the lesson of the moth

"the lesson of the moth," by Don Marquis.

the lesson of the moth

i was talking to a moth
the other evening
he was trying to break into
an electric light bulb
and fry himself on the wires

why do you fellows
pull this stunt i asked him
because it is the conventional
thing for moths or why
if that had been an uncovered
candle instead of an electric
light bulb you would
now be a small unsightly cinder
have you no sense

plenty of it he answered
but at times we get tired
of using it
we get bored with the routine
and crave beauty
and excitement
fire is beautiful
and we know that if we get
too close it will kill us
but what does that matter
it is better to be happy
for a moment
and be burned up with beauty
than to live a long time
and be bored all the while
so we wad all our life up
into one little roll
and then we shoot the roll
that is what life is for
it is better to be a part of beauty
for one instant and then cease to
exist than to exist forever
and never be a part of beauty
our attitude toward life
is come easy go easy
we are like human beings
used to be before they became
too civilized to enjoy themselves

and before i could argue him
out of his philosophy
he went and immolated himself on a patent cigar lighter
i do not agree with him
myself i would rather have
half the happiness and twice
the longevity

but at the same time i wish
there was something i wanted
as badly as he wanted to fry himself


-archy



the story goes, that Don Marquis arrived home one evening and found a cockroach jumping on the keys of his typewriter. the product of this interesting achievement was the poem, written by archy the cockroach. this fact explains the poem´s lack of caps. it does not however, explain mine.

De Kas greenhouse

I just realized that my photo links are broken. The only thing that's really safe is text. So from now on I'll stick to just that: text.

Last night we went for dinner to the De Kas greenhouse restaurant in Amsterdam. And this is what I could like to dedicate this post to.

The place is basically a giant greenhouse. You sit inside and can look out into the gardens and sky through the many glass panes that encase you. They grow all their own organic vegetables and herbs either on the grounds, or in a small piece of land that they have 15 minutes outside of Amsterdam.

There is no menu. Every day the chef prepares a 5 course set menu based on what is fresh from the garden. I like this. A lot. Anything that reduces the amount of decisions I have to make, in any given situation, is a very good thing.

The only thing the waiter asked was if there is anything in particular any one of us didn't want to eat, and I said that I don't eat meat. He then proceeded to say "very well, for everyone the main dish will be lamb and for you it will be fish". Last time I checked fish IS meat, mate. He saved himself being talked down to though because I am actually a hypocritical vegetarian, and do eat fish. (Fish don't have dreams.)

The first course was a fresh salad served in a rounded sort of whiskey glass. I'll just say now that the presentation for each of the dishes was wonderful and artistic. The food would always be perfectly arranged on the plate and somehow (edible) flowers were included which added a very special touch.

Back to the salad. It was my faveourite part of the meal I think. It was tomato balsamic compote on top of caramelized onions and under fresh leaves and flowers of some sort. It tasted like tomato ice cream. Icy, very refreshing, an absolutely unexpected.

Next we had a dish of broccoli cooked al dente covered in thinly sliced almonds and oil dressing. And after that some green beans with seafood and creme fraiche dressing. Both dishes were very flavourful with hints of fresh herbs. Yum!

The main course for me was poached white fish, zeewolf, and was absolutely delicious. Alongside the fish was a slice of grilled polenta under a yellow zucchini, a quarter of a cabbage, and a red and white beetroot salad. To bring the whole dish together a light white sauce was the perfect touch.

The others had the same as me, except that they had lamb which judging by how much relish they took to eating it was delicious, and their zucchini was wrapped in Serrano ham.

For desert we were given a puff pastry nest filled with thick vanilla sauce topped with strawberries and gooseberries next to smooth violet sorbet ice cream. This light desert was just right and very fitting to the hot summers day we had. I can still remember the taste of the vanilla and the crunchiness of the pastry, wonderful.

After dinner we stepped outside to catch a bus, and found ourselves in our first "tropical" rainstorm of the year and got completely soaking wet in our fancy dinner wear. I can recommend this to anyone :)