Listen / Read
Just jumping right in at Harries’ closing comments here, I’d like to consider what he means with the Edwin Muir quote. I’m sure it gives us great insight into the debate over assisted suicide, so I sought out the entire poem, One Foot in Eden, so we could consider the context of this elucidating poem.
Here’s the whole thing (my notes are in brackets):
One foot in Eden still, I stand
(I’ve got one foot in the Garden of Eden)
And look across the other land.
(And I’m looking across the world, which I’ll call ‘other’ because it’s rubbish)
The world’s great day is growing late,
(Jesus will be here any… moment… now…)
Yet strange these fields that we have planted
(But we’ve been busy, and we’ve done some freaky shit here on Earth)
So long with crops of love and hate.
(We’ve done some good shit, and some bad shit)
Time’s handiworks by time are haunted,
(Good shit we take the time to do gets fucked up because we don’t make things like we used to)
And nothing now can separate
(When stuff gets fucked up, it stays fucked up)
The corn and tares compactly grown.
(The good shit and the bad shit gets proper intermingled)
The armorial weed in stillness bound
(It’s got our name all over it, come to think of it, so it’s not time’s fault, it’s our fault)
About the stalk; these are our own.
(Yep, from the get go, we mixed all this good and bad shit up, we’ve only ourselves to blame)
Evil and good stand thick around
(Good shit and bad shit are all over the fucking place, there’s no getting away from them)
In the fields of charity and sin
(Again, good shit and bad shit, all together, all in each other’s shit)
Where we shall lead our harvest in.
(And we’ve just got to make the best of the shit we’ve got)Yet still from Eden springs the root
(But it was good shit to start with, before time – I mean we – fucked it all up)
As clean as on the starting day.
(It really was good shit before we got our hands on it)
Time takes the foliage and the fruit
(Wait, it’s time’s fault now, blame time again)
And burns the archetypal leaf
(Time totally fucked up that fig leaf we put over our cocks and faffs… oh I see, we started it, by committing Original Sin, and now after a little bit of time we’re all wearing knickers and suits and shit, and time is fucking us through them, via our clothing; time is fucking us because we’re sinful fig leaf wearing fucks)
To shapes of terror and of grief
(Yes, ever since we put on that fig leaf, time has made our lives a fucking misery)
Scattered along the winter way.
(Just filling our lives with rubbish, bad shit all along the crappy way)
But famished field and blackened tree
(But remember, there was good shit too, despite all the bad shit)
Bear flowers in Eden never known.
(But we have to wait until we get to heaven to get the good shit back, so it’s just bad shit right up until we die)
Blossoms of grief and charity
(Right now, we’ll just have to feel sorry for all this bad shit, and try and be nice to people to make them feel good)
Bloom in these darkened fields alone.
(And there’s fuck all else we can do, we just have to feel sorry for people, and be kind to them)
What had Eden ever to say
(What did the Garden of Eden ever do for us?)
Of hope and faith and pity and love
(It never helped us or cared about us, it was just home to a talking fucking snake that totally fucked all our shit up)
Until was buried all its day
(Until we started wearing those fucking fig leaves, and filling the world with bad shit)
And memory found its treasure trove?
(And then remembered how good that shit used to be, no doubt by reading the Bible)
Strange blessings never in Paradise
(Bad shit is strange shit because it makes you appreciate the good shit more, although you’d never find bad shit like that in heaven, it’s good shit all the way when you get to heaven)
Fall from these beclouded skies.
(This shit is coming at us like shit off a stick)
So, what can we learn from Edwin Muir on this occasion? Firstly that we only have ourselves to blame for all the bad shit that happens. And time. We only have ourselves and time for all the bad shit that happens. Which isn’t really much comfort to the terminally ill suffering in pain for a prolonged time with only the end to look forward to. But the end will be great if you’re a Christian, because heaven is the dog’s bollocks, nothing bad ever happens there. So we have that to look forward to, and all we can do in the meantime is look on the bright side that Jesus will be here any… time… now… and all the good Christians will get to go to heaven where nothing bad ever happens AND (this is important), AND we can be charitable to each other when bad stuff happens. One might interpret that to mean that when someone is living in intolerable circumstances and unbearable pain; when they are a prisoner in their own body or they are enduring the misery of a long and excruciating death; it might be decent of us to empathise with their situation, and show them the basic, merciful charity of relieving them of their pointless and miserable suffering if they should ask us to.
Lord Harries didn’t pay any attention to those lines, so they’re the lines I’ll leave you with today:
Blossoms of grief and charity
Bloom in these darkened fields alone.