compass

every single thing becomes a word
in a language that someone or something, a night and day,
writes down in a never-ending scribble,
which is the history of the world, embracing


rome, carthage, you, me, everyone,
my life, which i do not understand, this anguish
of being enigma, accident, and puzzle,
and all the discordant languages of babel.


behind each name lies that which has no name.
today i felt its nameless shadow tremble
in the blue-clarity of the compass needle,


whose rule extends as far as the far seas,
something like a clock glimpsed in a dream
or a bird that stirs suddenly in its sleep.


- jorge luis borges