The Road Less Traveled

[mildcigar_2001]

The title of the post of course comes from the poem by Robert Frost. To wit:


The Road Not Taken

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

My question is that if one had a choice of being born a genetic girl or being born a TS, would anyone still choose the later? Does anyone think that traversing the often times difficult path of being a transsexual has made them a better person, or that they enjoy a more unique view on life?

[ed_jaxon]

Great poem

[nicebrn]

I prefer "The Waste Land." ;)

"I will show you something different from either/Your shadow at morning striding behind you/Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you"

Out of perverse curiosity I've asked this question to a few girls that I've been close to, wondering what kind of answer I'd get. Assuming they were being honest, at least two did admit they'd rather be what they are rather than have been born a female. So if there's two, I'd reason that there are others. And of course there are some here who've said they're better than females. I'm not sure sure one is inherently "better" than thee other, but I can definitely see that point.

[Stavros]

Frost wrote the poem when he was living in Gloucestershire; I am not a fan of his but if you are interested this link if you dont know it gives the UK background to Frosts early career.
http://www.dymockpoets.co.uk/Frost.htm

[robertlouis]

My question is that if one had a choice of being born a genetic girl or being born a TS, would anyone still choose the later? Does anyone think that traversing the often times difficult path of being a transsexual has made them a better person, or that they enjoy a more unique view on life?[/FONT]

It's an interesting question, hamlet (may I call you that? ;-) ).

[ed_jaxon]

So long as we are being all literary and shit, I always liked Eliot's The Waste Land but identify more with Prufrock at this stage in my life

[robertlouis]

So long as we are being all literary and shit, I always liked Eliot's The Waste Land but identify more with Prufrock at this stage in my life

I can assure you Ed, sadly, that those feelings of self-conscious inadequacy never quite wear off....

"I should have been a pair of ragged claws, scuttling across the floors of silent seas"

Better stop before I start quoting Burns. :)

[ed_jaxon]

Yeah RL, "I have heard the mermaids singing each to each. I do not think they will sing to me."


.

[robertlouis]

Yeah RL, "I have heard the mermaids singing each to each. I do not think they will sing to me."


.

I love The Waste Land, but it is almost too multi-layered and complex to take in as a single poetic work. Prufrock is more direct and accessible - possibly the most indecisive man in literature since Hamlet!

"Should I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing...."

Infinitely quotable

[theone1982]

I like the Hollow Men by T.S. Eliot.
I


We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom
Remember us -- if at all -- not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.


II


Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death's dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind's singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.

Let me be no nearer
In death's dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat's coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer --

Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom


III


This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man's hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.

Is it like this
In death's other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.


IV


The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river

Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.


V


Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o'clock in the morning.

Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom

Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow


Life is very long

Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom


For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

[robertlouis]

I live about 5 miles from Little Gidding, setting for one of the Four Quartets.

Amazing to think that Eliot was both an American and a senior official at the Bank of England, as well as arguably the finest poet writing in English in the 20th century.

I like Larkin, Lowell, Seamus Heaney, e e cummings, Auden, but Eliot is the colossus.

[Jackal]

T.S. Eliot is an anagram for toilets. I prefer Wilfred Owen.

[theone1982]

:Bowdown::Bowdown:
YouTube - The Hollow Men - Apocalypse Now (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=845Hx3XV9EU)

[Jackal]

I live about 5 miles from Little Gidding, setting for one of the Four Quartets.

Amazing to think that Eliot was both an American and a senior official at the Bank of England, as well as arguably the finest poet writing in English in the 20th century.

I like Larkin, Lowell, Seamus Heaney, e e cummings, Auden, but Eliot is the colossus.

T.S. Eliot was the one who was also a banker? I thought it was Yeats...hmmm. I get some of the bio's confused

[robertlouis]

T.S. Eliot was the one who was also a banker? I thought it was Yeats...hmmm. I get some of the bio's confused

Yeats was a senator in the Dail, the Irish parliament.

[robertlouis]

T.S. Eliot is an anagram for toilets. I prefer Wilfred Owen.

