Commentary on Poem "Feminine Street Names":
Pamela, Phyllis, Camille, and Barbara—
feminine street names greet me as I walk
to catch my bus each day and while shopping.
Phyllis Avenue & Pamela Drive
Street Signs, Mountain View, CA |
Phyllis Avenue & Camille Court
Street Signs, Mountain View, CA |
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Barbara Avenue & Miramonte Avenue
Street Signs, Mountain View, CA |
I take Bus #22 on El Camino Real & Phyllis Avenue each day to Showers Drive for Bus #35
to Foothill College Middlefield Campus. I pass the corner street signs Pamela Drive & Phyllis Avenue.
After walking a block, I come to the corner of Phyllis Avenue and Camille Court. Another block
takes me to El Camino for Bus #22. When my friend takes me shopping at Safeway (1750 Miramonte Avenue),
the car turns at Barbara Avenue and Miramonte Avenue.
Photo Sources of Street Signs: Phyllis Avenue & Pamela Drive
(wisdomportal.com), Phyllis Avenue & Camille Court (wisdomportal.com),
Barbara Avenue & Miramonte Avenue (wisdomportal.com)
|
While living for fifteen years at Cypress Lodge
studio apartments, I've not encountered any
female street names in my neighborhood
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Cypress Lodge, Mountain View, CA |
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Neighborhood near Latham Street & Ortega Ave, Mountain View |
Living for fifteen years (1997-2012) in Mountain View near the intersection of Latham Street and Ortega Avenue,
there were no female street names during my walks in the neighborhood.
Photo Sources:
Cypress Lodge & Neighborhood Streets
(Google Maps) |
but after moving two miles and thirty blocks
south last year, I wonder whether these names
honored some old matrons of Mountain View.
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Google Street Map showing intersection of
Pamela Drive & Phyllis Avenue, Mountain View |
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Mountain View Map showing Pamela Drive,
Phyllis Avenue, Camille Court, Barbara Avenue |
|
Mountain View is a city in Santa Clara County,
in the San Francisco Bay Area of California. It is named for its views of the Santa Cruz Mountains, and shares its
borders with Palo Alto, Los Altos, and Sunnyvale. The 2010 census shows Mountain View with a population of 74,066.
Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory had its
beginning in 1956 at 391 San Antonio Road, Mountain View. In 1957, eight young employees left to form Fairchild Semiconductor.
From this group, Gordon Moore and Robert Noyce formed Intel Corporation in 1968
that would become the world's largest semiconductor chip maker. That's how Silicon Valley got its name.
Today, many of the largest technology companies in the world are headquartered in the city, including Google, Mozilla Foundation, Symantec, and Intuit.
Mountain View was incorporated in 1902, and its primary industry was agriculture until the mid-1950s when hi-tech arrived.
A search of Mountain View history did not show any of these feminine names.
Photo Source: Pamela Drive & Phyllis Avenue (Google Maps);
Mountain View Map (Google Maps)
|
Not able to find any connections, I turn
to literature and mythology to make sense
of these feminine names thrust upon me
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Camille 1936 film poster with
Greta Garbo & Robert Taylor |
Going back on memory lane, I searched for these female names that came across my life.
Pamela was my sister's childhood friend that lived next to our apartment in Glen Oaks.
Phyllis was a high school valedictorian who graduated a semester ahead of me.
Teachers raved about her scoring 100% in the Citywide Spanish Exam. Later she came over
our house to learn Chinese. One of my favorite films was Camille starring Greta Garbo.
Barbara was my first date on New Year Day— we went to Metropolitan Museum of Art
and had dinner before seeing a movie at Radio City. Since these real females didn't
seem to make any connections, I deleted them from the first draft of this poem and
focused on literature and mythology instead, consulting Lemprière's Classical Dictionary.
Photos: Camille poster (wikipedia);
La Dame Aux Camilias (Tower Books)
|
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Camille novel (1848)
by Alexandre Dumas fils |
Sir Philip Sidney invented the name Pamela
meaning "all sweetness" for his novel Arcadia
and there's a butterfly Perrhybris pamela.
| Sir Philip Sidney (1554-1586) invented the name
Pamela
meaning "all sweetness" (from the Greek words pan "all" and meli "honey")
in his novel The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia or simply
Arcadia around 1580.
The Duke of Arcadia, Basilius, has two beautiful daughters, Pamela and Philoclea. Two visiting cousins and
princes Pyrocles and Musidorus fell in love with them. Pyrocles disguised himself as Cleophila, an Amazonian lady
and woos Philoclea. Dorus disguised himself as a shepherd to woo Pamela.
