26January2007

I am in awe of the forgiveness that Demeter shows toward both Zeus and Hades. For a mother, losing your only child is horrendous, but for an immortal goddess it must be worse. As humans, we understand the vulnerability of our children, yet Demeter must have expected Persephone to live out all of her days on Olympus. This link is to Alfred Lord Tennyson's poem about Demeter and Persephone. I have always loved the way that Tennyson expresses himself.

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After reading lines 441 to 581 in Antigone, I once again find myself glad of being born into a society where women have rights, transgressions can be forgiven, and where one person does not control the fate of all people.

While the American government may have flaws, or not always be properly enforced, at least I can freely express my ideas without being arrested. I am thankful that I am allowed to attend a University that does not have the desire only to prepare me to be a good wife. I am also grateful to live in a society where single mothers are not ostracized.

I look at the dilemma of Antigone with deep sympathy. How could she be kept from giving her brother a proper burial? Life's transgressions should not keep her brother from Elysia. Being on the "wrong side" of a war is all from the perspective of the waring parties. When I look back at the Trojan war, I do not take sides, but look at it from a historical perspective instead. Emotions could the goings on of the present and create many false senses of truth. Someday, our great-grandchildren will be able to look back at our life time and see it with some clarity, until then, we must draw on the path to infer anything about the present.

Notes from 26 January 2007

Notes:

26 January 2007

1. Politics derived from Polis(or city)


2. B.C.E. - Before the Common Era


3. Chthonic - of the underworld.


4. "Read throught the times into the eternities." ~Dr. Sexson


5. Homeric Hymns - wiki, google, other info.


6. Hermes - one of the first peices of comedy.


7. Demeter - one hidden laugh.


8. There are nine Muses of inspiration.


9. Trope - a word used in a figurative sense (turning around or away).


10. Poly Tropes - skilled at getting out of a jam.


11. Music is an invocation of the Muse herself.


12. "Gesang ist ryhe desein." - Song is existence.


13. Anamnesis - recollection of what we have forgotten. We must see the beautiful in the world to get back our wings.

The Muses Clio, Euterpe, and Thalia, by Eustache Le Sueur