Dear Zazie,  Here is today’s Lovers’ Chronicle from Mac Tag dedicated to his muse.  Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

© copyright 2020 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

© copyright 2019 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

it was late when we got home
and you were sleepin’ soundly
so i decided to carry you to bed

i shushed your mild protest
when you woke and realized
what i was doin’

i helped you undress
and get into bed
and then i quickly
undressed and climbed
in beside you

i kissed you
and held you close
and told you,
over and over,
how much you mean
to me until i fell asl……

“I woke to see,
that snow had come
in the night
and covered the ground.
I know how the ground feels,
as you had done the same
for me last night;
covering me first
with the blanket,
then your arm,
then with your kisses,
and with promises.
You have me covered,
in compassion and love,
as completely as the snow
covers the ground.
I pray, it never melts.”

© copoyright 2018 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

dull, dark, soundless day
clouds hangin’ low
passin’ alone, on horseback,
found myself, as evenin’ drew on,
within view of melancholy

with me,
not a purpose
but a passion
held in reverence

do nothin’, you and i,
but lie under the big sky
and watch the cloud-sails
move along the mesas,
and dream and dream

© copyright 2016 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

A correspondence…

Dear Muse, Two poems for you by e e cummings.  I hope you enjoy!

i carry your heart with me
i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go, my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in my heart)

……

since feeling is first
since feeling is first
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;

wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world

my blood approves,
and kisses are better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don’t cry
—the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids’ flutter which says

we are for each other: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life’s not a paragraph

And death i think is no parenthesis

……

my dearest Mac,

again, you leave me speechless

(which is like the Cheshire Cat being without stripes or smiles)

thank you!  M

Dear Muse,

I love the second one, “since feeling is first”.  It is my new all-time favorite poem.  I may have to commit it to memory.  How great is the part, “we are for each other: then laugh, leaning back in my arms for life’s not a paragraph”   I know I am gonna commit that to memory.  I have another e. e. cumming’s poem in my repertoire that is very sensual.  It took my breath away.  Think you might be up for that?

Mac

Mac,

am i up for having my breath taken away?

pu-lease!

bring it 🙂

M

Dear Muse,

Well that is what I thought; forgive me askin’.  Next time I will go with my instincts.  The lady’s wish……

i like my body

i like my body when it is with your
body. It is so quite a new thing.
Muscles better and nerves more.
i like your body. i like what it does,
i like its hows. i like to feel the spine
of your body and its bones, and the trembling
-firm-smooth ness and which I will
again and again and again
kiss, i like kissing this and that of you,
i like, slowly stroking the, shocking fuzz
of your electric fur, and what-is-it comes
over parting flesh…And eyes big love-crumbs,and possibly i like the thrill
of under me you quite so new

Today is the birthday of Adolphe Joseph Thomas Monticelli (Marseille; October 14, 1824 – June 29, 1886 Marseille); painter of the generation preceding the Impressionists.

Gallery

dames élégantes dans une clairière forestière

Still life with Sardines and Sea Urchins, 1880–1882, Dallas Museum of Art

 

A Painter at Work on a House Wall, 1875, Städel

 

• 

  Portrait de Madame Pascal, 1871

• 

  Ladies in a Garden, 1870

• 

  Bouquet, ca. 1875

• 

  As You Like It

• 

  Fete Champetre

• 

  Flower Still Life, 1875

• 

  Seascape Near Marseille, 1880, São Paulo Museum of Art

• 

  Scène de parc, femmes, enfants et chiens

  ***********************************************************************************************************************************************************

Today is the birthday of Katherine Mansfield (Kathleen Mansfield Murry (née Beauchamp; Wellington, New Zealand 14 October 1888 – 9 January 1923 Fontainebleau, France); modernist writer. She wrote short stories and poetry. Mansfield was diagnosed with pulmonary tuberculosis in 1917 and she died aged 34.  She was the daughter of a successful businessman who sent her away to school in England. At 18, her parents brought her back to New Zealand, and she found that she no longer had anything in common with her family.

She became one of the wildest bohemians in New Zealand. She had affairs with men and women, lived with Aborigines, and published scandalous stories. She moved back to London and lived in the bohemian scene there. she became a friend of D. H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf, Lady Ottoline Morrell and others in the orbit of the Bloomsbury Group. At one point, she married a man she barely knew and left him before the wedding night was over because she couldn’t stand the pink bedspread.

She didn’t begin to write the stories that made her famous until her younger brother came to see her in 1915. They had long talks, reminiscing about growing up in New Zealand. He left that fall for World War I and was killed two months later. She was devastated by his death, and she wrote a series of short stories about her childhood, including “The Garden Party,” which many critics consider to be her masterpiece.

She said;

Why be given a body if you have to keep it shut up in a case like a rare fiddle?

If only one could tell true love from false love as one can tell mushrooms from toadstools. With mushrooms it is so simple — you salt them well, put them aside and have patience. But with love, you have no sooner lighted on anything that bears even the remotest resemblance to it than you are perfectly certain it is not only a genuine specimen, but perhaps the only genuine mushroom ungathered.

• “Love and Mushrooms,” journal entry (1917), published in More Extracts from a Journal, ed. J. Middleton Murry, in The Adelphi (1923), p. 1068

• ***********************************************************************************************************************************************************

  E. E. Cummings
  E. E. Cummings in 1953

  And today is the birthday of Edward Estlin “E. E.” Cummings (Cambridge, Massachusetts; October 14, 1894 – September 3, 1962 Madison, New Hampshire), often stylized as e e cummings (in the style of some of his poems—see name and capitalization below); poet, painter, essayist, author, and playwright. His body of work encompassed approximately 2,900 poems; two autobiographical novels; four plays; and several essays, as well as numerous drawings and paintings. He is remembered as an eminent voice of 20th-century English literature.

  Cummings was married briefly twice, first to Elaine Orr, then to Anne Minnerly Barton.  His longest relationship lasted more than three decades, a common-law marriage to Marion Morehouse.

  Cummings’s first marriage, Orr, began as a love affair in 1918 while she was still married to Scofield Thayer, one of Cummings’s friends from Harvard.  During this time he wrote a good deal of his erotic poetry.  After divorcing Thayer, Elaine married Cummings on March 19, 1924.  However, the couple separated after only two months of marriage and divorced less than nine months later.

  Cummings married his second wife, Barton, on May 1, 1929.  They separated three years later in 1932.  That same year, Anne obtained a Mexican divorce; it was not officially recognized in the United States until August 1934.

