Sunday, June 17, 2012

Like Poe's the Raven? Check this out! It's "Dusame in the Mirror"



Edgar Allen Poe The Raven the Crazians Ssal Nogard Dusame in the Mirror Mitt Romney

Dusame in the Mirror 

   by Ssal Nogard


In a land deep of reflection 
stands a mirror of perfection.
In it sees the soul’s subjection 
clearly against all objection 
       hardened into stone. 

There sits a maiden, sometimes standing
all within her view commanding 
vast and wide an understanding 
       of sights seen in the glass.

Through the mirror fair she looks, 
stealing thoughts, akin a crook;
with a glance she never brooks 
       the edges of the glass.

This creature lady has a ken
that sees the ills within and when
she sees the ills it comes forth ten
       more thousand fold as hard.

The mirror looks for her instead 
of her own eyes, to which it fed
forbidden sights behind her--led
her to such things as she would wed 
       fastly to her eyes. 

But if a look into this glass
from any eyes besides the lass, 
of verdant hair and eyes that pass 
   the gleaming of the moon, 

Would see the same as in a plain 
made looking glass. And so contain 
nothing of the brass insane-
       ness thrashing to look out. 

Through days that spun of languid splendor 
Ceaseless grew her glassly wonder. 
Could not god and could not thunder 
take her glass and her asunder. 
      

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Her sisters two at least as fair 
Gorgons both: the immortal hair 
that flamed by day and slunk through lair, 
by night, of green and serpent rare 
       The sisters of Dusame. 

They had the hair, they had the flame 
but never did they look the same. 
They’d not her eyes and could not blame 
     the shadows in the glass. 

Why so for one who sits and sees
by glass while two can look with ease 
at sights delightful as they please… 

For she was never on her knees,
and so she never could appease
her gods with prayer or small decrees
of sycophantish, squealing pleas.

For triflings none, she wanted ease
on par with that of this and these
immortals flying in the breeze.
But to the gods she paid no fees
and so she sits with their disease
       for never needing them. 

Thus, by day was changed a girling, 
solid skin and all-a-curling, 
hair that shivered, and a-pearling
       eyes that shone a shade of sterling,
Hardness more and hardness yearning
       bleakly for a break.

As such the mortal in her showed
no greater in her glass abode,
where all she sat and oft was told
of things not hers nor to behold.

