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Comments
The
main conceit in this muse-directed apostrophe is an “after-loss”
party following a defeat (3-5) that’s described in legal jargon,
as if it were a court case in which Will came out the acquiescent loser.
The friend’s behavior, both charming and cruelly cold, sets the
character of this “party” (8-11), and the friend’s capacity
for inspiring frivolity in unlikely settings (12-14) is an analog for
the boisterous runes here inspired (see 1-2).
Legalese
is overt in “filed” (1), “bonds,” “determinate”
(3), “prove thee virtuous,” “forsworn” (4), “reasons,”
and “defense” (5).
More covert
are terms compatible with the “court” conceit—e.g.,
“loss,” “unmoved, cold [like a judge or jury],”
“temptation,” and “to thee resort”—and legal
puns including “summon” and “in oather place [suggesting
a witness stand].”
The
opening lines suggest “marriage bonds” that require
an absolute commitment—the poet as the husband, the friend as the
mate who’s to be “proven virtuous” (4), is frigid (10),
and can “makes graces” (12). Thus the “after-loss”
is like a gloomy wedding reception, poorly attended (6-7). “Thy
reasons” (5) is ironic, because the “wife” is not rational.
Puns on “making” as “mating” (2, 5, 12, based
on the Renaissance equivalency make = mate) and a play
on “groomy bonds” reinforce the conceit, with “precious
phrase” (1) suggesting “I do.” (Since Will’s own
marriage to Anne may have been a shotgun affair, that party might well
have seemed an “after-loss” to him.)
Too, the
rune puns about “filing off” the initial word, “And,”
so that it becomes “An’” or “Anne”—in
apposition to “precious phrase” (2) and “thee”
(3). Puns such as “do not drop ‘n’” (6) expand
the joke. (Editor Stephen Booth cites an earlier critic who has proposed
that, in another context in Q, “And” puns on “Anne.”)
I
believe that a pun even occurs here on Fulke Sandell(s), the
name of one of Anne and Will’s bondsmen (cited, e.g., in biographer
Marchette Chute’s index)—as “My bond, sinthee
[are]all determined Anne proud, virtuous…” (3-4).
(Will seems to encode old Fulke’s family name without the “s.”)
Here the “r” character that Rune 87.1 suggests be “reserved”
is what interrupts the code form of Sandell: “…are….”
No minimalist’s detail seems beyond Will’s range of manipulation
or concern.
The
linked personifications “Muses” (1-2), “Graces”
(12), “old December” (13), and “heavy Saturn”
(14) give this rune an overtly allusive character. The image of two old
males cavorting at an ironic wedding reception—one of them “bare,”
one “heavy”—is ludicrous. The ostensible point is that
the friend’s influence can turn faults into graces (12). What
old December... (13) puns on “White...” (suggesting
both snow and bare skin) and “Weighty...” to amplify the images
and personifications of the closing scene.
Line 2 refers
implicitly to the Runes, which are “entombed” even in the
act of being generated. Tomb puns on “tome.”
Other puns
include these: “Eying deeper, see, I owe [i.e., admit]
you suffer: A feeble theme you see sealed” (1); “‘Anne,
proud, heavy, righteous...,’ thought Howard of our ass-worn, aging
sty: Our Avon ass-make [i.e., mate], engine odd is Anne. See?” (4-5);
and “...look: Sue, aye timid, here to another place unmoved”
(9-10). Recurring puns in Q depict Anne as overweight (plausible in light
of her having been the mother of twins), pious, and otherwise unappealing.
Line 1 here links her with a pun on “Pharisee” (in phrase).
One pun in 3-4 seems to sound a playful directive, telling us to help
the poet get out of his marriage vows: “My bonds end thee, a reality:
Terminate Anne—proud, heavy, righteous, th’ Huge
Turd forsworn...” (code: My bonds in thee a re all de terminate.
/ And prouet heevi rtuous, th ough thouart forsworne...). The next
line continues, “Against thy reasons making no defense.” (In
other words, “Don’t stop to examine your motives for getting
rid of her for me.”)
The pun in
“deter mine 8 (...determine 8)” (3) points to the rune number,
88.
The
fact that Will links one half of his endwords by consonance gives
the poem a crude approximation of rhyme: forsworn (4), defense
(5), loss (6), horse (7), place (9), enclose
(11), and resort (12). (A regular rhyme scheme was a technical
impossibility in the Runes, given the concurrent demands of rhyme in the
visible Sonnet cycle.)
