∞I have never known anyone who has taken a beating.
Everyone of my acquaintance has been a champion in everything.
And I, who have so often been shabby, filthy, contemptible,
So often unaccountably parasitic,
Inexcusably dirty,
I, who so often have not had the patience to take a bath,
I,…
“A degree of stability returned to northern India with the establishment of the Gupta dynasty, which lasted from 320 AD to roughly 550 AD. Its second king, Samudragupta, undertook a whole series of campaigns, eliminating small kingdoms that had emerged during the rundown of Kushana rule and he extended his dominion into the upper reaches of the Indus, and some distance beyond, a feat of Indian arms unequalled since the reign of Asoka. The Guptas seem deliberately to have imitated the Mauryans, with one notable exception: they were staunch supporters of the Hindu gods. To demonstrate his control of ‘all between the oceans’ Samudragupta staged an Aryan horse sacrifice.
“The rite was a perfect way for Samudragupta to demonstrate the extent of his authority, since it descended from a practice in remote times when a chieftain asserted his ownership of herds and the grounds on which they grazed. When such an early ruler wished to announce himself as a paramount chief, he would do so by letting loose his best stallion. This splendid animal was allowed to wander wherever it liked, followed by a guard of young warriors, ready to defeat anyone who might attempt to capture the horse. The Gupta king’s horse sacrifice included such a yearlong roam as well as rituals designed to purify both the horse and the ruler.
“Before setting the horse free, the prospective victim was washed in a pool while a dog was killed and thrown in the water. Then the Gupta warriors accompanying the stallion made sure that there was no contact with mares, or further immersion in rivers or streams, during the year it wandered the world. Towards the end of the year a huge pyre was erected, and Samudragupta underwent several observances in readiness for the sacrifice, which lasted three days. On the second day, when the actual slaughter took place, the king drove in a war chariot drawn by the sacrificial stallion and the other horses. The victim was anointed by Samudragupta’s three foremost wives, and its tail decorated with pearls. At the sacrifice of the horse, a sheep and a goat were also killed. The stallion was then smothered to death, presumably to avoid damaging its body, whereupon the king’s first wife, his queen, symbolically coupled with the sacrificed horse under covers, while the royal court gave her encouragement with obscene remarks. Afterwards, the victim was dismembered and burned on the pyre.”
Author: Arthur Cotterell
Title: Asia: A Concise History
Arnold Newman, Violins, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1941, Gelatin silver print, printed later.
liam, if i could “like” your whole blog, i would.
∞Rosalina. Woman.
You constantly revile me with your singular lack of vision. Be aware, there is an essential truth and beauty in all things. From the death throes of a speared gazelle to the damaged smile of a freeway homeless. But that does not mean that the invisibility of something implies its lack of being. Though simpleton babies foolishly believe the person before them vanishes when they cover their eyes during a hateful game of peek-a-boo, this is a fallacy. And so it is that the unseen dusty build up that accumulates behind the DVD shelves in the rumpus room exists also. This is unacceptable.
I will tell you this Rosalina, not as a taunt or a threat but as an evocation of joy. The joy of nothingness, the joy of the real. I want you to be real in everything you do. If you cannot be real, then a semblance of reality must be maintained. A real semblance of the fake real, or “real”. I have conquered volcanoes and visited the bitter depths of the earth’s oceans. Nothing I have witnessed, from lava to crustacean, assailed me liked the caked debris haunting that small plastic soap hammock in the smaller of the bathrooms. Nausea is not a sufficient word. In this regard, you are not being real.
Now we must turn to the horrors of nature. I am afraid this is inevitable. Nature is not something to be coddled and accepted and held to your bosom like a wounded snake. Tell me, what was there before you were born? What do you remember? That is nature. Nature is a void. An emptiness. A vacuum. And speaking of vacuum, I am not sure you’re using the retractable nozzle correctly or applying the ‘full weft’ setting when attending to the lush carpets of the den. I found some dander there.
I have only listened to two songs in my entire life. One was an aria by Wagner that I played compulsively from the ages of 19 to 27 at least 60 times a day until the local townsfolk drove me from my dwelling using rudimentary pitchforks and blazing torches. The other was Dido. Both appalled me to the point of paralysis. Every quaver was like a brickbat against my soul. Music is futile and malicious. So please, if you require entertainment while organizing the recycling, refrain from the ‘pop radio’ I was affronted by recently. May I recommend the recitation of some sharp verse. Perhaps by Goethe. Or Schiller. Or Shel Silverstein at a push.
The situation regarding spoons remains unchanged. If I see one, I will kill it.
That is all. Do not fail to think that you are not the finest woman I have ever met. You are. And I am including on this list my mother and the wife of Brad Dourif (the second wife, not the one with the lip thing). Thank you for listening and sorry if parts of this note were smudged. I have been weeping.
Your money is under the guillotine.
Herzog.
