Mama Black Widow, Mama moaned, “Thet fool chile.”

“But, God, you taught me to love and to help everybody regardless of race and color. And it was you, Lord, who directed me to go everywhere I was needed. You sent me to the Northside to lay my healing hands on a poor white spinster sick in mind and body. And some black lying snake in this church is trying to show my good works as evil. And about the church’s money, you know how I sacrifice many of my comforts to save church money. I would never steal the church’s money for—”

At the end of our first week in Chicago a snowstorm hid the grimy bleakness beneath three feet of glamorous whiteness. Cousin Bunny made Papa smile for the first time in Chicago. She gave him a pile of winter work clothes that her dead husband had worn to work sewers and to collect city garbage for twenty years. Then she had Soldier Boy, an acquaintance of hers who was a snow scuffler, pick up Papa to help shovel snow from the sidewalks of commercial businesses for a fee.

Continue reading “Mama Black Widow, Mama moaned, “Thet fool chile.””

Star of the Unborn, this soft but sharp, feeble but shrilly screeching eruption of human rage rising from the extensive turnip field made me forget everything else

The Ancestress asked permission to touch my hand. I respectfully surrendered it to her icy smooth fingers which, no matter how impeccable they looked, felt horrible.

At this point GR³ threw in a remark with her sonorous but suggestive contralto. “I remember those petrified cakes distinctly. I liked them better than the Sympaians of today.”

But suddenly he broke off and sagged down in his armchair, and his face seemed to shrivel up as he said to me with gloomy foreboding, “He only promises it, but the Others will bring it to pass.”

Under the screen of my numbing need of sleep I felt a radiant happiness. “It’s true then,” I mused. “The great naturalistic stupidity and its consequences were finally conquered?” The Grand Bishop refilled my glass with great deliberation. The crystal hummed like a bell under the impact of the golden wine. I had longed for another drink but had not dared to ask for it.

Continue reading “Star of the Unborn, this soft but sharp, feeble but shrilly screeching eruption of human rage rising from the extensive turnip field made me forget everything else”

When beetles fight these battles in a bottle with their paddles and the bottle’s on a poodle and the poodle’s eating noodles … Malbolge Fox in Socks, Sir!

D'`$M]oJIlG{EyUvSu?bq/M-JJ*kG'3gee/bx`<*)sxqYotsrk1oQPlkd*hg`edcbaZ~^W?[ZSRvuUNSLQPONGkK-IBA@dDC%;:?8\<|{981Uv.3,1*N.-m%*#GFgf$#zy?}_{t:xwputm3qpRQ.-e+ihJI_%c\a`_X|VUZSXQub

(Fox Socks Box Knox)

D'`rq]!n[}kFVh0vA@Q1a/o^mJIk54&feec!Q,<{)9xwvotm3Tpinglkd*hg`edc\"CBX]\UTx;WPUTMq4PONGLEDhHGF(>C<A@9]=6|:32V65.32+*N('&+*)('~D$#"!aw={zs9wvXnm32poQglkjib(feGcba`Y}@\UZYXWPOs65KPIHGkKDIBAe?'C<;@?>=6Z:9876v43,+Op.',%*#G'~f|{"y?w_utyxq7XWsrqpoh.ONdiba'eG]baZ_X|i

(Knox in box. Fox in socks.)

D'`_$">n6Y|{i1wv4Qt+rp;o&JH)5ED2|dc!bwO*)Lxwvotm3Tpinglkd*hg`edc\"CBX]\UTx;WPUTMqKJONGkKJIHA@dDCB;@?87[;:z870Tu3,10).'K+*j"F&f$#"!x}v<;yxqYutm3Tpinglkd*hgfH%F\[`_^W{>=YXQuO7SLKJnHGLKJIBAe(DCBA:^8=<;492V6/u-,+Op.-&+$)"F&feBz!xw|uzs9wpXn4lqpi/Pfejchg`&q

(Knox on fox in socks in box.)

D'`r^LKnIZXWi1Cwu@,P=M.KmI$Z(FED$BS?-}`{)LrZvonm3qpoQPlkd*bg`e^]#aCY}]\[T<RvVUTSRQPImMFj-CBG@dDCB;@?87[5{9810/S32r0/.'K%$H"!~}Cd"!x}v<;sxwvon4UTpong-NMcba'eGc\[!Y^WV[ZSwWVUTM5KoOHMFj-CgGFEDCB;_?>=<|{92V6/.3210)(L,+$j"'~D$dc!x>|uzyxqpo5Vrkjoh.Okdib(`H^c\"!~}@V[TYXWVOsMLp3ImM/KJIBAeED&B;_?!=654X876v43,+Op.',%*#G'~f|{"y?w_utyxq7XWsrqpoh.ONdiba'e^Fb[`_X|{>=YXQuOTSLp3ONMLEDhHGFED=%;_?!=6549270T4t,P0)o'&Jk#"!E}${Ab~w|u;yrZvutsl2jihmle+cb(`edcbaZ~AWVzg

(Socks on Knox and Knox in box. Fox in socks on box on Knox.)

