sio credesse che mia risposta fosse a persona che mai tornasse al mondo questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse ma perciocch giammai di questo fondo non torn vivo alcun siodo il vero senza tema dinfamia ti rispondo let us go then you and i when the evening is spread out against the sky like a patient etherized upon a table let us go through certain half deserted streets the muttering retreats of restless nights in one night cheap hotels and sawdust restaurants with oyster shells streets that follow like a tedious argument of insidious intent to lead you to an overwhelming question oh do not ask what is it let us go and make our visit in the room the women come and go talking of michelangelo the yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window panes the yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window panes licked its tongue into the corners of the evening lingered upon the pools that stand in drains let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys slipped by the terrace made a sudden leap and seeing that it was a soft october night curled once about the house and fell asleep and indeed there will be time for the yellow smoke that slides along the street rubbing its back upon the window panes there will be time there will be time to prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet there will be time to murder and create and time for all the works and days of hands that lift and drop a question on your plate time for you and time for me and time yet for a hundred indecisions and for a hundred visions and revisions before the taking of a toast and tea in the room the women come and go talking of michelangelo and indeed there will be time to wonder do i dare and do i dare time to turn back and descend the stair with a bald spot in the middle of my hair my morning coat my collar mounting firmly to the chin my necktie rich and modest but asserted by a simple pin do i dare disturb the universe in a minute there is time for decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse for i have known them all already known them all have known the evenings mornings afternoons i have measured out my life with coffee spoons i know the voices dying with a dying fall beneath the music from a farther room so how should i presume and i have known the eyes already known them all the eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase and when i am formulated sprawling on a pin when i am pinned and wriggling on the wall then how should i begin to spit out all the butt ends of my days and ways and how should i presume and i have known the arms already known them all arms that are braceleted and white and bare is it perfume from a dress that makes me so digress arms that lie along a table or wrap about a shawl and should i then presume and how should i begin shall i say i have gone at dusk through narrow streets and watched the smoke that rises from the pipes of lonely men in shirt sleeves leaning out of windows i should have been a pair of ragged claws scuttling across the floors of silent seas and the afternoon the evening sleeps so peacefully smoothed by long fingers asleep tired or it malingers stretched on the floor here beside you and me should i after tea and cakes and ices have the strength to force the moment to its crisis but though i have wept and fasted wept and prayed though i have seen my head brought in upon a platter i am no prophetand heres no great matter i have seen the moment of my greatness flicker and i have seen the eternal footman hold my coat and snicker and in short i was afraid and would it have been worth it after all after the cups the marmalade the tea among the porcelain among some talk of you and me would it have been worth while to have bitten off the matter with a smile to have squeezed the universe into a ball to roll it toward some overwhelming question to say i am lazarus come from the dead come back to tell you all i shall tell you all if one settling a pillow by her head should say that is not what i meant at all that is not it at all and would it have been worth it after all would it have been worth while after the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets after the novels after the teacups after the skirts that trail along the floor and this and so much more it is impossible to say just what i mean but as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen would it have been worth while if one settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl and turning toward the window should say that is not it at all that is not what i meant at all no i am not prince hamlet nor was meant to be am an attendant lord one that will do to swell a progress start a scene or two advise the prince no doubt an easy tool deferential glad to be of use politic cautious and meticulous full of high sentence but a bit obtuse at times indeed almost ridiculous almost at times the fool i grow old i grow old i shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled shall i part my hair behind do i dare to eat a peach i shall wear white flannel trousers and walk upon the beach i have heard the mermaids singing each to each i do not think that they will sing to me i have seen them riding seaward on the waves combing the white hair of the waves blown back when the wind blows the water white and black we have lingered in the chambers of the sea by sea girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown till human voices wake us and we drown 138