Highlights from Derek Walcott's Odysseus

I just finished reading Derek Walcott's stage adaptation of Odysseus, that he wrote back in 1990. Here are some highlights.

EURYLOCHUS
Her [Circe] music's pounding with the odours of rutting. 

ODYSSEUS
Perfumes won't dispel it. 

EURYLOCHUS
Her rooms are grunting pens. 

ODYSSEUS
Still, give it to our enchantress, she knows one thing. 

EURYLOCHUS
What? 

ODYSSEUS
That brothels aren't just sailors' dreams, but all men's. 

EURYLOCHUS
Not mine. 

ODYSSEUS
All. 

EURYLOCHUS
Don't yield, sir, you have a wife and son. 

ODYSSEUS
At the back of all men's minds is a rented room.

----

EUMAEUS
Look at these puddles lying like shield in the sun 

ODYSSEUS
Reflecting clouds and phantoms. Our passing travail. 

EUMAEUS
Aye. Our shadows slide over them, and then we're gone. 

ODYSSEUS
The earth is still swaying.

----

ODYSSEUS
For one glimpse of her [Penelope] my heart might lose all reason. 

DEMODOCUS
But why her, man? Is her patience now a legend? 

ODYSSEUS
Because I once held such a woman. And our son. 

DEMODOCUS
There is only one thing that I can compare her to:
She is like a green pine that never sways on its hill, 

Whole leaves repeat the swaying of burly water
Rooted in its cleft, not sea-grape or forked myrtle 

Is as steadfast. Twenty years after Troy's slaughter,
As a green pine will make a castle of herself 

This pine will feed no man's fire with crackling boughs
Or nestle his vows, as other branches, swallows, 

But on her height, in a meadow of cold flowers,
She has weathered a siege even longer than Troy's.

----

ODYSSEUS
O when this racked body slid down astounding seas... 

PENELOPE
When I'd kneel down like an olive, rooted in prayer... 

ODYSSEUS
When the spray blinded me, till I lost faith in tears... 

PENELOPE
When no sail startled the olive tree, year by year. 

ODYSSEUS
The sea still shakes in my body, can you hear it? 

PENELOPE
The sea is quiet and all you trials are done. 

ODYSSEUS
Keep me embayed in your arms, your harboring heart. 

PENELOPE
Take root my pine, my shade, my patience's pardon.

_DZ

Haha, Haikus

I carry around a notebook with me in which I write down haikus. Most of them are pretty rubbish, but practice does help make them better. I find that, most of the time, I end up in rather whimsical territory, which means that, given the restrained and refined history of the haiku, where poets aim to convey a rich sentiment or experience as elegantly and with as few words possible, my contributions often feel something like a Mario Cipollini skinsuit amidst a peloton of people playing by the rules.

Here are a few from my notebook that I thought I would share with you.

sent from my iPhone
hence may contain some words that
unattended for

A reference to autocorrect shenanigans, obviously.

I wonder if I
can write a poem about
my black-and-white socks

Yes, I can.

softer hands holding
me, hopelessly beautiful
but I never asked

Somebody, somewhere.

we moved away from
solitary apartments
and threadbare towels

Upward mobility!

fat tires revolve
crushed rock harmonizes with
my contented sigh

The joys of riding on crushed limestone trails.

man is appointed
to die once and face judgement
so it goes, he says

Kerouac was hard-hearted?

silvery blue tones
gracious curves on the fretboard
fingers flying up

Devin Townsend used D'Addario strings because they sound "more silver and blue and less.....purple."

hands on a glass door
soft face weeping in sunlight
love stands on the porch 

Somewhere between the paintings of Hopper and Pearlstein.

drip drip drip drip drip
jazz gig in a urinal
thunderous applause

Admittedly juvenile, this one is redeemed by being able to read the first line in whatever meter you want. Jazz, man.




_DZ

Michel Foucault or Max Ernst?

There have been quite a few times when, while reading a book, I have no idea what I'm actually reading. The prose just doesn't make sense. This usually happens in either books filled with philosophy or art criticism. And so, here I present to you passages of prose, and you have to tell me if the author is writing about Foucault or Ernst. Enjoy.

"The educational folly of grown-ups was no match for the mind of the boy."

Foucault or Ernst?

His work is "a long exploration of transgression, of going beyond social limits, always inseparably linked to knowledge and power."

Foucault or Ernst?

"[He] employs highly specific and identifiable techniques of manipulation and combination. Because his work is the result of conscious thought, and yet allows chance to operate, it possesses a whole variety of meanings."

Foucault or Ernst?

"[In covering the development of his work,] it would be inappropriate in a study of this nature to engage in detailed analyses of individual works."

Foucault or Ernst?

One major work "was not a conventional work of history, making sweeping generalisations without sufficient particular argument, and that [he] clearly 'thinks in allegories.'"

Foucault or Ernst?

"'Shouting, swearing, spewing,' he wrote later, 'gets you nowhere. There's no point either in trying to wrap yourself up in contemplation.'"

Foucault or Ernst?




_DZ

On Being Sick in England

So these last few days (like 6), I've been sick, which isn't too surprising because everyone gets sick now and again. But this time was different, because this time I'm in England (see below).

Since childhood is the prerequisite for adulthood, and everyone gets sick when they're a kid, most people have the whole "getting sick" thing pretty down to a science. You know what the symptoms are, how you should deal with them, and what "getting better" feels like.

