DIVINITY, TRINITY—A DOUBLE DACTYL. I posted here on the double dactyl, a light verse form invented by Anthony Hecht and John Hollander. I posted some examples of double dactyls here. Mary Jane and I spent some time with the poet Robert Rickert yesterday, and in the course of the conversation I asked Bob to recite a double dactyl he once sent me. Here it is, as he remembered it:
“Divinity, trinity,
Dante the Florentine,
Wrote an incredible poem that had
Moral, allegorical, anagogical and even a literal
Meaning b’gad.
I did not know the word “anagogical” and Bob gave me some background. This wikipedia article says: “anagogical is a method of spiritual interpretation of literal statements or events, especially scriptural exegesis that detects allusions to the afterlife. Certain medieval theologians describe four methods of interpreting the Scriptures: literal/historical, allegorical, tropological (moral), and anagogical.”