Cherry-Ripe
by Robert Herrick (1591-1674)
Cherry-ripe, ripe, ripe, I cry,
Full and fair ones; come and buy.
If so be you ask me where
They do grow, I answer: There,
Where my Julia’s lips do smile;
There’s the land, or cherry-isle,
Whose plantations fully show
All the year where cherries grow.
Views: 37
A Hue and Cry after Fair Amoret
by William Congreve (1670-1729)
Fair Amoret is gone astray—
Pursue and seek her, ev’ry lover;
I’ll tell the signs by which you may
The wand’ring Shepherdess discover.
Coquette and coy at once her air,
Both studied, tho’ both seem neglected;
Careless she is, with artful care,
Affecting to seem unaffected.
With skill her eyes dart ev’ry glance,
Yet change so soon you’d ne’er suspect them,
For she’d persuade they wound by chance,
Tho’ certain aim and art direct them.
She likes herself, yet others hates
For that which in herself she prizes;
And, while she laughs at them, forgets
She is the thing that she despises.
Views: 34
Love’s Philosophy
by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)
I
The fountains mingle with the river,
And the rivers with the ocean;
The winds of heaven mix for ever,
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In one another’s being mingle: —
Why not I with thine?
II
See, the mountains kiss high heaven
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister flower would be forgiven
If it disdain’d its brother:
And the sunlight clasps the earth,
And the moonbeams kiss the sea: —
What is all this sweet work worth,
If thou kiss not me?
Views: 50
Some thoughts on last night’s kaiseki ryōri at Fire & Water:
This was the second time I’ve eaten a formal kaiseki meal; ironically, despite having lived for over four years in Japan, I’ve had both kaiseki dinners at restaurants in the U.S.
Kaiseki is a style of refined, formal cuisine emphasizing fresh seasonal ingredients prepared with both subtlety and intricacy of technique. Generally, one is served several courses (we had eight last night), each quite small, that add up to a very complex and filling meal.
I don’t really want to tell you how much our dinner cost, so I’ll simply say that we wouldn’t have gone without the assistance of a very generous gift certificate from two of the professionals for whom my wife regularly works miracles. But we’re leaving New York very soon (I’ll be gone in a matter of days); it’s nearly Valentine’s Day; and we figured, go out with a bang.
The evening began inauspiciously, as both my wife and I had to trudge through sleety rain and deep, icy puddles to get to Fire & Water, conveniently located just west of Alphabet City and thus next to no subway stations. Despite having brought an umbrella, I was soaked when I first sat down at the counter, and grumpy.
It was a beautiful counter, though: a great slab of maple-stained wood, all whorls of smooth grain punctuated by exposed burl and black lacquer: very wabi-sabi. And when food and daiginjo sake began arriving, my mood lifted considerably.
The last kaiseki meal I had, in 2004, took place at Bizen in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. It was far more traditional: the dinner took place in a small room with tatami and shōji looking out on a lovely courtyard garden. Our server was Japanese and dressed in yukata, obi, and geta, and the food was very conservative. I mean, it was amazing and delicious (and vegan that time, too), but it was all carefully respectful of Japanese culinary tradition.
Our meal last night was much more experimental and avant-garde: homemade soba cut like fettucine; fig ponzu over fresh tofu; miso caramel—that sort of thing. It was clearly food rooted in Japanese flavors and techniques, but it was also food determined to express innovation and play; it wanted to honor the verities while twisting them a little. (That this sort of thoughtful whimsy is very much in the spirit of, say, Zen calligraphy and tea ceremony, two arts with ties to kaiseki, makes it arguably less a departure from tradition and more a reclamation of it.)
Not everything was astonishing: the initial seaweed salad was…fine, and as much as I enjoyed the hardcore buckwheatiness of the soba, there’s a reason the noodles are traditionally made thin. The ginger cake was dry. The tempura kabocha was more of a kushi-katsuesque croquette than a proper Kyoto- or even Tokyo-style tempura.
When the meal sang, though, how it sang! One of the marks of masterful Japanese chefs is their mastery of clear soup; Suimono (literally, “sipping food”) is a traditional component of kaiseki, a palate cleanser between heartier courses, and last night’s ginger broth with salsify and fried tofu was a revelation: clear, lambent, and just barely sweet.
