the deeper
the deeper we sound
obscure notes tantalize
our ears
held Whole
they force a howl that paints foolish space
or are
stabbed to death by staccato
splashing slick gobs on humid walls
and then desperate to hide their
flinty steel
deeper
and deeper
our eyes and noses are
negligible blinded and stuffed
we try to touch our original
foundations
although they are lost there were
no thoughts
or imagination that they could
be preserved for future suns because their lives
were so very tenuous lacking surety without a founding for themselves
so our basis
is spoiled
its remnant like dried clay resists reconstitution it rides
like fractured ash on misted
beads
it seems irradiated it shimmers with reflections
deeper
I have tried to sound my own
depth my earliest reckonings but
they elude me as
perhaps they should
I am extemporaneous they have no need of me
I think I need
though I know I want
and this wanting is no reason
to be met
deeper
deeper
I should be
satisfied I am
begun 1120,
Monday, 5 8. 13
from Thomas Mann’s Joseph and
His Brothers: “The deeper we sound, the further down
into the lower world of the
past we probe and press, the more do we find that the
earliest foundations of
humanity, its history and culture, reveal themselves
unfathomable.”
