499

498

497
The paged symbols without heat or color,
Earthly but unworlded entire, sleeping
Unslept from emergence;
Inanimate in organ stillness--
All: but in contemplation's eye.

496
We do not carry lessons to the field of tall grass
Nor instruction there receive--
Though the winded stalks in a whisper's guise
May gossip of the infinite, or the rain to come--
We but hear a measure of our own moment passed.

495

494

493
From inside the space inside the shell
In anguish, all not-space is whorled
To silence in tautness, and small.
The mind consumes its fever
And grows in this diminishment,
Till alone reigning in all substance,
A touchless, palpable fire.

492

491
The cat is dying.
The rain is so soft it seems illusion, but I see the branches reflecting lamplight.

490

489
...Despite the growing presence of electric street illumination, London in resolute municipal creep out of the Realm of Gas, he had begun to discover a structure to the darkness, dating from quite ancient times, perhaps well before there was any city at all--in place all along, and little more ratified by the extreme and unmerciful whiteness replacing the glare-free tones and composite shadows of the old illumination, with its multiplied chances of error. Even venturing out in the daylight, he found himself usually moving from one shadow to another, among quotidian frights which could only become unbearably visible with the passing of lamplighting-time into the lofty electric night.
The purposeful life did not keep him, for some while in fact, from trying to locate somewhere in Great Britain a source of Cyclomite, proceeding, desperately, from such opiated catarrh preparations as Collis Brown's Mixture on to cocainized brain tonics, cigarettes soaked in absinthe, xylene in unventilated rooms, and so on, each proving inadequate, often pathetically so, as a substitute for the reality-modifying explosive he had enjoyed back in his former or Stateside existence.
He had no shame about enlisting the aid of Neville and Nigel, always these days, it seemed, down from University. Each of them was reputed to have at least a thousand pounds a year, which it seemed they spent mostly on drugs and hats. "Here," Nigel greeted him, "do try a spot of 'pinky,' it's ever so much fun, really."
"Condy's fluid," explained Neville--"permanganate disinfectant, which one then mixes with methylated spirits--"
"Got the recipe from an Aussie we met whilst in the nick one Regatta weekend. Came to develop quite a taste for it after a while, though health aspects naturally did occur to us, so we're careful only to allow ourselves one bottle per year."
"Admire your restraint, boys."
"Yes, and tonight's the night, Lewis!" Abruptly producing a rather large bottle filled with a queer purple that Lew could swear was glowing.

--Thomas Pynchon

488

487

486

485

483

482

481

480

479
My eye was traitor to my affection,
And with sly inversion turned my object's spy.
.
My subdivisions, winter-tree'd ravens,
Were figments. As hers.
.
Unmuffle the bell;
And ribboned tree, and open eye.

478

477

476

475

474
A blank screen electric,
Bitter, snow-crust field
Night-set, wind-flat frame
Of a thing sustained
Without a cold-eyed trace.
.
Still--below--a stratum shift
In now light or next dark:
A new-boundaried state.

473

472

471

470

469
This article is undone to expose
The line of your neck, and time's;
Slender and grave both
And each.
The strain of an hour's reverse and addition
Is diminished by the fine-haired arc;
Yet, pause: an emblem may suffice.

468

467

466

465

464
In the aftermath of day, by the sun's staircase
Lettering down ink-blot cloud,
The symbols fade fine-veined
And in darkness seeping the star steps from
The runner's edge, done:
Event and eye, one.

463

462

461
It is no thing to understand
Nor thought nor manner
Nor device unmattered
For discretion's sake.
No: tis that ever-unfixed mark,
Motion's measure in slant sense stood.

460

459
In primitive without thought
Of stars underfoot, the silica grains,
The unsyllabled all between our toes--
And in the sun-bent grass the arc of time--
Our eyes on the blue-ruled edge.

458

457

456

455
The leaves are a thing to lose,
The lawn of yellow points.
Un-image a measure of days,
A season distempered both
In time's gray subsequence
And a separation all-ordained, unseen.

454

453