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Two Fathers


"I was born of two fathers." That is the opening line, as I recall, in the Nam war movie, "Platoon." Then the story proceeds, developes in such a way we get what the main character means. I've always been struck by that line. Without really understanding why, it resonates. Have used it a couple of times poetically. I suppose it could be said that, in ancient Egyptian religion, the god Horus might himself have been born of two fathers, Osiris and Set. Myth says he was the son of Osiris. But Isis did sleep with two gods, Osiris and Set. As they say, 'tis a lucky man who knows his father.

In poetry, at least, I know I was born of two fathers. In ancient Greece there were two primary schools of epic poetry. The Homeric and the Hesiodic. First Ionian, second Doric. Homer and Hesiod. And I have read them both more then a few times. Homer has always drawn me in, taken me up, without having to work at it. That lyrical voice of his strung through the narrative voice to accomplish the epic. The section of his Illiad poem known as 'Achilles Shield' extraordinary. Hesiod has always repulsed me. I resisted him for years. Hated what he had to say. His "Theogony" involving the nature of the gods brutal. His "Works and Days" even more so. The last brutal in the sense that Hesiod, a gentleman farmer scratching hard earth, fighting hard to get a yield, and having given up on finding a woman to work by his side, speaks to the hard truths. It is primary stuff between those two. One gets Odysseus home to his Penelope who has kept the faith. The other says home is an empty space and you wake up the next morning and you do it all again. The stuff of great literature.

Tere

    
Mar/6/2013, 8:45 pm Link to this post Send Email to Terreson   Send PM to Terreson
 
vkp Profile
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Re: Two Fathers


Perhaps every man is two men. Every father two fathers. Every woman two women. Every mother two mothers. Perhaps every truth has two faces. Every life has two paths. Every heart has two chambers.

That doesn't work, does it? There are four chambers in the heart. Ah, well.

The poet as descendant from two distinctive voices and points of view? One beautiful, one ugly? Both honest?
Mar/7/2013, 5:16 pm Link to this post Send Email to vkp   Send PM to vkp Blog
 
Terreson Profile
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Re: Two Fathers


Jung said every concept has its reverse. In my writing somewhere I extrapolate and say every dream has its nightmare, something from experience I know more about than what I know about philosophy. But it is more complicated than that. Jung also said that the genius of the Greeks rested on a dynamic between two primaries: Eros and Logos. Love (relationship) and the Word (truth). The collected poetry of Catullus is called "Odi et amo". I have a fairly recent poem called 'Eros and Thanatos". Likely it all speaks to the polarities.

Tere
Mar/7/2013, 7:43 pm Link to this post Send Email to Terreson   Send PM to Terreson
 


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