Once, when I was young and true,
Someone left me sad-
Broke my brittle heart in two;
And that is very bad.
...
A dream lies dead here. May you softly go
Before this place, and turn away your eyes,
Nor seek to know the look of that which dies
Importuning Life for life. Walk not in woe,
...
Star, that gives a gracious dole,
What am I to choose?
Oh, will it be a shriven soul,
Or little buckled shoes?
...
Oh, I can smile for you, and tilt my head,
And drink your rushing words with eager lips,
And paint my mouth for you a fragrant red,
And trace your brows with tutored finger-tips.
...
I think that I shall never know
Why I am thus, and I am so.
Around me, other girls inspire
In men the rush and roar of fire,
...
In April, in April,
My one love came along,
And I ran the slope of my high hill
To follow a thread of song.
...
When I am old, and comforted,
And done with this desire,
With Memory to share my bed
And Peace to share my fire,
...
A single flow'r he sent me, since we met.
All tenderly his messenger he chose;
Deep-hearted, pure, with scented dew still wet -
One perfect rose.
...
I think, no matter where you stray,
That I shall go with you a way.
Though you may wander sweeter lands,
You will not soon forget my hands,
...
If I had a shiny gun,
I could have a world of fun
Speeding bullets through the brains
Of the folk who give me pains;
...
Because my love is quick to come and go-
A little here, and then a little there-
What use are any words of mine to swear
My heart is stubborn, and my spirit slow
...
There's little to have but the things I had,
There's little to bear but the things I bore.
There's nothing to carry and naught to add,
And glory to Heaven, I paid the score.
...
In May my heart was breaking-
Oh, wide the wound, and deep!
And bitter it beat at waking,
And sore it split in sleep.
...
In the pathway of the sun,
In the footsteps of the breeze,
Where the world and sky are one,
He shall ride the silver seas,
...
When my eyes are weeds,
And my lips are petals, spinning
Down the wind that has beginning
Where the crumpled beeches start
...
They hail you as their morning star
Because you are the way you are.
If you return the sentiment,
They'll try to make you different;
...
Oh, mercifullest one of all,
Oh, generous as dear,
None lived so lowly, none so small,
Thou couldst withhold thy tear:
...
Oh, I'd been better dying,
Oh, I was slow and sad;
A fool I was, a-crying
About a cruel lad!
...
In youth, it was a way I had
To do my best to please,
And change, with every passing lad,
To suit his theories.
...
Dorothy Parker was an American poet, short story writer, critic and satirist, best known for her wit, wisecracks, and eye for 20th century urban foibles. From a conflicted and unhappy childhood, Parker rose to acclaim, both for her literary output in such venues as The New Yorker and as a founding member of the Algonquin Round Table. Following the breakup of the circle, Parker traveled to Hollywood to pursue screenwriting. Her successes there, including two Academy Award nominations, were curtailed as her involvement in left-wing politics led to a place on the Hollywood blacklist. Parker went through three marriages (two to the same man) and survived several suicide attempts. Dismissive of her own talents, she deplored her reputation as a "wisecracker." Nevertheless, her literary output and reputation for her sharp wit have endured Early Life Parker was born in West End, New Jersey, as the fourth and last child of Jacob (Henry) Rothschild, a garment manufacturer, and Annie Eliza (Marston) Rothschild, the daughter of a machinist at Phoenix Armour. Parker's mother died in 1898. Jacob married in 1900 Eleanor Frances Lewis, a Roman Catholic; Parker never liked her stepmother. Eleanor Frances died three years after the wedding. Parker's father died when she was twenty. Parker was educated at a Catholic school. "But as for helping me in the outside world, the convent taught me only that if you spit on a pencil eraser it will erase in," Parker said later in an interview. She moved to New York City, whe she wrote during the day and earned money at night playing the piano in a dancing school. Career In 1916 Parker sold some of her poetry to the editor of Vogue, and was given an editorial position on the magazine. In 1917 she married Edwin Pond Parker II, a stockbroker, whom she later divorced. Edwin was wounded in World War I, he was an alcoholic, and during the war he became addicted to morphine. From 1917 to 1920 Parker worked for Vanity Fair. Frank Crowinshield, the managing editor of the magazine, later recalled that she had "the quickest tongue imaginable, and I need not to say the keenest sense of mockery." With two other writers Robert Benchley and Robert Sherwood, Parker formed the nucleus of the Algonquin Round Table, an informal luncheon club held at New York City's Algonquin Hotel on Forty-Fourth Street. Other members included Ring Lardner and James Thurber. Parker was usually the only woman in the group. Alan Rudolph's film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994), starring Jennifer Jason Leigh, Campbell Scott, Matthew Broderick, depicted the life of the author and her friends around the famous Algonquin Round Table. Between the years 1927 and 1933 Parker wrote book reviews for The New Yorker. Her texts continued appear in the magazine at irregular intervals until 1955. Parker's first collection of poems, Enough Rope, was published in 1926. It contained the often-quoted 'Résumé' on suicide, and 'News Item'. Résumé Razors pain you; Rivers are damp; Acids stain you; And drugs cause cramp. Guns aren't lawful; Nooses give; Gas smell awful; You might as well live. Enough Rope became a bestseller and was followed by Sunset Guns (1928) and Death and Taxes (1931), which were collected in Collected Poems: Not So Deep As a Well (1936). Her poems were sardonic, usually dry, elegant commentaries on departing or departed love, or shallowness of modern life: "Why is it no one sent me yet / One perfect limousine, do you suppose? / Ah no, it's always just my luck to get / One perfect rose." (1926) Parker's short story collections, After Such Pleasures (1932) and Here Lies (1939), proved sharp understanding of human nature. Among her best-known pieces are 'A Big Blonde', which won her O. Henry Prize, and the