What Shall I Say About the Irish?
The utterly impractical, never predictable,
Sometimes irascible, quite inexplicable, Irish.
Strange blend of shyness,
pride and conceit,
And stubborn refusal to bow in defeat.
He's spoiling and ready to argue and fight,
Yet the smile of a child
fills his soul with delight.
His eyes are the quickest to well up with tears,
Yet his strength is the strongest
to banish your fears.
His hate is as fierce as his devotion is grand,
And there is no middle ground
on which he will stand.
He's wild and he's gentle,
he's good and he's bad.
He's proud and he's humble,
he's happy and sad.
He's in love with the ocean,
the earth and the skies,
He's enamoured with beauty wherever it lies.
He's victor and victim, a star and a clod,
But mostly he's Irish—
in love with his God.

And another

The Irish...
Be they kings, or poets, or farmers,
They're a people of great worth,
They keep company with the angels,
And bring a bit of heaven here to earth

A friend sent me this poem. She thinks that it is about Gene. I agree. Thanks Vicki.

TRUE SUCCESS

To laugh often and love much

To win the respect of intelligent persons

And the affection of children

To earn the approbation of honest critics

And endure the betrayal of false friends

To appreciate beauty

To find the best in others

To give one’s self

To leave the world a bit better,

whether by a healthy child, a garden patch

or a redeemed social condition

To have played and laughed with enthusiasm

and sung with exultation

To know even one life has breathed easier

because you have lived

This is to have succeeded

                        Ralph Waldo Emerson

This poem was written by Carl Sandburg especially for Gene to dance to, on one of his Pontiac TV specials. This is one of the shows I have not yet seen, and am desperate to do so. It is available for viewing at the Paley Center in New York and Los Angeles.

A POEM FOR GENE KELLY TO DANCE TO

Spring is when the grass turns green and glad

Spring is when the new grass comes up and says hey, hey, hey, hey.

Be dizzy now and turn your head upside down and see how the world looks upside down

Be dizzy now and turn a cartwheel and see the good earth through a cartwheel.

Tell your feet the alphabet

Tell your feet the multiplication table

Tell your feet where to go, and watch ‘em go and come back

Can you dance a question mark?

Can you dance an exclamation mark?

Can you dance a couple of commas?

And bring it to a finish with a period?

Can you dance like the wind is pushing you?

Can you dance like you are pushing the wind?

Can you dance like slow wooden heels??

And then change to bright and singing silver heels.

Such nice feet, such good feet.

So lazy as grass grows and rivers run

Silver lakes like blue porcelain plates

And snakes of winding rivers

You can see ‘em on a map.

Why we got geography?

Because we go from place to place, because the earth used to be flat and had four corners, and you could jump off from any of the corners.

But now the earth is not flat any more.

Now it is round all over. Now it is a globe, a ball, round all over, and we would all fall off it and tumble away into space if it wasn’t for the magnetic Poles. And when you dance it is the North Pole or the South Pole pulling on your feet like magnets to keep your feet on the earth.

And that’s why we got geography.

And it’s nice to have it that way.

Why does duh Mississippi River wind and wind?

Why, dat’s easy. She wind so she git where she wanna go.

Mississippi, Rappahannock, Punxatawney.

Spell out their names with your heels.

Where duh towns uh Punkatawney and Mauk Chunk?

Why, yeanh day’s bof in Pennsylvan-ee-eye-ay.

And dat’s why we git geography.

Left foot, tweedle-dum – right foot tweedle-dee, here they go.

When Yankee Doodle came to town, wat wuz he a ridin’ on?

A buffalo? A elephant? A horse?

No, no, no, no. A Pony it wuz, a Pony. That’s right.

Giddi-ap, Giddi-ap, Giddi-ap.

Whoa! Whoa!

I know that W B Yeats was one of Gene's favourite poets.

Here are a couple of his works which I thought appropriate

What Then?