Continue reading “When beetles fight these battles in a bottle with their paddles and the bottle’s on a poodle and the poodle’s eating noodles … Malbolge Fox in Socks, Sir!”

The Sorrows of Priapus, We Weep Because The Human Race Is No Better Than It Is

Chapter i, (∩`-´)⊃━☆゚.*・。゚

Man must be classed among the brutes, for he is still a very awkward and salacious biped. What shape he will assume in the future is vague. There are many traits of early man he has lost, and it is plain that he is much more given to falsehood, robbery and lawsuits than the primitive. The first two-legged man scratched himself because he had an itch. Men now lie and steal for this pleasure. Primeval natures wallowed without thought, but soon as men began thinking how pleasant it was to rub themselves and to have deliriums from mud, they employed their minds to achieve what paleolithic mankind did without being lascivious.

Men lie, not alone for profit, but to root in Circe’s mire. No pigmy or cave-dweller wears more bizarre or dirty raiment than present-day man. He is often as offensive as the gland on the back of the Brazil peccary. He would rather tell a lie than the truth because his sole purpose is to be a grub.

He is the most ridiculous beast on the earth, and the reason for this is his mind and his pudendum. He sacks nations, or throws away his reason to see the petticoat of Aspasia or Helen empurpled by murex or the lichen at Madeira. The procreative organ in the camel is behind, but in man it is in front, and unless he is too fat to look over his belly, he pays more attention to this gibbous organ than to his arms, his talus, or anything else. He frequently forgets how his arms look, and is surprised to find a wen on his jaw, and he rarely knows whether his pupils are brown or ochreous, but he is always mindful of his testes hanging between his legs like folly.

Continue reading “The Sorrows of Priapus, We Weep Because The Human Race Is No Better Than It Is”

L’angelo caduto diventa un diavolo maligno

“Oh, it is not thus—not thus,” interrupted the being; “yet such must be the impression conveyed to you by what appears to be the purport of my actions. Yet I seek not a fellow-feeling in my misery. No sympathy may I ever find. When I first sought it, it was the love of virtue, the feelings of happiness and affection with which my whole being overflowed, that I wished to be participated. But now, that virtue has become to me a shadow, and that happiness and affection are turned into bitter and loathing despair, in what should I seek for sympathy? I am content to suffer alone, while my sufferings shall endure: when I die, I am well satisfied that abhorrence and opprobrium should load my memory. Once my fancy was soothed with dreams of virtue, of fame, and of enjoyment. Once I falsely hoped to meet with beings, who, pardoning my outward form, would love me for the excellent qualities which I was capable of bringing forth. I was nourished with high thoughts of honour and devotion. But now vice has degraded me beneath the meanest animal. No crime, no mischief, no malignity, no misery, can be found comparable to mine. When I call over the frightful catalogue of my deeds, I cannot believe that I am he whose thoughts were once filled with sublime and transcendant visions of the beauty and the majesty of goodness. But it is even so; the fallen angel becomes a malignant devil. Yet even that enemy of God and man had friends and associates in his desolation; I am quite alone.

– Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

On ðone ærystan dæg þæs [monðes] bið ealra haligra tid

OE Old Eng. Martyrol. (Julius) 1 Nov. 243 On ðone ærystan dæg þæs [monðes] bið ealra haligra tid. OE Wulfstan Canons of Edgar (Junius) (1972) liv. 13 Ærest on easteræfen, and oðre siðe on candelmæsseæfen, þriddan siðe on ealra halgena mæsseæfen. 1325 Chron. Robert of Gloucester (Calig.) l. 8601 (MED) A sterre þat comete icluped is At alle halwen tid him ssewede. 1447 in S. A. Moore Lett. & Papers J. Shillingford (1871) i. 16 (MED) The morun tuysday, al Halwyn yeven. 1548 in J. G. Nichols Chron. Grey Friars 57 This yere before Alhallontyd was sett up the howse for the markyt folke in Newgate market for to waye melle in. 1556 in J. G. Nichols Chron. Grey Friars 17 Thys yere the towne of Depe was tane..on Halhalon evyn. 1616 W. Shakespeare Measure for Measure (1623) ii. i. 121 Clo. Was’t not at Hallowmas Master Froth? Fro. Allhallond-Eue. 1653 I. Walton Compl. Angler 222 About All-hollantide, when you see men ploughing up heath-ground.

I have gone out, a possessed witch,
haunting the black air, braver at night;
dreaming evil, I have done my hitch

over the plain houses, light by light:
lonely thing, twelve-fingered, out of mind.
A woman like that is not a woman, quite.

I have been her kind.

I have found the warm caves in the woods,
filled them with skillets, carvings, shelves,
closets, silks, innumerable goods;

fixed the suppers for the worms and the elves:
whining, rearranging the disaligned.
A woman like that is misunderstood.

I have been her kind.

I have ridden in your cart, driver,
waved my nude arms at villages going by,
learning the last bright routes, survivor

where your flames still bite my thigh
and my ribs crack where your wheels wind.
A woman like that is not ashamed to die.

I have been her kind.

– Anne Sexton