not w/a bang but a whimper

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

- Thomas Stearnes Eliot The Hollow Men

A world ended today. I remember when it began -- St Mary's, Oak Ridge -- a wet day -- I remember chasing a jack-off through the mist to the Turnpike.

Was that the fateful day the bean pot welded itself to the stove on Principia (no that was the apartments -- was it also the street?) Such smoke -- an ill omen.

Then the trip down here -- chill in the house - strep - strep in the other - then mono -- more ill omens for a bad beginning. A nice evening w/ her cousin at James Brown's club.

How did we stay together for 25 yrs? My reluctance for change, or was it just lonliness? What went through her mind indeed?

And now we have nullity -- just a whimper. she lost in the mists of yesteryear, me just lost.

Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats’ feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

- ibid.