SONNET 13 FATHER: O! that you were your self; but, love, you are

O! that you were your self; but, love, you are
No longer yours, than you your self here live:
Against this coming end you should prepare,
And your sweet semblance to some other give:
So should that beauty which you hold in lease
Find no determination; then you were
Yourself again, after yourself's decease,
When your sweet issue your sweet form should bear.
Who lets so fair a house fall to decay,
Which husbandry in honour might uphold,
Against the stormy gusts of winter's day
And barren rage of death's eternal cold?
   O! none but unthrifts. Dear my love, you know,
   You had a father: let your son say so.


Mnemonic Image

FATHER

Memory Passage

Death places his SEAL upon TIME, assuming the role of the FATHER of Time, showing meaning in the ASTRONOMY of the stars, the figures of which move upon the STAGE in a poor COUNTERFEIT of reality. Death places it all into a TOMB for the duration of the zero SUMMER until is reborn like the PHOENIX with a new FACE.

Idiosyncratic Abstract:



Couplet Imagery

O! none but unthrifts. Dear my love, you know,
   You had a father: let your son say so.

The vocative O at the beginning and provocative O at the end. The sound of the sucker-punch to the gut. O. The poet invoking heaven by the O. The woman and her sweet O.

O*vaginal orifice. In R&J, the nurse puns on expressions of misery: 'For Juliet's sake . . . rise and stand. Why should you fall into so deep an O?' (cf. rise, stand). Another instance has been detected in the play: see medlar; Dekker evidently registered at least one, since his Satiromastix I.i.17 borrows the joke along with much else from R&J (Intro, p.3). In MVlWIV.i.45, 'the focative case' evokes the vagina (case for fucking), and grammatical puns continue when William describes its invocational use: 'O - vocativo, O - Nowadays commentators find many more instances than are admitted here. But representation of the Globe Theatre as a 'wooden O' (H5 Prol.13) both affirms Shakespeare's ease with 'O' symbolism and cautions about vaginal overloading - though the zealot might urge the sexual transactions of the stage: 'New plays and maidenheads are near akin' (TNK Prol.l). See boar, pen. 2. representing orgasmic gasps and sighs. See die, groan 3.

- Shakespeare's Sexual Language, Gordon Williams

Note that unthrift was more damning in the 14th century. Could those undertones still be resonate in the 16th?

unthrifty (adj.)
late 14c., "unprofitable, useless," from un- (1) "not" + thrifty (adj.), or else from Middle English noun unthrift "profligacy," late 14c., earlier "evil practice, wicked act" (c. 1300). 

- https://www.etymonline.com/word/unthrifty

O!... Son say so!

Q1

O! that you were your self; but, love, you are
No longer yours, than you your self here live:
Against this coming end you should prepare,
And your sweet semblance to some other give:

O you once were the true blue, the one original Rose, but love, sweet love, you are no longer in possession of that what you once were. Any more than that beauty lives in this language. You are fading even as this sonnet unfolds. By the couplet, you will be dead. Give the semblance. Worship the semblance! All hail the Semblance. If you keep it solely in your possession any longer, you will wither and rot just along with your dying self.

Look at the psych on the first line enjambment:

O that you were yourself...  but, love.... you ARE!

You are yourself, my love, what was I saying, you will live forever and there's no need to pass your beauty on...

But then, the second line: NO! No longer yours. You are no loger the self you once were. O No!



Q2

So should that beauty which you hold in lease
Find no determination; then you were
Yourself again, after yourself's decease,
When your sweet issue your sweet form should bear.

O So O So Son Say So O. So Should the Mighty Semblance which you are only leasing, not owning, for who can truly hold the Semblance, the One Original Rose, the Platonic Form emanating? But O so if you do not find a place in which to give it, then you beceome your self and that semblance dies with you.

Q3

Who lets so fair a house fall to decay,
Which husbandry in honour might uphold,
Against the stormy gusts of winter's day
And barren rage of death's eternal cold?

Whoooo? Ooo ooo? A quatrain as a question. Who ruins the house? Who allows it to fall into decay? What's wrong with your penis? Why do not keep it up? What sort of person would not keep up with the upkeep, not practice good hygienic husbandry? You know: keep the carpet swept and the chimney clear, flush the pipes and oil all the locks and hinges of your house body, of your Semblance? Moisturize your dry bones unit you belive the have skin again.

You should make sure all is ship shape for the stormy gusts and if you think they are bad, wait until you feel the barren rage, the childless rage, of death's eternal cold.

C

O! none but unthrifts. Dear my love, you know,
   You had a father: let your son say so.

Oooooooo OOOooooooo OOoooo ! It is you! You are the one who is going to suffer the stormy gusts, the barren rage and the eternal cold. And you know, you should know, becaue your father prepared himself by reproducing in you. Time to pass the rotting carcass of the buck before it starts to stink up the place. You had a Dad, now let your issue say the same for you. 

You, Terrible One, why did you rude so upon me? 

SONNET 12 TIME - When I do count the clock that tells the time,

When I do count the clock that tells the time,
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night;
When I behold the violet past prime,
And sable curls, all silvered o'er with white;
When lofty trees I see barren of leaves,
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd,
And summer's green all girded up in sheaves,
Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard,
Then of thy beauty do I question make,
That thou among the wastes of time must go,
Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake
And die as fast as they see others grow;
     And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
     Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

Mnemonic Image

TIME

Memory Passage

Death places his SEAL upon TIME, assuming the role of the FATHER of Time, showing meaning in the ASTRONOMY of the stars, the figures of which move upon the STAGE in a poor COUNTERFEIT of reality. Death places it all into a TOMB for the duration of the zero SUMMER until is reborn like the PHOENIX with a new FACE.

Idiosyncratic Abstract:

Couplet Imagery

And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
     Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

I hear the Heideggerian Nothing in that nothing. What is Time's scythe? The inexorable sweeping hand of the clock mowing through the verses? What is the time inside the sonnet? For within the interior architecture of the poem, there is sanctuary - this played out in later sonnets. But for us, now, the memorization of the sonnet, the re-creation within our memory and the ability to "call it back," the double, the twin, the mirror, the representation.

Breed connotes the animal husbandry of a farmer and a sub-category of gay pornography.

Note the intimations of the afterlife in the "hence." And that it might be a hellish place, where there is need to be brave, or at least endure. 

Q1

When I do count the clock that tells the time,
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night;
When I behold the violet past prime,
And sable curls, all silvered o'er with white;

Tick tock goes the meter of that first line. Father Time stepping down the echoing hallways of memory. Brave day anticipates that later bravery of the long day's journey into night. Goya's drowning dog is emblematic of the brave day sunk into hideous night. The shriek of hideous damnation, hideous annihilation, the hideous features of the Abyss, of the monster. Counting moves on to beholding. And the sexual petals of the violet past prime. Tennessee Williams's in the whorehouse:

When I was fourteen, my father decided to initiate me into the ways of manhood, and took me to the local whorehouse. The woman spread her legs, and made me look between them. All I could see was something that looked like a dyin' orchid; consequently, I have never been comfortable around women or orchids.

And there is almost a time-lapse with the dark lady of sabled curls silvering white. That confusion of color with silver as a verb to whiten. The bloody bones silvered in the sun until they were pale with whiteness.

Q2

When lofty trees I see barren of leaves,
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd,
And summer's green all girded up in sheaves,
Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard,

The hero, the good man, the leader as the lofty tree. Moses with flowing locks, who once sheltered the herd, the good shepherd, turned the balding skeltal ghost of his former self. No longer able to even provide shade to disturb Diogenes. The herd now exposed to the hyenas of time.

Lusty green shoots and shafts of summer are girded up. Girding up the loins. Time's chastity. And carried around in-valid upon the stretcher. The summer soldier legless, armless. Moses with the white and bristly beard - morphing into Father Time himself.

Q3

Then of thy beauty do I question make,
That thou among the wastes of time must go,
Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake
And die as fast as they see others grow;

After having counted and beholded and seen all of the deprecatory effects of time, then I wonder. It makes me wonder. Not you! Your beauty may not fade nor wander down into the bad part of town, into the wastes of time. Thoreau: you cannot waste time without injuring eternity. But where is the Platonic Form? Here is the face to face I desire. Not the emanation. Not that which will be wasted by time, but the eternal, never fading.

