Two Short Speeches for Sisyphus

First Speech: While Ascending

I torment my tormentor.

How?

I shut him out of it.

See how I punish myself

by pushing this stone I cut

from this mountain

up this mountain I built.

Second Speech: While Descending

How adaptable we humans are.

After several hundred years,

I learned to sleep on my way down.

I take my time.

No one pushes me.

After several hundred more,

I taught myself to dream the same

dream each time:

To go up the mountain without the stone.

I’m working on the next one now:

I was never born.