MORGISH LAMENT

 

                        I walked on the sand

At the end of the land

And gazed at the booming sea.

I came to a halt

When the sea brume salt

Seemed to bring to me

An ancient song

From the land I long

Had sought unceasingly.

A Morgish tongue

Sighed and sung

To the tune of the crashing sea:

 

"Come back to home,

You kin who roam

Afar in ships

Upon the foam.

 

"Come back we call

To empty hall

For absent kin

Is bitter gall.

 

"Of blood to blood

And mood to mood,

We feel the call

Of Morgish brood.

 

"Great Gammoth stands

With outstretched hands

On the green hill

Of Golberand,

 

"And calls his child

Back from the wild

Paths of the deep

To havens mild.

 

"Why wander far?

Turn sail and spar

And take the trail

Of summer stars.

 

"Yes, take the track

Past wave and wrack.

Turn west to home;

It calls you back.

 

"I call to thee

Across the sea!

Ah! Hear my song

And turn to me!"

 

So it sang, then thinned, and died away

Like smoke blown on a misty day;

And the sea roared upon the shore

And the clouds in the wind were rent and tore

And I stood still on the beach alone

While the gulls wailed and the sea moaned

And the darkness came in a silent spring

And I waited more for the voice to sing,

But heard only the sound of wave on stone

As I still stood on the beach alone.

BALLADE OF AN UNFORGIVABLE CRIME (2016)

Pray, my dear, whatever is the matter?

Those cupcakes were well past their use-by date.

That old soda was only getting flatter,

And those crackers growing musty in their crate.

That last banana slowly turning brown,

That cheddar cheese so quickly going green,

With selective cuts can still be gotten down,

That space cleared up, that little dish get cleaned.

On all your leftovers, that never do get eaten

And all your drink, that never does get drunk

A life like mine, that's marginalized and beaten

Can learn to feed on and to like such junk.

I live my life upon the leavings and the lees

As I hobble about on knackered legs.

But every crumb your justice counts and sees:

I'm sorry that I drank your dregs.

 

That bread crust no one eats that's turning stale;

The tomato got last month, that's heading south;

That Frito pie not quite beyond the pale;

Those potatoes that already start to sprout;

That grilled rice that's getting hard and dry;

Those ancient oranges that daily shrink and wither;

The beef broccoli that's gotten rather high:

Put all them in a bag, and send them hither.

Those pink chicken thighs, now blushing gray,

I still would hazard, but with some haste.

That avacado won't last another day.

Those chip crumbs shouldn't go to waste.

For such presumption, gluttony, and pride

You like to take me down a couple pegs.

Now I your righteous judgement must abide;

I'm sorry that I drank your dregs.

 

Envoi:

 

Princess! About your castle I must go

Treading carefully, as if on agèd eggs;

Perhaps it's my blood sugar, running low,

But I'm sorry that I drank your dregs.

A Host of Troubles: Another Old Film Project

 

II. A group of child actors (now grown) meet and discover all have recent obsessions with the man who played their nemesis on their different TV shows. The Former Child Actors: The Success, The Radio Host, The Housewife, The Hood/Bum, The Drama Teacher.

The Nemesis at first played a benign Uncle, but due to the Success's uneasiness with him (a sort of negative chemistry) his character was made into a villain, and the show took off. The Nemesis, in real life a stage magician and puppeteer, has in turn, on different shows, played a Mad Scientist, an Evil Wizard, a Pirate, a Wicked Witch, a Crazed Professor, etc. No-one knows what happened to him after his last show in the mid-70's.

The Success is writing a book on kid's shows and meets the other kid actors at a reunion (convention? TV special?). Delves into mysteries about Nemesis. Who was he? Where is he? What strange hold does he still have, and is he responsible for the odd happenings that are leading them all to an old house far out in the country?

It's rather like an episode from any of their shows, but some suspect there is a deadly purpose. The Success feels guilty for turning the benevolent Nemesis into a Villain. Atonement?

[Nemesis kind of based on Charles Nelson Reilley; could have been well-played by Harvey Korman, or even Paul Reubens. The Success, loosely based on Ron Howard. The Former Child Actors could have been played by REAL former child actors. One of my possible ideas was that the actual villain leading them on is a missing, crazed Former Child Actor.]

"Kren" Part Fourteen: The Next Bit of Business

 

Out in the silent streets of the village, the nearly full moon in the cloudless sky had bleached out all but the strongest stars and turned the night into a patchwork of silver and shadow. Kren and Koppa walked wordlessly past dark houses, the youth now and then cutting his eyes over at the striding Morg to gather which way they were going to turn. The only sound was an occasional cricket’s chirping that would stop abruptly as they moved quietly by.

