Fame

It's unbefitting to be famous

And say fame elevates our souls;

It's unbefitting to trouble over

Your notes and manuscripts and rolls.

The way of art is self-surrender,

Not born of praise or great success.

How shameful when your name's a byword;

Your labor-vain and meaningless!

Oh, live! Not as pretenders live-

In emptiness, with many fears,

But give your heart to vast horizons

And hear the call of future years.

Censor the contents of your books,

Not your destiny. Deliberate

And mark the matter lying near

Your vital themes of life and fate.

Then pass into your deep seclusion,

A man alone and unespied,

As vanishes in evening mist

And sudden dark the countryside.

Another, step by step, will follow

After, and enter your retreat,

But you yourself must not prefer

your victories to your defeat.

You must never violate your purpose

One jot, one atom, to survive.

But be alive-this only matters,

Alive, to the end of ends alive!

1956

Boris Pasternak

Carson and I hit the local library this week. I have a stack of new books to read and after digging through one of the poetry books, I found the above.

It felt inspiring!

I have some new projects I'm working on. I am excited and nervous to see what I am capable of. More details to come.......

image: Fan Ho, via Amateur Couture