At home, in my flannel gown, like a bear to its floe,
I clambered to bed; up the globe's impossible sides
I sailed all night—till at last, with my black beard,
My furs and my dogs, I stood at the northern pole.
There in the childish night my companions lay frozen,
The stiff fur knocked at my starveling throat,
And I gave my great sigh: the flakes came huddling,
Were they really my end? In the darkness I turned to my rest.
—Here, the flag snaps in the glare and silence
Of the unbroken ice. I stand here,
The dogs bark, my beard is black, and I stare
At the North Pole . . .
And now what? Why, go back.
Turn as I please, my step is to the south.
The world—my world spins on this final point
Of cold and wretchedness: all lines, all winds
End in this whirlpool I at last discover.
And it is meaningless. In the child's bed
After the night's voyage, in that warm world
Where people work and suffer for the end
That crowns the pain—in that Cloud-Cuckoo-Land
I reached my North and it had meaning.
Here at the actual pole of my existence,
Where all that I have done is meaningless,
Where I die or live by accident alone—
Where, living or dying, I am still alone;
Here where North, the night, the berg of death
Crowd me out of the ignorant darkness,
I see at last that all the knowledge
I wrung from the darkness—that the darkness flung me—
Is worthless as ignorance: nothing comes from nothing,
The darkness from the darkness. Pain comes from the darkness
And we call it wisdom. It is pain.
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Comments
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An interesting little piece you put up here. Very fanciful in the begininng. I wasn't sure where you were going with it, till about half way through. But I do wonder about the significance to a 'black beard'. It, of course, could mean any number of things, I suppose that's why I wonder.
At any rate, it's a tale, that ultimately must end. And with it's end, your bitterness of 'reality' was perfectly clear. Nice work. -
One of the best poems ever written.
"nothing comes from nothing,
The darkness from the darkness. Pain comes from the darkness
And we call it wisdom. It is pain."
Pain is Pain. Wisdom is Wisdom. Nothing is Nothing. In a search for meaning, we often find such searches are meaningless themselves; as it can be with life in general. In these searches, we disguise our pain with what we want to believe as wisdom, when it is nothing more than the irrelevent knowledge that we have had all along. Pain is universal, and at the end of each of us, wisdom is nothing. When we all reach our own North Pole, knowledge and wisdom are insignificant. Pain, on any and all levels, is universal, and understood by all; whether we admit it or not.
Edited on May 31, 1:56 because ''. -
"I see at last that all the knowledge
I wrung from the darkness...Is worthless as ignorance: nothing comes from nothing...And we call it wisdom"
DAMN I love that - jolts me into a place I realize that so much of our self-pity and woefulness is a useless, time consuming waste, and we call ourselves "wise" if we feel we own our pain, and we call ourselves "pain" and think that with it, we can be wise...but it is what it is, it is just pain...and nothing will spill from a cup that is empty.
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