"Palindromic Haiku"

  Ire vessel peels;
foe griddle had a cicada held;
  dirge of sleepless-ever I.

01 23 86

from the letters of Sidonius Apollinaris (Loeb translation--W B Anderson):

'Consider too that the mob of the sluggards has so grown in numbers that unless there are at least a modest few like yourself to defend the exact use of the Language of Latium from the rust of vulgar barbarisms, we shall in a short time be lamenting its extinction and annihilation, so sadly will all the bright ornaments of noble expressions be dulled by the slovenliness of the mob.' (II.x, to Hesperius)

'Even though the Roman commonwealth has sunk to such an extremity of helplessness that it no longer rewards those who are devoted to it, it does not follow that my times never give birth to a Brutus or a Torquatus.' (III.viii, to Eucherius)

'...nowadays there are but few who hold literature in honor. Besides, owing to a natural defect, it is fixed and rooted in the human breast that failure to understand the art means failure to esteem the artist.' (V.x, to Sapaudius)

'...indeed, to combine pleasant discourse and a mind distressed is a sort of moral barbarism.' (I.iii, to Faustus)

Beliefs are the subjective lie, mind as structure, corresponding to the objective lie, body as image. The false freedom is to think you have chosen your beliefs; true freedom, once you understand where they came from, is choosing not to believe them.

"The true test of imagination is to name a cat." --Samuel Butler

Art is clean work; community is dirty work. Not everyone can do the former, but even artists have a duty toward the latter.

"Great changes in artistic style always reflect some alteration in the frontier between the sacred and profane in the imagination of a society." --Auden, op cit

A family is a commune where no one's there by choice.

"Music is the brandy of the damned." --Bernard Shaw

A lethargy you give in to, but have to walk over hot coals to get out of.