j o h n  r o s

parts two and four respectively…

ii

the second poem the night-walker wrote

over all the hilltops
silence,
among all the treetops
you feel hardly
a breath moving.
the birds fall silent in the woods.
simply wait! soon
you too will be silent.

^{goethe 1780, translated by robert bly — from news of the universe, poems of twofold consciousness by robert bly}

iv

i should be content
to look at a mountain
for what it is
and not as a comment
on my life.

^{david ignatow — from news of the universe, poems of twofold consciousness by robert bly}

188. when a newly independent art paints its world in brilliant colours, then a moment of life has grown old. by art’s brilliant colours it cannot be rejuvenated but only recalled to mind. the greatness of art makes its appearance only as dusk begins to fall over life.
190. art in the period of its dissolution, as a movement of negation in pursuit of its own transcendence in a historical society where history is not yet directly lived, is at once an art of change and a pure expression of the impossibility of change. the more grandiose its demands, the further from its grasp is true self-realization. this is an art that is necessarily avant-garde; and it is an art that is not. its vanguard is its own disappearance.
– the society of the spectacle chapter 8: negation and consumption within culture by guy debord

in this moment — “all for one and one for nothing” — our postmodern drum-beat.
efforts to gain access stifled by ball-gags — the march of the status quo — rhythmic beats together form one.
muted and dilute.
not to provoke — need to educate — hastened and well fed.