THE SURFACE

Once again, the "who misses" premonition of a huge fuss? Tell me, who misses it? After years and months of repetition on uninterrupted cogs, there is no point in throwing sweat-scented savings out of the window! - No small flat, no car, no wife with a sheltering refuge over my head - who could be happier and more contented after all this? 

Long spread tables, and here a proud tent spreading its wings, before an unknown host of guests, offers its bounteous bounty! I suppose they neither see nor hear: they have long since dipped in the more troubled petty worlds of themselves, and then have sunk as amused guests! 

I'm not amused by the big fuss! It chokes me! It distresses me that some proclaim the riches of sumptuous tables while down in the jelly-like depths the worm of poverty and despair gnaws at the iron roots of their so-called existence! - I have made a reservation - just for myself - as I like! On the island-periphery of a distant table-corner, in my stubborn selfishness, I had 

Consciousness and Law: the moral defence, which like a bulwark defended me: whispering commands to my dumb mouth, whispered their deliberate words, Be content with what thou hast, and haste not the mortal moment!" - Yet the rush of life is ever chasing and chasing and chasing 

to create my own happiness! Happiness arranged in moments would cut the tree under me in a hideous and unfair trick! - Perhaps one could still speak to the souls of the spiteful-mouthed, or would it be better to listen in all-enveloping silence?!