Eventually they came to the edge of town and the squat darkness that was Kren’s house. He stepped forward to undo the bolt, then threw the door open wide. It gaped like a portal from night into night. Kren moved back and with an exaggerated, almost mocking wave, gestured for Koppa to step in. With a small but equally sardonic bow, the man walked fearlessly over the yawning threshold. Kren followed and shut the door behind him.

Koppa stood silently while Kren cracked a shutter and by the streaming light of the moon kindled a couple of candles using the banked fire of the stove. As the light slowly grew, the man looked around the house with interest. When Kren was done the Morg finally turned and cocked an eyebrow at him. It was seldom he had anyone inside, let alone a complete stranger. He waved vaguely with one paw.

“Well,” he grunted. “Welcome to my house, I guess.”

“Thank you, Mr. Kren.” Koppa bowed slightly. “You’re a carpenter, I see. Thanks for bringing me in.” He paused, eyes challenging. “Tell me. Why do you trust me?”

Kren shrugged.

“Not exactly sure I do. But you tell an interesting tale. Besides, what’s a night?”

Koppa’s face was wry.

“Your friends might look askance at you for sheltering a dangerous fellow like me.”

The Morg barked a short laugh, beard wagging with the force of it.

“They look askance at me now. Now tell me your whole tale. I’m very interested in Morg City.” He pointed invitingly to his own deep chair next to the fireplace. “Have a seat.” He pulled a wooden chair out from under the workbench and swung it over to the dark hearth. He hesitated before sitting.

“Do you want something to drink? I’m afraid I’ve only got water.”

“Thank you. Perhaps later.” Koppa sat, spreading his cloak behind him with a grateful flourish, settling back. He sighed rather theatrically to indicate his comfort. He paused, steepled his fingertips together, and pointed at the Morg. “Now, what exactly do you want to know, Mr. Kren?”

The Last Old Soldier: My Poetry

 

                                                          THE LAST OLD SOLDIER

 

After forty long years had passed

There came the last old soldier home,

Crying, "Alone I have returned

From the burning and the battle's roar."

The children, dogs, and beggars

In their tatters and their filthy rags

With jeers and snags tormented him.

They pelted him and plastered him

With dung and rotten apples.

Then the people he'd defended

Threw his body on the trash heap.

So the soldier's life was ended.

 

But then a minstrel came to them.

He sang of him: his doughty deeds

On mighty steeds, driving evil folk

Who ran and broke before his sword.

Then the great lords of the city

Felt pity for the soldier's fate.

And all the purple populace

In opulence and scarlet robes

Began to see significance

And magnificence in his life's tale.

 

So there went the peasantry

With pleasantries and pageantry;

They gathered up his withered corpse

Onto a horse and bore him in.

Amidst a din of city bells

Whose mighty knells rang him home.

They brought the ancient soldier back,

In reverence laid him in a tomb.

 

All the folk assembled there

And held a fair to celebrate

With the youths and maidens dancing

And with prancing of the cavalry.

So with revelry and games and play

They drove away solemnity.

 

Though in these days of knavery

And slavery his story's dimmed,

Still children come with aperies

And japeries to honor him.

R.I.P. Robbie Coltrane

 

It's so odd, because I'd just watched (I don't know how long after so many years) an episode of Are You Being Served? where Robbie plays a truckdriver who crashes when Mrs. Slocum tells him over the CB radio that her pussy wins a silver cup every time she shows it. I think that may have been the first time I ever heard of him. He, of course, played a part in one of the greatest Fantasy franchises of all time - Krull.

Nunc Dimittis: The Rings of Power Episode 8 (Season Finale): “Alloyed”

I didn’t know exactly what I expected when we started watching the season finale. I mean, I knew there would be at least one big reveal and a sort of cliffhanger (if only an ominous implication), but just how bad it would be I could not imagine. How could it possibly be worse than Episode 7?

Well, somehow these genius showrunners found a way.

There were some good features. As usual, it is a very pretty show to look at, especially landscapes, cities, and (occasionally) some design elements. But there seems to be a general rule that the closer in you get, the worse and less satisfactory things become, especially in costuming. The exception might be the three Elven Rings. But I get ahead of myself.

There are some sequences that actually attain moments of excitement, despite the long stretches of tedium in between. A good example would be the parts of the first section follow the story of “the Stranger”, the Weird Sisters, and the Harbits who are following them. The Ghostly Trio catch up with the Stranger and hail him as Sauron Returned, albeit with some amnesia issues. They restrain him with force until his full memory can be restored. Nori and her little band turn up and try to release him but are fooled by the Weird Sisters, who are poised to destroy them. This snaps the Stranger out of his funk and rouses his powers, which he then channels through the staff that Nori takes away from the evil leader.  The Trio changes under his onslaught, first into wraith-like beings, then, inexplicably, into a cloud of moths. They have been turned into something … unnatural.

