Aural auspice austerity audible , augur aorist actuator , accidence ambience acoustics .
Counterfactual categorical imperative hubris .
Anarchy iconoclasm, invertible investiture, objectified manifest.
Chicanery dynamism's fealty.  
Ethology's entelechy, zoomorphic zoolatry's social contiguities, élan-vital's apotheosis, oneiromancy's apotropaic.
Chagrin ; fecund cogent apposite germane , inane inert inertia innate , propinquity habitation, proximity parameter perimeter peripherals .
Manumission gambit alluvium aloof , putschist kitsch , pandemicly phatic futurity fatidic, annex annul, extraversion embezzling euthanasia extortion.  
Extravagant exorbitance flirtatious flamboyance, flippantly flighty flit-ness.
Laborious beleaguerment, hypercritically meticulous tedium, diabolically maniacal dementia brusque macabre abrupt.
Ominous phenomenon portrayal spontaneous synchronous.

Financially responsible fiscal policy , plenary plenipotentiary fiduciary principle .
Incarnate encephala enunciate , synthetically conjugational conjecture juxtapositional adjunctly .
Noumenal sentience semantics.  Precociously petulant pedantic antics.
Zenithal azimuth entity zeal , transpicuous opacity , in extremis extremity cantankerous cantilever capacity .
Fulcrum fulgurous fulham presumptive.
Spanned collapsible feasible, vicinity victual vigilante villain, execration eventuation evocative vindictiveness vendetta vial.
Atrociously impetuous impudence impromptu innuendo juncture.
Ephemeral metaphor semantics flaunts , ***** affectation exserted protuberance .
Sepulcher stratagem objectified manifest , protractive analysis dimensional delineation .

Impetus intrigue intuitional intrepid , impertinence important , inadvertency inapplicable , initiate innate interpreters intervene intricacy.
Investiture annuity equity indemnity capital appreciation .
Preeminently preemptive retrospectively retroactive , aegis vagary incite.
Quixotically enrapturing mesmerist .
Sycophant swagger asymptotic hyperbolic, estranged ensemble orchestration .
Histophysiology mendacity somatology morphology metamorphosis, blasphemous farcical fugue preterit orchestrations.    
Terrestrial equestrian tellurian terrene, spatiotemporal telemetry tactician.    

****** matrix apex axis crux , actuarial acuity incursive .
Semantic dialectics eclectic synectic’s , wanton wayward warranty evitable.
Catalyst , relative rationality / rational relativity , circumstance contingency .
Incessant barratry omnipresence presage , decadent arrogant , irksome ire Zen.  
Grotto grouch gumption .
Bailiff rake-ness rails , prerogative presumptive judicature.  

Carousel ceaselessly ceremony chaos character charisma , clambering clamorous clangor .  
Catatonic phonics , concoct catenary concatenation , conjugationally conjunctive clairaudience clairvoyance .  
Ambrosia elixir libation inebriation , mirador bartizan panoramic tableau.
Citadel pinnacle pique piquant , altruism endemic intrinsic indigenous innate , existential allegorical .
Prosthesis pseudopodium prognostication , crude lewd , social stigmatism blind , ghastly gruesome grotesque meld .
Bizarre bazaar demonically deviant denizen , grimacing gremlin greaves gauntlets gamut catalyst abstracts .
Hideously horrible heinously horrendous awfully terrible , imagination's immaturity impromptu innuendo juncture , nuance ***** ,   incarnate encephalic enunciate .
Trajectory sordid transposition interlude rubato hi-jinks , nimbus nimiety exorcism.
Aura roan rainbow mare.  

Explicate zoomorphic zoolatry , exogamy of homogeny ontological ontogeny .
Astral projection prophylaxis protocol , telepathy teleportation .
Extraneous extemporaneous , embark embargo extradition , transcendental accession ascension , ecstatically euphoric meld .  
Deontological probity interstitial endemics , agnate aggregate amalgamated anathema android .
Translational interpretation , epistemology audacious pugnacity impunity.
Executant emulation simulation , evocative malfeasance mens rea  , geomancy effete.
Maieutic fallow feral .  apropos ergo ipso facto , carousing marauder syllogism .

Society is so focused on being flawless.  Perfect.  No one is flawless, not even Beyonce.  We will forget who we are on the inside, and soon that won’t even matter because the physical appearance is the main priority.  Women these days are spending so much effort trying to look perfect, which hurts.  Pretty hurts.  Society is expecting women to look perfect, otherwise people will judge.  ‘Perfection is a disease of a nation’. The showbiz industry is giving a negative message to the world.  Photoshop is one of them.  Making a celebrity look flawless is fooling the world into thinking we must look like that.  Spending so much money on clothes, hair etc. but we don’t need to focus on that because all that matters is on the inside, which most people don’t seem to see anymore.  We are constantly getting the messages in our mind that we must be flawless, and sooner or later, this is a disease.  Some of us can’t take it anymore, which leads to anorexia, bulimia, insecurities, and issues with body image.  Pain also takes over our minds, which is ridiculous.  Even celebrities have gone through this because in our naïve little minds, we are thinking we have to be pretty.  There is so much pressure it takes over our minds, and that’s the only thing we think about.  We look into the mirror despising ourselves, because we are who we are.  Society has created us into thinking there’s a certain way we must look, which there is not.  Our flaws make us who we are, makes us positively different.  Unique.  But we aren’t allowed to think that way because the media isn’t allowing us to.  When people change, they are only cheating on themselves because media displays images of what we should and shouldn’t look like.  It’s not their fault though.  They can’t help it.  Changing, like getting botox or body implant is only giving us a masquerade.  It’s a mask to hide our real, inner beauty, which the media has taken the idea away from us, to become people who we actually aren’t.
And in the end, we know that pretty hurts.
a.a.

Dream interpretation is far from a science
but when I read what they say, I buy in
for the accuracy presented to me
makes it hard to remember not to believe
the interesting things dreams seem to perceive.

Plane crash, water landing, somehow I survived.
Ten thousand feet into a nosedive
interpretation claims the crash signifies
unrealistic goals, unreachable highs.
That sounds about right.

Next is the medium of my almost demise
the water I jumped into as I fell from the sky.
Interpretation claims the water is for
deep regret and emotion I swore
I was over, but I don't know anymore

Last is the moment that brings me some peace,
the interpretation of surviving this mighty beast
suggesting that I can survive through the worst
and take on the world as it comes at me headfirst
redemption for my overzealous thirst.

and even in dreams, they are there
the people for whom I most care
There to hug and share my joy
There to make sure I don't destroy
myself with the dreams I employ

1.
Noong unang panahon, pulos patag ang lupa
Maliban sa bundok na dalawa
Bundok Kalawitan sa Kanluran
At Bundok Amuyaw sa Silangan!
(Once upn a time, all of the earth were plains
Except for two mountains
Mt. Kalawitan on the West
And Mt. Amuyaw on the East!)

2.
Ang kalikasan ay sagana
Ang mga tao ay payapa
(Nature was then bountiful
People were then peaceful)

3.
Ngunit dumating ang isang delubyo
Nagkandamatay ang lahat ng mga tao
(But a deluge arrived
All people died)

4.
Maliban sa magkapatid na dalawa
Sa bundok napadpad ang bawat isa
(Except for two siblings
Each of them landed on the mountains)

5.
Sa Amuyaw na kabundukan
Ang lalaki na si Wigan
(On Amuyaw mount
There was the man named Wigan)

6.
Sa Kalawitan na kabundukan
Ang babae na si Bugan
(On Kalawitan mount
There was the woman named Bugan)

7.
Nang humupa ang baha
Nagtagpo silang dalawa
(When the flood subsided
The two of them united)

8.
Subalit isang araw, nakadama si Bugan
Na may buhay sa kanyang sinapupunan
(Yet one day, Bugan felt something
In her womb, someone was living)

9.
Siya’y nagimbal sa natuklasan
Nagtangkang magpakamatay si Inang Bugan
(Upon her discovery, she was horrified
Mother Bugan tried to commit suicide)

10.
Sa dali-dali’y biglang nagpakita
Si Makanungan na bathala
(Soon, there suddenly appeared someone
He is a god named Makanungan)

11.
Kanyang pinigilan si Bugan
Dahil ganap niya itong nauunawaan
(He tried to stop Bugan
Because he could fully understand)

12.
Sila ay pinayagan ng diyos na magsama
Sapagkat sa mundo’y wala nang taong iba
(They were allowed to become a couple
Because in the world, there were no more people)

13.
Ang magkapatid na mag-asawa
Marami ang naging bunga
(The couple siblings
Got many offsprings)

14.
Apat na babae
(Four females)
At lima ay lalaki
(And five males)

15.
Sa kahuli-hulihan
Sila-sila rin ang nag-asawahan
(And soon after
They married one another)

16.
Subalit may natatangi sa kanila
Ang lalaking si Igon na walang asawa
(But there’s someone unique among them
He’s the man, Igon, who got no tandem)

17.
Isang araw, dumating ang ayaw ng lahat
Ito ang panahon ng tagsalat
(One day, there arrived something everyone didn’t like
The season of famine did strike)

18.
Kaya upang suyuin ang mga diyos
Ritwal ng pag-aalay kanilang idinaos
(So in order that the gods could be pleased
They rendered a ritual burnt offering of beasts)

19.
Nang sa alay kinapos na sila
Kanilang inihandog maliit na daga
(And when of sacrificial beasts they were out
They only offered just a small rat)

20.
Sa kabila ng lahat, walang paring tugon
Kaya isang krimen ang naging opsyon
(After all, there answered no voice
So it was crime that became the choice)

21.
Walang pakundangang kinitilan ng buhay
Kapatid na si Igon ang ipinang-alay
(They dared to **** their brother
It was Igon whom they did offer)

22.
At biglang nagpakita
Si Makanungan na bathala
(And suddenly, there appeared someone
It was the god, Makanungan)

23.
Lahat sila ay isinumpa
Iyon ang simula ng digmaan sa lupa!
He cursed everyone
That was the beginning of war in the land!)

