Via Negativa

October 18, 2019November 27, 2019 by Dave Bonta

Pepys pilgrimage

On Wednesday, Rachel and I made our way over to the Museum of London to gawk at the silver plate recently identified as having belonged to Samuel Pepys.

The silver trencher plate is one of three in existence known to have belonged to Pepys — although it was only recently recognised as such — and is the only one on display in the UK.

It bears Pepys’ coat of arms and was made in a workshop in Foster Lane, near St Paul’s Cathedral and the museum where it now resides, in 1681/2. Cutlery scratch marks are visible in its surface, suggesting it was one of the pieces Pepys was referring to in his diary when he boasted that he served his guests on silver plates rather than pewter.

Well, if it was made in 1681 or 2, it couldn’t have featured in the diary, though there’s no doubt he was very proud of his silver. At any rate, it was such an impressive object I walked right past it and had to ask Rachel where the hell it was. My photo is, um, not good:

I thought this ceramic plate on display nearby captured the spirit of the age much better:

Coolest of all, perhaps, was this copy of astrologer William Lilly’s 1651 book Monarchy or No Monarchy, which was said to predict the Great Fire:

Pepys’ diary accounts of the actual conflagration were extensively drawn upon for the museum’s looped six-minute film. I sometimes wonder whether his diary would be nearly as famous had he not had the (mis)fortune to live through the great plague in 1665 and the fire the next year.

We decided sort of on the spur of the moment to go back to Seething Lane and see whether the gardens on the site of Pepys’ office were accessible. On our previous attempt at a Pepys pilgrimage three years ago, the site had been all torn up and walled off for some sort of construction, and we feared the worse.

Our route took us past the Guildhall, and I couldn’t resist another selfie with the Pepys bust there. This is Sam at the peak of his power and influence — not the young man on the make of the diary period.

As we rounded the corner from Hart Street to Seething Lane, Rachel noticed that St. Olave’s — Pepys’ church — was actually open. We hadn’t gotten into that last time either. So we were finally able to see the sculptor John Bushnell’s bust of Elizabeth Pepys that the grieving Sam had paid for after her early death in 1669, high on the wall to the left of the altar.

A more modern memorial to Sam himself, paid for by public subscription at the instigation of his Victorian-era editor Wheatley — the diary edition I’m erasing — isn’t nearly as impressive:

But the church has plenty of other fascinating details, such as this window from the Clothworkers’ guild, which evidently had teasel as its emblem:

And it was great to see that it was still very much a functioning Anglican church, not merely a tourist attraction. See my album on Flickr for more photos.

The churchyard was also charming, and included an herb garden in tribute to another famous parishioner, William Turner (1510-1568), the father of English botany. There was also a labyrinth, and Rachel didn’t object to my filming her feet as she walked it. Naturally, I had to turn it into another videohaiku:

The site of the Naval Board offices was right across the narrow Seething Lane, and Pepys had arranged for a covered walkway connecting them so the great men could walk to their gallery in church without getting rained on. Such is the enduring interest in Pepys that even the location of that former entrance is memorialized…

…as is, of course, the site of the navy office, which survived the Great Fire only to be destroyed in another fire seven years later.

The reason the Seething Lane gardens had to be destroyed and replaced was to build an underground parking garage for the adjacent building, formerly the headquarters of the Port of London Authority, but now London’s second Four Seasons Hotel,

this one owned and operated by a Chinese corporation…

…which has done a decent job with it. To quote the wonderful London travel blog IanVisits:

The word ‘Seething’ may originate from a medieval word ‘sifethen’ meaning ‘full of chaff’, so-called after a nearby Corn Market.

Seething Lane Gardens have a curious history, but suffice to say it was once the topic of a planning dispute, and, with a slight gap, the fine of one red rose has been paid annually to the Lord Mayor. That’s since 1381, and the Knollys Rose ceremony still takes place each year.

In addition to the roses though, it’s famous for its association with the diarist Samuel Pepys, who lived in the same street and said he buried his exceptionally expensive Parmesan cheeses in his own back garden to protect them from the Great Fire of London.

Imagine our delight to look down and see Pepys’ buried cheese memorialized in a flagstone:

This was just one in a whole series of flagstone engravings relating to Pepys, the Naval Board, the fire and the plague. Check out, for example, this excellent flea:

And here’s a depiction of Pepys’ shorthand original of the diary:

There’s no key to the paving stones anywhere, so if you’re not a Pepys fan, some are likely to be mystifying. This for example clearly depicts the removal of his bladder stone, which diary readers will know was a very big deal to him — he marked the anniversary of the operation every year with a party:

I have photos of most of the engraved slabs on Flickr. As for the garden, Ian nails it:

Although I would have to say the current garden is rather pleasing, it’s of a style that’s increasingly generic – of raised beds with lots of paving, and hence not that interesting.

