The rose is a transcendental metaphor that exists outside of its velvety petals, thorns, dark green leaves. Whether the rose is just a flower, or something else, goes way beyond its meaning as a simple plant. In fact, there is nothing simple about either the word or the plant. The iconic existence of this flower reaches into the darkest part of the human soul as a metaphor for the transient nature of beauty, the impossibility of fooling the clock, and the ineffable nature of sublime experiences. The inner nature of the rose hints at the mystic, if not mundane, nature of symbols and how they invade the hermeneutic horizon of any given moment in which meaning is being generated. The rose is logos in its most primitive form. The sign of the sign, the inherent, if not obvious, signifier which means signifier, the rose means signified. The rose signifies a meta-signified symbol metonymy that may or may not mean anything more than a bit of nature that arbitrarily signifies beauty, love, aesthetics, youth, and an almost unlimited host of other things. We give roses because they are beautiful and because they will not last. The rose’s beauty is transient and a symbol of the finite nature of all physical beauty. The rose is, then, a piece of tragic irony because it invests all life, all creatures, all humans with meaning. Juliet understood that some things, some people, transcend their names, and that names do not always square with the thing, person, being signified. Nothing lasts, nothing stays the same, everything changes, even change. The fact that all flesh will eventually pass away is a universal truth that is reflected in the short-lived flesh of the rose. We give roses because like the human being, we can only face our mortality when we see it reflected in another living thing–even a thorny plant. The aesthetic of the rose, the petals, the fragrance, the velvety texture of the dark red flower, the painfully sharp thorns adorning the stem, the innocuous green leaves, form a whole which is both contradictory and unifying, hard and soft, round and pointy, fragrant and gritty, iconic, but all of that is undergirded by the promise of corruption and decay. The beauty can only be beautiful because it cannot last, born into corruption, the perfect rose blossom will always only ever point to the end of existence, a musty, off-purple, decadent flower that represents death, dying and corruption. The rose is at once a symbol of birth, death, and resurrection, replicating the human experience in its most basic form. As we observe the rose, we are also observing ourselves since the rose is the image, imago, of the human form–birth, youth, middle-age, old age, and death. What we see in the rose and its short life is our own mortality, but we also see the beauty of nature that exists outside of ourselves, that there is something beautiful outside of ourselves. Yet, the rose, feminine, anonymous, unknown, transcendent is inscrutable and silent, a sphinx, unwilling to ever reveal its secrets. The name of the rose, whether post-modern or medieval, is unknowable and undiscoverable. The mystery of the rose cannot be divined in any sense because it transcends all realities and all simulacra. A rose is a rose is a rose only if it is never a rose which means that the essence of the rose is larger than any given rose that might grow in your garden, which is anecdotal. In the end it is a fight between the thorns and the fragrance, a paradox of that which is sublimated by the beauty of the flower that has no function, does no work, has no reason for existing unless it is to produce more flowers, more flowers that mean everything but produce nothing.
Category Archives: rose
On the rose
The rose is a transcendental metaphor that exists outside of its velvety petals, thorns, dark green leaves. Whether the rose is just a flower, or something else, goes way beyond its meaning as a simple plant. In fact, there is nothing simple about either the word or the plant. The iconic existence of this flower reaches into the darkest part of the human soul as a metaphor for the transient nature of beauty, the impossibility of fooling the clock, and the ineffable nature of sublime experiences. The inner nature of the rose hints at the mystic, if not mundane, nature of symbols and how they invade the hermeneutic horizon of any given moment in which meaning is being generated. The rose is logos in its most primitive form. The sign of the sign, the inherent, if not obvious, signifier which means signifier, the rose means signified. The rose signifies a meta-signified symbol metonymy that may or may not mean anything more than a bit of nature that arbitrarily signifies beauty, love, aesthetics, youth, and an almost unlimited host of other things. We give roses because they are beautiful and because they will not last. The rose’s beauty is transient and a symbol of the finite nature of all physical beauty. The rose is, then, a piece of tragic irony because it invests all life, all creatures, all humans with meaning. Juliet understood that some things, some people, transcend their names, and that names do not always square with the thing, person, being signified. Nothing lasts, nothing stays the same, everything changes, even change. The fact that all flesh will eventually pass away is a universal truth that is reflected in the short-lived flesh of the rose. We