Everything sweet turns bitter. Beauty must fade. Note the reification. The desire to fix beauty into permanence. There is the waterfall, not the water falling. Denial of process. Denial. Would Basho even understand the underlying desire of the sonnets?

C

And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
     Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

And that Heideggerian Nothing is stronger here at the end than ever. Nothing CAN make defense.


"Nothing Exists" - the original ontological MacGuffin.

SONNET 11 SEAL: As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou grow'st

As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou grow'st
In one of thine, from that which thou departest;
And that fresh blood which youngly thou bestow'st,
Thou mayst call thine when thou from youth convertest.
Herein lives wisdom, beauty, and increase;
Without this folly, age, and cold decay:
If all were minded so, the times should cease
And threescore year would make the world away.
Let those whom nature hath not made for store,
Harsh, featureless, and rude, barrenly perish:
Look whom she best endowed, she gave the more;
Which bounteous gift thou shouldst in bounty cherish:
   She carved thee for her seal, and meant thereby,
   Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die.


Mnemonic Image

SEAL

Memory Passage

Death places his SEAL upon TIME, assuming the role of the FATHER of Time, showing meaning in the ASTRONOMY of the stars, the figures of which move upon the STAGE in a poor COUNTERFEIT of reality. Death places it all into a TOMB for the duration of the zero SUMMER until is reborn like the PHOENIX with a new FACE.

Idiosyncratic Abstract:



Couplet Imagery

She carved thee for her seal, and meant thereby,
   Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die.


Q1

As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou grow'st
In one of thine, from that which thou departest;
And that fresh blood which youngly thou bestow'st,
Thou mayst call thine when thou from youth convertest.

The image of the Paglian male withdrawing empty, spent, lifeless from the Chthonian womb of the Great Mother. The man is granted entrance into the Sanctum Sanctorum for his primal face-to-face with the monstrous God. He is overwhelmed and taken by grace into a state of ecstasy - out of body, out of flesh. The consciousness of the sonnet is at the one interval beyond the zenith, that roller coaster click and clack of climbing up and up preceding the Fall, there is a moment of weightless being, perhaps unbearable, but not of any inhuman duration. From ecstatic height of the spirit, the constant ringing bell tone of the orgasm,  the time out of time, out of mind, we come back into the flesh. Post-coitum sorrows. You shall come back into yourself after you have spent your seed inside the temple of the Goddess, but that great red ribbon, that double helix of your self continues to rise and grow within god's mind. And it is only when you see that fresh blood, that red ribbon that unspooled from the pearly white cloud of your cumming, when you see as it emerges out of the temple of god's mystery screaming and laughing with your face, your sweet semblance. It is only then that you may call it yours. It is your child. Grown, as Shakespeare would have it, in the divine ground of the woman's womb, signaling your conversion from youth to adulthood, from boy to man.

Q2

Herein lives wisdom, beauty, and increase;
Without this folly, age, and cold decay:
If all were minded so, the times should cease
And threescore year would make the world away.

The Platonic Triad of Beauty, Truth and Goodness here rendered as Beauty, Wisdom and Increase. Countered by Age, Folly and Decay. To not reproduce, to not create, to not live according to the transcendental emanations of beauty and wisdom and increase (creation), is to forfeit your humanity, your sacred duty and to descend into the world of shadows and fire, where all is subject to the ugliness of age, the ignorance of folly and the forces of rapid decay. This is the new categorical imperative, to not be so minded to to rebel against history, to hate the world, to seek the annihilation of all being, to make the world away.

Q3

Let those whom nature hath not made for store,
Harsh, featureless, and rude, barrenly perish:
Look whom she best endowed, she gave the more;
Which bounteous gift thou shouldst in bounty cherish:

Let those cave dwellers, those Morlocks, who live in the Dantean underworld and know only age and folly and decay, let them perish without reproduction. Another triad to ornament the monstrous faes in hell: harsh, featureless and rude. Not worthy of reproduction.

Look in the mirror. Look in your pants. The resonate meanings of endowed. Look to your own mind. You have been given more. You are an abundance. An overflowing container for beauty and truth and goodness. And you should never take for granted the bounteous, over abundant, super human gifts you were given.

C

She carved thee for her seal, and meant thereby,
   Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die.


The Goddess (Nature - See T. Hughes) carved out out of the semen and egg that formed within a woman's womb as her seal, as her divine form in the flesh. The Word made Flesh. The Word Carved into the figure and face of a man. And she did this for you to reproduce your self, physically, intellectually and spiritually. You are the source of the copy. You are the original. It is your duty to fertilize your life and spread your seed, make more, infect the dark and hollow world with beauty, truth and goodness to counter the grey harsh, featureless, rude viral tide of folly, age and cold decay.




- Death of son, Hamnet, on 11 August 1596

SONNET 62 TANNED ANTIQUITY: Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye

Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye
And all my soul, and all my every part;
And for this sin there is no remedy,
It is so grounded inward in my heart.
Methinks no face so gracious is as mine,
No shape so true, no truth of such account;
And for myself mine own worth do define,
As I all other in all worths surmount.
But when my glass shows me myself indeed
Beated and chopp'd with tanned antiquity,
Mine own self-love quite contrary I read;
Self so self-loving were iniquity.
   'Tis thee, myself, that for myself I praise,
   Painting my age with beauty of thy days.


Mnemonic Image

TANNED ANTIQUITY

Memory Passage

WAVES on the Ocean of Time crash upon the pebbled shore where stands the WATCHMAN whose face is a model of TANNED ANTIQUITY

Idiosyncratic Abstract:

Couplet Imagery

'Tis thee, myself, that for myself I praise,
   Painting my age with beauty of thy days.

painting / cosmetic / cf. S68 & S69, S101


Q1

Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye
And all my soul, and all my every part;
And for this sin there is no remedy,
It is so grounded inward in my heart.

Q2

Methinks no face so gracious is as mine,
No shape so true, no truth of such account;
And for myself mine own worth do define,
As I all other in all worths surmount.

Q3

But when my glass shows me myself indeed
Beated and chopp'd with tanned antiquity,
Mine own self-love quite contrary I read;
Self so self-loving were iniquity.

C

'Tis thee, myself, that for myself I praise,
   Painting my age with beauty of thy days.

SONNET 61 WATCHMAN: To play the watchman ever for thy sake

Is it thy will, thy image should keep open
My heavy eyelids to the weary night?
Dost thou desire my slumbers should be broken,
While shadows like to thee do mock my sight?
Is it thy spirit that thou send'st from thee
So far from home into my deeds to pry,
To find out shames and idle hours in me,
The scope and tenor of thy jealousy?
O, no! thy love, though much, is not so great:
It is my love that keeps mine eye awake:
Mine own true love that doth my rest defeat,
To play the watchman ever for thy sake:
   For thee watch I, whilst thou dost wake elsewhere,
   From me far off, with others all too near.


Mnemonic Image

WATCHMAN

Memory Passage

WAVES on the Ocean of Time crash upon the pebbled shore where stands the WATCHMAN

Idiosyncratic Abstract:

Couplet Imagery

For thee watch I, whilst thou dost wake elsewhere,
   From me far off, with others all too near

Watching theme
resonance of wake from sleep / funeral wake / wake as party


Q1

Is it thy will, thy image should keep open
My heavy eyelids to the weary night?
Dost thou desire my slumbers should be broken,
While shadows like to thee do mock my sight?

Neoplatonic theme
 cf S27, S53
heavy v weary
image v shadows
the inner sight mocked by imitative shadows

Q2

Is it thy spirit that thou send'st from thee
So far from home into my deeds to pry,
To find out shames and idle hours in me,
The scope and tenor of thy jealousy?

self-paranoia

Q3

O, no! thy love, though much, is not so great:
It is my love that keeps mine eye awake:
Mine own true love that doth my rest defeat,
To play the watchman ever for thy sake:

tonal drop from much to great
mine eye / mine own

the watchman
guarding the towers
watchman what of the night?

C

For thee watch I, whilst thou dost wake elsewhere,
   From me far off, with others all too near.

Sonnet 60 WAVES: Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore

Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore,
So do our minutes hasten to their end;
Each changing place with that which goes before,
In sequent toil all forwards do contend.
Nativity, once in the main of light,
Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crown'd,
Crooked eclipses 'gainst his glory fight,
And Time that gave doth now his gift confound.
Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth
And delves the parallels in beauty's brow,
Feeds on the rarities of nature's truth,
And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow:
   And yet to times in hope, my verse shall stand
   Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.

