In Praise of Darkness

“In Praise of Darkness” contains 46 lines and no stanza breaks. Borges’s free verse poem is primarily about Aging and Blindness. The poet is the speaker of the poem, as Borges draws upon his personal experience with going blind in his fifties, playing on tropes of the blind poet or bard whose work reflects the wisdom acquired after the loss of sight.

The first line uses a parenthetical to note that “Old age” (Line 1) is named by “others” (Line 1). Borges uses the parentheses to offer an aside—that he isn’t in charge of assigning names. The following line is his observation, which is set up as a contrast to the general consensus: He asserts that one can experience joy later in life.

Line 3 uses animal imagery to convey how the body changes as it ages. In the phrase “The animal has died or almost died” (Line 3), the “animal” represents the body, specifically the young body, which eventually fails. The repetition of “died” is a memento mori, or reminder that death is near and comes for us all. In Line 4, the speaker separates the intellect and spirit from the dying “animal”: While embodied experience comes to an end, “The man and his spirit remain” (Line 4). The soul and the mind outlive the purely physical.

Lines 5 and 6 describe what the speaker can still see as his eyesight fails. He can perceive “vague, luminous shapes” (Line 5) that have not yet slipped into the darkness. The light reflected and refracted by the shapes is contrasted with the “darkness” (Line 6) that follows. The imagery of the “luminous,” or light, is associated with sight. These shapes have “yet” (Line 6) to become dark, implying that soon even these indistinct forms will be consumed by darkness—that all light will be extinguished.

Lines 7-13 are about Buenos Aires, offering a sense of the place where Borges lived. The city is surrounded by “the endless plain” (Line 9), a reference to a real geographical feature: the Pampas grasslands in Argentina. The other geographical descriptor is “the South” (Line 13), a cardinal direction that identifies Argentina, and other countries in South America, as part of the global South. Additionally, Borges lists barrios, or neighborhoods, that are in the southern part of Buenos Aires: “the Recoleta, the Retiro [...] the Once” (Lines 10-11). These specific details about the location give the reader an insider’s view of the city. In these neighborhoods, the architectural features that Borges highlights are the “rickety old houses” (Line 12). This gives a sense of the city’s age. The repetition of the word “old” in Lines 1 and 12 connects the city to the speaker: The speaker’s identity and time of life are tied to his home, developing the theme of The Presence of the Past.

Borges continues the theme with an allusion to ancient Greek philosopher Democritus, in Lines 15-16. One story about this figure holds that he removed his own eyes to encourage the life of the mind over the distraction of the world. While Borges’s sight is being taken away by “Time” (Line 16), he metaphorizes the natural phenomenon of aging with the philosopher—both are engaged in the act of blinding. While Borges includes specific details about the eyes of Democritus, the allusion can be developed with philosophical context. Democritus is known for his atomic theory, which posits the existence of atoms as minute pieces of matter and conceives of sight as the interaction of the eyes and these atoms (See: Background).

This discussion about ancient philosophy is juxtaposed with the speaker’s individual obligations and sensations. Borges feels like his life was filled with “too many things” (Line 14), but these obligations are lessened by Aging and Blindness, a disability that simplifies his life. The speaker assures the reader that the process of losing his site is gradual and not painful. He describes it with a watery metaphor: “This penumbra [...] / flows down a gentle slope, / resembling eternity” (Lines 17-19). The slowly growing darkness is like water running down a lightly graded hill. The metaphorical water, and the darkness it represents, are compared to eternity, in a simile formed with the word “resembling” (or, in other translations, “like.”)

In Lines 20-23, the speaker contemplates what he can no longer see. His internal vision comes from The Presence of the Past. He sees women, in his mind’s eyes, as “they were so many years ago” (Line 21). These “years” are a part of the dimension of time discussed in Line 16. Borges is haunted by what he used to be able to see, including the small details of his friend’s faces, street corners, and “letters on the pages of books” (Line 23). As his eyesight diminishes, these things only exist as he remembers them—he doesn’t get more visual information about them as time progresses.

