By the last few times we saw her it was clear That things were different. When you tried to help her Get out of the car or get from the car to the door Or across the apartment house hall to the elevator There was a new sense of heaviness Or of inertia in the body. It wasn't That she was less willing to be helped to walk But that the walking itself had become less willing. Maybe the stupid demogorgon blind Recalcitrance of body, resentful of the laws Of mind and spirit, was getting its own back now, Or maybe a new and subtle, alien, Intelligence of body was obedient now To other laws: "Weight is the measure of The force with which a body is drawn downward To the center of the earth"; "Inertia is The tendency of a body to resist Proceeding to its fate in any way Other than that determined for itself."
That evening, at the Bromells' apartment, after She had been carried up through the rational structure By articulate stages, floor after flashing floor, And after we helped her get across the hall, And get across the room to a chair, somehow We got her seated in a chair that was placed A little too far away from the nearest table, At the edge of the abyss, and there she sat, Exposed, her body the object of our attention-- The heaviness of it, the helpless graceless leg, The thick stocking, the leg brace, the medical shoe.
. . .
Her smiling made her look as if she had Just then tasted something delicious, the charm Her courtesy attributed to her friends.
This decent elegant fellow human being Was seated in virtue, character, disability, Behind her the order of the ranged bookshelves, The windows monitored by Venetian blinds-- "These can be raised or lowered; numerous slats, Horizontally arranged, and parallel, Which can be tilted so as to admit Precisely the desired light or air."
. . .
The books there on the bookshelves told their stories, Line after line, all of them evenly spaced, And spaces between the words. You could fall through the spaces. In one of the books Dr. Johnson told the story: "In the scale of being, wherever it begins, Or ends, there are chasms infinitely deep; Infinite vacuities . . . For surely, Nothing can so disturb the passions, or Perplex the intellects of man so much, As the disruption of this union with Visible nature, separation from all That has delighted or engaged him, a change Not only of the place but of the manner Of his being, an entrance into a state Not simply which he knows not, but perhaps A state he has not faculties to know."
The dinner was delicious, fresh greens, and reds, And yellows, produce of the season due, And fish from the nearby sea; and there were also Ashes to be eaten, and dirt to drink.
David FerryBy the last few times we saw her it was clear That things were different. When you tried to help her Get out of the car or get from the car to the door Or across the apartment house hall to the elevator There was a new sense of heaviness Or of inertia in the body. It wasn’t That she was less willing to be helped to walk But that the walking itself had become less willing. Maybe the stupid demogorgon blind Recalcitrance of body, resentful of the laws Of mind and spirit, was getting its own back now, Or maybe a new and subtle, alien, Intelligence of body was obedient now To other laws: “Weight is the measure of The force with which a body is drawn downward To the center of the earth”; “Inertia is The tendency of a body to resist Proceeding to its fate in any way Other than that determined for itself.”
That evening, at the Bromells’ apartment, after She had been carried up through the rational structure By articulate stages, floor after flashing floor, And after we helped her get across the hall, And get across the room to a chair, somehow We got her seated in a chair that was placed A little too far away from the nearest table, At the edge of the abyss, and there she sat, Exposed, her body the object of our attention– The heaviness of it, the helpless graceless leg, The thick stocking, the leg brace, the medical shoe.
. . .
Her smiling made her look as if she had Just then tasted something delicious, the charm Her courtesy attributed to her friends.
This decent elegant fellow human being Was seated in virtue, character, disability, Behind her the order of the ranged bookshelves, The windows monitored by Venetian blinds– “These can be raised or lowered; numerous slats, Horizontally arranged, and parallel, Which can be tilted so as to admit Precisely the desired light or air.”
. . .
The books there on the bookshelves told their stories, Line after line, all of them evenly spaced, And spaces between the words. You could fall through the spaces. In one of the books Dr. Johnson told the story: “In the scale of being, wherever it begins, Or ends, there are chasms infinitely deep; Infinite vacuities . . . For surely, Nothing can so disturb the passions, or Perplex the intellects of man so much, As the disruption of this union with Visible nature, separation from all That has delighted or engaged him, a change Not only of the place but of the manner Of his being, an entrance into a state Not simply which he knows not, but perhaps A state he has not faculties to know.”
The dinner was delicious, fresh greens, and reds, And yellows, produce of the season due, And fish from the nearby sea; and there were also Ashes to be eaten, and dirt to drink.
David Ferry