IDENTITY | JORGE LUIS BORGES
On Argentina by Jorge Luis Borges
“Morning is an overwhelming blue, a swift and massive surprise spanning the sky, a crystallizing, a lavish outpouring of sunlight that piles up in squares, smashes mirrors with fictitious stones, and lowers long insinuations of light down wells. The day is a playing field for our endeavors or for our idleness, and there is only room for them on their usual chessboard. ”
I can attest to the beauty of the morning sky in Buenos Aires. The vastness and richness of color of the setting were extraordinary and were paralleled in the richness of the city. Every opportunity seems possible.
“Now for the altercation: the dramatic altercation and conflict between the visible and the shadows. It’s as if visible things begin twisting, going insane. Afternoon weakens us, eats away at us, abuses us, but because of its persistence, the streets recover their human meaning, their tragic meaning of volition that manages to last in time, time whose very essence change”
The afternoons were busy, an unsettled time between day and night. Work over and night still far off in the distance, one does not know whether to rest or be active.
“History is not the best place to trace the outlines of people’s spiritual face.”
Borges was very vocal in his disdain for the Germanophiles in his country. But what country, whether young, old, or ancient, does not have a stain of its own wrongful acts? How many generations have looked back and acknowledged the shameful black marks on their history?
“The future (whose best name is hope) is tugging at our heartstrings”
The future is where our hope should lie. Not in the past and solely in the present. The future holds the prospect of opportunity and possibilities, new ways of thinking and being. The future is tugging at us, pulling at us, begging to be discovered. We do a disservice to our community and ourselves if we are only looking backward.