Mojo, The Bard, & Me

 

I pray thee, give it to me.

 

-Oberon

A Midsummer Night’s Dream         Act II, Scene i, Line 248

 

Oberon talking to Puck, asking him to give him the flower that he sent him to find. It’s the flower that can make people fall in love with the first person they see. Oberon’s going to have Puck use it on Demetrius, but Puck uses it on Lysander in error (or do I have that backwards?), and Oberon’s going to use it himself on Titania.

There’s some really nice verse following this line where Oberon describes how he will find Titania. I know I always dis this play, but I like the twenty or so lines that Oberon and Puck finish this scene with.

Today is Walker P.'s birthday. I almost forgot.  He is twenty years old today. The last time that I was not parenting a child in the teens or younger was March 25, 1982. And yet today I feel the strains of parenting as sharply as any day. Isn’t that…something. March, 1982. It was a different world then, inside of me and outside of me. When I dwell on it it’s overwhelming.

I pray thee, give it me. Give me what? Strength. Peace? Of course, I have both of these; I just need to find them within, not in some magic flower. Or perhaps remember that all flowers, and so much more in the world, are magic - and dwell on that. 

And hence, Calvin. 

Be Calvin.