He turned toward me
As if for comment, or what didn’t need to be said
To indict Borofsky’s words painted black on a white canvass
“I want to be great”
I, a Swedenborgian divinity student; he, a photographer married to a conceptual artist
The lust to be great is quite a thing different from what is
Great in se
Not likely to produce what is great
–What is great–
Greatness is a gift
Vibrational resonance on the sound-board heartstrings thrilling the ode
That is what is human
A gift to us all—co-cooperation—collective consciousness all-soul
That is we human solidarity together
It is great to share all together collected around
A Prime Mover of soul
As is to me Borofsky’s Hammering Man and Picasso’s Untitled in Chicago’s Daley Plaza
Condense what is human freely among the affairs of daily life
These are not what humans commonly thought are metrics of greatness
A publication, a work alive 100 years after the artist’s demise, to be a class in a university, a
critic’s nod, mass appeal
Peace breathes in the spirit attendant relaxation of the choke-hold that is
The lust for greatness
And insignificance be not a curse;
The eyes of all need not wait not upon me
The satisfactions of being a good man among our common men are great enough to sustain
To be happy with the faces that you meet
And perhaps to touch a soul or two or two or three among the faces that you meet
And to touch the sky in private
For you don’t have to be tall to see the moon
And to walk humbly with a soul or two or two or three
And to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God
David Fekete 