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#69963 05/16/02 06:19 AM
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dxb Offline
Pooh-Bah
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Dear Jackie,

according to the OED, clock was a general term for beetle used in the north of England - origin unknown - often accompanied with a further descriptor. Clock-bee for instance was a flying beetle, clock-a-clay or clock-leddy was a ladybird ( I think you call it a ladybug in the USA). I don't know how far back rhyming slang was first used, but your question brought this to mind, crossing with the children's chants thread that was going a few weeks ago:

Ladybird, ladybird fly away home,
Your house is on fire and your children all gone,
Except for one, her name is Nan,
And she is hiding under the frying pan.

Children used to recite this nonsense rhyme when they found a ladybird.

dxb




#69964 05/17/02 02:23 AM
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In reply to:

That's a spring song ! saith Faldage.


Spring song, schming song!


#69965 05/17/02 04:36 AM
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old hand
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Note: This poem has been abridged by me.


_________JUNE RAPTURE__________

GREEN! What a world of green! My startled soul
Panting for beauty long denied,
Leaps in a passion of high gratitude
To meet the wild embraces of the wood;
Rushes and flings itself upon the whole
Mad miracle of green, with senses wide,
Clings to the glory, hugs and holds it fast,
As one who finds a long-lost love at last.
Billows of green that break upon the sight
In bounteous crescendos of delight,
Wind-hurried verdure hastening to the hills
To where the sun its highest rapture spills;
Cascades of color tumbling down the height
In golden gushes of delicious light -
God! Can I bear the beauty of this day,
Or shall I be swept utterly away?

Praised be the gods that made my spirit mad;
Kept me aflame and raw to beauty's touch;
Lashed me and scrourged me with the whip of fate:
Gave me so often agony to mate;
Tore from my heart the things that make men glad -
Praised be the gods! If I at last by such
Relentless means may know the sacred bliss,
The anguished rapture of an hour like this.
Smite me, O life, and bruise me if thou must;
Mock me and starve me with thy bitter crust,
But keep me thus aquiver and awake,
Enamoured of my life for living's sake!
This were the tragedy- that I should pass,
Dull and indifferent through the glowing grass
And this is the reason I was born, I say -
That I might know the passion of this day!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Angela Morgan





#69966 05/17/02 05:46 AM
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addict
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Spring song, schming song!

Self-yart to one of my earliest posts...

Shouldn't that be Spring song schmring schmong.


#69967 05/17/02 12:02 PM
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enthusiast
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Spring song, schming song!

A poem by Odgen Nash begins:
Forgive my singsong;
It's just my spring song.



#69968 05/20/02 04:04 AM
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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:
Sometime 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 thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st:
So long as men can breath, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

- Shakespeare, Sonnet 18


#69969 05/20/02 12:00 PM
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Carpal Tunnel
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Bob, that's my very own sonnet! Thank you for posting it! I have to say that now I don't hate ALL of Shakespeare...she said, still swooning. (Hi, Darling lusy! <grin>)


#69970 05/21/02 04:03 AM
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Hi, Darling lusy!

G'day, sweetest one, you just made my day.

lusy

#69971 05/22/02 02:06 PM
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Gather ye Rosebuds whilst ye may,
Old Time, he is a-flying;
And those same flowers that bloom to day,
Tomorrow may be dying.

also

Go no more a-rushing, Maids in May;
Go no more a-rushing, Maids I pray.
Go no more a-rushing, lest you fall a-blushing,
So bundle up your rushes and haste away.


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