Mnemonic Image

WAVES

Memory Passage

WAVES on the Ocean of Time

Idiosyncratic Abstract

The waves containing the ashes of my dead parents

Couplet Imagery

And yet to times in hope, my verse shall stand
   Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.

Standing vs Cruel Hand

Q1

Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore,
So do our minutes hasten to their end;
Each changing place with that which goes before,
In sequent toil all forwards do contend.

60 as the number of minutes in the hour

favorite line: In sequent toil all forwards do contend.

Q2

Nativity, once in the main of light,
Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crown'd,
Crooked eclipses 'gainst his glory fight,
And Time that gave doth now his gift confound.


progression: nativity to maturity to crooked eclipses to confound
gave / gift

Q3

Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth
And delves the parallels in beauty's brow,
Feeds on the rarities of nature's truth,
And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow:

lovely delves the parallels
beauty's brow cf S19

Time as the cruel lepidopterist || feeds on rarities - the hunger of time ||
 nothing STANDS || scythe mow

C

And yet to times in hope, my verse shall stand
   Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.

cf. S12 - heavy meter in L11 like time's hand ticking

Time and Hope || verse shall STAND || Time's cruel hand

SONNET 79 SICK MUSE: Whilst I alone did call upon thy aid

Whilst I alone did call upon thy aid,
My verse alone had all thy gentle grace;
But now my gracious numbers are decayed,
And my sick Muse doth give an other place.
I grant, sweet love, thy lovely argument
Deserves the travail of a worthier pen;
Yet what of thee thy poet doth invent
He robs thee of, and pays it thee again.
He lends thee virtue, and he stole that word
From thy behaviour; beauty doth he give,
And found it in thy cheek: he can afford
No praise to thee, but what in thee doth live.
   Then thank him not for that which he doth say,
   Since what he owes thee, thou thyself dost pay.

SONNET 78 ALIEN PEN: So oft have I invoked thee for my Muse

So oft have I invoked thee for my Muse,
And found such fair assistance in my verse
As every alien pen hath got my use
And under thee their poesy disperse.
Thine eyes, that taught the dumb on high to sing
And heavy ignorance aloft to fly,
Have added feathers to the learned's wing
And given grace a double majesty.
Yet be most proud of that which I compile,
Whose influence is thine, and born of thee:
In others' works thou dost but mend the style,
And arts with thy sweet graces graced be;
   But thou art all my art, and dost advance
   As high as learning, my rude ignorance.

SONNET 77 MOUTHED GRAVES: Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear

Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear,
Thy dial how thy precious minutes waste;
The vacant leaves thy mind's imprint will bear,
And of this book, this learning mayst thou taste.
The wrinkles which thy glass will truly show
Of mouthed graves will give thee memory;
Thou by thy dial's shady stealth mayst know
Time's thievish progress to eternity.
Look what thy memory cannot contain,
Commit to these waste blanks, and thou shalt find
Those children nursed, delivered from thy brain,
To take a new acquaintance of thy mind.
   These offices, so oft as thou wilt look,
   Shall profit thee and much enrich thy book.

SONNET 76 COMPOUNDS STRANGE: Why is my verse so barren of new pride

Why is my verse so barren of new pride,
So far from variation or quick change?
Why with the time do I not glance aside
To new-found methods, and to compounds strange?
Why write I still all one, ever the same,
And keep invention in a noted weed,
That every word doth almost tell my name,
Showing their birth, and where they did proceed?
O! know sweet love I always write of you,
And you and love are still my argument;
So all my best is dressing old words new,
Spending again what is already spent:
   For as the sun is daily new and old,
   So is my love still telling what is told.

SONNET 81 EPITAPH: Or I shall live your epitaph to make

Or I shall live your epitaph to make,
Or you survive when I in earth am rotten,
From hence your memory death cannot take,
Although in me each part will be forgotten.
Your name from hence immortal life shall have,
Though I, once gone, to all the world must die:
The earth can yield me but a common grave,
When you entombed in men's eyes shall lie.
Your monument shall be my gentle verse,
Which eyes not yet created shall o'er-read;
And tongues to be your being shall rehearse,
When all the breathers of this world are dead;
   You still shall live, such virtue hath my pen,
   Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths of men.

SONNET 80 SAUCY BARK: O! how I faint when I of you do write

O! how I faint when I of you do write,
Knowing a better spirit doth use your name,
And in the praise thereof spends all his might,
To make me tongue-tied speaking of your fame.
But since your worth, wide as the ocean is,
The humble as the proudest sail doth bear,
My saucy bark, inferior far to his,
On your broad main doth wilfully appear.
Your shallowest help will hold me up afloat,
Whilst he upon your soundless deep doth ride;
Or, being wracked, I am a worthless boat,
He of tall building, and of goodly pride:
   Then if he thrive and I be cast away,
   The worst was this, my love was my decay.

SONNET 115 TAN SACRED BEAUTY: Those lines that I before have writ do lie

Those lines that I before have writ do lie,
Even those that said I could not love you dearer:
Yet then my judgment knew no reason why
My most full flame should afterwards burn clearer.
But reckoning Time, whose million'd accidents
Creep in 'twixt vows, and change decrees of kings,
Tan sacred beauty, blunt the sharp'st intents,
Divert strong minds to the course of altering things;
Alas! why, fearing of Time's tyranny,
Might I not then say, 'Now I love you best,'
When I was certain o'er incertainty,
Crowning the present, doubting of the rest?
   Love is a babe, then might I not say so,
   To give full growth to that which still doth grow?

SONNET 114 MONARCH'S PLAGUE: Or whether doth my mind, being crowned with you

Or whether doth my mind, being crowned with you,
Drink up the monarch's plague, this flattery?
Or whether shall I say, mine eye saith true,
And that your love taught it this alchemy,
To make of monsters and things indigest
Such cherubins as your sweet self resemble,
Creating every bad a perfect best,
As fast as objects to his beams assemble?
O! 'tis the first, 'tis flattery in my seeing,
And my great mind most kingly drinks it up:
Mine eye well knows what with his gust is 'greeing,
And to his palate doth prepare the cup:
   If it be poisoned, 'tis the lesser sin
   That mine eye loves it and doth first begin.

SONNET 113 MINE EYE: Since I left you, mine eye is in my mind

Since I left you, mine eye is in my mind;
And that which governs me to go about
Doth part his function and is partly blind,
Seems seeing, but effectually is out;
For it no form delivers to the heart
Of bird, of flower, or shape which it doth latch:
Of his quick objects hath the mind no part,
Nor his own vision holds what it doth catch;
For if it see the rud'st or gentlest sight,
The most sweet favour or deformed'st creature,
The mountain or the sea, the day or night,
The crow, or dove, it shapes them to your feature.
   Incapable of more, replete with you,
   My most true mind thus maketh mine eye untrue.

SONNET 89 LAMENESS: Say that thou didst forsake me for some fault

Say that thou didst forsake me for some fault,
And I will comment upon that offence:
Speak of my lameness, and I straight will halt,
Against thy reasons making no defence.
Thou canst not, love, disgrace me half so ill,
To set a form upon desired change,
As I'll myself disgrace; knowing thy will,
I will acquaintance strangle, and look strange;
Be absent from thy walks; and in my tongue
Thy sweet beloved name no more shall dwell,
Lest I, too much profane, should do it wrong,
And haply of our old acquaintance tell.
   For thee, against my self I'll vow debate,
   For I must ne'er love him whom thou dost hate.

SONNET 88 EYE OF SCORN When thou shalt be disposed to set me light

When thou shalt be disposed to set me light,
And place my merit in the eye of scorn,
Upon thy side, against myself I'll fight,
And prove thee virtuous, though thou art forsworn.
With mine own weakness being best acquainted,
Upon thy part I can set down a story
Of faults concealed, wherein I am attainted;
That thou in losing me shalt win much glory:
And I by this will be a gainer too;
For bending all my loving thoughts on thee,
The injuries that to myself I do,
Doing thee vantage, double-vantage me.
   Such is my love, to thee I so belong,
   That for thy right, myself will bear all wrong.

