World Was in the Face of the Beloved
World Was in the Face of the Beloved - meaning Summary
Beloved Contains the World
The speaker describes seeing the whole world reflected in a beloved's face and attempts to take it in as if by drinking. Initially the world seems contained and intimate, then slips away into separate reality. When the speaker does drink, the experience overwhelms: desire to possess becomes excess, and the self spills over. The poem explores the tension between intimacy and ungraspable magnitude, and how yearning can flood identity.
Read Complete AnalysesWorld was in the face of the beloved--, but suddenly it poured out and was gone: world is outside, world can not be grasped. Why didn't I, from the full, beloved face as I raised it to my lips, why didn't I drink world, so near that I couldn't almost taste it? Ah, I drank. Insatiably I drank. But I was filled up also, with too much world, and, drinking, I myself ran over.
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