-03/10/2012
(Dumarao)
*for Lit. Day 2012

1.
Noong unang panahon, may lupaing walang makapapantay
Sa kariktan at kasaganahan nitong tinataglay
Ito ang “Ibalon” na kilala ngayong Bikol, Albay
Subalit ito’y iniiwasan ng mga manlalakbay
(Once upon a time, a land was known
For its beauty & bounty nothing outshone
It was Bicol, Albay which was then, Ibalon
Yet, travelers to there had been withdrawn)

2.
Dahil ito ay pinamumugaran
Ng mga halimaw na hayok sa laman
(Because it was teeming
With monsters to flesh were starving)

3.
Walang nangahas doon makapasok
Maliban sa lalaking si Baltog mula Boltavara na ubod ng lakas at pusok
(No one dared to enter in there
Except for Baltog, a daring & brave man from Boltavara yonder)

4.
Sinalanta niya ang mga halimaw na parang delubyo
Una si Tandayag, ang dambuhalang baboy-ramo
(He wiped out the monsters like a deluge
First was Tandayag, a warthog so huge)

5.
Mula noon, sa lupain na dating kinatatakutan
Mga tao’y dumayo at doon nanirahan
(From then on, in the land once feared
To flock & reside, people dared)

6.
Subalit hindi pa wagas na masaya
Dahil may mga halimaw pang natitira
(But it was not yet the happy ending
There were still monsters remaining)

7.
Si Baltog na matanda na ay labis nabahala
‘Pagkat siya’y mahina na at ‘di na makalaban pa
(Baltog was bothered now that he’s older
For he’s already weak and could fight no longer)

8.
Mabuti nalang at may binatang nagkusa
Siya si Handiong – matapang na, malakas pa
(Good there’s a young man who presented at last
He was Handiong so valiant and robust)

9.
Kanyang pinatumba ang duling na Sarimao
Pating na may pakpak at higantedng kalabaw
(He crushed down the cross-eyed Sarimao
The winged shark and the giant carabao)

10.
Subalit may nilalang na hindi niya nagapi
Ito ay mapanganib at tuso kasi
(But he cannot defeat a certain creature
For it was so dangerous and clever)

11.
Siya si Oryol, ang babaeng ahas
Lumalaban ba siya ng patas?
(She was Oryol, the snake lady
Does she fight impartially?)

12.
Sa kanyang mga yapos, walang nakapipiglas
Maging si Handiong na kaylakas, hindi nakaalpas
(On her grip, no one could break free
Even strong Handiong couldn’t escape from thee)

13.
Swerte ni Handiong, hindi siya binalak patayin
Bagkus ay ginamit nalang sa matagal na mithiin
(How fortunate was Handiong, there’s no plan to **** him
Instead, she just used him for her long-time dream)

14.
Laban sa mga mortal na kaaway, dapat tulungan siya ni Handiong
Na lipulin ang mga buwaya sa Ilog Ibalon
(Against her mortal enemies, Handiong must help her
To annihilate the crocodiles in Ibalon River)

15.
Matapos tuparin ang mapanganib na misyon
Si Oryol ay naging kapanalig sa Ibalon
(After fulfilling the dangerous mission
Oryol became an ally in Ibalon)

16.
Si Handiong ay naging mahusay na pinuno
Bangka, araro, alibata – kayraming naimbento sa kanyang pangungulo
(Handiong became an excellent ruler
Boat, plow, alphabet – many inventions were made during his tenure)

17.
At sa mga sumunod pang henerasyon
Naging mapayapa’t maunlad ang Ibalon
(And on the succeeding generations
Peace & prosperity reigned over Ibalon)

18.
Hanggang sa may sumulpot
Na panibagong kinatakutang salot
(Until there appeared
A new abomination so much feared)

19.
Siya’y nagtataglay ng katakut-takot na kapangyarihan
Hindi rin maipaliwanag ang kanyang kaanyuan
(He possessed a terrifying power
No one could even describe his feature)

20.
Siya ay isang mangkukulam na kilabot
Na tinatawag nilang Rabot
(He was a sorcerer fearsome
Called Rabot by some)

21.
Mapalad ang Ibalon, may natira pang bayani
Siya si Bantung, matalino’t maliksi
(Lucky was Ibalon, a hero was still there
That was Bantung vigorous and aware)

22.
Siya’y lumikha ng isang payak na plano
Pinaslang niya si Rabot habang natutulog ito
(He just devised a simple planning
He murdered Rabot while the monster was sleeping)

23.
Si Rabot ang pinakahuling halimaw sa Ibalon
Nang siya’y mapuksa, naging payapa na doon
(Rabot was the very last monster in Ibalon
Upon his death, peace reigned there from then on.)

-03/10-11/2012
(Dumarao)
*for Lit. Day 2012

Kurt Queller uses narrative criticism to analyze Mark 3:1-6, the healing miracle story in the gospel of Mark.  Queller’s narrative criticism includes “echoes of the Exodus liberation narrative” , echoes of Deuteronomy’s covenant language and Sabbatical provisions , intratextual echoes in Mark , and independent echoes in the other synoptic gospels.  Queller uses these echoes to fill in the gaps he finds in the story of Jesus healing the man with the withered hand on the Sabbath.
In the beginning of his criticism, Queller lists the gaps in Mark 3:1-6’s narrative that he seeks to fill: the meaning of the withered hand, Jesus’ reason for healing on the Sabbath, His reason for considering the withered hand life-threatening, why it is a choice between good and evil, et cetera.  He begins filling these gaps by referencing intertextual echoes of Mark 3:1-6 in Exodus.  Jesus’ command to the man with the withered hand in Mark 3:5, “Stretch out your hand,” is echoed in Exodus 14:16 where God commands Moses, “stretch out your hand.” When the man with the withered hand stretches out his hand, his hand is restored. Likewise, when Moses stretches out his hand, the Reed Sea parts, resulting in the restoration of the Israelites’ freedom.
Queller’s reference to this echo in Exodus, paired with other echoes he mentions in Deuteronomy, helped me begin to understand Jesus’ insistence on healing the withered hand. Queller was able to use the echoes to fill in the gaps I previously could not fill. In Deuteronomy 15, God’s covenant requires liberal lending and debt forgiveness to the poor on the Sabbath year. God reminds the Israelites that He delivered them from Egypt in verse 15, and He claims that this is the reason for His liberal Sabbatical law. Thus, this Deuteronomic prescription for Sabbath observance is a continuation of the Exodus liberation narrative. Queller mentions these echoes in Exodus and Deuteronomy to draw a larger narrative framework for understanding Mark’s controversial healing story.
In my initial reading, I recognized that a withered hand is not necessarily a matter of life and death. Like Queller, this was a gap that I initially set out to fill. However, I was unable to fill this gap in a way that completely satisfied my confusion on the matter. Queller’s larger narrative framework for this passage led me to a better understanding of why Jesus considered the withered hand worthy to heal on the Sabbath.
According to Queller’s filling of the gaps, the withered hand is an affliction that can be compared to the Israelites’ enslavement in Egypt. The withered hand also embodies the economic predicament of the poor, who remain enslaved to their debt to the rich.  Such enslavement could be a death sentence, which is why the Sabbath requires the liberation of slaves and debt forgiveness of the poor. It seems plausible to me that a withered hand could cause a man to be enslaved and/or perpetually poor. This line of reasoning, provided by Queller’s larger narrative framework, allowed me to truly see how the Sabbath could require Jesus’ healing of the withered hand.
Another gap Queller and I similarly set out to fill is the question of what constitutes as doing good and what constitutes as doing evil on the Sabbath. This gap also arises from Mark 3:4, in which Jesus asks, “Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to ****?” (Mark 3:4 NIV). In his analysis of this particular part of this particular verse, Queller points out a small important detail that I originally missed. Mark 3:4 does not set the frame for a passive, inner choice between good and evil.  The literal wording says, “to do good or to do evil.” The choice between good and evil on the Sabbath thereby requires action.
While recognizing that required action is problematic for the restful nature of the Sabbath, Queller supports his assertion by referencing Deuteronomy 30. Deuteronomy 30’s prescription for obedience of the Sabbath repeats the active command, “do it.”  Queller illustrates the parallelism between Mark and Deuteronomy by placing Deuteronomy 30:14 and Mark 3:4-5 in a figure side-by-side.  Deuteronomy 30:14 says, “The word is very near to you, in your mouth, and in your heart, and in your hands, to do it.” With this commandment as the framework, Mark 3:4-5 spells out the Pharisees’ failure to do good; It says, “But they were silent . . . grieved at their hardness of heart, he said to the man: ‘Stretch out your hand.’ And he stretched it out.”
From this, Queller concludes, “The ‘word’ to be done is already ‘in [their] mouth’ – but they refuse to say anything in response; it is ‘in [their] heart’ – but their heart is hardened against it. It is ‘in [their] hands, to do it’ – but as Jesus turns again to address the man, our attention is directed back to an inert hand, that, in its current withered state, seems unlikely to do anything.”  From this I am now able to conclude that which constitutes as doing “good” on the Sabbath is acting on the word. The word is completely accessible to us, and we must use our mouths, hearts, and hands to act upon it.
This gap of good and evil action that Queller helps fill also provides further evidence for the necessity of Jesus’ healing of the withered hand. Since the hands are required to carry out good action in obedience of the covenant, the withered hand is an affliction that can breach said covenant. Queller asserts that the withered hand symbolizes “the tangible embodiment of [the Pharisees] unwillingness, despite the ‘nearness’ of the word, to do it.”  Jesus, by necessity, must heal this affliction to show the Pharisees how to act according to the law of the Sabbath; “The stretching out of the hand then becomes a ‘witness against’ those who have chosen to forgo or even prohibit action because of exclusively sacral concerns.”  Without the preceding narrative frame of Deuteronomy, such significance of the withered hand for the Sabbath covenant was impossible for me to comprehend.
Though Queller is certainly helpful in providing evidence that enables understanding of the withered hand’s significance, there are parts of his criticism that I find contradictory and unhelpful. This occurs when he references echoes in Exodus and Deuteronomy to provide a framework for understanding the Pharisees’ silence in Mark 3:4 and hardness of hearts in Mark 3:5. He first relates the Pharisees’ hardened heart in response to Jesus’ plea in Mark to the Pharaoh’s hardened heart in response to Moses’ numerous pleas in Exodus. In my concordance work, I also made this connection. However, Queller and I differ in the conclusions we draw from this observation.
Queller draws from Deuteronomy to provide framework in conjunction with Exodus for understanding Mark’s interpretation of the Sabbatical law. He references Deuteronomy 29:19, which warns against thinking one can receive the blessings of the covenant while breaching it in the inner wanderings of the heart. This passive infidelity of the covenant brings God’s curse to the innocent as well as the guilty. Queller uses this context to explain why his literal translation says Jesus “co-aggrieved”  with the Pharisees because of their silence and hard hearts. The Pharisees’ passive, inner breach of the covenant invoked God’s curse on them, as well as the innocent Jesus, according to Queller.  
When I analyzed Jesus’ reaction to the hard hearts of the Pharisees in comparison to God’s reaction to that of the Pharaoh, I realized that the same Greek word was used to describe Jesus’ anger and God’s wrath. However, the consequences of Jesus’ anger and God’s wrath do not relate as clearly as Queller would lead one to believe. As a result of the Pharaoh’s hard heart, God’s wrath leads to the Pharaoh’s ultimate demise. Jesus’ resulting anger from the Pharisees’ hard hearts, on the other hand, catalyzes his decision to heal the withered hand. This action ultimately leads to Jesus’ destruction alone. Jesus, the innocent character, does not fall to the mutual destruction of the Pharisees, per Queller’s argument. I see no destruction of the Pharisees at all. Instead, Jesus restores God’s blessing of the guilty by becoming the recipient of God’s wrath in their place.
This conclusion, though differing from Queller, is consistent with his interpretation of the withered hand. Queller writes, “The withered hand embodies covenant curses invoked against those refusing to ‘open [their] hands’ in liberal lending, instead killing the poor by freezing credit in view of an impending sabbatical debt amnesty” . If the withered hand embodies God’s curse against the Pharisees, then Jesus revokes this curse when he cures the withered hand. Furthermore, the larger narrative framework of Mark’s gospel echoes this conclusion. Jesus’ crucifixion ultimately pays the debt of sinners and liberates them from God’s wrath.
Kurt Queller’s narrative criticism uses intertextuality, a narrative tool that “evokes resonances of the earlier text beyond those explicitly cited”  and “requires the reader to recover unstated or suppressed correspondences between the two texts.”  Such intertextual echoes he references from Deuteronomy and Exodus provide a larger background for interpreting Mark’s healing controversy. This granted me the ability to fill many gaps in the narrative that I was unable to fill prior to reading Queller’s criticism. In a footnote, he explains that his “metalepsis” uses such intertextual echoes for analysis, and, “In narrative, the resultant new figuration operates at what Robert M. Fowler calls the ‘discourse level.’ Metaleptic signification is thus transacted between an implied narrator and an implied audience – as it were, behind the backs of the narrative’s ‘story-level’ participants.”
The intertextual and metaleptic tools that Queller uses for his narrative criticism have proven to be very insightful and helpful for my understanding Mark 3:1-6 in an entirely new way. Even as I disagree with Queller on certain parts of his argument, these points of disagreement pushed me to deepen my own individual reading of the text. In comparing my argument to Queller’s, I realized just how far my initial interpretation was able to go. This narrative criticism answered a lot of my questions and filled many gaps. However, most of my conclusions about the implications and ultimate consequences of the text remain unshaken.  
Bibliography
Queller, Kurt. “Stretch Out Your Hand!” Echo and Metalepsis in Mark’s Sabbath Healing Controversy. Journal of Biblical Literature 129, no. 4 (2010): 737-58.

