The master said you must write what you see
But what I see does not move me
The master answered
Change what you see.
•.•❤•.•
[ Unwritten Law ]
Interesting how we fall in love:
in my case, absolutely. Absolutely, and, alas, often—
so it was in my youth.
And always with rather boyish men—
unformed, sullen, or shyly kicking the dead leaves:
in the manner of Balanchine.
Nor did I see them as as versions of the same thing.
I, with my inflexible Platonism,
my fierce seeing of only one thing at a time:
I ruled against the indefinite article.
And yet, the mistakes of my youth
made me hopeless, because they repeated themselves,
as is commonly true.
But in you I felt something beyond the archetype—
a true expansiveness, a buoyance and love of the earth
utterly alien to my nature. To my credit,
I blessed my good fortune in you.
Blessed it absolutely, in the manner of those years.
And you in your wisdom and cruelty
gradually taught me the meaninglessness of that term.
•.•❤•.•
[ The Burning Heart ]
"... No sadness
is greater than in misery to rehearse
memories of joy ..."
Ask her if she regrets anything
I was
promised to another -
I lived with someone.
You forget these things when you're touched.
Ask how he touched her.
His gaze touched me
before his hands touched me.
Ask how he touched her.
I didn't ask for anything;
everything was given.
Ask her what she remembers.
We were hauled into the underworld.
I thought
we were not responsible
any more than we were responsible
for being alive. I was
a young girl, rarely subject to censure:
then a pariah. did I change that much
from one day to the next?
If I didn't change, wasn't my action
in the character of that young girl?
Ask her what she remembers.
I noticed nothing, I noticed
I was trembling.
Ask her if the fire hurts.
I remember
we were together.
And gradually I understood
that though neither of us ever moved
we were not together but profoundly separate.
Ask her if the fire hurts.
You expect to live forever with your husband
in fire more durable than the world.
I suppose this wish was granted,
where we are now being both
fire and eternity.
Do you regret your life?
Even before I was touched, I belonged to you;
you had only to look at me.
•.•❤•.•
He takes her in his arms
He wants to say I love you, nothing can hurt you
But he thinks
this is a lie, so he says in the end
You're dead, nothing can hurt you
which seems to him
a more promising beginning, more true.
Louise Glück
