Pompayo Pets Poodles

— pomp > prevaricate > prostrate

Mask Wars ~~ Whoever commands the sea, commands the trade; whosoever commands the trade of the world commands the riches of the world, and consequently the world itself. Walter Raleigh — “Whoever commands the sea, commands the trade; whosoever commands the trade of the world commands the riches of the world, and consequently the world itself.”
— Walter Raleigh (1554–1618)

Mask Wars -- All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred and schizophrenia. — “All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred and schizophrenia.”
— George Orwell (1903–1950)

Mask Wars -- The Truth is out there... — (a) Honeytrap = a stratagem in which an attractive person entices another person into revealing information or doing something unwise. 1.) beauty is a subjective thing and 2.) the hand hold, it was all about the hand hold, my faded dancing queen, my rebellious player of sympathy for the devil. (b) Sugar daddy = a rich older man who lavishes gifts on a young woman in return for her company or sexual favours. 1.) company can be acquiescence and 2.) time is a relative thing, I mean, did you read my ode — with its strophe, antistrophe and epode — to my infatuation with my incarnation of Ms. Robinson in my (under)graduate days?

Mask Wars -- They who are cruel to animals become hard also in their dealings with fellow humans. We can judge the heart of a person by their treatment of animals. — “They who are cruel to animals become hard also in their dealings with fellow humans. We can judge the heart of a person by their treatment of animals.” (Quote de·gen·dered.)
— Immanuel Kant (1724–1804)

Mask Wars -- The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at those they have around them. — “The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at those they have around them.” (Quote de·gen·dered.)
— Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527)

Mask Wars -- The abuse of greatness is when it disjoins remorse from power. — “The abuse of greatness is when it disjoins remorse from power.”
— William Shakespeare (1564–1616)

“In the state of nature profit is the measure of right.”
— Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679)

In a clumsy sort of way they did what they probably should’ve done anyway (so did say several of the British newspaper opinion pieces). In the fanfare surrounding the volte-face the following was said: “today China is increasingly authoritarian at home, and more aggressive in its hostility to freedom everywhere else … if the free world doesn’t change Communist China, Communist China will change the free world.” We were reminded of the fact that in the 1970s (former US President) Nixon said he feared he had “created a ‘Frankenstein’ by opening the world up to the CCP.” It was starkly stated yesterday that this was “Prophetic.” I am reminded of something I learnt in an IR class: “Thucydides’s Trap.” * We were recommended to watch a talk in which political scientist Graham Allison sets out his thesis. Namely, the increasing antagonism between a rising China and the incumbent superpower, the USA, may portend to worse that the current posturing and pan-Pacific posturing. Tick-tock [Macedonia vs. Persia] … tick-tock [The Fall of Rome] … tick-tock [Europe vs. Ottomans] … TikTok [Colonial power struggles inc. Germany vs. England & then Japan vs. America too]. The punch–excuse the pun–line is that in 12 of 16 past geopolitical cases in which a rising power has confronted a ruling power, the result has been war.

According to Allison in 2012

The defining question about global order in the decades ahead will be: can China and the US escape Thucydides’s trap? The historian’s metaphor reminds us of the dangers two parties face when a rising power rivals a ruling power — as Athens did in 5^th c. BCE and Germany did at the end of the 19^th c. Most such challenges have ended in war.

“Thucydides’s Trap Has Been Sprung in the Pacific.”
— Financial Times, August 21, 2012.

According to Gideon Rachman in 2018

As tensions between the US and China rose in 2018, so did discussion of Thucydides’s trap (a term coined by Harvard professor Graham Allison to capture the idea that the rivalry between an established power and a rising one often ends in war). This cycle of reaction and counter-reaction might seem to justify the gloomy determinism of Prof Allison’s thesis. But it remains open to question whether patterns of state behaviour that emerged in ancient Greece will still prevail in the nuclear age.

“Year in a Word: Thucydides’s trap.”
— Financial Times, December 19, 2018.

‘Graham Allison has been a source of inspiration for me as a student and diplomat. As with Essence of Decision, Destined for War again provides us with his penetrating insights into global politics in the 21st century and beyond.’

