Present Perfect Simple (vs Past Simple)

Look at the picture. Who do you think this woman is?

Why is she so sad?

What has happened to her?

"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I've watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in the rain. Time to die."

My eyes have seen you

Stand in your door

When we meet inside

Show me some more

My eyes have seen you

Turn and stare

Fix your hair

Move upstairs

My eyes have seen you

Free from disguise

Gazing on a city under

Television skies

My eyes have seen you

Eyes have seen you

Let them photograph your soul

Memorize your alleys

On an endless roll

Endless roll

There are places I remember

All my life, though some have changed

Some forever not for better

Some have gone and some remain

All these places had their moments

With lovers and friends

I still can recall

Some are dead and some are living

In my life I've loved them all

But of all these friends and lovers

There is no one compares with you

And these memories lose their meaning

When I think of love as something new

Though I know I'll never lose affection

For people and things that went before

I know I'll often stop and think about them

In my life I love you more

There is a house in New Orleans

They call the Rising Sun

And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy

And God I know I'm one

My mother was a tailor

She sewed my new bluejeans

My father was a gambling man

Down in New Orleans

Now the only thing a gambler needs

Is a suitcase and a trunk

And the only time he's satisfied

Is when he's on a drunk

Oh mother, tell your children

Not to do what I have done

Spend your lives in sin and misery

In the house of the Rising Sun

Well, I got one foot on the platform

The other foot on the train

I'm going back to New Orleans

To wear that ball and chain

Well, there is a house in New Orleans

They call the Rising Sun

And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy

And God I know I'm one

Golden Hair (Syd Barrett's adaptation of James Joyce's poem)

Lean out your window

Golden hair

I heard you singing

In the midnight air

My book is closed,

I read no more

Watching the fire dance

on the floor

I've left my book

I've left my room

For I heard you singing

Through the gloom

Singing and singing,

A merry air

Lean out the window,

Golden hair...

The tax man's taken all my dough,

And left me in my stately home,

Lazing on a sunny afternoon.

And I can't sail my yacht,

He's taken everything I've got,

All I've got's this sunny afternoon.

Save me, save me, save me from this squeeze.

I got a big fat mama trying to break me.

And I love to live so pleasantly,

Live this life of luxury,

Lazing on a sunny afternoon.

In the summertime

In the summertime

In the summertime

My girlfriend's run off with my car,

And gone back to her ma and pa,

Telling tales of drunkenness and cruelty.

Now I'm sitting here,

Sipping at my ice cold beer,

Lazing on a sunny afternoon.

Help me, help me, help me sail away,

Well give me two good reasons why I oughta stay.

'Cause I love to live so pleasantly,

Live this life of luxury,

Lazing on a sunny afternoon.

In the summertime

In the summertime

In the summertime

Ah, save me, save me, save me from this squeeze.

I got a big fat mama trying to break me.

And I love to live so pleasantly,

Live this life of luxury,

Lazing on a sunny afternoon.

In the summertime

In the summertime

In the summertime

Present Perfect for science fiction lovers

I've known rivers (Langston Hughes)

I’ve known rivers: I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins. My soul has grown deep like the rivers. I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young. I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep. I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it. I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans, and I’ve seen its muddy bosom turn all golden in the sunset. I’ve known rivers: Ancient, dusky rivers. My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

Williams Carlos Williams

I have eaten

the plums

that were in

the icebox

and which

you were probably

saving

for breakfast

Forgive me

they were delicious

so sweet

and so cold

I have had my dream--like others--

and it has come to nothing, so that

I remain now carelessly

with feet planted on the ground

and look up at the sky--

feeling my clothes about me,

the weight of my body in my shoes,

the rim of my hat, air passing in and out

at my nose--and decide to dream no more.