This semester, one of our readings in my World Lit class was Virgil's The Aeneid. The character of Dido really got under my skin, so for a final assignment, I chose to continue her narrative a bit:
Dido in her eternal walk of night
Finds no respite in that, her hollow death
Given on the pyre of her marriage bed.
In that moment, an act so just and pure
The sword, a treasured gift of Dardan love
Deeply plunged, to fly on wings of Isis
But leaving no emotion behind her
Her wound bleeds bright in the Underworld.
Sychaeus again by her side, steadfast
Should give some succor to her ravaged soul
Instead, the memory of Aeneas' tears
Blends into one with her eternal flow.
Not that anyone will even want to post this elsewhere, but if you do, please at least link back to me. Thanks.
Showing posts with label amazing books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label amazing books. Show all posts
Saturday, December 8, 2007
Saturday, October 13, 2007
Random thoughts...non sequiturs...ramblings...
So, is it just me--or does the older author Michael Cunningham gets--the more he looks like Michael Palin?
No matter; they're both really amazing and inspirational. Just an observation.
~~
I've been visiting McDonald's lately...not because I have any great love for it, but because I want to take a stab at their big Monopoly game. Pathetic, I know--but what are you gonna do when you're as poor as me, yet with so many goals that require big bucks? Anyway, I order my customary iced tea today, and the girl who rings up my order--who has already struggled for what seems an endless amount of time to find the key for hot fudge during the previous customer's order--makes me think, "mine will be easy for her." But no. She manages to give me a large iced coffee instead--and after having to wipe off the drenched cup (apparently, she can't fill a styrofoam receptacle, either) I literally gag on the first sip. I hate coffee. I can't tell you how much I find the taste disgusting. The two worst things on anyone's breath, in my opinion, is coffee and cigarettes, and I avoid both. It took a literal hour to get the funky aftertaste to go away. Why didn't I notice it was coffee, you ask? Well, I was thinking of sex or something (as was she, apparently--not paying attention to where she was headed with the cup), and you have to admit coffee and tea share the same color, when they're coming from the mass dumping spigots of a place like McDonald's. Perhaps I should stay away and just put my dollar into the lottery, if I'm gonna jettison my earnings into the big vortex of chance. I make better tea, anyway.
~~
All of my new tattoo work is itching so bad, I feel like I have scabies. I always forget between tattoos how annoying the healing process is. Not only did I get the new ouroboros image on my arm, but I had Donald touch up my old sacral tattoo from '91, plus add a little shading to my ankle piece. Jesus, I'm scratching at myself like some homeless person. It has become such an absentminded act that my Metaphysics instructor mistook my grimace while digging away at my arm during class as frustration over a particularly complicated explanation of the bundle theory. Eeyah, I'll be glad when these things heal and I can relax.
~~
Valerian Root=bad for Alexandra. I've gotten into a habit of staying up really late to study (or just to toss and turn with insomnia), and then coming home after school (on the days I'm not working) to sleep for a couple of hours. This has, of course, created a vicious cycle, and I'm exhausted during the day. The other night, I remembered I had purchased some Valerian Root that was on sale last year in anticipation of the insomnia I have when I'm under stress. I took it at about 2 in the morning, and woke up in a cold sweat at 5 am, after just having a series of dreams that were beyond disturbing. It was if I was in some sort of Lovecraftian otherworld, where the walls were made of flesh that exuded macabre organ music that somehow had a scent, and all the inhabitants were chittering, psychologically threatening entities. During those terrified moments in the dark, I recalled I had read somewhere that Valerian sometimes causes bad dreams in some people.
Yeah, no shit. Guess I'll pass on the next dose.
~~
I know it's no longer cool to like Bruce Springsteen, but I find merit in his work. Plus, his politics are awesome. I just ripped The Rising and am currently listening to it. His writing is very simple, but it's very good:
"Lonesome Day"
Baby, once I thought I knew
Everything I needed to know about you
Your sweet whisper, your tender touch
But I didn't really know that much
Joke's on me, well it's gonna be okay
If I can just get through this lonesome day
Lonesome day
Hell's brewin' dark sun's on the rise
This storm'll blow through by and by
House is on fire, viper's in the grass
A little revenge and this too shall pass
This too shall pass, yeah I'm gonna pray
Right now all I got's this lonesome day
Lonesome day
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright
Better ask questions before you shoot
Deceit and betrayals bitter fruit
It's hard to swallow, come time to pay
That taste on your tongue don't easily slip away
Let kingdom come I'm gonna find my way
Yeah through this lonesome day
Lonesome day
Lonesome day
Lonesome day
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright
Lonesome day
Lonesome day
Lonesome day
~~
I find Leonard Nimoy's voice incredibly soothing. Perhaps it's all of the early childhood viewings of Star Trek and In Search Of... that have wormed their way into my brain to create some sort of subconscious response, but the timbre of his voice is so incredibly peaceful to me. I've been watching a bunch of episodes of A&E Mysteries that he narrated, and I just feel so good, afterward. I want him to record all of my reading assignments.
No matter; they're both really amazing and inspirational. Just an observation.
