“Fire and Ice“- At the West End Gallery
XXX Others, I Am Not The First
Others, I am not the first,
Have willed more mischief than they durst:
If in the breathless night I too
Shiver now, ’tis nothing new.
More than I, if truth were told,
Have stood and sweated hot and cold,
And through their reins in ice and fire
Fear contended with desire.
Agued once like me were they,
But I like them shall win my way
Lastly to the bed of mould
Where there’s neither heat nor cold.
But from my grave across my brow
Plays no wind of healing now,
And fire and ice within me fight
Beneath the suffocating night.
–A.E. Housman, A Shropshire Lad
In a bit of a hurry but I thought I’d share a trio of offerings this morning. They are somewhat connected, mainly in subject but not necessarily in tone.
The poem above is from A.E. Housman and his 1896 work, A Shropshire Lad. It has to do with fear and desire, represented in the forms of fire and ice.
The painting at the top is Fire and Ice. I think it can also be viewed in terms of fear and desire, maybe with a sense of resolution between the two. Here, the cold lifelessness of the snow and ice is set against the deep blood red of the living trees.
The final piece of this trio is a song below, The Snow It Melts the Soonest, from Sting and his performance at Durham Cathedral. This song dates back to 1821.
Not too challenging a puzzle, I know. But who needs a challenge all the time?
Redtree Times 