The Suicide (Jorge Luis Borges)

I put randomness aside and turned to Borges' poems. I found a blue textbook receipt (blank on the inked side, filled with silliness on the other) signaling "The Suicide." I remember liking the phrase "dust of dust" (probably not unique in itself), especially the Spanish version: polvo el polvo. I must've walked around with that in my head for weeks.

I've got miles to go today, so I'll only give the English translation (by Alastair Reid).


The Suicide

Not a single star will be left in the night.
The night will not be left.
I will die and, with me,
the weight of the intolerable universe.
I shall erase the pyramids, the medallions,
the continents and faces.
I shall erase the accumulated past.
I shall make dust of history, dust of dust.
Now I am looking on the final sunset.
I am hearing the last bird.
I bequeath nothingness to no one.

Comments

POPULAR POSTS

Tarkovsky's Death and the Film "Stalker"

TÃœBINGEN, JANUARY by Paul Celan

Hitchcock's Soda City

Coetzee's "Costello": Koba the Bear and Paul West