What does make this one stand out a bit is the paving […]

Sadly, the Knollys Rose has not been immortalized in stone, but some of the plants looked distinctly rose-like, so the ceremony should resume this year.

The garden was designed by the landscape architects, Capita Symonds.

The cost of the landscaping works came in at £1.25 million, paid for by the hotel development.

Walking to the Bank tube station at rush hour, we were impressed by the crowds of business-suited young and middle-aged City men, some scurrying, a few sauntering, many smoking (an unusual sight elsewhere these days). Palimpsest as London may be, some things don’t seem to change very much over the centuries.

October 18, 2019October 17, 2019 by Luisa A. Igloria

Of All the Birds I Love the Least

The pelican is thought 
unusual for the way it clasps 
food with its feet and dips it
in water before eating; 

for the sound it makes as it drinks, 
which is like a donkey braying. 
Most medieval bestiaries 
tell of the way it cares 

for its young, who as they grow
louder and stronger, turn against it. 
But even the most saintly reach 
a limit— one too many bouts 

of aggressive pecking, and 
the parent snaps. The story doesn't
say exactly how the lethal wounds
are inflicted on the young. But 

on the gilded page, the artist shows 
the mother frantically gouging out 
her breast with her own beak; drops 
of her blood fall on the fallen, 

and they rise again, miraculous, 
rejuvenated. Since the theme of virtue 
in self-sacrifice is re-established, 
the story doesn't see fit to continue 

past the moment of instruction. But
what happened then? Were they finally 
satisfied? Did the new lease on life 
extend to all? No caladrius painted

among the vines, steady gaze ready
to take on the malady. No mention of who
dressed the mother-wounds and helped 
her heal. No calculus of what it cost.

October 17, 2019 by Dave Bonta

Herbivory

Up and to my office, called up by Commissioner Middleton, newly come to town, but staid not with me; so I to my office busy all the morning. Towards noon, by water to Westminster Hall, and there by several hear that the Parliament do resolve to do something to retrench Sir G. Carteret’s great salary; but cannot hear of any thing bad they can lay to his charge. The House did this day order to be engrossed the Bill against importing Irish cattle; a thing, it seems, carried on by the Western Parliament-men, wholly against the sense of most of the rest of the House; who think if you do this, you give the Irish again cause to rebel. Thus plenty on both sides makes us mad. The Committee of the Canary Company of both factions come to me for my Cozen Roger that is of the Committee. Thence with [Sir] W. Coventry when the House rose and [Sir] W. Batten to St. James’s, and there agreed of and signed our paper of extraordinaries, and there left them, and I to Unthanke’s, where Mr. Falconbridge’s girle is, and by and by comes my wife, who likes her well, though I confess I cannot (though she be of my finding out and sings pretty well), because she will be raised from so mean a condition to so high all of a sudden; but she will be much to our profit, more than Mercer, less expense. Here we bespoke anew gowne for her, and to come to us on Friday. She being gone, my wife and I home by coach, and then I presently by water with Mr. Pierce to Westminster Hall, he in the way telling me how the Duke of York and Duke of Albemarle do not agree. The Duke of York is wholly given up to this bitch of Denham. The Duke of Albemarle and Prince Rupert do less agree. So that we are all in pieces, and nobody knows what will be done the next year. The King hath yesterday in Council declared his resolution of setting a fashion for clothes, which he will never alter. It will be a vest, I know not well how; but it is to teach the nobility thrift, and will do good. By and by comes down from the Committee W. Coventry, and I find him troubled at several things happened this afternoon, which vexes me also; our business looking worse and worse, and our worke growing on our hands. Time spending, and no money to set anything in hand with; the end thereof must be speedy ruine. The Dutch insult and have taken off Bruant’s head, which they have not dared to do (though found guilty of the fault he did die for, of something of the Prince of Orange’s faction) till just now, which speaks more confidence in our being worse than before. Alderman Maynell, I hear, is dead. Thence returned in the darke by coach all alone, full of thoughts of the consequences of this ill complexion of affairs, and how to save myself and the little I have, which if I can do, I have cause to bless God that I am so well, and shall be well contented to retreat to Brampton, and spend the rest of my days there. So to my office, and did some business, and finished my Journall with resolutions, if God bless me, to apply myself soberly to settle all matters for myself, and expect the event of all with comfort. So home to supper and to bed.

noon
and the cattle come for the rose

like a sudden rift
growing in a ruin

and have taken
off a head

which speaks dark thoughts
to itself

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Monday 8 October 1666.