Yet in the corner of her eye 
her sisters dance until they cry 
of things so lovely yonder high! 
and things so holy yonder nigh--
that from her lips she slips a sigh
       of things she cannot see. 


~~~**~~~***~~~~~~~~~~~~**~~~~~~~~~~~


They come to see the sisters three,
heroic with a certainty,
that in their curse they bear gladly
are free to wave most luridly
at suitors all who fast decree 
to slay the sisters famously.

It never ends this way, only
more turned to granite cruelly
not from fate but intensity
of finding more and differently.

Two steps forward, whistling lowly 
He has come to see the holy 
of the Gorgons, changing solely 
       at the break of eve. 

He sits to see the fair Dusame,
whose beauty deep is known by name.
Whoever so could win a claim
of sight and hair and so her tame,
yet live through such a ghoulish game
of sight, hair, and forbidden frame.

He catches sight far in the glass 
seductive lines and heinous mass
of things unseen, he lets it pass-- 
       those moments in her eyes. 

Her sisters smiling, sidling close 
to see their pilgrim and to boast… 
Instantly she turned a ghost 
       of shadows and of sighs. 

Dusame had seen him by the way 
and she had wanted him to lay 
his hand upon her---but she stayed 
and in her struggle did she sway 
       so that she nearly looked. 

Dared not to look, or even turn 
her body sick. A shudder yearned,
and in the instant that she spurned 
his call, it tripled her to burn
       still harder in the glass.  


~~****~~~*****~~~~~~******~~~~~~*****~~~~~****~~~~~


And when the sun spit shriveled rays, 
Her hair turned in a vastly maze 
of dark and emerald ablaze 
that met none of her awesome gaze-- 
        chimera called Dusame. 

And the mirror shines a clearer 
glow, and clearer with the sheerer 
lines of things outlined and nearer, 
made over big and over dearer 
       to the watcher called Dusame. 

How can she look and make him stone, 
her gaze that blights through look alone
from lightened eyes and depths they shone, 
       blazed into hard reflection. 

Looked through the glass but for a flash, 
He lifted sword and made to slash 
her slender throat a deep red gash 
       and saw her look away. 

She looked a look of guileless peer,
reflection and a window clear 
both of soul and desire dear. 
       She looked him through and back. 

He lowered blade and fought to spy
the wonder in the glassy eye 
but knew that look that would belie
the tendency to magnify 
       what was within the glass. 

“Your look is one of death,” he said 
and for this man would have your head. 
I cannot deviate my stead 
       fast intent to run you red.” 

“My look is death,” she said, “if only 
in your shadowed, dank and lonely 
crevices you speak--atone! Be 
       sorry--of things… ungod.” 

“Then all,” he said, “no doubt succumb
Better to be struck mute and dumb 
in mind and soul and so in sum 
       than risk a thought that strays. 

“And you Dusame, how do you fit 
into this frame you never quit 
so calmly do you peer and sit 
       extracting our misdeeds” 

“I sit unscathed as I can do no
wrong or right and thus I grow 
no further than my frame and so
I sit and dream of things I know
       not of and wish I did 
                                    --a little.” 
       sighed the sad Dusame.

On bended knee he took her hand
and gave her tears that rifely ran 
and seared her skin like desert sand,
       blinding her to see. 

Her eyes grew wide, her hair died lank 
she gazed at him once more and sank 
her head onto the mirror’s bank 
       and gazed at it no more. 

He lifted her and turned her face;, 
unseeing kissed her eyes with haste 
and set her back onto the chaste 
     smooth surface of the mirror.

He sheathed his blade, and set to go, 
his body limp and hanging low, 
in desolation for a foe 
who was not--And, will never know 
that he saw her more clearly thro’ 
       the eye glass of Dusame. 

And yet he steals her stony gaze 
cast from the glass to surely raze
The look, once seen, it always stays 
      the mortal called Dusame. 

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Other Hot Topics:

What I Said When I saw Salvador Dali's Metamorphosis ofNarcissus

Princess Boo Wakes Up on the Wrong Side of the Bed - A Serial Princess Story (Not Honey Boo Boo)


Book One: Princess Boo Wakes Up on the Wrong Side of the Bed

I. Princess Boo Wakes Up to a Cold Breakfast



Princess Boo was cross. Not a rectangle or a triangle. But a cross. Princess Boo was often cross. And when she was, everyone was unhappy.

On this particular day, Princess Boo was cross because she was hungry and waiting for breakfast. Princess Boo didn’t like to wait. “I want my breakfast, Now” she roared to the cook, who could hear her all the way from the dining room to the kitchen.

And in a princess’s house, that is a long way. A very long way indeed.

When Princess Boo was cross, everyone was unhappy. And Princess Boo liked it that way. The butler was walking around trembling, so that the silver serving tray he was carrying in one hand rattled loudly. Her lady-in-waiting did not want to wait on Princess Boo anymore. And the cook, the cook was the unhappiest. As a matter of fact, she was the most unhappiest. That’s right, the cook was not the most unhappy, or the unhappiest, she was the most unhappiest cook that had cooked for Princess Boo that month alone.

