Literature Out Loud

Sonnet One hundred and three by William Shakespeare

Alack, what poverty my muse brings forth,
That, having such a scope to show her pride,
The argument all bare is of more worth
Than when it hath my added praise beside.
O, blame me not if I no more can write!
Look in your glass, and there appears a face
That overgoes my blunt invention quite,
Dulling my lines and doing me disgrace.
Were it not sinful, then, striving to mend,
To mar the subject that before was well?
For to no other pass my verses tend
Than of your graces and your gifts to tell.
 And more, much more, than in my verse can sit
 Your own glass shows you when you look in it.

Sonnet One hundred and two by William Shakespeare

My love is strengthened, though more weak in seeming;
I love not less, though less the show appear.
That love is merchandized whose rich esteeming
The owner’s tongue doth publish everywhere.
Our love was new, and then but in the spring,
When I was wont to greet it with my lays,
As Philomel in summer’s front doth sing,
And stops his pipe in growth of riper days.
Not that the summer is less pleasant now
Than when her mournful hymns did hush the night,
But that wild music burdens every bough,
And sweets grown common lose their dear delight.
 Therefore, like her, I sometime hold my tongue,
 Because I would not dull you with my song.

Sonnet One hundred and one by William Shakespeare

Sonnet One hundred and one

O truant muse, what shall be thy amends
For thy neglect of truth in beauty dyed?
Both truth and beauty on my love depends;
So dost thou too, and therein dignified.
Make answer, muse. Wilt thou not haply say
“Truth needs no color with his color fixed,
Beauty no pencil beauty’s truth to lay;
But best is best if never intermixed”?
Because he needs no praise, wilt thou be dumb?
Excuse not silence so, for ’t lies in thee
To make him much outlive a gilded tomb
And to be praised of ages yet to be.
 Then do thy office, muse; I teach thee how
 To make him seem long hence as he shows now.

Sonnet Two by William Shakespeare

 

Sonnet II

by William Shakespeare

 

When forty winters shall besiege thy brow
And dig deep trenches in thy beauty’s field,
Thy youth’s proud livery, so gazed on now,
Will be a tattered weed of small worth held.
Then being asked where all thy beauty lies,
Where all the treasure of thy lusty days,
To say within thine own deep-sunken eyes
Were an all-eating shame and thriftless praise.
How much more praise deserved thy beauty’s use
If thou couldst answer “This fair child of mine
Shall sum my count and make my old excuse,”
Proving his beauty by succession thine.
 This were to be new made when thou art old
 And see thy blood warm when thou feel’st it cold.

 

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Doordash Dane

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One Minute at Boxcar Comedy

Dane Allred stand-up One minute at Boxcar Comedy Club right now.

Right now, give it up for Dane Allred.

He's so funny, he gets one minute, man.

Yeah, I teach BYU.

I'm in the wrong place.

I can't wait to tell these jokes to my students.

Especially the jiggly bits.

You're gonna have to explain that to me, Jiffy...

What's it called? Daniel, What was it?

Jiggly puff.

I'm excited to tell that.

Yeah, I'm gonna blame this on Michael.

I'm hoping to meet Helen Keller when I go to heaven.

Do you think people told her the Helen Keller jokes when she was alive?

If they didn't, I'm going to. And then she'll shoot me.

Because they'll be guns in heaven, right?

Most people in Utah aren't going to go to heaven if there aren't guns.

I want to meet Abraham Lincoln, too, because he said "The ballot is stronger than the bullet".

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Dane Allred! That's how you do it, all right.

South America at the Social

Oz Morris: Please welcome your adjunct professor, Dane Allred

Dane Allred:  Thank you.  I warned these two that we were going to do stand-up, but I didn’t think they knew they were going to be held hostage.

How long you been married?

Husband: Uh, twenty-seven years.

Dane Allred: Whoo!  It is eternal, isn’t it?  Feels like an eternity?  Thumbs up!  I’ve been married for 46 years.  Talk to me in twenty years.  How did you guys meet?

Husband: In Miami.

Dane Allred: And you’re from South America?

Wife: Yes.

