"Frugal eye" appears Emily Dickinson
XIX.
I HAD A GUINEA GOLDEN.
I had a guinea golden;
I lost it in the sand,
And though the sum was simple,
And pounds were in the land,
Still had it such a value
Unto my frugal eye,
That when I could not find it
I sat me down to sigh.
I had a crimson robin
Who sang full many a day,
But when the woods were painted
He, too, did fly away.
Time brought me other robins, --
Their ballads were the same, --
Still for my missing troubadour
I kept the 'house at hame.'
I had a star in heaven;
One Pleiad was its name,
And when I was not heeding
It wandered from the same.
And though the skies are crowded,
And all the night ashine,
I do not care about it,
Since none of them are mine.
My story has a moral:
I have a missing friend, --
Pleiad its name, and robin,
And guinea in the sand, --
And when this mournful ditty,
Accompanied with tear,
Shall meet the eye of traitor
In country far from here,
Grant that repentance solemn
May seize upon his mind,
And he no consolation
Beneath the sun may find.
On Wed, Jun 11, 2008 at 11:04 PM, Robin Hamilton
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Ok, here's the Rodent Rolodex Cyborg.
>
> Like Roger, I'd have been inclined to late 18thC -- the lines feel as if
> they were part of an octosyllabic couplet poem -- but the sentiment in the
> second line, "Merely born to mate or die," suggests a post-Darwinian
> perspective. (Browning has, for instance, "What of Venice and her people?
> -- merely born to bloom and drop") So I'd go for a mid-19thC pastiche of an
> 18thC mode.
>
> The poet Patrick mentioned, Isabel Burnard Owen, published her _Poems_ in
> 1856, but the phrases don't seem to occur there. This is available on
> google books:
>
>
> http://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&id=v1kCAAAAQAAJ&dq=Isabel+Burnard+Owen&printsec=frontcover&source=web&ots=aUfkpw-_LN&sig=zkWS9ceoCAcnfb15b3O4sLMzEyU
>
> I checked all 558 instances of "frugal" in the C-H English Poetic Text
> Database, and none are relevant.
>
> :-(
>
> Oh, and it's "blowens", not "blowsens", though "blowse", "blowsabella",
> etc., may be parallel or related terms.
>
> Rodent
>
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Roger Day" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Wednesday, June 11, 2008 10:09 PM
> Subject: Re: Quote origins
>
>
>> Yeah, I've seen that, and several others. Only I can't believe it's a
>> "saying". I think it's late eighteenth century.
>>
>> All respects to you, M Borges, I was hoping Robin "part index, part
>> man" Hamilton might have some pointers on this, even though it's nutin
>> to do with blowsens.
>>
>> Roger
>>
>> On Wed, Jun 11, 2008 at 8:13 PM, M. Borges Accardi <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>>
>>> Found an interesting article related to the topic:
>>>
>>> htt
>>> p://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-557656/Why-man-COULD-live-Desmond-Morris.html
>>>
>>> with its frugal eye
>>>
>>> Looking at some art-work today, this quote was used:
>>>
>>> "Nature with its frugal eye
>>> Asks only that we mate and die."
>>>
>>> Does anyone know it's origins please?
>>>
>>> Roger
>
--
My Stuff: http://www.badstep.net/
"I began to warm and chill
to objects and their fields"
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
|