February 19, 2007

In my end is my beginning

So you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking
And racing around to come up behind you again
The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death.

Every year is getting shorter
Never seem to find the time
Plans that either come to naught
Or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation
Is the English way
The time is gone, the song is over
Thought I'd something more to say

I shall have to stop again: to put this blog into hibernation. If I do not stop here, I shall never start again elsewhere: there is writing that needs to be done, in the sense that I have a need to do it. To start it, to complete it, to see what happens to it subsequently: to see what happens to me subsequently and to find out who I am now. What I have to write, I think I know. Whether I have still the words to write it - I do not know. I think I do. One loses confidence in words, loses control of them, as one gets older, changes, becomes less certain of oneself.

I wrote a book ten years ago, expecting it to be followed by another and another: but no sooner was it published than the world exploded and I fell through the fissures that opened up beneath me. I fell and kept on falling: and became so used to the fall that I could never be sure that it had actually stopped. When one cannot be sure of reality, or of oneself, one cannot be sure of the meaning of words either: nor can one be confident how they will be received. Or whether they will be heard.

So, lacking belief in the existence of an end, it is hard, hard beyond explaining, to begin, since one finds oneself changing ideas and intentions, putting off time and again the moment when one starts, searching for exactly the right way or expressing something of which one is no longer exactly sure:

Trying to use words, and every attempt
Is a wholly new start, and a different kind of failure
Because one has only learnt to get the better of words
For the thing one no longer has to say, or the way in which
One is no longer disposed to say it.

I think I still have something that I want to say, or something that I am grasping towards saying. I think that I am disposed to say it, if I can find out what it is. I can start now or I can never start. I can write now or I can never know whether or not I would have written

You say I am repeating
Something I have said before. I shall say it again.

I shall say it again. I need to write. Or I need to find out if I can write.

It is done, it is enough. It will do.



[Note : I can occasionally still be found here.]

16 Comments:

At February 19, 2007 10:06 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Best of luck with the writing. I have a folder for blogs that may return. Will get yours out occasionally and dust it of to see whats what.While not a prolific blogger I have enjoyed your reads. Regards from New Zealand.

 
At February 20, 2007 10:50 am, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Not only can you write, you write beautifully. I've read things of yours that prod away at my brain for ages after I've read them, I've read things of yours that make me cry, things that make me laugh, things that make me look at life in a completely new way. I shall miss your blog, but keenly anticipate reading you elsewhere.

 
At February 20, 2007 3:47 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Good luck with your writing. Hope you publish again someday. Best wishes from Washington, D.C.

 
At February 20, 2007 10:45 pm, Blogger Rob Jubb said...

I'll be sad to see you gone. Best of luck.

 
At February 26, 2007 4:11 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

"I think I still have something that I want to say, or something that I am grasping towards saying. I think that I am disposed to say it, if I can find out what it is. I can start now or I can never start. I can write now or I can never know whether or not I would have written"

AHHHHHHH!!!!!

Such sillyness.

Son i'll be dead before I reach 23 years, I'm deploying to Iraq in a week. (I'm an american)

Count your fucking blessings mate, and good luck, whatever you do.

 
At February 27, 2007 12:28 pm, Blogger Tom Chivers said...

I look forward to reading it when it's done, Justin.

 
At March 01, 2007 9:12 am, Blogger Ian Appleby said...

Also sad to see you go, and hoping to read you again in one incarnation or another. Go well.

 
At March 02, 2007 2:02 pm, Blogger Jon D'Souza-Eva said...

Good luck Justin. I hope your next book is about something more interesting than football!

 
At March 12, 2007 11:00 am, Blogger iskra said...

Come back soon. I'll miss your wonderful blog - good luck with everything Justin, not just the writing.
Chris

 
At April 01, 2007 9:06 pm, Blogger Cynnie said...

aww..
and I just found you

 
At April 02, 2007 10:53 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Self-absorbed pompous twaddle. Good riddance.

 
At April 03, 2007 2:04 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

EJH is probably no more self-absorbed than you, anonymous. He's just more honest and better at it than you are.

 
At April 08, 2007 7:56 am, Blogger flyingrodent said...

It occurs to me that I never, ever comment at your place Justin, despite your continual commentary at my bit.

Well, this is a start - I'll put up a link to you later today, when I'm less drunk. I feel embarassed it's taken this long for me to do so.

Of course, it's about time you posted something, you fat lazy fucker.

I know you're old, but that's no excuse. I'm almost thirty, which is tantamount to death as far as I'm concerned.

Tick, tock.

 
At July 13, 2007 9:51 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I wish you well on your journey. Take care.

 
At August 08, 2007 12:17 am, Blogger Gabriel said...

I was sorry to hear that Ron Brown former Labour MP ahd died...an interesting take on his passing in

http://unrepentantcommunist.blogspot.com/

 
At September 30, 2007 11:19 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

ejh--

fuck you for quitting!!

think, then write.

don't give up.

scott

 

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