Comin Thro the Rye
by Robert Burns
modern English translation by Michael R. Burch

Oh, Jenny's all wet, poor body,
Jenny's seldom dry;
She's draggin' all her petticoats
Comin' through the rye.

Comin' through the rye, poor body,
Comin' through the rye.
She's draggin' all her petticoats
Comin' through the rye.

Should a body meet a body
Comin' through the rye,
Should a body kiss a body,
Need anybody cry?

Comin' through the rye, poor body,
Comin' through the rye.
She's draggin' all her petticoats
Comin' through the rye.

Should a body meet a body
Comin' through the glen,
Should a body kiss a body,
Need all the world know, then?

Comin' through the rye, poor body,
Comin' through the rye.
She's draggin' all her petticoats
Comin' through the rye.

The poem "Comin Thro the Rye" by Robert Burns may be best-known today because of Holden Caulfield's misinterpretation of it in "The Catcher in the Rye." In the book, Caulfield relates his fantasy to his sister, Phoebe: he's the "catcher in the rye," rescuing children from falling from a cliff. Phoebe corrects him, pointing out that poem is not about a "catcher" in the rye, but about a girl who has met someone in the rye for a kiss (or more), got her underclothes wet (not for the first time), and is dragging her way back to a polite (i.e., Puritanical) society that despises girls who are "easy." Robert Burns, an honest man, was exhibiting empathy for girls who were castigated for doing what all the boys and men longed to do themselves. Keywords/Tags: Robert Burns, Jenny, rye, petticoats, translation, modernization, update, interpretation, modern English, song, wet, body, kiss, gossip, puritanism, prudery


Translations of Scottish Poems

Sweet Rose of Virtue
by William Dunbar [1460-1525]
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Sweet rose of virtue and of gentleness,
delightful lily of youthful wantonness,
richest in bounty and in beauty clear
and in every virtue that is held most dear―
except only that you are merciless.

Into your garden, today, I followed you;
there I saw flowers of freshest hue,
both white and red, delightful to see,
and wholesome herbs, waving resplendently―
yet everywhere, no odor but rue.

I fear that March with his last arctic blast
has slain my fair rose of pallid and gentle cast,
whose piteous death does my heart such pain
that, if I could, I would compose her roots again―
so comforting her bowering leaves have been.



Ballad
by William Soutar
translation/modernization by Michael R. Burch

O, surely you have seen my love
Down where the waters wind:
He walks like one who fears no man
And yet his eyes are kind!

O, surely you have seen my love
At the turning of the tide:
For then he gathers in his nets
Down by the waterside!

Yes, lassie we have seen your love
At the turning of the tide:
For he was with the fisher folk
Down by the waterside.

The fisher folk worked at their trade
No far from Walnut Grove:
They gathered in their dripping nets
And found your one true love!

Keywords/Tags: William Soutar, Scottish, Scot, Scotsman, ballad, water, waterside, tide, nets, nets, fisher, fishers, fisher folk, fishermen, love, sea, ocean, lost, lost love, loss



Lament for the Makaris (“Lament for the Makers, or Poets”)
by William Dunbar (c. 1460-1530)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

i who enjoyed good health and gladness
am overwhelmed now by life’s terrible sickness
and enfeebled with infirmity;
the fear of Death dismays me!

our presence here is mere vainglory;
the false world is but transitory;
the flesh is frail; the Fiend runs free;
how the fear of Death dismays me!

the state of man is changeable:
now sound, now sick, now blithe, now dull,
now manic, now devoid of glee;
and the fear of Death dismays me!

no state on earth stands here securely;
as the wild wind waves the willow tree,
so wavers this world’s vanity;
and the fear of Death dismays me!

Death leads the knights into the field
(unarmored under helm and shield)
sole Victor of each red mêlée;
and the fear of Death dismays me!

that strange, despotic Beast
tears from its mother’s breast
the babe, full of benignity;
and the fear of Death dismays me!

He takes the champion of the hour,
the captain of the highest tower,
the beautiful damsel in full flower;
how the fear of Death dismays me!

He spares no lord for his elegance,
nor clerk for his intelligence;
His dreadful stroke no man can flee;
and the fear of Death dismays me!

artist, magician, scientist,
orator, debater, theologist,
all must conclude, so too, as we:
“the fear of Death dismays me!”

in medicine the most astute
sawbones and surgeons all fall mute;
they cannot save themselves, or flee,
and the fear of Death dismays me!

i see the Makers among the unsaved;
the greatest of Poets all go to the grave;
He does not spare them their faculty,
and the fear of Death dismays me!

i have seen Him pitilessly devour
our noble Chaucer, poetry’s flower,
and Lydgate and Gower (great Trinity!);
how the fear of Death dismays me!

since He has taken my brothers all,
i know He will not let me live past the fall;
His next victim will be —poor unfortunate me!—
and how the fear of Death dismays me!

there is no remedy for Death;
we must all prepare to relinquish breath,
so that after we die, we may no more plead:
“the fear of Death dismays me!”



To a Mouse
by Robert Burns
modern English translation by Michael R. Burch

Sleek, tiny, timorous, cowering beast,
why's such panic in your breast?
Why dash away, so quick, so rash,
in a frenzied flash
when I would be loath to pursue you
with a murderous plowstaff!

I'm truly sorry Man's dominion
has broken Nature's social union,
and justifies that bad opinion
which makes you startle,
when I'm your poor, earth-born companion
and fellow mortal!

I have no doubt you sometimes thieve;
What of it, friend? You too must live!
A random corn-ear in a shock's
a small behest; it-
'll give me a blessing to know such a loss;
I'll never miss it!

Your tiny house lies in a ruin,
its fragile walls wind-rent and strewn!
Now nothing's left to construct you a new one
of mosses green
since bleak December's winds, ensuing,
blow fast and keen!

You saw your fields laid bare and waste
with weary winter closing fast,
and cozy here, beneath the blast,
you thought to dwell,
till crash! the cruel iron ploughshare passed
straight through your cell!

That flimsy heap of leaves and stubble
had cost you many a weary nibble!
Now you're turned out, for all your trouble,
less house and hold,
to endure the winter's icy dribble
and hoarfrosts cold!

But mouse-friend, you are not alone
in proving foresight may be vain:
the best-laid schemes of Mice and Men
go oft awry,
and leave us only grief and pain,
for promised joy!

Still, friend, you're blessed compared with me!
Only present dangers make you flee:
But, ouch!, behind me I can see
grim prospects drear!
While forward-looking seers, we
humans guess and fear!