In Destined for War, the eminent Harvard scholar Graham Allison explains why Thucydides’s Trap is the best lens for understanding U.S.-China relations in the twenty-first century. Through uncanny historical parallels and war scenarios, he shows how close we are to the unthinkable. Yet, stressing that war is not inevitable, Allison also reveals how clashing powers have kept the peace in the past — and what painful steps the United States and China must take to avoid disaster today.

‘Graham Allison is one of the keenest observers of international affairs around. He consistently brings his deep understanding of history’s currents to today’s most difficult challenges and makes our toughest foreign policy dilemmas accessible to experts and everyday citizens alike. In Destined for War, Allison lays out one of the defining challenges of our time — managing the critical relationship between China and the United States.’ In Destined for War, the eminent Harvard scholar Graham Allison explains why Thucydides’s Trap is the best lens for understanding U.S.-China relations in the twenty-first century. Through uncanny historical parallels and war scenarios, he shows how close we are to the unthinkable. Yet, stressing that war is not inevitable, Allison also reveals how clashing powers have kept the peace in the past — and what painful steps the United States and China must take to avoid disaster today.

The reason is Thucydides’s Trap, a deadly pattern of structural stress that results when a rising power challenges a ruling one. This phenomenon is as old as history itself. About the Peloponnesian War that devastated ancient Greece, the historian Thucydides explained: ‘It was the rise of Athens and the fear that this instilled in Sparta that made war inevitable.’ Over the past 500 years, these conditions have occurred sixteen times. War broke out in twelve of them. Today, as an unstoppable China approaches an immovable America, and both Xi Jinping and Donald Trump promise to make their countries ‘great again’, the seventeenth case looks grim. Unless China is willing to scale back its ambitions or Washington can accept becoming number two in the Pacific, a trade conflict, cyberattack, or accident at sea could soon escalate into all-out war.

Over the past 500 years, these conditions have occurred sixteen times. War broke out in twelve of them. Today, as an unstoppable China approaches an immovable America, and both Xi Jinping and Donald Trump promise to make their countries ‘great again’, the seventeenth case looks grim. Unless China is willing to scale back its ambitions or Washington can accept becoming number two in the Pacific, a trade conflict, cyberattack, or accident at sea could soon escalate into all-out war.

In Destined for War, the eminent Harvard scholar Graham Allison explains why Thucydides’s Trap is the best lens for understanding U.S.-China relations in the twenty-first century. Through uncanny historical parallels and war scenarios, he shows how close we are to the unthinkable. Yet, stressing that war is not inevitable, Allison also reveals how clashing powers have kept the peace in the past — and what painful steps the United States and China must take to avoid disaster today.

I’ll let you know something. Once it was said — muttered and murmured mutedly in order to check for rhyme as it was being etched — on the eve of a known near-certain to be humiliating death — I think here of (a) Icarus (Ancient Greek: Ἴκαρος // sun of Labyrinthine) and (b) the punch-(excuse the pun)-line of the song that begins: “Well they tell me of a pie up in the sky / Waiting for me when I die / But between the day you’re born and when you die / They never seem to hear even your cry” — with an exclaimed uplift of a twist at end (?), the following sombre lines:

❝
Even such is time, that takes in trust
Our youth, our joys, our all we have,
And pays us but with age and dust;
Who in the dark and silent grave,
When we have wandered all our ways,
Shuts up the story of our days.
But from this earth, this grave, this dust,
My God shall raise me up, I trust!
❞
— Walter Raleigh

You see, it was the speaker of those now hallowed lines that said too — in a tome he wrote whist entombed within the rock-like stone walls of The Tower (the Kentish rag-stone of the time now largely reupholstered in Portland stone–i lapse in to remorse, not reverie, as I think of Brighton Rock, Lyme Regis , the Portsmouth Maritime Museum, the third floor exhibition of The Museum of London, Docklands, the National Maritime Museum’s rooms on the Elizabethan era of voyage, discovery and conquer &, Cardiff Docks oh, dear fictitious reader, it’s all moored to the Quay of why and I ask you to pay heed to the following question too: can you tell heaven from hell?) — that, “it is not truth, but opinion that can travel the world without a passport.” Is this, I wonder, a case in point:

Mask Wars -- Truth is the daughter of time, not of authority. -- Francis Bacon — “Truth is the daughter of time, not of authority.”
— Francis Bacon (1561–1626)

D’ya get me? careless whispers; grapes so divine.

