A Catskill Eagle

If you have ever known anyone who has bipolar illness, you can feel their likeness in the weather of the Pacific Northwest. For the last few weeks, the weather has been alternating between grey rains that keep darkened wet leaves and limbs in the ravines held down, or days of winter sun that draws everyone outside for that blissful sight of orange, red and fuchsia that bathes the inner lids so soothingly.

Many artists have been blessed and cursed with an internal barometer that rises and falls for reasons that are obscure to themselves, as well as those who love and care for them. I don’t know if Herman Melville was one of these afflicted souls, but his writing suggests it. 

Long ago, my mother wrote down a passage of his, that reads like a poem, into a book of collected snippets of wisdom given to my sister and myself on our wedding days. It isn’t a verse from religious scriptures, but it could be, and it has stayed with me more than any other lines I’ve known.

In this same book my mother gave me is a quote from a minister, no less: “The theologians gather dust upon the shelves of my library but the poets are stained with my fingers and blotted by my tears.” And so as we go, we thoughtfully or unintentionally gather to us images, scenes, sayings, and writings of all sorts that find their way to the place in our imagining hearts that is waiting for them.

Ravines and gorges in a futuristic vision of "King's View of New York" by Moses King 1915

There is a wisdom that is madness, but there is a madness that is woe; and there is a catskill eagle in some souls that can alike dive down into the blackest gorges and soar out of them again to become invisible in the sunny spaces. -- Herman Melville

"Blue Savannah Song" by Erasure from their 1990 album Wild!

I like to think of Melville's Catskill eagle flying into Camus' invincible summer. This song is for my girl, the lullaby we sang to you when you first exploded onto the desert scene.

Janus and the Seadoor

Can it really be an entire year since we looked upon the faces of Janus and reflected on all the previous months and wondered at the ones ahead. Here we are, again. Like many people, I have been through several circumstances in the past year; landing in geographical and emotional climates I had never bargained for, struggling to stay afloat. 

Janus looks upon it all as the protector of doors, gateways, roadways, bridges and harbors, for those who travel to exchange goods, do business, or to return from war. He was honored in times of transition, particularly during outbreaks of war and ensuing peace, when communities had to find ways to integrate and restore balance. Janus was appealed to as one who opens and closes the ancient ceremonial passage of Mars, god of war, along with Quirinus, the “wielder of the spear.”

The temple of Janus. Two sets of arched doorways were to remain open during times of war and closed during times of peace.

Quirinus, the lesser known deity is a salient symbol as well. The fear of some potential doom can indeed feel as if a spear has been wielded upon the sternum, and is still protruding for all to see. Of course no one can see, as we continue to go about the business of opening and closing doors into the new year. 

One interesting observation about Janus is that he is the protector of all of these structures— the doors, the bridges, the harbors— but he is not a protector of the people who pass through them. He presides over but apart from hopes, resolutions, loss and gain. His silence is neutral and he never tugs at his beard over a dilemma or tips his garland in a favored direction. He is a reminder that life must move forward, and will do. Our acceptance of this law can buoy us up, while resistance to this law can leave us capsized and floundering. The Romans remind us of this with an ancient bronze coin depicting Janus on its head, showing the prow of a ship on its tail.

Coins are an appropriate object for the depiction of Janus, as they are currency and often needed for passage through doors and across waters. A now-popular quote from Isak Dinesen states, “The cure for anything is saltwater: tears, sweat or the sea.” And perhaps if we have tried two of those for long enough to no avail, Janus might provide a reminder to round out our efforts by trying the third.

Rooms by the Sea by Edward Hopper, 1957