To a Louse
by Robert Burns
translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Hey! Where're you going, you crawling hair-fly?
Your impudence protects you, barely;
I can only say that you swagger rarely
Over gauze and lace.
Though faith! I fear you dine but sparely
In such a place.

You ugly, creeping, blasted wonder,
Detested, shunned by both saint and sinner,
How dare you set your feet upon her—
So fine a lady!
Go somewhere else to seek your dinner
On some poor body.

Off! around some beggar's temple shamble:
There you may creep, and sprawl, and scramble,
With other kindred, jumping cattle,
In shoals and nations;
Where horn nor bone never dare unsettle
Your thick plantations.

Now hold you there! You're out of sight,
Below the folderols, snug and tight;
No, faith just yet! You'll not be right,
Till you've got on it:
The very topmost, towering height
Of miss's bonnet.

My word! right bold you root, contrary,
As plump and gray as any gooseberry.
Oh, for some rank, mercurial resin,
Or dread red poison;
I'd give you such a hearty dose, flea,
It'd dress your noggin!

I wouldn't be surprised to spy
You on some housewife's flannel tie:
Or maybe on some ragged boy's
Pale undervest;
But Miss's finest bonnet! Fie!
How dare you jest?

Oh Jenny, do not toss your head,
And lash your lovely braids abroad!
You hardly know what cursed speed
The creature's making!
Those winks and finger-ends, I dread,
Are notice-taking!

O would some Power with vision teach us
To see ourselves as others see us!
It would from many a blunder free us,
And foolish notions:
What airs in dress and carriage would leave us,
And even devotion!



A Red, Red Rose
by Robert Burns
modern English translation by Michael R. Burch

Oh, my love is like a red, red rose
that's newly sprung in June
and my love is like the melody
that's sweetly played in tune.

And you're so fair, my lovely lass,
and so deep in love am I,
that I will love you still, my dear,
till all the seas run dry.

Till all the seas run dry, my dear,
and the rocks melt with the sun!
And I will love you still, my dear,
while the sands of life shall run.  

And fare you well, my only love!
And fare you well, awhile!
And I will come again, my love,
though it were ten thousand miles!



Auld Lange Syne
by Robert Burns
modern English translation by Michael R. Burch

Should old acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?
Should old acquaintance be forgot,
And days for which we pine?

For times we shared, my darling,
Days passed, once yours and mine,
We’ll raise a cup of kindness yet,
To those fond-remembered times!



Banks o' Doon
by Robert Burns
modern English translation by Michael R. Burch

Oh, banks and hills of lovely Doon,
How can you bloom so fresh and fair;
How can you chant, diminutive birds,
When I'm so weary, full of care!
You'll break my heart, small warblers,
Flittering through the flowering thorn:
Reminding me of long-lost joys,
Departed―never to return!

I've often wandered lovely Doon,
To see the rose and woodbine twine;
And as the lark sang of its love,
Just as fondly, I sang of mine.
Then gaily-hearted I plucked a rose,
So fragrant upon its thorny tree;
And my false lover stole my rose,
But, ah! , he left the thorn in me.

"The Banks o' Doon" is a Scots song written by Robert Burns in 1791. It is based on the story of Margaret (Peggy)Kennedy, a girl Burns knew and the area around the River Doon. Keywords/Tags: Robert Burns, air, song, Doon, banks, Scots, Scottish, Scotland, translation, modernization, update, interpretation, modern English, love, hill, hills, birds, rose, lyric

1.
Noong unang panahon, doon sa lupain ng Mindanao
Puro katubigan ang nangingibabaw
Binabalot nito mga kapatagan
Kaya mga tao’y nakatira sa kabundukan
(Once upon a time, in the land of Mindanao yonder
Rising almost was water
Covering the plains
So people reside on the mountains)

2.
Sa loob ng mahabang panahon
Mapayapa’t masagana doon
(For a time lengthy
There’s peace & prosperity)

3.
Hanggang sa dumating halimaw na apat
Salot at kasawian ang sumambulat
(Until arrive four monsters
Pestilence & death disperse)

4.
Si Kurita na maraming kamay
Kayrami ring sinaktan at pinatay
(Kurita with many arms
Also many it kills and harms)

5.
Nananatili ito sa bundok na tinutubuan ng rattan
Sa bundok na ang ngalan ay Kabalan
(It stays on the mountain where grew rattan
On the mountain named Kabalan)

6.
Mabangis na higante naman ang pangalawang halimaw
Kung tawagin siya ay Tarabusaw
(The second monster is a giant not tame
He is Tarabusaw by name)

7.
Sa Bundok Matutum ito ay nakatira
Panghampas na kahoy sandata niya
(On Mount Matutum it lives on
A tree club is its weapon)

8.
Ang pangatlo kung turingan ay Pah
O kaylaking ibon ng Bundok Bita
(Pah is the epithet of the third one
Oh bird of Mt. Bita so gargantuan)

9.
Kapag mga pakpak niya’y ibinukadkad
Kadiliman sa lupa’y lumaladlad
(When its wings are opened wide
Darkness on land do not hide)

10.
Sa Bundok Kurayan ang halimaw na panghuli
Isang dambuhalang ibon iri
(The last monster on Mt. Kurayan
Also a bird gigantic one)

11.
May pitong ulong lahat ng direksiyon ay tanaw
Grabeng maminsala ang nasabing halimaw
(With seven heads that can see on all directions
This monster brought so great devastations)

12.
Lubos na mapaminsala itong halimaw na apat
Kaya sa kanila takot ang lahat
(So destructive are these four monsters
That’s why them everyone fears)

13.
Maliban sa isang prinsipeng mula Mantapuli
Si Sulayman itong kaytapang na lalaki
(Except for one prince from Mantapuli
Sulayman is this man of bravery)

14.
Si Haring Indarapatra nagpabaon
Isang singsing sa kapatid niyang yaon
(Given by Indarapatra King
To that his brother a ring)

15.
Isa ring pananaim inilagay niya
Sa tabi ng kanyang bintana
(A plant he placed also
Beside his window)

16.
Kapag daw nalanta ang halaman
Kapatid niya’y inabot ng kasawian
(If that plant withers
Death to his brother enters)

17.
At si Sulayman nagtungo sa Kabalan
Tinalo si Kurita na kalaban
(And Sulayman to Kabalan went ahead
The foe Kurita he defeated)

18.
Pagkatapos ay sa Matutum dumalaw
Pinuksa naman si Tarabusaw
(After which to Matutum visited
Tarabusaw too was exterminated)

19.
Sunod na pinuntahan ay Bita
Napatay niya doon si Pah
(Next destination was Bita
There he was able to **** Pah)

20.
Pero dambuhalang pakpak sa kanya’y dumagan
Inabot si Sulayman ng kamatayan
(But he was crushed by the enormous wing
Death to Sulayman was reaching)

21.
Sa oras na iyon ay nalanta ang pananim
Kasawian ng kapatid batid ng hari’t nanimdim
(At that moment the plant shriveled
Brother’s death perceived by king and lamented)

22.
Labi ni Sulayman tinunton niya
Binuhay ang lalaki gamit ang tubig na mahiwaga
(Traced he the corpse of Sulayman
Using magical water resurrected the man)

23.
Si Sulayman ay nagdesisyong umuwi
Si Indarapatra’y haharapin ang kalabang panghuli
(Sulayman to home decided to go
Indarapatra will face the final foe)

24.
Sa wakas ay napuksa rin ang ibong may pitong ulo
Sa pag-uwi ng hari may nakilalang dilag ito
(At last slain was the bird with heads that are seven
Upon the king’s return he met a maiden)

25.
‘Di nagtagal nag-isang dibdib ang dalawa
At muling nagbalik katiwasayan sa lupa
(Not later the two wedded
And in the land serenity reverted).

-08/25-26/2013
(Dumarao)
*for Epic Day 2013

oh right... i thought i was on a ****** nod for a minute,
what, a, blank...

she thought i looked like Jim Morrison when met,
i worked out, played squash,
a really healthy example of zoology -
is that, the logic of caged animals?
a bit like the logic of soulless animals
with a god, soulless animals without one,
and the other two 90° variations of the square?
they're inspereble (blah) / momentary
dyslexia, naturally with English - inseparable,
pairing, ah! but isn't much of modern
psychology a bit like zoology? i mean the cages,
the untested theories, stemming from
roots of Jungian and Freudian *******?
Edward Hopper sketched himself with the joke
on visual inferences from these two
molesters of fair game - Michael Myers
just walked in and smashed their heads in...
win win scenario... but psychology is very
much like zoology - keeping a caged animal,
reverse baby onomatopoeia from what the adults
equate mama with... ego... that's their childishness,
babies say *mama adults say ego,
as if no dead Latin bureaucrat is listening
with a chisel in hand to double-fold missing
the concept of handwriting - it wasn't alive
back when it was all on papyrus, or stone,
it had a brief existence in aristocratic circles
when we wrote with quills and connected pretty well,
we soared with geese! we soared with swans!
we perched on trees like jerky crows!
god, it was beautiful, but then digital came in,
newspaper print, we felt claustrophobic connecting
letters, like jigsaw puzzles put together
some things didn't connect - unless it was a case
of a familial affair, ******, less game of hide & seek
and more a game of lookalike...
we even had perfumed paper back then...
right now you read a newspaper for too long
and you're ready to stamp your fingerprint in a police
station... and i thought money was *****,
newspapers are second-best... ***** currency of
the omni-literate populace - starving journalists
who parasitically feed of of celeb culture,
provided with excess stimulation by paparazzi
nudes... but zoology and psychology are alike,
cages in both cases, restrictions: either no god
or no soul, either some body or nobody -
trained cognitive monkey... does a fanciful trick
sometimes: yep, gets up onto a table in a nightclub
and does a cancan interpretation of the goose step
(stechschritt - all those in favour of the ministry
of simply silly get drowned in the Thames)
as if jogging on a treadmill, in one place -
the mantis in a game of chess - the mantis in a game of chess -
a game kings believed having the earliest known
satellite image from way way above - the best
way of looking at the abstraction of insects.
still, zoology is very much psychology, or vice versa,
cages and prior theories with their guillotines of
Aztec like sacrifice - i told you! those pyramids were
built for capital punishment, excess on architectural side
of what a scaffold could look like, fear inducers,
deterrents, but at least not Egyptian tombs!
and how many bars in this cage of yours can you can
with psychology: the logic of having soul, in practice
the logic of not having a soul, i.e. treatment of thinking -
the behavioural study of a man sitting in silence -
after an hour he folds a leg over the other and continues
sitting in silence - psst... it's called listening therapy...
or talk... 3 hours pass some rain falls... neither patient
or the psychiatrists is any wiser... but the latter gets paid,
the former just looks like a **** clown without makeup.
so she hooked up and wanted to start a band...
she had keyboards in mind... that was already a bad idea...
she thought i was some sort of version of Jim Morrison...
well, if i was, or if i am... i'm doing this thing solo.

