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| JUXTAPOSITION, in fine; and what is juxtaposition? | |
| Look you, we travel along in the railway-carriage or steamer, | |
| And, pour passer le temps, till the tedious journey be ended, | |
| Lay aside paper or book, to talk with the girl that is next one; | |
| And, pour passer le temps, with the terminus all but in prospect, | 5 |
| Talk of eternal ties and marriages made in heaven. | |
| Ah, did we really accept with a perfect heart the illusion! | |
| Ah, did we really believe that the Present indeed is the Only! | |
| Or through all transmutation, all shock and convulsion of passion, | |
| Feel we could carry undimmed, unextinguished, the light of our knowledge! | 10 |
| But for his funeral train which the bridegroom sees in the distance, | |
| Would he so joyfully, think you fall in with the marriage-procession? | |
| But for that final discharge, would he dare to enlist in that service? | |
| But for that certain release, ever sign to that perilous contract? | |
| But for that exit secure, ever bend to that treacherous doorway?— | 15 |
| Ah, but the bride, meantime,—do you think she sees it as he does? | |
| But for the steady fore-sense of a freer and larger existence, | |
| Think you that man could consent to be circumscribed here into action? | |
| But for assurance within of a limitless ocean divine, o’er | |
| Whose great tranquil depths unconscious the wind-toss’d surface | 20 |
| Breaks into ripples of trouble that come and change and endure not,— | |
| But that in this, of a truth, we have our being, and know it, | |
| Think you we men could submit to live and move as we do here? | |
| Ah, but the women,—God bless them!—they don’t think at all about it. | |
| Yet we must eat and drink, as you say. And as limited beings | 25 |
| Scarcely can hope to attain upon earth to an Actual Abstract, | |
| Leaving to God contemplation, to His hands knowledge confiding, | |
| Sure that in us if it perish, in Him it abideth and dies not, | |
| Let us in His sight accomplish our pretty particular doings,— | |
| Yes, and contented sit down to the victual that He has provided. | 30 |
| Allah is great, no doubt, and Juxtaposition his prophet. | |
| Ah, but the women, alas! they don’t look at it in that way. | |
| Juxtaposition is great;—but, my friend, I fear me, the maiden | |
| Hardly would thank or acknowledge the lover that sought to obtain her, | |
| Not as the thing he would wish, but the thing he must even put up with,— | 35 |
| Hardly would tender her hand to the wooer that candidly told her | |
| That she is but for a space, an ad-interim solace and pleasure,— | |
| That in the end she shall yield to a perfect and absolute something, | |
| Which I then for myself shall behold, and not another,— | |
| Which, amid fondest endearments, meantime I forget not, forsake not. | 40 |
| Ah, ye feminine souls, so loving and so exacting, | |
| Since we cannot escape, must we even submit to deceive you? | |
| Since, so cruel is truth, sincerity shocks and revolts you, | |
| Will you have us your slaves to lie to you, flatter and—leave you? | |
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