Dane Allred: So, do you make fun of the North Americans?  Like if somebody says “Are you from South America?” and you say, “Yeah, the good America.  Not Central America.  I’m sorry.  The better America?  I’m going to get beat up on the way out of here.

I teach at BYU (Brigham Young University).  Everybody likes to talk about this.  I’m just like, yeah, yeah, yeah, I’ve taught there twenty-five years, but I shouldn’t, ‘cause I always have a beard, and I mean look at this (Dane in shorts).  Wouldn’t you be disappointed you paid tuition?  I mean, like, “I want a refund”. 

And this is Oz’s favorite joke. I start teaching next Thursday, so I’m going to have to start wearing my garments again. So, I can’t, uh, I should show up in shorts one time, don’t you think?  No?

It’s sad not being the oldest guy in the room.  Isn’t being a boomer fun?  Some of these guys will never be that old.  No, how old do you think I am?  Who thinks 40’s?  50’s?  I am 65.  Comedy keeps you young.  Just look at Willy Juan.  No, he’s twenty-three.  I think I’ve met you’re first ex-wife.

Willy Juan:  I feel for you.

Dane Allred:  Her OnlyFans page.  Trailer mom.

Willy Juan:  That’s the one.

Dane Allred:  So, how was, what was the date in Miami?  You were just looking for love, and there she was?

Husband: No, she got in a car wreck and broke her jaw, and they sent me to the hospital to give her a blessing.  And I just kept coming back.

Dane Allred:  And that’s the way it started.  And he told me earlier, he’s like “I wish I wouldn’t have fixed her jaw.”  Isn’t it sad how all these men are so mean to women?  But really all they want is a woman, but that’s why they do stand-up.

Wife:  They want to lose her, right?

Dane Allred: Yes!  And see, these guys right here, have not seen the girl that’s sitting over there.  But when you do, it’s over, man.

Husband: Are there no women in stand-up?

Dane Allred:  Not usually.  Some.  Ellen Degeneres.  Who else can you guys think of?

Comedians:  Whitney Cummings.  Taylor Tomlinson.

Dane Allred:  All those famous women that they just mentioned.

Husband:  I mean here, though?

Dane Allred:  Some. Julia Waterman hosts one.  What are you shaking your head “No” for?  I gotta tell you the most disturbing image tonight was…uh…

I love Howie Feels’ name.  Don’t you love that name?  Howie always knows how he feels.

And I can’t repeat it, but I looked back there’s Willy Juan doing something obscene, and I’m like “That’s not nice, Willy!”  And then I realized what he was doing.  So, ask him later, I can’t say it in front of mixed company.  So…

Dane laughing.

And what he’s doing now isn’t appropriate, so you’re lucky your sitting in front of him.

I am old.  I sat behind Jesus in the second grade.  He was always getting a hundred percent.  I think he was getting outside help, yeah?

Shouldn’t I have copied him?  Should I have copied Jesus?

He would have forgiven me, right?  Or else that’s all for nothing.

No, I’m older than that.  Speaking of Moses, Moses was my locker partner.

So, congratulations, and thank you again for staying here as our hostages, and I’m Dane Allred, you guys have a great night.

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Dane Allred demo reel

Dane Allred's demo reel

After Apple Picking by Robert Frost

 

After Apple Picking

by Robert Frost

 

My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree

Toward heaven still,

And there's a barrel that I didn't fill

Beside it, and there may be two or three

Apples I didn't pick upon some bough.

But I am done with apple-picking now.

 

Essence of winter sleep is on the night,

The scent of apples: I am drowsing off.

I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight

I got from looking through a pane of glass

I skimmed this morning from the drinking trough

And held against the world of hoary grass.

 

It melted, and I let it fall and break.

But I was well

Upon my way to sleep before it fell,

And I could tell

What form my dreaming was about to take.

Magnified apples appear and disappear,

Stem end and blossom end,

And every fleck of russet showing clear.

 

My instep arch not only keeps the ache,

It keeps the pressure of a ladder-round.

I feel the ladder sway as the boughs bend.

And I keep hearing from the cellar bin

The rumbling sound

Of load on load of apples coming in.

For I have had too much

Of apple-picking: I am overtired

Of the great harvest I myself desired.

 

There were ten thousand thousand fruit to touch,

Cherish in hand, lift down, and not let fall.

