Allen Ginsberg on The Marriage of Heaven and Hell continues from here
AG: “Joys impregnate. Sorrows bring forth.” – (What’s that: “Joys impregnate. Sorrows bring forth.” Well, I guess, obviously, orgasm impregnates, birth can be painful or sorrowful. But brings forth. Or seed breaking through the ground_.
Student: It’s also like (you) don’t know what joy’s worth until you really leave it. Say, if you had joyful moments, you sort of maybe take it for granted at some level, until you really recognize its value.
AG: Maybe.
Student: I think it also just, using those opposites, joy and sorrow, it’s sort of expressing they’re part of the same process and….
AG: Oh, yeah, but one follows on the other.
Student: Yeah.
AG: “In seed time learn… later on you’ll have that one. [Allen is quoting from”The Proverbs of Hell” from “The Marriage of Heave and Hell” – “In seed time learn, in harvest teach, in winter enjoy“]
Peter Orlovsky: What does it mean, “Sorrows bring forth?”
AG: Well, sorrows bring forth understanding. Pain sometimes might bring … or the pain of childbirth might bring forth a babe. Sorrow of childbirth.
Peter Orlovsky: Isn’t that a funny way to put it, “Sorrow brings forth”?
AG: Yeah. He’s being funny. “Joys impregnate. Sorrows bring forth.” Impregnate means to conceive and make pregnant.
Peter Orlovsky: Yeah.
AG: Then to give birth. “For there the babe is born in joy/That was begotten in bitter woe.” Just the opposite. Remember in “The Mental Traveller”? “For there the babe is born in joy/That was begotten in bitter woe.” So “The Mental Traveller” had it reversed. Interesting.
Student: This is kind of like you can enjoy reading Blake’s poetry (for instruction)?
AG: Well, it depends. You could live that way, but do you have to use one or another of the slogans? So you take it easy living that way. So you don’t push it too hard. Or any of the other poems, like not here but “He who kisses the joy as it flies/Lives eternity’s sun rise.” [Allen is quoting here Blake’s “Eternity“] -“He who binds to himself a joy/Does the winged life destroy.” “He who binds to himself a joy,” sometimes written by Blake in other versions, “He who binds himself to a joy,” or – “(He who) binds to himself a joy/Does the winged life destroy/(But) he who kisses a joy as it flies/Lives in eternity’s sun rise” – (So, if you take one of these joyful or sorrowful things and push it to its limit and try to live by it, but then let go, like in meditation, then you’re alright. You won’t get pulled into a madhouse corner.
to be continued
We tend to think of things as different faces on the same coin. The greatest joy I ever felt was the birth of my son. Death of course is a great sorrow. You know the expression when you encounter death… better get busy living, or get busy dying.