Shored Fragments
“These fragments I have shored against my ruins.”
This is from T.S. Eliot’s “The Wasteland,” a poem I recently
rediscovered and keep circling back to during the pandemic. It got me thinking
that Eliot was somehow prescient. I mean, the poem begins “April is the
cruelest month.”But the line about fragments was the one that I loved most,
and felt I understood.Fragments conjured precious objects. Favorite books, a
single photograph of a loved one no longer alive. True and valued keepsakes,
turned to for strength, for grounding. These days, the fragments we shore against
our ruins are toilet paper and yeast. Gloves and masks. Soap.What does it say that in this moment, a poetic association
once noble and self-defining is reduced to the common and basic? Maybe that we are
capable of connecting the words we’ve found meaning in, taken to heart, and
applying them to our particular situation. Maybe that we are always trying to
locate ourselves wherever we happen to be, and uncover the totems we need to survive.
Reposted from https://lies.tumblr.com/post/614653344220364800.