So you know you’re looking at two very different styles of dress, here. But precisely what decades? When did that waistline move back down? What details are the defining touches of their era? How long were women actually walking around with bustles on their backsides?

Lydia Edwards’s How to Read a Dress is a detailed, practical, and totally beautiful guide to the history of this particular form of clothing from the 16th to the 20th centuries. It tracks the small changes that pile up over time, gradually ******* until your great-grandmother’s closet looks wildly different than your own. As always, fashion makes for a compelling angle on history—paging through you can see the shifting fortunes of women in the Western world as reflected in the way they got dressed every morning.

Of course, it’ll also ensure that the next lackadaisically costumed period piece you watch gives you agita, but all knowledge has a price.

I spoke to Edwards about how exactly we go about resurrecting the history of an item that’s was typically worn until it fell apart and then recycled for scraps; our conversation has been lightly trimmed and edited for clarity.

The title of the book is How to Read a Dress. What do you mean by “reading” a dress?

Basically what I mean is, when you are looking at a dress in an exhibition or a TV show, reading it in terms of working out where the inspirations or where certain design choices come from. Being able to look at it and recognize key elements. Being able to look at the bodice and say, Oh, the shape of that is 1850s, and the design relates to this part of history, and the patterning comes from here. It’s looking at the dress as an object from the top down and being able to recognize different elements—different historical elements, different design elements, different artistic elements. “Read” is probably the best word to use for that kind of approach, if that makes sense.

It must send you around the bend a little bit, watching costume adaptations where they’re a bit slapdash. The one I think of is the Keira Knightley Pride and Prejudice, which I actually really enjoy, but I know that one’s supposed to have all over the place costuming-wise.

Yeah, it does. I mean, I love the BBC Pride and Prejudice one, because they kept very specifically to a particular era. But I can see what they did with the Keira Knightley one—they were trying to keep it 1790s, when the book was written, as opposed to when it was published. But they’ve got a lot of kind of modern influences in there and they’ve got a lot of influences from 30, 40 years previously, which is interesting to an audience and gives an audience I suppose more frames of reference, more areas to think about and look at. So I can see why they did that. But it does make it more difficult if you’re trying to accurately decode a garment. It’s harder when you’ve got lots of different eras going on there, but it makes it beautiful and interesting for an audience.

The guide spans the 16th to the 20th century. Why start with the 16th century?

Well, partly because it’s where my own interest starts, in terms of my research and the areas I’ve looked at. But more importantly in terms of audience interest, we get a lot of TV shows, a lot of films in recent years—things like The Tudors—that type of era seems to be something that people are interested in. That time is very colorful and very interesting to people.

And also because in terms of thinking about the dress as garment, obviously people wore dresses in medieval times, but in terms of it being something that specifically women wore, distinct from men’s clothes, I really think we start to see that more in the 15th, 16th century onwards.

Where do you go to get the historical information to put together a book like this? What do you use as your source material? Because obviously the thing about clothing is that it has to stand up to a lot of wear and tear and a lot of it doesn’t survive.

This is the other thing about the 16th century stuff—there’s so little surviving. That’s why that chapter was a lot shorter and also that’s why I used a lot of artworks rather than surviving garments, just because they don’t exist in their entirety.

But wherever possible, you go to the garments themselves in museum collections. And then if that’s proving to be difficult, you go to artworks or images, but always bearing in mind the artist will have had their own agenda, so they won’t necessarily be accurate of what people were actually wearing. So then you have to go and look up written source material from the time—say, diaries. I like using letters that people have written to each other over the centuries, describing dress and what they were wearing on a daily basis. Novels can be good, as well.

Also the scholarship that has come before, the secondary sources, works by people like Janet Arnold, Aileen Ribeiro. Really well researched scholarly books where people have used primary sources themselves and put their own interpretation on it can be really, really helpful. Although you take some of it with a pinch of salt, and you put your own interpretation on there, as well.

But always to the dress itself wherever possible.

What are some of the challenges you face, or the constraints on our ability to learn about the history of fashion?

Well, the very practical issue of trying to see garments—some of them I did see here in Australia, but a lot of them were in the States, in Canada, in New Zealand, so it’s hard to physically get there to see them. And often, even when you can get to the museum, garments are out on loan to other exhibitions or other museums. That’s a practical consideration.

But also, especially when I’m talking about using artworks and things, which can be really helpful when you’re researching, but as I’ve said they do come from a place where there’s more interpretations and more agendas. So if someone’s done a portrait and there’s a beautiful 1880s dress in it, that could have been down to the whims of the person who was wearing it, or the artist could have changed significantly the color or style to suit his own taste. Then you have to do extra research on top of that, to make sure that what you are seeing is representative.

It’s a fascinating area. There’s a lot of challenges, but for me, that’s what makes it really exciting as well. But it’s really that question of being able to trust sources and knowing what to use and what not to use in order to make things clear for the audience.

Obviously many of these dresses were very expensive and took a lot of labor and it wasn’t fast fashion—people didn’t just give it away or toss it when it fell out of season. A lot of times, you did was you remade it. When you’re looking at a dress that’s been remade, how do you extract the information that you need as a historian out of it?

I love it when something like that comes up. I’ve got a couple of examples in the book.

Well, it can be quite challenging, because often when you’re first looking at a piece it’s not obvious that it’s been remade. But if you’re lucky enough to look inside it and actually hold it and turn it round different angles, there’ll be things like the placement of a seam, or you’ll see that the waist has been moved up or down according to the fashion. And that’s often obvious when you’re looking inside. You can see the way the skirt’s been attached. Often you can tell if a skirt’s been taken off and then reattached using different pleats, different gatherings; that can give you a hint that it’s then been remade to fit in with a different fashionable ideal.

One of the key ways is fabric. You can often see, especially in early 19th century dresses when they’ve been made of these beautiful 18th century silks and brocades. That’s nice because it’s the first obvious clue that something’s been remade or that an old dress has been completely taken apart and it’s just the fabric that’s been used. I find it particularly interesting when the waist has been moved or the seams have been taken off or re-sewn in a different shape or something like that. It can be subtle but once your knowledge base grows, that’s one of the most fascinating areas that you can look at.

You page through the book and you watch these trends unfold and there are occasional sea changes will happen fairly quickly, like when the Regency style arises. But how much change year-to-year would a woman have seen? How long would it take, just as a woman getting dressed in the morning, to see styles just radically alter? Would you even notice?

Well, this is the thing—I think it’s very easy, when we’re looking back, to imagine that in 1810 you’d be wearing this dress and then all the frills and the frouf would have started to come in the late 1810s and the 1820s, and suddenly you would have had a whole new wardrobe. But obviously, unless you were the very wealthiest women and you had access to dressmakers who had the absolute newest patterns and newest fabrics then no, you wouldn’t have seen a massive change. You wouldn’t have afforded to be able to have the newest things as they came in. You would have maybe remade dresses to make them maybe slightly more in line with a fashion plate that you might have seen, but you wouldn’t have had access to new information and new fashion plates as soon as they came. To be realistic, there would have been very little change on a day to day level.

But I think also, for us now—it’s hard to see it without hindsight, but we feel like we’re fairly fluid in wearing the same kind of styles, but obviously when we look back in 20 years, we’ll look at pictures of us and see greater changes than we’re now aware. Because it happens on a slow pace and it happens on such a subconscious level in some ways.

But actually, yeah, it’s to do with economics, it’s to do with availability. People living in towns where they couldn’t easily get to cities—if you were living in a country town a hundred miles away from London, there’s no way that you would have the resources to see the most recent fashion plates, the most recent ideas that were developing in high society. So it was a very slow process in reality.

If you have a lot of money you can change out your wardrobe quicker and wear the latest styles. And so the wealthiest people, their clothes were what in a lot of case stood the best chance of surviving and being in modern collections. So how do we know what working women would have worn or what middle class women would have worn?

Yeah, this is hard. I do have some more middle class examples, because we’re lucky in that we do have quite a few that have survived, especially in smaller museums and historical collections, where people have had clothes sitting in their attics for years and have donated them, just from normal families over the years.

But, working women, that’s much more difficult. We’re lucky from the 19th century because we have photographic evidence. But really a lot of it will come down to written descriptions, mainly letters, diaries, not necessarily that the people themselves would have kept, but there’s examples of people that worked in cotton mills, for instance, and people that ran the mills and their families and wives and friends who had written accounts of what the women there were wearing. Also newspaper accounts, particularly of people who would go and do charity work and help the poor. They often wrote quite detailed descriptions of the people that they were helping.

But in terms of actual garments, yeah, it’s very difficult. Certainly 18th century and before, it’s really, really hard to get hold of anything that gives you a really good idea of what they wore. But in the 18th century—it’s quite interesting, because then we get examples of separate pieces of clothing worn by the upper classes, like a skirt with a jacket, which was actually a lower middle class style initially and then it became appropriated by the upper classes. And then it became much fancier and trimmed and made in silks and things. So then, we can see the inspiration of the working classes on the upper classes. That’s another way of looking at it, although of course that’s much more problematic.

It’s interesting how in several cases you can see broader historical context, or other stories happening through clothes. Like you point out that the rise of the one-piece dresses is due to the rise of mantua makers, who were women who were less formally trained who were suddenly making clothing. Are there any other interesting stories like that, that you noticed and thought were really fascinating?

