What I saw, I kept outside: I entered
Into the long project of record-keeping --
It was necessary to duplicate my observations
In full and keep them for posterity (not,
My reader, that the entries were anything
Like this: amber philosophies of autumnal
Iridescence ranging from pools of cloud / Today
A snake-bite sent the venom of exterior things
Inward on a bullet stream, &c. &c.). What
Posterity had to do with them, I will explain.
You see, I have long considered that we
Are our own posterity, and that the past is,
More than a legacy, our duty. That is why
I never studied history: the retrospect
Of all of that is incomplete depresses
And repels me. So I busy myself about
These present ruminations, and I bequeath this work
To you. Now pass it down along the line.
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