In the course of the day, I ran across a couple of odd references to idiocy. No point here, really, but I like this little poem:
The idiot greens the meadow with his eyes,
The meadow creeps implacable and still;
A dog barks, the hammock swings, he lies.
One two three the cows bulge on the hill.
--Allen Tate (1899-1979), U.S. poet, critic. "Idiot."
RL and I, as we drive to work, look for the cows in the field on the road into MRU. I like to think that it's a good day when we see them, but I am sure that RL attaches no more significance to them than that they are fine to look at. I also like to "green the meadows" of the parched yellow landscape around here, but RL certainly does not. Perhaps I, then, am the idiot.
If so, I will hang my hat on Ralph Waldo Emerson's thoughts on the idiot notwithstanding the obvious bad cultural translation over a couple of centuries:
The idiot, the Indian, the child and unschooled farmer's boy, stand nearer to the light by which nature is to be read, than the dissector or the antiquary.
I am more than a bit of an antiquary myself, so I am evidently trying to stand on both sides of Emerson.
Photo by Arod, in Paris, in the back of the Ecole des Beaux Arts ... graffiti, I suppose
1 comment:
Hi, I have just come across your blog and found it to be quite simply wonderful. I never did like Emerson though...of course I am absolutely biased and do not like most American authors on princicple...that was half a joke.
Absolutely wonderful photo by the way...never did like Paris or most things Parisian...people, foods, culture in general. Again, half joking. No I am not trying to get a complete stranger to loathe me. Just telling you that someone found your blog to be greatly entertaining and well written.
Cheers.
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