yeah especially the green feathers, you could almost replace those with watercress or fern.. i hesitate to give it the face of the green man, but the thought presents itself.. there's really a whole aesthetic of biophilia 'woodsqueer' throughout the whole book which is wonderful..
lq > That Serpent as Messiah sounds like Quetzalcoatl - > John > > At 05:37 AM 10/27/2005, you wrote: > >have been reading Hakim Bey's book Gothick Institutions > >for the last couple of days, and was fascinated, blown away > >really, by the entirety of it. and then something curious just > >now. i was reading an article called _The Language of Birds: > >Some Notes on Chance and Divination_ by Dale Pendell > >and I ran across something quite remarkable or maybe > >perhaps only slightly remarkable, but interesting to > >me, and perhaps to the group. > > > >There's some discussion of a Linnaean Hermeticism within the book > >in the section on Erasmus Darwin so I found this quite appropriate. > > > >First Bey's black violets which is VIIII in his > >Eclogues (dedicated to the ghost of Warren G. Sherwood > >(d. 1947) > > > >black violets > > > >Satyr with boner draws curtain back > >to reveal scene now green with moss > >algae snails & deep shade > > a Green Messiah > >not descending from clouds so much as > >rising from Earth, from Hollow Earth > > > >or Jesus as a snake > > > >an ecology of the unnatural > > > >a fishbowl we're > >trying to escape even at the risk > >that pure air will choke us. > > > >== > > > >Now I think most of you know I'm a pretty irreligious > >and for the most part blasphemous sort of fellow > >so when I came across this I kind of had to shift > >out of my usual ruts and fall into a more Norman > >O. Brownian kind of reading of 'Jesus'.. > >I liked the poem and related it in passing to the > >context of the eclogues and book. I did I will admit have > >a flash from the film Lair of the White Worm > >of a snake on the cross.. I also was reminded > >of an image I used to get which is more normal > >for me which was of a kind of cathedral where > >these erotic slave nuns are sort of imprisoned > >in a cathdral using crucifix dildoes and then a giant > >satyr breaks in through the wall and lets in pure > >light and birds and petals etc and frees these deludees.. > >something from a dream i had.. the emancipation of the nuns or some > >such.. pretty crass.. the usual.. anyway > >'Jesus as a snake' did work on me a bit, in a symbolic sense, > >an inversion perhaps within biblical context, or even > >coniunctio as in forking paths of knowledge rejoined, but not > >in any definite way really other than in the context > >of the poem's Green Messiah and trying to think of how > >N.O.Brown would read this. > > > >Then I was reading the article I mentioned and found > >this: > > > >Hebrew prophecy came from snakes: Nehushtan, the bronze > >serpent that Moses affixed to a cross. > > > >Nachash nechosheth, the serpent of bronze. > >Both words from nachash, 'to hiss, whisper, to divine.' > > > >Nachash = Mashiyach = 358: > >the Serpent is the Messiah. > > > >Not sure about the Qabbalistic numerology.. > >At any rate, I thought this was a fascinating detail. > >There is also, before this (above) section: > > > >The serpent in the tree, offering knowledge. > >Mercury's snakes, the Hermetic power: hermeneutics, > >the interpretation of signs, poisoning single vision. > > > >(pure air choking us...)? > >as if we would move from the 'poisoned' fishtank > >of hermeneutics into the pure air of a single vision.. > >hmmm. works for me! > > > >Anyway another strange thing was that the article > >is dedicated to Norman O. Brown and the author > >wrote it after NOB's death. He had been having > >weekly walks with Norman for his last 10 years of > >life. > > > >Anyway, that was my little Eureka of the evening. > >Not much I'm sure, but I thought it was interesting, > >or something curious at least in terms of random > >access / the temporal sieve / etc.. > > > >I know this happens all the time, but I just thought > >this one was a little better than usual. > >The last good one I had, was when I did the painting > >with the Hermandades characters. I rented 5 movies > >that weekend and 3 of them had the hermandades or similiar figures > >in them completely by chance.. what's interesting > >about that is that the hermandades figure is related > >to a counterreaction within catholicism against protestant > >reactions to Catholicism's fetishism of the image.. > >The Hermandades are in fact a kind of 'hyperfetish'.. > >This also directly relates to Gothick Institutions > >where he talks about a liberation from the image, through > >the image, which is exactly what I was trying to convey > >more or less, with my appropriation of these hyperfetish > >hermandades.. > > > >anyway best to all.. > >your tie-dyed Cladesmum > >lanny > > __________________________________________ > Dr. John M. Bennett > Curator, Avant Writing Collection > Rare Books & Manuscripts Library > The Ohio State University Libraries > 1858 Neil Av Mall > Columbus, OH 43210 USA > > (614) 292-3029 > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > www.johnmbennett.net > ___________________________________________
