Edmond Jabès ~

In Touch With the Book

 

1

 

Sitting on a rock, Yukel watched the sea leaf through the world's book of water.

 

We are constantly in touch with the work, as salt is in touch with the sand, as air with water, secretly in touch as scales are with the echo, as silence is with signs.

 

Lived moments, faithfully recorded. The patient work of death.

 

There are no trees for the dead earth.

 

There are no stars for dead skies.

 

Light from beyond the crests, the grooves.

 

It engulfs heaven and earth.

 

2

 

"Impossible to save. Every day escapes the day."

                                                 — Reb Lieto

 

3

"Conscious and unconscious of the possible.

"The impossible is beyond the no-longer-possible. But the no-longer-possible depends as much on what we know of ourselves and the world as on the general scope of human knowledge in the given instant.

"Earth impregnated by the river, the impossible — a fruitful text."

                                                        — Red Tilche

( "We are at the heart of what is added.

We are at the heart of what is subtracted.

We are at the heart of what is multiplied.

We are at the heart of what is divided.

We are at the heart of what is subdivided.

Wea are at the heart of what is silent.

Open my heart.

You will see silence

in the shape of a cloud or lake.

Open, open my heart.

You will speak

for silence."

— Red Libra

"Enter into my speech, my dark home.

On one side of silence or the other, 

we will be the same voice."

— Reb Sieris )

 

 

Edmond Jabès

translated by Rosmarie Waldrop

The Book of Questions: II & III

The Book of Yukel

Return of the Book 

Wesleyan University Press 1977