your eyes were cinnamon

[littledust]

Anyone have any deep thoughts on 17th-century poetry that they would care to share? I'm unit planning for student teaching! Right now the running theme I've come across is: "Please, please have sex with me, because life is short." Well, that and all the stuff about God. I think Donne's "Holy Sonnet XIV" best encapsulates the era's crazy tension

Comments

[theroyalbrat]

We are going to have SO MUCH BRAINSEX when we get back. You're enabling my lust for John Donne and all of his miserable crazy. SHAME.

Oh! Oh! Oh! Is "The Relic" part of your Donne curriculum? Because it does a great job of portraying the tension between the ephemeral and the eternal, and he reconciles the seemingly impossible contradiction of loving someone in the flesh and the physical body and the idea of eternity outside of the body. And it's one of the sweetest love poems ever (...but maybe I'm just creepy). It's one of his few happy poems, and it still manages to kind of be about death 'cause that's how he rolled.

I doubt you get to teach His Most High Debauchedness, John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester, right? Public high schools frown upon the liberal use of "fuck" and "cunt" in Important Literary Courses, probably. But it's the Restoration! It's important!

...I apologize for the entirety of this comment. I usually try to keep a lid on my bizarre 17th Century obsession...but yeah. <3!

[twisteddave]

You keep no such lid. That's why we love you.

[theroyalbrat]

Also! "The Apparition" is super fun. It basically translates to "Fine, bitch, you know what? When I DIE because you're such a CHEATING SLUT, I'm gonna come back and haunt your ass so bad, you'll wish I didn't...haunt your ass so bad. You AND that douchebag you left me for, who is a total homo, by the way. Me: 1, Cheating Whores and Gay Douchebags: 0. Hah!" I might have exaggerated a bit...but it makes me giggle.

And Dave, it's a damn good thing you crazy folks love my insane nerdery, 'cause otherwise I'd be pretty much screwed.

[twisteddave]

I am also a fan of "The Apparition," for the same reasons, although it's more poignant and emo to me than your hilarious interpretation.

And dear, you're talking to a man with an idea of starting his own steampunk penny dreadful. Of COURSE I love your nerdery.

[littledust]

Your nerdery makes me happy. :D

"The Relic" is not in my handy dandy textbook, but the nice thing about poems is that they can be easily photocopied. I look forward to going, "You think poetry is all hearts and flowers and candy? It's also CREEPY and WEIRD yet strangely romantic."

I wish I could include the Earl of Rochester, much like the more naughty Canterbury Tales should have been on the curriculum. SIGH. The advantages of college over public high school.