The state of man

The fall of man

The demise of man

— § —

NOTES

* The ancient Greek historian Thucydides had observed that the Peloponnesian war (431-404 BCE) was a result of the growth of Athenian power and the fear that this caused in Sparta.

In 1914, few could imagine slaughter on a scale that demanded a new category: world war. When war ended four years later, Europe lay in ruins: the kaiser gone, the Austro-Hungarian Empire dissolved, the Russian tsar overthrown by the Bolsheviks, France bled for a generation, and England shorn of its youth and treasure. A millennium in which Europe had been the political center of the world came to a crashing halt.

The defining question about global order for this generation is whether China and the United States can escape Thucydides’s Trap. The Greek historian’s metaphor reminds us of the attendant dangers when a rising power rivals a ruling power—as Athens challenged Sparta in ancient Greece, or as Germany did Britain a century ago. … Read on.

“The Thucydides Trap: Are the U.S. and China Headed for War?”
— Graham Allison, The Atlantic, September 24, 2015.

Relevant reads, oh my fictitious one!:

Bidoonism, A. (2020, March). Mask wars. Retrieved, https://bidoonism.com/2020/03/19/mask-wars/.

Bidoonism, A. (2020, July). Short-termism. Retrieved, https://bidoonism.com/2020/07/22/short-termism/.

Come live with me

& be my love[r] forever.

A literary analysis of “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love” by Christopher Marlowe (c. 1588).

“The Passionate Shepherd to His Love”

❝
Come live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove,
That Valleys, groves, hills, and fields,
Woods, or steepy mountain yields.
–
And we will sit upon the Rocks,
Seeing the Shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow Rivers to whose falls
Melodious birds sing Madrigals.
–
And I will make thee beds of Roses
And a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroidered all with leaves of Myrtle;
–
A gown made of the finest wool
Which from our pretty Lambs we pull;
Fair lined slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold;
–
A belt of straw and Ivy buds,
With Coral clasps and Amber studs:
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me, and be my love.
–
The Shepherds’ Swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May-morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me, and be my love.
❞
— Christopher Marlowe

**“Save the Sheep”**
by Adam Miller (1979– ) (c. 2017).

Literary Analysis

1. The poet

Christopher Marlowe (1564–1593) was an English playwright and poet of the Elizabethan era, his version of “Doctor Faustus” (c. 1589) is still being shown on stages around the globe today (see: Better the 😈 u no). Marlowe, it is said, was the foremost Elizabethan tragedian of his day. He also had, according to hearsay &c., a colourful life that can be correctly labelled as: short ‘n’ illustrious. While little is known about his fleeting time in London town (in distinction to his writings) stories of his ‘interesting’ affairs do abound and, let us be honest, who cares about fact checking when such tales are so titillating? He has often been described as a spy, a heretic, as well as a “magician”, “duellist” (a person who fights duels for their honour: pistols at dawn after a piss up and porn), “tobacco-user”, “counterfeiter” and “rakehell.” In short-form a rake was a ‘man’ who dealt in immoral conduct, particularly womanising. A typical rake would burn away his inherited wealth on fine wine, racy women and slanderous suggestive sing-song (think: libertine – o gawd n dyaames deen). If not out and out homosexual he was almost certainly bisexual. Homoerotic overtones and undertones have been noted in various of his works and, the object of the shepard’s obsession (see below) is neither obviously male or female ;P

2. The poem

What is this thing I hear they call “love?” What’s its fatal attraction? How is it that such an intangible thing can have such tangible consequences? J. H. Black. . . poetic step by poetic step we will dig and we will get to our Shangri-la. “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love” is a so-called pastoral poem, which is set in the English countryside in the season of Spring (beautiful bunnies and lovely lambs e t c).

