Log24

Order and Disorder

From “Connoisseur of Chaos,”
by Wallace Stevens, in
Parts of a World, 1942:

I

A.  A violent order is a disorder; and
B.  A great disorder is an order.
    These Two things are one. (Pages of illustrations.)               

IV  

A.  Well, an old order is a violent one. This proves nothing.
    Just one more truth, one more
    Element in the immense disorder of truths.

B.  It is April as I write. The wind
    Is blowing after days of constant rain.
    All this, of course, will come to summer soon.
    But suppose the disorder of truths should ever come
    To an order, most Plantagenet, most fixed. . . .
    A great disorder is an order.
    Now, A And B are not like statuary, posed
    For a vista in the Louvre. They are things chalked
    On the sidewalk so that the pensive man may see.

V

    The pensive man . . . He sees that eagle float
    For which the intricate Alps are a single nest.

Related material:

Skewed Mirrors,
Sept. 14, 2003

“Evil did not  have the last word.”
— Richard John Neuhaus, April 4, 2005

Mot Juste?

From today’s New York Times, on the effort of Paris to be chosen as the host of the 2012 Olympics:

“‘To have the games would bring a little fun, as you say, a breath of fresh air,’ said Benoît Génuini, president of the French operation of Accenture, a global consulting company, on a balcony of the Louvre last week during an event to highlight the city’s cultural attractions as an Olympic host. He remarked that the country was morose and that the city itself had become a sort of museum. ‘The games would put Paris back in the saddle and lead it into the 21st century,’ he said, ‘get it out of its stupor.'”

Attributed to Dominique de Villepin, the new Prime Minister of France: words about his book on poetry–

“It tries to penetrate the heart of the poetic ferment, this secret place where words are made and unmade, where language is fashioned.”

Villepin (l.) with President Chirac