Tag Archives: corsican

A Corsican Escape Through Sheetrock and Cork

The penultimate panel in “The Conundrum of the Swivetbee Mews”.

I have noticed that when most people use the word “penultimate”, even good writers who should know better, they seem to think it means the big revelation, the last word or the climax of the story. Some people use it as a synonym for “ultimate” in the sense that this is an extra-special, fancy-sounding ultimate.

It just means second to the last.

(My Official Geranium Lake Properties Calendar was delivered yesterday. The only thing I feel I need to say about it is that it is pretty damn stunning.)

Graffiti at the Alakamandava Gate

This is another aperture in the Corsican Screen, or Lattice. What I have only recently realized, strangely enough, is that quite a few GLP comics depict a view through the Corsican screen. Only the gates, doors and windows permit a person to pass through. I wonder if people have been using GLP panels to find the Corsican screen and pass through, to find a world much like ours, but different in very significant ways?

I wonder if that world beyond the Corsican screen has a coronavirus pandemic? It’s nice to think of a world that would have the sensibility (and good taste) to enjoy Geranium Lake Properties comics in their daily newspapers. I bet they would elect philosophers and poets as leaders, and have just as many art leagues as sports leagues for their children to enjoy.

I think there would be no Covid-19 in that world, because the US government would have worked efficiently, and worked together with China and Europe and all their brilliant scientists. They would have contained it, just like New Zealand did, and we would have already opened the baseball season. The President would have thrown out the first pitch (and she would not be Trump, Biden, Bernie or Kanye, thank god). There would be no Black Lives Matter movement in that world, because it would not be needed. No police, because they would not be needed. Armies would be made up of only unarmed first responders, who volunteered to be sent to the sites of disasters, to render expert aid to hurt, hungry, homeless people. And all those expensive, useless weapons? That money was used to solve other problems, so that people’s fears were relieved, and anxieties comforted, and war became unnecessary.

(I’m aware that few people talk like this anymore. Most people want to be a soldier in a cause, a warrior of some kind, so they can be the ones on the right side of history, the chosen ones, wielding judgment and punishing the guilty.)

We might have been on the way to becoming that world beyond the Corsican screen. Maybe back in time around the Summer of Love? But then the men that decide everything, decided that freedom and love meant free sex, more Vietnam War, and Nixon for President. Then George Lucas made Star Wars and Steven Spielberg made Raiders of the Lost Ark and America’s common sense sank into male juvenalia. It was just too fun, too cool, too easy to solve a problem with a big, loud gun blast. This world would never wake up to read Geranium Lake Properties comics with their morning coffee. Peace, Love and Freedom as a philosophy hung on for a while, but somewhere in the nineties it collapsed under the apocalypse that nobody noticed.

Running to Mischief

The vista of ti-Umorn Aindor’rba is perhaps the least popular window in the Corsican screen. It is identified as the Discordant Portal in Seth Devishale’s Guide to the Corsican Lattice, where the instructions for its use are accompanied by two quotes. One is from the Bible, Proverbs 6:18, “A heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief,”. The other is from the Fifth Ashtapadi of the Sukhmani Sahib, “False are the feet which run to do evil to others.”

Proverbs 6 is easily found through an online search, but finding the English translation of the Fifth Ashtapadi of the Sukhmani Sahib is a bit more daunting, so I have provided the complete text here.

Sukhmani Sahib, Ashtapadi 5

Shalok:

One who renounces God the Giver, and attaches himself to other affairs –
O Nanak, he shall never succeed. Without the Name, he shall lose his honor. 1

Ashtapadee:

He obtains ten things, and puts them behind him;
for the sake of one thing withheld, he forfeits his faith.
But what if that one thing were not given, and the ten were taken away?
Then, what could the fool say or do?
Our Lord and Master cannot be moved by force.
Unto Him, bow forever in adoration.
That one, unto whose mind God seems sweet –
all pleasures come to abide in his mind.
One who abides by the Lord’s Will,
O Nanak, obtains all things. 1

God the Banker gives endless capital to the mortal,
who eats, drinks and expends it with pleasure and joy.
If some of this capital is later taken back by the Banker,
the ignorant person shows his anger.
He himself destroys his own credibility,
and he shall not again be trusted.
When one offers to the Lord, that which belongs to the Lord,
and willingly abides by the Will of God’s Order,
the Lord will make him happy four times over.
O Nanak, our Lord and Master is merciful forever. 2

