untitled (maze)
I was sitting at a bus stop with Jorge Louis Borges, talking about Icarus' wings and why Daedalus built them at all let alone allowed his son to use them. He must have known, must have been well-acquainted with the folly of youth and its belief in its own immortality. But there must also have been love, a great rampaging love for his son and an even greater (though actually impossible) love for his son's freedom. How long had they been imprisoned in the labyrinth?
"It is true," said Borges, "that there was no point in what I did; the Greeks had already done all of it first."
"And the Egyptians, Assyrians, and Chinese," I added.
"Too true," he replied, "but the Romans--the Romans would have polished Greek turds and then claimed to have shat them themselves."
"From this pristine, marble asshole!"
And we laughed.
"I've forgotten how to think about language," I said, "forgotten how to think about my own not particularly peculiar brand of plagiarism."
"It doesn't bear thinking about," Borges said. "It only leads to a dead end."
"Yes. Indeed. Have you seen this photograph of Ursula K. Le Guin smoking a pipe?"
He had not and was duly impressed.
"And you say she created her own labyrinth?"
"Didn't you read her? I asked.
"Oh," he said sadly, "nobody read women in those days, but I'm not here to discuss old fears with you."