October 16, 2019 by Dave Bonta

Storm light

(Lord’s day). Up, and after visiting my father in his chamber, to church, and then home to dinner. Little Michell and his wife come to dine with us, which they did, and then presently after dinner I with Sir J. Minnes to White Hall, where met by Sir W. Batten and Lord Bruncker, to attend the King and Duke of York at the Cabinet; but nobody had determined what to speak of, but only in general to ask for money. So I was forced immediately to prepare in my mind a method of discoursing. And anon we were called in to the Green Room, where the King, Duke of York, Prince Rupert, Lord Chancellor, Lord Treasurer, Duke of Albemarle, [Sirs] G. Carteret, W. Coventry, Morrice. Nobody beginning, I did, and made a current, and I thought a good speech, laying open the ill state of the Navy: by the greatness of the debt; greatness of work to do against next yeare; the time and materials it would take; and our incapacity, through a total want of money. I had no sooner done, but Prince Rupert rose up and told the King in a heat, that whatever the gentleman had said, he had brought home his fleete in as good a condition as ever any fleete was brought home; that twenty boats would be as many as the fleete would want: and all the anchors and cables left in the storm might be taken up again. This arose from my saying, among other things we had to do, that the fleete was come in — the greatest fleete that ever his Majesty had yet together, and that in as bad condition as the enemy or weather could put it; and to use Sir W. Pen’s words, who is upon the place taking a survey, he dreads the reports he is to receive from the Surveyors of its defects. I therefore did only answer, that I was sorry for his Highness’s offence, but that what I said was but the report we received from those entrusted in the fleete to inform us. He muttered and repeated what he had said; and so, after a long silence on all hands, nobody, not so much as the Duke of Albemarle, seconding the Prince, nor taking notice of what he said, we withdrew. I was not a little troubled at this passage, and the more when speaking with Jacke Fenn about it, he told me that the Prince will be asking now who this Pepys is, and find him to be a creature of my Lord Sandwich’s, and therefore this was done only to disparage him. Anon they broke, up, and Sir W. Coventry come out; so I asked his advice. He told me he had said something to salve it, which was, that his Highnesse had, he believed, rightly informed the King that the fleete is come in good condition to have staid out yet longer, and have fought the enemy, but yet that Mr. Pepys his meaning might be, that, though in so good condition, if they should come in and lie all the winter, we shall be very loth to send them to sea for another year’s service with[out] great repairs. He said it would be no hurt if I went to him, and showed him the report himself brought up from the fleete, where every ship, by the Commander’s report, do need more or less, and not to mention more of Sir W. Pen for doing him a mischief. So I said I would, but do not think that all this will redound to my hurt, because the truth of what I said will soon appear. Thence, having been informed that, after all this pains, the King hath found out how to supply us with 5 or 6000l., when 100,000l. were at this time but absolutely necessary, and we mentioned 50,000l.. This is every day a greater and greater omen of ruine. God fit us for it! Sir J. Minnes and I home (it raining) by coach, calling only on Sir G. Carteret at his lodging (who is I find troubled at my Lord Treasurer and Sir Ph. Warwicke bungling in his accounts), and come home to supper with my father, and then all to bed. I made my brother in his cassocke to say grace this day, but I like his voice so ill that I begin to be sorry he hath taken this order upon him.

the green time of the storm
had the greatest weather

silence is a creature
of the winter air

but all this rain
is home to my voice

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Sunday 7 October 1666.

