Exodus

They say it is real if it returns.

From where the power to continue in more days, more semblances? Is truth then to be parried with the instruments of time, taunted with prematurities – a future ever future? Whose the power, if man has power to proclaim, ‘Here is state, and this the rule,’ and there take stand, and that make master? It is a borrowed power, if not returned is taken away; and the end, death, as in a foreign country, not as the fortunate bring travel home to native recognition and embrace.

What is man? It is that which is less than truth. And what is that which is less than man? It is that which lifts to fall, abashed to be, better content not to be. And what is that which is more than man, nor yet is truth?

It is divinity, man-monster of self-fright uplifted to self-fascination, to cast the guardian shadow, pride. And how shall man, that is less than truth, endure into truth’s always, self-outlasting? Has not a man a mind? A mind is a way to be with truth. It is a power asked, and a power granted, and when delivered up again is vested in a covenant of power, by which all is made changeless, that power could not change, that power taught desistance. And this is power: to remain.

I say it is real if it never leaves.