Sample Puns
1)
Anne, precious phrase, bile-theme, you see; Anne/peer show is
fairest: by Hall the muff is filled (…Tom’s ass filed); a
feeble Tom you see; vial; And peer shows Pharisee bile; Aye in “dipper”
see “I”; fairies built hymn, you see; theme you see shuffled
1-2) Amos
shoveled (shuffled) my King t’ hurt him; the muff is vile (sullied),
dim, aching (tee!), hairy tomb be the womb wherein th’ “I”
grew; the Muses’ sullied hymn; Muse assailed m’ king
2) May-king
[cf. 13-14]; My ache aye inched hairy tomb; the womb be weary integer
(end t’ jeer); W., Harry, in the eye grave; end th’ edge,
Eve; G-row; Tom, Bede you imbue herein
2-3) The
G-row may bond (my Beyond), send Harry a letter (ladder [i.e., vertical
acrostic])
3) Maybe
“O” ends in the air, all determinate; awl; Ariel; a reel
3-4) terminate
Anne, proud, heavy, righteous, t[oo] huge; Hall did “ear”
m’ Annie, Tanned, proud, heavy, arduous
4)
hit Howard forsworn (…force war in)
4-5) sore
is war, any age; Any age, Anne Shakespeare’d hairy ass own, ass
making no defense; you jet Howard’s arse, war, neige eying
5) a
gay Anne fit theories on smacking in ode; reason’s making knotty
sense; Again Shakespeare there eye, fon
5-6)
aching node offends Anne
5-7)
in scene, Dido note, dropping foreign ass t’ Earl of S.
6) eying
Dido, knot rope
6-7)
John, sore Annie S. tear, loathesome Anne; Anne, dough-knot, D-row pincer,
an astral office; sore enough t’ realize
7) Summoned
Hero kiss and down; Sow men their hawks and hounds, sow men their horse;
aye in downs, summoned Harry whores; raucous
7-8) summoned,
Harry, our favorite deepens/deep-ends—a pun t’ hate
8)
Fart deepens (a pun t’ Hat, lowest hiney)
8-9)
lusty hiney t’ heal, OO [a pictographic ogle], kiss
9) Sue,
eye timid, headier tenet (tenant) here; The Y [pictographic crotch] looks
wide (white), meaty, hard in other place; hard aye an oather plays
9-10)
herbalist you name; here plays you name Ovid could end; her place…Ovid
called “end”; in another play, see unmoved, cold Anne; Anne
to tempt eye
10-11) autumn
partitions allow, own what’s witty; aye shun flow, O, Hen., W.H,
aye ’tis wet, said O stowed high sins in seals
11) O, eye
new Hat.’s wit (…wet ass); eye nude ass; O, eye nude, sweet,
sad Ovid, thou this incense (...innocence) love
11-12)
th’ haughty hyphens enclosed “home-ache”; this inn-sign
(...ensign), close to home eye
12) Thou,
make [mate], Shakespeare faults Graces [cf. Muses, line 1] that
to thee resort; Thou makest salts [i.e., tears] graces; re-fart; revert;
coughed faults gray see; races thought to the River T[hames]
12-13) hairy’s
our twat old
13) W.H. aye
told [tallied] dick-members bare in ass everywhere; waddled; wattled dick,
m’ bare ass, bareness everywhere; Baron, fever you hear; suffer
you, Harry?
13-14) rude,
haughty vice eternal ought end; baring ass, you reared Hathaway-ass eternal,
haughty Anne dull aye peed wit-hymn; end delay: ape, two eyed him; jet
handily, pee, to item; peed wight, eye him; handily pituita (pituitary)
hymn; Saturnalia
Acrostic Wit
The
downward acrostic—AMMAAAS FT VOT WT—encodes,
e.g., “A maze, fit [i.e., stanza]—what wit (...what vaunt)!”;
“Eye hymn’s fit—what wit!”; “A.M. mass fit
you, oat wet”; “Amos-fit, what wit!”; and “A maze
of taut (...toad-)wit (...of tough ode-wit)”—with other bawdy
possibilities including “...twat-wit” and “..twat wet.”
As a numeric (or time/date) line, the code suggests such readings as “A.M.,
May 5 [S=5] of 202. Tee!” and “Is it 5 o[f] 2:00?” With
T = 7, other potentialities are latent in the letterstring. The string
TVOTWT can be read 2027: TV-0-TW-7.
The
up acrostic code—TWTOVTFSAAAMMA—suggests,
e.g., “Taught oaf tough sum I,” with other, bawdier possibilities
including “Too tough—toughest—am I” or “Too
tough to fist am I.” The elements RTTVS and A
MMAAAS in the codes of Runes 87 and 88 suggest “rites”
and “a mass” (or Amos, the Old Testament book), so
players who prefer hearing more pious inherencies can set off—on
bended knee, if they choose—to ferret them out.
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