When the Princess’s breakfast was prepared, the cook called the butler and the butler came running. “Quick,” the cook said, “Bring this to the princess, post haste. You know how she hates her breakfast when it gets cold.” So the butler rushed out of the kitchen, post haste, down the hallway, past the pantry, through the long dining room that Princess Boo never used for breakfast because she liked breakfast in bed, up a long winding staircase whose eighth step always creaked when someone stepped on it going up but only squeaked when somebody stepped on it going down, turned right at the landing and then did an about face back to the left (he forgot the Princess was sleeping in the West Wing this week, the sun was too bright in the morning during summer) and post haste rushed to the Princess’s door, last one at the end, the other rooms on his left were her dressing room, which was connected to her jumbo closets, one on each side of the dressing room, past her bathroom on the right, and past her lounge somewhere in  the middle. (He forgot.)

“O-M-lower-case-g!” exclaimed the butler. “I hope the Princess’s breakfast isn’t cold.” But how could it not be? It had to be delivered from one end of the palace to the next. Did I mention? The butler also had to run outside, past the stables and the stable boys who rooted him on, past the fields of corn, wheat and rice, past the cherry blossom trees (which never grew any cherries), and the apple trees, back into another castle, and then up the stairs!

Why? Because Princess Boo wanted her own private castle. She had no privacy in her father’s castle. He was always getting in the way. If Princess Boo wanted to read in the library, her father would come right in and give her a big hug and ask how his little pumpkin was doing that fine day.

Fine day! Princess Boo often retorted. My breakfast was cold and there was a icy draft under her bathroom sink. “My toes are blue,” KF (Princess Boo called her father KF), they are blue like my Coco blue nail polish! And everyone knows that you don’t match your nail polish to your skintone!”

Thus it was that the butler ran up the grand staircase of the second castle to the left past a gallery of portraits of Princess Boo, all during various stages of her life, such as when she was cross, not so cross, mildly vexed, exceedingly irritated, and downright vexed. Not one portrait had her smiling, because we all know it takes days and weeks to pose for a portrait and everyone knew that Princess Boo could not be pleasant for that long, emphasis added.

The butler scree-eeched to a halt at Princess Boo’s bedroom door, and gave a resoundingly succinct rap, like a woodpecker on downers, rat. a. tat. tat. “Who is it?” came back the sharp voice of Princess Boo. “Your breakfast, your highness,” the butler called back, trying hard to hide the quake in his voice and failing terribly. “You-ur, your breakfast, you-ur hi-highness!”

“I’m sleeping. You took so long I fell asleep again. How dare you wake me?” Princess Boo yelled. The butler quaked and gently peeped open the door.

“I’m so sorry, your highness, I rushed here as soon as the cook prepared your breakfast, only the dash through two castles…”

“If I want to hear excuses, I’ll visit the executioner’s jail! There’s plenty of slipshod servants like you who always had an excuse for why breakfast was cold! Don’t just cower there all day, bring me my breakfast!” Hollered the princess.

The butler hurried in and quickly laid out Princess’s breakfast. Blueberry waffles with extra whipped cream and two cherries, maple and glazed doughnuts, two of the former, one of the latter, double-chocolate loaf with extra chocolate chips, and a banana (“I’ve decided to eat healthy from now on,” pronounced the Princess last week).

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A Friend told me to change Princess Boo's name because it was so close to Honey Boo Boo, and she dos act like a princess but I think Princess Boo can stand on her own, don't you?



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MY OTHER WRITINGS

 What I Said When I saw Salvador Dali's Metamorphosis of Narcissus at the Tate Modern


Led Zeppelin's Houses of Holy Continued


Click here if you want to know how I got to the Inauguration and for An Open Letter to President Obama.


Background behind this chapter. Another famous scene is Michael the Archangel banishing Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden after they had eaten of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge (FottoK or FTK for short).


Michael, being God's right hand man, is a little tired of always doing the right thing. He's wondering what it's like to be Adam and Eve and do wrong once in a while...and give in to temptation. 

The line in Led Zeppelin's Houses of the Holy about Satan's daughter and a sword of gold in hand with an angel hovering by made me think of Michael, who is always pictorized as having a blazing sword in hand. Especially when he is sent by God to banish Adam and Eve East of Eden. 

In this story, Michael is almost wistful to go with them. But he cannot, and must return to the Houses of the Holy.
Led Zeppelin Houses of the Holy Ssal Nogard the CRAZIANS
Part II: Casting out of the Garden of Eden, Wishing he could go too

(should be read to Led Zeppelin’s song “Houses of the Holy”)



Uh, oh.  Here’s Mike to rip asunder.
                   Eden’s ending with his coming.
