{"id":2344,"date":"2008-12-12T05:45:28","date_gmt":"2008-12-12T10:45:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=2344"},"modified":"2009-08-28T15:38:42","modified_gmt":"2009-08-28T19:38:42","slug":"sweet-mystery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2008\/12\/sweet-mystery\/","title":{"rendered":"Sweet Mystery"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Kitty<\/a><\/p>\n

[Image above is a “Kitty Kitsch” sculpture by C. David & Ferbie Claudon,
\ndepicting feline versions of Jeanette McDonald and Nelson Eddy<\/a>
\nserenading each other in the Canadian wilderness. Click image for more info.]<\/em><\/p>\n

From whiskey river<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Strange Life<\/strong><\/p>\n

It’s as if you are alone in a room
\nin an empty house and there’s music
\nplaying somewhere, the kind of
\nmusic that you always knew would
\naccompany a moment like this
\nThe air is heavy. The water in
\nthe pool outside looks like glass
\nThe color of everything can be
\ndescribed as in the blue hour<\/em>,
\nwhich eventually fades to gray
\nYes, it’s a strange life
\nBut wait. It’s getting stranger still<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(by Eleanor Lerman<\/a>)<\/p>\n

Not from whiskey river:<\/p>\n

The Mystery of Meteors<\/strong><\/p>\n

I am out before dawn, marching a small dog through a
\nmeager park<\/span>
\nBoulevards angle away, newspapers fly around like blind
\nwhite birds<\/span>
\nTwo days in a row I have not seen the meteors
\nthough the radio news says they are overhead
\nLeonid’s brimstones are barred by clouds; I cannot read
\nthe signs in heaven, I cannot see night rendered into fire
\nAnd yet I do believe a net of glitter is above me
\nYou would not think I still knew these things:
\nI get on the train, I buy the food, I sweep, discuss,
\nconsider gloves or boots, and in the summer,
\nopen windows, find beads to string with pearls
\nYou would not think that I had survived
\nanything but the life you see me living now
\nIn the darkness, the dog stops and sniffs the air
\nShe has been alone, she has known danger,
\nand so now she watches for it always
\nand I agree, with the conviction of my mistakes.
\nBut in the second part of my life, slowly, slowly,
\nI begin to counsel bravery. Slowly, slowly,
\nI begin to feel the planets turning, and I am turning
\ntoward the crackling shower of their sparks
\nThese are the mysteries I could not approach when I was younger:
\nthe boulevards, the meteors, the deep desires that split the sky
\nWalking down the paths of the cold park
\nI remember myself, the one who can wait out anything
\nSo I caution the dog to go silently, to bear with me
\nthe burden of knowing what spins on and on above our heads
\nFor this is our reward:Come Armageddon, come fire or flood,
\ncome love, not love, millennia of portents —
\nthere is a future in which the dog and I are laughing
\nBorn into it, the mystery, I know we will be saved<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(also by Eleanor Lerman*)<\/p>\n

Finally, this: If you’re familiar with Mel Brooks’s 1974 film Young Frankenstein<\/em>, you know the scene in which Madeline Kahn’s character — Elizabeth, Dr. F’s fiancee — first meets up with The Monster (played by Peter Boyle). Or rather let’s say, the scene in which The Monster first makes himself known to her. The scene which, uh, climaxes with Kahn’s operatically ecstatic warbling of the first few lines of the song “Sweet Mystery of Life.”<\/p>\n

The YouTube clip below takes a different approach with the song. Here, the singer is Mario Lanza; over that glorious voice are interleaved a host of scenes fom Young Frankenstein<\/em> (except, interestingly, any scenes featuring Madeline Kahn or Peter Boyle).<\/p>\n

<\/object><\/p>\n

(By the way, if you’d like to see the Kahn-Boyle moment itself, of course it’s on YouTube<\/a> as well.)<\/p>\n

Update, a little later on 2008-12-12:<\/strong> Over at the inestimable Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast<\/em> site, coincidentally, Jules is also thinking about<\/a> great movie-music moments.<\/p>\n

___________________________________<\/p>\n

* Eleanor Lerman’s work has now made three appearances in two consecutive Friday posts here. (Here<\/a>‘s last week’s, which includes Lerman’s lovely “Starfish.”) This pretty much makes her the only candidate for the title of RAMH<\/em> Poet Laureate. I didn’t even know there was<\/em> such a title.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Image above is a “Kitty Kitsch” sculpture by C. David & Ferbie Claudon, depicting feline versions of Jeanette McDonald and Nelson Eddy serenading each other in the Canadian wilderness. Click image for more info.] From whiskey river: Strange Life It’s as if you are alone in a room in an empty house and there’s music […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","h5ap_radio_sources":[],"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[183,247,1393,53,251,713],"tags":[178,786,811,812],"class_list":{"0":"post-2344","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-everyday-life","7":"category-ruminations","8":"category-whiskey-river-runningaftermyhat","9":"category-movies-media","10":"category-poetry-writing_cat","11":"category-humor-writing_cat","12":"tag-whiskey-river","13":"tag-eleanor-lerman","14":"tag-young-frankenstein","15":"tag-sweet-mystery-of-life","16":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kZSG-BO","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2344","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2344"}],"version-history":[{"count":23,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2344\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5541,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2344\/revisions\/5541"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}