Carson, corrected

Here is the correct text of Anne Carson's "Short Talk on Walking Backwards," which I cited from memory as part of my gush about the wonders of Anne Carson last week. I got it pretty close, but as I predicted, the second-to-last sentence is much better in the real version.

"Short Talk on Walking Backwards"

My mother forbade us to walk backwards. That is how the dead walk, she would say. I don't know where she got this idea, perhaps from a bad translation. The dead, after all, do not walk backwards, but they do walk behind us. They have no lungs and cannot call out, but would love for us to turn around. They are victims of love, many of them.

Now, go order Short Talks, which is published by the fine folks at Brick Books.