SONNET 99 THE FORWARD VIOLET: The forward violet thus did I chide

The forward violet thus did I chide:
Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that smells,
If not from my love's breath? The purple pride
Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells
In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dy'd.
The lily I condemned for thy hand,
And buds of marjoram had stol'n thy hair;
The roses fearfully on thorns did stand,
One blushing shame, another white despair;
A third, nor red nor white, had stol'n of both,
And to his robbery had annexed thy breath;
But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth
A vengeful canker eat him up to death.
   More flowers I noted, yet I none could see,
   But sweet, or colour it had stol'n from thee.


SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

Couplet Imagery





Introductory




Q1:



Q2:



Q3:



Couplet:

 

SONNET 98 HEAVY SATURN: From you have I been absent in the spring

From you have I been absent in the spring,
When proud pied April, dressed in all his trim,
Hath put a spirit of youth in every thing,
That heavy Saturn laughed and leapt with him.
Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell
Of different flowers in odour and in hue,
Could make me any summer's story tell,
Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew:
Nor did I wonder at the lily's white,
Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose;
They were but sweet, but figures of delight,
Drawn after you, you pattern of all those.
   Yet seemed it winter still, and you away,
   As with your shadow I with these did play.

SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

Couplet Imagery





Introductory




Q1:



Q2:



Q3:



Couplet:

  

SONNET 97 FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT: How like a winter hath my absence been

How like a winter hath my absence been
From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year!
What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen!
What old December's bareness everywhere!
And yet this time removed was summer's time;
The teeming autumn, big with rich increase,
Bearing the wanton burden of the prime,
Like widow'd wombs after their lords' decease:
Yet this abundant issue seemed to me
But hope of orphans, and unfathered fruit;
For summer and his pleasures wait on thee,
And, thou away, the very birds are mute:
   Or, if they sing, 'tis with so dull a cheer,
   That leaves look pale, dreading the winter's near.


SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

Couplet Imagery





Introductory




Q1:



Q2:



Q3:



Couplet:

 

SONNET 96 FINGER OF THRONED QUEEN: Some say thy fault is youth, some wantonness

Some say thy fault is youth, some wantonness;
Some say thy grace is youth and gentle sport;
Both grace and faults are lov'd of more and less:
Thou mak'st faults graces that to thee resort.
As on the finger of a throned queen
The basest jewel will be well esteem'd,
So are those errors that in thee are seen
To truths translated, and for true things deem'd.
How many lambs might the stern wolf betray,
If like a lamb he could his looks translate!
How many gazers mightst thou lead away,
If thou wouldst use the strength of all thy state!
   But do not so, I love thee in such sort,
   As thou being mine, mine is thy good report.



SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

Couplet Imagery





Introductory




Q1:



Q2:



Q3:



Couplet:

 

SONNET 95 CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE: How sweet and lovely dost thou make the shame

How sweet and lovely dost thou make the shame
Which, like a canker in the fragrant rose,
Doth spot the beauty of thy budding name!
O! in what sweets dost thou thy sins enclose.
That tongue that tells the story of thy days,
Making lascivious comments on thy sport,
Cannot dispraise, but in a kind of praise;
Naming thy name blesses an ill report.
O! what a mansion have those vices got
Which for their habitation chose out thee,
Where beauty's veil doth cover every blot
And all things turns to fair that eyes can see!
   Take heed, dear heart, of this large privilege;
   The hardest knife ill-used doth lose his edge.


SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

Couplet Imagery





Introductory




Q1:



Q2:



Q3:



Couplet:

 

SONNET 94 POWER TO HURT: They that have power to hurt, and will do none

They that have power to hurt, and will do none,
That do not do the thing they most do show,
Who, moving others, are themselves as stone,
Unmoved, cold, and to temptation slow;
They rightly do inherit heaven's graces,
And husband nature's riches from expense;
They are the lords and owners of their faces,
Others, but stewards of their excellence.
The summer's flower is to the summer sweet,
Though to itself, it only live and die,
But if that flower with base infection meet,
The basest weed outbraves his dignity:
   For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds;
   Lilies that fester, smell far worse than weeds.


SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

Couplet Imagery





Introductory




Q1:



Q2:



Q3:



Couplet:

 

SONNET 93 EVE'S APPLE: So shall I live, supposing thou art true

So shall I live, supposing thou art true,
Like a deceived husband; so love's face
May still seem love to me, though altered new;
Thy looks with me, thy heart in other place:
For there can live no hatred in thine eye,
Therefore in that I cannot know thy change.
In many's looks, the false heart's history
Is writ in moods, and frowns, and wrinkles strange.
But heaven in thy creation did decree
That in thy face sweet love should ever dwell;
Whate'er thy thoughts, or thy heart's workings be,
Thy looks should nothing thence, but sweetness tell.
   How like Eve's apple doth thy beauty grow,
   If thy sweet virtue answer not thy show!



SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

Couplet Imagery





Introductory




Q1:



Q2:



Q3:



Couplet:

SONNET 92 TERM OF LIFE: ut do thy worst to steal thyself away

But do thy worst to steal thyself away,
For term of life thou art assured mine;
And life no longer than thy love will stay,
For it depends upon that love of thine.
Then need I not to fear the worst of wrongs,
When in the least of them my life hath end.
I see a better state to me belongs
Than that which on thy humour doth depend:
Thou canst not vex me with inconstant mind,
Since that my life on thy revolt doth lie.
O what a happy title do I find,
Happy to have thy love, happy to die!
   But what's so blessed-fair that fears no blot?
   Thou mayst be false, and yet I know it not.

SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

Couplet Imagery





Introductory




Q1:



Q2:



Q3:



Couplet:

  

SONNET 91 HORSE: Some glory in their birth, some in their skill,

Some glory in their birth, some in their skill,
Some in their wealth, some in their body's force,
Some in their garments though new-fangled ill;
Some in their hawks and hounds, some in their horse;
And every humour hath his adjunct pleasure,
Wherein it finds a joy above the rest:
But these particulars are not my measure,
All these I better in one general best.
Thy love is better than high birth to me,
Richer than wealth, prouder than garments' cost,
Of more delight than hawks and horses be;
And having thee, of all men's pride I boast:
   Wretched in this alone, that thou mayst take
   All this away, and me most wretched make.


SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

Couplet Imagery





Introductory




Q1:



Q2:



Q3:



Couplet:

 

SONNET 90 CROSS: Then hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now;

Then hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now;
Now, while the world is bent my deeds to cross,
Join with the spite of fortune, make me bow,
And do not drop in for an after-loss:
Ah! do not, when my heart hath 'scaped this sorrow,
Come in the rearward of a conquered woe;
Give not a windy night a rainy morrow,
To linger out a purposed overthrow.
If thou wilt leave me, do not leave me last,
When other petty griefs have done their spite,
But in the onset come: so shall I taste
At first the very worst of fortune's might;
   And other strains of woe, which now seem woe,
   Compared with loss of thee, will not seem so.


SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 

CROSS

Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

Couplet Imagery

And other strains of woe, which now seem woe,
   Compared with loss of thee, will not seem so.

Woe is the word here. Echoed heavily in Q2: sorrow, woe, morrow, overthrow. Strains groans out of bent and bow in Q1. The language itself straining, being bent, made to bow, under the possibility of loss of love. The negation of all other sorrow and suffering in the presence of this loss. This one wound is so grievous, the pain from all the other cuts is diminished. 

Introductory

The immediate sense of the sonnet follows out of the preceding sonnet:

Say that thou didst forsake me for some fault,
And I will comment upon that offence:
Speak of my lameness, and I straight will halt,
Against thy reasons making no defence.
Thou canst not, love, disgrace me half so ill,
To set a form upon desired change,
As I'll myself disgrace; knowing thy will,
I will acquaintance strangle, and look strange;
Be absent from thy walks; and in my tongue
Thy sweet beloved name no more shall dwell,
Lest I, too much profane, should do it wrong,
And haply of our old acquaintance tell.
   For thee, against my self I'll vow debate,
   For I must ne'er love him whom thou dost hate.

You sense the Poet stinging himself with that last line of self-hatred, taking a deep breath, then proceeding straight away to this sonnet. 

Q1:

Then hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now;
Now, while the world is bent my deeds to cross,
Join with the spite of fortune, make me bow,
And do not drop in for an after-loss:

Riding off of the hate from sonnet 89, the "then hate me" burns off the page, spit out of the Poet's mouth. I read an angry resignation in the tone, something of the masochist, if you seek to inflict pain, if ever you think you might be so inclined, do not wait, do it now.