In the distance, hear the thunder
            and a complacent kind of humming.


He steps lightly, feathers taut
                senses alert like a wide-eyed bug
going into an invisible knot
          sees nothing--continues with a shrug.


There they wait with bags that match
   ‘tween the two trees that let them know:
There are things beyond their green patch
              that their paradise would not show.

                                         You know.

He looks clinically at the two that stand
                 but one a bit more than the other
then peers at the lines of the man
                 places his hand upon his brother

                                  You know.

The man’s look comes from seeing things
                          that he wasn’t meant to see.
Alas, now does those things that bring
                       blights of that accursed tree.

                                            Oh – oh.

Cause it’s easier to blame the fruit
                        or even the serpent’s tongue
frankly all of it is moot
                      the promises his woman sung

                                            Oh – oh-oh. . .

At last, grudging Mike must glance
                at the female looking beyond.
It seems she prefers her chance
                    and looks forward to the dawn.
              
Behind them Mike’s toy licks up hail
                    it’s really just for showing off.
He really likes to wow the females
                        with his aching sword aloft.

                                             You know.

At the edge, Mike rests his arm
                       and stands just to the inside.
She turns and he sees with alarm
                      the gleaming eyes of a bride

                                 Oh-oh, Satan and Man.

Mike didn’t know but he would face
                         those gleaming eyes again.
Inscrutable in time or place
                     When he’d be ready to begin.

But for now Mike returns alone
                        to quiet houses of the holy.
Where only the mighty like he are prone
             to stare out longingly at the lowly.
                                     
                                          Oh – oh – oh.

The lowly were a-walking
       Dragging feet and stepping toes, then
One says a prayer and hand crossing
                       the other just says an amen.

                                 Oh-oh, Man and Satan.

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MY OTHER WRITINGS

Metamorphosis of Narcissus by Salvador Dali Analysis by Ssal Nogard of the Crazians
Metamorphosis of Narcissus by Salvador Dali 


Princess Boo Wakes Up on the Wrong Side of the Bed

Continuation of Led Zeppelin's Houses of the Holy




Houses of the Holy Album Sleeve by Led Zeppelin


You can check out the Crib Notes for this poem and lyrics written in the style of the lyrics for Led Zeppelin's "Houses of the Holy." I've always been one to just read a poem or book without having it interpreted for me, but I get I like it but, "huh"? lol, okay, if you don't know the song, you should click here for the lyrics to the song so you can appreciate how truly great these continued lyrics are, lulz...

And now here comes Michael walking

(should be read, or better sung out loud!, to Led Zeppelin’s song “Houses of the Holy”)

Part I: Sending his brother away



Michael stands and shoe shines his things
                     with the underside of his feathers.
They’re a sight these handsome wings,
               will withstand all inclement weathers.

That’s a good thing for on the eve
                                 he’ll fly out leading battle.
And the last thing he needs to grieve
                                 is for them to give a rattle.
    
                                  You know.

Getting dressed is a production.
                         Got that sword of his that fires
into ribbons of destruction,
                 Sends you down into the quagmires.

                                 Oh –oh.

Chain mail of his is somethin’ swell,
                      made of things weird and unman.
You gotta’ get used to the smell
                                 but I’d avoid it if you can.

                                Whoah –oh .

Because He who is as the Lord
                 forgets at times to sponge on down.
But who needs it when he can afford
                              a thousand stainless gowns?


For if angels could be vain
                     Mike would be our leading man
affectation for being unstained
                        He would be his own best fan.

                                 You know.  That’s right.

But that’s why he feels so bland
                               Immortal and without sin
Virtues he doesn’t understand
                     having angels and saints for kin


Enters Gabs just in from riding
                   Dragons, with a smile on his face.
Gabs: the bearer of good tidings--
                  Mike puts high ones in their place.


Chief prince reads the sky blue pages
            Longing lumps of pain for his brother
Whom he hasn’t seen for ages
                           Cause he belongs to another.

                                           It’s so-o.

Speck turns to dense crimson flaring
                 buzzes along heaven’s lines above.
Come the hosts of Lucifer blaring
                       Mike feels a queer mix of love.

