#opacities

It seemed true to writing that it should be a form of repetition, closer to a heartbeat than a craft. One moment like another.

I wanted to send you something very small and perfect that would say everything. A single sentence. A word. A letter.

I'd like to write a magic spell. When I finished writing it, I'd break into a million pieces. And you, too, when you finished reading, you'd break into a million pieces. A spell for shattering.

That’s what I wanted: to throw my notecards out. To throw them away and then, somehow, retrieve them. Somehow to retain their atmosphere, their ragged smell, that sense of something gathered, hoarded, of the stash. As you wrote: a work suffused with feeling.

Imitation makes community. It is an affectionate art.

“No poem is intended for the reader,” wrote Walter Benjamin, “no picture for the beholder, no symphony for the listener.” Reading this, I remembered his practice of lifting quotations from texts, which he cherished as if they had been written for him alone.

Early December. Rilke's birthday. It was the season of Absolute Shadows, the time of closing the book, snuffing the candle, and folding one's arms to lie down on the tomb.