And in L2, there is an unelaborated subtext: things are already bad, I've hit rock-bottom, go ahead an pile on while I am here. Evidently, bending deeds to cross was a common enough phrase with no Christian resonance. But I can not help but read it as the Poet being crucified for his sins, bent upon the cross. Just a personal mnemonic image.

With L3, the image of the Poet in the hole, carrying the cross, the weight, join with the spite of fortune, and the invective: make me bow. Pile on your hatred, bending me over, making me bow. Now now now. Do not delay, wait, linger, the Poet wants all the pain at once. He knows he will endure, but that he must pass through this.

The rest of the sonnet emphasizes this.

Q2:

Ah! do not, when my heart hath 'scaped this sorrow,
Come in the rearward of a conquered woe;
Give not a windy night a rainy morrow,
To linger out a purposed overthrow.

With a sense of the day after, that the Poet has endured the Dark Night of the Soul, escaped.

Of course, there is also a graphic mnemonic reading for me: do not, says the Poet, after finally having come to terms with losing you, knowing he will no longer have loving sex, do not come around again through the rearward to linger out your overthrow. There is no more love, the Poet knows he is hated, but the Young Man continues to make the Poet submit to anal sex, humiliating him. The windy night is the night of a gassy degraded fucking and the rainy tomorrow is his leaking ass.


Q3:

If thou wilt leave me, do not leave me last,
When other petty griefs have done their spite,
But in the onset come: so shall I taste
At first the very worst of fortune's might;

Graphic mnemonic interpretation: in the onset cum in my mouth, don't fuck me in the ass, so I shall then taste the worst of fortune's might.

Couplet:

And other strains of woe, which now seem woe,
   Compared with loss of thee, will not seem so.


Woe woe woe moaning though the sonnet as the Poet is hate-fucked by the Young Man.

Sonnet 59 A FORMER CHILD - If there be nothing new, but that which is

If there be nothing new, but that which is
Hath been before, how are our brains beguiled,
Which, labouring for invention, bear amiss
The second burden of a former child!
O, that record could with a backward look,
Even of five hundred courses of the sun,
Show me your image in some antique book,
Since mind at first in character was done!
That I might see what the old world could say
To this composed wonder of your frame;
Whether we are mended, or whether better they,
Or whether revolution be the same.
O, sure I am, the wits of former days
To subjects worse have given admiring praise.

Sonnet 58 GOD FORBID - That god forbid that made me first your slave,

That god forbid that made me first your slave,
I should in thought control your times of pleasure,
Or at your hand the account of hours to crave,
Being your vassal, bound to stay your leisure!
O, let me suffer, being at your beck,
The imprison'd absence of your liberty;
And patience, tame to sufferance, bide each cheque,
Without accusing you of injury.
Be where you list, your charter is so strong
That you yourself may privilege your time
To what you will; to you it doth belong
Yourself to pardon of self-doing crime.
I am to wait, though waiting so be hell;
Not blame your pleasure, be it ill or well.

Sonnet 57 SLAVE - Being your slave, what should I do but tend

Being your slave, what should I do but tend
Upon the hours and times of your desire?
I have no precious time at all to spend,
Nor services to do, till you require.
Nor dare I chide the world-without-end hour
Whilst I, my sovereign, watch the clock for you,
Nor think the bitterness of absence sour
When you have bid your servant once adieu;
Nor dare I question with my jealous thought
Where you may be, or your affairs suppose,
But, like a sad slave, stay and think of nought
Save, where you are how happy you make those.
So true a fool is love that in your will,
Though you do any thing, he thinks no ill.

Sonnet 56 SAD INTERIM - Sweet love, renew thy force; be it not said

Sweet love, renew thy force; be it not said
Thy edge should blunter be than appetite,
Which but to-day by feeding is allay'd,
To-morrow sharpen'd in his former might:
So, love, be thou; although to-day thou fill
Thy hungry eyes even till they wink with fullness,
To-morrow see again, and do not kill
The spirit of love with a perpetual dullness.
Let this sad interim like the ocean be
Which parts the shore, where two contracted new
Come daily to the banks, that, when they see
Return of love, more blest may be the view;
Else call it winter, which being full of care
Makes summer's welcome thrice more wish'd, more rare.

Sonnet 55 SLUTTISH TIME - Not marble, nor the gilded monuments

Not marble, nor the gilded monuments
Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme;
But you shall shine more bright in these contents
Than unswept stone besmear'd with sluttish time.
When wasteful war shall statues overturn,
And broils root out the work of masonry,
Nor Mars his sword nor war's quick fire shall burn
The living record of your memory.
'Gainst death and all-oblivious enmity
Shall you pace forth; your praise shall still find room
Even in the eyes of all posterity
That wear this world out to the ending doom.
So, till the judgment that yourself arise,
You live in this, and dwell in lover's eyes.

Sonnet 54 SWEET ORNAMENT - O, how much more doth beauty beauteous seem

O, how much more doth beauty beauteous seem
By that sweet ornament which truth doth give!
The rose looks fair, but fairer we it deem
For that sweet odour which doth in it live.
The canker-blooms have full as deep a dye
As the perfumed tincture of the roses,
Hang on such thorns and play as wantonly
When summer's breath their masked buds discloses:
But, for their virtue only is their show,
They live unwoo'd and unrespected fade,
Die to themselves. Sweet roses do not so;
Of their sweet deaths are sweetest odours made:
And so of you, beauteous and lovely youth,
When that shall fade, my verse distills your truth.

Sonnet 53 STRANGE SHADOWS - What is your substance, whereof are you made,

What is your substance, whereof are you made,
That millions of strange shadows on you tend?
Since every one hath, every one, one shade,
And you, but one, can every shadow lend.
Describe Adonis, and the counterfeit
Is poorly imitated after you;
On Helen's cheek all art of beauty set,
And you in Grecian tires are painted new:
Speak of the spring and foison of the year;
The one doth shadow of your beauty show,
The other as your bounty doth appear;
And you in every blessed shape we know.
In all external grace you have some part,
But you like none, none you, for constant heart.

Sonnet 52 BLESSED KEY - So am I as the rich, whose blessed key

So am I as the rich, whose blessed key
Can bring him to his sweet up-locked treasure,
The which he will not every hour survey,
For blunting the fine point of seldom pleasure.
Therefore are feasts so solemn and so rare,
Since, seldom coming, in the long year set,
Like stones of worth they thinly placed are,
Or captain jewels in the carcanet.
So is the time that keeps you as my chest,
Or as the wardrobe which the robe doth hide,
To make some special instant special blest,
By new unfolding his imprison'd pride.
Blessed are you, whose worthiness gives scope,
Being had, to triumph, being lack'd, to hope.

Sonnet 51 DULL BEARER - Thus can my love excuse the slow offense

Thus can my love excuse the slow offense
Of my dull bearer when from thee I speed:
From where thou art why should I haste me thence?
Till I return, of posting is no need.
O, what excuse will my poor beast then find,
When swift extremity can seem but slow?
Then should I spur, though mounted on the wind;
In winged speed no motion shall I know:
Then can no horse with my desire keep pace;
Therefore desire of perfect'st love being made,
Shall neigh--no dull flesh--in his fiery race;
But love, for love, thus shall excuse my jade;
Since from thee going he went wilful-slow,
Towards thee I'll run, and give him leave to go.



Obviously paired with S50.
That groan from the froward beast,
the reminds the Poet that his destination
he is ever traveling towards grief and away from joy.

S50 is an internal monologue
while S51 is the outward explanation to the YM

Lest, perhaps, the YM believes the Poet's delay
is calculated? What is the slow offense?

Speed used ironically.

Note the movement from dull bearer to poor beast

The beautiful passage:

Then should I spur, though mounted on the wind;
In winged speed no motion shall I know:

Seems modern: no motion shall I know
the effect of being on an airplane

And the loaded line the marks Q3:

no horse can keep up with my desire

priapic boasting. the poet has been away too long
his prick shall spur the horse beyond the limits of the dull flesh
and he shall like a cartoon comet
arc fiery across the sky back to the YM

Interesting in the couplet
no spurring is necessary
the horse desires to get back to the YM
as quickly as possible


Q1: slow offense of the dull beast in leaving

Q2: the promised return will be faster than the wind

Q3: because the poet's desire is stronger than any horse and will speed him back like fire

C: I will let loose the reins on the horse and give him leave to exercise his full powers of speed (and desire?)

