From a New York Times guest essay by Edward Hirsch headlined “I Am Going Blind, and I Now Find It Strangely Exhilarating”:

Edward Hirsch is a poet, critic and the president of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.

I have been gradually going blind for the past 20 years. I didn’t pay attention — I thought I needed better glasses — until one night I popped out to go to the bathroom in a crowded movie theater. When I returned, the people and the seats had disappeared. I couldn’t see anything except the screen. I stood in the back of the theater until my partner, Laurie, came to find me. This was disconcerting, but I went about my business in my usual state of cheerful denial.