Samuel Richardson novel Pamela (1741) inaugurated
the use of Pamela as a given name but it was not in common usage until the 20th century.
Perrhybris pamela is a butterfly
of the Pieridae family. The combination of conspicuous black and orange markings on a white ground colour is a common theme amongst these
butterflies found in the Amazon and Andes.
Photo Sources: Sir Philip Sidney (wikipedia);
Arcadia (mouveuno.cila.unior.it);
Perrhybris pamela (wikipedia)
|
Phyllis was a Thracian princess changed by gods
into an almond tree that blossomed when her lover
Demophoon returned and clasped the tree in tears.
|
Phyllis was a daughter of Lycurgus, King of Thrace. She received
Demophoon, King of Athens (circa 1182 BC) and son of
Theseus, who,
at his return from the Trojan War, had stopped at her coasts. After some months of mutual tenderness and affection, Demophoon
set sail for Athens to help his father. He promised to return after a month, but when he didn't, Phyllis grew desperate and
hanged herself from a tree. According to Servius, Phyllis was changed by Athena into an almond tree, which is called
Phylla
by the Greeks. Some days after this metamorphosis, Demophoon revisited Thrace, and when he heard of the fate of Phyllis, he ran
and clasped the tree, which, though at that time stripped of its leaves, suddenly shot forth and blossomed, as if still sensible
of tenderness and love. The absence of Demophoon from the house of Phyllis has given rise to a beautiful epistle of Ovid in
Heroides, supposed to have been written by the Thracian queen, about the fourth month after her lover's departure.
(Lemprière's Classical Dictionary, 3rd Edition, 1984, p. 487)
Photo sources: Phyllis & Demophoon
(heresyandbeauty.wordpress.com);
Phyllis & Demophoonti (wikipedia); Phyllis & Demophoon
(johnwilliamwaterhouse.com) |
Camilla was a Volsci maiden warrior
for goddess Diana— she was so swift
running across the sea without wetting her feet.
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Queen Camilla
Poster of Woman Warrior
|
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Warrior Camilla
Virgil's Aeneid VII
|
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Achilles & Penthesilea
Red Figure Volute Krater, Vienna
|
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Penthesilea
Louvre, Paris
|
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Atalanta
Vatican Museum
|
|
Camilla, queen of the Volsci, was daughter of Metabus and Casmilla.
She was educated in the woods, inured to the labors of hunting, and fed upon the milk of mares.
Her father devoted her, when young, to the service of goddess Diana. When she was declared queen,
she marched at the head of an army, and accompanied by three youthful females of equal courage
with herself, to assist Turnus against Aeneas, where she signalized herself by the numbers that
perished by her hand. She was so swift that she could run, or rather fly, over a field of corn
without bending the blades, and make her way over the sea without wetting her feet. She died by
a wound which she had received from Aruns. (Lemprière's Classical Dictionary, 3rd Edition, 1984, p. 123)
The image of Camilla is similar to Penthesilea
and Atalanta, swift-footed warriors in service of Diana.
"Ambiguity and the Female Warrior: Vergil's Camilla" (Essay by Trudy Harrington Becker).
Legend of Camilla (with 6 images).
Photo sources: Queen Camilla (mulholland-drive.net);
Warrior Camilla (home.earthlink.net);
Achilles & Penthesilea (vroma.org);
Penthesilea (wikipedia);
Atalanta (wikipedia)
St. Barbara of Nicodemia was a martyr
and patron saint of explosives— her name
is invoked in time of lightning & thunder.
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Saint Barbara
Holy Card |
Saint Barbara was a Christian martyr who lived in the
3rd century AD in Nicomedia (present day Turkey). According to William Caxton's
The Golden Legend,
Barbara was the daughter of a rich Greek man, Dioscorus. Because of her great beauty, he kept her imprisoned
in a high tower. Princes still sought her hand in marriage, but she refused, wishing to remain a virgin.
While her father was away on a long trip, Barbara descended from
the tower to look at a bathhouse her father had under construction. She was dismayed that it had only
two windows, and persuaded workmen to make a third window to honor the Trinity. Barbara lived in the bathhouse
and was secretly baptized by a priest.
Enraged at Barbara's conversion, her father handed her over for punishment to a Roman governor, who had her whipped.
The whip turned into peacock feathers, and her wounds were miraculously healed. The governor then commanded
that Barbara be beheaded. The executioner moved slowly, so Dioscorus seized the ax himself and cut off his
daughter's head. At that point, a thunderbolt fell from heaven and reduced him to a pile of ashes.