The Stranger’s mind has been unblocked, apparently, and suddenly he can speak perfectly sensibly. The Harbit elder Sadoc has been killed in the fight, so the Harfoots can all go on to being a matriarchy. Gandalf (because let’s face it, that’s who the Stranger, to no-one’s surprise but merely in an anti-climactic confirmation, turns out to be) heads off to Rhun, joined (after a moment’s hesitation), by Nori, who is off on an adventure.

Meanwhile, Elendil and Miriel are on their way back to Numenor. Miriel is too proud to be helped around by Elendil (so brave! so independent! I would have laughed if she had then gone walking over the side of the ship). Back in Numenor, the old King is dying, and Pharazon commissions a memorial portrait of him. Elendil’s daughter Earien is one of the artists left alone with him. The King wakes up, starts babbling significantly, and wanders into the next room. Earien follows and finds the covered Palantir. She ominously pulls the cover off (but since all seven stones are still in Numenor, she can’t be in danger of Sauron – perhaps she’ll get something from Eldamar, where the Master-stone resides in the Undying Lands). Elendil and Miriel return to find the ships and city shrouded in black. The old King has died.

Meanwhile Galadriel and Halbrand have reached Eregion, and Halbrand gets his “Elvish medicine”, though he seems to barely need it. High King Gil-galad is also there and has ordered Celebrimbor to shut his forge down since the Dwarves have refused them mithril and the Elves must pass into the West. But the recovered Halbrand has some good advice on how to stretch the little bit of mithril they have, and with his surprising insights into smithcraft Celebrimbor begins a last-ditch effort to save the Elves on Middle-earth.

Galadriel, suddenly suspicious of this mere human’s skill that surpasses even the son of Feanor and the repetition of words she heard elsewhere, finally decides to do some research on the man she’s helped set up as King of the Southlands. She confronts Halbrand with the fact that the line of kings had been broken a thousand years ago without any heir. Halbrand reveals that he is Sauron (what a surprise!) and immediately begins an attack on her mind.

In a series of visions he reminds her that her brother Finrod told her about touching the darkness, how she has aided Sauron to return to Middle-earth, how his ambitions were for the restoration and healing of the world (just with him as ever-lasting tyrant), how he never really lied to her (just didn’t correct her assumption), and how he can make her a Queen if he joins her, or reveal that she helped him if she doesn’t. She defies him and wakes up struggling in the river, where Sauron has apparently pushed her. Elrond helps rescue her, but Halbrand/Sauron has disappeared. Ominously, Galadriel appears not to reveal Sauron’s return to anyone, feeling ashamed about her part in it.

However, she now seems to have some insight into ring-making, and says they need to make three rings for the Elves. Celebrimbor says they need the purest gold and silver to add to the mithril to make the stretching alloy. She sacrifices her beloved Valinorean-made dagger, last relic of her brother, and the rings are made of the new alloy. Galadriel herself has become ‘alloyed’ by her experiences, perhaps ready to give up mere military means for new spiritual powers. We finally get to see some rings of power in The Rings of Power.

The last scene is of the revealed Sauron, looking rather like Anakin Skywalker, on the brink of the newly created land of Mordor. You get the feeling that Adar the rebellious proto-Orc is in for some hard times. He gazes speculatively at Mt. Doom, the future forge of the One Ring. There is a terrible rendition of the Ring verse in song.

Which all sounds more exciting than it actually worked out to be. The episode suffered from the same boring stretches; the same lapses of narrative logic; the same poor writing; the same lapses of Lore and tone; and the even more frequent use of callbacks, Easter eggs, and references to evoke the member-berries of long-established LOTR fans. One little trick that they do that annoys the heck out of me is to have an almost word-for-word quote (usually from the Jackson films) but tweaked or minimally rephrased. Good visuals, yes, but piss-poor writing. They could have gotten away with much less CGI or special effects if only their characters and pacing were handled better. As it is, there is too much filler and too little meat in this sausage.

I was left at the end, not so much in anticipation of the next season, as in relief that this one was over, and that it would be about a year until any more would be available. Whether the showrunners will have learned better in Season Two (already filming) or not, at least there can no longer the fake tension of the Sauron reveal. The clumsy misdirection and obvious foreshadowing were done. I need never watch this season again.

Perhaps sometime in the future when The Rings of Power has passed into the dark backward abysm of time, I will run across a copy of the whole series remaindered in the $1.99 bin. Perhaps I will buy it, for completion’s sake or as an object lesson. But maybe I won’t. It would still be a little too expensive, especially in the waste of time and spirit.