We are lucky, all is good here

A small Lion of Venice, taken Sept 2019.

"Cats on the whole are loath to discuss God.

Generally speaking, cats have no money, although some of them secretly collect rare and valuable coins.

Cats believe that all human beings, animals and plants should congregate in a huge heap in the centre of the universe and promptly fall asleep together."

for more of the poem see

MAGIC CATS

Gwendolyn MacEwen

From:   Magic Animals: Selected Poems Old and New. Toronto: Macmillan, 1974

https://canpoetry.library.utoronto.ca/macewen/poem3.htm

“I think I can see a little into the springs and motives which 

being cunningly presented to me under various disguises, 

induced me to set about performing the part I did, besides 

cajoling me into the delusion that it was a choice resulting 

from my own unbiased freewill and discriminating judgment.”

from Moby Dick

by Herman Melville

"He yearned for the day when the new church

would be built—right across the road. Now

it rises above the moon: saints in frescoes 

meet the eye,"

from The New Church"

by Lucia Cherciu

http://www.americanlifeinpoetry.org/columns/current #629

"Reciting. They say candle-vigilant 

woods in high Arizona swirl

twisting upward out of red dust

miles of such emphasis.

Like them, dark on dark on dark."

from Hail Mary

by William Stafford

Giovanni Bellini 1488, Virgin with the Child and Saints.

Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, Venice

Ordinary life does not interest me. I seek only the high moments. 

I am in accord with the surrealists, searching for the marvelous.

Anais Nin

Venice was very much a de Chirico moment, one of our favourite 

artists, with it's statues and plazas and vistas glimpsed between

lovely buildings coloured in muted earth tones.

"Art is the fatal net which catches these strange moments 

on the wing like mysterious butterflies, fleeing the innocence 

and distraction of common men."

by Giorgio de Chirico

"Now who art thou, that on the bench wouldst sit

In judgment at a thousand miles away,

With the short vision of a single span?"

Dante Alighieri, Paradiso

Canto XIX, lines 79–81 (tr. Longfellow).

S.Michele in Isola, Venice. 

dedicated to Saint Michael, 

the holder of the scales on 

Judgement Day.

Venetian Boats

“Believe me, my young friend, there is nothing 

- absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply 

messing about in boats.” 

Ratty

Still cold here.

Fog in Venice

"it is bitter earnestness
That makes beauty; the mind
Knows, grown adult.
A sudden fog-drift muffled the ocean,
A throbbing of engines moved in it,
At length, a stone's throw out, between the rocks and the vapor,
One by one moved shadows
Out of the mystery, shadows, fishing-boats"

from Boats in a Fog

by Robinson Jeffers

“Before the real city could be seen it had to be imagined, the way rumours and tall tales were a kind of charting.” 

from In the Skin of a Lion

Michael Ondaatje

"The Patriarchal Cathedral Basilica of Saint Mark (officially known in Italian as the Basilica Cattedrale Patriarcale di San Marco and commonly known as Saint Mark's Basilica) is the cathedral church of the Roam Catholic Archdiocese of Venice, northern Italy. It is the most famous of the city's churches and one of the best known examples of Italo-Byzantine architecture It lies at the eastern end of the Piazza San Marco, adjacent and connected to the Doge's Palace. Originally it was the chapel of the Doge, and has only been the city's cathedral since 1807." 

from Wikipedia

Photos of the exterior of Saint Mark's 

"Which of the horses

we passed yesterday whinnied

all night in my dreams?

I want that one."

from Stories from Kansas

 by William Stafford

"As in the Arsenal of the Venetians 

Boils in the winter the tenacious pitch 

To smear their unsound vessels o’er again,

 For sail they cannot; and instead thereof 

One makes his vessel new, and one recaulks 

The ribs of that which many a voyage has made; 

One hammers at the prow, one at the stern, 

This one makes oars, and that one cordage twists, 

Another mends the mainsail and the mizzen; 

Thus, not by fire, but by the art divine, 

Was boiling down below there a dense pitch 

Which upon every side the bank belimed."

Dante Inferno Canto XXI, Longfellow trans.

Our trip to Venice offered the opportunity to experience a number of things. Great art, wonderful food, spectacular buildings and a palpable sense of history.

I have two individuals whose work and life I have been keenly interested in Charles Darwin and Dante, okay a bit of a contrast but whatever. So I was really ecstatic one foggy morning to see the Venetian Arsenal the site of so much of the naval power of the Venetian Republic at the height of it's power. It was also the subject of a metaphor in Dante's Inferno, so for me to see it was to experience both history and literature.

"The image of the busy shipyard with its activity revolving around a vat of viscous pitch establishes the tone for this canto (and the next) as one of tense and excited movement. Also we once again see Dante imitating the action with his language: the busy syntax reflects the activity of the shipyard" 

from the notes to Mark Musa's translation of the Inferno (probably my favourite)

"The Arsenal at Venice ( built in 1104 and greatly enlarged in 1303-4 and 1325 ) was one of the most important shipyards in Europe in Dante's time. About two miles in perimeter, it was enclosed within high walls surmounted by battlements and flanked by towers. See F.C. Lane (1934) ,pp. 129-31" 

from the Charles S. Singleton's  Commentary to the Inferno. p. 365

Venice

“Memory's images, once they are fixed in words, are erased," Polo said. "Perhaps I am afraid of losing Venice all at once, if I speak of it, or perhaps, speaking of other cities, I have already lost it, little by little.”

from Invisible Cites 

By Italio Calvino

My wife and I spent 8 days at the beginning of Oct. in Venice a trip she has been planning for years. It exceeded our expectations and will be the subject of many posts. To start, we saw

Grand Canals

lovely but less grand canals

Winged Lions, Helen loves winged lions.

Venice from the tower at San Giorgio Maggiore.

The Doge's Palace, truly amazing.

The last evening of this trip, The Campo San Polo.

 And Polo said: 'Every time I describe a city I am saying 

something about Venice.” 

from Invisible Cites 

By Italio Calvino