Mexico Easter 2003 - Part 1: Poetry and preparation

The man who goes out alone can start today; but he who travels with another must wait till that other is ready.

Henry David Thoreau

Friday 4 April

This Encarta article is a good introduction to the Mayan civilisation.

Obsession

Forest, I fear you! In my ruined heart
	your roaring wakens the same agony
	as in cathedrals when the organ moans
	and from the depths I hear that I am damned.

Ocean, I hate you! For I recognize
	the sobs and insults of my own despair,
	the bitter laughter of a beaten man
	repeated in the sea's huge gaiety.

Night! You'd please me even more without these stars
	which speak a language I know all too well-
	I long for darkness, silence,
	nothing there...

Yet even shadows have their shapes which live
	where I imagine them to be,
	the hordes of vanished souls
	whose eyes acknowledge mine.

Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867)

I was reading poetry. This, from Baudelaire, struck a tune on the day.