Trophia
Richmond Lattimore’s translation of TheIlliad of Homer the description of Achilles’ shield contains a depiction ofboth unrest and war and of reunion and feasting.
These stood their ground and fought abattle by the banks of the river,
And they were making casts at eachother with their spears bronze-headed;
And Hate was there with Confusion amongthem, and Death the destructive;
She was holding a live man with a newwound, and another
One unhurt, and dragged a dead man bythe feet through the carnage.
The clothing together like living menand fought with each other
And dragged away from each other thecorpses of those who had fallen.
There were three sheaf-binders whostood by, and behind them
were children picking up the cutswathes, and filled their arms with them and carried and gave them always; andby them the king in silence
and holding his staff stood near theline of the reapers, happily.
And apart and under a tree the heraldsmade a feast ready
and trimmed a great ox they hadslaughtered. Meanwhile the women scattered, for the workmen to eat, abundantwhite barley. -The Iliad, Book Eighteen[1]
[1] “18.” The Iliad ofHomer ; Translated with an Introduction by Richard Lattimore, by Homer andRichmond Lattimore, University of Chicago Press, 1962, pp. 481–481.
In Emblematic Eating: Reading the Feasts of the Iliad as Models for Social Order by Erin Welty, Weltydescribes communal feasting found in Homer’s Iliad as a primeexample of an economy of redistribution.[1]The Homeric term for feast, δαίς, shares a root with the verb δαίζω, meaning “to distribute or divide,” which frames the act offeasting in terms of the communal circulation of resources. The concept of theδαίς ἕϊση –“an equal share” or “a well-divided feast” –attaches a populistmeaning to the symbolic value of the feast. The ancient quadrated bread formsthat has been discovered at archeological sites of Pompeii aligns to thisnotion of shared eating. The bread is divided into equal quarters and its formis an emblematic depiction of distribution of wealth. The bread is segmentedinto parts and stands as a sign for social reconciliation through sharing.
[1] Welty,Erin, Emblematic Eating: Reading the Feasts of the Iliadas Models for SocialOrder, 2018, pp 6-14
Panis Quadratus
What of hunger’sauspices
Can be contained? Brick
Ovens holding bread, shields
written and wrought furiously.
Beginning, always, in desire
And glass too,without
Air. Time striates, leavening
The eating to’veeaten.
Assembled fourthwise: clear auspices
What wets theworld...
Time’s crystal allayer also.
And grain, ground numinous.
A continent of grain
Defining its own telos:
To shield fromhunger
Or else, borrowtime.
Enter whisks like years
The continent then, disparate—
Okeanos for Nerean roil.
The instrument bringsagita,
Biga then like pharmacopuloi.
Sediment collects. Whole settling
Occurrences at particulate levels.
Let it wash throughout.
Onto the work surface:
The work amidstfontaines.
A hand must reach.
These origins, these consequences.
How fingers gather through
Dough that yields, gasping.
Hunger’s history’s best answer.
How does anything open?
A sudden orbital cleanness.
The lid anaerobes content.
But telos reaches still,
Out of time, gathering.
Here, hold yourface
Over the newopening.
What contains is opened,
Desire having claimed additional.
A fist poised above
Not to beat, only
To prepare. The fruit
Of a hand hovering.
And so it presses,
Not destroying. It descends,
Balled purpose to need,
Other fleshes, with care.
No, hesitation doesn’t mark
Here. Here records attentions.
The knuckles of purpose
Mark the lastgaspings.
Spare a breath, lifting
Dough sophysical it
Embarrasses. Thiswill do
What we’ve mirrors for.
Oh, everything is embarrassing:
Plastics to hold antiquity.
The night’s no wiser.
Folding desire to edges.
But look! Itsmoothes,
It yields totouching
This lift isphysical
also, but now lovely.
The last organic rumpling
of desire, which also
is desire’s very envelope.
What, kissing, issealed?
And like that, gone.
What bore continents, fists
Even Nereus’s daughters; orbiform.
See the envelope,awaiting.
Thus the twine binds—
That careful precise knot.
One white arm, lain
Resting, thoughtfully, in dust.
Into the orange cloche
The whole of desire
Awaits. Fire gathers off-screen.
By heat, theworld.
From its domestic crucible
the trades betwixtheat
and time andgrain
and desire does emerge.
Curiosity’s strange trowel splays,
trepanning the crust once.
A little light settles
Through the Aeolian catacombs.
Again, the trowel hesitates
What, seeping, does soothe,
Offering wisdom to desire
As a calmative? Salt?
Already the work vivisects.
More of desire lain
Bare for the day’s
Touch. And stains not.
Twice over, ifgood.
Desire’s cooling aerated innards
Begging to rise, whispering
Back at thelight.
Like the body, structure
Emerges circumstantially. It’s not
Easy, noris it
Quick, thisdeep opening.
At Pompeii, the dust
Fell slow from above.
Here too, from above
Loosed gently onto below.
An artifact, then. Good.
Desire writ into desire’s
Face, it’s envelope’s bound
In string and attention.
Gather finally. Holdhere.
The edges burstingforth,
Your yearning darkensit.
The smell is absolute.