leonardcohenforum.com

I refer my learned colleagues to my previous post.

As a matter of fact, Albert [whoops, Byron ], your most recent posting created one of those dratted "Edited" messages at the bottom of my own posting, when I returned to put "you" in capital letters ~ for the time being, I will give my email address to Helven and await the poems she selects to send me. Two reasons ~ First, I'm interested in what her selections will be, which ones she's opted to keep on hand in English [perhaps for sharing with other, English-speaking people]. I learn something about people, through the choices they make. Second [with my reasons being in reverse order], I like the personal connection of someone sending me poems they love.

Thank you for your thoughtfulness, no matter what. It will always be there and accessible for returning to later [for more], after I receive those that Tanya/Helven offered to send me.

~ Elizabeth

Helven/Tanya ~ No wonder you suggested that you need a rest! I just looked at the length of the next sentence, with the intention of restatement ~ re/statement ~ and it's a doozie! Now, 7:40 PM that moments ago looked early, suddenly looks very late! I think I need rest, too ! I at least need to feed my cats and make a phone call first. I'll revisit it later tonite [if I wake up ].

Seriously, let's carry on......merely restating [if we can keep our tiger distracted] seems do-able. I wish you were awake to take the next sentence, though! Wake up, Helven......wake up......

I'll be back later. If anyone else wants to jump in with this next one, it'll suit me just fine !

Love,
Elizabeth

Byron/Albert~

Thank you for the Pushkin link, you are a peach! Loved "Yevgeny Onegin"! (all the way to 'short shrift') I had not read any Pushkin before; I've only seen the ballet 'Eugene Onegin'.

Helven/Tanya~

I'm very pleased you understood.

Love,

~Makera/Gennelle

Dear Albert, thank you very much for the link. I’ve run through “Onegin”. It’s an interesting translation. But it’s a pity that rhythm and rhyme are weak a little. Of course, it’s difficult to keep both meaning and style and translator have to ignore certain things. But it’s a pity, nevertheless. Actually, Pushkin’s style was amazing. His poems sound like music.
My kind regards to Byron .

Dear Elizabeth, of course, it wasn’t just a fun. But there are, maybe, different “levels” of seriousness… something like that…

And as for my “hope to redeem” , actually, it was self-irony. I didn’t add emoticon… I thought the words were so pompous that couldn’t be perceived otherwise…

And glue… Yes, it was literal glue. It was made of natural components, and also they “cooked” it somehow but it still was glue. They had to eat it in order to survive. It was really terrible.

Love,
Tanya/Helven

P. S. I’m still on holiday! But I’ll be back soon with new restatements!

Hi Helven ~

Yes, of course, on your self-irony . We use that reference here, too, "I hope I can redeem myself;" "I hope I'm forgiven;" etc. in ways way-out-of-proportion to the situation the comment relates to. I used the Internet [not even realizing ~ cuz I hadn't seen it yet! ~ that Byron had just provided me with a link ] and library references, quickly then saying, "That comes frightfully too close to 'refund.' That is to say that there is nothing to be redeemed," was my own way of reconnecting to my teasing you, in the greeting of my post, the italicized words just now, showing the connection and the joking. A-h-h-h, the written word ! Yes, too, on the levels of seriousness ~ but I am certainly glad, however you want to describe it for yourself [in light of my serious compliments], that it is all there for later reference!

Well, get good rest on your holiday ~ I'll start trying to do the restatement on that l-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-n-n-n-g sentence, and if someone jumps in first with theirs, all the better !

It would be great to see Tchocolatl or Vesuvius step back in and wrestle with it! I don't know if Joe Way is back yet. Of course, Sohbet can always fill in, in his students' real or virtual absence, too [ahem ~ hint, hint]!

Love,
Elizabeth

Uhhh... I'm back from hummingbirds and growing trees watch, and I took so much time to read everything that I have to be very brief, now.

Makera, I can say that I am even behind, not behind, sorry, below a 0 and made an aureole for me out of all this. The Saint vs the Godesse? Eve vs Lilith ? Oh! I do not like the vs games, but I truly love this one here, so let's go back to it.

Lizzy and Helven you did a great job on the acorn. Helven I don't know if you are still joking in telling that you were joking but to see the bright and the dark side of a life of errands seems very true to me. However, in China, pig is the most positive symbol, the symbol of good health, happiness and prosperity in the house.

Lizzy I feel your interpretation in regards to the life of service and the ego is just.

Now, I would like to stress that he used Capital Letters for all the little ordinary words of every day, like to sanctify them.

Also, I am not a musician, and I would appreciate a lot to read comments from musicians about this poem. Could it be easely turn into a song? What about its qualities to the music point of view?

So glad to see you here ~ that seems a very insightful observation, Tchocolatl ~ it's as though [somehow] the tiny words, generally understood as being of no consequence, are being honoured ~ and, with that thought, in my mind, symbolically standing in for the errands.

In reality, in sentences, the small words are the connectors, that bring the bigger words of thought together. In his poem, these small words are given the same value in terms of capitalization, in their symbolizing of the errands; as it is the small deeds and errands for others, that bring their lives together [the details of those, separate lives, symbolically found in the bigger, capitalized words]. I hope I haven't lost you with all that. I know clearly what's in my mind as I say it . It's kinda like the movie-within-a-movie concept .

