wjsullivan.net

Overloading the Machine

Epilogue

The restaurant turns
and you wish I looked nicer.

I just laid down and tried
to duck the smoke
because perfection was
a power outage on
a stormless afternoon
with clouds. Quiet.

How dare you read this
tonight.

I know the glass
is gathering all the dust
we must have missed
but you have no right.

I thought we should
have a candle while we talked
but you're not talking.
"I found out that softness
isn't something you carve,"
you say. "It's a grand design
you sink in the aquarium and watch
leak away," I say,

while watching
your fault lets me
down, a fragile blur of soft
mixups. The end of your nose
used to mean something, a sign
that language submits.

I can hear it, the first time
we rode the subway together,
sideways, but no one saw.

You see, I consider that a man's brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose. A fool takes in all the lumber of every sort he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things, so that he has difficulty in laying his hands upon it. Now the skilful workman is very careful indeed as to what he takes into his brain-attic. He will have nothing but the tools which may help him in doing his work, but of these he has a large assortment, and all in the most perfect order. It is a mistake to think that that little room has elastic walls and can distend to any extent. Depend upon it there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones.

-- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, "A Study in Scarlet"