Jimmy Mo Mhíle Stór

A friend introduced me to this beautiful Irish song, Jimmy Mo Mhíle Stór. It just gets better with each listening.

The title translates poetically from Irish to "Jimmy My Thousand Times Beloved." Some translate it to "Jimmy My Thousand Treasures," which is an attempt at direct translation, but doesn't really make much sense. Or they drop the word mhíle altogether, and wind up with "Jimmy My Treasure," which is rough, but at least accurate to the original meaning of the phrase, if not precise.

The song is a monologue by a girl whose love has gone to the sea, and she waits every day for his return.



This particular rendition is my favorite of the ones I've heard. It is sung by Kathleen MacInnes. Her performance is incomparable. The song is a waltz, but the musical phrasing is constantly adjusted throughout the song, following the lead of the singer. Ms. MacInnes's voice has a genuine, natural quality that gives the song a vivid sense of personality. Her phrasing is deliberate and unchained, following the voice of the sea, or a desperate, inconsolable young woman who refuses to believe that her Jimmy is lost. Nothing in the song's lyrics actually suggest he is lost, but the very fact that she's lamenting his absence, and he at the mercy of the sea, urges you to that conclusion.

Somali wild ass born at Zoo

Yes, that is an actual headline from stltoday.com today.

"The St. Louis Zoo welcomed its first newborn Somali wild ass."

Whoohoo! I'm looking forward to a wild ass birthday party!

Word puzzles

These sentences are all grammatically correct. A friend of mine introduced me to the Buffalo buffalo one, and I found the rest in Wikipedia...

This sentence demonstrates lexical ambiguity. See if you can work it out before you read the Wikipedia article.

Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.

This stream of words lacks punctuation. See if you can insert the correct punctuation to make sense of it.

James while Jon had had had had had had had had had had had a better effect on the teacher

And these are examples of Garden Path sentences:

"The old man the boat."

"The man who whistles tunes pianos."

"The cotton clothing is made of grows in Mississippi."

Jason Bredle

I am exhibiting signs of early-onset Bredlemania, and I have Jason Bredle to thank for that. I have been practically glued to his work, what I can find of it on the Internet, ever since I discovered it on Friday.

I first learned of him while scanning through the online content of the Missouri Review. There are three of his poems posted there. His prosaic style and brilliant sense of humor captivated me. I immediately started scouring the Internet for more. Found his website, which pointed me to his blogs, which are hysterical, found Aurora Borealis Beard Fire Party, which made me laugh and enjoy the outstanding wordplays and rhythms, found The Crossfire, the Breathtaking Explosions, O, which is so complex, and so efficient in every line, that I haven't even found halfway of it yet, and then I found The Idiot's Guide to Faking Your Own Death and Moving to Mexico.

This last one is probably the most intense, although I am probably only saying that because I haven't fully parsed any of his works yet, but this one I am starting to crack the shell of, and it is everything you could hope a work of art is: it is moving, it is sad, it is funny, it is refreshing, it's challenging, it's musical, it's weird, it's exciting, it's devastating, it's demanding, it's actually easy to relate to. It's all of these things and more.

A work of art is best when it entices the audience to explore it, and as they explore it, they are rewarded at every layer with new insight, emotion, and a feeling of intellectual accomplishment.

Bredle opens the poem with an ostensibly humorous stanza, which disarmed me into thinking this would be a fun piece, like the ones I read in the Missouri Review.

Every few seconds I check the Bible
to see what Jesus is saying about me. The answer
is always nothing. Sometimes

Note how the last word of the last line pulls you into the next stanza, while also providing a funny nonsequitur. There is plenty more to say about this stanza, like the surreal impression of someone checking the Bible every few seconds for anything, let alone the possibility of new information that wasn't already there, or the use of in media res, and there may be something going on with the s sound there, but I haven't figured it out yet, and the break on the second line is curious. Broken on the period, the rhythm is perhaps too conventional, makes the stanza soft, but...

My point is actually that even though I feel like I've barely scratched the surface of this poem, it is written so exquisitely, that I can't hold back from blogging about it already. It suddenly hit me today as I was re-reading it for the Nth time, o no, is he contemplating suicide? He has before? Is he grappling with his belief in God? Remembering someone who has died? Did they commit suicide? The language goes back and forth, creating paradoxes, I guess such is life, he is confused and, as the reader, I feel the confusion, and yet... The title of this poem is ...Faking Your Own Death... Is he joshing me? That would be kind of humiliating because I am really feeling empathetic for this author the more I am reading this, but perhaps the humiliation is intentional, like he feels it too. He can't believe his own thoughts, and feels astonished by them. He writes...

I've gone forever. I know! That's what I thought
too. This is the story, but in this language, this
is not the story. I am eating red ice,

harvesting a field of knives. I am speaking
the language in which heaven and earth mean
the same, in which sky and white mean the same.

Ah, I have a lot more reading to do on this poem before I feel comfortable with my understanding of it, but I can surely tell you that it is art of an exceptional quality.

I checked Left Bank Books, but they didn't have Bredle's book, Standing in Line for the Beast, so I had to order a copy. Should be here before the week is done.

Wondergrrrl

Jason Bredle is a clever man, and he's into Unicorns, and stuff. Wondergrrrl is one of his blogs. You will not regret reading every entry in it. I recommend you actually start at the beginning.

The Washing of the Hands

I used to wash my hands less, but now I wash them more. Life can be such a wondrous journey.

This is a photo of my actual hands being washed. I felt compelled to wash them after changing the cat's litter. I think it raises some interesting questions: Am I washing my hands, or are they washing each other? Do other people refill their Softsoap containers, or do they just buy new ones? How exactly did I take a picture of my own hands? Is this appropriate content for the Internet?

I look forward to your comments.