Good and now pretty much the palimpsest for anyone writing about the emotions of the First World War. I prefer Rosenberg and Sassoon though.

[Birgitta]

Good question,
From the moment i was born it was like i knew there was something wrong, almost as if i could already feel id have a difficult life,
Nowadays i see my transition, especially everything ive gone through mentally as something i needed to learn, like a task i needed to fullfill...
And im happy i have past the test so far...could not have done it without the help from so many people, friends and family...

Im not sure that this made me a better human though, dont think so though i did learn to be humble...

Xxx
Birgitta

[Prospero]

For the heart Yeats wins over Eliot. But for the head Eliot and - perhaps - Ezra pound. Heaney is good, but what about Derek Walcott? Omeros is epic - literally and everyotherwhichway.

[Stavros]

Poetry seems to evoke differences in taste in the same way that music does.

Eliot's reputation was forged in the 1920s at a time when modernism was reaching its zenith -the literature of the modern, predominantly urban/industrial experience that sort of began with Baudelaire, in which life has no simple direct route from youth and childhood to marriage and the family and death; and is quite different from Frost.

Eliot's move away from rhyme and metre, the flamboyant imagery, the allusions to other sources of literature and religion (but the Notes to The Waste Land to some are typical of Eliot's prissy elitism) can be seen either as a new and ambitious departure for literature -whose most extreme form is Finnegan's Wake -or, if you are Kingsley Amis, as the beginning of the death of western civilisation, when with Schoenberg and Picasso, 'the rot set in'. Eliot worked in in Lloyd's Bank in King William St in the Foreign dept, and is variously described as anti-Semitic and gay -he was anti-semitic in the way a lot of people were before 1945 but probably not as sick as Ezra Pound; Eliot definitely had heterosexual relationships but lived in Carlyle Mansions in Chelsea with John Hayward which some thought might have been sexual and so on-he could have been bisexual, or more likely not that interested in sex, and apparently he wasn't any good at it either.

I enjoyed Eliot when I was a teenager, I now appreciate him as being part of the modernist movement in the 1920s, but one whose works have not survived, compared to Woolf, Conrad, Joyce and Proust. Eliot's Christian Fascist politics have been his downfall, and for that reason I cannot maintain any respect for him; Ezra Pound took a selfish delight in being obscure, wrote possibly two or three nice poems, but is otherwise another relic of the Fascist era who should have known better. To get some perspective on the times, George Orwell's 'Inside the Whale' is irreplaceable, and damning.

There are scores of individual poems which delight me but I rarely come across a large body of work that is sustained thoughout a poet's career: Heaney and Ted Hughes in English score higher marks than the beat poets for example, although Gregory Corso's Marriage must be one of the funniest poems of the century, and Ferlinghetti's Autobiography is serene.

WH Auden to me remains the finest of the poets who wrote in English; he wrote a lot of dross, and he was a cultural snob, but at his best his use of language is both direct and sensitive, he never goes beyond the possible in life, his humanism asks for the essential.

But if its just favourites, I would go for two obscure poets whose work I read again and again: Antonia Pozzi, and Judith Wright.

[Prospero]

We should have a separate strand on this site for this... as it's interesting but wayyyyyy of the main topic.

Individual poems then - some of Auden, some of Louis Macniece for sure, Yeats in abundance, and lots of poets in translation - Seferis, Cavafy, Symborska.. the list is way too long

[Birgitta]

Well its nice to see men here that are intelligent and creative...i heard a tgirlfriend once tell me that most guys into ts arent very intelligent, but i have to disagree!

[lisaparadise]

The title of the post of course comes from the poem by Robert Frost.


My question is that if one had a choice of being born a genetic girl or being born a TS, would anyone still choose the later? Does anyone think that traversing the often times difficult path of being a transsexual has made them a better person, or that they enjoy a more unique view on life?well now thats a tough question because ive often thought about what if i was born genetic i mean it does have its perks but i think id still choose being a ts simply because im diferent i love being different ive always marched to my own drum and most of all i like being special.i love the attention i get no matter where i go sometimes its not good attention mostly from girls they whisper in there partners ear and i know what there saying so i stare her down letting her know i caught her and the guys well gay straight or bi they all wanna fuck me period and guarenteed to get a boner being within 2 feet of me so ya im a ts and i wouldnt want it any other way.

