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Right at this moment I'm totally cool
In honor of April Fool's Day, a poem; even if a reprint. "Tzaddik" was originally published in Mythic Delirium #11 and can be found in Postcards from the Province of Hyphens. It seemed as appropriate as anything.
Tzaddik
Snapshot of the wonder-worker: it rained
soup and caught him outside, fork still
in one hopeful hand and knaidlach bouncing
like hailstones softly all around, proverb
turned as indisputable as a curl of onion
picked from behind one ear; he wrestles
with no angels but the talent of laughing
precisely at every worst moment. Spirits
do not attend on his studies, each page
like a leaf on the Tree of Life; Elijah's
cup never brimmed with ocean, lost riches
salvaged from a salt wave of wine, not
at his table; he never trips but he falls
laughing with the brilliant, backward
spite of his miracles, the sun that blazes
nightlong in honor of his new profession,
selling lamps: by threatening to take up
undertaking, he can frighten off even
the Angel of Death. Thirty-five more
like him and the world would blow out,
a candle that somebody sneezed on: one
still center of absurdity on which all
the solemn universe revolves, physics
and prayer and the infinite repetition
of the lightning-stricken umbrella
that he shakes out, still smoking,
and raises again to keep off the rain
of herring—this time, he had a spoon.
Tzaddik
Snapshot of the wonder-worker: it rained
soup and caught him outside, fork still
in one hopeful hand and knaidlach bouncing
like hailstones softly all around, proverb
turned as indisputable as a curl of onion
picked from behind one ear; he wrestles
with no angels but the talent of laughing
precisely at every worst moment. Spirits
do not attend on his studies, each page
like a leaf on the Tree of Life; Elijah's
cup never brimmed with ocean, lost riches
salvaged from a salt wave of wine, not
at his table; he never trips but he falls
laughing with the brilliant, backward
spite of his miracles, the sun that blazes
nightlong in honor of his new profession,
selling lamps: by threatening to take up
undertaking, he can frighten off even
the Angel of Death. Thirty-five more
like him and the world would blow out,
a candle that somebody sneezed on: one
still center of absurdity on which all
the solemn universe revolves, physics
and prayer and the infinite repetition
of the lightning-stricken umbrella
that he shakes out, still smoking,
and raises again to keep off the rain
of herring—this time, he had a spoon.
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Thanks! It's based on Leo Rosten’s definition of a shlimazel in The Joys of Yinglish (1989) and a passage I remembered for years from a children’s book about Jewish holidays, Sadie Rose Weilerstein’s Ten and a Kid (1961), which similarly defines the luckless:
Father was certain that all would go well.
"Our luck will be as golden as your curls," he would say to three-year-old Goldie, lifting her high into the air.
But after a year he felt less sure.
One evening he said to Momme, "Gittel, my luck is like Ibn Ezra's."
"Who was Ibn Ezra?" Momme asked.
"One of the Spanish Hebrew poets," Father explained. "A great poet—but without luck! Once he said, 'If I manufactured coffins, nobody would die.'"
Father paused.
"Gittel, if I keep on making candles, women will stop kindling Sabbath lights!"
(Yay, The Tick.)
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Heh. Here's a circle for you--clicking on "Spooooon" in The Tick's Wikipedia entry, you get to an entry called "Inherently funny word" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inherently_funny_words), which says, "Yiddish and German words, for example, are a staple of humor in American English, in particular those that begin with the /ʃ/ ("sh") sound, spelled sch- (or sometimes sh- in Yiddish)."
Once he said, 'If I manufactured coffins, nobody would die.'"
Heh. Have you seen Yojimbo?
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"On Gilmore Girls, Lorelai Gilmore posits that "oy" is the funniest word ever and poodle is also very funny, and creates what she considers a wonderful catchphrase, "Oy with the poodles, already.'"
That is a wonderful catchphrase . . .
Have you seen Yojimbo?
I have not. I should?
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Yes. From when Gilmore Girls was good. Have you seen that show? It's surprisingly good for a WB family comedy, or at least it was. Since the head writer, Amy Sherman Palladino, got axed last season, the show's kind of a pathetic shadow of itself now.
I have not. I should?
Sure--Yojimbo's an Akira Kurosawa movie, which always makes a movie worth viewing in my book. Plus, you'd be better prepared for the big post I've been cooking in the back of my mind for weeks about Yojimbo, Irresponsible Captain Tylor, and the necessity of federal income tax.
But the reason I brought it up:
The movie's about a small town ruled by gangs and corrupt businessmen who're constantly in conflict, so the only person in town who's happy is the coffin maker, though he becomes depressed when too many people start dying for anyone to bother buying coffins.
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Okay, I must know.
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Unfortunately, no: it's one of the many huge blocks of pop culture that I have completely missed out on. At least I'm finally starting to catch up on movies.
Plus, you'd be better prepared for the big post I've been cooking in the back of my mind for weeks about Yojimbo, Irresponsible Captain Tylor, and the necessity of federal income tax.
Whoa.
The movie's about a small town ruled by gangs and corrupt businessmen who're constantly in conflict, so the only person in town who's happy is the coffin maker, though he becomes depressed when too many people start dying for anyone to bother buying coffins.
Hee. That's awesome.
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I wouldn't call it a huge block. Most of the one hour, family dramedy things on WB/UPN/CW aren't worth anyone's time, and I'd have thought the same of Gilmore Girls too if I hadn't happened to catch some of it at my parents' house.
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he wrestles
with no angels but the talent of laughing
precisely at every worst moment.
A more specific :D
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Thank you!