"The Unstilled World Still Whirled"

At our salon this past Sunday, my friend read part of Ash Wednesday by T.S. Eliot. The beginning haunted me:

Because I do not hope to turn again
Because I do not hope
Because I do not hope to turn
Desiring this man's gift and that man's scope
I no longer strive to strive towards such things
(Why should the agèd eagle stretch its wings?)
Why should I mourn
The vanished power of the usual reign?

After hearing that stanza, I knew I must read the rest. These two stanzas that appear in Part V particularly arrested me:

If the lost word is lost, if the spent word is spent
If the unheard, unspoken
Word is unspoken, unheard;
Still is the unspoken word, the Word unheard,
The Word without a word, the Word within
The world and for the world;
And the light shone in darkness and
Against the Word the unstilled world still whirled
About the centre of the silent Word.

O my people, what have I done unto thee.

Where shall the word be found, where will the word
Resound? Not here, there is not enough silence
Not on the sea or on the islands, not
On the mainland, in the desert or the rain land,
For those who walk in darkness
Both in the day time and in the night time
The right time and the right place are not here
No place of grace for those who avoid the face
No time to rejoice for those who walk among noise and deny the voice

I generally read like someone in great need of water-huge guzzling gulps with no breaks. But with poetry and this poem in particular I'm forced to read like a proper Victorian Lady-little sips with pauses in between to breathe. To my surprise, I enjoy the slow pace of reflecting between stanzas, between phrases on the imagery and possible meaning. Such activity will keep me from senility and it's far more enjoyable than bridge!