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Prothalamion Am I detached enough to recognize (on its own, if it were presented to me bare, without its rings about or wiring to Myself Incorporated)—this odd thing, my mind-dog, amanuensis, my right hand? Like its master the mind, it's been on itself (on hand, that is) forever. It is all I have to know it with. I feel myself, a finger on a palm; I try to grasp which is the object: which feels felt. Would I recognize my hand displayed on a platter (assuming sufficient anaesthesia to lull the arm and mind meanwhile)? Would I identify its thumb, my thumb—could I identify with it? Wouldn't the rule of thumb (foregone conclusion) suddenly be broken—human rule, unsung, of self-attachment? I live more certainly in such foregoneness than in open actuality, I fear. Ah me! Dear me! Of all identities precisely it's the most assumed. How well have I ever loved or studied it? And what about me 54 could I give to you? My hand?—lines learned by heart but not by eye (the eye goes deeper); networks held in scant regard. A hand was always moreorless a metaphor for me— a number, one of two, one of hundreds, to be given a caption here and there, a cursory shake, a courtesy cough. Head, heart and having, all three, took my hand. It wasn't really there for me, until they cut it off. 35 ...

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