This type of poem — Pastoral lyric — typically expresses emotions in idyllic conditions and contexts. In quatrains (4 line stanzas) of iambic tetrameter (8 syllables per line, 4 measures per line with 2 syllables in each measure), the poem’s narrator, the shepherd, invites the object of his desire to experience the joys of nature not least, one can assume, the birds and bees in particular. The narrator hopes to be transported with his loved one to the garden of Eden, where clothes, contraception, gender identity and inhibition are things for future generations to fret about.

Pastoral poems have their roots with shepherds waxing lyrical as they tend their crops and dream deliriously of the oh so attractive one back in the village (they say: back to David in the Bible and Ancient Greek poetry too). The theme/undertone is carpe diem and gratification of sexual passions today, not tomorrow. Spring: a time of flowering and budding birth. You know, escape to the country, throw of the vestiges of modernity (clothes, deadlines, con-form-it-y). As one critic commented, “if we could get away from these rules, we could return to a pristine condition of happiness” and gave the so-called “free love” movement of the 1960’s as an example of this utopian belief (ironically it was the very modern and mass produced pill that aided and abetted all a dat).

The poem was published in 1599 — after Marlowe’s death — and was counterpointed with many poetic replies some earnest, some mocking. Remember the “love” in the poem isn’t made male or female but in perhaps the most famous responding poem, the gender is left in no doubt. “The Nymph’s Reply to the Shepherd,” by Sir Walter Raleigh was penned in 1600:

heart vs. head -- Youth gets slated; Youth becomes jaded and gets slated. — Youth becomes jaded / & then gets slated //

We see write away in “The Nymph’s Reply to the Shepherd” that Raleigh’s narrator is an older more jaded character. Who with (assumed age and experience) is telling the starry-eyed Shepard that romanticised love is a fallacy. Harsh realities (work, health, societal constraints) and that we age, tire and with any relationship, once consummated, the petty individual idiosyncrasies will soon mire all of that pent up passion and lust. I like what one critic wrote: “Normally we should sieze the day because time flies. Raleigh argues that because time flies, we should NOT sieze the day.” The truth is that ultimately Raleigh is right, but I’ll defend to death the quest for attaining (or regaining) true passionate love.

**Tempus Fugit** — so, live for today or save for tomorrow? Usually translated from Latin as “time flies.” It was first use in poetic terms by Virgil (‘fugit inreparabile tempus’ – “it escapes, irretrievable time”). Yeah mate, time’s a-wasting.

Time does not stand still; autumn and winter — after the summer heat — inevitably follows the spring. We must face reality and not live by fantasy (but really must we?).

Walter Raleigh’s retort uses the same meter and references to give us readers “mirror images” of Marlowe’s work. The nymph character plays devil’s advocate as it were and points out by doing so that all of the sheep herder’s promises are transitory. Mirror, mirror on the wall should we go with the heart or the head:

flowers do fade fields yield to the harvest rivers rage

We live in a fallen world, we’re born sinners (so say the monotheistic tomes) ripening fruit will ultimately shrivel. Birds become crestfallen (one would think even more so if abruptly abandoned by their true loved one).

These opposing lines are particularly telling:

Marlowe:
By shallow Rivers to whose falls Melodious birds sing Madrigals.

Raleigh:
When Rivers rage and Rocks grow cold, And Philomel becometh dumb,

Symbolism

Madrigal
— a song (or poem indeed!) that’s usually about love and sung. It would be suitable for being set to music; thus thing of bird song and the music that is the dawn chorus in an English country garden.

Myrtle
— a flowering plant that’s native to the Mediterranean (not the green and pleasant land of England). It thus invokes notions of Rome and Greece. In Greek mythology Myrtle is sacred to Aphrodite (the goddess of desire and love). And we all know what an aphrodisiac is.