[Stavros]

Well its nice to see men here that are intelligent and creative...i heard a tgirlfriend once tell me that most guys into ts arent very intelligent, but i have to disagree!

It works both ways Birgitta, a lot of men think Ts are dim whereas a lot have degrees, and so on. I once met a famous ts known to most on this board who hasn't had the education but could easily run a multi-million dollar business because she has the business savvy a lot of people dont. My real concern is with girls who become so fixated on their transition that they dont keep up with education or employment and find that by the time they are 30 they have lost a crucial decade to depilation, drugs and despair. But there are so many different people and experiences out there.

[robertlouis]

We should have a separate strand on this site for this... as it's interesting but wayyyyyy of the main topic.

Individual poems then - some of Auden, some of Louis Macniece for sure, Yeats in abundance, and lots of poets in translation - Seferis, Cavafy, Symborska.. the list is way too long

Two poets stand head and shoulders above the rest for me.

Burns, for his intense humanity, universality and embrace of the brotherhood of man. OK, he was a Scot too, so that helps.

But the poet I return to again and again is Thomas Hardy, who most people know as a late-Victorian novelist. The poetry of guilt and grief that he wrote after the death of his estranged first wife is a supreme achievement in literature.

I was also lucky enough to have as my tutor at university the late, great Edwin Morgan who when he died last year held the title of Scottish Laureate.

[Jackal]

Two poets stand head and shoulders above the rest for me.

Burns, for his intense humanity, universality and embrace of the brotherhood of man. OK, he was a Scot too, so that helps.

But the poet I return to again and again is Thomas Hardy, who most people know as a late-Victorian novelist. The poetry of guilt and grief that he wrote after the death of his estranged first wife is a supreme achievement in literature.

I was also lucky enough to have as my tutor at university the late, great Edwin Morgan who when he died last year held the title of Scottish Laureate.

Oh, that's ace! Richard Burton read Hardy, Dylan Thomas and Wilfred Owen on different albums, great to listen from such a voice. Check it out, you can find digital copies online

[robertlouis]

Oh, that's ace! Richard Burton read Hardy, Dylan Thomas and Wilfred Owen on different albums, great to listen from such a voice. Check it out, you can find digital copies online

My poetry shelf is the one I reach for when I'm seeking solace or inspiration.

[theone1982]

Of course, there is also that famous poem, whose title and author escapes me, but it goes like this:

There once was a man from Curlass,
Who had balls made of fine brass,
In stormy weather, they clanked together,
And sparks flew out of his ass!


:)Pure class!

[robertlouis]

Of course, there is also that famous poem, whose title and author escapes me, but it goes like this:

There once was a man from Curlass,
Who had balls made of fine brass,
In stormy weather, they clanked together,
And sparks flew out of his ass!


:)Pure class!

Thanks for your contribution, young man.

We'll let you know..... ;)

[theone1982]

Thanks for your contribution, young man.

We'll let you know..... ;)

I got plenty more, if you want to hear 'em!:lol:

[robertlouis]

I got plenty more, if you want to hear 'em!:lol:


Umm, as I said, we'll let you know..... :whistle:

[Prospero]

There was a young man from Strathclyde
Who fell in a sewer and died
the next day his brother
fell into another
and now they're interred side-by-side

[robertlouis]

Oh well, if you can't beat 'em.....

This one from Spike Milligan:

There was a young man from Darjeeling
Who got on a bus bound for Ealing
It said on the door,
Don't spit on the floor,
So he stood up and grogged on the ceiling

And Anon (who obviously got around a bit...)

A young man from Botany Bay
Caught a slow boat to China one day
He was chained to the tiller by a sex-starved gorilla
And China's a bloody long way!