For Ithaka

‘The lover is the reader par excellence. He spends his time reading signs -- he does nothing else. He is truly a prey to signs.’

‘The Real sets fire to everything. But it is a cold fire.’

‘Of what use is a philosopher who doesn’t hurt anybody’s feelings?’

One must have a mind of winter To regard the frost and the boughs Of the pine-trees crusted with snow; And have been cold a long time To behold the junipers shagged with ice, The spruces rough in the distant glitter Of the January sun; and not to think Of any misery in the sound of the wind, In the sound of a few leaves, Which is the sound of the land Full of the same wind That is blowing in the same bare place For the listener, who listens in the snow, And, nothing himself, beholds Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

‘Infinitely close, and infinitely distant.’

'Today, the chains of love have given way to the hell of freedom.'

‘As a digital reflector, the smartphone serves to renew the mirror stage after infancy. It opens up a narcissistic space — a sphere of the imaginary — in which one encloses oneself. The other does not speak via the smartphone.’

‘The critic is one who glimpses destiny in forms.’

'Suddenly as thus they rode from infinite to infinite, suddenly as thus they tilted over abysmal worlds, a mighty cry arose -- that systems more mysterious, worlds more billowy, other heights and other depths, were dawning, were nearing, were at hand. Then the man sighed, stopped, shuddered, and wept. His overladen heart uttered itself in tears; and he said, “Angel, I will go no further. For the spirit of man aches under this infinity. Insufferable is the glory of God's house. Let me lie down in the grave, that I may find rest from the persecutions of the Infinite; for end, I see, there is none.” And from all the listening stars that shone around issued one choral chant -- “Even so it is: Angel, thou knowest that it is: end there is none that ever yet we heard of.” “End is there none?” the Angel solemnly declared. “And is this the sorrow that kills you?” But no voice answered, that he might answer himself. Then the Angel threw up his glorious hands to the heaven of heavens, saying, “End is there none to the Universe of God? Lo! also THERE IS NO BEGINNING.''’ 

'As a character disorder, narcissism is the very opposite of strong self-love. Self-absorption does not produce gratification, it produces injury to the self; erasing the line between self and other means that nothing new, nothing "other," ever enters the self; it is devoured and transformed until one thinks one can see oneself in the other — and then it becomes meaningless . . . The narcissist is not hungry for experiences, he is hungry for Experience. Looking always for an expression or reflection of oneself . . . one drowns in the self.'

‘Everything is in the poems, but at the risk of sounding like the poor wealthy man’s Allen Ginsberg I will write to you because I just heard that one of my fellow poets thinks that a poem of mine that can’t be got at one reading is because I was confused too. Now, come on. I don’t believe in god, so I don’t have to make elaborately sounded structures. I hate Vachel Lindsay, always have, I don’t even like rhythm, assonance, all that stuff. You just go on your nerve. If someone’s chasing you down the street with a knife you just run, you don’t turn around and shout, "Give it up! I was a track star for Mineola Prep."

'We hate poetry that has a palpable design upon us--'

‘The poet / Has only the formulations of midnight.’

'The way through the world / Is more difficult to find than the way beyond it.'

‘To philosophize with open eyes is to philosophize in the dark. Only the blind can look straight at the sun.’ 

JR:

‘Continuous present is one thing and beginning again and again is another thing. These are both things. And then there is using everything.