Sunset, Malta. La Kid.
Who has, for a week,
left dark chilly Galway
for the sun.
Next week, she starts
an internship at the
Abbey Theatre.
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Whew. Took a bit of work but I found
Malta in Molly Bloom’s soliloquy.
I said I was tired we lay over the firtree cove a wild place I suppose it must be the highest rock in existence the galleries and casemates and those frightful rocks and Saint Michaels cave with the icicles or whatever they call them hanging down and ladders all the mud plotching my boots Im sure thats the way down the monkeys go under the sea to Africa when they die the ships out far like chips that was the Malta boat passing Yes the sea and the sky you could do what you liked lie there for ever
(UD had lunch last week with a
woman her equal in Joyce madness.
This woman named her daughter Molly,
while UD‘s La Kid is Anna Livia.)
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A completely, completely charming and
hilarious poem about Malta by Richard
Blanco, whose work my friend d. has
been after me to read:
*********************************
WE’RE NOT GOING TO MALTA. . .
because the winds are too strong, our Captain
announces, his voice like an oracle coming through the
loudspeakers of every lounge and hall, as if the ship
itself were speaking. We’re not going to Malta–an
enchanting island country fifty miles from Sicily,
according to the brochure of the tour we’re not taking.
But what if we did go to Malta? What if, as we are
escorted on foot through the walled “Silent City” of
Mdina, the walls begin speaking to me; and after we
stop a few minutes to admire the impressive
architecture, I feel Malta could be the place for me.
What if, as we stroll the bastions to admire the
panoramic harbor and stunning countryside, I dream
of buying a little Maltese farm, raising Maltese horses
in the green Maltese hills. What if, after we see the
cathedral in Mosta saved by a miracle, I believe that
Malta itself is a miracle; and before I’m transported
back to the pier with a complimentary beverage, I’m
struck with Malta fever, discover I am very Maltese
indeed, and decide I must return to Malta, learn to
speak Maltese with an English (or Spanish) accent,
work as a Maltese professor of English at the University
of Malta, and teach a course on The Maltese Falcon. Or,
what if when we stop at a factory to shop for famous
Malteseware, I discover that making Maltese crosses is
my true passion. Yes, I’d get a Maltese cat and a
Maltese dog, make Maltese friends, drink Malted milk,
join the Knights of Malta, and be happy for the rest of
my Maltesian life. But we’re not going to Malta. Malta
is drifting past us, or we are drifting past it–an
amorphous hump of green and brown bobbing in the
portholes with the horizon as the ship heaves over
whitecaps wisping into rainbows for a moment, then
dissolving back into the sea.
April 15th, 2013 at 6:53PM
Have not been to Malta yet, but it seems like an interesting place.
Nicholas Monsarrat, better known as author of The Cruel Sea, also wrote The Kappillan of Malta, an interesting novel which interweaves the story of Malta during WWII with the much earlier history of the island.