soliloquies 'A Telephone Call' and 'The Waltz'. During the 1920s Parker had extra-marital affairs, she drank heavily and attempted suicide three times, but maintained the highs quality of her texts. In the 1930s Parker moved with her second husband, Alan Campbell, to Hollywood. She worked there as a screenwriter, including on the film A Star Is Born (1937), directed by William Wellman and starring Janet Gaynor, Fredric March, and Adolphe Menjou. The film received an Oscar for Best Original Story. In Alfred Hitchcock's film Saboteur (1940) Parker collaborated with Peter Vierter and Joan Harrison. Her contribution is mainly visible in some of the bizarre details of the circus the hero (Robert Cummings) takes refuge in, with its squabbling Siamese twins, its bearded lady in curlers and a malevolent dwarf who acts and dresses a bit like Hitler. With Lillian Hellman and Dashiell Hammett, Parker helped found the Screen Writers' Guild. She also reported on the Spanish Civil War, and collaborated on several plays. Temptations of Hollywood did not make Parker any softer, which a number of film stars had to face. When Joan Crawford was married to Franchot Tone, she became obsessed with self-improvement. Parker said: "You can take a whore to culture, but you can't make her think." Parker had taken an early stand against Fascism and Nazism and she declared herself a Communist, for which she was blacklisted during the McCarthy era. Her last major film project was The Fan (1949), directed by Otto Preminger. It was based on Oscar Wilde's play Lady Windermere's Fan, but Wilde's witty comments on society and Parker's updating did not amuse the audience. Later Preminger admitted that "it was one of the few pictures I disliked while I was working on it." Parker died alone on June 7, 1967 in the New York hotel that had become her final home. She left her estate to civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. Posthumous Honors In 1988, the NAACP claimed Parker's remains and designed a memorial garden for them outside their Baltimore headquarters. The plaque reads, Here lie the ashes of Dorothy Parker (1893–1967) humorist, writer, critic. Defender of human and civil rights. For her epitaph she suggested, 'Excuse my dust'. This memorial garden is dedicated to her noble spirit which celebrated the oneness of humankind and to the bonds of everlasting friendship between black and Jewish people. Dedicated by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. October 28, 1988. On August 22, 1992, the 99th anniversary of Parker's birth, the United States Postal Service issued a 29¢ U.S. commemorative postage stamp in the Literary Arts series. The Algonquin Round Table, as well as the number of other literary and theatrical greats who lodged there, helped earn the Algonquin Hotel its status as a New York City Historic Landmark. The hotel was so designated in 1987. In 1996 the hotel was designated a National Literary Landmark by the Friends of Libraries USA based on the contributions of Parker and other members of the Round Table. The organization's bronze plaque is attached to the front of the hotel. Her birthplace was also designated a National Literary Landmark by Friends of Libraries USA in 2005 and a bronze plaque marks the spot where the home once stood.)
A Very Short Song
Once, when I was young and true,
Someone left me sad-
Broke my brittle heart in two;
And that is very bad.
Love is for unlucky folk,
Love is but a curse.
Once there was a heart I broke;
And that, I think, is worse.
Simple, honest, sharp and friendly! It's so hard to create simplicity in poetry.Using colloquial language with a sharp sense of humour. It seems a little cruel, as she judges life.
In Dorothy Parker's 'The Dark Girl's Rhyme', there is an error. It's 'folk of mud and flame', not 'folk of mud and name.' Every Dorothy Parker reference on the internet (that I have found) has the same error.
Excellent North American Poetess, great humor in almost all her poems, her humor must be undsrood, so treu!
Hollywood money isn't money. It's congealed snow, melts in your hand, and there you are.
Gratitude—the meanest and most snivelling attribute in the world.
All those writers who write about their childhood! Gentle God, if I wrote about mine you wouldn't sit in the same room with me.
I can't talk about Hollywood. It was a horror to me when I was there and it's a horror to look back on. I can't imagine how I did it. When I got away from it I couldn't even refer to the place by name. "Out there," I called it.
Those who have mastered etiquette, who are entirely, impeccably right, would seem to arrive at a point of exquisite dullness.
Enjoyed it! One more drink and I'd have been under the host.
This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force.
Good work, Mary. We all knew you had it in you.
Excuse my dust.
And there was that wholesale libel on a Yale prom. If all the girls attending it were laid end to end, Mrs. Parker said, she wouldn't be at all surprised.
That woman speaks eighteen languages and can't say No in any of them.
It serves me right for putting all my eggs in one bastard.
Wit has truth in it ... wisecracking is simply calisthenics with words.
The affair between Margot Asquith and Margot Asquith will live as one of the prettiest love stories in all literature.
The two most beautiful words in the English language are "check enclosed."
Money is only congealed snow.
Maybe it is only I, but conditions are such these days, that if you use studiously correct grammar, people suspect you of homosexual tendencies.
I was the toast of two continents: Greenland and Australia.
Scratch a lover, and find a foe.
... if this world were anything near what it should be there would be no more need of a Book Week than there would be a of a Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.
I misremember who first was cruel enough to nurture the cocktail party into life. But perhaps it would be not too much too say, in fact it would be not enough to say, that it was not worth the trouble.
Sorrow is tranquility remembered in emotion.
If you're going to write, don't pretend to write down. It's going to be the best you can do, and it's the fact that it's the best you can do that kills you.
It's not the tragedies that kill us, it's the messes.
beautiful is your creation.