The speaker offers a surprising emotional reaction to losing his sight in Lines 24 and 25. While this is considered a frightening experience by the “others” who are referenced parenthetically in Line 1, Borges considers it “a sweetness, a return” (Line 25). This recalls the “Praise” diction in the title and the fact that this work is an ode, or a poem paying tribute. Darkness is not frightening, but welcoming for the speaker, who conceives of it as a sensory comfort (in which eyesight has been replaced by taste and smell via the word “sweetness”). This is further emphasized by different translation choices. For example, Robert Mezey’s translation of the poem offers “coming back home” instead of “return” for Line 25. This connects with the details about Buenos Aires, Borges’s home. The diction of “return,” however, connects to the following lines about how the speaker will mentally return to books, even when he can’t see them.

Lines 26-29 are about books and the speaker’s Relationship to Literature. Losing his vision means he can no longer read new books. This poem was written in the late 1960s, before audiobooks were in widespread use, which meant that books were consumed visually; Braille books did exist in Borges’s lifetime, but they were rare and expensive—and the speaker likely considers himself too old to learn a new language. He admits that he has “read only a few” (Line 27) of the texts that have been written throughout history—an understatement that is more about the sheer innumerable quantity of texts in existence than a real assessment of his reading life. These “few” texts he will “keep rereading in my memory, / reading and transforming” (Lines 28-29). He asserts that the activity of rereading is transformative.

In Lines 30-42, the speaker describes the various paths that have made up his life. The paths come from all four directions. The “South” (Line 30) is listed first, which connects it to “the South” in Line 13. It is the only direction that is repeated, emphasizing its importance in Borges’s national identity. The paths come together in the speaker’s “secret center” (Line 32)—another obscure place that connects to the darkness that the poem praises. Some of the different kinds of paths are “death-throes” (Line 34) and “the acts of the dead” (Line 40). The speaker is haunted by the people who have died and the inevitable experience of dying, imagery that develops the theme of The Presence of the Past. The speaker is also haunted by the idea of “resurrections” (Line 34). This can be read as an allusion to the resurrection of Christ, or the influence of the church. It could also be a more general term for unexpected returns—such as the “return” (Line 25) the speaker himself describes undergoing as a result of his blindness.

The dead also connect to other paths from the past, those described by the repeated word “yesterday” in Lines 37 and 38: “every innermost moment of yesterday / and all the yesterdays of the world.” Additionally, the list of paths includes “words” (Line 41) that were written in the past. Borges also includes allusions to past literary figures: “the Dane’s staunch sword and the Persian’s moon” (Line 39). These subtle references indicate how Borges is writing for a well-read audience. His audience is familiar with the classics, such as Shakespeare’s Hamlet and the poetry attributed to Omar Khayyam, influential authors from several of the many cultures that have influenced Borges’s writing. These allusions, and the directly named Ralph Waldo Emerson, highlight the speaker’s Relationship to Literature.

The list of paths also includes aspects of the dimension of time, emotions, and the senses. Time is broken into “days and nights, / dreams and half-wakeful dreams” (Lines 35-36). The dreams that occur during the night are presented alongside daydreams, as the darkness of night is balanced by the light of day. Other entries in the list are “shared love” (Line 41) and “echoes and footsteps” (Line 33). These paths are experiences that are felt and heard, respectively. Overall, the list of paths is very diverse.

In the last four lines, the speaker asserts that he can now forget all of the different paths he listed. The idea of the “center” (Line 43) returns in these lines, echoing the “secret center” in Line 32. The repetition emphasizes the importance of this inner resource. In addition to being secret and dark, the center is described as an algebra, key, and mirror. Keys, secrets, and mirrors come up frequently in occult texts; they are also frequent features of magical rituals, alchemical experimentation, and clues in classical detective fiction—all of which point to the idea that this hidden, dark center contains the answer to an elusive mystery. This mystery turns out to be self-understanding: “Soon I will know who I am” (Line 46). The end of the poem looks towards the future, when the speaker will finally have a clear sense of self, developing the dimension of time that runs throughout the poem.