  In 1934, after his separation from his second wife, Cummings met Marion Morehouse, a fashion model and photographer.  Although it is not clear whether the two were ever formally married, Morehouse lived with Cummings in a common-law marriage until his death in 1962.

  Verse

   All in green went my love riding
  on a great horse of gold
  into the silver dawn.

  • Tulips and Chimneys (1923) IV
• somewhere i have never travelled,
• gladly beyond
  any experience, your eyes have their silence.
  in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
  or which i cannot touch because they are too near
• your slightest look easily will unclose me
  though i have closed myself as fingers,
  you always open petal by petal myself as Spring opens
  (touching skilfully,mysteriously)
• her first rose
• or if it be your wish to close me, i and
  my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly
  as the heart of this flower imagines
  the snow carefully everywhere descending;
• nothing we are to perceive in this world equals
  the power of your intense fragility: whose texture
  compels me with the colour of its countries
  rendering death and forever with each breathing
  • W [ViVa] (1931) LVII
• • (i do not know what it is about you that closes
    and opens;
  • only something in me understands
    the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
    nobody,not even the rain,
  • has such small hands
    • W [ViVa] (1931) LVII

  Why do you paint?
  For exactly the same reason I breathe.
  That’s not an answer.
  There isn’t any answer.
  How long hasn’t there been any answer?
  As long as I can remember.
  And how long have you written?
  As long as I can remember.
  I mean poetry.
  So do I.

  • “Forward to an Exhibit: II” (1945)

  • Your poems are rather hard to understand, whereas your paintings are so easy.
    Easy?
    Of course—you paint flowers and girls and sunsets; things that everybody understands.
    I never met him.
    Who?
    Everybody.
    Did you ever hear of nonrepresentational painting?
    I am.
    Pardon me?
    I am a painter, and painting is nonrepresentational.
    Not all painting.
    No: housepainting is representational.
    And what does a housepainter represent?
    Ten dollars an hour.
    In other words, you don’t want to be serious—
    It takes two to be serious.
    • “Forward to an Exhibit: II” (1945)

  milly befriended a stranded star
  whose rays five languid fingers were;

  and molly was chased by a horrible thing
  which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:

  and

  may came home with a smooth round stone
  as small as a world and as large as alone

  for whatever we lose (like a you or a me)
  it’s always ourselves we find in the sea

  • “maggie and milly and molly and may” in Complete Poems: 1904-1962

  wholly to be a fool
  while Spring is in the world

  my blood approves,
  and kisses are a better fate
  than wisdom

  • Four VII

  • life’s not a paragraph
    And death i think is no parenthesis
    • Four VII

  50 Poems (1940)

  • Women and men (both little and small)
    cared for anyone not at all
    they sowed their isn’t they reaped their same
    sun moon stars rain…
    all by all and deep by deep
    and more by more they dream their sleep
    • 29

  • my father moved through dooms of love
    through sames of am through haves of give
    singing each morning out of each night
    my father moved through depths of height
    • 34

  • and nothing quite so least as truth
    —i say though hate were why men breathe—
    because my father lived his soul
    love is the whole and more than all
    • 34

  • love is the every only god
    • 38

  • love is more thicker than forget
    …it is more sane and sunly
    and more it cannot die
    than all the sky which only
    is higher than the sky
    • 42

  • measureless our pure living complete love
    whose doom is beauty and its fate to grow
    • 50

  • on forever’s very now we stand
    • 50

  XAIPE (1950)

  • out of the mountain of his soul
    comes a keen pure silence
    • 19

  • blossoming are people…
    all the earth has turned to sky
    …and i am you are i am we
    • 32

  • i feel that
  • (false and true are merely to know)
    Love only has ever been,
  • is,
  • and will ever be,
  • So
    • 33

  • i thank You God for most this amazing
    day:
  • for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
    and a blue true dream of sky;
  • and for everything
    which is natural which is infinite which is yes
    • 65 – This poem was used by Eric Whitacre for an a capella SATB chorus titled “i thank you God”.

  • i who have died am alive again today,
    and this is the sun’s birthday;
  • this is the birth
    day of life and of love and wings:
  • and of the gay
    great happening illimitably earth
  • • 65

  • how should tasting touching hearing seeing
    breathing any — lifted from the no
    of all nothing — human merely being
    doubt unimaginable You?
    • 65

  • now the ears of my ears awake and
    now the eyes of my eyes are opened
    • 65

  • —the great my darling happens to be
    that love are in we, that love are in we
    • 66

  • completely dare
    be beautiful
    • 68

  • more each particular person is
  • (my love)
    alive than every world can understand
    and now you are and i am now and we’re
    a mystery that will never happen again, a miracle which has never happened before—
    and shining this our now must come to then
    • 69

  73 poems (1963)

  • seeker of truth
    follow no path
    all paths lead where
    truth is here
    • 3

  • it’s love by whom (my beautiful friend) the gift to live is without until:
    …love was and shall be this only truth (a dream of a deed, born not to die)
    • 4

  • it’s so damn sweet when Anybody—
    …makes you feel
    …for once
    (imag
    -ine) You
    • 7

  • because it’s
  • Spring
    thingS
  • dare to do people
    • 10

  • a great
    man
    is
    gone.
  • Tall as the truth was who; and
    wore his
    … life
    like a …
    sky.
    • 14

  • they flock and they flee through the thunder of seem
    though the stars in their silence
    say Be.
    • 29

  • the cunning the craven
    … they live for until
    though the sun in his heaven
    says Now
    • 29

  • they work and they pray
    and they bow to a must
    though the earth in her splendor
    says May
    • 29

  • without any doubt he was
    whatever
  • (first and last)
  • most people fear most:
    a mystery for which iv’e
    no word except alive
    • 30

  • Most
  • people have been heard
    screaming for international
    measures that render hell rational—
  • i thank heaven somebody’s crazy
    enough to give me a daisy
    • 30

  • we sans love equals mob
    • 31

  • unbeing
  • dead isn’t being
  • alive
    • 31

  • all which isn’t singing is mere talking
    …
    and all talking’s to oneself alone
    but the very song of
  • (as mountains
    feel and lovers)
  • singing is silence
    • 32

  • hugest whole creation may be less
    incalculable than a single kiss
    • 37

  • now I lay me down to dream of
  • (nothing
    i or any somebody or you
    can begin to begin to imagine)
  • something which nobody may keep.
    • 44

  • the axis of the universe
    —love
    • 73

  Mac Tag

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e e cummings, monticelli, the lovers almanac

Dear Zazie,  Here is today’s Lovers’ Chronicle from Mac Tag dedicated to his muse.  Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

