ABSTRACT
This chapter extends the powers of description as a mode of reasoning into further contexts of alienation and disruption separate from those political expressions of power discussed in the previous two chapters. It does so by a descriptive reading of Eugene Montale’s poem ‘Flux’ (‘Flussi’). Montale’s poem offers powerful but ambiguous descriptions of life that I compare with other descriptions, prompting me to make judgments about the poem, but also about the kind of thing life is. Montale’s poem motivates a critical ethical question: What is life if it cannot be organized around goals and a final end? I answer this question in thenext chapter.
