1.
there are two sides to every story and to abbreviate one side is to diminish a side of a wall creating an absence that is stronger than any presence and making any attempt at accurate construction hopeless sid luft is such an accusative absence perhaps you have never had to address yourself to a wraith to proceed adverbially naming effects as of the wind upon trees or Van der Waals forces on a surface but sid luft was a test pilot had flown grumman p 47's called thunderbolts and twin-fuselaged p 38's called lightnings and thought it an agreeable task his eye proceeding over the control panel checking the readings on all of the luminous dials letting his ear discriminate among the complex series of metallic sounds that would allege a private relaxation the way it takes the sharp eyes and quick ears of an astronaut to foresee a future failure in the allusion of a single dial what is out there is altogether conjectural that is the attraction that can take a smart boy out of his apartment and suspend him over an entire atmosphere this applies also to arctic explorers whom also some bubble must arouse let this be an attempt at assessment
2.
you know how a small deviation in the suspension of a balance wheel can lead to a barbarous inflection of the entire mechanism? bringing a belgian police dog to sit in your lap or a bicycle to rest under a moving van and the imperfection is only borne in upon you once it has passed a certain boundary?
3.
and in a car a defect in the low speed carburetor circuit will leave the entire carriage sucking for air at anything below the highest throttle speeds so it is necessary to go on a splurge in cincinnati and choose a tomato soup red oldsmobile before going to chef's college to infuse a vessel with air here becomes a commission it is required to create a sense of competition where there isnt any on a farm by the connecticutt then to stand back at a street corner refraining from criticism like roger de coverley as much of a spectator and as kindly a moss covered rock coolly withstanding the current
4.
such a machine is guaranteed to bring you to despair precisely when the situation isnt desperate because a mounting anxiety approaches a maximum when you have nothing to record in your diary and you have nothing to fall back upon except a tenuous self-discipline
5.
which supposes not only a set of earnest resolutions promises made to Eliot for a regimen of self-improvement to be undertaken in the doldrums dance lessons at 12:00 voice in the afternoon and strict control of your diet the problem is how to go on being enthusiastic about swallowing air in the evening it means being equipped with the sense of a soft worm under the shell of a mollusc which is an excellent image but finally fails to exhilarate if you have never seen it
6.
yet what continues to fascinate us in the shell are the continuous depositions of calcium which we undertake to unwind like a bandage while each roll is just like the last allowing for minor accidents and merely somewhat smaller it does not fulfill our expectations but the belief that there is something to fulfil in our expectations is fundamental
7.
a guard outside of a warehouse suggests there is something to protect
8.
the idea of hypocrisy is expensive
9.
for someone to scream incidentally and interrupt lunch
10.
similar cases in "temporary amnesia" are also known
11.
all you have to do is go to the library to become convinced that they are very likely energy coming from somewhere striking like lightning
12.
annulling a marriage in a minute such impulsive behavior modifies the entire history of a landscape when a car breaks down it appears there was always something wrong with the motor
13.
to a man on a tightrope the Falls at Niagara are the truth of a river and living to ninety appears like a sudden nomination
14.
its hard to maintain your obedience to impulse when you know that at 5 o'clock you're about to enter Mercy Hospital for a colitis operation which leaves you nothing to do but pretend that under the ether you're going back for a look at your origin
15.
have you noticed how psychological states are all nouns Happiness Sorrow Rage Fear and Shame are never named participially say like Smiling-Preceding-the-Storm or Lining-the-Depths-of-an-Outer-Darkening or Something-Preferred-to-Nothing? its almost worth becoming a professor and obtaining a right to prophesy erecting a science of naming and calling it Pyschology finding a net in our hands meaning that there is something we pursue
16.
Judith what i have to say will be lost in this quiet for which i was never quite successful at promoting an antidote
17.
the knack of a child cupping a radio to his ear on his walk through the traffic i would really have liked to wrap you in music in elevators and airliners which i could recommend over amphetamine for its more regular rhythm
18.
to engineer another moment in the wings at the palladium and wait for an illumination from the scene to come and seize you what we can expect of speaking sincerely is an elevation of feeling that we can equate with sincerity which makes Wearing-Your-Heart-On-Your-Sleeve more than a becoming fashion that can fit any college sophomore and be successful it needs a desire to be stretched while you are still superintendent of your passions to which you will ultimately surrender
19.
and recalling the moment of your triumph is a roll call of reporters in which i even remember Ted Thackerey of the Compass the last time we were truly together
20.
though in your memory it was undoubtedly different
21.
maybe you remember a village where i was a villain
22.
and the weather was bad yet you didn't know whether to leave or take Joey and Lisa to the movie the separate inventories of facts in the memories of people who have shared common experiences are weird though perhaps only this division preserves the welfare of individuals and is insurance against the inevitable separations of pairs of men and women
From Meditations. Copyright © 1971 by David Antin. Reprinted with permission of Black Sparrow Press.