Simon Critchley

The fear of death slept for most of the day and then crept up late at night and grabbed me by the throat, making sleep impossible no matter how much alcohol I had drunk that evening

Poetry lets us see things as they are. It lets us see particulars being various. But – Michel insisted – poetry lets us see things as they are anew. Under a new aspect. Transfigured. Subject to a felt variation. The poet sings a song that is beyond us and yet it is ourselves that it sings. Things change when the poet sings them, but they are still our things: recognizable, common, near, low. We hear the poet sing and press back against the pressure of reality

But it’s not death that terrifies me, but life’s continuation, its stretching into a distance that recedes as we try to approach. No pur

purpose, aim or goal. That is the most difficult thing to endure. Not death, but dying. Death will happen. Yes. It is certain. Yes. But not now, and life cannot be consumed in the now. The now of nows. It is forever not now. Even if I hanged myself I would not experience a nihilating leap into the abyss, but just the rope tying me tight, ever tighter, to the existence I wanted to leave.