| WHO knows what I know | |
| when I have asked the night questions | |
| and the night has answered nothing | |
| only the old answers? | |
| |
| Who picked a crimson cryptogram, | 5 |
| the tail light of a motor car turning a corner, | |
| or the midnight sign of a chile con carne place, | |
| or a man out of the ashes of false dawn muttering “hot-dog” to the night watchmen: | |
| Is there a spieler who has spoken the word or taken the number of night’s nothings? am I the spieler? or you? | |
| |
| Is there a tired head | 10 |
| the night has not fed and rested | |
| and kept on its neck and shoulders? | |
| |
| Is there a wish | |
| of man to woman | |
| and woman to man | 15 |
| the night has not written | |
| and signed its name under? | |
| |
| Does the night forget | |
| as a woman forgets? | |
| and remember | 20 |
| as a woman remembers? | |
| |
| Who gave the night | |
| this head of hair, | |
| this gipsy head | |
| calling: Come-on? | 25 |
| |
| Who gave the night anything at all | |
| and asked the night questions | |
| and was laughed at? | |
| |
| Who asked the night | |
| for a long soft kiss | 30 |
| and lost the half-way lips? | |
| who picked a red lamp in a mist? | |
| |
| Who saw the night | |
| fold its Mona Lisa hands | |
| and sit half-smiling, half-sad, | 35 |
| nothing at all, | |
| and everything, | |
| all the world ? | |
| |
| Who saw the night | |
| let down its hair | 40 |
| and shake its bare shoulders | |
| and blow out the candles of the moon, | |
| whispering, snickering, | |
| cutting off the snicker .. and sobbing .. | |
| out of pillow-wet kisses and tears? | 45 |
| |
| Is the night woven of anything else | |
| than the secret wishes of women, | |
| the stretched empty arms of women? | |
| the hair of women with stars and roses? | |
| I asked the night these questions. | 50 |
| I heard the night asking me these questions. | |
| |
| I saw the night | |
| put these whispered nothings | |
| across the city dust and stones, | |
| across a single yellow sunflower, | 55 |
| one stalk strong as a woman’s wrist; | |
| |
| And the play of a light rain, | |
| the jig-time folly of a light rain, | |
| the creepers of a drizzle on the sidewalks | |
| for the policemen and the railroad men, | 60 |
| for the home-goers and the homeless, | |
| silver fans and funnels on the asphalt, | |
| the many feet of a fog mist that crept away; | |
| |
| I saw the night | |
| put these nothings across | 65 |
| and the night wind came saying: Come-on: | |
| and the curve of sky swept off white clouds | |
| and swept on white stars over Battery to Bronx, | |
| scooped a sea of stars over Albany, Dobbs Ferry, Cape Horn, Constantinople. | |
| |
| I saw the night’s mouth and lips | 70 |
| strange as a face next to mine on a pillow | |
| and now I know … as I knew always … | |
| the night is a lover of mine … | |
| I know the night is … everything. | |
| I know the night is … all the world. | 75 |
| |
| I have seen gold lamps in a lagoon | |
| play sleep and murmur | |
| with never an eyelash, | |
| never a glint of an eyelid, | |
| quivering in the water-shadows. | 80 |
| |
| A taxi whizzes by, an owl car clutters, passengers yawn reading street signs, a bum on a park bench shifts, another bum keeps his majesty of stone stillness, the forty-foot split rocks of Central Park sleep the sleep of stone whalebacks, the cornices of the Metropolitan Art mutter their own nothings to the men with rolled-up collars on the top of a bus: | |
| Breaths of the sea salt Atlantic, breaths of two rivers, and a heave of hawsers and smokestacks, the swish of multiplied sloops and war dogs, the hesitant hoo-hoo of coal boats: among these I listen to Night calling: | |
| I give you what money can never buy: all other lovers change: all others go away and come back and go away again: | |
| I am the one you slept with last night. | |
| I am the one you sleep with tonight and tomorrow night. | 85 |
| I am the one whose passion kisses | |
| keep your head wondering | |
| and your lips aching | |
| to sing one song | |
| never sung before | 90 |
| at night’s gipsy head | |
| calling: Come-on. | |
| These hands that slid to my neck and held me, | |
| these fingers that told a story, | |
| this gipsy head of hair calling: Come-on: | 95 |
| can anyone else come along now | |
| and put across night’s nothings again? | |
| |
| I have wanted kisses my heart stuttered at asking, | |
| I have pounded at useless doors and called my people fools. | |
| I have staggered alone in a winter dark making mumble songs | 100 |
| to the sting of a blizzard that clutched and swore. | |
| It was the night in my blood: | |
| open dreaming night, | |
| night of tireless sheet-steel blue: | |
| The hands of God washing something, | 105 |
| feet of God walking somewhere. | |
