The necessity of paradox
20:48 Oct 23 2013
Times Read: 884
This video and song is a tribute to Betty Mars, a wonderful woman and artist:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betty_Mars
The last sentence:
"Reportedly beset by emotional and financial problems, Mars jumped from a window of her flat in La Défense on 31 January 1989. She died three weeks later, on 20 February in the Foch Hospital at Suresnes."
The existence has a curious and disturbing rule that makes from consolation - understood as paradox - a necessity: there is always an end to ascension, happiness and "extasis" but there is no end to downfall.
Ode to Hypnos
13:47 Oct 20 2013
Times Read: 889
The House of Somnus
Near the Cymmerians, in his dark abode,
Deep in a cavern, dwells the drowzy God;
Whose gloomy mansion nor the rising sun,
Nor setting, visits, nor the lightsome noon;
But lazy vapours round the region fly,
Perpetual twilight, and a doubtful sky:
No crowing cock does there his wings display,
Nor with his horny bill provoke the day;
Nor watchful dogs, nor the more wakeful geese,
Disturb with nightly noise the sacred peace;
Nor beast of Nature, nor the tame are nigh,
Nor trees with tempests rock’d, nor human cry;
But safe repose without an air of breath
Dwells here, and a dumb quiet next to death.
An arm of Lethe, with a gentle flow
Arising upwards from the rock below,
The palace moats, and o’er the pebbles creeps,
And with soft murmurs calls the coming sleeps.
Around its entry nodding poppies grow,
And all cool simples that sweet rest bestow;
Night from the plants their sleepy virtue drains,
And passing, sheds it on the silent plains:
No door there was th’ unguarded house to keep,
On creaking hinges turn’d, to break his sleep.
But in the gloomy court was rais’d a bed,
Stuff’d with black plumes, and on an ebon-sted:
Black was the cov’ring too, where lay the God,
And slept supine, his limbs display’d abroad:
About his head fantastick visions fly,
Which various images of things supply,
And mock their forms; the leaves on trees not more,
Nor bearded ears in fields, nor sands upon the shore.
Ovid, Metamorphoses, Book XI (1 A.D.)
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The Family Tree of Hypnos
Father: Erebus, the deity of Darkness
Mother: Nyx, the deity of the Night.
Wife: Pasithea, the deity of hallucinations
Sons:
Morpheus: The Winged God of Dreams, able to take any human form in dreams.
Phobetor: He was the one who created the scary dreams. He was the personification of nightmare, taking the form of huge and scary animals.
Phantasus: He was the one creating the fake and illusional dreams, and had no animus form.
Ikelos: He was the one creating the true dreams, making them more realistic.
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