A Silent Self Imposed Identity

After a Joyce quotation about darkness, the speaker compares a silent identity to a soul in space and a misunderstood painting, then names unmentioned horror, beauty and illness.

The speaker asks for surefootedness to balance light and darkness before letting space answer for itself. That request follows several forms of experience the speaker cannot demonstrate or speak about.

Under an epigraph attributed to James Joyce, the poem sets 'A silent / Self imposed identity / of a soul in space' beside a misunderstood painting, a horror 'That went unmentioned' and a beauty 'Not demonstrated twice', and ends as surefootedness 'balances the light and dark of time / To let space / answer for itself'.

The poem is built from short fragments that name things left unspoken or unseen. The Joyce line about darkness and light is answered by the closing balance of light and dark, and the last word is handed to space rather than to a speaker.