Throwback Thursday: A Poem by Pessoa On Social Media

From the highest window of my house 

I wave farewell with a white handkerchief 

To my poems going out to humanity. 

 

And I'm neither happy nor sad. 

That is the fate of poems. 

I wrote them and must show them to everyone 

Because I cannot do otherwise, 

Even as the flower cannot hide its color, 

Nor the river hide its flowing, 

Nor the tree hide the fruit it bears. 

~ Fernando Pessoa, 1914 

As I read these words last night in my easy I chair, it struck me that they could just as easily apply to bloggers today. 

From the highest window of my house 

I wave farewell with a white handkerchief 

To my blog entries going out to humanity.

...that is the fate of a blog post.

We write them and must show them to everyone....

Pessoa's little stanza shows insight about human nature. First, there is the desire to create. So we produce art, or books or pottery, or maybe a miniature railroad or carved hope chest or a city. We create things. Then, there is the need to share. Just as the tree must give up its fruit, and was not even deigned to cling to it, so we recognize our role and yield to it.

We share for many reasons, but one of them is an innate desire to connect with others.

And so it is that we see the remarkable growth of today's social media. Blogger, Twitter, Facebook. Pessoa continues:

Who knows who might read them?

Who knows into what hands they'll fall?

A flower, I was plucked by fate to be seen.

A tree, my fruit was picked to be eaten.

A river, my water's fate was to flow out of me.

I submit and feel almost happy,

Almost happy like a man tired of being sad.

Go, go away from me!

The tree passes and is scattered throughout Nature.

The flower wilts and its dust lasts forever.

The river flows into the sea and its water is forever the water that was its own.

I pass and I remain, like the Universe.

And if you have read this blog entry today, it is my gift to you for the weekend.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED MARCH 25, 2011