Once more into the bleach?

Mrs Clinton, whose political activities continue to draw interest, is said to be looking forward to presenting remarks tomorrow on the international nuclear accord with Iran. On the same day, two rivals for the other Party's Presidential nomination also plan to cast a distinguishing light upon themselves, by denouncing the likely fail-ure of the same instrument, to "obliterate" Iran, an objective to which she, herself, famously gave voice when losing her campaign against the current President in 2008. 

Possibly we shall see if copyright applies to the public musings of a candidate scorned, but of greater interest here is whether they ever expire. Asking, as she is, to carry forward the implementation of this accord, people may wonder if she actually means to do it. They can expect her to be adamant again about something, therefore, and so these new remarks may well carry a thrilling, more than a nuanced definition, unless modulated by timeless ambiguities of statecraft -- a self-deflating anti-climax, on split-screen with Ted Cruz. Has she negligently entrapped American diplomacy in another pissing contest with the warmakers, or has she assimilated the genuine power of the quiet determination which produced this pact?

Her listeners will be attuned to a much deeper principle than sincerity. They will want to know if she can voice their inherent embodiment of the conduct of peace, and desist from abusing this virtue as shameful, this aspiration as naïve, this commitment as treacherous, and its triumph - no more than conditional, as it always is - as false. It is upon her comprehension of this arms accord that they will assess her credibility, not by vows to raise the wagers of Republicans. She is on the spot she asked for. The greatest light is ready for her close-up.

Gillian Laub

Tel Aviv, 2007

Plus que ça change

It was the healthy side of Cowper's self-distrust that it never allowed his imagination to become self-indulgent or self-deceptive, as the roman-tic imagination was so often tempted to be. With modest amusement he would prick the bubble of his daydream, and turn towards home.

On this date some years ago

I ventured where I am. I do

not paint pictures and I do

not write poetry; I turn to-

ward my place of origin, as

even painters and poets do,

but my home is many places.

Lord David Cecil

The Stricken Deer

  The Life of Cowper

Constable & Co., Ltd., 1929©

Richard Diebenkorn

1922 - 1993

undated

Combed by moonlight

harvest
vine of
moscato
ottonel

   If I could be a mirror
            you could see yourself in me,
   and I could see you always
            your essence and your beauty;
   if I could be a comb
            slowly, slowly I'd begin
   to part your hair,
            combing it again and again!
   If I were a little wind
            all of me would press
   against your breast
            blowing sweetly,
   and at last if I were sleep
            I would come at night
   to bind your sweet
            eyes in the dark.


   





































Athanasios Christopoulous
1772  - 1847
Desire
Karen van Dyck
  translation
Peter Constantine, Rachel Hadas,
  Edmund Keeley, and Karen van Dyck
  editors
The Greek Poets
  Homer to the Present
Norton & Company, 2010©
op. cit.

Android photograph, Laurent
September, 2015

More sneakers

    Aylan Kurdi, not expecting to
    become the most famous child
    in the world, if not the il-
    luminating messenger of link-
    age of populations uprising 
    across the entire Northern
    Hemisphere, has given Hermes
    unforgettable new shoes. Be-
    yond doubt, infants born to-
    day will grow into sneakers
    with a higher sense of life,
    the treasure they convey be-
    ing declared at every portal.

For those who suppose all things to be in motion conceive the greater part of nature to be a mere receptacle; and they say that there is a penetrating power which passes through all this, and is the instrument of creation in all, and is the subtlest and swiftest element; for if it were not the subtlest, and a power which none can keep out, and also the swiftest, passing by other things as if they were standing still, it could not penetrate through the moving universe ..
But I, being an enthusiastic disciple, have been told in a mystery that the justice of which I am speaking is also the cause of the world: now a cause is that because of which anything is created ..

            And some one comes and whispers in my ear 
            that justice is rightly so called because 
            partaking of the nature of the cause, and 
            I begin, after hearing what he has said, 
            to interrogate him gently: Well, my excel-
            lent friend, say I, if all this be true, 
            I still want to know what is justice. 

Thereupon they think that I ask tiresome questions, and am leaping over the barriers, and have been already answered, and they try to satisfy me with one derivation after another, and at length they quarrel. 