© copyright 2020 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

© copyright 2019 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

sortin’ through the moments
makin’ amends for wasted verse
some voices remain elusive
a murmur beneath the surface

for here, as nowhere else,
brought together at the end
seein’ the greetin’s and farewells
the entire vision of as is

throw the light of mornin’
on the forgotten longin’

play a tune of unbroken spirit
hear the voices awaken
the forgotten longin’,

play a tune of once again
of remembered touch,
not from faded dreams,
nor ghosts of regrets

play a tune
of what could be

© copyright 2018 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

movin’ through the moments
makin’ amends for wasted time
but the voices remain elusive
a murmur below the immense sky

for here, as nowhere else,
brought together at the end
of the journey
seein’ the greetin’s and farewells
the entire picture of destiny

throw the light of mornin’
on the forgotten longin’
let us see Venice
on an average evenin’

play us a tune of unbroken spirit
hear the sound of the voices waken
the forgotten longin’, let us hear
the sounds again unchanged by time

play us a tune of an unbroken spirit,
not echoes of forgotten time,
not from old broken strings,
nor ghosts of faded dreams

© copyright 2016 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

Today is the birthday of Mariotto Albertinelli, in full Mariotto di Bigio di Bindo Albertinelli (Florence; 13 October 1474 – 5 November 1515); High Renaissance painter of the Florentine school.  He was a close friend and collaborator of Fra Bartolomeo and their joint works appear as if they have been painted by one hand.

Gallery

Visitazione Uffizi

 

Madonna and Child with Saints

 

Creation and Fall of Man

Allan Ramsay
Allan Ramsay, self-portrait, c.1737–9 (National Portrait Gallery)

Today is the birthday of Allan Ramsay (Edinburgh; 13 October 1713 – 10 August 1784 Dover, Kent, England) portrait-painter.

One of his drawing pupils was Margaret Lindsay.  He later eloped with her and on 1 March 1752 they married in the Canongate Kirk, Edinburgh; her father never forgave her for marrying an artist.  Ramsay and his new wife spent 1754–1757 together in Italy, going to Rome, Florence, Naples and Tivoli, researching, painting and drawing old masters, antiquities and archaeological sites.

Gallery

« Miss Craigie » (1741)

Portrait of George III, circa 1762

• 

  Self-portrait

• 

  The lost portrait of Charles Edward Stuart, painted in Edinburgh in 1745

• 

  Queen Charlotte as painted by Allan Ramsay in 1762

• 

  David Hume

• 

  Portrait of David Hume by Allan Ramsay, 1766

• 

  Alexander Boswell, Lord Auchinleck

• 

  Lady in a Pink Silk Dress

Mac Tag

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allan ramsay, mariotto albertinelli, the lovers almanac, the lovers chronicle

Dear Zazie,  Here is today’s Lovers’ Chronicle from Mac Tag dedicated to his muse.  Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

come, to me

© copyright 2020 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

© copyright 2019 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

from afar
i am with you

because it is
in the dream night
turn around
there you are

snuggle close
this bed is so cold

the candlelight
in your hair

warmth at last
as sleep comes

last thoughts
with you

for you
when you awake

© copyright 2018 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

the totem spins…

i called her
she did not hang up
but there was silence
i asked, how are you
“What do you think?!”
i had that comin’

the totem spins…

after an absence
we are still each other
wave on wave of memories
ebb and flow of time
when we were not apart

wave on wave of visions of you
washin’ over and over
and i feel myself… i feel again

the totem spins…

pullin’ you close
puttin’ my arms
around you
you have beat me;
how can i fight this
your smile answers

the totem spins…

sippin’ absinthe
playin’ like i am Goya
spreadin’ madness
all over the wall
© copyright 2016 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

Eugenio Montale

• Amo l’atletica perché è poesia | se la notte sogno, | sogno di essere un maratoneta.
• Folta la nuvola bianca delle falene impazzite | turbina intorno agli scialbi fanali e sulle spallette, | stende a terra una coltre su cui scricchia | come su zucchero il piede […] | e l’acqua seguita a rodere | le sponde e più nessuno è incolpevole. (da La primavera hitleriana, in La bufera e altro)
• Il genio purtroppo non parla | per bocca sua. | Il genio lascia qualche traccia di zampetta | come la lepre sulla neve. (da Il genio, in Satura)

Le occasioni

• Lontano, ero con te quando tuo padre | entrò nell’ombra e ti lasciò il suo addio. (da Lontano, ero con te)
• Non so come stremata tu resisti | in questo lago | d’indifferenza ch’è il tuo cuore; forse | ti salva un amuleto che tu tieni | vicino alla matita delle labbra, | al piumino, alla lima: un topo bianco, | d’avorio; e così esisti! (da Dora Markus, 1928-1939)
• Dalla Torre cade un suono di bronzo: | la sfilata prosegue fra tamburi che ribattono | a gloria di contrade. (da Palio)
• Tu non ricordi la casa dei doganieri | sul rialzo a strapiombo sulla scogliera: | desolata t’attende dalla sera | in cui v’entrò lo sciame dei tuoi pensieri | e vi sostò irrequieto. (da La Casa Dei Doganieri)
• Occorrono troppe vite per farne una. (da L’estate)

Ossi di seppia

• Torna l’avvenimento | del sole e le diffuse | voci, i consueti strepiti non porta. (da Quasi una fantasia)
• Spesso il male di vivere ho incontrato: | era il rivo strozzato che gorgoglia, | era l’incartocciarsi della foglia | riarsa, era il cavallo stramazzato. (da Spesso il male di vivere ho incontrato)
• Ascoltami, i poeti laureati | si muovono soltanto fra le piante | dai nomi poco usati. (da I limoni)
• Riviere, | bastano pochi stocchi d’erbaspada | penduli da un ciglione | sul delirio del mare. (da Riviere)
• Non chiederci la parola che squadri da ogni lato | l’animo nostro informe, e a lettere di fuoco | lo dichiari e risplenda come un croco | perduto in mezzo a un polveroso prato. | Ah l’uomo che se na va sicuro, | agli altri ed a se stesso amico, | e l’ombra sua non cura che la canicola | stampa sopra a uno scalcinato muro! (da Non chiederci la parola, 1925)
• Felicità raggiunta, si cammina | per te sul fil di lama. | Agli occhi sei barlume che vacilla, | al piede, teso ghiaccio che s’incrina; | e dunque non ti tocchi chi più t’ama. (da Felicità raggiunta, 1925)
• Forse un mattino andando in un’aria di vetro, | arida, rivolgendomi, vedrò compirsi il miracolo: | il nulla alle mie spalle, il vuoto dietro | di me, con un terrore di ubriaco. (da Forse un mattino andando, 1925)
• Va’, per te l’ho pregato, – ora la sete | mi sarà lieve, meno acre la ruggine […] (da In limine, 1920-1927)
• Ma in attendere è gioia più compita. (da Gloria del disteso mezzogiorno)
• Tu chiedi se così tutto vanisce | in questa poca nebbia di memorie; | se nell’ora che torpe o nel sospiro | del frangente si compie ogni destino. | Vorrei dirti di no, che ti s’appressa | l’ora che passerai di la dal tempo; | forse solo chi vuole s’infinita, | e questo tu potrai, chissà, non io. (da Casa sul mare)
• Voi, mie parole, tradite invano il morso | secreto, il vento nel cuore soffia. | La più vera ragione è di chi tace. (da So l’ora)
• Upupa, ilare uccello calunniato | dai poeti, che roti la tua cresta | sopra l’aereo stollo del pollaio | e come un finto gallo giri al vento; | nunzio primaverile, upupa, come | per te il tempo s’arresta, | non muore più il Febbraio, | come tutto di fuori si protende | al muover del tuo capo, | aligero folletto, e tu lo ignori. (da Upupa, ilare uccello calunniato)

