Commonplacing

Mar 25, 2022

Was charmed by the idea of this program that will deliver future letters to one’s self.

And on letters, collections of those you keep to yourself are a genre of literature unto itself.

And when you need to be reminded of worlds beyond your own window—a place to swap views.

I love anything Chris LaTray writes—his love for the world comes out so clearly in his voice. This post last week brought me to tears, in the way that surprises you only because someone has expressed so well what I—and I’m sure many of us—have been feeling.

And in thinking of Ukraine, and returning to Lesya Ukrainka, who wrote, in her dramatic poem on the plight of Cassandra. In the excerpt below, her sacrifice would be to accept marriage to the enemy in exchange for their alliance:

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Brother, you 
Know not the price of women's sacrifices,
But I will tell you: of all woman's kind
Far-famed Iphigenia did not make
The greatest and hardest sacrifice.
So many harder sacrifices thought
Unfamed, are made by women who leave not
Even a name to them! If you had wished 
That I should give my life in sacrifice,
Surely I would have offered it, but this--
I cannot, brother, I'm no heroine.