose-world, the river and the town.
Wild joy possessed him; through enchanted skies
He saw the cranes of Ibycus swoop down.
He closed the page, he lifted up his eyes,
Lo--a black line of birds in wavering thread
Bore him the greetings of the deathless dead!

poem by Emma Lazarus
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Nunc Dimittis

No INFERNO – Faust’s RESENTFUL fears,
U NFORTUNATE, MALEVOLENT, - the years
N ow drip towards their watershed as time
C reates an image with no BROKEN rhyme.
D ETESTABLE those who, as GRIM Death nears,
I n ANXIOUS, SPITEFUL, MELANCHOLY, tears
MALEVOLENCE invent as if their mime
I nane were EVIL-STARRED, their phantomime
T orn by SPITEFUL world ACCURSED, arrears
T o pay to godhead OMINOUS which leers
I magining in ENMITY fall follows climb.
S uch BLASPHEMOUS behaviour we MALIGN.
R EPULSIVE each RESENTFUL failure’s sign.
E nd may mean new beginnings … and, if not,
ADd joys once shared to sweet forget-me-not.

poem by Jonathan Robin
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Die Häfen Waren Geöffnet

Die Häfen waren geöffnet. Wir schifften uns ein,
die Segel voraus, den Traum über Bord,
Stahl an den Knien und Lachen um unsere Haare,
denn unsere Ruder trafen ins Meer, schneller als Gott.

Unsere Ruder schlugen die Schaufeln Gottes und teilten
die Flut;
vorne war Tag, und hinten blieben die Nächte,
oben war unser Stern, und unten versanken die andern,
draußen verstummte der Sturm, und drinnen wuchs unsre
Faust.

Erst als ein Regen entbrannte, lauschten wir wieder;
Speere stürzten herab und Engel traten hervor,
hefteten schwärzere Augen in unsere schwarzen.
Vernichtet standen wir da. Unser Wappen flog auf:

Ein Kreuz im Blut und ein größeres Schiff überm Herzen.

poem by Ingeborg Bachmann
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Seth Compton

When I died, the circulating library
Which I built up for Spoon River,
And managed for the good of inquiring minds,
Was sold at auction on the public square,
As if to destroy the last vestige
Of my memory and influence.
For those of you who could not see the virtue
Of knowing Volney's "Ruins" as well as Butler's "Analogy"
And "Faust" as well as "Evangeline,"
Were really the power in the village,
And often you asked me,
"What is the use of knowing the evil in the world?"
I am out of your way now, Spoon River,
Choose your own good and call it good.
For I could never make you see
That no one knows what is good
Who knows not what is evil;
And no one knows what is true
Who knows not what is false.

poem by Edgar Lee Masters
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Melodies Without Sound (Revised)

The first time I was asked for my ideal I said To
become Faust and learn everything there is; by
dramatic phrasing I meant being a student for-
ever- she derisively replied, Get real child, what
a pretentious ideal - I was deeply mortified

Studied philosophy, science, quantum physics and
relativism, wondered about astronomy; astrology
explained the characters we deal with in life; read
everything that evoked my curiosity, unsure where
the quest would lead - the joy of doing it an end in
itself - and while stimulating discussion is limited

I write to clarify emotional problems, practise the
art of expression and learn to use sonorous words
to create melodies without sound, learning from
the poet I most admire because - HIS poetry
sings at all times

poem by Margaret Alice Second
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The Abnormal Is Not Courage

The Poles rode out from Warsaw against the German
Tanks on horses. Rode knowing, in sunlight, with sabers,
A magnitude of beauty that allows me no peace.
And yet this poem would lessen that day. Question
The bravery. Say it's not courage. Call it a passion.
Would say courage isn't that. Not at its best.
It was impossib1e, and with form. They rode in sunlight,
Were mangled. But I say courage is not the abnormal.
Not the marvelous act. Not Macbeth with fine speeches.
The worthless can manage in public, or for the moment.
It is too near the whore's heart: the bounty of impulse,
And the failure to sustain even small kindness.
Not the marvelous act, but the evident conclusion of being.
Not strangeness, but a leap forward of the same quality.
Accomplishment. The even loyalty. But fresh.
Not the Prodigal Son, nor Faustus. But Penelope.
The thing steady and clear. Then the crescendo.
The real form. The culmination. And the exceeding.
Not the surprise. The amazed understanding. The marriage,
Not the month's rapture. Not the exception. The beauty

[...] Read more

poem by Jack Gilbert
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So they begin. With two years gone...

So they begin. With two years gone
From nurse to countless tunes they scuttle.
They chirp and whistle. Then comes on
The third year, and they start to prattle.

So they begin to see and know.
In din of started turbines roaring
Mother seems not their mother now,
And you not you, and home is foreign.

What meaning has the menacing
Beauty beneath the lilac seated,
If to steal children's not the thing?
So first they fear that they are cheated.

So ripen fears. Can he endure
A star to beat him in successes,
When he's a Faust, a sorcerer?
So first his gipsy life progresses.

[...] Read more

poem by Boris Pasternak
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Bunny Is Missin

Bunny is missing

She is out to feed her flock

To save her kittens

But she aint young anymore

And love aint what she's lookin for

A warm bed and a light

Some where to sleep at night

But bunny has been missing too long

After her first trip

The light flickered

[...] Read more

poem by Yvette Smith
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Anniversary 2

Understanding comes in waves and whether waves come
too breathlessly fast or dawdle conscionably
out of the future or the past,
it doesn't matter, everything adding up and cancelling out.
From the golden fields of youth and Need
through the inexplicable let-downs of passing time,
evolve differently, often,
than the ways we expect them to.
Purity is all.

Mother, beauty
worthy to be sculpted by Pisano,
you thought you had a hotline to God;
in fact, you did,
via the cable of infinite trust.
Many imagine righteousness a bulwark against evil.
It isn't always. Still others say you get what you deserve.

Deserve? Ditch that awful habit
of saying what others deserve:

[...] Read more

poem by Morgan Michaels
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