For all

That struck the earth,

No matter if not bruised or spiked with stubble,

Went surely to the cider-apple heap

As of no worth.

 

One can see what will trouble

This sleep of mine, whatever sleep it is.

Were he not gone,

The woodchuck could say whether it's like his

Long sleep, as I describe its coming on,

Or just some human sleep.

 

LITERATURE OUT LOUD -- see and hear great literature

800+ audio versions of poems, short stories, novels
and all of Shakespeare's Sonnets -- over 30,000 downloads

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Quick Quotations by Dane Allred

a public speaking handbook with more than 2000 quotes

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Dents in the Van from A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Dane Allred

Dents in the Van

I used to deliver flowers. It was a great job for someone who needed some extra money but can’t work all day. After school I would run by the flower shop and pick up the deliveries, and after thinking about the best route, I’d be paid to drive around the city, listen to the radio and have happy people greet me when I showed up with flowers.

It really is a cool thing to have people thank you for doing your job. It’s like I sent them the flowers, and everyone is so excited when they get them. It’s not like I paid for them – I’m just the messenger. I guess the saying about don’t shoot the messenger also works in reverse. Why do they thank the messenger?

Well, in the state where I live, people really don’t tip very well. I don’t know why we are so cheap, but this is a complaint I often hear from those who are paid poorly, using the excuse of tips to pay someone way below minimum wage. Waiters, waitresses, or do you call them waitpersons, delivery people like the pizza man, and yes, the flower delivery person are usually short-changed around here. I delivered thousands of beautiful bouquets, and I got tipped once. What was the grand tip? A quarter.

I understand being parsimonious, but a quarter? It was really an insult, and the contradiction here is I think I would rather have not received a tip. I often feel this way about being paid poorly; sometimes I would rather be volunteering my time than receiving a ridiculously low payment for something. Again, it doesn’t seem to make much sense, but that’s the way I feel.

The scariest delivery ever was at a really nice house. This may have been where I got the quarter. I was a little distracted though, since the owners had a Doberman pincer. This dog was very interested in protecting the property, but I usually get along well with dogs. I can proudly say I have never been bit by a strange dog – just my own pets. This dog barked fiercely as I approached the door, and as I rang the doorbell, the Doberman began trying to bite my leg. Now there’s two things that saved me here; I was wearing incredibly tight jeans (it was the 70’s after all), and the dog was trying to bite my thigh.  So luckily his teeth just kept slipping off the tight denim, and the owner answered before blood was drawn.

I liked delivering flowers so much that while I did that during my high school years, I applied for the same job when I went to college at another place. Again it really worked well with my schedule. The only problem with this job is the little old lady who owned the flower shop also liked her grandkids to help out. So when I get the job of washing and vacuuming out the van came along to me, guess who gets to come along and help?

The twelve-year old grandson thought it would be great to help clean the van, but I wasn’t very excited to be baby-sitting. There really wasn’t anything he could do to help, which gave him a little time to hatch a plan. While he watched me wash the outside, he decided it would be a really good idea to let him pull the van up to the vacuums.

When I finished the wash, I opened the door and saw him sitting in the driver’s seat. He begged me to let him pull the van up to the vacuums. So here’s the choice; I can tell him no, and he complains to his grandma, or I let him drive 15 feet and make him ecstatic.

Now, I should have remembered at this point something that happened to me when I was a junior in high school. At a summer workshop, I ran out of gas, and I had my girlfriend drive as we pushed the truck up to the pumps. We were actually going pretty fast when we got to the station, and she was pulling on the wrong side of the pump. So as I gave her directions, she ended up plowing right into the gas pump. We were lucky there wasn’t a giant fire – it just knocked the pump off the foundation. Whose insurance jumped the next quarter, even though he wasn’t driving at the time of the accident? You guessed it.

But I guess I chose to forget this earlier lesson; I let him drive up to the vacuums. And don’t ask me how he did it, but he pulled too close to the vacuums, which were on the passenger side. He didn’t slow down, and he didn’t stop when the crunching started.

One giant gash in the side door later, I had another choice.

I told the old lady I did it.

The kid never even blinked an eyelash.

 

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