                 For one of them says that justice 
                 is the sun, and that he only is 
                 the piercing and burning element 
                 which is the guardian of nature. 
                 And when I joyfully repeat this 
                 beautiful notion, I am answered 
                 by the satirical remark, What,  
                 is there no justice in the world 
                 when the sun is down?

And when I earnestly beg my questioner to tell me his own honest opinion, he says, "Fire in the abstract"; but this is not very intelligible. Another says, "No, not fire in the abstract, but the abstraction of heat in the fire." Another man professes to laugh at all this, and says, justice is mind, for mind, as they say, has absolute power, and mixes with nothing, and orders all things, and passes through all things. At last, my friend, I find myself in far greater perplexity about the nature of justice than I was before I began to learn.

                          But still I am 

                          of opinion that 

                          the name, which 

                          has led me into 

                          this digression, 

                          was given to jus-

                          tice for the rea-

                          sons which I have 

                          mentioned.

Plato

Cratylus

Dialogue of Socrates

  with Hermogenes and

  Cratylus

  [fragments]

360 BC

Benjamin Jowett

  translation

Massachusetts In-

  stitute of Technology©

Photographs Reuters

September 4, 2015

Port of Piraeus

Rail hub Hungary

Macedonian border

"They won't let us talk about God"

   The tragic open secret of
   a political party's fabri-
   cation of religious perse-
   cution, on the basis of a
   failure of its bigotries,
   is not remotely only an A-
   merican dilemma. But it's
   also not a proud American
   tradition, unless we mean
   the term as Homer did, as
   the harbinger of contempt.



      If others in the same glass better see,
      'Tis for themselves they look, but not for me:
      For my salvation must its doom receive
      Not from what others, but what I believe.



   I'd go into the dock with
   Dryden, before all the Ju-
   lius Streichers ever call-
   ed to lead their movement.

























John Dryden
Steven N. Zwicker and
  David Bywaters, editors
Selected Poems
  Religio Laici
1682
Penguin Books, 2001©
op. cit.


   

The peacewreckers gather

Word has spread that radical

Right Wing opposition to the

worldwide consensus embodied

in the arms accord with Iran,

just assured yesterday of su-

perfluous passage through a

gauntlet in the American Con-

gress, is regrouping predic-

tably in many murky corners,

to say nothing of the usual

NASCAR grandstand habituated

by Republicans. 

What could be more uplifting

proof of this long-sought vin-

dication of worldwide hope,

than the company which renoun-

ces it? By all means, vigil-

ance against these ostenta-

tious patriots, of one place

or another, simply remains a

part of any gentler regime.

Something about the gift to

be simple.

Now, as hysterics in Jerusalem

and Washington flog the Ameri-

can people to betray this ac-

cord as fully and as fast as

possible, and sharpen daggers

endlessly behind their gaudy

arras, humanity's honest watch

requires its own escalations,

in earnest outreach to peace-

ful institutions everywhere.

If this means diverting phil-

anthropies and investments

from their decadent ruts, the

road itself rewards the trek.

Jennifer Steinhauer

Republicans Weigh New Ways

  to Upend Iran Nuclear Deal

The New York Times©

September 2, 2015

Photograph Jack Alexander

Photograph Maurice Chalfin

Photograph Gustave Roud

I did not get through Proust this Summer

This is even actually partly

a sort of honest confession,

so it would be best to stop,

while embarrassment might be

minimal. Again I didn't even

pursue Proust. Now it's time

to close up the cottage, and

be grateful for having spent

the season without having to

assess it, ever after. Maybe

I avoid Proust, to avoid the

sacrifice of associating any

span of time with more poig-

nancy than it already bears.

In Peru he had said, Johnny,

you have just graduated from

one of the finest universit-

ies in America, and you are

illiterate.

That, I did happen to read,

this Summer: one classmate,

chiding another, precisely

for not knowing Proust. Dur-

ing endless tramps through 

the slums of Lima, no less. 

Warned me off redundantly, 

that did. Better, I think,

a sting than a splinter as

the prize of Summer's end.

John Hopkins 
The White Nile Diaries
I.B. Tauris, 2014©

ii  Hervé Guibert

Sunday Chopin

    Texture and structure,
    élan of the polonaise.

    Donegal tweed for the
    pocket T, for wit and
    bonhommie. A profile,
    for remembrance, just
    a thoughtful courtesy.























Patrik Podkonicky
Manfred Langer, photography