Xenia II

• Ho sceso, dandoti il braccio almeno un milione di scale | e ora che non ci sei è il vuoto ad ogni gradino. (da Ho sceso, 1967)
• Il mio dura tuttora, né più mi occorrono | le coincidenze, le prenotazioni, | le trappole, gli scorni di chi crede | che la realtà sia quella che si vede. (da Ho sceso, 1967)

Mac Tag

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eugenio montale, the lovers almanac, the lovers chronicle

Dear Zazie,  Here is today’s Lovers’ Chronicle from Mac Tag dedicated to his muse.  Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

© copyright 2020 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

© copyright 2019 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

The Road to You

i tried
i really did
well
kinda,
sorta

more than convinced,
this will be the way

“But you will be alone.”
i have been alone before
and i will be fine

how was i to know
the answers
could only be found
down the trail
less traveled

what is inaccessible
need not be discussed

© copyright 2018 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

the reason why,
workin’ and livin’
and havin’ this vision
the only way forward,
the only reward cared about
without which there is nothin’

seein’ your own face
starin’ back at you
from the shadows;
a dream,
when he who comes as mourner,
finds himself the mourned

admit the need,
entangled in your limbs,
i have never admitted
my pretendin’ and posturin’,
nothin’ but bluffin’,
nothin’ but coquetry

i long for you,
and yet i cannot deny
what my better self knows

therefore i turn my back
and ride away
those questionin’ eyes
fixed upon me
what can they do but haunt me
as empty night closes in

© copyright 2016 mac tag/cowboycoleridge all rights reserved

François Mauriac
François Mauriac in 1932

Today is the birthday of François Charles Mauriac (Bordeaux; 11 October 1885 – 1 September 1970 Paris); novelist, dramatist, critic, poet, and journalist, a member of the Académie française (from 1933), and laureate of the Nobel Prize in Literature (1952). He was awarded the Grand Cross of the Légion d’honneur in 1958.

Le Désert de l’amour, 1925

« Je n’aime que ce qui se dévore »

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. I, p. 9 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

En amour, le gibier longtemps pullule, mais la petite troupe de ceux qui ont commencé avec nous de vivre, se réduit chaque année. Les survivants aux coups sombres de la guerre, qu’ils fussent enlisés dans le mariage, ou déformés par le métier, Courrèges, leur voyant le poil grison, cette bedaine, ce crâne, les haïssait d’avoir son âge ; il les accusait d’être les assassins de leur jeunesse et, avant qu’elle les renonçât, de la trahir.

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. I, p. 9 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

[…] la défaite d’un adolescent vient de ce qu’il se laisse persuader de sa misère.

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. III, p. 40 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

[…] elle ne savait pas que l’amour, dans les vies les plus pleines, sait toujours se creuser sa place ; qu’un homme d’État surmené, autour de l’heure où sa maîtresse l’attend, arrête le monde. Cette ignorance l’empêchait de souffrir.

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. III, p. 42 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

[…] la contemplation délivre […].

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. IV, p. 62 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

[…] ce qui est inaccessible ne vaut pas qu’on s’y sacrifie.

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. V, p. 87 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

Ah ! l’importunité de ces êtres, à qui notre cœur ne s’intéresse pas et qui nous ont choisis, et que nous n’avons pas choisis ! – si extérieurs à nous, dont nous ne désirons rien savoir, dont la mort nous serait aussi indifférente que la vie… et pourtant ce sont ceux-là qui remplissent notre existence.

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. V, p. 97 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

L’homme et la femme, aussi éloignés qu’ils puissent être l’un de l’autre, se rejoignent dans une étreinte. Et même une mère peut attirer la tête de son grand fils et baiser ses cheveux ; mais le père, lui, ne peut rien, hors le geste que fit le docteur Courrèges posant la main sur l’épaule de Raymond, qui tressaillit et se retourna. Le père déroba ses yeux et demanda :
« Pleut-il encore ? »

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. V, p. 105 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

   C’est la grand misère des femmes que rien ne les détourne de l’obscur ennemi qui les ronge.

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. VII, p. 135 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

On ne pense jamais que ce sont les passions des pères qui le plus souvent les séparent de leurs fils.

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. VII, p. 139 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

Un bouquin bouleverse la vie d’un homme quelquefois, et encore ! ça se dit… mais d’une femme ? Allons donc ! Nous ne sommes jamais troublés profondément que par ce qui vit – que par ce qui est sang et chair. Un bouquin ?

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. VII, p. 141 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

Au plus brûlant d’une passion, nos gestes d’instinct la dissimulent ; mais lorsque nous avons renoncé à sa joie, que nous acceptons une faim et une soif éternelles, c’est bien le moins, songeons-nous, de ne plus nous exténuer à donner le change.

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. X, p. 191 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

Au seuil de notre jeunesse, les jeux sont faits, rien ne va plus ; peut-être sont-ils faits depuis l’enfance : telle inclination, enfouie dans notre chair avant qu’elle fût née, a grandi comme nous, s’est combinée avec la pureté de notre adolescence, et, lorsque nous avons atteint l’âge d’homme, a fleuri brusquement sa monstrueuse fleur.

