Ash.
Organic Compounds + Oxygen.
Sign of mourning.
Sign of judgement.
Covering of destruction.
End of all things.
"Dies Irae" as the Requiems have it - the "Day of Wrath when the world dissolves in ashes".
The poet said, "This is how the world ends - not with a bang, but with a whimper."
He lied.
Or at least was uninformed.
The Sun is warming. In a billion years the seas will boil. All life will cease. And as the sun expands, the Earth will turn to an ash in its turn.
This is how the world ends - not with a bang, but with a fry-up.
As the prophet said, "Anyone here from Hastromil?" It's going to be too late to worry about whether you left the gas on then.
Ash - the end of every civilisation. Whether the burning of a city, or the covering from a volcano - what's left is ash.
Ash - the recognition. If this is all there is, then fine. But it's all ashes. But if there's more than this, then what we have and what we are must change. The impurities must be purged. The phoenix must rise from the ashes - because where else do you get a phoenix from?
Ash - what's left from a fire, that we scatter on the ground so new life can spring up.
Have a thoughtful, and repentant, Lent.
Image "Garden of the fugitives", Pompeii - from wikipedia
Funk to funky.
ReplyDeleteAs the liturgy has it,
ReplyDelete"We know Major Tom's a Junkie".
For some reason the image of a Yorkshire penny arcade in 1980 swims through my mind...
Don't remember that bit of the video, was it after the bit when he's walking along the beach with his mum?
ReplyDeleteNo, it was the situation in which I heard that song about 200 times in succession on the juke box.
ReplyDelete