Lines Composed and Written in an Edition of the Saga of Beowulf
Sometimes I wonder what compels me, without the slightest hope now, as my darkness falls, of accuracy, to grind on with this study of the language of those flinty Saxons. Worn down by time, my memory fumbles with words which, time and again, I have repeated, and, in this way, is so much like my life, which spins and then unspins its flagging story. And then I tell myself that it will be because the soul knows, in its secret, arrogant way, it is immortal, that its huge, determined circle can embrace and can accomplish everything. So far beyond this yearning and my verse, waiting for me, inexhaustible, is the universe.
Translated by Allen ProwleLines Composed and Written in an Edition of the Saga of Beowulf - meaning Summary
Learning Against Mortality
The poem links Borges's late-life study of Old English with his awareness of failing memory and approaching blindness. He asks why he persists in work that seems impossible to complete, then finds an answer in the soul's proud sense of immortality: human desire reaches beyond bodily limits. The final image enlarges private effort into an inexhaustible universe still awaiting exploration.
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