Sonnet 50 BLOODY SPUR: How heavy do I journey on the way

How heavy do I journey on the way,
When what I seek, my weary travel's end,
Doth teach that ease and that repose to say,
'Thus far the miles are measured from thy friend!'
The beast that bears me, tired with my woe,
Plods dully on, to bear that weight in me,
As if by some instinct the wretch did know
His rider lov'd not speed being made from thee.
The bloody spur cannot provoke him on,
That sometimes anger thrusts into his hide,
Which heavily he answers with a groan,
More sharp to me than spurring to his side;
   For that same groan doth put this in my mind,
   My grief lies onward, and my joy behind.

It's a sweet image of a sullen Shakespeare
on a horse plodding down the road

You can feel the weight of time: the wait
heavy, weary, tired with woe, plods dully on...
The meter resounding like horse's hooves on the road
lugubrious lamentation in alliteration
when what weary woe weight wretch
mile measured
beast bears bear bloody
and those two bears!
wretched beastly bears
then the bloody spur
singing out in Q3
anger, what anger? where?
weren't we weary with woe?
but with the turn comes anger
perhaps for having to leave London
and travel back to Stratford
to the wife and kids
to the million little pricks
and that groan
this sadistic Shakespeare
full of such anger as to bloody a spur
in a horse's hide
seems incongruous and yet all too human
rationalized that the greater pain is his
that same groan
you wonder at the sound
the recalcitrant horse
Rocinante
the angry Poet
spurs jingling on his boots
wheels spinning
dripping with hot red blood
but which cause no difference in the horse's pace
there's a sonnet to be written about this horse
and his evocative groan

We each enact our own myths

source

Film offers an all too easy metaphor for memory which, while evocative, is not accurate. I think people born in the age of film and now smart phones will think of memory as a message aligned with those mediums: a slow motion panning shot of a walk to the altar, soundtracked with a favorite song, close up on the face, or, far worse, their lives as a series of posed/ not posed filter / no filter selfies.

The creative and interpretively demanding windows opened by a work of art with its constantly shifting meanings and aporia are traded for these more compressed representations of the experience - the plastic souvenir remembered instead of the experience itself.

The capacities of memory of enormous are vast and energized by immersion to the most profound depths. Borges said one of the most signal moments in the development of Western culture was when Aeschylus introduced a second actor onto the stage. No longer a single singer or priest addressing the crowd directly, but a re-presentation of reality, as two actors magically create a dramatic universe we view as non-participatory spectators. No wonder the earliest memory systems were memory theaters. Internal private stages where we each enact our own myths. Something Freud "discovered" as a unexplored country within.

OSSA 3 TRIGRAMS: I-CHING TRIGRAMS

source

source

source

source

SCRIPTUM 3 CASTLES: I learned this, at least, by my experiment

Walden 

Henry Thoreau (1817-1862)

I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. He will put some things behind, will pass an invisible boundary; new, universal, and more liberal laws will begin to establish themselves around and within him; or the old laws be expanded, and interpreted in his favor in a more liberal sense, and he will live with the license of a higher order of beings. In proportion as he simplifies his life, the laws of the universe will appear less complex, and solitude will not be solitude, nor poverty poverty, nor weakness weakness. If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.

I learned this, at least, by my experiment:
that if one advances confidently
in the direction of his dreams,
and endeavors to live the life
which he has imagined,
he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.

He will put some things behind,
will pass an invisible boundary;
new, universal, and more liberal laws
will begin to establish themselves
around and within him; or the old laws be expanded,
and interpreted in his favor in a more liberal sense,
and he will live with the license of a higher order of beings.

In proportion as he simplifies his life,
the laws of the universe will appear less complex,
and solitude will not be solitude,
nor poverty poverty,
nor weakness weakness.

If you have built castles in the air,
your work need not be lost;
that is where they should be.
Now put the foundations under them.

Synaesthetics

Composition VIII, 1923 - Kandinsky - source

I've been working to synaesthetically intertwine colors with letter, word and number. An age old Kandinskian effort, but solely for my own mnemonic purposes. For example. 0 = white. Seems natural to me, the white on a page around printed words is seen as silence. White is a kind of blank, an emptiness, a zero. The letter B is blue. It just looks like Blue. The two circles leaning against the wall, tired, drunk, squashed, blue. And 2 is also blue. Rhyme. But the image of the man on his knees, head bent over, in prayer or defeat, is blue. Blue smells like the sea, for obvious reasons. And the same: tastes like water. And so on... making myself into Pavlov's dog: 20 is blue on white, a drunk man kneeling on a white sheet, remembering the taste of rain, perhaps a sailor on a deserted island praying on a white sail, dying of thirst. This associative process of mnemonic creation, of cracking words open like oysters, searching for pearls amidst the labial folds.

SONNET 72 RECITE: O! lest the world should task you to recite

O! lest the world should task you to recite
What merit lived in me, that you should love
After my death,--dear love, forget me quite,
For you in me can nothing worthy prove.
Unless you would devise some virtuous lie,
To do more for me than mine own desert,
And hang more praise upon deceased I
Than niggard truth would willingly impart:
O! lest your true love may seem false in this
That you for love speak well of me untrue,
My name be buried where my body is,
And live no more to shame nor me nor you.
   For I am shamed by that which I bring forth,
   And so should you, to love things nothing worth.

SONNET 71 BELL: No longer mourn for me when I am dead

No longer mourn for me when I am dead
Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell
Give warning to the world that I am fled
From this vile world with vilest worms to dwell:
Nay, if you read this line, remember not
The hand that writ it, for I love you so,
That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot,
If thinking on me then should make you woe.
O! if, I say, you look upon this verse,
When I perhaps compounded am with clay,
Do not so much as my poor name rehearse;
But let your love even with my life decay;
   Lest the wise world should look into your moan,
   And mock you with me after I am gone.


The CROW from Sonnet 70 collides with the BELL in the belltower
sits dazed and dizzy, stars around his head as in a cartoon,
Jeckle with his English accent, is tasked to RECITE...

Note lead words on the Qs and the C:

No
Nay, if you read
O! if, I say
Lest

Compare to it's paired sonnet 72:

O! lest
Unless
O! lest
For I am shamed

Note
vile world in L4
and wise world in L13

Names and memory

SONNET 70 CROW: That thou art blamed shall not be thy defect

That thou art blamed shall not be thy defect,
For slander's mark was ever yet the fair;
The ornament of beauty is suspect,
A crow that flies in heaven's sweetest air.
So thou be good, slander doth but approve
Thy worth the greater, being wooed of time;
For canker vice the sweetest buds doth love,
And thou present'st a pure unstained prime.
Thou hast passed by the ambush of young days
Either not assailed, or victor being charged;
Yet this thy praise cannot be so thy praise,
To tie up envy, evermore enlarged,
   If some suspect of ill masked not thy show,
   Then thou alone kingdoms of hearts shouldst owe.

The Crow, black stain, shadow, blot, eclipse
appearing suddenly in the clear blue sky of the sonnet
either Heckle or Jeckle, these talking magpies up to no good.

This ornament of beauty
a piece of foil, a shining object
attracts them in to enact their chaos
of idle amusement
for them, the purpose of the being
is to get a good laugh
at the expense of others

Or that mysterious, all powerful Minah Bird
from the early racist Looney Tunes cartoons.

"Minah is a small and seemingly almighty mynah bird. He has a blank emotionless face and personality, and he always walks to the tune of Mendelssohn's "The Hebrides" (http://youtu.be/FAXyj1dy-PE). Minah played a major role in every Inki cartoon short and has made several small appearances in Looney Tunes, Tiny Toon Adventures, Animaniacs, The Sylvester & Tweety Mysteries and Tweety's High-Flying Adventure. Minah in all cases appears in the middle of a conflict and proceeds to resolve it in his own unique way. Everything in the jungle is terrified of Minah apart from Inki and lions due to them being unaware of his reputation. In the shorts Minah always makes a huge, intimidating entrance which he doesn't seem to live up to having a small and non-intimidating appearance but he does live up to it in his abilities. Minah always gets in the middle of a conflict and causes physical pain to both sides (the amount of pain received is consistent to the size of their part in the conflict). Minah's abilities include escaping in a maze of holes, disappearing into thin air, reappearing out of seemingly anywhere whenever and wherever it is least expected or most convenient, and making other things disappear and reappear. Minah also delivers the pain personally through off-seen and sometimes onseen violence. It is true Minah cannot be defeated in a physical fight for he has regularly given brutal beatings to dogs, lions, and in one case a 28 ton dinosaur in all his cartoons but always comes out completely unharmed." - source


"Comics historian Don Markstein wrote that the character's racial stereotype "led to [the series'] unpopularity with program directors and thence to its present-day obscurity." He noted that, "The Minah Bird, which appears immensely powerful, [is] an accomplished trickster; and yet acts, when it acts at all, from motives which simply can not be fathomed...."[1] The series' director, Chuck Jones, said[where?] these cartoons were baffling to everyone, including himself. He had no understanding of what the bird was supposed to do other than walk around. But the shorts were well-accepted by audiences.[2] According to Terry Lindvall and Ben Fraser, Inki is an Everyman who encounters mysterious forces of life. He serves as a symbol of all humanity, "frustrated and rescued by the wonderfully inexplicable" - Wikipedia


Sense of "slander's mark" as the conman's mark.

SCRIPTUM 2 WHALE: He Tasks Me... Moby-Dick by Herman Melville

Moby-Dick

Chapter XXXVI - THE QUARTER-DECK

Herman Melville (1819 - 1891)

"Hark ye yet again, - the little lower layer. All visible objects, man, are but as pasteboard masks. But in each event - in the living act, the undoubted deed - there, some unknown but still reasoning thing puts forth the mouldings of its features from behind the unreasoning mask. If man will strike, strike through the mask! How can the prisoner reach outside except by thrusting through the wall? To me, the white whale is that wall, shoved near to me. Sometimes I think there's naught beyond. But 'tis enough. He tasks me; he heaps me; I see in him outrageous strength, with an inscrutable malice sinewing it. That inscrutable thing is chiefly what I hate; and be the white whale agent, or be the white whale principal, I will wreak that hate upon him. Talk not to me of blasphemy, man; I'd strike the sun if it insulted me. For could the sun do that, then could I do the other; since there is ever a sort of fair play herein, jealousy presiding over all creations. But not my master, man, is even that fair play. Who's over me? Truth hath no confines. Take off thine eye! more intolerable than fiends' glarings is a doltish stare!


Mnemonic breakdown:

"Hark ye yet again, - the little lower layer.
All visible objects, man, are but as pasteboard masks.

But in each event - in the living act, the undoubted deed -
there, some unknown but still reasoning thing
puts forth the mouldings of its features
from behind the unreasoning mask.

If man will strike, strike through the mask!
How can the prisoner reach outside except by thrusting through the wall?
To me, the white whale is that wall, shoved near to me.
Sometimes I think there's naught beyond.

But 'tis enough.
He tasks me; he heaps me;
I see in him outrageous strength,
with an inscrutable malice sinewing it.

That inscrutable thing is chiefly what I hate;
and be the white whale agent,
or be the white whale principal,
I will wreak that hate upon him.

Talk not to me of blasphemy, man;
I'd strike the sun if it insulted me.
For could the sun do that,
then could I do the other;
since there is ever a sort of fair play herein,
jealousy presiding over all creations.

But not my master, man, is even that fair play.
Who's over me? Truth hath no confines.
Take off thine eye!
more intolerable than fiends' glarings is a doltish stare!

ALTER CANTICUM JESUS: Jesus Gonna Be Here by Tom Waits

Jesus Gonna Be Here

Tom Waits (1949-    )

Well, Jesus will be here
Be here soon
He's gonna cover us up with leaves
With a blanket from the moon
With a promise and a vow
And a lullaby for my brow
Jesus gonna be here
Be here soon

Well I'm just gonna wait here
I don't have to shout
I have no reason and
I have no doubt
I'm gonna get myself
Unfurled from this mortal coiled up world
Because Jesus gonna be here
Be here soon

I got to keep my eyes open
So I can see my Lord
I'm gonna watch the horizon
For a brand new Ford
I can hear him rolling on down the lane
I said Hollywood be thy name
Jesus gonna be
Gonna be here soon

Well, I've been faithful
And I've been so good
Except for drinking
But he knew that I would
I'm gonna leave this place better
Than the way I found it was
And Jesus gonna be here
Be here soon

MATHEMATICA 1

Wikipedia: 

1 (one, also called unit, unity, and (multiplicative) identity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It represents a single entity, the unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of unit length is a line segment of length 1. It is also the first of the infinite sequence of natural numbers, followed by 2.

It is also the first and second number in the Fibonacci sequence (0 is the zeroth) and is the first number in many other mathematical sequences.

1 is neither a prime number nor a composite number, but a unit (meaning of ring theory), like −1 and, in the Gaussian integers, i and −i. The fundamental theorem of arithmetic guarantees unique factorization over the integers only up to units. (For example, 4 = 22, but if units are included, is also equal to, say, (−1)6 × 123 × 22, among infinitely many similar "factorizations".)

1 is the only positive integer divisible by exactly one positive integer (whereas prime numbers are divisible by exactly two positive integers, composite numbers are divisible by more than two positive integers, and zero is divisible by all positive integers). 1 was formerly considered prime by some mathematicians, using the definition that a prime is divisible only by 1 and itself. However, this complicates the fundamental theorem of arithmetic, so modern definitions exclude units.

1 is the atomic number of hydrogen.

In the philosophy of Plotinus and a number of other neoplatonists, The One is the ultimate reality and source of all existence. Philo of Alexandria (20 BC – AD 50) regarded the number one as God's number, and the basis for all numbers ("De Allegoriis Legum," ii.12 [i.66]).


The Express - Concerning One

1. The ancient Greeks did not consider One to be a number at all. A number, said Euclid, is an “aggregate of units”, so numbers began at Two.

2. They also considered One to be both male and female and both odd and even.

3. There is only one hiccup in the works of Shakespeare, uttered, appropriately enough, by Sir Toby Belch in Twelfth Night.

4. The Icelandic for “one” is “eitt”, which sounds just like “eight”.

5. Each hair on a human head grows one centimetre a month.

6. The word “girl” only occurs once in the King James Bible (in Joel 3:3). The King James Bible, incidentally, was first published on May 2, 1611.

7. In the UK, a first wedding anniversary is a cotton anniversary; in the USA it is paper.

8. Among the words Charles Dickens used only once are “kangaroo” (in David Copperfield) and “zoo” (in Martin Chuzzlewit).

9. A word that any particular author used only once in their works is called a “hapax legomenon”.

10. “One” is the 35th most commonly used word in the English language, just ahead of “all”.

OSSA 1 CROWN: The Sephirot

The Sephirot

King Casey's Bones Call God To Negate His Youthful Mystery

Wikipdedia: According to Gershom Scholem, the Ein Sof is the emanator of the ten sefirot. Sefirot are energy emanations found on the Kabbalistic Tree of Life. Ein Sof, the Atik Yomin ("Ancient of Days"), emanates the sefirot into the cosmic womb of the Ayin in a manner that results in the created universe. The three letters composing the word "Ayin" (אי״ן), indicate the first three purely intellectual sefirot, which precede any emotion or action.[5] The order of devolution can be described as:

000. Ayin (Nothing; אין‬)

00. Ein Sof (Limitlessness; אין סוף‬)

0. Ohr Ein Sof (Endless Light; אור אין סוף‬)

-.Tzimtzum (Contraction; צמצום‬)

The ten sefirot were preceded by a stage of concealment called tzimtzum, which "allows space" for creations to perceive themselves as separate existences from their creator. The sefirot exhibit reflection in sets of triads between more exalted states of being (or "non-being," when "otherness" does not yet exist) and the lower, more mundane levels of existence:

