[spectre] (no subject)

[Norman]

Words move, music moves
Only in time; but that which is only living
Can only die. Words, after speech, reach
Into the silence. Only by the form, the pattern,
Can words or music reach
The stillness, as a Chinese jar still
Moves perpetually in its stillness.
Not the stillness of the violin, while the note lasts,
Not that only, but the co-existence,
Or say that the end precedes the beginning,
And the end and the beginning were always there
Before the beginning and after the end.
And all is always now. Words strain,
Crack and sometimes break, under the burden,
Under the tension, slip, slide, perish,
Decay with imprecision, will not stay in place,
Will not stay still. Shrieking voices
Scolding, mocking, or merely chattering,
Always assail them. The Word in the desert
Is most attacked by voices of temptation,
The crying shadow in the funeral dance,
The loud lament of the disconsolate chimera.

T.S.Eliot, Four Quartets

He says it much better than I can. It's a drag that he was such a blue-blooded royalist, but these words have always moved me. Although I must confess that when I first discovered them, it was the first quartet subtitle, Burnt Norton, that scorched my bikie mind. For others wanting reprieve from scolding, mocking, or merely chattering, there's humour and irony to be had at empyre these days. Not much of that around here it seems. 

Good to hear about your exhibition, Inke; please let us know how it goes. Those of us who lurk count many who really read as well. Even between the lines.

With love to friends in Deep Europe and beyond.

kia ora

sjn