chiaroscuro
Hinter unseren Gedanken, wahren und falschen, liegt immer wieder ein dunkler Grund, den wir erst später ins Licht ziehen und als einen Gedanken aussprechen können.
Behind our thoughts, true and false, there is always to be found a dark background, which we are only later able to bring into the light and express as a thought.
As the light dims, but before putting the lamp out, I finish my allotment in the current evening books, including two from the library that I would like to finish in the coming week, and I turn them over in my mind in a drowsy sort of stupor. The Donne elegies, lately, have seemed very ill-tempered and silly, which is to be expected from romantic or sexual ambivalence (even if it is just a poetic pose), but everything else has seemed just as it should be, different and variable and very much itself.
Before switching off the light, I touch the idea of checking the news one last time, just on the off chance that something has happened; I touch the idea as one touches a sore tooth – exploratory, anticipatory. I think of the frisson of anger/fear/anxiety or – at best – schadenfreude that I could expect from current events. I hold the notion of the bland unknown against the dissatisfaction of knowing in uneasy contest for a moment, perhaps several moments.
I turn out the light and fall asleep quickly.