| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Phantasmagoria and Other Poems by Lewis Carroll: "Kind words are more than coronets,"
She said, and wondering looked at me:
"It is the dead unhappy night, and I must hurry home to tea."
A SEA DIRGE
THERE are certain things - as, a spider, a ghost,
The income-tax, gout, an umbrella for three -
That I hate, but the thing that I hate the most
Is a thing they call the Sea.
Pour some salt water over the floor -
Ugly I'm sure you'll allow it to be:
Suppose it extended a mile or more,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Love Songs by Sara Teasdale: "Sara Teasdale sings about love better than any other contemporary
American poet." -- `The Boston Transcript'.
"`Rivers to the Sea' is the most charming volume of poetry that has appeared
on either side of the Atlantic in a score of years." -- `St. Louis Republic'.
Sara Teasdale (1884-1933):
Teasdale was born in St. Louis, Missouri, where she attended a school
that was founded by the grandfather of another great poet from St. Louis --
T. S. Eliot. She later associated herself more with New York City.
Her first book of poems was "Sonnets to Duse" (1907),
[at least one poem in the current volume, "Faults", is from this book,]
but "Helen of Troy" (1911) was the true launch of her career,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Salammbo by Gustave Flaubert: him. He ought to have attacked them immediately with fresh troops.
Another similar day and the war was over! If matters were protracted
they would return with greater strength; the Tyrian towns would join
them; his clemency towards the vanquished had been of no avail. He
resolved to be pitiless.
The same evening he sent the Great Council a dromedary laden with
bracelets collected from the dead, and with horrible threats ordered
another army to be despatched.
All had for a long time believed him lost; so that on learning his
victory they felt a stupefaction which was almost terror. The vaguely
announced return of the zaimph completed the wonder. Thus the gods and
 Salammbo |