#accomplishment — Public Fediverse posts

A quotation from Victor Hugo

He had slipped, climbed, rolled, searched, walked, persevered, that is all. Such is the secret of all triumphs.
 
[Il avait glissé, grimpé, roulé, cherché, marché, persévéré, voilà tout. Secret de tous les triomphes.]

Victor Hugo (1802–1885) French writer, journalist, human rights activist, politician
The Man Who Laughs [L’Homme qui rit; The Laughing Man; By Order of the King], Part 1, Book 3, ch. 1 (1.3.1) (1869) [tr. Unknown, Authorized (1871)]

More about (and translations of) this quote: wist.info/hugo-victor/85611/

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Reaching

When I write
I find myself reaching—

reaching
reaching
reaching
reaching

for something.

Satisfaction.
Accomplishment.
Arrival.

There is none now.

Only words.
More words.
Another page.

Perhaps
I still have far to climb.

Perhaps
I have mistaken a hill
for a mountain.

Perhaps
the pinnacle
was never there.

Perhaps there is no
there.

Only this:

the reaching,
the climbing,
the wanting
to arrive.

And still
nothing.

No summit.
No flag.
No voice saying—

enough.

Perhaps
I am not finished.

Perhaps
I never will be.

Or perhaps

this is only doubt and hope —

standing at the bottom
of something,

looking up.

(Journal entry April 8, 1986, age 19, expanded 40 years later)