Well, no it isn’t a breeze, it’s a goddam’ hurricane out there. So although there are lots of spring flowers about, it’s not ideal conditions for taking photos.
This camelia bloom was just one of the casualties of the storms. Still, at least that meant it stayed reasonably still.
Poetry is the synthesis of hyacinths and biscuits.
but I couldn’t remember who said it.
Knowing I’d kept it as one of a whole list of poetry-associated quotations, I searched my computer for hyacinths.
It turns out it was Carl Sandburg, though further investigation online suggests he may actually have used the subtly different phrase:
poetry is the achievement of the synthesis of hyacinths and biscuits.
The search for hyacinths also turned up the forgotten draft of a poem.
Continue reading “a lack of biscuits”
If of thy worldly goods thou art bereft
and of the store two loaves alone are left,
sell one and with the dole
buy hyacinths to feed the soul.
I seem to have known that verse all my life, and always associated it with the phrase “Man shall not live by bread alone.” Of course the latter is from the Bible; the verse, it seems, is by Rumi. Presumably the original wasn’t written in English, which would account for the variations I found when I went looking to see where it came from.
Continue reading “not by bread alone”
For reasons irrelevant, last night I stayed in a strange hotel in London. “Strange” in the sense that I had never stayed there before, and “strange” in the sense that it was not like any hotel I had ever stayed in previously.
Firstly, some daffodils for St David’s Day:
Continue reading “translation and otherness”
don't confuse the narrator 