It was a pleasure to burn. - Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451
'Cause Sadie moved like water poured
The shapes she shaped had angels floored
She knew her walk turned wind to fire
A wink from Sadie turned brains to mire" -Tim Seibles, The Ballad of Sadie LaBabe
Sunday, February 19, 2006
The Burning
Out of the blue I start to cry For no reason I burst into tears It burns in my soul.
Like in the summer In the depth of it all The overwhelming heat The fury of the sun It burns in my soul.
And in the fall The dying trees The shortening of the days My eyes show the deep brown And the burning in my soul.
The winter of course must come And the ice falls from the gray sky Everything is dark and drab And the cold sweeps over the icy ridge But it still burns in my soul.
And with the spring Comes the new days And the blooming flowers Everything is beautiful Yet it still burns in my soul.
With the seasons And the cries for help No one comes No one cares It burns in my soul.
The rage builds Until the fierceness shows Then the anger is set free But the burning doesn't end And the anger is still there It just lingers until another day.
The Sneetches by Dr. Seuss. This is one of my absolute favorite stories. Focusing on prejudice, it demonstrates the silliness of segregating people based on categories (race, religion, gender, etc). The story's strength is that it shows just how arbitrary these categories are.
The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. In this classic story, a new mother suffering from what we might today call 'post-partum depression,' sinks into a still-deeper depression invisible to her husband, who believes he knows what is best for her. Alone in the yellow-wallpapered nursery of a rented house, she descends into madness.
"Where shall I begin, please your Majesty?" He asked.
"Begin at the beginning," the King said, very gravely, "and go on till you come to the end: then stop."
"But I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked.
"Oh, you can't help that," said the Cat: "we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here."
(both quotes from Lewis Carroll's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland," available in full-text here.)