As I Wrote One Day

Ever felt like you were a tiny piece of thread, like a single snip could mark the end of a feeling?

I was thinking about buying a train ticket to Santa Fe. I don't know why.
A train ride to Santa Fe would mean 39 free hours that could be lived outside this box.
The thought was immobilizing. It was peaceful and calm. I just woke up from a nap in the garden, the tea was warm as it sat out in the sun, a book was sprawled open on the grass.

I didn't feel fogged in confusion. This was a rare moment of clarity. But life is tumultuous. And everyday the plunge is great and anxiety is a steep hill that I climb in hopes of reaching this feeling of stability. Tomorrow is another day that foils this feeling. For a while it hangs around me but the hours fan it away--tomorrow will come and the feeling will have vanished.

Something different to everybody but nothing to myself.

I wish that I could stand up, interrupt myself mid-sentence as the words are being dragged out by a voice that sounds like it doesn't even belong to me. I wish I could be brave, I wish I could tell them truth and stop pretending.

But in this reverted state all I do is live for these moments.

Reach me down my Tycho Brahe, I would know him when we meet,
When I share my later science, sitting humbly at his feet;
He may know the law of all things, yet be ignorant of how
We are working to completion, working on from then to now.

Pray remember that I leave you all my theory complete,
Lacking only certain data for your adding, as is meet,
And remember men will scorn it, 'tis original and true,
And the obliquy of newness may fall bitterly on you.

But, my pupil, as my pupil you have learned the worth of scorn,
You have laughed with me at pity, we have joyed to be forlorn,
What for us are all distractions of men's fellowship and smiles;
What for us the Goddess Pleasure with her meretricious smiles.

You may tell that German College that their honor comes too late,
But they must not waste repentance on the grizzly savant's fate.
Though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light;
I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night.

— “The Old Astronomer To His Pupil” by Sarah Williams