The very first step toward happiness

When I Have Fears That I May Cease to Be, by John Keats

When I have fears that I may cease to be
  Before my pen has glean’d my teeming brain,
Before high piled books, in charactry,
  Hold like rich garners the full-ripen’d grain;
When I behold, upon the night’s starr’d face,      
  Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
  Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,
  That I shall never look upon thee more,    
Never have relish in the fairy power
  Of unreflecting love;—then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
  Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink.

L又聽見了那首曲子，事隔多年之後。

那曲子以及伴隨那曲子而經歷的一切，曾經頻繁地浮現於L的腦海，提醒L關於那些不可克服的無盡痛苦與暴烈欲望。

如今，究竟是哪裡出了問題呢？L心想。某種改變馴服了一切，或者顛倒了一切。原本是擾亂的來源，如今卻成為將擾亂切除的手段。過去是：因為做愛，所以產生了無窮的煩惱而頭痛；如今卻是：這情況真令人頭痛，那麼讓我們做愛吧。

一模一樣的曲子，聽來如此冷酷，一刀刀地切割著L的記憶。

多愁善感是無濟於事的，W略帶鄙夷地說道，真正該擔心的不是做愛的功能，而是做愛的無功能。

也就是說，W鄭重地伸出食指指出，當做愛既非令人困擾，也不能解決困擾，而成為徹頭徹尾無所謂的，可有可無的東西時，那才是麻煩大了。

L被W煞有介事的神態逗得笑了起來，然後像是想起甚麼似的，突然陷入沮喪。

Scriabin Etude Op. 8 No. 12, by Morton Estrin

You Kindly, by Sharon Olds

Because I felt too weak to move
you kindly moved for me, kneeling
and turning, until you could take my breast-tip in the
socket of your lips; and my womb went down
on itself, drew sharply over and over
to its tightest shape, the way, when newborns
nurse, the fist of the uterus
with each, milk, tug, powerfully
shuts. I saw your hand, near me, your
daily hand, your thumbnail,
the quiet ordinary self, when your mouth at my
breast was drawing sweet gashes of come
up from my womb made black fork-flashes of a
celibate's lust shoot through me. And I couldn't
lift my head, and you swiveled, and came down
close to me, delicate blunt
touch of your hard penis in long
caresses down my face, species
happiness, calm which gleams
with fearless anguished desire. It found
my pouring mouth, the back of my throat,
and the bright wall which opens. It seemed to
take us hours to move the bone
creatures so their gods could be fitted to each other,
and then, at last, home, root
in the earth, wing in the air. As it finished,
it seemed my sex was a grey flower
the color of the brain, smooth and glistening,
a complex calla or iris which you
were creating with the errless digit
of your sex. But then, as it finished again,
one could not speak of a blossom, or the blossom
was stripped away, as if, until
that moment, the cunt had been clothed, still,
in the thinnest garment, and now was bare
or more than bare, silver wet-suit of
matter itself gone, nothing
there but the paradise flay. And then
more, that cannot be told — may be,
but cannot be, things that did not
have to do with me, as if some
wires crossed, and history
or war, or the witches possessed, or the end
of life were happening in me, or as if
I were in a borrowed body, I
knew what I could not know, did — was
done to — what I cannot-do-be-done-to, so when
we returned, I cried, afraid for a moment
I was dead, and had got my wish to come back,
once, and sleep with you, on a summer
afternoon, in an empty house
where no one could hear us.
I lowered the salt breasts of my eyes
to your lips, and you sucked,
then I looked at your face, at its absence of unkindness,
its giving that absence off as a matter
I cannot name, as if I was seeing not
you but something between us, that can live
only between us. I stroked back the hair in
pond and sex rivulets
from your forehead, gently raked it back
along your scalp,
I did not think of my father's hair
in death, those oiled paths, I lay
along your length and did not think how he
did not love me, how he trained me not to be loved.

In a field
I am the absence
of the field.
This is
always the case.
Whenever I am
I am what is missing.

When I walk
I part the air
and always
the air moves in
to fill the spaces
where my body’s been.

We all have reasons
for moving.
I move
to keep thing whole.

 ---Keeping Things Whole, by Mark Strand

Shostakovich: Violin Sonata, op. 134 - II. Allegretto

與石頭交談 - Szymborska

我敲了敲石頭的前門，
「是我，讓我進去。
我想進去你裏面去，
四處瞧瞧，飽吸你的氣息。」

「走開。」石頭說。
「我緊閉著。
即使你將我打成碎片，
我們仍是緊閉的。
你可以將我們磨成沙礫，
我們依舊不會讓你進來。」

我敲了敲石頭的前門，
「是我，讓我進去。
我來是出於真誠的好奇。
唯有生命才能將它澆息。
我打算先逛遍你的宮殿，
再走訪葉子，水滴。
我的時間不多。
我終必一死的命運該可感動你。」

「我是石頭做的，」石頭說，
「因此必須扳起面孔。
走開。
我沒有肌肉可以大笑。」

我敲了敲石頭的前門。
「是我，讓我進去。
聽說你的體內有許多空敞的大廳，
無人得見，徒具華美，
無聲無息，沒有任何腳步的回聲，
招認吧，你自己也不甚清楚。」

「的確，又大又空，」石頭說，
「但沒有任何房間。
華美，但不合你那差勁的胃口。
你或有機會結識我，但你永遠無法徹底了解我。
你面對的是我的外表，
我的內在背離你。」

我敲了敲石頭的前門，
「是我，讓我進去。
我並非要尋求永恆的庇護。
我並非不快樂。
我並非無家可歸。
我的世界值得我回去。
我將空手而入，空手而出。
我將只用言語
證明我曾到訪。
沒人會相信此事。」

「我不會讓你進入，」石頭說，
「你缺乏參與感。
其他的感官都無法彌補你失去的參與感。
即使視力提升到無所不能見的地步，
對你並無用處，如果少了參與感。
我不會讓你進入，你只略知此感為何物，
只得其種籽，想像。」

我敲了敲石頭的前門。
「是我，讓我進去。
我沒有二十萬年的壽命，
所以請讓我到你的屋簷底上。」

「如果你不相信我，」石頭說，
「去問問葉子，它會告訴你同樣的話。
去問水滴，它會說出葉子說過的話。
最後再問問你頭上的毛髮。
我真想大笑，是的，大笑，狂笑，
雖然我不知道如何大笑。」

我敲了敲石頭的前門。
「是我，讓我進去。」

「我沒有門。」石頭說。

Brecht - Conversations

"We can't go on talking to each other," said Mr. K. to a man.
"Why not?" asked the latter, taken back.
"In your presence I am incapable of saying anything intelligent," complained Mr. K.
"But I really don't mind," the other comforted him.
"That I can believe," said Mr. K. angrily, "but I mind."


--- Stories of  Mr. Keuner

Brecht - The hopeless boy

Mr. K. talked about the bad habit of silently allowing an injustice suffered to eat at one, and told the following story:

A boy was crying to himself and a passerby asked what was wrong.
'I have saved two dimes for the movies,' said the boy, 'when a big lad came and grabbed one from me,' and he pointed at a lad who could be seen some distance away.
'Did you not shout for help?' asked the man.
'I did,' said the boy and sobbed a little more loudly.
'And didn't anyone hear you?' the man went on, stroking him fondly.
'No,' sobbed the boy and looked at the man with new hope.
'Then give me that one as well,' said the man and took the second dime out of the boy's hand and walked away unconcerned.

--- Stories of  Mr. Keuner