During this whole "childhood" phase, how your parents treat you when you are sick has a big influence on how you cope with sickness. (Duh). This is always a great thing to talk about with international students, because most peoples' stories and methods seem really natural to them and really bizarre to everyone else.

For example, to treat a cold when I was younger, I used to snort salt water through my nose to try and clear my sinuses. It may have worked, but I don't do that anymore. Now I take showers, because covering yourself in hot water is a great way to loosen up mucus (second only to spicy Chinese food). The bonus of showers is that you feel clean and fresh afterwards, instead of the usual clammy-sick-grossness that sets in after 20 hours of being curled up and coughing under multiple blankets.

By the time you "strike out on your own" and go off to college/get a job/pay for your own blankets, you have a pretty good idea of what helps you ward off a cold. I'm positive that a good part of this is the placebo effect or a logical fallacy or both, ("I feel better when this happened, so that must make me better") but some of it is probably backed up by legit science (mainly the "take drugs" part).

I'm all for drugs, but that can be overdone, too. I had a flatmate who was (probably) addicted to NyQuil, and once dated a girl who would take 10-12 Advil or aspirin at a time. She just gobbled up those nummiform tablets like they were Skittles.

So anyway, if my brother or I were ever laid up, my mom would stick to a fairly standard regimen of Foods That Help Fix Colds. This list included:

• Applesauce (plain - none of that flavored stuff loaded with sugar)
• Toast
• Vitamin-C-rich fruits
• Sprite
• Orange juice
• Chicken noodle soup (Campbells) 
• Jell-O (preferably shaped like NASCAR cars)
• Plain rice (or flavored rice soup)
• Cheerios and apple juice (my parents didn't think having dairy when sick was a good idea)

So this is what I learned to eat to fix a cold. Looking back now, it's amazing that my mom could even get most of that stuff over in Japan, yet I never remember a time when I was sick and there was no (fill in the blank). As I got older, some stuff went off the list (toast, Cheerios and apple juice) and some stuff came on (Kosher baby dill pickles, Gatorade/G2). 

Fast-forward to last week, and I'm sick. To deal with it I think I need: drugs, lots of liquids, applesauce, Jell-O, chicken noodle soup, dill pickles, and fresh fruit. What do I discover instead?

--American applesauce doesn't exist here. Seriously. What the Brits call "apple sauce" is basically thick, cold apple pie filling-like jam that you add to pulled pork sandwiches. This is great in its appropriate context, but a poor substitute for proper applesauce, which you can basically drink when you need to and soothes your throat like nothing short of ice cream can.

--The British don't have a very strong Jell-O tradition. Instead what they have is "jelly." Hartley's is a popular brand. Somewhere in sweetness between Jell-O and grape jelly (sandwich spread), it comes in little containers the about size of a double-shot glass. This size is surprisingly OK, because with how sweet it is there is no way that I could pound it down like I do real Jell-O. Don't even try to look for Jell-O molds, either. A huge disappointment.

--Chicken noodle soup seems not to be high on the list either, since the supermarket I shopped in only has two facings of Campbells Cream of Mushroom soup, and no Classic Chicken Noodle (or Double Noodle!). I probably could have looked for some other type of chicken noodle soup, but I'm really suspicious of imitation soup, because one time aliens broke into my house and replaced my Campbells with Cub's/Walmart's/Target's generic stuff (either that or I was poor, which was probably more likely) and I had to deal with that generic garbage soup for one flu session. Who knew that an extra 30-cents-a-can could make that much difference? That experience ranks up there on my list of Worst Soup Experiences Ever. 

--And the pickles! Oh, the pickles. I finally found the pickles on the second-to-bottom shelf of the "Oils, Sauces, and Spices" aisle, and to my dismay there were only four (four!) options: super tiny& sweet, gherkins in sweet vinegar, gherkins in sour vinegar, and sweet sliced hamburger pickles. Really, I wanted none of these. I especially dislike sweet pickles (they offer all the looks of being a good pickle and then disappoint to mightily), so I had to settle for the sour ones. These were another huge disappointment. I can usually eat 1/3 to 1/2 a jar of pickles in a sitting (combine that with any Campbells soup and you have a lunch where sodium levels are through the roof!), so I was expecting to do the same this time with these, but I could barely finish three pickles. Just terrible.

Quality gets worse as you move from right to left

What the British ARE very good at is hydration. The juices are generally good quality, and thanks to a very widespread drinking culture, good-quality mixers are everywhere. I mixed some premium apple juice with fizzy lemon-lime water and the result was amazing! It was like ambrosia for sick people.

(Not pictured: Me, bursting with strength)

There was plenty of fresh fruit to be had as well, and I had my fair share of figs, bananas, and mikans. I also had a glass of wine, which I'm sure took the edge off of...something. Britain has plenty of drugs, too (thanks NHS!), so finding ibuprofen wasn't a problem. 

Getting sick is not great - I don't recommend it. However, as you've probably gathered, I recommend it even less if you're me living in Britain. I think that's the moral that we can all learn here. The other moral is that when child version of you gets sick, make sure your mom rehabilitates you with foods that are available always and everywhere. Bread. Potatoes. Rice. Water. Milk. Grass. Rubber. Bark. Sears catalogs. All the boring stuff that you already (might) eat anyway.  Or you could just never travel. Or you can choose to never get sick. These are all potentially valid options. Meanwhile, while you are considering those options, please ship me crates of kosher baby dill pickles and applesauce. Thanks.

_DZ