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Date:         Fri, 21 Oct 2005 20:45:29 -0500
Reply-To:     Joel Walker <jwalker17@EARTHLINK.NET>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Joel Walker <jwalker17@EARTHLINK.NET>
Subject:      Frydaye Phollees - Klassikal Po'try :
Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset="iso-8859-1";
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yes, friends and neighbors, it's Frydaye once again. and that means something ...i just can't recall what it was ... anyway, here's some stuff dug up many years ago from an attic across town by the water tank. it seems that Willie "da Bard" Shakespeare was a vw bus nut, and even wrote some pomes about the subject. course, vw buses didn't look much the same back then, and they were powered by smallish poor (but strong!) folks hiding under the rear of the bus. :)

don't belief it? check out All's Well That Ends Well, Act 4, Scene 4

Our wagon is prepared, and time revives us: All's well that ends well; still the fine's the crown; Whate'er the course, the end is the renown.

a bus-like sentiment if ever i heard one! :)

and Cymbeline, Act 5, Scene 5

And would so, had it been a carbuncle Of Phoebus' wheel, and might so safely, had it Been all the worth of's car.

now, i'm not quite so sure just who Phoebus was in this play, but usually they were referring to Apollo, who used to cruise up and down the california coast highway in his bright sun-yellow split-window bus. don't recall the carbuncle on it, though ...

and in Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 5

O, how the wheel becomes it!

(lots of you folks keep on and on and on about this very same subject!!!). ;)

and even King Lear, Act 2, Scene 2, talks about the high costs of alloy wheels:

Fortune, good night: smile once more: turn thy wheel!

and later in Act 2, Scene 4 ...

Let go thy hold when a great wheel runs down a hill, lest it break thy neck with following it: but the great one that goes up the hill, let him draw thee after.

or basically: it's dangerous to push buses DOWNhill ... you'll break your neck. they used to talk funny back in them days. probably had something to do with those strange clothes they wore.

and again in Act 4, Scene 7, where he talks about what happens if you don't replace your fuel lines in a timely manner (you've all seen those photos of buses burning on the side of the road, tires all aflame and metal melting off the bus) ...

but I am bound Upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears Do scald like moulten lead.

and in Coriolanus, Act 1, Scene 6, we have a situation most familiar to the old split-window hippie generations, trying to avoid the fuzz/gestapo/police ...

Spies of the Volsces Held me in chase, that I was forced to wheel Three or four miles about, else had I, sir, Half an hour since brought my report.

anyhoo, here's some offerings from the Bard hisself ...

Believe It ... or Don't Department Willy "Bill the Bard" Shakesbeer drove a vw bus!

Sonnet xviii

Shall I compare thee to the summer's days? Nah, for thou art too ugly and too fat; No lines of grace nor speed thy form displays, More like the Snail, with speed akin to that; But when the showers of April are forgot, And darling buds of May do grace the land, Are thoughts of camping given rein to trot Within the wintered hearts and minds of Man, For it is then thy use belies thy form, As caterpillar turns to butterfly, From cargo's bus to camper's little dorm, You turn whenever weekends happen by. So long as campers camp, from sea to sea, So lives a Bus, and those who camp with thee.

Sonnet xxix

When, in this race of Fortune and men's lies, I often sit alone and contemplate ... Where might I be, had I been much more wise In choice of cars with which to link my fate? What might I drive to work, to play, to cope In rageous traffic, more than some can bear, Were I to let someone decree my scope In what to buy, to say, or clothes to wear? How more in profit might my time be spent Than nursemaid to some broken old auto? A smile does ease my brow with troubles bent As to the wheel I climb and off I go ... And though my drives through rolling country end, I love this bus, this one that makes me grin.

and just to prove that Shakespeare wasn't the only literary figure that knew about buses and such ...

SONNET #43

From the Portuguese Man-of-War By Lizzie Barrel Browning .50 cal.

How do I drive thee? Let me count the ways ... I drive thee to the length and breadth and height My bumpers reach, when feeling, out of sight, For the ends of other Cars in parking space.

I drive thee by the headlights glowing trace At Dawn, and Dusk, and yawning dead of Night. I drive thee slowly, in the lanes upon the Right; I drive thee quickly, when in Rushing Hour's Race.

I drive thee with a verve I seldom choose In other cars, when out upon the Lanes; But then a Calm descends upon my Brain, And daily Woes and Worries oft I lose.

So, all in all, I drive thee with a Smile, And shall but drive thee more, for years and miles.

SONNET #8,349.2 (Name Game)

Sonnets from the Manganese by Lizzie Barrel Browning .50 cal.

How shall I call thee? What shall be thy Name? The name of Roses matters not to those Who smell the Flowers' sweet Perfume and close Their eyes to fondly see a Face again.

Should Names reflect some Memories of Olde? Or attributes of Strength, or Skill, or Dare? Or should I give thee Ancient Names to bear, Of People, Places, Things in Tales still told?

Or should a Name be new, and picked from Now? A chosen Symbol of the Modern Times? Somewhere, Someone, Something - a Name that rhymes Our View of Life with all somehow.

But thou art naught but steel, glass and rubber ... Eureka, that's it: thy Name is Bubba!!

:) unca joel


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