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), chap. XI, p. 215 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

« Tu ne saurais croire comme il fait bon vivre au plus épais d’une famille… mais oui ! On porte sur soi les mille soucis des autres ; ces milles piqûres attirent le sang à la peau, tu comprends ? Elles nous détournent de notre plaie secrète, de notre profonde plaie intérieure ; elles nous deviennent indispensables… […] »

• Le Désert de l’amour, François Mauriac, éd. LGF, 1989 (ISBN 2-253-01234-3), p. 237 (voir la fiche de référence de l’œuvre)

Today is the birthday of George Ault (George Copeland Ault; October 11, 1891 Cleveland, Ohio – December 30, 1948 Woodstock, New York); painter. He was loosely grouped with the Precisionist movement and, though influenced by Cubism and Surrealism, his most lasting work is of a realist nature.

Ault was born into a wealthy family and spent his youth in London, England, where he studied at the Slade School of Art and St John’s Wood School of Art. Returning to the United States in 1911, he spent the rest of his life in New York and New Jersey. His personal life henceforth was troubled. He became alcoholic during the 1920s, after the death of his mother in a mental institution.  Each of his three brothers committed suicide, two after the loss of the family fortune in the 1929 stock market crash.

Although he had exhibited his works with some success, by the early 1930s his neurotic behavior and reclusiveness had alienated him from the gallery world.  In 1937, Ault moved to Woodstock, New York with Louise Jonas, who would become his second wife, and tried to put his difficulties in the past. In Woodstock the couple lived a penurious existence in a small rented cottage that had no electricity or indoor plumbing.  Depending on Louise for income, Ault created some of his finest paintings during this time, but had difficulty selling them.  In 1948, Ault was discovered dead five days after drowning in the Sawkill Brook on December 30, when he had taken a solitary walk in stormy and dark weather. The death was deemed a suicide by the coroner.  In his lifetime, his works were displayed at the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Addison Gallery of American Art (in Andover, Massachusetts), among others.

Gallery

Nude and torso 1945

 

The Stairway 1921

 

Bright Light at Russell’s Corners (1946)

 

New Moon, New York

 

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Dear Zazie,  Here is today’s Lovers’ Chronicle from Mac Tag dedicated to his muse.  Who has appeared in your life?  Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

© copyright 2020 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

© copyright 2019 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

perhaps,
livin’ at the edge
is the only way
to understand

but if you do,
make dang sure
you study and observe
everything along the way
so you can write about it

all i have goin’ for me,
really, i did a good job
of pokin’ and proddin’
all of the feelin’s
felt in the aftermath
of one crash and burn
love affair after another

obviously, still fueled,
sortin’ through the debris
and will be for awhile

one of the reasons why
as is, is all there will be

© copyright 2018 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

ridin’ up the canyon,
twilight gathers
night enfolds the pass
sky darkens; stars begin
to show; unsaddle,
make camp,
whiskey by the fire

as is
a consequence

out of joy, sorrow born
memory of past bliss,
anguish of today
ecstasies
that might have been

the night’s wildness,
loneliness, silence,
darkness, and trains
of radiant stars

sleep comes with an ache

© copyright 2016 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

bottle of whiskey, by the fire,
composed to await sleep
night on the High Plains
most satisfyin’

A day in history note for you and a song.

On this day in 1963, French singer and cultural icon Édith Piaf died at her villa on the French Riviera.  The song, “Non, je ne regrette rien” is featured extensively in one of my favorite movies, Christopher Nolan’s 2010 film Inception.  In the movie, the extraction agents who infiltrate dreams use the song as a signal to warn their companions that they are about to be woken up.  The film stars Marion Cotillard, who portrayed Piaf in the film, La Vie En Rose.  Here are the lyrics of the day:

Non, je ne regrette rien

Non, rien de rien
Non, je ne regrette rien
C’est payé, balayé, oublié
Je me fous du passé !

Avec mes souvenirs
J’ai allumé le feu
Mes chagrins, mes plaisirs
Je n’ai plus besoin d’eux !

Balayées les amours
Et tous leurs trémolos
Balayés pour toujours
Je repars à zéro

Non, rien de rien
Non, je ne regrette rien
Ni le bien qu’on m’a fait
Ni le mal; tout ça m’est bien égal !

Non, rien de rien
Non, je ne regrette rien
Car ma vie, car mes joies
Aujourd’hui, ça commence avec toi

The song of the day is Piaf’s version of “Non, je ne regrette rien”.

My life, my joy, started with you.  Without you, there is no joy.

Maurice Prendergast
Prendergast in 1913, photo by Gertrude Käsebier

Today is the  birthday of Maurice Brazil Prendergast (St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador; October 10, 1858 – February 1, 1924); Post-Impressionist artist who worked in oil, watercolor, and monotype.  He exhibited as a member of The Eight, though the delicacy of his compositions and mosaic-like beauty of his style differed from the artistic intentions and philosophy of the group.

Gallery 

Sunny Day at the Beach 

• 

  Green Dress (1891-1894)

• 

  Street Scene (1891-1894)

• 

  Lady on the Boulevard/The Green Cape (1892)

• 

  Along the Seine (1892–94)

• 

  Skipping Rope (1892-1895)

• 

  Children at Play (1895)

• 

  Franklin Park Boston (1895)

• 

  Spring in Franklin Park (1895)

• 

  The Tuileries Gardens, Paris (1895)

• 

  The Breezy Common (1895-1897)

• 

  Marine Park (1895-1897)

• 

  South Boston Pier (1895–97)

• 

  Evening on a Pleasure Boat (1895-1898)

• 

  Franklin Park Boston (1895-1898)

• 

  Viewing the Ships (1896)

• 

  Summer Visitors (1897)

• 

  Ponte della Paglia (1898–99)

• 

  Venetian Canal Scene (1898–99)

• 

  The Balloon (1898)

• 

  St. Mark’s Venice (1898)

• 

  Easter Procession St. Mark’s (1898)

• 

  Afternoon. Pincian Hill [in Rome], graphite and watercolor, 1898-9, Honolulu Museum of Art

• 

  Courtyard Scene, Siena, watercolor and graphite, c. 1898-9, Honolulu Museum of Art

• 

  The Grand Canal, Venice (1898-1899)

• 

  Monte Pincio (1898-1899)

• 

  Monte Pincio Rome (1898-1899)

• 

  Splash of Sunshine and Rain (1899)

• 

  Telegraph Hill (1900)

• 

  West Church Boston (1900–01)

• 

  Central Park, New York (1901)

• 

  In Central Park New York (1900–03)

• 

  Figures Under the Flag (1900–05)

• 

  Surf, Cohasset (1900–1905)

• 

  The Mall Central Park (1901)