Good point on the pigs potentially representing the "negative" side of errands in life. That's a point that Lightning referred to, the drudge of it all, a life of endless errands, so to speak.

I like what you've said about the pig in Chinese symbology. In fact, no matter where a pig resides, or what it eats, it remains one of the brightest and most intelligent of animals. Yet, they go to slaughter. Maybe it's all those acorns that have inbred intelligence and brightness into them ~ and if man ate more acorns himself, he'd stop sending the pigs to slaughter. Sorry ~ just had to go there !!!

Well, I hope you can return soon [and aren't the hummingbirds wonderful ~ no matter by what name they are called!] and help us grapple with this next long sentence staring at us. I'll check in later tonite, and if nothing has appeared, will make my attempt.

By the way, every time I see your signature, I mean to comment, but don't think of it until after I Submit my post, and see it above mine. I love the simple truths that the Aztecs brought together in those 5/6 words. [As a matter of fact, we could even apply it to all our wanderings here ~ exploring the terrain for explanations and understanding .]

~ Lizzy

Thank You Lizzy,

You understand the symbol of the capital letters as I do. A very Jewish idea this time, isn't it? I mean compare to the Buddhism philosophy of these lines "And Neither The Traffic Nor The Weather Will Bother You In The Least".

And yes pigs are, in reality, very intelligent, nice and.... clean animals! Like Prof. Sohbet said, the way we see the world - pigs or poems is telling more about the observator than about the subject, sometimes. Projection, Freud would say. But a more objective observation is possible if we keep this in mind.

For now, the only lines that really puzzled me are : "Yes, Sir, These Are The Very Gold Rimmed Pair She Left In the Plastic Tray Beside The Dollar Slot Machines."


P.S. : Sohbet, the memory do not retain the reality at all, as we like to think, but only what we need to survive in the best way. This is a true scientific fact. Well, until science discover something else about it.

Hi Tchocolatl~

Take care with 'assumptions', my friend. By the way, for accuracy, the 'projection' you refer to is Carl Jung's domain, not Freud's. Big difference also between figurative/common/proverbial connotations and the literal realities of a subject.
My grandmother's favourite saying was: "Fools and children should never see anything half done".
No offence is implied, hope none will be inferred.

Love,

~Makera

(Things are not always as they appear.)

Dear Tchocolatl ~

Yes! I forgot to include the clean aspect, contrary to their reputation! Thank you for adding that !

I am very short on time, so will only comment that part of my take on that line that puzzles you regarding the glasses is, "I haven't come all this way to fool ya....." [and with all that implies] ~ more later, dear one .

Love,
Lizzy

Oh! What is that? Makera do not worry my sweet nature allows me not to grow bitter for such a foolish thing as getting an answer that does not match at all what I was talking about (now you can blame it on my lack of accuracy, you are number 1 at this, and I'll but my aureola on, and that's all - no problem).

BTW I prefer Carl G. Jung to Sigmund Freud because of the restricting aspects of the sexual theory of S. Freud. He was a famous pionner in the field of psychology and I admire the courage Jung had to had to follow his own path and add synchronicity, animus, anima, and other archetypes, collective unconscious and the Self as the Royal Archetype to the map of psychology. But as far as I know, unconsciousness (individual), transference and projection were used before him, by Freud and his daughter Anna.

Well, maybe I have to notify to the Professor I had in college that he knows nothing about his subject. This course I had on Freud by a French Psychiatrist was not accurate. We should be very careful in beleiving what people are saying. Fortunately it is easy enough to check the truth in this case.

Lizzy, regarding the pigs - very interesting suject - they are living in the poor conditions we know because of human beings. Do I have to say it. When we traited them right they are allright. I heard that the religious interdiction to eat ham is because it is very easy for worms to leave in the smooth flesh of captive pigs and for human to be colonized by eating meat not properly cleaned and cooked. Disgusting, really. Cheers to the wild pigs that do not have to support us. We should eat acorns and leave pigs quiet.

"I haven't come all this way to fool ya....." Good. Yes! Make sense to me. Thanks.

Dear Lizzy,

It appears limpid now that you told me (at least to me also ) that general meaning is "I haven't come all this way to fool ya.....". But you are aware like me about the fact that Leonard Cohen is very careful (accurate, Makera, yes ) when he chooses the words. Therefore, why this particular words :

"These Are The Very Gold Rimmed Pair She Left In the Plastic Tray Beside The Dollar Slot Machines."

The Yes-Sir-No-Sir thing is another interesting matter. Like in the army. Field Commander Cohen to the report? What do you think? (please answer me like when you are short of time you are precise concise and efficient when you are short of time. and this leaves me more time to do this exercise that we both appreciate when I don't (not like today, if you see what I mean ) have so much time to do it.)

And again, because I'm a afraid that my question will be drawn in the nothingness of the last dialogues that do not concern A Life Of Errands at all (I mean mine and other, Lizzy), if some musicians are reading this post, I would like to have their opinions in regard to the music in this poem.

Tchocolatl~

Strange over-reaction!? I am quite aware that Freud was the "pioneer" of psychoanalysis; I simply stated that 'projection' (i.e. of the 'shadow') was C G Jung's domain.

Might be good for some to 'get a grip' around here....a touch of the old "protest to much", methinks.

~Makera

It's a good thing for you that you know about this mechanism of the psyche. You are able name what I see you do since I read your messages.

Tata Makera! have an nice we can!