2/17/2006

Marked

There are things
we cannot escape...

drawn to damage
like the fatal bird,

the wolf
to forgotten fields,

the blade
to its mark

between the ribs.

We were not made
to suffer

this confusion.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am reminded of Nietzsche - the burden of history on man. Is it the forgotten field he yearns for?

Nietzsche writes,

"Observe the herd which is grazing beside you. It does not know what yesterday or today is. It springs around, eats, rests, digests, jumps up again, and so from morning to night and from day to day, with its likes and dislikes closely tied to the peg of the moment, and thus neither melancholy nor weary. To witness this is hard for man, because he boasts to himself that his human race is better than the beast and yet looks with jealousy at its happiness. For he wishes only to live like the beast, neither weary nor amid pains, and he wants it in vain, because he does not will it as the animal does. One day the man demands of the beast: "Why do you not talk to me about your happiness and only gaze at me?" The beast wants to answer, too, and say: "That comes about because I always immediately forget what I wanted to say." But by then the beast has already forgotten this reply and remains silent, so that the man wonders on once more."

Rachel Phillips said...

said so much more eloquently than my rendition of the human condition! You explained my words better than I could have myself!
Very astute!