Monday, August 31, 2009

Self portrait (two views after the last photo)

Image of the author.Dear Gentle Reader,

Apsu and Tiamat were the primordial (Babylonian) progenitors of the universe.

As Apsu said to his wife, Tiamat, in the Babylonian creation myth, the Enuma elish--when speaking of their children, the first pantheon of gods:
"Their ways are verily loathsome unto me. By day I find no relief, nor repose by night..."
And, therefore, the two progenitors set about to annihilate their progeny.

Genocide, which I have previously recounted the etymology of, is an old concept for mankind, even if it is a young word.

But, the twentieth century saw more than its fair share of genocides, such as the Cambodian genocide of the 1975-1979.

I did not intend to be gratuitous with my usage of the images of skulls and bound bones in last Friday's post.

I stand by that image; I do not believe it was gratuitous.

As individuals, and as members of various communities, we all have many perceptions of ourselves.

While we likely recognize some aspects of ourselves accurately, we do not always acknowledge other aspects.

In order to grow and to overcome various pasts, as people, as communities, as nations, and as world citizens, we need to embrace these pasts and not try to eradicate memory or awareness of them.

I am a firm believer that wishing things away does not make it so. However, the closing image of Friday's post was an ugly image for which I gave no warning.

Today, in response, one slice of a self-image:


THE MONSTER WITHIN...

(the one who can take pictures of loathsome things, I suppose...)
(...which would imply a potentially monstrous, post-Jekyllandhydian duality as both subject and photographer...)


Image of a slice of the author's brain, this section shows fangs rather than teeth, due to the angle of the image 'slice'.

Tschuess,
Chris

6 comments:

Cloudia said...

Does the medical image imply that it is your mortality we should be concerned about, our bloggy scribe-friend?

We've coome to care.....

Aloha-

Comfort Spiral

jjdebenedictis said...

Your brain is winking at me. Should I clutch my pearls and have an attack of the vapours?

Teresa said...

Yeah, Chris, what is that dark patch in the middle of your brain? The Mr. Hyde part?

Thank you for pushing us to continue to reflect on the pasts we need to collectively overcome. It is still a timely sentiment all over the world.

Teresa

Dominic Rivron said...

The scan, I take it, is of your head. I perused it for e-Cuneform scratchings but could see none. Strange things, brains.

It's a far cry from the 1941 version.

Dominic Rivron said...

Thanks for visiting my link! If you like the 1941 "industrial anatomy" cut-away head picture, check out Bibliodyssey. It seems like a great blog.

simmers said...

Chris,

I believe you need
because of your massive brain
a skull enlargement

John