Was there anyone so gently strong
                             as Lucifer his beloved light?
Since Luz was the one to know wrong
                    was the only who too knew right.

So began the battle of Hosts
                       heavenly, deadly, and sanguine.
It left many if not most,
                   letting out a gruesome whine.

                                                 Oh. oh.

First lamb is cast from the fold
                looks like this’s Mike’s new day job
clasps Lucifer’s hand but he can’t hold
                                  lets him go with lurid sob.

                                    Oh-oh.

Lucifer falls and yet leaves warning:
                                 he’s not really all that far;
Look to Venus in the morning
                             you see his light-giving star.


Led Zeppelin's Houses of the Holy the Crazians Ssal Nogard

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MY OTHER WRITINGS

What I Said When I Saw Salvador Dali’s Metamorphosis of Narcissus at the Tate Modern



Saturday, June 16, 2012

The Cataracts of Paradise by Ssal Nogard a.k.a. The Cataracts of Iguacu (Iguazu)

Yes, this is about the Cataracts of Iguacu (Iguazu) you can scroll toward the bottom. 


Cataracts of Iguazu (Foz de Iguacu) The World's Highest Waterfalls



Slight Detour: Check out how I got to the Inauguration in D.C. and my Open Letter to President Obama and An Inaugural Poem I wrote for President Obama. Background Notes to the poem I wrote in Honor of President Obama's Inauguration are available in Part I, Part II, Part III, and Part IV.




Cataracts of Iguazu Iguacu the Crazians Ssal Nogard
The Cataracts of Paradise is my version of the story based on the highest waterfall in the world, the Cataracts of Iguazu (or Iguacu with the funny little squiggle on the bottom of the "c") that runs between Brazil and Argentina.

The name means "really big water". The background story is the typical tragic one of star-crossed lovers, Naipi and Taroba. A (male) god saw Naipi and fell in love with her (beauty) but she preferred her mortal lover (really?) and as they were fleeing from the spurned and wrathful god down the river Iguazu, the god split the river in half (much like Moses) separating the lovers for eternity. 

(The funny thing is, I never read or heard of this story before I wrote this poem. The reason I thought of such a similar story is that I started thinking of Naiads and water nymphs, and drowning men--a la Odysseus but I guess those were water sirens--as is my wont when around or  reading about water. Of course, being a poet, my story had to have a tragic ending as well. Don't ask me where God came in. He just did. In my version, the water nymph started out that way, not human, and wants to become human to be with her human love. In the traditional story, I guess the lovers are human.)

It is at this precarious juncture that those who try to navigate the falls will not come out alive. Hence, it has come to be known as Garganta del Diablo, which means Devil's Throat. (I did hear that is was called the Devil's Throat when I was traveling nearby but did not have time to take a detour there.)

In the traditional story, the rejected godling is vengeful. In my story (and I have no idea why I wrote such a similar story), God is a little sad that the nymph girl wants to leave, but God lets her go anyway, knowing that she won't be any happier in human form. But alas, humans (and newly transformed naiads-to-maidens must learn things for themselves. The hard way.


The Cataracts of Paradise


The cataracts of Iguacu
fall from the steps
                      of highness
down to the arms
        of el Diablo
                      and roar into the dryness.

Diablo’s arms encircle falls
that crash down
                     his enfolding.
Yet all the drops rise back on high
       to blight
                     his infernal holding.

A kind of space
       within the walls
forms at Diablo’s base,
       where nothing moves or shivers--
                    except one lonely grace.

They say upon a time 
       there once
was formed
                   inside the mind
       of god a fancy passing fair
                   kept separate from mankind.

he kept it lone at Iguacu
       for
       this fancy passing fair was such
a thing of peerless grace,
       which man should never touch.

Thus, in the forest by the falls
       there lived a maid thing
                 of the trees.
Her form was like a veil of mist.
                 Her hair was of the breeze.

Her shape was of a comeliness
        that set man in her thralls.
Her song was cousin
                 to the sirens
and her eyes
                 were of the Falls.
For in the falls she saw her down
        a fate made even fairer,
Within her eye a sight
                 of Him,
        therefrom gleams
                 her terror.

But something happened long ago, 
They say: upon a yearly
        a man did touch the passing fair
                 so that Iguacu fell
                 severely.

Come far and wide like many men
        from whence He came is hidden.
He only knew he came to taste
        the fruits that were forbidden.

But really He was not a man
        but boy between the line
                   of gravity and boundless fancy,
        He chose what he could find.

With vigor did He seek a spirit
