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BOOKSHELF
A Walker’s City
28 Apr 2003

In his long 1969 poem By the Well of Living and Seeing, the “peregrinating poet” Charles Reznikoff writes about an overheard conversation.

I was walking along Forty-Second Street as night was falling.
On the other side of the street was Bryant Park.
Walking behind me were two men
and I could hear some of their conversation:
“What you must do,” one of them was saying to his companion,
“is to decide on what you want to do
and then stick to it. Stick to it!
And you are sure to succeed finally.”

 

I turned to look at the speaker giving such good advice
and was not surprised to see that he was old.
But his companion
to whom the advice was given so earnestly,
was just as old;
and just then the great clock on top of a building across the park
began to shine.

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