El sueño de la razón produce monstruos.
When reason sleeps, monsters are born.
Francisco de Goya.
5:00 AM
… bright flowers of penance purchased for a pittance finger knitted spider webs of silence spun into wrinkles between stars and evensong while an old film shadow boxes black and white photographs and a rowing boat lurches over the waves as if a soggy brown cardboard box had dropped down on a moonbeam to pluck the mote from a one-eyed jack-in-the-truck who surveyed his road map for the dead days lying in ambush next to the sudden bonfire that flared on Guy Fawkes night and ignited the world like a Jacky-jumper vaulting a Roman Candle as Catherine spun on her wheel and a sky full of stars wheeled round the North Pole and slid down the Big Dipper’s handle to launch a long white scar of lightning that scared night’s velvet mask and plucked a diamond feather from the peacock’s tail as it strutted through the garden of bifurcating paths where Borges left his summer footprints at low tide in the sandy grief of the autumn leaf that the red fox dripped and dropped as he fled in vain like blood sizzles drizzling from an open vein and observe I say the play of light as it glistens on the voices of young children reaching to pluck the church bells as if they were ripe fruit dangling before us in our dreams and the world is a handkerchief so small it is and now not so clean and so we dream these dreams and pluck this unripe apple from the eternal branch where it lay hidden kicking and struggling up like the float that bobbled then sank through deep water and memory bent itself into two like that fragile reed dead in the water lying as straight as a bowing string at a crazy angle at the pillows edge where mouths flap open as shadows walk and talk and we slide back into sleep’s dark waters where there are no dreams and nothing from those dark depths is ever recalled …
6:00 AM
a clicking of claws
needles knitting outwards
towards dawn’s guillotine
the alarm clock shuffles
its pack of sleeping hours
the church bell
lurches into action
We have come full circle and the sequence of rewrites that I have dedicated to At the Edge of Obsidian / Obsidian’s Edge ends here, with the start of a new day in Oaxaca that will be very similar to the old day that has just passed us by. For those of you who wish to read the full sequence, in its correct order, it will appear (some time soon) under Obsidian’s Edge at the top of this page.
I would like to thank all those readers who have accompanied me on this journey. In addition, I would like to thank all of you who lent your voices to this sequence either below the line with your comments or, and I refer specifically to those who are close enough to know me in the flesh and blood of real life, with your verbal comments and telephone conversations.
I hope this will be the first of many journeys that we make together. My best wishes go out to you. I trust you will consider joining me in my next verbal adventure on this blog.
rogermoorepoet 
The best recent translation of Don Quixote is that of Edith Grossman and I recommend it highly. However, there are many other translations and all offer something a little different. This one (below) is free and quite worth reading. I have used it on many occasions and it will stand you in good stead. In the sense of being a bibliophile (!) and of preferring to read with the book in your hand, go for the Grossman Edition, though the Modern Penguin will serve you equally well. http://www.online-literature.com/cervantes/don_quixote/1/ I am still mulling this over, but I think it may well be a valuable project. Maybe I’ll start a new page for it. I’ll have to think about that!
LikeLike
Excellent work, Roger! I loved that you came full circle with the final verse. The dream sequence is, once again, stunning!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, Tanya. And thank you for your support, enthusiasm, and insightful comments. They have kept me going. I am wondering where to go next. I think I will begin with a sequence of poems that I really like from Though Lovers Be lost. Then I am looking at a more difficult book of poetry with which I have been struggling for the last two years … perhaps placing that online on the blog would speed up its development. I’ll think about it. Decisions soon.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’ll be looking forward to reading whatever you decide to share!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I just had an idea: I haven’t re-read Don Quixote for a couple of years. At five chapters a week for 24 weeks I could read it and analyze it and add a commentary here on the blog. Now how about that?
LikeLiked by 1 person
I would love that. I have never read it and would love to read it along with your commentary. Is there an English translation that you would recommend over the others?
LikeLiked by 1 person
You just coined it, Roger. Take the credit.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well, it exists now, John. Pen-aholics, key-board-ahoy-aholics, click-aholics, twitter-aholics, tweet-aholics … I bet we could come up with quite a few more. Perhaps we should run it as a blog competition: with a free book of my poetry for the winner with the best invention!!!! Competition-aholics ahoy-aholics!
LikeLike
Looking forward to more verbal adventures, Roger. Other good news: I just found the perfect ending for my most recent novel. Should have it done this weekend, and then re-write, re-write, re-write. At the same time, I just came up with another story to write, to join the thirty (and more) that are in waiting.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I always think I am busy until I see what you are up to, John. We are both writer-holics! And if the word doesn’t exist: it ought to.
LikeLike