Heraclitus

Fragment 1


The Word proves
those first hearing it
as numb to understanding
as the ones who have not heard.

Yet all things follow from the Word.

Some, blundering
with what I set before you,
try in vain with empty talk
to separate the essences of things
and say how each thing truly is.

And all the rest make no attempt.
They no more see
how they behave broad waking
than remember clearly
what they did asleep.




trns. by Brooks Haxton

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