His chosen comrades thought at school
He must grow a famous man;
He thought the same and lived by rule,
All his twenties crammed with toil;
`What then?' sang Plato's ghost. `What then?'
 
Everything he wrote was read,
After certain years he won
Sufficient money for his need,
Friends that have been friends indeed;
`What then?' sang Plato's ghost. `What then?'
 
All his happier dreams came true -
A small old house, wife, daughter, son,
Grounds where plum and cabbage grew,
Poets and Wits about him drew;
`What then?' sang Plato's ghost. `What then?'
 
`The work is done,' grown old he thought,
`According to my boyish plan;
Let the fools rage, I swerved in naught,
Something to perfection brought';
But louder sang that ghost, `What then?'

 
This is a poem which he read to Betsy, his first wife, 
relating the last two lines of the second stanza directly to her.

When You are Old

When you are old and grey and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;
 
How many loved your moments of glad grace,
And loved your beauty with love false or true,
But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face;
 
And bending down beside the glowing bars,
Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled
And paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.

This is the last stanza of Among School Children

Labour is blossoming or dancing where
The body is not bruised to pleasure soul.
Nor beauty born out of its own despair,
Nor blear-eyed wisdom out of midnight oil.
O chestnut-tree, great-rooted blossomer,
Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bole?
O body swayed to music, O brightening glance,
How can we know the dancer from the dance? 

This is a link to the complete poem.

 http://www.web-books.com/Classics/Poetry/Anthology/Yeats/Among.htm

  
The Secret Rose 
Far-off, most secret, and inviolate Rose,
Enfold me in my hour of hours; where those
Who sought thee in the Holy Sepulchre,
Or in the wine-vat, dwell beyond the stir
And tumult of defeated dreams; and deep
Among pale eyelids, heavy with the sleep
Men have named beauty. Thy great leaves enfold
The ancient beards, the helms of ruby and gold
Of the crowned Magi; and the king whose eyes
Saw the Pierced Hands and Rood of elder rise
In Druid vapour and make the torches dim;
Till vain frenzy woke and he died; and him
Who met Fand walking among flaming dew
By a grey shore where the wind never blew,
And lost the world and Emer for a kiss;
And him who drove the gods out of their liss,
And till a hundred morns had flowered red
Feasted, and wept the barrows of his dead;
And the proud dreaming king who flung the crown
And sorrow away, and calling bard and clown
Dwelt among wine-stained wanderers in deep woods;
And him who sold tillage, and house, and goods,
And sought through lands and islands numberless years,
Until he found, with laughter and with tears,
A woman of so shining loveliness
That men threshed corn at midnight by a tress,
A little stolen tress. I, too, await
The hour of thy great wind of love and hate.
When shall the stars be blown about the sky,
Like the sparks blown out of a smithy, and die?
Surely thine hour has come, thy great wind blows,
Far-off, most secret, and inviolate Rose?
 

The following is a passage taken from a beautiful book

which Gene once said he loved, and often 'dipped into' - 

"Simply because it delights me - and in this troubled world

gives me surcease and balm for my woes.” 

Crock Of Gold, by James Stephens. 

Does this somehow sound familiar?

"Two people, the girl, and a young, slender man,

were coming slowly up to the house. 

The rain was falling heavily, but they did not seem to mind it. 

There was a big puddle of water close to the kerb, and the girl, 

stepping daintily as a cat, went round this,

but the young man stood for a moment beyond it. 

He raised both arms, clenched his fists, 

swung them, and jumped over the puddle. 

Then he and the girl stood looking at the water, 

apparently measuring the jump. 

I could see them plainly by a street lamp. 

They were bidding each other goodbye. 

The girl put her hand to his neck and settled the collar of his coat, 

and while her hand rested on him the young man 

suddenly and violently flung his arms about her and hugged her;

then they kissed and moved apart. 

The man walked to the rain puddle and stood there 

with his face turned back laughing at her, 

and then he jumped straight into the middle of the puddle

and began to dance up and down in it,

the muddy water splashing up to his knees. "