Clone of My Own (Song Parody)

The first verse and chorus are by science fiction writer Randall Garrett. The other verses are by Isaac Asimov.

This parody is to be sung to the tune of Home on the Range.

Oh, give me a clone
Of my own flesh and bone
With its Y-chromosome changed to X
And when it is grown
Then my own little clone
Will be of the opposite sex.

(Chorus)
Clone, clone of my own,
With your Y-Chromosome changed to X
And when I’m alone
With my own little clone
We will both think of nothing but sex.

Oh, give me a clone
In my sorrowful moan
A clone that is wholly my own.
And if she’s an X
Of the feminine sex
Oh, what fun we will have when we’re prone.

My heart’s not of stone,
As I’ve frequently shown
When alone with my own little X
And after we’ve dined
I am sure we will find
Better incest than Oedipus Rex.

Why should such sex vex
Or disturb or perplex
Or induce a disparaging tone.
After all, don’t you see
Since we’re both of us me
When we’re having sex, I’m alone.

And after I’m done
She will still have her fun
For I’ll clone myself twice ere I die.
And this time without fail,
They’ll be both of them male
And they’ll ravage her by and by.

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The Prophet "on Marriage"

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Khalil Gibran
From the Book: The Prophet

Then Almitra spoke again and said…
"And what of Marriage, master?"
And he answered saying:

You were born together,
and together you shall be forevermore.

You shall be together
when the white wings of death scatter your days.

Aye, you shall be together
even in the silent memory of God.

But let there be spaces in your togetherness,
And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.

Love one another, but make not a bond of love.
Let it rather be a moving sea
between the shores of your souls.

Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.

Sing and dance together and be joyous,
but let each of you be alone,

Even as the strings of a lute are alone
though they quiver with the same music.

Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping.
For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.

And stand together, yet not too near together.
For the pillars of the temple stand apart,

And the oak tree and the cypress
grow not in each other’s shadow.

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The Passionate Shepherd to His Love

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Christopher Marlowe – 1599
From the Book: The Complete Poems and Translations

Come live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That valleys, groves, hills, and fields,
Woods, or steepy mountain yields.

And we will sit upon rocks,
Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

And I will make thee beds of roses
And a thousand fragrant poises,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle;

A gown made of the finest wool
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Fair lined slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold;

A belt of straw and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs;
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me, and be my love.

The shepherds’s swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me and be my love.

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IF

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Rudyard Kipling
From the Book: Rudyard Kipling: Everyman’s Poetry Library

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting;
Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don’t give way to hating;
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream – and not make dreams your master;
If you can think – and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings – nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run –
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,

And – which is more – you’ll be a Man, my son!

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In Excelsis

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Amy Lowell
From the Book: Complete Poetical Works of Amy Lowell

You — you —
Your shadow is sunlight on a plate of silver;
Your footsteps, the seeding-place of lilies;
Your hands moving, a chime of bells across a windless air.

The movement of your hands is the long, golden running of light from a rising sun;
It is the hopping of birds upon a garden-path.

As the perfume of jonquils, you come forth in the morning.
Young horses are not more sudden than your thoughts,
Your words are bees about a pear-tree,
Your fancies are the gold-and-black striped wasps buzzing among red apples.
I drink your lips,
I eat the whiteness of your hands and feet.
My mouth is open,
As a new jar I am empty and open.
Like white water are you who fill the cup of my mouth,
Like a brook of water thronged with lilies.

You are frozen as the clouds,
You are far and sweet as the high clouds.
I dare to reach to you,
I dare to touch the rim of your brightness.
I leap beyond the winds,
I cry and shout,
For my throat is keen as is a sword
Sharpened on a hone of ivory.
My throat sings the joy of my eyes,
The rushing gladness of my love.

How has the rainbow fallen upon my heart?
How have I snared the seas to lie in my fingers
And caught the sky to be a cover for my head? How have you come to dwell with me,
Compassing me with the four circles of your mystic lightness,
So that I say "Glory! Glory!" and bow before you
As to a shrine?

Do I tease myself that morning is morning and a day after?
Do I think the air is a condescension,
The earth a politeness,
Heaven a boon deserving thanks?
So you — air — earth — heaven —
I do not thank you,
I take you,
I live.
And those things which I say in consequence
Are rubies mortised in a gate of stone.

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Selected Sonnets

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William Shakespeare
From the Book: The Complete Works of William Shakespeare [UNABRIDGED]

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date:
Sometimes too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course, untrimm’d,
But they eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade
When in enternal lines to time thou growest;
     So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
     So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Sonnet 23

As an unperfect actor on the stage,
Who with his fear is put beside his part,
Or some fierce thing replete with too much rage,
Whose strength’s abundance weakens his own heart;
So I for fear of trust, forget to say
The perfect ceremony of love’s rite,
And in mine own love’s strength seem to decay,
O’ercharged with burthen of my own love’s might.
O let my books be then, the eloquence
And dumb presagers of my speaking breast;
Who plead for love, and look for recompense
More than that tongue that hath more express’d.
     O learn to read what silent love hath writ:
     To hear with eyes belongs to love’s fine wit.

Sonnet 26

Lord of my love, to whom in vassalage
Thy merit my duty strongly knit,
To thee I send this written embassage,
To witness duty, not to show my wit.
Duty so great, which wit so poor as mine
May make seem bare, in wanting words to show it;
But that I hope some good conceit of thine
In thy soul’s thought, all naked, will bestow it:
Till whatsoever star that guides by moving,
points on me graciously with fair aspect,
And puts apparel on my tatter’d loving,
To show me worthy of thy sweet respect:
     Then may I dare not to boast how I do love thee,
     Till then, not show my head where thou mayst prove me.