• 

  May Day Central Park (1901)

• 

  Madison Square (1901)

• 

  After the Storm (1902–1906)

• 

  Opal Sea (1903-1910)

• 

  Salem Willows (1904)

• 

  Spring Flowers (1904)

• 

  Crescent Beach (c. 1907)

• 

  Summer in the Park (1907–1910)

• 

  Autumn in New England (1910–1913)

• 

  Santa Maria Formosa Venice (1911–12)

• 

  Still Life Apples Vase (1913-1915)

• 

  Still Life w Apples (1913-1915)

• 

  Marblehead (1914–1915)

• 

  Blue Mountains (1914–1915)

• 

  The Grove (1915)

• 

  The Bathers (1918–1923)

• 

  New England Harbor (1919–1923)

• 

  St. Malo (Unknown)

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The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

© copyright 2020 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

© copyright 2019 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

then one day,
there you were
like magic

or was it
luck or fate

whichever,
does not matter
just glad you appeared

i was already
well into forgettin’
how to feel by then

you know how Leonard wrote,
“there is a crack in everything,
that is how the light gets in”

well, nailed the cracked part
but it had been a long time
since i had been anywhere
near any light

until that day

© copyright 2018 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

have you ever spent
everything,
reason, your pride,
all of your tears

“Did you know
I so look forward
to your notes?
Here is a new favorite
song line;
‘we didn’t want
to stop ourselves’.”

“Your self expression
is unabated and honest.
There are many thoughts
that I stop mid stream.”

you know your thoughts
are safe with me
“In all things
I feel safe with you.”

© copyright 2017 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

Safe with You

Muse, Song line of the day from the song Per Amore, as sung by Andrea Bocelli –

Per amore,
hai mai speso tutto quanto,
la ragione,
il tuo orgoglio fino al pianto?

For love,
have you ever spent everything,
reason,
your pride, up to the tears?

A conversation…

Muse,  Oh thank heavens because I so enjoy sendin’ ’em.  And the creative flow continues unabated.  I jotted notes yesterday on what will become, “She’s Not You.”  I will have one of those Bellinis if you please!  Love the song line.  I shall be here ever patiently awaitin’ your return.

Mac, in all things, I feel safe with you.

Muse

Today is the anniversary of the birth of Giuseppe Verdi (1813).   In his honour, and yours, here is “Un dì, felice, eterea” (One day, you, happy, ethereal) a duet from the first act of La Traviata.  It is sung by the male and female protagonists of the opera, Alfredo (a tenor) and Violetta (a soprano).  The main melody of the duet, which is famous in its own right, is also an important musical theme throughout the opera.  It is also notable for bein’ one of the songs heard in the film Pretty Woman.

The Song of the Day is “Un dì, felice, eterea” as performed by Giuseppe di Stefano and Maria Callas.

I will never forget the day you appeared in front of me, happy, ethereal.

Nicholas Roerich

Today is the birthday of Nicholas Roerich (Saint Petersburg; October 9, 1874 – December 13, 1947 Naggar, Himachal Pradesh, India) – known also as Nikolai Konstantinovich Rerikh; painter, writer, archaeologist, theosophist, and philosopher.  He was interested in hypnosis and other spiritual practices and his paintings are said to have hypnotic expression.

Gallery 

“Language of bird” 1920

Guests from Overseas, 1901 (Varangians in Rus’)

Roerich. 1916 

Roerich’s family (Kullu valley, India) 

Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Nicholas Roerich, and Mohammad Yunus. (Roerich’s estate, Kullu). 

Altai. Peaks and passes named in honor of the Roerich family. 

• 

  Treasure of angels

•  

A photograph by David Wilkie Wynfield of Solomon in oriental costume.

Today is the birthday of Simeon Solomon (London; 9 October 1840 – 14 August 1905); Pre-Raphaelite painter noted for his depictions of Jewish life and same-sex desire.

Gallery

Toilet Roman lady

• 

  Ruth and Naomi holding the infant Obed, 1860.

• 

  Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, 1863.

• 

  The Bride, Bridegroom and Sad Love, 1865.

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Dear Zazie,  I just now found the note you left sayin’ you were sick.  Well I care and I hope you are feelin’ better!  And Mac Tag is usin’ carin’ as the theme for today’s Lovers’ Chronicle.  Follow us on twitter @cowboycoleridge.  Who do you care about?  Who cares about you?  Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

© copyright 2020 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

© copyright 2019 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

i know
and you know

shall we leave
the worst behind
for what it was
and take the trail
that lies ahead
for what it will be

only this matters

there has been
one constant
since that day

through the years
and over distance

even through
other loves
that faded away

because
what was meant to be
has not yet been

because
what began that day
has been waitin’
to be fulfilled

and the time is at hand

© copyright 2018 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

i god Marina
talk about sorrow

got nothin’ on you

wish i coulda known ya
not that i am arrogant
enough to think
i coulda helped

i just know
that those in sorrow
need all the friends they can git

and special thanks
to Zazie, my beautiful
Carolina friend
for sharin’ your sorrow
hope my words helped

not a man of constant sorrow
but of often enough sorrow
to have seen it all
and to realize
there is but one course

© copyright 2017 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

Who Really Cares

Who really cares, you ask
Well I care, so take my hand
Let me release you from the struggle
Let me lead you to the field of dreams
I will keep away the agents of despair
I will keep away thrown together prose

© copyright 2012 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

The Song of the Day is “Who Really Cares” by Powderfinger

portrayed in a 1917 etching
by Emil Orlik

Today is the birthday of Max Slevogt (Landshut, Germany 8 October 1868 – 20 September 1932 Leinsweiler, Bavaria, Germany); Impressionist painter and illustrator, perhaps best known for his landscapes. He was, together with Lovis Corinth and Max Liebermann, one of the foremost representatives in Germany of the plein air style.

He studied at the Munich Academy, and his early paintings are dark in tone, exemplifying the prevailing style in Munich. In 1889 Slevogt visited Paris, where he attended the Académie Julian. In 1896, he drew caricatures for the magazines Simplicissimus and Jugend, and the next year he had his first solo exhibition in Vienna.

Toward the end of the 1890s his palette brightened. He travelled again to Paris in 1900, where he was represented in the German pavilion of the world exhibition with the work Scheherezade, and was greatly impressed by the paintings of Édouard Manet. In 1901 he joined the Berlin Secession.