give roses because like the human being, we can only face our mortality when we see it reflected in another living thing–even a thorny plant. The aesthetic of the rose, the petals, the fragrance, the velvety texture of the dark red flower, the painfully sharp thorns adorning the stem, the innocuous green leaves, form a whole which is both contradictory and unifying, hard and soft, round and pointy, fragrant and gritty, iconic, but all of that is undergirded by the promise of corruption and decay. The beauty can only be beautiful because it cannot last, born into corruption, the perfect rose blossom will always only ever point to the end of existence, a musty, off-purple, decadent flower that represents death, dying and corruption. The rose is at once a symbol of birth, death, and resurrection, replicating the human experience in its most basic form. As we observe the rose, we are also observing ourselves since the rose is the image, imago, of the human form–birth, youth, middle-age, old age, and death. What we see in the rose and its short life is our own mortality, but we also see the beauty of nature that exists outside of ourselves, that there is something beautiful outside of ourselves. Yet, the rose, feminine, anonymous, unknown, transcendent is inscrutable and silent, a sphinx, unwilling to ever reveal its secrets. The name of the rose, whether post-modern or medieval, is unknowable and undiscoverable. The mystery of the rose cannot be divined in any sense because it transcends all realities and all simulacra. A rose is a rose is a rose only if it is never a rose which means that the essence of the rose is larger than any given rose that might grow in your garden, which is anecdotal. In the end it is a fight between the thorns and the fragrance, a paradox of that which is sublimated by the beauty of the flower that has no function, does no work, has no reason for existing unless it is to produce more flowers, more flowers that mean everything but produce nothing.
On Valentine’s Day
Perhaps we might invent a holiday that torments single people and makes them feel isolated and alone. Wait, we already did that with Valentine’s Day. I think marriage was invented so that the vast majority of people would not have to worry about getting a date for that day, or not getting flowers, or not going dancing, or not giving away chocolates. The pressure is always on during the days leading up to Valentine’s Day. Single people are tormented by the endless parade of happy people, their flowers, their heart-shaped balloons, their romantic dinners, their Valentine’s Day cards. What if you don’t get any? And romantic music is like a stake in the heart for a vampire. For those lucky folks who find themselves paired up during the Valentine, the holiday in mid-February is a wonderful time to love stuff, but for those folks who have recently broken up with their significant other, every loving couple is only another reminder of their own loneliness and failure. Every Valentine’s Day party, every bouquet of roses, every couple dining in a romantic setting, is a reminder of their own solitary condition. This is supposed to be happy occasion, and for many people it is, but the irony is bitter, difficult to swallow because solitude is the only part of the human condition for which there is no solution, unless it be other people. I don’t know which part of Valentine’s Day I hate most–the stuffed bears, the bunches of balloons, the red, frilly hearts, the roses, the chocolates, or kissing couples. The clichés are not endless, but they are repetitive, and they are boring. People in love just make me sick. In another lifetime I might not have felt this way, but the years have tanned my hide, so to speak, and any romantic bone that I might have ever had has long since petrified, cold and unfeeling. Yet, this strange red and pink-hearted holiday is about an ideal after which most of strive at some moment in our lives. Our crushes, our loves, our obsessions all come home to roost on Valentine’s Day when we remember, perhaps ponder, our emotional attachments, the loves of our lives. What most bothers me about Valentine’s Day is how the multi-national corporations that sell Valentine’s Day have turned a sweet, emotional fun day into an out-of-control consumer nightmare of buying and splurging and spending. One is delinquent if one has not bought a diamond or chocolate or roses or lobster or mink or electronics or whatever. Since when is love about money and spending a whole bunch of it? I am often disappointed in my own culture’s inability to find meaning and value in something without attaching a monetary value to it. Savage consumerism has wrecked this holiday, and there is probably no way to save it from unbridled spending and uncontrolled materialism. Materialism is the dialectic opposite of love, which is a self-less emotional response to another human being. Things, stuff, can only get in the way, and are often the cause of so many break ups. Perhaps love can only survive Valentine’s Day when it is not controlled by a capitalistic market that is marked only by dollars and cents. Diamonds are not the solution to Valentine’s Day, but real emotion might be. Valentine’s Day, the way it is sold in stores, is fake, phony, a waste of time. Valentine’s Day really only exists in the heart, and that is the only place where it will ever be found.
