THE WONDER OF THE IMPERFECT
Nothing that I do is finished
so I keep returning to it
lured by the notion that I long
to see the whole of it at last
completed and estranged from me
but no the unfinished is what
I return to as it leads me on
I am made whole by what has just
escaped me as it always does
I am made of incompleteness
the words are not there in words
oh gossamer gossamer breath
moment daylight life untouchable
by no name with no beginning
what do we think we recognize
– W.S. Merwin, from The Moon Before Morning (2014, Copper Canyon Press). Used by permission of the publishers.
Copyright © 2014 by W. S. Merwin.
