Working Draft

Epigraph

Then I drew up lists and catalogues in a dream of order,
but the only order was in the dream.
  – Keith Waldrop

Ah well.
  You, I, these others – none of us can know for sure or
  Share what we know surely.

Shall we then await another other with
  A voice to change our minds?
  Might as well change our
Selves.

Move them in to dwell with all that
  Undersky makes equal,
Let them flow, on and on in
  Ceaseless evolution as
  Our longish years run their course —
This space, this time.

‘All that Undersky makes equal’ ?
  This, not this.
  So, not so.

If this was really this
  None of us would rail about its difference from not this.
If so was really so
  None of us would rail about its difference from not so.

Forget your longish years,
  Your grand ideas.
Boundlessness brushes up to us.
Boundlessness is where we are.
  – Zhuangzi

I cannot know, and you cannot tell me.
  – Thomas Mann

Notes

Keith Waldrop. Light While There is Light: an American History Champaign: Dalkey Archive, 2013, 77.

Zhuangzi. This is my own interpretative translation. Burton Watson’s was part of my formation. His version of the entire passage from the second chapter, one of the so-called ‘Inner Chapters,’ reads as follows:

Suppose you and I have had an argument. If you have beaten me instead of my beating you, then are you necessarily right and am I necessarily wrong? If I have beaten you instead of your beating me, then am I necessarily right and are you necessarily wrong? Is one of us right and the other wrong? Are both of us right or are both of us wrong? If you and I don’t know the answer, then other people are bound to be even more in the dark. Whom shall we get to decide what is right? Shall we get someone who agrees with you to decide? But if he already agrees with you, how can he decide fairly? Shall we get someone who agrees with me? But if he already agrees with me, how can he decide? Shall we get someone who disagrees with both of us? But if he already disagrees with both of us, how can he decide? Shall we get someone who agrees with both of us? But if he already agrees with both of us, how can he decide? Obviously, then, neither you nor I nor anyone else can decide for each other. Shall we wait for still another person?

But waiting for one shifting voice to pass judgment on another is the same as waiting for none of them. Harmonize them all with the Heavenly Equality, leave them to their endless changes, and so live out your years. What do I mean by harmonizing them with the Heavenly Equality? Right is not right; so is not so. If right were really right, it would differ so clearly from not right that there would be no need for argument. If so were really so, it would differ so clearly from not so that there would be no need for argument. Forget the years; forget distinctions. Leap into the boundless and make it your home!
  (Zhuangzi; Watson, 1964)

Original text for the passage I have translated:
然則我與若與人俱不能相知也，而待彼也邪？何化聲之相待，若其不相待。和之以天倪，因之以曼衍，所以窮年也。謂和之以天倪？曰：是不是，然不然。是若果是也，則是之異乎不是也亦無辯；然若果然也，則然之異乎不然也亦無辯。忘年忘義，振於無竟，故寓諸無竟。

Thomas Mann. Often quoted by Samuel Delany; striking me particularly when reading Dhalgren, ‘In the House of the Axe.’