via Daily Prompt: Precipice
Definition of precipice
- a very steep or overhanging place
- a hazardous situation; broadly : brink
(merriam-webster.com/dictionary)
We’re on the brink of summer. Finally some sun after long cold gray days of rain. The flower garden is happy, past the early spring crocuses and yellow daffs and now to tulips, more complicated daffodils with double blooms, and the blooming of the flowering crab tree. Lilacs are coming. We endure the long winter, the slow spring for summer and fall in Maine, Maine, and New England, at her beautiful best. Maybe because of the cold days and nights, the trees are only half in green, and the black flies are here, too. I’m ready for some hotter weather, as pretty as this is, with sangria on the porch, long Saturday nights talking and waiting for the moon, stars, and fireflies to come out…
Meanwhile…
Precipice (n)
(photo credit: Pixabay)
(from entymology.com)
“steep face of rock,” 1630s, from Middle French precipice from Latin praecipitium “a steep place,” literally “a fall or leap,” from praeceps (genitive praecipitis) “steep, headlong, head first,” from prae “before, forth” (see pre- ) + caput “head” (n)). Earlier in English as a verb (1590s) meaning “fall to great depth.”
We can’t quite move forward and yet we can’t go back.
The nation has been steamrolling toward this moment in time for…has it only been almost four months? The majority of us whole-heartedly agree that 45 is not competent to run the serious business of a country. How relieved we’ll be when the grownups remove him from office…though a precipice, a brink suggests that something is not a foregone conclusion, or that this will end the problems. It’s the long fall of a multi-armed octopus. Is this the start of the finale or just another cliffhanger to the next season of West Wingnut2017? #Imarched.
I do like the “fall to great depth” from the etymology definition. In Dante’s Inferno, traitors occupy the 9th circle of Hell, frozen in ice for eternity. And 45 won’t be alone. This is from a wonderful analysis of Niven and Pournelles’ scifi classic Inferno (1976–because there is nothing new under the sun) by Mary Pat Campbell Building A Modern Hell http://www.marypat.org/stuff/mywords/dante.html
“Finally, to round out one man’s journey through Hell, Allen comes to the ice plain in which the Traitors are trapped. Again, we have the historical parade of sinners: Bob Ford, who shot Jesse James, Al Capone, and Vito Genovese. But before Allen can get to Hell’s exit, Niven and Pournelle inject one last political shot: two Senators are stuck in the ice, their punishment due only to their votes on anti-ballistic missiles vs. a laser defense system. Both voted the opposite of their conscience, but along party lines; both voted opposite each other. By being traitors to their consciences on a matter of at least nationwide life-or-death, they were condemned to the lowest part of Hell. I found this as a criticism of America’s political system, in which one joins a party for its clout, and in which one may vote “wrong” on important matters for it is the party line.”
Okay, got that off my chest. One of these days, maybe I’ll write my own modern Inferno 😉
From Gustav Dore
Precipice
Coffee And Ink 
You must be logged in to post a comment.