        whose life the lore was told
        if caught could give him
                 His desire
                             beyond the worth of gold.

He stood there on a ledge that thrust
                into the waterfall.
And when he spied the two bright eyes
                             fell he within her thrall.

She saw him too
                and too at once
a longing sprung
        within her form.
It sprouted like an evil weed
                and yet her heart was warm.

Her heart, though really she had not
         a heart to feel
                the things of bliss,
that souls can feel, but yet
               she could
endure what part-souls cannot miss.
And so her half-soul felt a warming
       as such a part-soul might permit,
                but with it at the time
                                       and same
a pin of cold
                went through it.

For she was not of blood and sinew
       mere substance of fire
                and vim,
a soulless pittance that feared
                her fate
                from god, who made his whim.

She had no corporality
                to make the love He desired.
       Thus He prayed to god to give
                her essence
                            what love required.

God listened and as usual
       he gave a saddened sigh,
                           and gave up what was asked of him
                to her that lived on high.

Drawn long and pale
                in resignation
       she shimmered into state,
                           diminished by her body,
                she came full to her fate.

She has a soul so long as she
                is bathed within the falls.
      Yet if she ever crashes down. . .
                           is tender for the walls.

Through moonlight upon the falls
                erupts a light
                           of kind unseen
in this they bathed in love
                unhallowed.
Came nothing in between.


They wallowed in infinity
                 the nymph girl and her boy
                 and with uncommon might
                           and main
he gave her body joy.

She had the limbs of heaven’s ease
                in which He glorified
and paid the ransom of the saints--
                like them:
                           divinely died.

And with her new-found faith did she,
                           moan soft idolatries.
Yet god awayed his grief
                and
                           pretended not to see.

Sometime in their love
                                          that was
                the nymph girl gave a shudder.
                           She slipped through
                                          her love’s embrace
                and broke him as no other.

And in the moment when she fell
       the cataracts grew mute.
                The only sound that could be heard
                                          were
                           her trees that followed suit.

She let no scream pass through her lips
       nor tear fall
                from her eye. 
Though terror reigned again complete
                 beginning from on high.

Her body viscerated in
                 the mists
       that rise from
                 the wall’s embrace.
Save the bright terror
                 of her eyes,
       her soul flows unencased.

Thus now she is part mist and nymph,
       a half-soul he cannot hold.
                And he knows why there are
                           some things
       that god leaves from the fold.


The falls fell fey
                           upon that day
       their nymph became their leaven.
Still He laments why there are things
                           that god brings not to heaven. 

The falls changed with a slightness
                           like a line that was
                                               lengthened
Still men blight the cataracts
        whose walls were ever strengthened.

Thus she may never leave the falls
until He can defer
        a love without the boon of god
but then he would not
                                        need her.

He cups his hands upon the ledge
       to catch the eyes
                that downpour
But the nymph of Iguacu
                 will fall
       for ever and for more.

Yet once or twice a moonlit night
                a drop of falls shines clearer
these are, they say, the bright eyes
                of terror
that grips her even dearer.

A glimpse he often gets of her
       that paid all for their love.
but never catching her bright eyes
       he looks ceaselessly above.

And as she falls she seeks salvation
       he solely can confer--
but the steps to heaven bid him pass
       so long as he is
                without her.
But with his soul he still does hope
                and never will forget
nor she but with her soul
       has only memory
                and no regret.

Let no man doubt that
                Eden and hell
are linked by Iguacu
       Just peer into the eyes of her
                           that lives and joins the two. 

The cataracts of Iguacu
       fall down from Paradise
raining down twice heaven’s
       length
                into Diablo’s vise.

And in the falls there is a girl
                who endlessly pays the toll
       for reaching out
                beyond her fancy
with which to reach her soul.


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