A trip to Egypt in 1914 resulted in 21 oil paintings in a fresh bright style, as well as numerous watercolors and drawings; on the return journey he stopped off in Italy. In June he acquired the country seat Neukastel. After the outbreak of World War I he was sent as official war painter to the western front. The war experience brought about a search for new style appropriate to the expression of the horrors of war. In the same year he became a member of the Prussian Academy of Arts in Berlin.

He designed scenery for the performance of Mozart’s Don Giovanni in the Dresdner state opera in 1924. His work was part of the painting event in the art competition at the 1928 Summer Olympics.  In 1929 he was given a large 60th birthday exhibition in the Prussian academy of the arts in Berlin. During the last year of his life he worked on the religious mural Golgatha in the peace church in Ludwigshafen on the Rhine. It was destroyed by bombing raids during World War II.

He is buried in the burial place of the family Finkler east of his house, the so-called Slevogthof (with wall paintings) at Neukastel.

Gallery

« Danse avec la Mort » (1896)

Portrait of the Dancer Anna Pavlova

 

by Harold Cazneaux ca. 1935

Today is the birthday of Hans Heysen (Hamburg; 8 October 1877 – 2 July 1968 near Hahndorf in the Adelaide Hills, Australia); artist.  He became a household name for his watercolours of monumental Australian gum trees.  Heysen also produced images of men and animals toiling in the Australian bush, as well as groundbreaking depictions of arid landscapes in the Flinders Ranges.  He won the Wynne Prize for landscape painting a record nine times.

Heysen married Selma Bartels (1878–1962) on 15 December 1904.

Gallery

SALLIE (the artist’s wife) 1913

Droving into the Light, 1914-21, Art Gallery of South Australia

The Way Home 1908

 

Marina Tsvetaeva
Tsvetaeva in 1925

Today is the birthday of Marina Ivanovna Tsvetaeva (Moscow 8 October – 31 August 1941 Yelabuga, Tatar ASSR, USSR); poet. In my opinion, her verse is among the greatest in twentieth century Russian literature. She lived through and wrote of the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the Moscow famine that followed it. Tsvetaeva left Russia in 1922 and lived with her family in increasing poverty in Paris, Berlin and Prague before returning to Moscow in 1939. Her husband Sergei Efron was arrested on espionage charges in 1941 and executed. Tsvetaeva committed suicide in 1941. As a lyrical poet, her passion and linguistic experimentation mark her as an important chronicler of her times and the depths of the human condition.

Verse

I Know the Truth

I know the truth – give up all other truths!
No need for people anywhere on earth to struggle.
Look – it is evening, look, it is nearly night:
what do you speak of, poets, lovers, generals?

The wind is level now, the earth is wet with dew,
the storm of stars in the sky will turn to quiet.
And soon all of us will sleep under the earth, we
who never let each other sleep above it.

“I know the truth” Tsvetaeva (1915).
Trans. by Elaine Feinstein

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Dear Zazie,  Here is today’s Lovers’ Chronicle from Mac Tag dedicated to his muse.  Follow us on twitter @cowboycoleridge.  Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

© copyright 2020 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

you remember
when you were at that cafe
drinkin’ coffee and you said
you wished i was there

i was
i am always with you
as you are with me
……

right there
at the surface
a voice,
a reminder,
or a memory

well, you know me
i will not stop
till i have
the right verse
to understand this

not sure
but could be
the beginnin’

is there
some somethin’
missin’

© copyright 2018 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

i god, where to begin
the pain, the hunger
the despair
the nightmares
the dreams

© copyright 2017 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

Edgar Allan Poe
1849 “Annie” daguerreotype of Poe

Today is the anniversary of the death of Edgar Allan Poe (Boston, Massachusetts; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849 Baltimore, Maryland); writer, editor, and literary critic.  Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre.  In my opinion, he was a central figure of Romanticism in the United States, and he was one of the country’s earliest practitioners of the short story.  Poe is generally considered the inventor of the detective fiction genre and is further credited with contributing to the emerging genre of science fiction.  He was the first well-known American writer to try to earn a living through writing alone, resulting in a financially difficult life and career.

Poe was born in Boston, the second child of two actors.  His father abandoned the family in 1810, and his mother died the following year.  Thus orphaned, the child was taken in by John and Frances Allan of Richmond, Virginia.  They never formally adopted him, but Poe was with them well into young adulthood.  Tension developed later as John Allan and Edgar repeatedly clashed over debts, including those incurred by gambling, and the cost of his secondary education.  Poe attended the University of Virginia for one semester but left due to lack of money.  Poe quarreled with Allan over the funds for his education and enlisted in the Army in 1827 under an assumed name.  It was at this time that his publishing career began with the anonymous collection of poems Tamerlane and Other Poems (1827), credited only to “a Bostonian”.  With the death of Frances Allan in 1829, Poe and Allan reached a temporary rapprochement.  However, Poe later failed as an officer cadet at West Point, declaring a firm wish to be a poet and writer.

Poe switched his focus to prose and spent the next several years working for literary journals and periodicals, becoming known for his own style of literary criticism.  His work forced him to move among several cities, including Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York City.  In Richmond in 1836, he married Virginia Clemm, his 13-year-old cousin.  In January 1845, Poe published his poem “The Raven” to instant success.  His wife died of tuberculosis two years after its publication.  For years, he had been planning to produce his own journal The Penn (later renamed The Stylus), though he died before it could be produced.  Poe died in Baltimore on October 7, 1849, at age 40; the cause of his death is unknown and has been variously attributed to alcohol, brain congestion, cholera, drugs, heart disease, rabies, suicide, tuberculosis, and other agents.

Poe and his works influenced literature in the United States and around the world.  Poe and his work appear throughout popular culture in literature, music, films, and television.  A number of his homes are dedicated museums today.  The Mystery Writers of America present an annual award known as the Edgar Award for distinguished work in the mystery genre.

 

 In 1835, Poe, then 26, obtained a license to marry his 13-year-old cousin Virginia Clemm. They were married for eleven years until her early death, which may have inspired some of his writing.

One evening in January 1842, Virginia showed the first signs of consumption, now known as tuberculosis, while singing and playing the piano.  Poe described it as breaking a blood vessel in her throat.  She only partially recovered.  Poe began to drink more heavily under the stress of Virginia’s illness. Poe moved to a cottage in Fordham, New York, in what is now the Bronx.  That home is known today as the “Poe Cottage” on the southeast corner of the Grand Concourse and Kingsbridge Road, where he befriended the Jesuits at St. John’s College nearby (now Fordham University).  Virginia died there on January 30, 1847.  Biographers and critics often suggest that Poe’s frequent theme of the “death of a beautiful woman” stems from the repeated loss of women throughout his life, including his wife.