The other mark of a true Japanese chef is, of course, rice, and the evening’s other standout course was the maitake and shimeji mushroom chirashi with grilled leeks and shio kombu over sushi rice. As I said to my wife Fire & Waterthis morning, if you gave me a trough of this stuff, I would eat it until my stomach tore. I would literally kill many people I have met—most of them annoying, to be fair—in exchange for the secret of those leeks, which were sweet, smoky, and sour all at once.
I was also thrilled to see homemade yuba on the menu; having eaten yuba pretty much every time I went to Nikkō, I’ve become a massive fan of the stuff. This was a little runny (I like mine slightly drier), but still incredible, especially considering that the chef had never been to Japan and had learned all his techniques and dishes through experimentation. (He told us he used to buy Japanese-language cookbooks and ask one of his coworkers, a Japanese man, to translate them for him. This fact would horrify a fair number of purists in Japan, but I thought it was awesome.)
The sake was overpriced but terrific, and when we finished our tokkuri my wife ordered wine and I had a rice lager. We were both quite stuffed when we finished dessert (which included kurogoma brittle!), but pretty much as soon as we got home, I wanted more chirashi.
Sayonara, New York. Part of me wishes it were still just mata ne, but if I have to leave, that was an amazing meal to go out on.
Views: 43
Cats Sleep Anywhere
by Eleanor Farjeon (1881-1965)
Cats sleep, anywhere,
Any table, any chair
Top of piano, window-ledge,
In the middle, on the edge,
Open drawer, empty shoe,
Anybody’s lap will do,
Fitted in a cardboard box,
In the cupboard, with your frocks-
Anywhere! They don’t care!
Cats sleep anywhere.
Views: 31
Views: 59
The Bear Hunt
by Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865)
A wild bear chase didst never see?
Then hast thou lived in vain—
Thy richest bump of glorious glee
Lies desert in thy brain.
When first my father settled here,
’T was then the frontier line;
The panther’s scream filled night with fear
And bears preyed on the swine.
But woe for bruin’s short-lived fun
When rose the squealing cry;
Now man and horse, with dog and gun
For vengeance at him fly.
A sound of danger strikes his ear;
He gives the breeze a snuff;
Away he bounds, with little fear,
And seeks the tangled rough.
On press his foes, and reach the ground
Where’s left his half-munched meal;
The dogs, in circles, scent around
And find his fresh made trail.
With instant cry, away they dash,
And me at fast pursue;
O’er logs they leap, through water splash
And shout the brisk halloo.
Now to elude the eager pack
Bear shuns the open ground,
Through matted vines he shapes his track,
And runs it, round and round.
The tall, fleet cur, with deep-mouthed voice
Now speeds him, as the wind;
While half-grown pup, and short-legged fice
Are yelping far behind.
And fresh recruits are dropping in
To join the merry corps;
With yelp and yell, a mingled din—
The woods are in a roar—
And round, and round the chase now goes,
The world’s alive with fun;
Nick Carter’s horse his rider throws,
And Mose Hill drops his gun.
Now, sorely pressed, bear glances back,
And lolls his tired tongue,
When as, to force him from his track
An ambush on him sprung.
Across the glade he sweeps for flight,
And fully is in view—
The dogs, new fired by the sight
Their cry and speed renew.
The foremost ones now reach his rear;
He turns, they dash away,
And circling now the wrathful bear
They have him full at bay.
At top of speed the horsemen come,
All screaming in a row—
‘Whoop!’ ‘Take him, Tiger!’ ‘Seize him, Drum!’
Bang—Bang! the rifles go!
And furious now, the dogs he tears,
And crushes in his ire—
Wheels right and left, and upward rears,
With eyes of burning fire.
But leaden death is at his heart—
Vain all the strength he plies,
And, spouting blood from every part,
He reels, and sinks, and dies!
And now a dinsome clamor rose,—
‘But who should have his skin?’
Who first draws blood, each hunter knows
This prize must always win.
But, who did this, and how to trace
What’s true from what’s a lie,—
Like lawyers in a murder case
They stoutly argufy.
