Ways there are that in themselves aren't new


Ways there are that in themselves aren't new
but just because nobody for the longest time
has trodden them, then they do seem new,
and what is new is always advantageous,
making you young again. Forgotten ways,
when you have, for once, found them again,
seem younger than the ones they were before.
This seeming in itself is something beautiful.
There was a sort of shimmer on the way
I walked on yesterday for the first time in years.
It is knowledge that imposes age on things,
and everything I love, by questioning it daily,
I do take value from. Things forgotten
stay forever young and beautiful.
Anyone whom you forget can be
glad of it, since thinking of those you love
takes everything away, and so they disappear.
Things thought bore through life a hole
as running water bores one in a rock.
Ways there are, people too, who stay
just as they are because you have forgotten them.
Whoever thinks of you, thinks on you to sup;
once forgotten, you won't be gobbled up.


robert walser