Liza Minnelli is an actress, singer, dancer, and choreographer, known for her commanding stage presence and powerful singing voice. She Is one of a few performers to be awarded non-competitive Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony awards. Minnelli is also a Knight of the French Legion of Honour
Liquor and Stilettoes Form: 11 Lines using the letters SDAPRETBSRS to start each line
Starting out, things were fine Dancing the night into the morning light And walking home her stilettos hanging in her hand Pressing her liquor-sweet lips on mine Romance seemed to float in the air Enchanted my thoughts turned away from the one-night tryst Taking the chance on another date, then another But time revealed the dramatic queen Seeing a crisis is nothing at all Rose-tinted shades lost their edge Silenced in the mountains of her molehills
Oath of the Tennis Court 1791 Neo-Classicism Pen and brown ink, brown wash with white highlights Collection of Musée du Chateau de Versailles, Versailles, France
‘Oath of the Tennis Court’ was created to celebrate the first anniversary of a moment of solidarity that sparked the Revolution. David’s ambitious project was on a monumental scale requiring nearly life-sized portraits of the main characters, including Jean-Sylvestre Bailly and Maximilien Robespierre
Jacques-Louis David Neo-classicism Born: 30 August 1748, Paris, France Nationality: French Died: 29 December 1825, Brussels, Belgium
David was a Neoclassical painter and was considered the preeminent painter of the era. In the 1780s his brand of historical painting marked a change from Rococo frivolity towards classical austerity, severity, and feeling harmonized with the moral climate of the last years of the Ancien Régime
David Foster Classical Pop Born: 1 November 1949, Victoria, Canada Nationality: Canadian
David Foster is a musician, composer, arranger, record producer, and music executive. He chaired Veve Records from 2012—2016. Foster has been nominated for 47 Grammy Awards of which he won 16
Hence, loathed Melancholy, …………Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born In Stygian cave forlorn …………’Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights unholy! Find out some uncouth cell, …………Where brooding Darkness spreads his jealous wings, And the night-raven sings; …………There, under ebon shades and low-browed rocks, As ragged as thy locks, …………In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell. But come, thou Goddess fair and free, In heaven yclept Euphrosyne, And by men heart-easing Mirth; Whom lovely Venus, at a birth, With two sister Graces more, To ivy-crowned Bacchus bore: Or whether (as some sager sing) The frolic wind that breathes the spring, Zephyr, with Aurora pIaying, As he met her once a-Maying, There, on beds of violets blue, And fresh-blown roses washed in dew, Filled her with thee,. a daughter fair, So buxom, blithe, and debonair. Haste thee, Nymph, and bring with thee Jest, and youthful Jollity, Quips and cranks and wanton wiles, Nods and becks and wreathed smiles Such as hang on Hebe’s cheek, And love to live in dimple sleek; Sport that wrinkled Care derides, And Laughter holding both his sides. Come, and trip it, as you go, On the light fantastic toe; And in thy right hand lead with thee The mountain-nymph, sweet Liberty; And, if I give thee honour due, Mirth, admit me of thy crew, To live with her, and live with thee, In unreproved pleasures free: To hear the lark begin his flight, And, singing, startle the dull night, From his watch-tower in the skies, Till the dappled dawn doth rise; Then to come, in spite of sorrow, And at my window bid good-morrow, Through the sweet-briar or the vine, Or the twisted eglantine; While the cock, with lively din, Scatters the rear of darkness thin, And to the stack, or the barn-door, Stoutly struts his dames before: Oft listening how the hounds and horn Cheerly rouse the slumbering morn, From the side of some hoar hill, Through the high wood echoing shrill: Sometime walking, not unseen, By hedgerow elms, on hillocks green, Right against the eastern gate Where the great Sun begins his state, Robed in flames and amber light, The clouds in thousand liveries dight; While the ploughman, near at hand, Whistles o’er the furrowed land, And the milkmaid singeth blithe, And the mower whets his scythe, And every shepherd tells his tale Under the hawthorn in the dale. Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures, Whilst the landskip round it measures: Russet lawns, and fallows grey, Where the nibbling flocks do stray; Mountains on whose barren breast The labouring clouds do often rest; Meadows trim, with daisies pied; Shallow brooks, and rivers wide; Towers and battlements it sees Bosomed high in tufted trees, Where perhaps some beauty lies, The cynosure of neighbouring eyes. Hard by a cottage chimney smokes From betwixt two aged oaks, Where Corydon and Thyrsis met Are at their savoury dinner set Of herbs and other country messes, Which the neat-handed Phyllis dresses; And then in haste her bower she leaves, With Thestylis to bind the sheaves; Or, if the earlier season lead, To the tanned haycock in the mead. Sometimes, with secure delight, The upland hamlets will invite, When the merry bells ring round, And the jocund rebecks sound To many a youth and many a maid Dancing in the chequered shade, And young and old come forth to play On a sunshine holiday, Till the livelong daylight fail: Then to the spicy nut-brown ale, With stories told of many a feat, How Faery Mab the junkets eat. She was pinched and pulled, she said; And he, by Friar’s lantern led, Tells how the drudging goblin sweat To earn his cream-bowl duly set, When in one night, ere glimpse of morn, His shadowy flail hath threshed the corn That ten day-labourers could not end; Then lies him down, the lubber fiend, And, stretched out all the chimney’s length, Basks at the fire his hairy strength, And crop-full out of doors he flings, Ere the first cock his matin rings. Thus done the tales, to bed they creep, By whispering winds soon lulled asleep. Towered cities please us then, And the busy hum of men, Where throngs of knights and barons bold, In weeds of peace, high triumphs hold With store of ladies, whose bright eyes Rain influence, and judge the prize Of wit or arms, while both contend To win her grace whom all commend. There let Hymen oft appear In saffron robe, with taper clear, And pomp, and feast, and revelry, With mask and antique pageantry; Such sights as youthful poets dream On summer eves by haunted stream. Then to the well-trod stage anon, If Jonson’s learned sock be on, Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy’s child, Warble his native wood-notes wild. And ever, against eating cares, Lap me in soft Lydian airs, Married to immortal verse, Such as the meeting soul may pierce, In notes with many a winding bout Of linked sweetness long drawn out With wanton heed and giddy cunning, The melting voice through mazes running, Untwisting all the chains that tie The hidden soul of harmony; That Orpheus’ self may heave his head From golden slumber on a bed Of heaped Elysian flowers, and hear Such strains as would have won the ear Of Pluto to have quite set free His half-regained Eurydice. These delights if thou canst give, Mirth, with thee I mean to live
John Milton Born: 9 December 1608, London, England Nationality: English Died: 8 November 1674, London, England
Milton was a poet, polemicist, and civil servant. He is best known for the epic poem ‘Paradise Lost’ (1667), composed in blank verse over ten books and written at a time of religious flux and political upheaval. Milton served as a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under its Council of State and later under Oliver Cromwell
Memories remain of Maisie Writing out algebra on a whiteboard A equals B squared added together C is cubed Do the same for both sides And an answer you will find So I wrote a poem with letters And landed a detention An hour of algebra after school Really wasn’t cool Divide both sides by C she said After that, my mind drifted to French homework to be done By morning Translation is easier than This differentiation and integration I said to Maisie So is maths a language, now?
I sometimes think you guys are sat by the creative box in my brain, well, it sure seems that way with this one
Form: Free Verse
Forgiveness Settled in the misty haze On a Sunday afternoon and alcohol Whispering your promises it won’t happen again The whiskey melted warmly into my body And believing maybe this time there is a second chance Deep down Did I know I would live to regret that? Were my doubts washed away by the drink? I’m pretty sure I must have had doubts Perhaps, I forgot to think As my heart of love, still able to batter my mind into submission Still had a pulse And for a while it was okay The future seemed to smile Until the second time The last time Another Sunday morning throbbed through my senses And the scarlet tears wept on my thighs While the shards of your promises Splintered into my soul This was never again My never again Embraced in pain I sat weeping As my heart of love died In the icy coldness of the fading emotions Of a Coeur Noir