Sonnet 46

Mine eye and heart are at mortal war,
How to divide the conquest of they sight;
Mine eye my heart they picture’s sight would bar,
My heart mine eye the freadom of that right.
My heart doth plead that thou in him dost lie,
(A closet never pierc’d with crystal eyes,)
But the defendant doth that plea deny,
And says in him they fair appearance lies.
To ‘cide this title is impannelled
A quest of thoughts, all tenants to the heart;
And by their verdict is determined
The clear eye’s moiety, and the dear heart’s part
     As thus, mine eye’s due is thine outward part,
     And my heart’s right thine inward love of heart

Sonnet 57

Being your slave, what should I do but tend
Upon the hours and times of your desire?
I have no precious time at all to spend,
Nor services to do till you require.
Nor dare I chide the world-without-end-hour,
Whilst I, my sovereign, watch the clock for you,
Nor think the bitterness of absence sour,
When you have bid your servant once adieu;
Nor dare I question with my jealous thought
Where you may be, or your affairs suppose,
But like a sad slave, stay and think of nought,
Save, where you are how happy you make those;
     So true a fool is love, that in your will
     (Though you do anything) he thinks no ill.

Sonnet 78

So oft I have invok’d thee for my muse,
And found such fair assistance in my verse,
As every alien pen hath got my use,
And under thee their poesy disperse.
Thine eyes, that taught the dumb on high to sing,
And heavy ignorance aloft to fly,
Have added feather’s to the learned’s wing,
And given grace a double majesty.
Yet be most proud of that which I compile,
Whose influence is thine and borne of thee:
In others’ works thou dost but mend the style,
And arts with thy sweet graces graced be;
     But thou are all my art, and dost advance
     As high as learning my rude ignorance.

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Poems by Stephen Crane

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From the Book: The Complete Poems of Stephen Crane

The Heart

In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial
Who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, "Is it good, friend?"
"It is bitter—bitter," he answered;
"But I like it
Because it is bitter,
And because it is my heart."

A Man Said to the Universe

A man said to the universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the universe
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."

The Wayfarer

The wayfarer
Perceiving the pathway to truth
Was struck with astonishment.
It was thickly grown with weeds.
"Ha," he said,
"I see that none has passed here
"In a long time."
Later he saw that each weed
Was a singular knife.
"Well," he mumbled at last,
"Doubtless there are other roads."

I Saw a Man Pursuing The Horizon

I saw a man pursuing the horizon;
Round and round they sped.
I was disturbed at this;
I accosted the man.
"It is futile," I said,
"You can never–"
"You lie," he cried,
And ran on.

Many Workmen

Many workmen
Built a huge ball of masonry
Upon a mountaintop.
Then they went to the valley below,
And turned to behold their work.
"It is grand," they said;
They loved the thing.

Of a sudden, it moved.
It came upon them swiftly;
It crushed them all to blood.
But some had opportunity to squeal.

Many Red Devils

Many red devils ran from my heart
And out upon the page.
They were so tiny
Then pen could mash them.
And many struggled in the ink.
It was strange
To write in this red muck
Of things from my heart.

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The Condor

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Truman Capote

Like the mighty Condor,
    It’s vulture wings
Against a copper sky.
I have waited and watched
For my prey!
My victim is immortality-
To be something and be remembered-
Is that not, too, your idle dream?
For in remembrance we hold life itself
Cupped tenderly in aged hands.
    You say-"He’s a fool and a dreamer."
I laugh, and let my laughter,
Like a bright and terrible knife
Go tearing through your hearts!
For you know and I know,
No matter how young, how old,
We are only waiting,
Waiting to see our names in
            Scriptures
of stone.
So it is today and so it will be
            tomorrow!

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Cat Haiku

Author Unknown

You never feed me.
Perhaps I’ll sleep on your face.
That will sure show you.

You must scratch me there!
Yes, above my tail!
Behold, elevator butt.

The rule for today
Touch my tail, I shred your hand.
New rule tomorrow.

In deep sleep hear sound
cat vomit hairball somewhere
will find in morning.

Grace personified.
I leap into the window.
I meant to do that.

Blur of motion, then-
silence, me, a paper bag.
What is so funny?

You’re always typing.
Well, let’s see you ignore my
sitting on your hands.

My small cardboard box.
You cannot see me if I
can just hide my head.

Terrible battle.
I fought for hours. Come and see!
What’s a ‘term paper’?

Small brave carnivores
Kill pine cones and mosquitoes
Fear vacuum cleaner

I want to be close
to you. Can I fit my head
inside your armpit?

Wanna go outside.
Oh, crap! Help! I got outside!
Let me back inside!

Oh no! Big One
has been trapped by newspaper!
Cat to the rescue!

Humans are so strange.
Mine lies still in bed, then screams
My claws are not that sharp.

Cats meow out of angst
"Thumbs! If only we had thumbs!
We could break so much!"

The Big Ones snore now
Every room is dark and cold
Time for "Cup Hockey"

We’re almost equals
I purr to show I love you
Want to smell my butt?

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She Walks In Beauty

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George Gordon, Lord Byron
From the Book: The Essential Byron

See Also: The Love Poems of Lord Byron : A Romantic’s Passion
Byron’s Poetry : Authoritative Texts, Letters and Journals, Criticism, Images of Byron

She walks in Beauty, like the night
    Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
    Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellowed to that tender light
    Which Heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,
    Had half impaired the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
    Or softly lightens o’er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express,
    How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o’er that brow,
    So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
    But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
    A heart whose love is innocent!

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