 Amazing Grace by James Newton Red for LibriVox.org by Laurie N. Walden Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see. Twas grace that taught my heart to fear and grace my fears relieved. How precious did that grace appear the hour I first believed. Through many dangers, toils and snares I have already come. To his grace hath brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home. The Lord has promised good to me, his word my hope secures. He will my shield in portion be as long as life endures. Yea, when this flesh and heart shall fail, and mortal life shall cease, I shall possess within the veil a life of joy and peace. Back to the Army by Rudyard Kipling, read for LibriVox.org on the 22nd of February 2007 by Alan Chant, living in Tumbridge, England, www.7oaksprep.kent.sh.uk. I'm here in a tickly Ulster, and a broken billy cockat, a laying onto the sergeant I don't know a gun from a bat, my shirt's doing duty for jacket, my sock sticking out of my boots, and I'm learning the damned old goose-step along at the new recruits. Back to the Army again, sergeant, back to the Army again. Don't look so hard, for I haven't no card. I'm back to the Army again. I've done this, actually, a service, Her Majesty says. Good day, you're pleased to come when you're wrung for, and here's your old back-pay, and forms a day for backy, and bloom in generous too, and now you can make your fortune the same as your officers do. Back to the Army again, sergeant, back to the Army again. How did I learn to do right about turn? I'm back to the Army again. A man of four and twenty that hasn't learned of a trade, beside reserve again him, he'd better be never made. I tried me luck for a quarter, and that was enough for me, and I thought of Her Majesty's barracks, and I thought I'd go and see. Back to the Army again, sergeant, back to the Army again. It isn't my fault if I dress when I ought. I'm back to the Army again. The sergeant asked no questions, but he winked the other eye. He says to me, shun, and I shunted, the same as in days gone by, for he saw the set of my shoulders, and I couldn't help holding straight when me and the other rookies came under the barric gate. Back to the Army again, sergeant, back to the Army again. Who would have thought I could carry and port? I'm back to the Army again. I took me bath, and I wallowed, for God, I needed it so. I smelt the smell of the barracks. I heard the bugles go. I heard the feet on the gravel, the feet of the memoir drill, and I says to me, fluttering art strings, I says to him, peace, peace still. Back to the Army again, sergeant, back to the Army again. Who said I knew when the Jumner was due? I'm back to the Army again. I carried me slops to the tailor. I says to him, none of your lip, you tight them over the shoulders and loose them over the hip, for the set of the tunings orried. And he says to me, struck me dead, but I thought you was used to the business. And so he done what I said. Back to the Army again, sergeant, back to the Army again. Rather too free with my fancies, what, me? I'm back to the Army again. Next week, I'll have them fitted. I'll buy me a swagger cane. They'll let me free of the barracks to walk on the hoe again in the name of William Parsons that used to be Edward Clay and any poor beggar that wants it can draw my forms a day. Back to the Army again, sergeant, back to the Army again. Out with the cold and the rain, sergeant. Out of the cold and the rain. Who's there? A man that's too good to be lost to you. A man that is handled and made. A man that will pay what he cost you in learning the others their trade, parade. You're dropping the pick of the Army because you don't help them remain, but drives them to cheat to get out of the street and back to the Army again. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Bush by James Lister Cuthbertson. Recorded for LibriVox.org by Susan Barker. The Bush. Give us from dawn to dark, blue of Australian skies. Let there be none to mark wither our pathway lies. Give us when noontide comes, rest in the woodland free, fragrant breath of the gums, cold, sweet scent of the sea. Give us the wattles gold and the due laden air and the loveliness bold, loneliest landscapes wear. These are the haunts we love, glad with enchanted hours, bright as the heavens above, fresh as the wild bush flowers. