"The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
"Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit
"Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
"Nor all thy tears wash out a Word of it."
- Fitzgerald: Rubaiyat, ed., 51
figure
is an uncompleted gestalt
which upon completion
will pass into
ground
for example
I hunger
eat
am satisfied
and forget
until the next time ....
for example
since you died
I fail to grieve
my tangled tears
of terror
loneliness and loss
defying company
consequently
I fear
all human contact
until ....
for example
so young
so early
before ever the worlds were made
or so it seems:
before I had language
perhaps even
before I had imagery
being unborn -
some foul insidious parasitic weed
crept around bone
sapped my forming heart
like a thief in the night
a bodily invasion
pestilential
but the sap
is primal
and rises still
deep in the rock
bubbles
springing water ....
when corn and tares
are so compactly grown
how
now
can I achieve
completion
before
I pass
into ground ....
3rd December 1990