in which we analyse day and night

I think there just might be some truth in the whole early-to-bed-early-to-rise business.

I remember one of my friends telling me that it’s very easy to wallow in self-pity. It’s easy to curl up in the comfort of your depression. You know how you want to stay wrapped in your blankets in the winter even though it’s 10 in the morning and you have a long, long day ahead of you? Depression’s like that. It’s a snuggly blanket. It takes effort to get out of it.

I realise I love the night because it fuels my despondency. There’s something about darkness that throws you into delightful fits of despair. And you embrace the despair  with open arms, with absolute relief. And then there’s the small matter of the moon. Have you ever seen anything so beautifully melancholic?

But the most important thing about night? It’s inspiring. Come on, nobody writes poems on a sunny day. My English teacher once wisely said — uh, they (the great poets) had better things to do when they were happy.

So I went to bed at around 3 last night feeling unloved and alone, convinced that I was going to spend my whole life feeling just that. And then I woke up in the morning feeling … fine. Though nothing had changed.

in which we drown our sorrows in (expensive) wine

Damn, they’re floating.

in which we inaugurate the blog with a hauntingly beautiful poem…

… by one of my all-time favourite poets, because for some reason, I woke up thinking about it.

Refugee Blues

Say this city has ten million souls,
Some are living in mansions, some are living in holes:
Yet there’s no place for us, my dear, yet there’s no place for us.

Once we had a country and we thought it fair,
Look in the atlas and you’ll find it there:
We cannot go there now, my dear, we cannot go there now.

In the village churchyard there grows an old yew,
Every spring it blossoms anew;
Old passports can’t do that, my dear, old passports can’t do that.

The consul banged the table and said:
‘If you’ve got no passport, you’re officially dead’;
But we are still alive, my dear, but we are still alive.

Went to a committee; they offered me a chair;
Asked me politely to return next year:
But where shall we go today, my dear, but where shall we go today?

Came to a public meeting; the speaker got up and said:
‘If we let them in, they will steal our daily bread’;
He was talking of you and me, my dear, he was talking of you and me.

Thought I heard the thunder rumbling in the sky;
It was Hitler over Europe, saying: ‘They must die’;
We were in his mind, my dear, we were in his mind.

Saw a poodle in a jacket fastened with a pin,
Saw a door opened and a cat let in:
But they weren’t German Jews, my dear, but they weren’t German Jews.

Went down the harbour and stood upon the quay,
Saw the fish swimming as if they were free:
Only ten feet away, my dear, only ten feet away.

Walked through a wood, saw the birds in the trees;
They had no politicians and sang at their ease:
They weren’t the human race, my dear, they weren’t the human race.

Dreamed I saw a building with a thousand floors,
A thousand windows and a thousand doors;
Not one of them was ours, my dear, not one of them was ours.

Stood on a great plain in the falling snow;
Ten thousand soldiers marched to and fro:
Looking for you and me, my dear, looking for you and me.

— WH Auden