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Clancy of the Overflow. By Andrew Barton Banjoe Patterson. Read for LibriVox.org by Susan Barker. Clancy of the Overflow. I had written him a letter, which I had for want of better knowledge, sent to where I met him down the Lachlan years ago. He was shearing when I knew him, so I sent the letter to him just on spec, addressed as follows, Clancy of the Overflow. And an answer came directed in a writing unexpected, and I think the same was written with a thumbnail dipped in tar. It was his shearing mate who wrote it, and verbatim I will quote it. Clancy's gone to Queensland, drove on and we don't know where he are. In my wild erratic fancy visions come to me of Clancy gone a-droving down the Cooper where the Western drovers go, as the stalkers slowly stringing, Clancy rides behind them singing, for the drover's life has pleasures that the town's folk never know. And the bush hath friends to meet him, and their kindly voices greet him in the murmur of the breezes, and the river on its bars. And he sees a vision splendid of the sunlit plains extended, and at night the wondrous glory of the everlasting stars. I am sitting in my dingy little office, where a stingy ray of sunlight struggles feebly down between the houses tall, and the fetid air and gritty of the dusty, dirty city through the open window floating spreads its foulness over all. And in place of lowing cattle, I can hear the fiendish rattle of the tramways and the buses making hurried down the street, and the language uninviting of the gutter children fighting comes fitfully and faintly through the ceaseless tramp of feet. And the hurrying people daunt me and their pallid faces haunt me as they shoulder one another in their rush and nervous haste, with their eager eyes and greedy and their stunted forms and weedy. For townsfolk have no time to grow, they have no time to waste. And I somehow rather fancy that I'd like to change with Clancy, like to take a turn at droving where the seasons come and go, while he faced the round eternal of the cash book and the journal, but I doubt he'd suit the office, Clancy of the overflow. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. This reading for LibriVox.org by Deborah Lynn in Northern Lower Michigan. A cry from the consumer by Wilbur D. Nesbitt. Grasshoppers roam the Kansas fields and eat the tender grass, a trivial affair indeed. But what then comes to pass? You go to buy a Panama or any other hat. You learn the price has been advanced a lot because of that. A glacier up in Canada has slipped a mile or two. A little thing like this can boost the selling price of glue. Occurrence is so tragic, always throw me to the core. I hope and pray that nothing ever happens anymore. Last week, the peaceful Indians went a searching after scalps and then there was an avalanche way over in the Alps. These diametric happenings seem nothing much, but look we had to add a dollar to the wages of the cook. The bean crop down at Boston has grown measurably less and so the dealer charges more for goods to make a dress. Each day there is some incident to make a man feel sore. I'm on my knees to ask that nothing happens anymore. It didn't rain in Utah and it did in old Vermont. Result, it cost you 50 more to take a summer's jaunt. Upon the plains of Tibet, some tornadoes took a roll. Therefore the barons have to charge a higher price for coal. A streetcar strike in Omaha has cumulative shocks. It boosted huckleberries up to 20 cents a box. No matter what is happening, it always finds your door. Give us a rest, let nothing ever happen anymore. Mosquitoes in New Jersey bite a magnet on the wing. Result, poor consumer feels that fierce mosquitoes sting. Mosquitoes song is silenced, but in something like an hour, the grocers understand that it requires a raise in flour. A house burns down in Texas and a stove blows up in Maine. 10 minutes later, breakfast foods and prices show again. Effects must follow causes, which is what I most deplore. I hope and pray that nothing ever happens anymore. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Divine Image by William Blake. Read for LibriVox.org by Therese Cepeshie Blair. To mercy, pity, peace, and love all pray in their distress and to these virtues of delight return their thankfulness. For mercy, pity, peace, and love is God, our Father, dear, and mercy, pity, peace, and love is man, his child, and care. For mercy has a human heart, pity, a human face, and love, the human form divine, and peace, the human dress. Then every man of every climb that prays in his distress prays to the human form divine, love, mercy, pity, peace, and all must love the human form in heathen, turk, or Jew, where mercy, God, and pity dwell there, God is dwelling too. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Fate by Ralph Waldo Emerson. Read for LibriVox.org by Richard Gardett. Deep in the man sits fast his fate to mold his fortunes, mean or great. Unknown to Cromwell as to me was Cromwell's measure or degree. Unknown to him as to his horse, if he then his groom be better or worse, he works, plots, fights, and rude affairs, with squires, lords, kings, his craft compares. Till late he learned, through doubt and fear, broad England harbored not his pair. Obeying time, the last to own the genius from his cloudy throne, for the provision is allied unto the thing so signified, or say the foresight that awaits is the same genius that creates. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Haunted Chamber by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Read for LibriVox.org by Peter Yersley. Each heart has its haunted chamber where the silent moonlight falls. On the floor are mysterious footsteps, there are whispers along the walls, and mine at times is haunted by phantoms of the past, as motionless as shadows by the silent moonlight cast. A form sits by the window that is not seen by day, for as soon as the dawn approaches it vanishes away. It sits there in the moonlight itself as pale and still, and points with its airy finger across the windowsill. Without, before the window, there stands a gloomy pine, whose boughs wave upward and downward, as wave these thoughts of mine, and underneath its branches is the grave of a little child, who died upon life's threshold, and never wept nor smiled. What are ye, oh pallid phantoms, that haunt my troubled brain, that vanish when day approaches and at night return again? What are ye, oh pallid phantoms, but the statues without breath, that stand on the bridge overarching the silent river of death? End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Invictus by William Ernest Hanley. Read for LibriVox.org by Richard Gardett. Invictus. Out of the night that covers me, black as the pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be for my unconquerable soul. In the fell clutch of circumstance I have not winched, nor cried aloud, under the bludgeoning of chance my head is bloody, but unbowed. Beyond this place of rathen tears looms but the horror of the shade, and yet the menace of the years finds and shall find me unafraid. It matters not how straight the gate, how charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll. Recorded for LibriVox.org by Susan Barker. Jabberwocky. Twas Billig, and the slivy toves did gire and gimble in the wave. All mimsy were the borrogoves, and the moan rats outgrabe. Beware the Jabberwock my son, the jaws that bite, the claws that catch. Beware the jub-jub bird and shun the frumious band of snatch. He took his vaupal sword in hand, long time the manxome foe he sought, so rested he by the tum-tum tree, and stood a while in thought. And as in Uffish thought he stood, the Jabberwock with eyes of flame came wiffling through the toll-gee wood and burbled as it came. One-two, one-two, and through and through the vaupal blade went snicker-snack. He left it dead, and with its head he went glumping back. And hast thou slain the Jabberwock? Come to my arms, my beamish boy, O frabduous day, kaloo, kalay, he chortled in his joy. Twas Billig, and the slivy toves did gire and gimble in the wave. All mimsy were the borrogoves, and the moan rats outgrabe. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Mulgabill's Bicycle by Andrew Barton, Banjo Patterson. Read for LibriVox.org by Susan Barker. Mulgabill's Bicycle Twas Mulgabill from Eaglehawk that caught the cycling craze, he turned away the good old horse that served him many days. He dressed himself in cycling clothes, resplendent to be seen. He hurried off to town and bought a shining new machine. And as he wheeled it through the door with air of lordly pride, the grinning shop assistant said, Excuse me, can you ride? See here, young man, said Mulgabill, from Walget to the sea, from Conroy's Gap to Castle Ray, there's none can ride like me. I'm good all round at everything as everybody knows, although I'm not the one to talk. I hate a man that blows. But riding is my special gift, my chiefed soul delight. Just ask a wild duck, can it swim? A wild cat, can it fight? There's nothing clothed in hair or hide or built of flesh or steel. There's nothing walks or jumps or runs on axle hoof or wheel. But what I'll sit while hard will hold and girths and straps are tight. I'll ride this here too, wild concern, right straight away at sight. It was Mulgabill from Eaglehawk that sought his own abode that perched above the dead man's creek beside the mountain road. He turned the cycle down the hill and mounted for the fray, but ere he'd gone a dozen yards it bolted clean away. It left the track and threw the trees just like a silver streak. It whistled down the awful slope towards the dead man's creek. It shaved a stump by half an inch. It dodged a big white box. The very Wallaroos in fright went scrambling up the rocks. The Wombats hiding in their caves dug deeper underground as Mulgabill as white as chalk sat tight to every bound. It struck a stone and gave a spring that cleared a fallen tree. It raced beside a precipice as close as close could be. And then as Mulgabill let out one last despairing shriek, it made a leap of twenty feet into the dead man's creek. It was Mulgabill from Eaglehawk that slowly swam ashore. He said, I've had some narrow shaves and lively rides before. I rode a wild bull round a yard to win a five pound bet, but this was the most awful ride that I've encountered yet. I'll give that two-wheeled outlaw best. It's shaken all my nerve to feel it whistle through the air and plunge and buck and swerve. It's safe at rest in dead man's creek. We'll leave it lying still. A horse's back is good enough, henceforth for Mulgabill. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. My Love is in a Light Attire by James Joyce for LibriVox.org narrated by Sean McKinley. My Love is in a Light Attire among the apple trees where the gay winds do most desire to run in companies. There, where the gay winds stay to woo the young leaves as they pass, my love goes slowly, bending to her shadow on the grass. And where the sky's a pale blue cup over the laughing land, my love goes lightly, holding up her dress with dainty hand. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Or Comet that may range on high. Only a Zephyr that may blow among the reeds by the river low. Give me thy most privy place where to run my airy race. In some withdrawn on public mead let me sigh upon a reed or in the woods with leafy din. Whisper the still evening in. Some still work give me to do, only be it near to you. For I'd rather be thy child and pupil in the forest wild than be the king of men elsewhere and most sovereign slave of care. To have one moment of thy dawn or share the city's year forlorn. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The day is cold and dark and dreary. It rains and the wind is never weary. The vine still clings to the mouldering wall. But at every gust the dead leaves fall. And the day is dark and dreary. My life is cold and dark and dreary. It rains and the wind is never weary. My thoughts still cling to the mouldering past. But the hopes of youth fall thick in the blast. And the days are dark and dreary. Be still, sad heart, and cease repining. Behind the clouds is the sun still shining. Thy fate is the common fate of all. Into each life some rain must fall. Some days must be dark and dreary. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. A Sonnet of the Moon by Charles Best. Read for LibriVox.org by Catherine Monachia. Look how the pale queen of the silent night doth cause the ocean to attend upon her. And he, as long as she is in his sight, with her full tide is ready her to honour. But when the silver wagon of the moon is mounted up so high he cannot follow, the sea calls home his crystal waves to moan, and with low ebb doth manifest his sorrow. So you that are the sovereign of my heart have all my joys attending on your will. My joys low ebbing when you do depart. When you return their tide my heart doth fill. So as you come and as you do depart, joys ebb and flow within my tender heart. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Dance there upon the shore. What need have you to care for wind or water's roar? And tumble out your hair that the salt drops have wet. Being young you have not known the fool's triumph, nor yet love lost as soon as won, nor the best labourer dead and all the sheaves to bind. What need have you to dread the monstrous crying of the wind? Has no one said those daring kind eyes should be more learned or warned you how despairing the malls are when they are burned? I could have warned you, but you are young, so we speak a different tongue. Oh, you will take whatever's offered and dream that all the world's a friend, suffer as your mother suffered, be as broken in the end. But I am old and you are young, and I speak a barbarous tongue. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Who Goes Amid the Green Wood? By James Joyce For LibriVox.org Narrated by Sean McKinley Who Goes Amid the Green Wood? With Springtide all adorning her. Who Goes Amid the Merry Green Wood? To make it merrier. Who Passes in the Sunlight? By ways that know the light footfall. Who Passes in the Sweet Sunlight? With means so virginal. The ways of all the woodland gleam with a soft and golden fire. For whom does all the sunny woodland carry so brave attire? Oh, it is for my true love the woods the rich apparel wear. Oh, it is for my own true love that is so young and fair. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. I caught this morning morning's minion kingdom of daylight's dofah dappled dawn-drawn falcon in his riding of the rolling level underneath him's steady air and striding high there how he rung upon the rain of a wimpling wing in his ecstasy then off, off, forth on swing as a skates heel sweep smooth on a bow-bend the hurl and gliding rebuffed the big wind my heart in hiding stirred for a bird the achieve of the mastery of the thing. Brute beauty and valour and act oh, air, pride, plume, hear, buckle and the fire that breaks from thee then a billion times told lovelier, more dangerous oh, my chevalier no wonder of it sheer plod makes plow down-silion shine and blue bleak embers are, my dear, fall gall themselves and gash gold vermillion. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Winds of May that's Dance on the Sea by James Joyce for LibriVox.org narrated by Sean McKinley. Winds of May that's Dance on the Sea dancing a ring around in glee from furrow to furrow while overhead the foam flies up to be garlanded in silvery arches spanning the air saw you, my true love, anywhere? Well-a-day, well-a-day for the winds of May love is unhappy when love is away. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain.