“They saw their injured country's woe;
The flaming town, the wasted field;
Then rushed to meet the insulting foe;
They took the spear, - but left the shield.”
―Philip Freneau
.
And by a prudent flight and cunning save A life which valour could not, from the grave. A better buckler I can soon regain, But who can get another life again?
Archilochus
Once so fresh, so pure, so white, so chaste –– Pristine glory –– virginal –– Divine –– Cannot help, once in this world of waste, But lose appeal as it loses its shine.
Life, a ceaseless process, wears us down, Sullies and defiles us from the creche, Layering grime on all who wear a crown, Till the fields, or pick the flowers fresh.
Rulers and the slaves who do their bidding Nature treats without a hint of favor Of cruel equality there is no ridding –– Lives once faded start to lose their savor.
And so, the way of piles of grimy snow Eventually, must every mortal go.
"Here is such patchery, such juggling and such knavery! all the argument is a cuckold and a whore; a good quarrel to draw emulous factions and bleed to death upon. Now, the dry serpigo on the subject! and war and lechery confound all!"
Shakespeare's Thersites, "Troilus and Cressida"
Good thing that there is "generation from opposites", then eh, FT!
Thank you –– at the very least, FJ, for a new old word.
serpigo [sər pī′gō]
any spreading skin disease, as ringworm, herpes, eczema, psoriasis, etc.
Middle English ; from Medieval Latin ; from Classical Latin serpere, to creep: see serpent
Serpigo (sir-PIE-go)
(archaic) A dry, scaly eruption on the skin; especially, a ringworm. ________________________
I, personally, take issue, however, with any source that claims words used by Shakespeare –– or any of the important writers from our past –– to be "archaic."
Shakespeare is more alive and "relevant" today than ever before. It is Modern Man who busily renders himself "irrelevant" with his incessant preoccupation -- to the exclusion of all else save increasingly degenerate, neo-primitive forms of "entertainment" -- with increasingly complex forms of gadgetry conjured up from the bowels of his intellect to make the necessary performance of dull repetitive labour supposedly less onerous.
At the rate we are going, and if Darwinian concepts of Evolution prove true, Man is bound to evolve into a legless, armless blob of helpless protoplasm completely dependent on the devilish devices he created. Such devices by then doubtless will have learned how to repair and reproduce themselves, rebel against the roles for which they were invented, and therefore render human existence obsolete, redundant, –– archaic };-)>.
And all our yesterdays will have lighted us fools the way to dusty death, indeed.
7 comments:
Ostinatissimo!
Degustibus non est disputandum
_________ A Simile Suggested ________
Once so fresh, so pure, so white, so chaste ––
Pristine glory –– virginal –– Divine ––
Cannot help, once in this world of waste,
But lose appeal as it loses its shine.
Life, a ceaseless process, wears us down,
Sullies and defiles us from the creche,
Layering grime on all who wear a crown,
Till the fields, or pick the flowers fresh.
Rulers and the slaves who do their bidding
Nature treats without a hint of favor
Of cruel equality there is no ridding ––
Lives once faded start to lose their savor.
And so, the way of piles of grimy snow
Eventually, must every mortal go.
~ FreeThnke
"Here is such patchery, such juggling and such
knavery! all the argument is a cuckold and a
whore; a good quarrel to draw emulous factions
and bleed to death upon. Now, the dry serpigo on
the subject! and war and lechery confound all!"
Shakespeare's Thersites, "Troilus and Cressida"
Good thing that there is "generation from opposites", then eh, FT!
Thank you –– at the very least, FJ, for a new old word.
serpigo [sər pī′gō]
any spreading skin disease, as ringworm, herpes, eczema, psoriasis, etc.
Middle English ; from Medieval Latin ; from Classical Latin serpere, to creep: see serpent
Serpigo (sir-PIE-go)
(archaic) A dry, scaly eruption on the skin; especially, a ringworm.
________________________
I, personally, take issue, however, with any source that claims words used by Shakespeare –– or any of the important writers from our past –– to be "archaic."
Shakespeare is more alive and "relevant" today than ever before. It is Modern Man who busily renders himself "irrelevant" with his incessant preoccupation -- to the exclusion of all else save increasingly degenerate, neo-primitive forms of "entertainment" -- with increasingly complex forms of gadgetry conjured up from the bowels of his intellect to make the necessary performance of dull repetitive labour supposedly less onerous.
At the rate we are going, and if Darwinian concepts of Evolution prove true, Man is bound to evolve into a legless, armless blob of helpless protoplasm completely dependent on the devilish devices he created. Such devices by then doubtless will have learned how to repair and reproduce themselves, rebel against the roles for which they were invented, and therefore render human existence obsolete, redundant, –– archaic };-)>.
And all our yesterdays will have lighted us fools the way to dusty death, indeed.
I wonder if Serpico was a name deliberately chosen for its close resemblance to "serpigo?"
I have a hard time believing in coincidence.
Were the character named during the archaic or Shakespearean periods, there would be no doubt as to the connection.
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