Single Entity

So, in an attempt to keep us from getting too sophisticated and artsy over here, some naughty riddles! Well, there are non-dirty options. But the dirty ones are so much more fun! :D

Riddle 42:
A small miracle hangs near a man's thigh,
Full under folds. It is stiff, strong,
Bold, brassy, and pierced in front.
When a young lord lifts his tunic
Over his knees, he wants to greet
With the hard head of this hanging creature
The hole it has long come to fill.

Riddle 43:
I heard of something rising in a corner,
Swelling and standing up, lifting its cover.
The proud-hearted bride grabbed at that boneless
Wonder with her hands; the prince's daughter
Covered that swelling thing with a swirl of cloth.

Riddle 60:
I am the hard punch and pull of power,
Bold thrusting out, keen coming in,
Serving my lord. I burrow beneath
A belly, tunneling a tight road.
My lord hurries and heaves from behind
With a catch of cloth. Sometimes he drags me
Hot from the hole, sometimes shoves me
Down the snug road. The southern thruster
Urges me on. Say who I am.

Riddle 52:
The young man came over to the corner
Where he knew she stood. He stepped up,
Eager and agile, lifted his tunic
With hard hands, thrust through her girdle
Something stiff, worked on the standing
One his will. Both swayed and shook.
The young man hurried, was sometimes useful,
Served well, but always tired
Sooner than she, weary of the work.
Under her girdle began to grow
A hero's reward for laying on dough.

Riddle 23
I am a wonderful help to women,
The hope of something to come. I harm
No citizen except my slayer.
Rooted I stand on a high bed.
I am shaggy below. Sometimes the beautiful
Peasant's daughter, an eager-armed,
Proud woman grabs my body,
Rushes my red skin, holds me hard,
Claims my head. The curly-haired
Woman who catches me fast will feel
Our meeting. Her eye will be wet.

Riddle 36:
This strange creature, a stripling boy,
Sought sweet pleasure pumping joy.
His nourishing Bess gave him four
White fountains-murmur and roar
To the boy's delight. A bystander said,
"Alive, that boy will break the downs;
Dead, he'll bind and wrap us round."

Riddle 59:
Sometimes a lady, comely and proud,
Locks me up, boxes me tight--
Sometimes draws me out on demand
And hands me over to her pleasing prince
Who shoves his hard head in my hole,
Slides up while I slip down--
A tight squeeze. If the man who seizes me
Presses with power, something shaggy
Will fill me up, muscle me out--
A precious jewel. Say what I mean.

So, as it's been obvious this week that Jules and I fail at this kind of thing (me more than her), some thoughts:

There's an art show in the Kenyon library that's vaguely disturbing to me. It's a bunch of vintage clothes and zippers encased in rubber, some of it colored. Her artists statement at has some bullshit about the inevitability of gendered sterotypes in clothing or something (well no shit, clothes are made to fit our bodies, and women's bodies look different from men's bodies), but it almost seems like a thing you'd do just because it's possible. I don't know; I'm not an artiste.

What I am, however, is someone who loves vintage clothes, and the quality associated with certain eras. I'm also someone who loves history, and the very personal aspect inherent there (ask me about my geneaology sometime). There was someone who wore all the clothes in this art before, someone who bought that beautiful blue dress for her junior prom, someone who sewed that tiny nightgown for her first child. There are stories associated with the garments, stories that you can read, looking at a dress that's had all it's seams moved out so a little girl could keep wearing it when she was growing.

The thing is, with the clothes encased within rubber like this, you can't see those details. You can't see the little things that make these clothes special, you can't feel them. Fabric is physical thing -- the way it feels is a huge part of if a garment gets worn until it's falling apart, or left in the back of the closet until it's given away.

The over all feeling I get looking at this art is that I'm in a mortuary, looking at things that have been preserved, taken into an unnatural state. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of people in this country who would have gladly bought those clothes to be worn, who would have let them live again. I'm not saying I hated all of it -- the zipper art was really cool, and some of the rubber clothes pieces worked really well -- there were some little boys' dress shirts in rubber squares, with the front ruffles sticking out, and some little girls' dresses with the skirts free from rubber, displayed on a wall like a class photo.

This piece doesn't bother me so much, perhaps because the clothes are freed a little bit from the rubber? But it also had a factor of cute, and amusing about it -- look at them all arranged like they're in thier first class photo. It has an idea behind it.

The pieces I really didn't like were a few full-skirted party dresses whose bodices had been crushed and encased in dyed rubber circles, with the skirts spread all around them. These dresses were meant to be worn. Simply keeping them on the floor like this, they've been denyed thier purpose, thier existence. I wanted to pick them up, hold them up to my shoulders, swirl them around like I was dancing, I wanted to love them. These dresses feel abandoned.

It also kind of killed me that she had some of the best quality and prettiest vintage clothes that I have seen, and you can't just buy that stuff anymore -- it's really expensive. So to see it encased in rubber, where sure, it will be preserved, but it won't ever be worn again, it was saddening.

Here are a few links to look at more pictures and a review -- the children's nightgowns are particularly sad, to me.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9901E3DD1E31F934A25750C0A9609C8B63

http://cowlesgallery.com/archive/weinstock06.html

http://www.davidsongalleries.com/artists/weinstock/weinstock.html

Yes, I’m alive and still have things to say. Last week was kind of crazy with the papers and the ridiculous Latin poetry. But this weekend, I got to relax and cook medieval food with friends! Pictures (by Carolyn) and recipes:

First, a picture of me with glasses, which most people have not seen before, since I don’t wear them regularly. My eyes are getting worse, though, so I figure I should start, you know…actually using them. Carolyn says I look "matronly" in them. Do I really?


This is my medieval cookbook with…almonds in it? Don’t ask me why there are almonds. I wasn’t responsible for those. Note the Middle English text above the modern English interpretation of the recipe. Awesome, no?


The mushroom and leek soup was very good. To make: chop 1 lb. mushrooms and 3 leeks and combine with 1 cup beef broth, a pinch of saffron, ¼ tsp. ground ginger, ½ tsp. ground cinnamon, ¼ tsp. ground white pepper, and ½ tsp. ground cloves. Simmer for about 10 minutes.


Rastons! This is a stuffed bread loaf that is very, very good. It makes an excellent appetizer, even for non-medieval meals. To make: get a bread loaf (the recipe says a round loaf, but as you can see, ours was not round and it worked perfectly well), cut off the top third of the loaf and tear out the soft bread on the inside. Tear the soft bread into pieces, toss with two tablespoons of melted butter and dried herbs (we used rosemary and basil; at the Bors Head, they used poppy seeds. Both were good.), and place back in the loaf. Bake for about ten minutes at 350°.


Chicken in rose sauce (note the awesome garnish, handiwork of moi). This was our masterpiece, and it turned out better than I expected. It did taste like roses! It had some very interesting flavors: it’s made with almonds, sugar and rose petals, so it was a very sweet dish, which is unexpected for an entrée, but good. It actually went really well with the buttered greens, surprisingly. The sweetness and the butteriness were quite tasty together. Wifey even had two servings of the vegetables, and she never eats vegetables!