Resurrection

Resurrection, originally uploaded by Ayala Moriel.

You are sown in order to blossom again.
The Lord of the harvest goes forth
and gathers us in sheaves
when we have died. *

What awaited me at the very end of March were the last breaths of winter, persistently attempting to overpower the burst of cherry blossom with a flood of cold caressing cotton balls. At the same time Mahler’s symphony no.2, AKA “Die Auferstehung” (Resurrection) is playing, and I am wearing the first mod I’ve created for “In A Station of the Metro”. Interestingly, both perfume and music were inspired by a poem. One is longish, the other very short as you may know.

The great Romantics of the late 19th century were not merely death obsessed; they saw death as a positive thing, mulling over concepts that perhaps before were more prevalent in the East, such as incarnation, the rise of spirit above matter and so on. I am not particularly inclined to connote Spring with death, but through the lessons of life, I’ve learned that spring is not always just sunny daffodils and birthday parties. Early spring is a time of struggle, a battle fought wearing coat of arms made from bursts of showy flowers. While to some, waking up in the morning is an appealing and easy task, the rise from near-death sleep (or a dark Winter hibernation, for that matter) takes a lot of energy, and we may need all the flowers we can get to get out of this death-bed.

* “Wieder aufzublueh’n wirst du gesat!
Der Herr der Erhnte geht
und sammelt Garben
uns ein, die starben!” (from “ Die Auferstehung” by Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock, translated by a mysterious translator who works for Decca record label, and copied from the pamphlet accompanying the 1975 recording Zubin Mehta & Wiener Philharmoniker and soloists Christa Ludwig and Ileana Cortrubas)