There’s a dress in the book that a woman made for her wedding. I think she was living on her own, or she was living with a servant and her mother or something. She made the dress and then turned up to her wedding and traveled quite a long way to get there, and when she arrived, the groom and all the guests weren’t there. There was nobody. So she went away and came back again a week later, and everyone was there. And the reason that no one was there before was that a river had flooded in the direction that they were all coming from. She had obviously no way of finding out about this until after the fact, and we have this beautiful dress that she spent ages making and had obviously gone to a lot of effort to try and work out what the latest styles were, to incorporate it into her wedding dress.

Things like that, I find really interesting, because they talk so much about human and social history as well as fashion history, and the garment is the main way we have of keeping these stories alive and remembering them and looking into the kind of life and world these people lived, who made these garments.

Over the centuries, how does technology affect fashion? Obviously, we think of the industrial revolution as really speeding up the pace of fashion. But are there other moments in the history of fashion where technology shapes what women end up wearing?

One example is where I talk about the Balenciaga dress from the early 1950s—with a bubble hem and a hat and she would have worn these beautiful pump shoes with it—with the introduction of the zipper. Which just made such a huge difference, because it suddenly meant you’d have ease and speed of dressing. It meant that you didn’t have to worry about more complicated ways of fastening a garment. I think the zipper made a massive change and also in terms of dressmaking at home, it was a really quick and simple way that people had of being able to create quite fashionable styles on a budget and with ease and speed at home.

Also, of course, once women’s dress started to become simpler and they did away with the corset and underwear became a lot less complicated, that made dressing a lot easier, that made the introduction of the bias cut and things that sit very closely to the natural body much more widely used and much more fashionable.

I would say the introduction of machine-made lace as well, particularly from the late 19th, early 20th century onwards where it was so fashionable on summer dresses and wedding dresses. It just meant that you could so much more easily add this decadent touch to a garment, because lace would have been so much more expensive before then and so time-consuming to make. I think that made a huge difference in ordinary women being able to attain a kind of luxury in their everyday dress.

That actually makes me think of something else I wanted to ask you, which is you point out in your intro the way we casually use this word “vintage.” I think about that with lace. Lace is described as being a “vintage” touch but it’s very much this question of when, where, who, why—it’s a funny term when you think about it, the way we use it so casually to describe so much.

Oh, yes. It’s crazy. I used to work in a wedding dress shop and I used to make historically inspired wedding dresses and things. And brides used to come in and say, “Oh, I want something vintage.” But they didn’t really know what they meant. Usually what they meant is they wanted something with a bit of lace on it, or with some sort of pearls or beading. I think it’s really inspired by whatever is trending at the time. So, you know, Downton Abbey became vintage. I think ‘50s has always been kind of synonymous with the word vintage. But what it means is huge,

She sent it to me as a text message, that is an image of a quote in situ, a piece of interpretation in a gallery. Saturday morning and I was driving home from a week in a remote cottage on a mountain. I had stopped to take one last look at the sea, where I usually take one last look, and the phone bleeped. A text message, but no text.  Just a photo of some words. It made me smile, the impossibility of it. Epic poems and tapestry weaving. Of course there are connections, in that for centuries the epic subject has so often been the stuff of the tapestry weaver’s art. I say this glibly, but cannot name a particular tapestry where this might be so. Those vast Arthurian pieces by William Morris to pictures by Burne-Jones have an epic quality both in scale and in subject, but, to my shame, I can’t put a name to one.

These days the tapestry can be epic once more - in size and intention - thanks to the successful, moneyed contemporary artist and those communities of weavers at West Dean and at Edinburgh’s Dovecot. Think of Grayson Perry’s The Walthamstowe Tapestry, a vast 3 x 15 metres executed by Ghentian weavers, a veritable apocalyptic vision where ‘Everyman, spat out at birth in a pool of blood, is doomed and predestined to spend his life navigating a chaotic yet banal landscape of brands and consumerism’.  Gosh! Doesn’t that sound epic!

I was at the Dovecot a little while ago, but the public gallery was closed. The weavers were too busy finishing Victoria Crowe’s Large Tree Group to cope with visitors. You see, I do know a little about this world even though my tapestry weaving is the sum total of three weekends tuition, even though I have a very large loom once owned by Marta Rogoyska. It languishes next door in the room that was going to be where I was to weave, where I was going to become someone other than I am. This is what I feel - just sometimes - when I’m at my floor loom, if only for those brief spells when life languishes sufficiently for me be slow and calm enough to pick up the shuttles and find the right coloured yarns. But I digress. In fact putting together tapestry and epic poetry is a digression from the intention of the quote on the image from that text - (it was from a letter to Janey written in Iceland). Her husband, William Morris, reckoned one could (indeed should) be able to compose an epic poem and weave a tapestry.  

This notion, this idea that such a thing as being actively poetic and throwing a pick or two should go hand in hand, and, in Morris’ words, be a required skill (or ‘he’d better shut up’), seemed (and still does a day later) an absurdity. Would such a man (must be a man I suppose) ‘never do any good at all’ because he can’t weave and compose epic poetry simultaneously?  Clearly so.  But then Morris wove his tapestries very early in the morning - often on a loom in his bedroom. Janey, I imagine, as with ladies of her day - she wasn’t one, being a stableman’s daughter, but she became one reading fluently in French and Italian and playing Beethoven on the piano- she had her own bedroom.

Do you know there are nights when I wish for my own room, even when sleeping with the one I love, as so often I wake in the night, and I lie there afraid (because I love her dearly and care for her precious rest) to disturb her sleep with reading or making notes, both of which I do when I’m alone.
Yet how very seductive is the idea of joining my loved one in her own space, amongst her fallen clothes, her books and treasures, her archives and precious things, those many letters folded into her bedside bookcase, and the little black books full of tender poems and attempts at sketches her admirer has bequeathed her when distant and apart. Equally seductive is the possibility of the knock on the bedroom / workroom door, and there she’ll be there like the woman in Michael Donaghy’s poem, a poem I find every time I search for it in his Collected Works one of the most arousing and ravishing pieces of verse I know: it makes me smile and imagine.  . .  Her personal vanishing point, she said, came when she leant against his study door all warm and wet and whispered 'Paolo’. Only she’ll say something in a barely audible voice like ‘Can I disturb you?’ and with her sparkling smile come in, and bring with her two cats and the hint of a naked breast nestling in the gap of the fold of her yellow Chinese gown she holds close to herself - so when she kneels on my single bed this gown opens and her beauty falls before her, and I am wholly, utterly lost that such loveliness is and can be so . . .

When I see a beautiful house, as I did last Thursday, far in the distance by an estuary-side, sheltering beneath wooded hills, and moor and rock-coloured mountains, with its long veranda, painted white, I imagine. I imagine our imaginary home where, when our many children are not staying in the summer months and work is impossible, we will live our ‘together yet apart’ lives. And there will be the joy of work. I will be like Ben Nicholson in that Italian villa his father-in-law bought, and have my workroom / bedroom facing a stark hillside with nothing but a carpenter’s table to lay out my scores. Whilst she, like Winifred, will work at a tidy table in her bedroom, a vase of spring flowers against the window with the estuary and the mountains beyond. Yes, her bedroom, not his, though their bed, their wonderful wooden 19C Swiss bed of oak, occupies this room and yes, in his room there is just a single affair, but robust, that he would sleep on when lunch had been late and friends had called, or they had been out calling and he wanted to give her the premise of having to go back to work – to be alone - when in fact he was going to sleep and dream, but she? She would work into the warm afternoons with the barest breeze tickling her bare feet, her body moving with the remembrance of his caresses as she woke him that morning from his deep, dark slumber. ‘Your brown eyes’, he would whisper, ‘your dear brown eyes the colour of an autumn leaf damp with dew’. And she would surround him with kisses and touch of her firm, long body and (before she cut her plaits) let her course long hair flow back and forward across his chest. And she did this because she knew he would later need the loneliness of his own space, need to put her aside, whereas she loved the scent of him in the room in which she worked, with his discarded clothes, the neck-tie on the door hanger he only reluctantly wore.

Back to epic poetry and its possibility. Even on its own, as a single, focused activity it seems to me, unadventurous poet that I am, an impossibility. But then, had I lived in the 1860s, it would probably not have seemed so difficult. There was no Radio 4 blathering on, no bleeb of arriving texts on the mobile. There were servants to see to supper, a nanny to keep the children at bay. At Kelmscott there was glorious Gloucestershire silence - only the roll and squeak of the wagon in the road and the rooks roosting. So, in the early mornings Morris could kneel at his vertical loom and, with a Burne-Jones cartoon to follow set behind the warp. With his yarns ready to hand, it would be like a modern child’s painting by numbers, his mind would be free to explore the fairy domain, the Icelandic sagas, the Welsh Mabinogion, the Kalevara from Finland, and write (in his head) an epic poem. These were often elaborations and retellings in his epic verse style of Norse and Icelandic sagas with titles like Sigurd the Volsung. Paul Thompson once said of Morris  ‘his method was to think out a poem in his head while he was busy at some other work.  He would sit at an easel, charcoal or brush in hand, working away at a design while he muttered to himself, 'bumble-beeing' as his family called it; then, when he thought he had got the lines, he would get up from the easel, prowl round the room still muttering, returning occasionally to add a touch to the design; then suddenly he would dash to the table and write out twenty or so lines.  As his pen slowed down, he would be looking around, and in a moment would be at work on another design.  Later, Morris would look at what he had written, and if he did not like it he would put it aside and try again.  But this way of working meant that he never submitted a draft to the painful evaluation which poetry requires’.

Let’s try a little of Sigurd

There was a dwelling of Kings ere the world was waxen old;
Dukes were the door-wards there, and the roofs were thatched with gold;
Earls were the wrights that wrought it, and silver nailed its doors;
Earls' wives were the weaving-women, queens' daughters strewed its floors,

And the masters of its song-craft were the mightiest men that cast
The sails of the storm of battle down the bickering blast.
There dwelt men merry-hearted, and in hope exceeding great
Met the good days and the evil as they went the way of fate:
There the Gods were unforgotten, yea whiles they walked with men,

Though e'en in that world's beginning rose a murmur now and again
Of the midward time and the fading and the last of the latter days,
And the entering in of the terror, and the death of the People's Praise.

