Last night we took Constantin (Tin) to friends who live on Constantinople Street and visited with Turks who teach the Ottoman Empire. We named Tin, Constantin because it aligned with our sensibilities and culture – my grandparents from Constantinople and T’s Eastern European background – why does Constantinople keep coming up?
When the I-Ching told me what to expect he said the person who will come into your life and change it is a Horse, symbolized by the Chinese horoscope, so came T, a Horse, the last gift I received from Steve was a Jonathan Adler pure white horse, then a friend’s wife gave me a tapestry from Russia with a prince riding on a horse, it hangs above Tin’s crib and every morning he points to the prince on the horse and I tell him, “You are my Prince on a horse!” Then I see this poem:
Description of a Badly Drawn Horse
The horse’s head looks more like the butt end
of an oar, squared off and wooden the way an animal’s is not.
Its mane is mangy; the mouth toothy; one white eye is wild.The legs tangle at wrong angles and the body seems short.
This was a horse to shoot, but I sharpened my pencil instead,
and returned to my seat. Astride the beast, with hands like cloudsand checkered shirt, is a boy—not whipping his horse,
battering its belly with shiny spurs, or scouting the dusty plains
and bluffs for a good leap-off place. He’s smiling terribly.