October 16, 2019October 15, 2019 by Luisa A. Igloria

Landscape, with Dead Bulls and Juice Boxes

In some ranches out west, all 
summer long, farmers have found
their cows crumpled on the ground 
like giant blow-up toys with the air 
siphoned out of them. Blood drained, 
tongues and genitals removed 
with surgeon-like precision 
from the carcasses; no gunshot 
wounds or animal marks, the ground 
pristine underneath. No one 
can explain how a Hereford bull 
weighing 2,400 lbs. turns up 
on a dry path, looking like a squashed 
Tetra Brik of juice or chocolate milk 
which a preschooler has gulped in one go 
and tossed over his shoulder, running 
into the schoolyard to play. The county 
sheriff and forest rangers can't make 
sense of it. When the crop duster pilots 
talk among themselves, you might hear 
words like beam or alien ship. Nervous 
farmhands can't tell if broken wheat 
stalks or speckled chicken eggs 
are omens; or if they are, of what. 
At least the cows are mostly in one
piece, unlike the matriarch in House
of the Spirits who gets decapitated
in a freak accident; they have to go
hunting for her head in the weeds.
Not even The Old Farmer's Almanac
can predict the weather on the day
we'll die and how we'll go, though 
it will tell you when to put bulbs 
in the ground; that spider webs 
floating at sunset in late autumn 
herald nights of frost; how you 
should always confess the worst 
thing first and how, if you hang 
the skin shed by a snake but not 
the flap-footed lizard or night 
lizard's from the rafters, it 
will most certainly bring rain.

October 15, 2019 by Dave Bonta

Connoisseur

Up, and having seen my brother in his cassocke, which I am not the most satisfied in, being doubtfull at this time what course to have him profess too soon. To the office and there busy about a list of the extraordinaries of the charge of the fleete this war; and was led to go to the office of the ordnance to be satisfied in something, and find their accounts and books kept in mighty good order, but that they can give no light, nor will the nature of their affairs permit it to tell what the charge of the ordnance comes to a man a month. So home again and to dinner, there coming Creed to me; but what with business and my hatred to the man, I did not spend any time with him, but after dinner [my] wife and he and I took coach and to Westminster, but he ‘light about Paul’s, and set her at her tailor’s, and myself to St. James’s, but there missing W. Coventry, returned and took up my wife, and calling at the Exchange home, whither Sir H. Cholmly come to visit me, but my business suffered me not to stay with him. So he gone I by water to Westminster Hall and thence to St. James’s, and there found W. Coventry waiting for me, and I did give him a good account to his mind of the business he expected about extraordinaries and then fell to other talke, among others, our sad condition contracted by want of a Comptroller; and it was his words, that he believes, besides all the shame and trouble he hath brought on the office, the King had better have given 100,000l. than ever have had him there. He did discourse about some of these discontented Parliament-men, and says that Birch is a false rogue, but that Garraway is a man that hath not been well used by the Court, though very stout to death, and hath suffered all that is possible for the King from the beginning. But discontented as he is, yet he never knew a Session of Parliament but he hath done some good deed for the King before it rose. I told him the passage Cocke told me of his having begged a brace of bucks of the Lord Arlington for him, and when it come to him, he sent it back again. Sir W. Coventry told me, it is much to be pitied that the King should lose the service of a man so able and faithfull; and that he ought to be brought over, but that it is always observed, that by bringing over one discontented man, you raise up three in his room; which is a State lesson I never knew before. But when others discover your fear, and that discontent procures favour, they will be discontented too, and impose on you. Thence to White Hall and got a coach and home, and there did business late, and so home and set up my little books of one of my presses come home gilt, which pleases me mightily, and then to bed. This morning my wife told me of a fine gentlewoman my Lady Pen tells her of, for 20l. per annum, that sings, dances, plays on four or five instruments and many other fine things, which pleases me mightily: and she sent to have her see her, which she did this afternoon; but sings basely, and is a tawdry wench that would take 8l., but [neither] my wife nor I think her fit to come.

my cassock is doubt
I profess no light
or nature or other
false way out

death is the one
king of the faithful

but I serve you
my little books
my instruments and other
fine things

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Saturday 6 October 1666.

October 15, 2019 by Dave Bonta

200 years

View on Vimeo.

A brief videohaiku tribute to the 200th anniversary of John Keats composing “To Autumn” in September 1819. I’d thought about going to the Keats house next to Hampstead Heath to shoot video, but instead I was charmed by this tiny square of wildflowers that someone had protected in the middle of the sidewalk on a busy street (Kilburn Lane) closer to home. It speaks to me of how greatly wild spaces have diminished in the last two centuries, and much British people still love nature despite having so little of it left.

October 15, 2019October 13, 2019 by Luisa A. Igloria

Portrait in Stained Glass of the Body Moving through a Field

- after "Mare Tenebrarum" (2016), Judith Schaechter


Shadows slash across an ambient field: a planetarium 
of wildflowers, their interwoven tongues harboring 

prophecies preceding your birth— their murmuring 
a wind or wave, a plow making a path for the body's 

passage, lashed to the back of a mare galloping 
toward the woods in the distance. Or the cliff's 

edge, or the sea. When you close your eyes, you 
can feel time sift its fine powder on your lashes. 