Oh dear. And to think he sustained such poetry for another 340 lines, and that’s just book 1 of 4. So what dear reader, dear sender of that text image encouraging me to weave and write, just what would epic poetry be now? Where must one go for inspiration? Somewhere in the realms of sci-fi, something after Star-Wars or Ninja Warriors. It could be post-apocalyptic, a tale of mutants and a world damaged by chemicals or economic melt-down. Maybe a rich adventure of travel on a distant planet (with Sigourney Weaver of course), featuring brave deeds and the selfless heroism of saving companions from deadly encounters with amazing animals, monsters even. Or is ‘epic’ something else, something altogether beyond the Pixar Studios or James Cameron’s imagination? Is the  ‘epic’ now the province of AI boldly generating the computer game in 4D?  

And the epic poem? People once bought and read such published romances as they now buy and engage with on-line games. This is where the epic now belongs. On the tablet, PlayStation3, the X-Box. But, but . . . Poetry is so alive and well as a performance phenomenon, and with that oh so vigorous and relentless beat. Hell, look who won the T.S.Eliot prize this year! Story-telling lives and there are tales to be told, even if they are set in housing estates and not the ice caves of the frozen planet Golp. Just think of children’s literature, so rich and often so wild. This is word invention that revisits unashamedly those myths and sagas Morris loved, but in a different guise, with different names, in worlds that still bring together the incredible geographies of mountains and deserts and wilderness places, with fortresses and walled cities, and the startling, still unknown, yet to be discovered ocean depths.

                                    And so let my tale begin . . . My epic poem.

                                                 THE SEAGASP OF ENNLI.
       A TALE IN VERSE OF EARTHQUAKE, ISLAND FASTNESS, MALEVOLENT SPIRITS,
                                                AND REDEMPTIVE LOVE.

.    like cardinal Leto remarked, having received news from Versailles... why is it always the ******* French?

perhaps in a less crude manner,
drinking wine,
while eating raw fruits -

  always a bad combination...
no *****, no meat?
   bad idea... wine, and raw fruit
akin to strawberries?
    irritable bowel movements...

- and that's because Einstein
didn't discover the concept of
gravity, in the format of: sideways?
in the form of orbits?
   expansive waves...
   that allowed for the elliptical interpretation?
like the old
              argument:
      (heliocentric) oval...
             contra the (geocentric) circular
"concern" for...
   whatever is up / down
            sideways in
      the Copernican terminology...
because there was ever a "shape"
concerning the universe,
  and not a medium,
            an extraction for the metaphor
for water,
   gas, liquid, solid...
              and the fourth aspect
of ancient elements:
   its existence in a vacuous "space"?

- but i can't fathom the French at this point...
once upon a time...
one Frenchman equated the motivation
for a "summa summarum"
    to be bound with a thinking,
and a curiosity...

            the current fashion of Latin
abbreviations...
   this... cogito ergo sum?
   it's nonsense...
    speak it long enough...
   and you'll find yourself inclined
to suppose that cogitans per se:
is a motivation, an impetus to exist...
yet... so much of thought it "wasted"
or, rather, to craft an impetus to
"doubt", within the confines of fiction...
but the motivation has lost its
origin within the confines of doubt,
and has been replaced by
the Freudian unconscious,
   a serialized phobia fest... notably
including a, clown...

originally, thought (per se) was
a secondary motivational outlet
that precipitated into being...
    first came... doubt...
   but... these days?
               doubt is a conspiracy theory,
no longer an emotional thrill
to prop-up thinking...
   and we have the French existentialists
to thank for this...
for they subverted their own
idea...

             negation has replaced doubt
as the origin, and motivation
for thinking...
        yet... this sort of "thinking",
has made, its materialization, so, so...
obscene...
    i can hardly find it surprising while
i took to propping two worthwhile
economic outlets...
   prostitution (since they will spend
the money i give them...
on things... i wouldn't even care
for propping up)...

    and... alcohol (scotch whiskey,
russian standard *****...
    shveedish cider...
                     german beer)...

but how can you even claim an existence,
if...
       there is no thrill...
of what is the secular expression of faith:
i.e. doubt?
  how can you replace doubt -
a motivation for thinking, materialized
into being... with negation?
  jean-paul Sartre attempted this inversion -

doubt has been replaced with negation
in his system...
             it's like that cliche of an English
1960s ***-joke / ***-like...
       this... frivolity over a blatant lie...
a lie so... bogus...
    so ineffectual in translating a hidden truth
that... you allow it...
   to care for the cheap comic aspect
of the execution...

but how can the French suddenly
feign to disbelieve their secularism -
   resorting to the antithesis,
namely:

  original

  doubt motivates thinking,
  which subsequently motivates
   being within the confines of reason,
or rather, reasonableness...

20th century existentialists

negation "motifs" thinking,
   which subsequently motifs
"being" within the freedom of non-reason,
or rather, unreasonableness...

   and by negation,
   i don't mean the atomic conceived softening
blow...
   akin to: dis-ease...
    i.e. (as i explained it to one old man
in a park, walking his dog):
  a negation, or ease... a denial of...

how can the Cartesian model work,
when the 20th century French existentialists
began with the presupposition:

   i deny, i think, therefore i exist?
where is the original thrill of
the secular aspect of faith, within the boundaries
of doubt?
              gone... vanished!
****! a **** on the London tube,
during the rush hour,
  during the heatwave
                of the past month!

                   perhaps this only comes
as a method of assimilating an increased population,
within the confines of the Taoist maxim:
the best way to aid the world,
is to forget the world, and let the world
forget about you...

             perhaps... the Andy Warhol 15 minutes
analogy...
      that in order to encompass the individual,
the world, and the individual within it...
   the approach had to change
from the original, exciting, exploration
genesis of thought, bound to the genesis
of doubt...
             having to be replaced by
a genesis of denial...
      the second tier of a secular society...
    the zeitgeist of Herr Censor...
to filter through what we see so often,
faces, bodies...
  but would be much more comfortable
having been bound to Plato's cave,
         of complete shadow theater...

perhaps... but the original tier of
secular societies' alternative to church prescribed
articles of faith...
                     to have replaced
the thrill of doubt...
      with this... Byzantine pillar of denial
as motivational groundwork for
thinking impetus
   that becomes an article of being?
am i the only one to see the frustration,
how, people abhor their being,
being founded upon an act of denial,
rather than an act of doubt?

     the once thrilling maybe (gnostic):
   has become the stale, "i don't know"
    (agnostic) - as if... people can't tell you
whether zebras have stripes!
   where there was once an article
of secular faith (doubt) -
   now?
                        there's not even that!

p.s.
  there has to be a much needed new mantra,
all publicity: is bad publicity -
unless of course you're riding that
fame juggernaut and are paying
for your all-inclusive status akin
   to madonna: since fame dies off
and you, none-the-less invest in the momentum...

one day where i drink a bottle of wine,
half a liter of whiskey,
   and i'm apparently not "screaming" in
my sleep from the heat,
the whole, "apparently", as i retorted:
at 5:15am? i was alseep! i was asleep!
how can i stop screaming in my sleep
like a banshee:
the sleeper and the blind man both see
eye to eye regarding the future to come...

one day without engaging in internet
content: of my own accord,
next day? this... this... lethargy builds
up in me... i end up thinking:
i can't do this any more,
this insomnia culture globalism of
24h news reels is tirying me,
i pick up the sunday newspaper
which i found to be respecteable...
the sunday times,
  i peer into the magazines...
toxic masculinity,
    desire: what three women want...
i'm bored...
well more tired than bored,
bored-tired...
                 what women want:
what an exhausting question...
**** fantasy, beta-male provideer...
yada-yada-yada...
                    
    the only relaxing aspect of the day
(apart from the shade) is watching
england beat india in the cricket...
i always loved cricket sport terminology:
50 overs... innings...
wickets... 6 throws of the ball in an over...
the rest? i'm no atlas...
i don't like the world crashing in on
me with all its problems...
not because i don't have the right
advice to give,
but i remember the most modern secular
motto about giving advice borrowed
from Athos of the creation of alexandre dumas:

the best advice? to not give advice...
you cannot be held accountable
for giving bad advice: and people complaining,
or good advice and leaving
people in your sphere of influence...
asking for more - non verbatim... of course...

second categorical imperative?
tao...
              the best way you can help
the world: is to forget the world,
and let the world forget you...

                        you only need two absolute
maxim vectors to orientate yourself
in this world,
a third is nice, but: it can be kept loose...
at least two on a tight leash...

but one night spent drinking,
not writing anything:
and i am... spent!

                            the boogieman of england's
persistent complaints...
the muslims are not integrating,
the english: we should give them more
ground...
           o.k., o.k.... joe peshi in the role
leo getz in lethal weapon II...
            i too had to integrate!
i said: like **** if you think i'll give up
my native tongue when spoken in private...
you're not getting it...
i'll spreschen ihre zunge, no problem,
i'll even write you pwetty free verses to boot!
but, guess what?
  i will not force you to eat my
sauerkraut, my schnitzels,
                           my smoked sausages,
my raw herrings etc.,
                      integration does not work
within the confines of: pampering to a people
expected to meet you half-way...
what happened when the polonaise attempted
to meet the english half-way?
brexit...
oh come on guv'... is there a ******* tram
echoing its way out of my eye
when you peer into it while i attach
an index finger to the bottom lid to give
you a clearer picture?
           25 years in england: no englush girlfriend:
i guess all the english girls just love, just love love
being ***** by 9 pakistanis
daubed in gasoline...
                   hey: they **** thrill...

i'm tired of the weakness of the english,
the humpty-dumpty nature they are imposing,
self-cencorship,
    appeasing, like neville chamberlain...
bringing back the munich agreement...
not on a piece of paper,
instead... waving a scrap of a toilet roll...
so the english could wipe their own *****
on the promises of the germans...
if this really hurts the northern monkies...
guess how much it hurts the sourthern fairies...
(well... fairy, is a designated region surrounding
devon, bristol, hardly a ******* fairy in essex)...