~~
I've been visiting McDonald's lately...not because I have any great love for it, but because I want to take a stab at their big Monopoly game. Pathetic, I know--but what are you gonna do when you're as poor as me, yet with so many goals that require big bucks? Anyway, I order my customary iced tea today, and the girl who rings up my order--who has already struggled for what seems an endless amount of time to find the key for hot fudge during the previous customer's order--makes me think, "mine will be easy for her." But no. She manages to give me a large iced coffee instead--and after having to wipe off the drenched cup (apparently, she can't fill a styrofoam receptacle, either) I literally gag on the first sip. I hate coffee. I can't tell you how much I find the taste disgusting. The two worst things on anyone's breath, in my opinion, is coffee and cigarettes, and I avoid both. It took a literal hour to get the funky aftertaste to go away. Why didn't I notice it was coffee, you ask? Well, I was thinking of sex or something (as was she, apparently--not paying attention to where she was headed with the cup), and you have to admit coffee and tea share the same color, when they're coming from the mass dumping spigots of a place like McDonald's. Perhaps I should stay away and just put my dollar into the lottery, if I'm gonna jettison my earnings into the big vortex of chance. I make better tea, anyway.
~~
All of my new tattoo work is itching so bad, I feel like I have scabies. I always forget between tattoos how annoying the healing process is. Not only did I get the new ouroboros image on my arm, but I had Donald touch up my old sacral tattoo from '91, plus add a little shading to my ankle piece. Jesus, I'm scratching at myself like some homeless person. It has become such an absentminded act that my Metaphysics instructor mistook my grimace while digging away at my arm during class as frustration over a particularly complicated explanation of the bundle theory. Eeyah, I'll be glad when these things heal and I can relax.
~~
Valerian Root=bad for Alexandra. I've gotten into a habit of staying up really late to study (or just to toss and turn with insomnia), and then coming home after school (on the days I'm not working) to sleep for a couple of hours. This has, of course, created a vicious cycle, and I'm exhausted during the day. The other night, I remembered I had purchased some Valerian Root that was on sale last year in anticipation of the insomnia I have when I'm under stress. I took it at about 2 in the morning, and woke up in a cold sweat at 5 am, after just having a series of dreams that were beyond disturbing. It was if I was in some sort of Lovecraftian otherworld, where the walls were made of flesh that exuded macabre organ music that somehow had a scent, and all the inhabitants were chittering, psychologically threatening entities. During those terrified moments in the dark, I recalled I had read somewhere that Valerian sometimes causes bad dreams in some people.
Yeah, no shit. Guess I'll pass on the next dose.
~~
I know it's no longer cool to like Bruce Springsteen, but I find merit in his work. Plus, his politics are awesome. I just ripped The Rising and am currently listening to it. His writing is very simple, but it's very good:
"Lonesome Day"
Baby, once I thought I knew
Everything I needed to know about you
Your sweet whisper, your tender touch
But I didn't really know that much
Joke's on me, well it's gonna be okay
If I can just get through this lonesome day
Lonesome day
Hell's brewin' dark sun's on the rise
This storm'll blow through by and by
House is on fire, viper's in the grass
A little revenge and this too shall pass
This too shall pass, yeah I'm gonna pray
Right now all I got's this lonesome day
Lonesome day
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright
Better ask questions before you shoot
Deceit and betrayals bitter fruit
It's hard to swallow, come time to pay
That taste on your tongue don't easily slip away
Let kingdom come I'm gonna find my way
Yeah through this lonesome day
Lonesome day
Lonesome day
Lonesome day
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright it's alright
Yeah
It's alright it's alright
Lonesome day
Lonesome day
Lonesome day
~~
I find Leonard Nimoy's voice incredibly soothing. Perhaps it's all of the early childhood viewings of Star Trek and In Search Of... that have wormed their way into my brain to create some sort of subconscious response, but the timbre of his voice is so incredibly peaceful to me. I've been watching a bunch of episodes of A&E Mysteries that he narrated, and I just feel so good, afterward. I want him to record all of my reading assignments.
Saturday, August 18, 2007
An excerpt.
From Iris Murdoch's Under the Net:
And as I looked down now on the crowds in Oxford Street and stroked Mars's head I felt neither happy nor sad, only rather unreal, like a man shut in a glass. Events stream past us like these crowds and the face of each is seen only for a minute. What is urgent is not urgent for ever, but only ephemerally. All work and all love, the search for wealth and fame, the search for truth, like itself, are made up of moments which pass and become nothing. Yet through this shaft of nothings we drive onward with that miraculous vitality that creates our precarious habitations in the past and the future. So we live; a spirit that broods and hovers over the continual death of time, the lost meaning, the unrecaptured moment, the unremembered face, until the final chop that ends all our moments and plunges that spirit back into the void from which it came.
And as I looked down now on the crowds in Oxford Street and stroked Mars's head I felt neither happy nor sad, only rather unreal, like a man shut in a glass. Events stream past us like these crowds and the face of each is seen only for a minute. What is urgent is not urgent for ever, but only ephemerally. All work and all love, the search for wealth and fame, the search for truth, like itself, are made up of moments which pass and become nothing. Yet through this shaft of nothings we drive onward with that miraculous vitality that creates our precarious habitations in the past and the future. So we live; a spirit that broods and hovers over the continual death of time, the lost meaning, the unrecaptured moment, the unremembered face, until the final chop that ends all our moments and plunges that spirit back into the void from which it came.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)