Touch one hand to your throat and feel the pulse 
slinging toward rapture. With your other hand, make 

a gesture that means I welcome all dreams; just keep 
the terrors at bay. Every fragment you graze offers 

a different fragility in form: millefiori shaken 
out of paperweights, translucent twigs, insects 

with tearable husks for wings. Thus stirred, 
the darkest sea ripples with hidden light.

October 14, 2019 by Dave Bonta

Martyrdom

Up, and with my father talking awhile, then to the office, and there troubled with a message from Lord Peterborough about money; but I did give as kind answer as I could, though I hate him. Then to Sir G. Carteret to discourse about paying of part of the great ships come in, and so home again to compare the comparison of the two Dutch wars’ charges for [Sir] W. Coventry, and then by water (and saw old Mr. Michell digging like a painfull father for his son) to him, and find him at dinner. After dinner to look over my papers, and comparing them with some notes of his and brought me, the sight of some good Navy notes of his which I shall get. Then examined and liked well my notes, and away together to White Hall, in the way discoursing the inconvenience of the King’s being thus subject to an account, but it will be remedied for the time to come, he thinks, if we can get this over, and I find he will have the Comptroller’s business better done, swearing he will never be for a wit to be employed on business again. Thence I home, and back again to White Hall, and meeting Sir H. Cholmly to White Hall; there walked till night that the Committee come down, and there Sir W. Coventry tells me that the Subcommittee have made their report to the Grand Committee, and in pretty kind terms, and have agreed upon allowing us 4l. per head, which I am sure will do the business, but he had endeavoured to have got more, but this do well, and he and I are both mighty glad it is come to this, and the heat of the present business seems almost over. But I have more worke cut out for me, to prepare a list of the extraordinaries, not to be included within the 4l., against Monday. So I away from him, and met with the Vice-Chamberlain, and I told him when I had this evening in coming hither met with Captain Cocke, and he told me of a wild motion made in the House of Lords by the Duke of Buckingham for all men that had cheated the King to be declared traitors and felons, and that my Lord Sandwich was named. This put me into a great pain, so the Vice-Chamberlain, who had heard nothing of it, having been all day in the City, away with me to White Hall; and there come to me and told me that, upon Lord Ashly’s asking their direction whether, being a peere, he should bring in his accounts to the Commons, which they did give way to, the Duke of Buckingham did move that, for the time to come, what I have written above might be declared by some fuller law than heretofore. Lord Ashly answered, that it was not the fault of the present laws, but want of proof; and so said the Lord Chancellor. He answered, that a better law, he thought, might be made so the House laughing, did refer it to him to bring in a Bill to that purpose, and this was all. So I away with joyful heart home, calling on Cocke and telling him the same. So I away home to the office to clear my Journall for five days, and so home to supper and to bed, my father who had staid out late and troubled me thereat being come home well and gone to bed, which pleases me also. This day, coming home, Mr. Kirton’s kinsman, my bookseller, come in my way; and so I am told by him that Mr. Kirton is utterly undone, and made 2 or 3000l. worse than nothing, from being worth 7 or 8,000l.. That the goods laid in the Churchyarde fired through the windows those in St. Fayth’s church; and those coming to the warehouses’ doors fired them, and burned all the books and the pillars of the church, so as the roof falling down, broke quite down, which it did not do in the other places of the church, which is alike pillared (which I knew not before); but being not burned, they stand still. He do believe there is above; 50,000l. of books burned; all the great booksellers almost undone: not only these, but their warehouses at their Hall, and under Christchurch, and elsewhere being all burned. A great want thereof there will be of books, specially Latin books and foreign books; and, among others, the Polyglottes and new Bible, which he believes will be presently worth 40l. a-piece.

digging like a father
for his son

I find my notes
for the subcommittee on pain

all the old accounts of a heart
clear as windows in a church

and the doors burned
and the roof falling down

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Friday 5 October 1666.

October 14, 2019October 12, 2019 by Luisa A. Igloria

Portrait in Stained Glass of the Soul, in the Throes of Living or Dying

– after “The Life Ecstatic” (2016) by Judith Schaechter

Tied to this field and rising, cocooned

in the blue of your own body’s binding.

Do you hear the larval teeth, the patient

scallops they draw around each leaf?

All is flush and overwhelming: scents

you never could possess in your one-

chambered belly, your partitioned

heart. But the only possible answer

tremors all the way across your ribs’

marimba. Its echo lodges in your throat,

though you will hold out until the last.

Isn’t that why all the speckled flowers

curve like spoons toward your mouth,

why they petal you in light that touches

without form, without shape,

without moon or weight?