"Poetry comes at things through particulars, by means of images, and it doesn't deal so easily with generalities. Its mode is to cherish without limit. You could say it is idolatrous art. Some poems, the great poems, are true to their specific situations deep down, but they also have a universal quality that lets them live again and again, even in apparently unrelated circumstances." -Galway Kinnell
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
17
As she gave birth, she screamed out that all who heard that scream would suffer...
From "The Pangs of Ulster" from the remscela, or pre-tales, of the Irish saga The Tain. In this story, a goddess, Macha, marries a landowner, who foolishly boasts that she can outrun the king's chariot and horses. Macha is heavily pregnant and her pangs begin as she is forced to begin the race. She wins, but curses the men of Ulster: from then on, they will suffer birth-pangs for five days and four nights in their times of greatest difficulty.
She wins the race and gives birth to twins. In some versions of the tale, one of the children is a horse.
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From "The Pangs of Ulster" from the remscela, or pre-tales, of the Irish saga The Tain. In this story, a goddess, Macha, marries a landowner, who foolishly boasts that she can outrun the king's chariot and horses. Macha is heavily pregnant and her pangs begin as she is forced to begin the race. She wins, but curses the men of Ulster: from then on, they will suffer birth-pangs for five days and four nights in their times of greatest difficulty.
She wins the race and gives birth to twins. In some versions of the tale, one of the children is a horse.
Watch out! Creativity and power are dangerous!
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