Hugo Schwyzer

Well, we’re packed and ready to go. Our flight leaves at the ungodly hour of 1:40AM tomorrow, but I don’t suspect I will post before then. I will be back and blogging on August 16; in the meantime, visit some of my links, please!

So, before we go off to Colombia, let me share my favorite poem about my favorite pastime by my favorite 20th century poet of all. When I shuffle off (many years from now, thank you), this is the poem I want read at my funeral. (Does that sound morbid? Don’t worry, I am planning on coming back quite safe and sound).

The Runner, by W.H. Auden:

All visible visibly
Moving things
Spin or swing,
One of the two,
Move, as the limbs
Of a runner do,
To and fro,
Forward and back,
Or, as they swiftly
Carry him
In orbit go
Round an endless track:
So, everywhere, every
Creature disporting
Itself according
To the law of its making
In the rivals’ dance
Of a balanced pair
Or the ring-dance
Round a common centre,
Delights the eye
By its symmetry
As it changes place
Blessing the unchangeable
Absolute rest
Of the space all share

The camera’s eye
Does not lie
But it cannot show
The life within,
The life of a runner,
Of yours or mine,
That race which is neither
Fast nor slow,
For nothing can ever
Happen twice,
That story which moves
Like music when
Begotten notes
New notes beget
Making the flowing
Of time a growing
Till what it could be
At last it is,
Where Fate is Freedom,
Grace, and Surprise.

I’ve got that last section of 20 short lines memorized; I sometimes recite it to myself during particularly difficult long runs.