Ayin, Ein Sof, Ohr Ein Sof

Keter, Chokhmah, Binah

Chesed, Gevurah, Tiferet

Netzach, Hod, Yesod

1. Keter (Crown; כתר‬)

2. Chokhmah (Wisdom; חכמה‬)

3. Binah (Understanding; בינה‬)

4. Chesed or Gedulah (Loving Kindness or Mercy; חסד‬)

5. Gevurah or Din (Power or Judgement; גבורה‬)

6. Tiferet (Beauty or Compassion; תפארת‬)

7. Netzach (Triumph or Endurance; נצח‬)

8. Hod (Majesty or Splendor; הוד‬)

9. Yesod (Foundation; יסוד‬)

10. Malchut (Realm; מלכות‬)

22 Lines or Paths what are can be overlayed with the Major Arcana from the Tarot

0. Keter – Chokhmah : The Fool

1. Keter – Binah: The Magician

2. Keter – Tiferet : The High Priestess

3. Binah – Chokhmah: The Empress

4. Chokhmah – Tiferet: The Emperor

5. Chokhmah – Chesed : The Hierophant

6. Binah – Tiferet: The Lovers

7. Binah – Gevurah: The Chariot

8. Gevurah – Chesed : Strength

9. Chesed – Tiferet : The Hermit

10. Chesed – Netzach: Wheel of Fortune

11. Gevurah – Tiferet : Justice

12. Gevurah – Hod: The Hanged Man

13. Tiferet – Netzach: Death

14. Tiferet – Yesod: Temperance

15. Tiferet – Hod: The Devil

16. Hod – Netzach: The Tower

17. Netzach – Yesod: The Star

18. Netzach – Malkuth: The Moon

19. Hod – Yesod: The Sun

20. Hod – Malkuth: Judgment

21. Yesod – Malkuth: The World

SCRIPTUM 1: MOON Philosophies of India by Heinrich Zimmer

Philosophies of India

Heinrich Zimmer (1830-1943)

The moon, the stars, dissolve. The mounting tide becomes a limitless sheet of water. This is the interval of a night of Brahma. Vishnu sleeps. Like a spider that has climbed up the thread that once issued from its own organism, drawing it back into  itself, the god has consumed again the web of the universe. Alone upon the immortal substance of the ocean, a giant figure, submerged partly, partly afloat, he takes delight in slumber. There is no one to behold him, no one to comprehend him; there is no knowledge of him, except within himself. 

Mnemonic breakdown:

The moon, the stars, dissolve. 

The mounting tide becomes a limitless sheet of water. 

This is the interval of a night of Brahma. 

Vishnu sleeps. 

Like a spider that has climbed up the thread that once issued from its own organism, 

drawing it back into  itself, 

the god has consumed again the web of the universe. 

Alone upon the immortal substance of the ocean, a giant figure, 

submerged partly, partly afloat, 

he takes delight in slumber. 

There is no one to behold him, 

no one to comprehend him; 

there is no knowledge of him, 

except within himself. 

Notes:

Spider: resonance with Sinners at the Hands of an Angry God

Full text of "Heinrich Robert Zimmer, Myths And Symbols In Indian Art And Civilization"

Mnemonic Synthesis 1 - 10 Magician to Wheel

1. ROSE

א‬ - Aleph - Ox
Magician - Mercury - Mind

POESIS

SCAFFOLD

Straight Tip to Call Cross Coves

LYRICA

ROSE

From fairest creatures we desire increase

SCRIPTUM 

MOON

Philosophies of India

OSSA 

CROWN
The Sephirot

CANTICUM 

FACE

Man From Nod

ALTER CANTICUM 

JESUS

Jesus Gonna Be Here

MUSICA

GYPSY

Zigeunerweisen

IOCULARIA

PIG

MATHEMATICA

NUMBER 1 

CHRONOS

1962

2. TRENCH

ב - Beth - House
High Priestess - Moon

POESIS

DRAGON

Jabberwocky

LYRICA

TRENCH

When forty Winters shall beseige thy brow

SCRIPTUM

WHALE

He Tasks Me...

OSSA

GOD'S EXCELLENT LOVE
Books of Old Testament
MY MOTHER LOVES JESUS
Books of the New Testament

CANTICUM

HUMMINGBIRD

Hummingbird Lullabye

ALTER CANTICUM

DIRT

Dirt In The Ground

MUSICA

ELISE

Für Elise

IOCULARIA

CANNIBAL

MATHEMATICA

 Number 2

CHRONOS

1963

3. GLASS (MIRROR)

ג‬ - Gimel - Camel
Empress - Venus

source

POESIS

AIRPLANE
Funeral Blues

LYRICA

GLASS (MIRROR)
Look in thy glass and tell the face thou viewest

SCRIPTUM

CASTLES
I learned this, at least, by my experiment

OSSA

I-CHING
TRIGRAMS

CANTICUM

HOLE
40 Days in a Hole

ALTER CANTICUM

FIRE

Who By Fire

MUSICA

MOON

Moonlight Sonata

IOCULARIA

DESERT ISLAND

MATHEMATICA

NUMBER 3

CHRONOS

1964

4. EXECUTOR (DEATH)

ד‬ - Daleth - Door
Emperor - Aries 

POESIS

SPHINX
The Second Coming

LYRICA

EXECUTOR
Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend

SCRIPTUM

WAR

Gettysburg Address

OSSA

SICKNESS
The Four Noble Truths

CANTICUM

CRYPTONITE
Cryptonight

ALTER CANTICUM

TOWER

Tower of Song

MUSICA

STRIPPER
Air on the G String

IOCULARIA

PIRATES

MATHEMATICA

NUMBER 4

CHRONOS

1965

5. FRAME

ה‬ - Heh - Window
Hierophant - Taurus - Congelation

POESIS

STAR
Bright Star

LYRICA

FRAME
Those hours, that with gentle work did frame

SCRIPTUM

TONGUE

The Portage to San Cristobal of A.H.

OSSA

SOPHIA
Five Intellectual Virtues

CANTICUM

EGGS
Transcendental Pretense

ALTER CANTICUM

HEAVEN

Just Like Heaven

MUSICA

SUNSET
The Trio in E-flat

IOCULARIA

HUNTER

MATHEMATICA

NUMBER 5 

CHRONOS

1966

6. HAND

ו‬ - Vav - Nail
Lovers - Gemini - Fixation 

POESIS

DAISY
And Death Shall Have No Dominion

LYRICA

HAND
Then let not Winter's ragged hand deface

SCRIPTUM

CLOCK

The Third Man

OSSA

CANTICUM

TRASHCAN
Ghosts

ALTER CANTICUM

POET

Drunken Poet's Dream

MUSICA

AIRPLANE
Poème

IOCULARIA

SHIT

MATHEMATICA

NUMBER 6

CHRONOS

1967

7. SUN

ז‬ - Zayin - Sword
Chariot - Cancer - Dissolution 

POESIS

PRAYER
Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night

LYRICA

SUN
Lo! in the orient when the gracious light

SCRIPTUM

CONSTITUTION

The Preamble

OSSA

SEVEN
LIBERAL ARTS, DEADLY SINS, HOLY VIRTUES
CHAKRAS

CANTICUM

TRAIN
Mayfield

ALTER CANTICUM

WINE

People Who Died

MUSICA

IOCULARIA

STRUDEL

MATHEMATICA

NUMBER 7

CHRONOS

1968

8. MUSIC

ח‬ ‬- Cheth - Fence
Strength - Leo - Digestion 

POESIS

KISS
Non Sum Qualis Eram Bonae Sub Regno Cynarae

LYRICA

MUSIC
Music to hear, why hear'st thou music sadly?

SCRIPTUM

SPIDER

Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God

OSSA

EIGHTFOLD PATH

CANTICUM

TOTEM POLE
Simple Head

ALTER CANTICUM

DIAMONDS

Snake Song

MUSICA

IOCULARIA

FISH

MATHEMATICA

NUMBER 8

CHRONOS

1969

9. SHAME

ט‬ ‬- Teth - Serpent
Hermit - Virgo - Distillation 

POESIS

SKULL
Hamlet Act 3, Scene 1

LYRICA

SHAME
Is it for fear to wet a widow's eye

SCRIPTUM

JONAH

Father Mapple's Sermon

OSSA

MUSE
9 Muses, 3 Graces, 3 Fates, 3 Furies

CANTICUM

RED ROCKS
63 Days in a God-haunted Haze

ALTER CANTICUM

GOLD
Mr. Mudd and Mr. Gold

MUSICA

IOCULARIA

PARROT

MATHEMATICA

NUMBER 9

CHRONOS

1970

10. HATE

כ‬ ‬- Kaph - Palm of Hand
Wheel of Fortune - Jupiter

POESIS

BARREL
The Congo 

LYRICA

HATE
For shame deny that thou bear'st love to any

SCRIPTUM

WHITE

The Whiteness of the Whale

OSSA

OX
Ox-Herding Sequence

CANTICUM

DOMINOES
Kingdom Come

ALTER CANTICUM

MOON

Simple Song

MUSICA

IOCULARIA

BLONDE

MATHEMATICA

NUMBER 10

CHRONOS

1971