Barbara is a patron of architects, gunners, weapons makers, miners, masons, firemen, bell-founders,
and those at risk of sudden death, as well as a protector against thunder, lightning and explosions.
Branches from a fruit tree or flowering shrub cut on St. Barbara's Feast Day (December 4) and kept in water
in a warm room will flower by Christmas. This is known as a "St. Barbara's bouquet" in Germany. Though
Saint Barbara was struck from the Roman calendar of saints in
1969, one can still make such a bouquet successfully today.
Photo source: Saint Barbara holy card (wikipedia) |
Virgil escorts Dante through Hell and
Purgatory but only Beatrice could guide
Dante across the spheres to Paradise
| Dante's Divine Commedy (1321) is the greatest love poem about
the soul's ascent from Inferno to Purgatory to Paradise. Dante begins his pilgrimage in midlife (age 35 in 1300) in the dark woods with fear
and trepidation (Inferno 1.13-15, 52-54).
After meeting the Roman poet Virgil, whom Dante regarded as his master (Inferno 1.85-87),
he asked him to be his guide (Inferno 2.10-12). Virgil tells Dante
that there are three blessed ladies in heaven (Beatrice, Saint Lucia, Virgin Mary) who are looking after him (Inferno 2.124-126).
He also initiated Dante into the Circle of Poets that includes Homer, Horace, Ovid, Lucan, Virgil
(Inferno 4.100-102).
Virgil tells Dante that "a soul more worthy than I will guide you; / I'll leave you in her care when I depart"
(Inferno 1.121-123) in
reference to Beatrice. Dante wept profusely when Virgil left him (Purgatorio 30.49-57),
before Beatrice came to guide him onward to heaven.
Photo sources: Doré's engravings (dante.ilt.columbia.edu) |
|
for Virgil represents the intellect
while Beatrice the feminine intuition
is better in leaping to the transcendent.
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Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510)
Dante's Paradiso I: Ascent to Heaven
|
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Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510)
Dante's Paradiso 6: Sphere of Mercury
|
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Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510)
Dante's Paradiso 26: Fixed Stars
|
|
The conventional explanation why Virgil didn't guide Dante to Paradise is that the Roman poet was forbidden to enter heaven.
On Inferno 1.126 "will not allow me entry to His city",
John Ciardi comments "Salvation is only through Christ in Dante's theology. Virgil lived and died before the establishment
of Christ's teachings in Rome, and cannot therefore enter Heaven." (The Divine Comedy, 1970, p. 7).
However, Dante was aware of the feminine principle that guided him in his spiritual pilgrimage.
It is Saint Lucia, the Patron Saint of Florence and Patroness of Sight
that carried Dante up Mount Purgatorio (Purgatorio 9). It is Beatrice that tells Dante that his home is not this earth
but the stars that enables him to fly (Paradiso I.91-105).
I've discussed Beatrice as Dante's feminine guide (anima & yin) in an earlier essay on Romance.
Photo Sources: Sandro Botticelli's "Dante's Commedia" (dante.ilt.columbia.edu)
|
|
After a lifetime writing Faust,
Goethe ends his magnum opus with
"the Eternal Feminine leads us above."
| Goethe
was a poet, novelist, playwright, artist, natural philosopher, scientist,
diplomat, and civil servant. He was a universal genius like Leonardo da Vinci. Goethe was a literary celebrity at 25 with his autobiographical novel
The Sorrows of Young Werther[ (1774).
After seeing Michelangelo's Sistine Ceiling in Rome (August 23, 1787),
Goethe felt reborn and vowed to accomplish something. He wrote Wilhelm
Meister's Apprenticeship (1796) and Part I of Faust was published
in 1808. Goethe published Metamorphosis of Plants (1790)
and Theory of Color (1810). However, it would take Goethe the rest of his life to complete
Part II of Faust (1832), published the year of his death.
There are numerous depictions of "The Eternal Feminine" in Google Images, mostly erotic in nature. It's interesting that Faust's erotic desire
for Gretchen made him sell his soul to the devil Mephistopheles (Faust I). After making love to the great beauties of history,
even marrying Helen of Troy, Faust turns at the end to love of humanity and service to his community that gave him true joy (Faust II).
Goethe's ending with the Chorus Mysticus shows that "The Eternal Feminine" is not leading him to the
lower chakras of eroticism
but the higher chakra of enlightenment. The Eternal Feminine has 16
images of goddess from mythology and religion. The Eternal Feminine: A Notebook
presents more material on the spiritual dimension. After some search, I located three "Eternal Feminine" images at
Pre-Raphaelite Art. The first is
Doré's Beatrice Visiting Virgil in Limbo
(Inferno 2.52-93)
telling him to guide Dante onward for there are three blessed women in heaven waiting for him
(Inferno 2.124-126).
