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Quote by Margaret Yorke

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Mortal Remains

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Margaret Yorke

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“If you were not so gentle, If you were hard to please, If you were never patient And always ill at ease, If you were far from humble, If you could not forgive, If all you did was grumble And curse the life you live, If you were irreligious, If you were not composed, If you were quite ignoble, If you had not proposed, If you were daft as killdeer, If you were less than kind, If you were proud and pushy, I’d pay you little mind. And never would I ever Call you Valentine. But you are kind and gentle, So patiently at ease. You’re gracious, sweet, and humble. Not ever hard to please. You evince faith and service; They dictate how you live. Good will along with mercy Allow you to forgive. Despite the trials and heartaches, You count your blessings all. Despite the miles between us, Persistently you call. The gestures of affection. The compliments so kind. The selfless acts of service Endear you in my mind. And that, my dear, is why I Call you Valentine.”

“... While much recent historicist criticism has assumed early nineteenth-century readers attuned to subtle ideological nuances in poetry, actual responses from readers often come closer to clulessness. ... It is no surprise that no one understood Blake, but other poets fared not much better. ... Coleridge's 'Christabel' was 'the standing enigma which puzzles the curiosity of literary circles. What is it all about?', while another reviewer asked about Shelley, 'What, in the name of wonder on one side, and of common sense on the other, is the meaning of this metaphysical rhapsody about the unbinding of Prometheus?'. Even Keats was condemned for 'his frequent obscurity and confusion of language' and his 'unintelligible quaintness'. Byron, never to be outdone, boasted in 'Don Juan' that not only did he not understand many of his fellow poets, he did not understand himself either: 'I don't pretend that I quite understand / My own meaning when I would be very fine.' ...”