repand, Oaxaca Journals, Panderus, Troilus and Cressida, O'Horten

readingthedictionaryztoa.blogspot.com
glennlouisfeole@gmail.com

 Other blogs: artbyglennfeole.blogspot.com
sweetsilentsessions.blogspot.com (essays on Shakespeare)

repand (Latin re- again, pandas bent)   [re pand’] adjective, having a slightly undulating margin.   

     I love the subtle, almost intimate distinctions of definitions.  This adjective is a biological term, botanical actually. and gently recalls the beauty of my favorite Oliver Sack’s book, Oaxaca Journal, in which he traveled to Mexico with the New York Fern Society.   I have seen graceful illustrations of repand leaves with a ‘gentle’ undulation of the margins, as opposed to the more vigorous, seaworthy ‘undulate’ margins of other leaves.  Even more boisterous are the serrated leaves, the Nordic Vikings of foliage.  I myself am a repand pisces.  

     As a pediatrician, just today I saw a gentle young Latino girl who proudly showed me a large red rash that I noted had a repand edge…although I didn’t know it was a repand rash at the time.   As an artist and poet, I often appreciate the gracefulness of the presentations of illnesses despite their obvious pathos, ala the surgeon Richard Seltzer.’s essays.   I collect some strikingly beautiful medically related poetry and will try to quote them later for you.

    Some thoughts on repand and the concept of being ‘bent’  into a curving edge.   Its seems to be a fit philosophical and poetic metaphor. 

  I took a break from thinking about this surprising word tonight and started to read my very last Shakespeare play, Troilus and Cressida.  At my age, with the passage of time, each milestone is bitter sweet, tinged with ‘sweet sorrow,’ (Romeo and Juliet), intimation of my having been bent from my original state of grace.  I actually ambivalently am excited and simultaneously dread the reading of the last paragraph after reading every word of Shakespeare.  In any case, in the play, Cressida’s Uncle is Pandarus…an ironic coincidence with the similar “pand” element.  Perhaps there is a similar etymology here, as Pandarus bends his niece’s affections towards a romantic relationship with Troilus.  As he thinks of his role in encouraging this couple to get together, he says, “Let all pitiful goers-between be called to the world’s end after my name: call them all panders.” 3.3.202-204.  

    And speaking of ‘bent,’ my favorite movie director and producer is the Norwegian Bent Hamer (of “O’Horten,” my favorite movie).   I will have to look up a Norewegian dictionary of etymology.  

    Pandemonium, pandemic…all with the root “pan” as opposed to “pend.”       Panda?  A Nepalese derivation. 

     I do love the connotation of life’s gentle ‘bending’ of our soul, of our character.  As a wise soul who helped hurricane survivors was quoted recently, ‘If we don’t know our weaknesses, we would never know our strengths.”  Biblically, I am trying to ‘honor my gray hairs.’  No hat for me.  Give me the ancient oak tree with its crooked branches and intriguing bifurcating bark as opposed to the young sapling.