culturalterrain.com > gallery > the skins series > matrimony > memory tables | ||
memory tables | ||
inattention | ||
the calculus was difficult | ||
we had the experience | I compose my memory | |
She fell off the podium | ||
(twenty years largely wasted) | ||
expectation | I miscalculated | |
we had the experience | ||
we fell off the bed | I translate the present | |
(men and bits of paper) | ||
I was lost in New Hampshire | ||
disappointment | we had the experience | |
the war was a number | ||
but missed the meaning | I select my necessity | |
distracted from distraction by distraction | ||
disregard | ||
as one becomes older | ||
I was in transit | I edit my certainty | |
the past has another pattern | ||
from betrayal to boredom | ||
distraction | what you thought you came for | |
I was unfaithful | ||
the past has another pattern | I annotate my text | |
(except to expectation) | ||
(reconsidered passion) | ||
relation | I studied laws | |
the past has another pattern | ||
(ignoring cause and effect) | I reread the future | |
(old stones that cannot be deciphered) | ||
I was distracted, I was forgetful | ||
observation | the pattern more complicated | |
I misplaced by longing | ||
(having had twenty years) | I rewrite my desire | |
I discovered regret | ||
recognition | ||
I forget what I wanted | ||
the past has another pattern | I correct my reasons | |
(somebody to love?) | ||
and ceases to be mere sequence | ||
recollection | I forget their names | |
the pattern more complicated | ||
(do they think of me?) | I revise my longing | |
having had twenty years | ||
time wasn't a dimension | ||
passion | reconsidered passion | |
we were all in relation | ||
things that other people have desired | I compile my excuses | |
we had all we need | ||
what you thought you came for | ||
assurance | like love | |
a shell, a husk | ||
time isn't a dimension | I rearrange the past | |
we had the experience | ||
we have all we need | ||
vision | having had twenty years | |
the years of l'entre deux guerres | ||
twenty years largely wasted | I transpose my regret | |
to make mistakes | ||
voice | but missed the meaning | |
Notes: These lines are from the poems of T. S. Eliot: "distracted from distraction by distraction" and "men and bits of paper" (Four Quartets, "Burnt Norton") "the pattern more complicated"; "old stones that cannot be deciphered"; "having had twenty years"; "twenty years largely wasted" and "the years of lentre deux guerres" (Four Quartets, "East Coker") "as one becomes older"; "the past has another pattern"; "we had the experience"; "but missed the meaning" (Four Quartets, "The Dry Salvages") "what you thought you came for" and "a shell, a husk" (Four Quartets, "Little Gidding") "things that other people have desired" ("Portrait of a Lady") "reconsidered passion" ("Gerontion") |