Poem for Friday

Alas, Have I Not Pain Enough
By Philip Sidney

Alas, have I not pain enough; my friend,
Upon whose breast a fiercer gripe doth tire
Than did on him who first stole down the fire,
While Love on me doth all his quiver spend,
But with your rhubarb words ye must contend,
To grieve me worse, in saying that desire
Doth plunge my well-formed soul even in the mire
Of sinful thoughts which do in ruin end?
If that be sin which doth the manners frame,
Well stayed with truth in word and faith of deed,
Ready of wit and fearing nought but shame;
If that be sin which in fixed hearts doth breed
A loathing of all loose unchastity,
Then love is sin, and let me sinful be.

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Fall continues to be magnificent, like all the rain last month ensured us an enchanted few weeks or something. My kids got out of school early and my mother took them for awhile so and I could go to younger son's teacher conference (mandatory in the county for all elementary school kids), which was delightful -- his teacher is just my kind of educator and person, teaching the old math system because obviously kids need to learn their multiplication tables even if the new system is focused on early introduction to statistics and other things that make no sense without the basics, and very enthusiastic about creative writing and alternative learning and living history, all the things that matter to me. They also both got report cards, quite good in both cases; younger son got an O in instrumental music for his first term taking it at school, but an N in handwriting (both of which are graded on an Outstanding, Satisfactory, Needs Improvement scale) and apparently told his teacher it was not his fault because he took after his mother! I told him to practice typing and he would never again hear about his handwriting.

More family stuff has been put in a friends-locked, backdated post just before this one because it was more ranting than I knew I had in me and more than the world needs to hear. *g* Otherwise my evening was very nice. We all watched "The Devil in the Dark," the episode in which Spock runs around crying out, "JIM!" and trying to protect Kirk while Kirk, who had taken a "rah-rah shoot the creature" stance, realizes that Spock may love him less if he does so and goes out of his way to save it instead. Plus it has "I'm a doctor, not a bricklayer!" -- what more does any Star Trek episode need to be perfect? And then, heh, there was Smallville. Oh, it is the guiltiest of pleasures! There is Professor Oh-So-Fine lecturing about how powerful men can be betrayed by those they trust, showing slides of Brutus and Caesar and a veryveryclose Judas and Jesus. There is Chloe announcing that Lex is "from Rube Goldberg school of villainy -- direct attack isn't really his style." There is Lex showing Lana the spaceship, less, of course, because he gives a shit about Lana than because he knows it will drive a wedge between her and Clark since she won't tell Clark (at least, that is how I read it, heh), and then Clark being so jealous about Lana making a move on his man! He can't believe Lex showered him with attention when Lex was heterosexual!

"I don't want to hurt you," Clark says and throws Lex into a glass door, which only bruises him moderately compared to what Clark does to Lana -- don't you usually try to scare the one you love and kill the competition, not the other way around? Meanwhile Lionel wants to back Jonathan! Just to smack down Lex, whom he thinks is too greedy for power! And Jonathan says, "I guess the apple doesn't fall that far from the tree!" Whee! And then the two rocking ending scenes, first Lionel telling Lex that the press will have a field day about Lex being soundly beaten by a jealous young lover...I gasped when he said that, I really thought for a second he meant that the press would find out Clark was jealous Lex was cheating on him rather than that Lex was beaten out for Lana. "The people close to you will always know what is in your heart...that's why Lana Lang will never love you, son." That's right, because even a ditz like Lana will eventually figure out who's not primarily interested in women! And then Professor Finally Reveals Himself! And Superman insists upon being called Clark rather than Kal-El! Can you tell I loved this episode, even though it was pretty dorky and superficially reminded me of Voyager's atrocious "Persistence of Vision"? Give me a little Clex and some Lionel and I am a happy girl.


The sunset over the farmhouse driving home from Catoctin on Sunday.

Tomorrow younger son has a VERY VERY early orthodontist appointment so he does not have to miss any school, since I had forgotten when I made the appointment that it was a half-day. Sigh!