Poe was increasingly unstable after his wife’s death.  He attempted to court poet Sarah Helen Whitman who lived in Providence, Rhode Island.  Their engagement failed, purportedly because of Poe’s drinking and erratic behavior.  Poe then returned to Richmond and resumed a relationship with his childhood sweetheart Sarah Elmira Royster.

Death

Westminster Hall in Baltimore, Maryland (Lat: 39.29027; Long: -76.62333).

On October 3, 1849, Poe was found delirious on the streets of Baltimore, “in great distress, and… in need of immediate assistance”, according to Joseph W. Walker who found him.  He was taken to the Washington Medical College where he died on Sunday, October 7, 1849 at 5:00 in the morning.  Poe was never coherent long enough to explain how he came to be in his dire condition and, oddly, was wearing clothes that were not his own.  He is said to have repeatedly called out the name “Reynolds” on the night before his death, though it is unclear to whom he was referring.  Some sources say that Poe’s final words were “Lord help my poor soul”.  All medical records have been lost, including his death certificate.

Newspapers at the time reported Poe’s death as “congestion of the brain” or “cerebral inflammation”, common euphemisms for deaths from disreputable causes such as alcoholism.  The actual cause of death remains a mystery.  Speculation has included delirium tremens, heart disease, epilepsy, syphilis, meningeal inflammation, cholera, and rabies.  One theory dating from 1872 suggests that cooping was the cause of Poe’s death, a form of electoral fraud in which citizens were forced to vote for a particular candidate, sometimes leading to violence and even murder.

Illustration by French impressionist Édouard Manet for the Stéphane Mallarmé translation of “The Raven”, 1875.

1848 “Ultima Thule” daguerreotype of Poe

For decades, every January 19, a bottle of cognac and three roses were left at Poe’s original grave marker by an unknown visitor affectionately referred to as the “Poe Toaster”.  The Poe Toaster’s last appearance was on January 19, 2009, the day of Poe’s birth bicentennial.

Verse

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edgar allan poe, the lovers almanac, the lovers chronicle

Dear Zazie,  Here is today’s Lovers’ Chronicle from Mac Tag dedicated to his muse.  Follow us on twitter @cowboycoleridge.  Who did you see today?  Did you see the one?  Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

dream on…

© copyright 2020 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

as in every pretty face
mere reflections of you

always stop to notice
in every shape and form
the images that seize

content to follow
this imagination
wherever it may lead

try to imagine
another other
way to be
but temptation
no longer pulls
as it did

so welcome
to this vision
glad you are here
saddle up
and enjoy the ride

© copyright 2018 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

“Time may get longer
or shorter—such is time.
Always inconsistent,
but imagine
hope getting closer.”

imagine,
oh i imagine…
your eyes, your smile
and your hands
i so enjoyed
sketchin’ your hands
hands that quelled
my waywardness

imagine…
the passion sown
the crescendos reaped

imagine you say

it is all i do

© copyright 2017 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

Saw Her Today

He saw her today
But she was not near
Yet, he saw her

He saw her everywhere

Every pretty face
A reflection of her
Every beautiful woman
A mere reflection of her

He always stopped to notice
Beauty in all it’s shapes and forms
Whether a beautiful woman,
A painting, an aria,
A rose, a sonnet
Or the stars at night;
He stopped to wonder
At the beauty before him

Admirin’ whatever form
Beauty took to seize and grip
His attention, he would smile,

For his mind would grasp the beauty
And his thoughts would turn to her
The various images
Of her that he cherished
Would dance through his mind

Then his thoughts would turn to the hope
That he held in his heart
That kept him goin’
That he would see her again

© Cowboy Coleridge

The Song of the Day is “Saw Her Today” by The Stairs.

Euridice painting by Pólya Tibor

On this day in 1600 – Jacopo Peri’s Euridice receives its première performance in Florence, signifying the beginning of the Baroque period.  Euridice (also Erudice or Eurydice) is an opera with additional music by Giulio Caccini.  It is the earliest surviving opera, Peri’s earlier Dafne being lost.  (Caccini wrote his own “Euridice” even as he supplied music to Peri’s opera, published this version before Peri’s was performed, in 1600, and got it staged two years later.)  The libretto by Ottavio Rinuccini is based on books X and XI of Ovid’s Metamorphoses which recount the story of the legendary musician Orpheus and his wife Euridice.  The opera was first performed at the Palazzo Pitti with Peri himself singing the role of Orfeo.  Peri’s Euridice tells the story of the musician Orpheus and Euridice from Greek Mythology.  According to myth, Orpheus was a great musician who journeyed to the underworld to plead with the gods to revive his wife Euridice after she had been fatally injured.

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Today is the birthday of Jenny Lind (Johanna Maria Lind; Stockholm, 6 October 1820 – 2 November 1887 Wynd’s Point, Herefordshire); opera singer, often called the “Swedish Nightingale”. One of the most highly regarded singers of the 19th century, she performed in soprano roles in opera in Sweden and across Europe, and undertook a popular concert tour of the United States beginning in 1850. She was a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music from 1840.

Lind became famous after her performance in Der Freischütz in Sweden in 1838. Within a few years, she had suffered vocal damage, but the singing teacher Manuel García saved her voice. She was in great demand in opera roles throughout Sweden and northern Europe during the 1840s, and was closely associated with Felix Mendelssohn. After two acclaimed seasons in London, she announced her retirement from opera at the age of 29.

In 1850, Lind went to America at the invitation of the showman P. T. Barnum. She gave 93 large-scale concerts for him and then continued to tour under her own management. She earned more than $350,000 from these concerts, donating the proceeds to charities, principally the endowment of free schools in Sweden. With her new husband, Otto Goldschmidt, she returned to Europe in 1852, where she had three children and gave occasional concerts over the next two decades, settling in England in 1855. From 1882, for some years, she was a professor of singing at the Royal College of Music in London.

And today is the birthday of Frank Sutcliffe (Francis Meadow Sutcliffe; 6 October 1853 Headingley, Leeds, England – 31 May 1941 Sleights, North Yorkshire, England); pioneering photographic artist whose work presented an enduring record of life in the seaside town of Whitby, England, and surrounding areas, in the late Victorian era and early 20th century. His documentation of the Victorian and Edwardian periods in Whitby, led him to be labelled as the “pictorial Boswell of Whitby.

He married Eliza Weatherill Duck, the daughter of a local bootmaker, on 1 January 1875 and had a son and three daughters at his home in Sleights. He was buried in Aislaby churchyard.

Gallery

Portrait of Polly Swallow, c. 1889

Mac Tag

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