When is a cliché not a cliché?

by Mary Jackson (April 2012)

It is a while since I saw any Poems on the Underground on the underground. For those not in the know, Poems on the Underground is described on Wikipedia as:

a project to bring poetry to a wider audience by displaying various poems or stanzas on advertising boards across the London Underground rapid transit network.

A river rises
A bird flies. I watch, wait
And stay behind.

There have been some good ones, though. A few years ago I caught sight of this:

They are not long, the weeping and the laughter,
Love and desire and hate:
I think they have no portion in us after
We pass the gate.

They are not long, the days of wine and roses:
Out of a misty dream
Our path emerges for a while, then closes
Within a dream.

The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness.

I have forgot much, Cynara! gone with the wind,
Flung roses, roses riotously with the throng,
Dancing, to put thy pale, lost lilies out of mind

Too many roses. He died of alcholism at thirty-two. Too much wine.

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