Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
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Limits
Jorge Luis Borges
Of all the streets that blur in to the sunset,
There must be one (which, I am not sure)
That I by now have walked for the last time
Without guessing it, the pawn of that Someone
Who fixes in advance omnipotent laws,
Sets up a secret and unwavering scale
for all the shadows, dreams, and forms
Woven into the texture of this life.
If there is a limit to all things and a measure
And a last time and nothing more and forgetfulness,
Who will tell us to whom in this house
We without knowing it have said farewell?
Through the dawning window night withdraws
And among the stacked books which throw
Irregular shadows on the dim table,
There must be one which I will never read.
There is in the South more than one worn gate,
With its cement urns and planted cactus,
Which is already forbidden to my entry,
Inaccessible, as in a lithograph.
There is a door you have closed forever
And some mirror is expecting you in vain;
To you the crossroads seem wide open,
Yet watching you, four-faced, is a Janus.
There is among all your memories one
Which has now been lost beyond recall.
You will not be seen going down to that fountain
Neither by white sun nor by yellow moon.
You will never recapture what the Persian
Said in his language woven with birds and roses,
When, in the sunset, before the light disperses,
You wish to give words to unforgettable things.
And the steadily flowing Rhone and the lake,
All that vast yesterday over which today I bend?
They will be as lost as Carthage,
Scourged by the Romans with fire and salt.
At dawn I seem to hear the turbulent
Murmur of crowds milling and fading away;
They are all I have been loved by, forgotten by;
Space, time, and Borges now are leaving me.
Friday, December 3, 2010
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Sunday, November 21, 2010
☾
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
☾
Dark Wood, Dark Water
This wood burns a dark
Incense. Pale moss drips
In elbow-scarves, beards
From the archaic
Bones of the great trees.
Blue mists move over
A lake thick with fish.
Snails scroll the border
Of the glazed water
With coils of ram's-horn.
Out in the open
Down there the late year
Hammers her rare and
Various metals.
Old pewter roots twist
Up from the jet-backed
Mirror of water
And while the air's clear
Hourglass sifts a
Drift of goldpieces
Bright waterlights are
Sliding their quoits one
After the other
Down boles of the fir.
☾
I'm not someone whose seen this side of me
but it drifts across the ground so down I look
and I could spend my time wondering who I was
I could count the times that I have lost or won
I could turn towards you and ask you what you saw
but what do these feelings mean?
Come meet me on this path of wonder
take my hand I'd like to share with you
what can we learn when we can't understand?
we could spend our time wondering what could be
we could ask of God to show us where we stand
you could follow me back to where we met
but what have you been dreaming of?
I'm going to live
but I'm living far away
I'm going to die
I'm dying for a way out
I'm dying for a way out