The many forms of attachment to Maya,
shall surely pass away – know that they are transitory.
People fall in love with the shade of the tree,
and when it passes away, they feel regret in their minds.
Whatever is seen, shall pass away;
and yet, the blindest of the blind cling to it.
One who gives her love to a passing traveler –
nothing shall come into her hands in this way.
O mind, the love of the Name of the Lord bestows peace.
O Nanak, the Lord, in His Mercy, unites us with Himself. 3

False are body, wealth, and all relations.
False are ego, possessiveness and Maya.
False are power, youth, wealth and property.
False are sexual desire and wild anger.
False are chariots, elephants, horses and expensive clothes.
False is the love of gathering wealth, and reveling in the sight of it.
False are deception, emotional attachment and egotistical pride.
False are pride and self-conceit.
Only devotional worship is permanent, and the Sanctuary of the Holy.
Nanak lives by meditating, meditating on the Lotus Feet of the Lord. 4

False are the ears which listen to the slander of others.
False are the hands which steal the wealth of others.
False are the eyes which gaze upon the beauty of another’s wife.
False is the tongue which enjoys delicacies and external tastes.
False are the feet which run to do evil to others.
False is the mind which covets the wealth of others.
False is the body which does not do good to others.
False is the nose which inhales corruption.
Without understanding, everything is false.
Fruitful is the body, O Nanak, which takes to the Lord’s Name. 5

The life of the faithless cynic is totally useless.
Without the Truth, how can anyone be pure?
Useless is the body of the spiritually blind, without the Name of the Lord.
From his mouth, a foul smell issues forth.
Without the remembrance of the Lord, day and night pass in vain,
like the crop which withers without rain.
Without meditation on the Lord of the Universe, all works are in vain,
like the wealth of a miser, which lies useless.
Blessed, blessed are those, whose hearts are filled with the Name of the Lord.
Nanak is a sacrifice, a sacrifice to them. 6

He says one thing, and does something else.
There is no love in his heart, and yet with his mouth he talks tall.
The Omniscient Lord God is the Knower of all.
He is not impressed by outward display.
One who does not practice what he preaches to others,
shall come and go in reincarnation, through birth and death.
One whose inner being is filled with the Formless Lord –
by his teachings, the world is saved.
Those who are pleasing to You, God, know You.
Nanak falls at their feet. 7

Offer your prayers to the Supreme Lord God, who knows everything.
He Himself values His own creatures.
He Himself, by Himself, makes the decisions.
To some, He appears far away, while others perceive Him near at hand.
He is beyond all efforts and clever tricks.
He knows all the ways and means of the soul.
Those with whom He is pleased are attached to the hem of His robe.
He is pervading all places and interspaces.
Those upon whom He bestows His favor, become His servants.
Each and every moment, O Nanak, meditate on the Lord. 8

Ancient Quincuncial Networks


Jainne Lummrey was a postgraduate student at Newcastle University, studying the history and literature of early modern Britain, when she discovered Geranium Lake Properties in the British comic magazine Viz. (GLP appeared irregularly in Viz from 1987 to 1991, according to a deal with John Brown that was independent from Yost’s agreements with his other comics syndication services.) Jainne wrote to Yost after the “Ancient Quincuncial Networks” panel was published in May 1990. Thus began an ardent correspondence that lasted for nine years, until Jainne Lummrey’s death in 1999. Yost last letter arrived at Jainne’s London address two days after the police discovered her body. The letter was sent from New Zealand, postmarked the day before Yost disappeared after boarding a ferry from Auckland to Rangitoto Island.


Cover for the first edition of Urn Burial, The Garden of Cyrus by Thomas Browne: A New Interpretation by Jainne Lummrey, 1997, Trace Mark Press.

© 2018 lcmt

Escape from the myths of modernity


A taalcif-shaped hole for escape in the Corsican screen. A taalcif is a tool made from the antlers of a taalchirrik. The 20th letter of this alphabet is shaped like a taalchirrik. Readers were challenged with different parts of the Corsican screen many times during GLP’s run from 1984 and 1997. You can see some of them here. This also might be a glimpse.