Rambling about Measure for Measure and natural law

every time I read this play I get more sympathetic to Angelo. He's less a villain than a schmo. Shakes really seems to be painting a man who lacks the power to fight the whims of lust - is Measure a Greek play with Fate played by Cupid?) .  Of course there's Angelo's previous dealings with Mariana, and his willingness to perjure himself and let others suffer in his defense, to keep him in the villain camp.  But he reminds me more of Hamlet's Claudio than of an Iago or Aaron.  He does evil but spends more time expressing guilt and conflict over it than in reveling in his misdeeds.. I know this play can be read as a political critique against Puritan morality in a time when the Theatre itself was under direct attack, but I wonder if there's something to a reading of the play as an exploration of natural forces...  The Natural Law above all expressed through lust and love, the state below becoming sick and corrupt the more it seeks to oppose the natural law.. I don't know what this says bout Duke Vincentio who (if Lucio is entirely false) is somehow above the whims of lust, his "complete breast" impenetrable by the dribbling dart (graphic!) of cupid...  but maybe that a complete philosophical education renders Man harmonious with nature, sort of a zen read? He isn't immune to love's pulls since he eventually proposes to Isabella (who is about to join a convent!), but since, unlike Angelo, the feelings that lead to that proposal never interfere with his execution of duty, and comes at the final scene, maybe it's an illustration of lust successfully sublimated into moral action..

Ukraine

In Ukraine they are dancing in the square
with fire around them
the human chain passes
combustible objects
to feed the flame
tires and boards and fear
while wolves howl
in the darkness
their teeth
like pistols


far away writers say "in this place the people made fires"
"they became cold easily and could not survive as we"
"so they burnt their homes and children"
"they had two heads"



seems silly but
read Herodotus

Objectification done right.

your ass:

I don't want to touch or tap it so much as I want to build a house of it - north of the city overlooking the Delaware, and live in it for 20-30 years 
then take an apartment, sell it for a quarter billion to the state 
as an architectural landmark.

• Smooth (laminar) air flow around blunt obstacles may result in the formation of vorticies (the plural of vortex) that snap off or shed with a characteristic frequency. This process is called vortex shedding and is another means by which sound waves are formed. This is how a whistle or flute produces sound. Aslo the aeolian harp effect of singing power lines and fluttering venetian blinds.

phhheeeeeeew

feeeeee

phweeeeeeeeeee

galway on flute, vivaldi's 4 seasons

i can hear it

even in a vacuum

(quote from physics.info)

This year I spent time searching the road and yard and trees for glimpses of the foxes
twice I saw a large fox standing quite close to the house, across the alley behind, at the edge of the grass. once I saw what looked like two fox pups, chasing a skunk over the awful cement barriers of the parking lot where students practice driving.
Most glimpses were an accident.
Many times I waited, watching, and saw nothing. Many times I failed to wait or watch, while they hunted.
Many times I'll think at 4 am, are they well, will they return, in summer?

great works led to satellites falling round earth

allowing me to whisper to you

miles away

you to hear me

and the same raindrop

to fall on both our ears

why not the same

though it startles me

and you hear music

Now rain is irregular at the windows
freezing on the pear tree like early blossoms
inevitably somewhere a car engine strikes its music - crescendo - decrescendo -
and i want to explain everything: why rain makes me nervous at night
why my words don't ring true on rereading
why i want to escape, or remain

these reasons are fleeting
and when i've said them they seem incomplete - like they are spinning themselves
so i leave them for after

and try to imagine a better way to say complex things, like that the branches of pear I know are new and green seem as dark as the branches which are established,

or a rush of warmth that comes of touching, before there's been time to evaluate plans, or desires, or conscience. Or some simple thing like one rain drop hitting glass with a note which might be G and disappears so quickly

until I stop imagining and listen

what words then

is silence life or death