Charmed

Clay King rides shotgun.

Drowning Atlantis

I need to swim.

Right now, the water-of-life goes down like water.

When I am swimming regularly, putting in the laps, day after day, I'm not so thirsty.

Right now, I'm trying to drown Atlantis.
And I am.
Drop by drop,
dram by dram,
deluge by deluge.

The King of Atlantis
Fall 2009: Sculpture mix
(glazed with Transparent Brown, Stormy Blue, & Celadon),
copper wire, and hemp.

King: Clay from 2011

King Holmberg: Sculpture mix; transparent brown and denim glazes, layered.

Missing the play of clay in hand . . . .

Clay: Njord Bathing

 Even at the beach, one must play with clay:
Mask: Njord
soldate clay, oribe glazing (?).

"Whither Now, Friend?"

Two old clay pieces,
searching for the right setting,
for the proper game.
They seem slightly lost to me.  To you?

Hermes And Company

Shadow of a Man

"Whirl is king."  --Aristophanes

Me: Scotch On The Rocks. You?

Thinking about Macbeth and Macbeth.

A Cold Wind Blowing -- At The Ford

A Cold Wind Blowing

"Seyton!"

I'm thinking of a particular speech from Shakespeare's Macbeth: 
V.III. 23-34.  (Seyton is Macbeth's retainer and body-servant.)

Long ago, I wrote what I felt was a successful piece explicating Lord Byron's use of this same passage in his own masterpiece Don Juan.  I should hunt up those old words and see if there's any validity still there.  In the interim, I'll reread that piece from the Scottish play.

Charming

 Sculpture mix  charms and ornaments in progress.  The deer pattern is from a design by the wonderful Celtic artist Jen Delyth.  I have an ornament of hers that I am using to make patterns in clay for my own use and enjoyment.  Check out her art!

Dunnett's Macbeth: Thorfinn of Orkney -- A Favorite Passage

Here's a favorite passage from Dorothy Dunnett's King Hereafter, a novel about the historical Macbeth: Thorfinn the Mighty, Earl of Orkney, King of Scotia.  Frankly, Dunnett's King Hereafter is one of my Top Ten Novels of All Time, but that's an idiosyncratic list.  Still.

Here, we get a crucial insight into the "secret of [Thorfinn's] success", but even as Dunnett provides Thorkel Fostri's bitter assessment, she also provides Tuathal's reflections on what Thorkel says, making a simple statement complex in the best ways.  I end up appreciating the insight into the main character, even as I feel for Thorkel's frustration year after year.  (And yet Thorkel deserves some of that frustration . . . and if you've read the novel, I'll bet you'd agree.  "Year after year" refers both to Thorkel's relationship over time with Thorfinn and to my yearly rereadings.)  There are worthy ponderings possible here: about leadership, about problem-solving, and about reciprocity and the mysteries of connection and admiration.

I'm putting Dunnett's passage below the photo of knife and novel.  (The point of view, here, is that of Tuathal, Prior of St. Serf's, as the POV shifts throughout the novel, usefully so.)

Did [Earl Siward of York] regret his exile?  Had he envied Kalv, turning his coat so adroitly over and over, and at least buying back some years at Egge?

'Envy?  He despised Kalv.  Kalv was a fool,' Thorkel had said.  'There was only one man he envied.'

'He hated Thorfinn?  Always?  I suppose he must have done,' Tuathal had said, thinking aloud.  'Or the Lady Emma would never have risked making Siward her buffer between the rest of England and Scotia.  But then, what if Siward had tried to take over Scotia?'

'Twelve years ago?  Against Thorfinn's manpower, and his money, and his fleet?  Even with England and Denmark behind him,' had said Thorkel Fostri with scorn, 'I doubt if he would have got a levy over the Forth.  And England wouldn't have backed him.  Magnus had Norway then, remember, and half a foot in Orkney already through Thorfinn's nephew Rognvald.  England would rather have had Thorfinn in Scotia, I can tell you, than Siward or Norway.'