On Valentine’s Day
Perhaps we might invent a holiday that torments single people and makes them feel isolated and alone. Wait, we already did that with Valentine’s Day. I think marriage was invented so that the vast majority of people would not have to worry about getting a date for that day, or not getting flowers, or not going dancing, or not giving away chocolates. The pressure is always on during the days leading up to Valentine’s Day. Single people are tormented by the endless parade of happy people, their flowers, their heart-shaped balloons, their romantic dinners, their Valentine’s Day cards. What if you don’t get any? And romantic music is like a stake in the heart for a vampire. For those lucky folks who find themselves paired up during the Valentine, the holiday in mid-February is a wonderful time to love stuff, but for those folks who have recently broken up with their significant other, every loving couple is only another reminder of their own loneliness and failure. Every Valentine’s Day party, every bouquet of roses, every couple dining in a romantic setting, is a reminder of their own solitary condition. This is supposed to be happy occasion, and for many people it is, but the irony is bitter, difficult to swallow because solitude is the only part of the human condition for which there is no solution, unless it be other people. I don’t know which part of Valentine’s Day I hate most–the stuffed bears, the bunches of balloons, the red, frilly hearts, the roses, the chocolates, or kissing couples. The clichés are not endless, but they are repetitive, and they are boring. People in love just make me sick. In another lifetime I might not have felt this way, but the years have tanned my hide, so to speak, and any romantic bone that I might have ever had has long since petrified, cold and unfeeling. Yet, this strange red and pink-hearted holiday is about an ideal after which most of strive at some moment in our lives. Our crushes, our loves, our obsessions all come home to roost on Valentine’s Day when we remember, perhaps ponder, our emotional attachments, the loves of our lives. What most bothers me about Valentine’s Day is how the multi-national corporations that sell Valentine’s Day have turned a sweet, emotional fun day into an out-of-control consumer nightmare of buying and splurging and spending. One is delinquent if one has not bought a diamond or chocolate or roses or lobster or mink or electronics or whatever. Since when is love about money and spending a whole bunch of it? I am often disappointed in my own culture’s inability to find meaning and value in something without attaching a monetary value to it. Savage consumerism has wrecked this holiday, and there is probably no way to save it from unbridled spending and uncontrolled materialism. Materialism is the dialectic opposite of love, which is a self-less emotional response to another human being. Things, stuff, can only get in the way, and are often the cause of so many break ups. Perhaps love can only survive Valentine’s Day when it is not controlled by a capitalistic market that is marked only by dollars and cents. Diamonds are not the solution to Valentine’s Day, but real emotion might be. Valentine’s Day, the way it is sold in stores, is fake, phony, a waste of time. Valentine’s Day really only exists in the heart, and that is the only place where it will ever be found.
On yellow
Perhaps there is no color odder than yellow. Okay, fuchsia, but I don’t know what that looks like. Sponge Bob, need I say more? Bananas, mustard, the middle light in the stop light for which no one stops, yield signs, taxi cabs, high-lighters, school buses, lemons, some butterflies, butter, baby chicks, corn, sponges, the sun. What I like are yellow cars that are of a yellow that is so strange that one must wonder what kind of good deal that person was offered so that they would buy that odd-looking car. I imagine that yellow is used to get our attention, and one will hardly miss a bright yellow Corvette as it roars by. People will often wear yellow raincoats–so they might be seen with greater ease? There are some naturally occurring yellows, lemons, for example, or apples, which seem healthy and normal and not at all strange. A yellow rose can be a thing of beauty and not the least bit odd. Dandelions are yellow, and they were always a sign that perhaps winter might be over for a few months and that the parka might be stowed away until maybe October. I do not own (nor should anyone) a pair of yellow jeans, bell bottoms or otherwise. Wasn’t the smiley-face logo yellow? (From the category, “Things I wish I’d never seen in the first place.”) According to the Beatles (a small ’60’s rock band from Liverpool–strange names and funny hair), traveling on a yellow submarine was really where it was at. I was never offered a ride, although my cousin Kent has a yellow Sunbird, probably one of his more forgettable automobiles. Of course, never eat yellow snow, a nice bit of advice and a catchy aphorism for those who live in snowy climates–Texans need not worry about this particular reference. Gumby was a freaky blue-green color and I have no idea why he made it into this note other than the fact that he is just odd in general.Some dish soaps are yellow, but blue or maybe green might be more appealing. I’m sure a marketing director somewhere has data on why yellow dish soap sells at all. Why “Yield” signs are yellow is an existential mystery that no one will ever resolve. No baseball teams, excluding the Oakland A’s, have contemporary uniforms that are purely yellow, although I think that the Pirates, and maybe the Padres, at some point in their history has had a mustard color road uniform–enough said on that subject. Baseballs are still white although faux-baseball, softball, is now played, occasionally, with a fluorescent yellow ball that looks quite unnatural and not at all like a grapefruit. Some pills are yellow so that you might distinguish them from the blue ones, or the pink ones, or the white ones, or the brown ones. There are one or two soda pops that are yellow, but I’ll pass on saying anything else about yellow liquids. Grapefruit are rather yellow, but I really like the pink variety better, sweeter, less bitter. Are canaries really yellow or is that a stereotype? Would you ever be caught dead in yellow shoes? Only if I was wearing yellow pants with the matching yellow suit coat. Yellow ties, on the other hand, offer some interesting possibilities. Why are the yolks of eggs yellow? My favorite color of pencil is a greenish blue, not yellow, although 99% of all #2 pencils seem to be yellow. A couple of more yellow things: stickies, legal pads, sunflowers, PacMan, daffodils, pollen, Tweety Pie, Big Bird, the Yellow pages, the leaves on some trees in the fall.
On caprice
It is summer, time for vacations and excursions, time for new experiences, getting away from home, meeting new people, trying new foods, exploring new landscapes, escaping the normal, the everyday, the humdrum, letting caprice carry you away. Yes, for all you rational empiricists, caprice is a naughty word associated with irrational and illogical behavior bordering on insanity. Caprice is about wanting things you shouldn’t want, doing things on the spur of the moment, letting go of the controlled life. For many people, caprice is childish and foolish. One should be able to live their whole life without being either spontaneous or unpredictable. All of life should be planned, logical, thought out, reasonable, predictable, and unsurprising. I know lots of people like this, and they are wonderful, if not a little boring. Caprice, on the other hand, can lead to all sorts of trouble: one might eat too much chocolate or ice cream, or heaven forbid, to much chocolate ice cream. No one needs chocolate ice cream for any reason whatsoever, so it is a caprice. Caprice might mean staying up too late to watch an old movie about good guys and bad guys, beautiful dangerous women, whiskey, big cars and palatial estates where some old guy grows orchids he hates. Nobody needs any of that. Caprice might mean eating that lobster as opposed to watching it swim in its aquarium. Nobody needs lobster, and besides, eating lobster usually leads to drinking white wine with someone you love, and of course, love only leads to rack and ruin, so lobster is a caprice. Life’s caprices will ruin your heavily structured, well-toned life of predictable and good behavior. Caprice is almost always about being bad, wanting something that is not good for you, getting something that is bad for you. Jetting off to Paris is a caprice because no one really needs to go to Paris when they have everything they really need in the United States, probably at the mall just down the street, or maybe even closer in that big box retailer on the corner near your house. And heaven forbid you should go to Madrid, which is full of caprices: lobster, flamenco, bull-fighting, the Prado, tapas, red wine, terraces, handsome people, wild night life, and chocolate ice cream. You might as well throw in the towel if you go there because you will be assaulted on all sides by unwelcome caprice of all kinds. You might lose control of your well-tailored life, of your managed respectability, of your over-sculpted identity. Caprice is a bad thing, no question about it. Stay at home and eat rice cakes. Drive a four-door, respectable, good-mileage sedan with an automatic transmission. Caprice can have nothing to do with your well-run life. Please stay away from other people, roses, fast cars, jazz, art museums (all sorts), bars, restaurants that offer lobster and/or chocolate ice cream, and airports, which only leads to flying and before you know it, you’re eating lobster on some beach where half-nude people are sipping drinks with little umbrellas in them. Don’t be tempted. Stay away from caprice and live your life.
On caprice
It is summer, time for vacations and excursions, time for new experiences, getting away from home, meeting new people, trying new foods, exploring new landscapes, escaping the normal, the everyday, the humdrum, letting caprice carry you away. Yes, for all you rational empiricists, caprice is a naughty word associated with irrational and illogical behavior bordering on insanity. Caprice is about wanting things you shouldn’t want, doing things on the spur of the moment, letting go of the controlled life. For many people, caprice is childish and foolish. One should be able to live their whole life without being either spontaneous or unpredictable. All of life should be planned, logical, thought out, reasonable, predictable, and unsurprising. I know lots of people like this, and they are wonderful, if not a little boring. Caprice, on the other hand, can lead to all sorts of trouble: one might eat too much chocolate or ice cream, or heaven forbid, to much chocolate ice cream. No one needs chocolate ice cream for any reason whatsoever, so it is a caprice. Caprice might mean staying up too late to watch an old movie about good guys and bad guys, beautiful dangerous women, whiskey, big cars and palatial estates where some old guy grows orchids he hates. Nobody needs any of that. Caprice might mean eating that lobster as opposed to watching it swim in its aquarium. Nobody needs lobster, and besides, eating lobster usually leads to drinking white wine with someone you love, and of course, love only leads to rack and ruin, so lobster is a caprice. Life’s caprices will ruin your heavily structured, well-toned life of predictable and good behavior. Caprice is almost always about being bad, wanting something that is not good for you, getting something that is bad for you. Jetting off to Paris is a caprice because no one really needs to go to Paris when they have everything they really need in the United States, probably at the mall just down the street, or maybe even closer in that big box retailer on the corner near your house. And heaven forbid you should go to Madrid, which is full of caprices: lobster, flamenco, bull-fighting, the Prado, tapas, red wine, terraces, handsome people, wild night life, and chocolate ice cream. You might as well throw in the towel if you go there because you will be assaulted on all sides by unwelcome caprice of all kinds. You might lose control of your well-tailored life, of your managed respectability, of your over-sculpted identity. Caprice is a bad thing, no question about it. Stay at home and eat rice cakes. Drive a four-door, respectable, good-mileage sedan with an automatic transmission. Caprice can have nothing to do with your well-run life. Please stay away from other people, roses, fast cars, jazz, art museums (all sorts), bars, restaurants that offer lobster and/or chocolate ice cream, and airports, which only leads to flying and before you know it, you’re eating lobster on some beach where half-nude people are sipping drinks with little umbrellas in them. Don’t be tempted. Stay away from caprice and live your life.
On the rose
As you might imagine, a rose is a tired metaphor. Tired because it has been used and abused by poets, writers and artists for centuries, turning the rose into anything but a thing of beauty. The rose is like a song you’ve heard one too many times on the radio: the song isn’t bad necessarily, but you change the station anyway. So the rose exists on two planes–one as a biological specimen, and two, as pure metaphor. Yet even as metaphor, the rose has been reduced to ashes through overuse and overexposure. I’m sure many people see no beauty, indeed, no magic, in the rose anymore. You can buy a dozen for almost nothing at the grocery store any time of the day, any day of the week, any week of the year. The rose is dead, and I defy any writer, poet, or songwriter to write anything in which the rose does not come across as superficial, trite, or rehashed. The rose needs a respite from pop culture, from literary expression, from the greeting card industry, from the vapid savagery of unbridled capitalism. It needs a rest. The rose is a beautiful flower, but if you look at it too long and too often, you end up seeing nothing but another flower. I can’t blame people for liking the rose, the image of the rose, the name of the rose, the smell of the rose, the metaphor of the rose, the symbol of the rose. Red velvety petals, thorny green stems, fragrant smell, the rose is put together in perfect harmony with itself, and after it is picked and gifted, it is finite and perishable, a work of art that will soon vanish forever. You can create as many simulacra of the rose that you care to–paintings, poems, t-shirts (“Carpe diem!”), greeting cards, but you can never recreate the real thing. The complexity of the rose is only equaled by its charismatic charms and its exotic architecture. Each rose that blooms in Spring is already marking time until it withers in the harsh winds of winter. The rose, as a symbol of beauty, carries within itself the seeds of its own destruction long before it ever opens. Death is the only outcome for this analogue of human life. Perhaps the reason they so enthrall our culture has everything to do with our own finite natures, our obsession with death, and our unwillingness to accept the passing of time, the inevitability of growing old, and limited time that we have on earth.
