Nothing by Robert Pack - The New Criterion

Poems

October 1997

Nothing

Burke

was right!

If knowing I know nothing comforts me,
That out of nothing sudden space commenced
In time to cool and bring forth stars, a galaxy
To mother us and call our own, immense
By our brief human lights, and yet just one
Rotating structure among multitudes,
Then who will notice nothing when we’re gone;
Can nothing comfort when there’s no one left to brood
That out of nothing cooling space commenced?
Perhaps some enterprise beyond our need
For solace in the face of nothing might be sensed
In nature’s unrelenting laws which heed
No animal or human cry, some yet to be
Vast consciousness, for which I am the seed,
Nurtured from nothing by the light of stars to see
If knowing I know nothing comforts me.

Robert Pack

Events

November 09 2009

YOUNG FRIENDS: Tour of an important contemporary art collection

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November 24 2009

OPEN EVENT: Laura Jacobs reading

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December 02 2009

Friends Event: The Swallow Anthology Reading

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Webcasts

New Criterion-Social Affairs Unit Conference: Part 4
"The Criminalization of Making Money" by Lionel Shriver, Recorded 9/25/09

New Criterion-Social Affairs Unit Conference: Part 3
"The State and the Threat to Democracy" by Jeremy Black and "The Paradox of the Intellectual and the Future of Capitalism" by Tim Congdon, Recorded on 9/25/2009

New Criterion-Social Affairs Unit Conference: Part 2
"Nice 'N' Easy: The Age of Micro Tyranny" by Mark Steyn, Recorded on 9/25/2009

Weblog

The death of attention

by Michael Weiss

Nov 07, 2009 02:26 PM

God Bless

by James Bowman

Nov 05, 2009 06:05 PM

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