Andrew Maxwell's Blog, page 18

8.17.10

Behind the "incalculable balances", the cruelty of the parent's corrections. Against the improvisations of the child, he bestows a degenerative gift: personhood.

8.16.10

Masanobu Kuno sat down and hand-wrote the lines:

"Do not envy the fathers of others."

"I can't be your horse to ride, but you two be good friends."

"Please be an unbeatable person like your father and avenge my death."

No line from there to here, no line to steer the fingertip across face, no line to stay the instruction.

13 Lines on Smallness, from Lucretius

How small can anything be? We know of creatures
So tiny they would seem to disappear
If they were less than half their present size.
How big do you suppose their livers are?
Their hearts? The pupils of their eyes? Their toes?
Pretty minute, you must admit. Well, then,
What about things like those atomic motes
That form the elements of mind and spirit?
Diminutive, to say the least. Nor can we
Find with our finger tips the cause of smell
That clings there from the touch of marigold,
Centaury, heal-all, wo...

8.15.10

The father proves nothing by immobility. To join to the occasion, he must follow, and follow, and follow, and follow.

8.14.10

At twenty months, the son is the gladdest usher.

8.13.10

In the background of the visual field, the child is a charged object. To fix one's attention to him is fall away from much of the world.

8.12.10

To understand Char's sense of acquiescence, one must understand what he chose to sentinel: the sovereignty of the child.