   why am i foreigner and i share
the same nausea of the natives,
                     exhausted by the narratives?
i guess the english didn't like the polonaise:
but the polonaise are to blame...
came here with a list of benefits they could claim:
without having even lived 5 years among
the natives... housing benefits, child benefits...
believe me: the polonaise are the only
people in the world that hate each other...
to the extent of citing bitter criticisms...
whenever i pass through warsaw to see my grandparents
i am gripped with a sickness:
this homogeneity is too much for me...
shove me back into the east end of London...
too much of the same genetic material...
and that's when the language i am keeping
(seemingly for vanity reasons) fizzles out
into your basic encounter and that basic reminder
that circa 40 million speak it too,
better or worse, but they speak it...

of all the festivals? download...
                                   i wish...
    glastonbury?       not my thing...
kylie? i'll concede: slow? live, with instruments,
rather than the studio original...
wasn't that a cover of
   bowie's fashion?
                  sure as hell sounded similar...
but i heard the cure were playing...
so while writing my father's invoice
i made myself a paperclip bracelet...
   i figured... "let's just pretend to be there"...
and no, the 1980s weren't that bad when
it comes to music,
not now, by comparison...
the cure's kiss me, kiss me, kiss me (1987)
release?
one of those rare albums you can
listen to akin to reading a book...

                       but there's still that persisting
exhaustion... i came from under communism,
from under the iron curtain,
but at least there was the economic aspect
of communism involved...

   only today i watched the story
of the terrible inversion of english jursprudence,
i.e.: guilty until proven innocent...
the 1975 case of the silesian vampire...
an innocent man was hanged...
the original vampire?
    smashed his wive's head in,
then his childrens', then he set himself
on fire...
              then again: the tragedy of those
rare cases of being presumed guilty
rather than innocent...
then the reverse: presumed innocent rather
than guilty and getting away with it,
through the parody of death
and the non existent god...

   there could not be anything more exhausting
than communism without a communist
economic model...
this current state of affairs in the west:
cultural marxism and the yet to be discovered
antithesis of cultural darwinism...

i'll use the cartesian chirality for a moment:
sum ergo cogito...
i don't like using political terms...
but... liberal (classical) - i don't even know
what sort of thinking goes into the label -
in the east? the liberals are exhausted
by a resurgent nationalism within
   the newly acquired capitalist system...
in the west? the liberals are exhausted
by an insurgent communism within
an ageing capitalist system...

         on a side: seriously, why even bother
engaging in any sort of "public intellectual"
debates when the public are only
discussing two books: 1984 and brave new world...
**** it, might as well talk to a camel jockey
who only own and rides the waves of
time in this world only using one...
muhammad...
   whom Khadija **** Khuwaylid
would probably whip into his young
respectable shape...

                  and this is how Ezra Pound comes
into rememberance:
usura... at least the muslims do not
play into the game of usury:
of interest... borrow a quid,
pay back £2.33...
            that's the only way you can
gain respect of the muslims:
if they truly were the money lenders
of this world: which they aren't...
unless a newly blessed...

   among the philistines and the proselytes...
england is such a tiresome project,
even on the outskirts of London...
i'm being dragged down by this intervention
of marxism: on a whim,
on a whimsical projection...
of "adding" values...
            
           communism would have worked...
in exceptional circumstances...
poland... circa 1945 - 1990...
syria: the current year...
  to whatever year is demanded...
exceptional as in: war torn...
where was the marshall plan
   for poland, when there was one
for sweden (neutral) and switzerland
(also neutral)?!
        black youths bothered about
the summer holidays,
having to live in council flats,
  concrete goliaths...
           want to know what it feels like
when entire cities are like council
estates,
with only pockets of remaining
   free-standing houses among
overshadowing council flats?
                                    nee bother...
sure... in a country where:
the house is the castle and there's a labyrinth
of castles constituting outer suburbia...
balconies... that's what the soviet
models had... balconies...
where women could grow flowers...
concrete staccato gardens in the sky...
the blocks of flats in england
didn't have balconies (sky gardens,
          esp. the early ones, massive fault)...
i spent one summer reading
bertnard russell's history of western philosophy...
lying in my grandparent's balcony,
in the shade...
watching passerbys among
          the barking dogs of the neighbours...

one day, one ******* day!
   and i'm already exhausted from the castrato
english narrative...
pandering to the people you expected
to integrate...
  no! you're not changing your standards...
your standards are perfectly reasonable!
i'm tired of the english pandering
to the sort of people who, will, not,
integrate!
               i integrated in a way
of respecting both the english culture,
as well as hiding / preserving my own...
why don't i just do the following:
   pisać po polsku?
                      like some czesław miłosz?

ah... good point... at what point
is the standard of integration appreciated?
when nothing is preserved?
surely integration is supposed to
accommodate some variation
of preservation?
     i might add: that's a fine line...
preserve all? no integration...
preserve some? integration...
                    preserve none? no integration...
food is a cheap target to example
with...
                   it's a low hanging fruit...
given that even i find indian cuisine
   the most superior in the world...
food is a cheap target concerning integration...
but the niqab?
  when the local english authorities
are employing face-recognition
technology and when testing it...
are forcing people to uncover their faces,
subsequently arresting them out of protest...
but not the women wearing the niqab...
out of? out of what?
   a secular society shouldn't be allowed
to discriminate against any religion...
it should discriminate against: all religions!

                isn't that what the secular ideology
is all about? the... softcore version
of soviet atheism?
        secularism of the west (miltary-industrial
complex)...
"vs." soviet atheism of the east
  (scientific-industrial complex)...
           i'm still so ******* tired
               of this bogus trap of "necessary"
                       commentary.

1.
Noong unang panahon, sa nayon ng Nalbuan
Nakatira ang mag-asawang sina Don Juan at Namongan
At nang bago manganak ang babae
Nagtungo sa mga kaaway ang lalaki
(Once upon a time, in the shire of Nalbuan
There lived a couple named Don Juan and Namongan
And before the maternal labor of the female
To the enemies went the male)

2.
Si Don Juan ay natalo ng mga Igorot
Walang atubiling ulo niya ay pinugot
(By the Igorots Don Juan was defeated
Without hesitation they cut off his head)

3.
‘Di nagtagal, si Namongan ay nanganak
Kakaiba ang kanyang lalaking anak
(Soon, Namongan gave birth to a child
Her son was so odd)

4.
Malaki ang pangangatawan niya kaysa ibang bata
Para siyang isang ganap na binata
(To any child his body is bigger
He is like a mature teenager)

5.
Siya ay nakakapagsalita narin
At sinabi sa lahat na Lam-ang siya kung tawagin
(He could speak even
And said to all Lam-ang is his name given)

6.
Siya rin ang pumili ng kanyang mga ninong
Kung nasaan ang ama kanyang tinanong
(His godparents he elected
His father’s whereabouts he interrogated)

7.
Nang siya ay nasa gulang na siyam na buwan
Ganap na lalaki na kung siya’y masdan
(When he became nine months old
A grown-up man is he to behold)

8.
Nang hindi pa bumabalik ang ama nito
Siya’y nagpasya na sundan ito
(When his father yet returned has not
He then decided to follow that)

9.
Naglakbay siya nang dali-dali
At naabutan ang mga Igorot na nagpupunyagi
(He travelled fastly
And saw the Igorots having revelry)

10.
Sila ay nagsasayawan
Palibot sa pugot na ulo ni Don Juan
(They were dancing
Don Juan’s severed head they’re surrounding)

11.
Galit nag alit si Lam-ang
Lahat na kaaway kanyang pinaslang
(Lam-ang was so very mad
He killed all enemies he had)

12.
Maliban sa isa na kanya munang pinahirapan
Bago ito tuluyang pakawalan na sugatan
(Except for one whom he tortured
Before releasing that injured)

13.
Sa kanyang pagbabalik sa Nalbuan
Siya muna’y naligo sa Ilog Amburayan
(Upon his return to Nalbuan
He first took a bath at River Amburayan)

14.
Dahil sa kapal ng libag at sama ng amoy niya
Doon ay nagkandamatay ang mga isda
(Because of his thick dirt and foul odor
All fished died in that river)

15.
‘Di naglaon, siya’y may babaeng napusuan
Ito’y anak ng pinakamayaman sa Kalanutian
(Later, he fell in love with a woman
He is the daughter of the richest man in Kalanutian)

16.
Ines Kannoyan ang ngalan ng dilag
Kayrami ang lalaking sa kanya’y nangaglaglag
(Ines Kannoyan is the name of the maiden
To her so many men have fallen)

17.
Isa na rito si Sumarang
Kanyang hinamon si Lam-ang
(One of them was Sumarang
He dared to challenge Lam-ang)

18.
Silang dalawa ay naglaban
Nanalo ang binata ng Nalbuan
(The two of them fought on
The bachelor of Nalbuan won)

19.
Nadatnan ni Lam-ang kaydaming manliligaw
Kaya gumawa siya ng paraan upang pumangibabaw
(Lam-ang saw so many suitors
So he made a way to surpass them all)

20.
Pinatilaok niya ang manok at isang bahay ang nagiba
Pinatahol niya ang aso at ang bahay ay naayos na
(He made his rooster crow and a house was destroyed
Then he made his dog growl and that house was restored)

21.
Kayrami ding ginto ang tangan ng binata
Kaya kapagkuwan ay ikinasal ang dalawa
(So much gold the man had carried
So soon the two were married)

22.
Dumating ang panahon na si Lam-ang ay inatasang
Manghuli ng isda na kung tawagin ay rarang
(Time came that Lam-ang was summoned
To catch a fish rarang that’s called)

23.
Subalit habang siya’y nasa kailalaiman ng karagatan
Si Lam-ang ay kinain ng pating na berkakan
(Yet while he was down deep the ocean
Lam-ang was eaten by a shark berkakan)

24.
Si Marcos na maninisid sila’y tinulungan
Pagkuha sa bangkay ni Lam-ang kanyang kinayanan
(A diver named Marcos came to their aid
The corpse of Lam-ang he recovered)

25.
At sa kapangyarihan ng aso at tandang niya
Muling nabuhay ang magiting na bida!
(And by the power of his dog and rooster
Again came to life our brave main character!)

-08/10/2013
(Dumarao)
*for Epic Day 2013