Aforesaid fice, of blustering mood,
Behind, and quite forgot,
Just now emerging from the wood
Arrives upon the spot.
With grinning teeth, and up-turned hair
Brim full of spunk and wrath,
He growls, and seizes on dead bear
And shakes for life and death—
And swells, as if his skin would tear,
And growls, and shakes again,
And swears, as plain as dog can swear
That he has won the skin!
Conceited whelp! we laugh at thee,
Nor mind that not a few
Of pompous, two-legged dogs there be
Conceited quite as you.
Views: 44
Elegy
He complains how soon the pleasing anxiety of life is over
by William Shenstone (1714-1763)
Ah me, my Friend! it will not, will not last,
This fairy scene, that cheats our youthful eyes;
The charm dissolves; th’ aerial music’s past;
The banquet ceases, and the vision flies.
Where are the splendid forms, the rich perfumes,
Where the gay tapers, where the spacious dome?
Vanished the costly pearls, the crimson plumes,
And we, delightless, left to wander home!
Vain now are books, the sage’s wisdom vain!
What has the world to bribe our steps astray?
Ere Reason learns by studied laws to reign,
The weakened passions, self-subdued, obey.
Scarce has the sun seven annual courses roll’d,
Scarce shown the whole that Fortune can supply,
Since, not the miser so caress’d his gold,
As I, for what it gave, was heard to sigh.
On the world’s stage I wish’d some sprightly part,
To deck my native fleece with tawdry lace!
’Twas life, ’twas taste, and—oh! my foolish heart!
Substantial joy was fix’d in power and place.
And you, ye works of Art! allured mine eye,
The breathing picture, and the living stone:
“Though gold, though splendour, Heaven and Fate deny,
Yet might I call one Titian stroke my own!”
Smit with the charms of Fame, whose lovely spoil,
The wreath, the garland, fire the poet’s pride,
I trimm’d my lamp, consumed the midnight oil—
But soon the paths of health and fame divide!
Oft, too, I pray’d; ’twas Nature form’d the prayer,
To grace my native scenes, my rural home;
To see my trees express their planter’s care,
And gay, on Attic models, raise my dome.
But now ’tis o’er, the dear delusion’s o’er!
A stagnant breezeless air becalms my soul;
A fond aspiring candidate no more,
I scorn the palm before I reach the goal.
Youth! enchanting stage, profusely bless’d!
Bliss even obtrusive courts the frolic mind;
Of health neglectful, yet by health caress’d,
Careless of favour, yet secure to find.
Then glows the breast, as opening roses fair;
More free, more vivid, than the linnet’s wing;
Honest as light, transparent e’en as air,
Tender as buds, and lavish as the Spring.
Not all the force of manhood’s active might,
Not all the craft to subtle age assign’d,
Not Science shall extort that dear delight,
Which gay Delusion gave the tender mind.
Adieu, soft raptures! transports void of care!
Parent of raptures, dear Deceit, adieu!
And you, her daughters, pining with despair,
Why, why so soon her fleeting steps pursue!
Tedious again to curse the drizzling day!
Again to trace the wintry tracks of snow!
Or, soothed by vernal airs, again survey
The self-same hawthorns bud, and cowslips blow!
Life! how soon of every bliss forlorn!
We start false joys, and urge the devious race;
A tender prey; that cheers our youthful morn,
Then sinks untimely, and defrauds the chase.
Views: 43
Ariel Mengarini (1919-1998) was a master-strength amateur and practicing psychiatrist. I vaguely recall that his “Predicament in 2 Dimensions: The Thinking of a Chess Player” (1979) was a worthwhile read. Here he beats a well-known grandmaster.
Views: 49
The Constant Lover
by John Suckling (1609-1642)
Out upon it, I have loved
Three whole days together!
And am like to love three more,
If it prove fair weather.
Time shall moult away his wings
Ere he shall discover
In the whole wide world again
Such a constant lover.
But the spite on ’t is, no praise
Is due at all to me:
Love with me had made no stays,
Had it any been but she.
Had it any been but she,
And that very face,
There had been at least ere this
A dozen dozen in her place.
Views: 26