The second is a female beauty from George MacDonald's
Phantastes
(1858) illustrated by Arthur Hughes.
The novel centers on Anodos ("ascent" in Greek) who is transported to Fairy Land. The caption for this
drawing: "There stood on the threshold a tiny woman-form". The third is North Wind, a study for
Sponsa de Libano ("Bride of Lebanon" 1891) by Edward Burne-Jones.
I've chosen this last image for "The Eternal Feminine" for the North Wind's breath will carry us above.
|
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Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
(1749-1832) |
Chorus Mysticus
All things corruptible
Are but a parable;
Earth's insufficiency
Here finds fulfilment;
Here the ineffable
Wins life through love;
Eternal Feminine
Leads us above.
— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust
Part II, Act V (1831), Closing Lines
translated by Philip Wayne,
Penguin Books, Baltimore, 1959, p. 288) |
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Edward Burne-Jones,
North Wind
Sponsa de Libano (1891) |
Photo Sources: Joseph Stieler's portrait Goethe at 79 (wikipedia);
Burne-Jones' North Wind (preraphaelitepaintings.blogspot.com)
|
Not since living on Ithaca's Catherine Street
at Cornell have I been so close to the Tao—
surrounded by the Spirit of the Valley.
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109 Catherine Street, Ithaca
Residence while studying at Cornell (1964-1970)
|
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Lao Tzu
(604 B.C.-517 B.C.)
|
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Spirit of the Valley
Tao Te Ching 6
|
There were no feminine streets in my neighbor while living in Queens, New York;
Cambridge & Worcester, Massachusetts; Palo Alto & Mountain View, California. I noticed them after my move
to Pamela Drive and Phyllis Avenue in Mountain View on January 1, 2012. However, it dawned upon me
that during my graduate studies at Cornell (1963-1970), I lived in a one-bedroom apartment at 109 Catherine Street, Ithaca.
It was a block from College Avenue, and I pass by Cascadilla Gorge on my half-hour walk across the beautiful
Cornell campus to Baker Lab. Here I did my doctoral research on polyamino acids and proteins under
Professor Harold A. Scheraga.
I also read voluminously books on creativity and Eastern philosophy at the Olin Library. Lao Tzu's
Tao Te Ching is one
of my favorite books. I am inspired by this ancient sage's insights on the
uncarved block (Chapter 15), mysterious female and Spirit of the Valley
in Chapter 6:
The Spirit of the Valley never dies,
it is the Eternal Feminine.
The gateway of the mysterious female
is the root of heaven and earth.
Darkly veiled, it remains forever.
It may be used, but cannot be exhausted.
It was in 1968 at a lecture by a Catholic Benedictine monk
Brother David Steindl-Rast at Anabel Taylor Hall,
that I learned more about Zen and spirituality. Two Cornell students told me about
Anthony Damiani and
his American Brahmin Bookshop at 118 West State Street, Ithaca,
where I could learn more about Buddhism. My visit there on April 5, 1968
would enrich my spiritual quest for enlightenment. My weekly visit to Anthony's bookshop
made me learn more about Plato, Plotinus, and sages from Taoism, Confucianism, Sufism,
Advaita Vedanta, Mahayana Buddhism, and Zen. It was years later that I realized that
Brother David and Anthony Damiani were my first spiritual mentors. Through Anthony,
I met the sage Paul Brunton
in Switzerland, who inspired me in mindfulness so I could do better research work in predicting
protein structures as well as living a peaceful and joyful life. Catherine Street also reminds me
of Cathy, who came to Foothill Computer Lab on May 8, 2000 to ask about course offerings.
When she mentioned her doctrate in chemistry, I told her about my lab research with Professor
Scheraga at Cornell. Cathy said her professor at CCNY had co-authored a paper with Scheraga.
Then she told me about her sister Carol and second-cousin Linda who studied with Anthony Damiani
at Wisdom Goldenrod. It was amazing that she knew both my physical and spiritual mentors.
We soon became good friends, and I dedicated my poem
"Mango's Mystery"
(Notes) to her. How wonderful
to be blessed by the Eternal Feminine Spirit in the course of our daily life.
|
Photo Sources: 109 Catherine Street (trulia.com);
Lao Tzu (wisdomportal.com);
Spirit of the Valley (revelife.com)
— Peter Y. Chou
Mountain View, 1-23-2013
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P.O. Box 390707, Mountain View, CA 94039
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