Philomela
— of Greek mythology, is invoked now and again in the poetry and prose of the Western canon. Identified as being the younger of two daughters of Pandion I, a King of Athens, the story goes that after being raped and mutilated by her sister’s husband, she first gets revenge and then morphs into a bird. Not just any bird, but a nightingale, a bird renowned for its song. It is said that because of the violence done to her, poets of later generations depict the nightingale’s mating calls to be sorrowful laments (yet ornithologists will tell you that its only the male nightingales that sing for love; somehow that okay for Marlowe’s shepherd because, it is not sexist to say he is a he — love though my dear J is universal as is obsession). To continue with my dig: Ovid and other servants of poetry & prose have accidentally (on purpose perhaps) made the claim that the etymology of her name was “lover of song” — derived from the Greek φιλο- and μέλος (“song”) instead of μῆλον (“apple” or “fruit” or “sheep”). Now! You know about Eve, Steve and the Apple, and I know what Westerners think we Arabs do with our camels and goats, much like what the English say the Welsh do with their sheep and the Americans say the Mexicans do with their asses and mules. Love is Love some say, love is blind the same and/or others say too.

Man Alive!

(i.e., Good Lord!)

Oh My Word! All day I’ve been racking my brain to recall the name of a poem me and my man did analyse a semester or two ago. I actually wrote a post about this memory lapse earlier on today: Within the hour /, see how I began,

❝
I’ll not lie… the poem that is obsessing my thoughts now… its name I cannot recall.
❞

Well as the British do say in a non-literal way, “fuck me!” The poem I’ve been hunting is called: ‘The Lie.’ It was there in plain sight ( { [ Lie ] } ), it was on the tip of my tongue but my brain didn’t allow me to know so ( { [ LIE ] }.

The Lie

❝
Go, soul, the body’s guest,
Upon a thankless errand;
Fear not to touch the best;
The truth shall be thy warrant:
Go, since I needs must die,
And give the world the lie.
–
Say to the court, it glows
And shines like rotten wood;
Say to the church, it shows
What’s good, and doth no good:
If church and court reply,
Then give them both the lie.
–
Tell potentates, they live
Acting by others’ action;
Not loved unless they give,
Not strong but by a faction.
If potentates reply,
Give potentates the lie.
–
Tell men of high condition,
That manage the estate,
Their purpose is ambition,
Their practice only hate:
And if they once reply,
Then give them all the lie.
–
Tell them that brave it most,
They beg for more by spending,
Who, in their greatest cost,
Seek nothing but commending.
And if they make reply,
Then give them all the lie.
–
Tell zeal it wants devotion;
Tell love it is but lust;
Tell time it is but motion;
Tell flesh it is but dust:
And wish them not reply,
For thou must give the lie.
–
Tell age it daily wasteth;
Tell honour how it alters;
Tell beauty how she blasteth;
Tell favour how it falters:
And as they shall reply,
Give every one the lie.
–
Tell wit how much it wrangles
In tickle points of niceness;
Tell wisdom she entangles
Herself in overwiseness:
And when they do reply,
Straight give them both the lie.
–
Tell physic of her boldness;
Tell skill it is pretension;
Tell charity of coldness;
Tell law it is contention:
And as they do reply,
So give them still the lie.
–
Tell fortune of her blindness;
Tell nature of decay;
Tell friendship of unkindness;
Tell justice of delay:
And if they will reply,
Then give them all the lie.
–
Tell arts they have no soundness,
But vary by esteeming;
Tell schools they want profoundness,
And stand too much on seeming:
If arts and schools reply,
Give arts and schools the lie.
–
Tell faith it’s fled the city;
Tell how the country erreth;
Tell manhood shakes off pity
And virtue least preferreth:
And if they do reply,
Spare not to give the lie.
–
So when thou hast, as I
Commanded thee, done blabbing–
Although to give the lie
Deserves no less than stabbing–
Stab at thee he that will,
No stab the soul can kill.
❞
— Sir Walter Ralegh

This is sublime, fucking sublime. At first I thought what the fuck’s going on here, but — as we say — step by step, it all became clearer and clearer and then dearer and dearer to me. As I say here:

❝
Literature, like other forms of cultural production, is not created in a vacuum. It is created in a specific context (time, place, and situation), and therefore it is a product of specific historical, cultural, and social circumstances. …it is widely argued that without an understanding of the given text’s social, cultural, and historical context the experience and significance of the work may well be diminished.
❞

In short, this poem is about betrayal, about how everyone turned on Walter as he was imprisoned in the Tower of London. Luckily for us, for posterity they allowed him to have and use pencil and paper whilst he awaited mortem eius.

p.s.

