3 hamlet shorts: they ask me when i do not sup, "hamlet, what fills you up?" i tell them that i feed on air. my madness has them most confused, t'was dark poison the ghost did use - my father fed me on foul air. shall i die revenge unmet? if i "not be" they win the bet... action fails me, i'll drink the air. then if t'is wind that keeps me brave, itself unseen but its forces grave, for all i'll set a feast of air... * * * ophelia, what do you there, alone in your watery hole? i, on this airy branch do perch, while you, with flowy fins, just float about, just below the mirrored ripples, just beyond my reach. o what beauteous bubbles and sequin scales! that glisten in chaotic mirth a can see them between flower petals floating between us. and even if you came to land, your lap is slick, i would slide off! and the air would choke you. and even if i to water went, i would be heavy and slow my brain would be sloshy and the world all too calm. so from here each other we must watch, a reflection of the other looking back. * * * hamlet, dear, please remove thy elbow from my eye. yes, mother, but i shall once i find some room... laertes, could you shift a bit, this grave is much too small for all of us to lie in any comfort. and ophelia, those flowers are rotting. i would smell them if the worms had not liberated my nose, and the air's long since gone. claudius, i'd have a word with you, if it won't disturb you much, for we have eternity here to talk and i'd rather we be friends, but i can't look you in the eyes i think they slipped into the folds of polonius' robes, and some snake is ticking my ear. it's hard to think with everyone here, dead together and in a crowded grave.--------++++++++=========:::::::::|||||||||||[[[[[[[[[[<<<<<<<<
i decided to try to produce some more entertaining litte hamlet pieces after my more depressing poem, and these were the images that popped into my head.i liked the one line where hamlet says he eats the "cameleon's dish" - air, and i thought that was a good way to look at his craziness... either beging drunk on air, with an airy soul, or dealing with the insubstantial (in the literal sense) matters of thoughts... he really is all hot air most of the time, unable to act, but only to ponder and philosophize, his only fuel be air.
the bird and fish imagery i saw as a cartoon of sorts, with hamlet a creature of the air (connected back to first piece) and ophelia a creature of water (a line in the play has her drinking too much water, laertes says i think)... they are in so many ways similar - his madness becomes hers, yet they forever must be seperate for some reason, either difference in nature, or some other forbiding force.
the crowded grave is my favorite image... it makes me laugh and think of shel silverstein. it's pretty much a little stab at the irony that everyone dies, and they all end up in the same place... i thought of it as i was reading the gravediggers scene, and how they dig up old bones that have just kinda mingled.