World Wednesday: Kleenex Boxes

I wonder who gets to design Kleenex boxes as their job?

Maybe it's because of the allergies that have plagued me half my life, requiring frequent trips for tissues, but I have often noticed the really beautiful designs that show up on the functional Kleenex box. Quirky patterns, rich colours, photographs that focus in on the detailed heart of a flower - so many different artistic displays on each new batch of boxes.

When pennies are tight I make do with trusty old toilet paper, but I do enjoy buying a few boxes of Kleenex to have around the house, and I honestly stand there for several minutes trying to decide which of the pretty designs I'm going to choose!

How delightful that such a mundane space can be turned into it's own miniature canvas and bring an unexpected beauty to corners of a room. :)

World Wednesday: Keats Creative Addition

    One really great thing about university was how it motivated me to finish projects. Having a deadline and upcoming critique often inspired me to polish up assignments to a much greater extent than I ever have with writings begun on a personal whim.

   On that note, here's a poem I wrote in my second year at OLSWA which I think really benefited from the rigour of school.

This is a creative addition for Keats, inspired chiefly by his concise language and rich imagery. John Keats was part of the second generation of romantic poets, and besides his emphasis on self, nature, and senses, his poetry also incorporated deeper reflection about reality. Following in the train of “Ode to a Nightingale”, I explored in this poem the lyric speaker’s sadness over morality and desire to know what death truly is. He despairs of man’s ability to understand death through reason and believes instead that imagination can transcend time and discover truth. But even imagination might not be enough . . .

On A Winter Glade

                                                                       

I halt as sorrow hurls against my breast

And jolts me from the hurry-beaten way

And does my feelings like my breath arrest

To spy a glint amid Erebus grey:

A forest glade enclosed in polished glass

And white new-felled; its statue chambers poise

In an eternal stance and bid me thus

To stay and not to pass,

Forsaking all the jostle and the noise

Of jaded rush, our futile business.

O see the laden boughs like brittle edge

Of flaking crust; see glittering facets sheer,

And icicles poised flawless from a ledge

In stillness never broken by the fear

That plagues the ticking toil of running days,

Corrupting pleasure found in love and life,

The bridal blush, the gift of infant birth,

Each fleeting as a phase,

Marking transient respite from the strife,

Then puffed away like lingering echomirth.

A bitter biting breeze attacks my heart;

Its pinching stings my cheek with cold despair

And threatens newfound hush to tear apart

When life takes on consistency of air:

Each field of beggars topples in a blow

While kings and pharaohs bow, their scepters fail;

Death in a mighty rampage rages on

With shining scythe of woe.

I look to check his stride - to no avail,

His step will hasten to my side anon.

Who is this monarch dread that treads the earth,

And looks upon protest with mirthful scorn?

Our books have sought to view his baffling girth,

Our brains to probe the essence of his thorn.

Yet ever brains meet soil ere thought is done,

And books turn dust, ere ever page is turned

And man abandons such a hopeless quest

With resolution none,

Relinquishing the truth that he has yearned

For long, he holds his head and craves his rest.

Yet silence of this winter gives me cause

To hope; to try imagination’s spell,

To steal intimate into a pause,

Arrive where reason failed, and excel,

Suspending the rotation of the world.

Here Cupid’s darts themselves are pierced with frost,

Here Jupiter’s bolt frozen in mid flight.

My very tears are pearled

And hang immobile; not a gem is lost,

Beheld forever under crystal light.

Here sheets enclose a feather bed of snows

Where Hades’ crown is lately set aside;

He lies, fell beauty, naked in repose,

Throughout whose sleep must ruin, idle, bide.

Cool marble are his lips and mighty brow

His hoary hair a mass of stone-cold coils.

I look on him with wonderment beguiled,

This pale king that now

Heart’s-eye is victor o’er, so stern and royal,

This giant Death, defenseless as a child.

At last to know the face I hold in awe!

To understand the captor, caught alone!

Whether to flee his great embrace so raw

Or seek oblivion tendered at his throne?

If he be tyrant or deliverer?

If he in truth bear such an iron fist,

Or rather gentle hush to stem our moan?

No more shall I demur:

I reach slow hand toward his wan cheek, kissed

with rime – one moment – soon all will be known . . .

Yet wait! What if my warm touch break the spell?

Or sunbeams stretch and yawn, come out to play?

Might not a flush of springtime in this dell

the picture shiver, melt, and fade away?

I hesitate and waver in alarm,

And see my spirit’s firm foundation quake,

That sculpture such as this cannot enthrall

With everlasting charm.

Look! Even now I see a droplet wake,

And slip along a branching arm and fall.

World Wednesday: Circumcision

   I learned something fascinating a few weeks ago on the subject of circumcision.

   I didn't learn it from Robin Hood Men in Tights though. The Hippie Housewife was listing reasons on her blog why circumcising baby boys is not beneficial. I have read and heard many similar arguments before, especially from followers of attachment parenting and similar parenting styles. Primarily that it is a traumatic procedure and has lasting bad effects by leaving the penis without it's natural protection.

   The practice of circumcision is much less common today than it was in previous generations, as many parents are recognizing it as unnecessary and damaging. My husband and I never even considered circumcising our newborn son (not that I blame mothers and fathers who have in the past, thinking it was just what you were supposed to do).

 As a Roman Catholic, whose faith heritage originates in Judaism, I always wondered about why God required circumsicion as a covenant sign in the old testament. I thought it might have to do with a practical health reason (like how he commanded the Israelites not to eat pork, as one could easily get sick from eating it in those days), but apparently that is not the case. Many sources I have read say there is no health benefit to circumcision. In that case it seems like a cruel thing for God to require, and not very affirming of the goodness of his creation.

   On the other hand, traditional Jewish circumcision, as I learned, is much less painful than modern medical circumcision. It always took place on the 8th day after birth, when blood clotting is highest, and they supplied the child with means of comfort. It was also a clean sharp cut rather than a clamp.

   What I was even more interested to learn was that it originally did not mean what we think of, which is the full removal of the foreskin, it was just a little "clip at the tip", waaaaay less traumatic or destructive.

    I definitely can't claim comprehensive knowledge of the history or details, but I did find THIS interesting scholarly article concerning how the custom came to change in Jewish history. The author, Rubin Nissan, says that periah, "the splitting and peeling back of the mucosal membrane of the foreskin, thus fully uncovering the glans penis", was not the command given to Abraham by God. He suggests it is an interpretation put forward by the rabbis at at time when Jews were assimilating into gentile nations unnoticed by disguising their circumcision. In order to keep Jewish identity distinct, the rabbis required full periah as part of the law.

   Nissan says it is important to distinguish between the "sacred and unchanging" text of the Torah on which Judaism is founded and the social contexts which have changed and modified in response to culture.

   This makes a lot more sense to me, that circumcision as we know it was not the requirement of our loving God, but a change in practice brought about by people because of their social situation.

   I'm still not quite sure why God would have chosen to ask even the minimal circumcision of his people; it's something I take on faith, like many other difficult aspects of Christianity, trusting that his reasons are greater than my understanding. But learning things like this aspect of history help me to remember that when I am tempted to make a quick judgement, the truth might not always be as it first appears.

Too True Tuesday: Sleep Habits

Can you imagine this?