“Wracking” or “Racking” Your Brain?
If you are “racked” with pain or guilt or you feel nerve-racked, you are feeling as if you were being stretched out to snapping point on a medieval instrument of torture: the rack. It isn’t surprising that ‘rack’ was adopted as a verb meaning to cause pain and anguish. You rack your brains when you stretch them vigorously to e.g., remember the name of a poignant poem. On the other hand, “wrack” has to do with ruinous accidents — meaning “to ruin or wreck” it is recorded in print from the 1560s onward and initially it specifically meant “to be shipwrecked.” — so if the stock market is wracked by rumours of imminent recession, it is wrecked. n.b., if things are wrecked, we can say they’ve gone to “wrack and ruin.”

“Did I do that? Did I say that? Yes, yes I confess!”

Within the hour /

his power totally consumed me

( { [ Sir Walter Ralegh ] } )

I’ll not lie, I studied him several semesters ago and, the poem that is obsessing my thoughts now (a highly charged and thinly veiled critique of the duplicity of the powers that be), its name I cannot recall; it is in here somewhere:

Reading is key…

Writing’s therapy

…but that anthology’s at the house I dwell in and I am here on this hallowed campus, this poisoned chalice, where life’s been lived, where love was found and, alas, where love was lost. For now, for the right here and right now, I’ll post this (on love & loss):

❝
Farewell, false love, the oracle of lies,
A mortal foe and enemy to rest,
An envious boy, from whom all cares arise,
A bastard vile, a beast with rage possessed,
A way of error, a temple full of treason,
In all effects contrary unto reason.
–
A poisoned serpent covered all with flowers,
Mother of sighs, and murderer of repose,
A sea of sorrows whence are drawn such showers
As moisture lend to every grief that grows;
A school of guile, a net of deep deceit,
A gilded hook that holds a poisoned bait.
–
A fortress foiled, which reason did defend,
A siren song, a fever of the mind,
A maze wherein affection finds no end,
A raging cloud that runs before the wind,
A substance like the shadow of the sun,
A goal of grief for which the wisest run.
–
A quenchless fire, a nurse of trembling fear,
A path that leads to peril and mishap,
A true retreat of sorrow and despair,
An idle boy that sleeps in pleasure’s lap,
A deep mistrust of that which certain seems,
A hope of that which reason doubtful deems.
–
Sith then thy trains my younger years betrayed,
And for my faith ingratitude I find;
And sith repentance hath my wrongs bewrayed,
Whose course was ever contrary to kind:
False love, desire, and beauty frail, adieu.
Dead is the root whence all these fancies grew.
❞
— Sir Walter Ralegh

And this (on life & loss):

❝
Even such is time, which takes in trust
Our youth, our joys, and all we have,
And pays us nought but age and dust;
Which in the dark and silent grave,
When we have wandered all our ways,
Shuts up the story of our days!
And from which grave, and earth, and dust,
The Lord shall raise me up, I trust.
❞
— Sir Walter Ralegh

Dwell on his works awhile, they are profound and powerful. He was much more than a swashbuckling pirate with a crush on the virgin qween.

Sir_Walter_Ralegh_by_'H'_monogrammist

Sir_Walter_Raleigh_Signature — (artist, unknown) Inscriptions: on left — Raleigh’s motto ‘Amor et Virtute’ (“By Love and Virtue”); on right — Aetatis suae 34 An(no) 1588 (“In the year 1588 of his age 34”)

p.s.

Swashbuckle
To engage in daring and romantic adventures with bravado or flamboyance. A swashbuckler is a heroic archetype in European adventure literature that is typified by the use of a sword, acrobatics and chivalric ideals.