And that, thought Tuathal, was still true.  Despite Thorfinn's present weakness, it was still, thank God, true.  He had said, 'And Thorfinn?  He's used to dealing with princes these days.  Does he resent being forced to barter with someone . . . '

He had paused, having caught Eochaid's eye, to rephrase the question, but Thorkel Fostri's voice, at its most sardonic, had taken him up.  'Someone like me, from the barbarous north?  Haven't you noticed yet that Thorfinn is prouder of being Earl of Orkney than he is of ruling Scotia?  He fought for Orkney and won it, against men just like Siward.  His own kind.  He knows them too well to despise them.'

His own kind?  Thorfinn was three-quarters Celt.  They were not his own kind.  Tuathal had said, 'So it's just another negotiation?  Thorfinn neither likes nor dislikes Kalv's nephew?  I find it hard to believe.'

To which Thorkel Fostri had answered in a way he had not expected.  'When did you ever know whether Thorfinn likes or dislikes a man?  He takes them for what they are, and deals with them accordingly.  It's the secret of his success.  You don't fight the sea by getting angry at it, or persuade it to be kinder by loving it.'

The bitterness was plain to all to hear.  Eochaid had got up and left, and he, Tuathal, had asked only one or two questions more.

He was not embarrassed.  It merely appeared to him a paradox worth someone's attention: how a man such as Thorkel described could inspire what Thorkel undoubtedly felt for him.

Therapy: Clay / Hands / Soul

I allowed myself an hour or so in the studio today.

Moya Cannon's "Prodigal"

PRODIGAL

Dark mutter tongue
rescue me,
I am drawn into outrageous worlds
where there is no pain or innocence,
only the little quiet sorrows
and the elegant joys of power.

Someone
businesslike in his desires
has torn out the moon by its roots.
Oh, my tin king is down now mother
down and broken,
my clear browed king
who seemed to know no hungers
has killed himself.
Old gutter mother
I am bereft now,
my heart has learnt nothing
but the stab of its own hungers
and the murky truth of a half-obsolete language
that holds at least the resonance 
of the throbbing, wandering earth.

Try to find me stones and mud now mother
give me somewhere to start,
green and struggling, a blade under snow,
for this place and age demand relentlessly
something I will never learn to give.

--Moya Cannon,
from Oar

The King of the Isles

King Holmberg: Sculpture mix; transparent brown and denim glazes, layered.

The Oracle of Light

The King of Atlantis: sculpture mix; misc. blue and green glazes; twine; copper wire.

I've posted shots of this mask a few times before. This afternoon I took it down from the wall and out into the sun for a good look. I like this piece, and I brought out the camera just because of that liking. I haven't put enough time aside for playing with clay, and this posting encourages me to pursue such pleasure.

These shots somehow call to mind one particular fragment from Archilochos. Here it is, translated by Guy Davenport in his Seven Greeks. Note the range of tones as Archilochos carries us through even this brief piece.

Be bold! That's one way

Of getting through life.

So I turn upon her

And point out that,

Faced with the wickedness

Of things, she does not shiver.

I prefer to have, after all,

Only what pleases me.

Are you so deep in misery

That you think me fallen?

You say I'm lazy; I'm not,

Nor any of my kin-people.

I know how to love those

Who love me, how to hate.

My enemies I overwhelm

With abuse. The ant bites!

The oracle said to me:

"Return to the city, reconquer.

It is almost in ruins.

With your spear give it glory.

Reign with absolute power,

The admiration of men.

After this long voyage,

Return to us from Gortyne."

Pasture, fish, nor vulture

Were you, and I, returned,

Seek an honest woman

Ready to be a good wife.

I would hold your hand,

Would be near you, would have run

All the way to your house.

I cannot. The ship went down,

And all my wealth with it.

The salvagers have no hope.

You whom the soldiers beat,

You who are all but dead,

How the gods love you!

And I, alone in the dark,

I was promised the light.

--Archilochos

(7th century B.C.)