Sunday, November 1, 2009

No!

No sun--no moon!
No morn--no noon!
No dawn--no dusk--no proper time of day--
No sky--no earthly view--
No distance looking blue--
No road--no street--no "t'other side this way"--
No end to any Row--
No indications where the Crescents go--
No top to any steeple--
No recognitions of familiar people--
No courtesies for showing 'em--
No knowing 'em!
No traveling at all--no locomotion--
No inkling of the way--no notion--
"No go" by land or ocean--
No mail--no post--
No news from any foreign coast--
No Park, no Ring, no afternoon gentility--
No company--no nobility--
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease,
No comfortable feel in any member--
No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees,
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds--
November!

-- Thomas Hood (1844)
(sometimes quoted by the
Old Bailey Hack, even though
it doesn't appear in the
Oxford Book of English Verse
[Quiller-Couch Ed.])

4 comments:

t.a. barnhart said...

this, btw, is the same man who wrote the poem in The Piano.

Nothstine said...

And oddly, that poem--"Silence"--is in the Quiller-Couch edition of the Oxford Book of Verse: http://is.gd/4KjGt.

Thanks!

OregonYankee said...

Nice, Bill. Very creative.

Nothstine said...

Hi, Oregon Yankee--

You'll be pleased [I hope] to know that this month I crossed the 8K mark on my odometer, beginning Feb 2003. Mostly commuting, but there's a Cycle Oregon in there too.

best
bn