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and then W.S. Merwin came along and I was inspired once again.




I'm reading W.S. Merwin, or trying to. I don't know, but I gather, he was educated in a rather classical tradition, which is sort of uncommon among the common folks especially these days. Not a lot of Greek and Latin scholaring going on if you know what I mean, which I think you do. 

I need a translator and an historian to walk me through Merwin, with his references to Greek history and Latin phrases. 

It's beautiful stuff though. The most accessible the poem  for me so far is, The Dance of Death. 
A king, a huntsman, a scholar, a monk, a farmer, and a woman (because at the time, a woman would not be anything else but a woman) address the reader in verse, what it is to be alive, but then each stanza ends the same, "Et, ecce, nunc in pulvere dormio"  which I looked up and it's a quote from the Bible, Job 7:21 "For now shall I sleep in the dust, and thou shalt seek me in the morning, but I shall not be." Bible words in Latin. Wowz. Beautiful stuff. 

I feel smarter already but I can't really riff on it. It's too stately for me to rob from, too serious and too stately. 

Or can I riff on it?

First of all, Spellcheck wants me to change my misspelled huntsman (I originally spelled "huntman") to "stuntman" which would shake things up considerably. 


The Stuntman

pretending to be slew
in front of the assembled film crew
through a fake window threw
the stage blood a scarlet hue---
waiting for my next cue
so for now I shall slumber 
in the Styrofoam rubble 
for I, I'm just the body double
Sempi ubi sub ubi

oohhh, ouch. Yeah, no. Or maybe all kinds of yes.
Step aside W.S. Merwin with all your fancy learnin'. I've got this shit DOWN.

Merwin by the way was educated at Princeton, is a linguist, poet, and editor, is 90 years old and still very much alive. No Et, ecce, nunc in pulvere dormio for him. He's totally not dormio in the pulvere. (the Latin is intentionally bad, just FYI)



















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