| |
I “SUPPOSE,” he thought, “there are invisible beings, fairies, elves; | |
| Suppose rheumatism is nothing but Robin-pinches; | |
| Suppose a wind is only the beating of fairy wings | |
| And fairy fingers doffing your hat to invisible majesties.” | |
| |
| He sat on the bench motionless. | 5 |
| The dust sifted upon him, | |
| Leaves caught upon his clothing, | |
| Vagrant sheets of paper wrapped about his feet. | |
| |
| “Chance is decent and does not leave the silent things exposed. | |
| She covers the stone with moss, and spreads | 10 |
| A coverlet of mold upon the unmoving things. | |
| “Suppose I stayed here a year? | |
| Would the elves come and cover me with leaf drift, and dust | |
| Carefully shaken over me? | |
| Would they sow seeds under my feet? | 15 |
| Would the moss grow from the clay on the soles of my shoe? | |
| Would I be wound in spider-webs?” | |
| |
II Another one sat down beside him | |
| And cut his world in two. | |
| He moved back as if to drag back the severed half, | 20 |
| But the other one held it tenaciously. | |
| His very shadow was a seal of possession, ineffaceable. | |
| For a moment they sat still, taut, | |
| Like two who tug at a rope. | |
| |
| “Pleasant day?” | 25 |
| |
| “Pleasant day!” | |
| |
| And so they fused their world with sticky speech. | |
| |
| “I was wondering how it would be | |
| To be a year in one place— | |
| For the rain to soften you, and the wind to mold you, | 30 |
| And the dust to fill in your cracks.” | |
| |
| “You would be a tree then: | |
| Your toes would drip into roots; | |
| Your arms would be long brown branches | |
| Holding leaves like cups to fill with sunlight and dew.” | 35 |
| |
| “If I were silent | |
| The invisible realms would open about me; | |
| The unseen people would build a road between my feet— | |
| They would build a city in the shadow of my knees, | |
| Like cities built below mountains. | 40 |
| I might be their sphinx, satiate with questions.” | |
| |
| “There is no invisible world | |
| Except the worlds you do not see. | |
| These can be reached by travel. | |
| Your stillness will not be inviolate— | 45 |
| All things using life will apportion you | |
| With shrewd husbandry: | |
| The birds will inherit your head and your shoulders; | |
| Hungry things will not spare you; | |
| Insects and beasts will dispute your flesh, | 50 |
| And bound your body for dwelling-places.” | |
| |
| “There is no need of travel— | |
| Stillness will invite these other worlds | |
| That are delayed by distance. | |
| The wind will plant about my feet | 55 |
| Their final flowers; | |
| The rivers will wash their soil under my roots; | |
| The travel-urge will throw | |
| Their curious sampled people out to me. | |
| The other worlds I mean are mixed with this— | 60 |
| They course within our life | |
| Like floods within the ocean.” | |
| |
| “I do not think these things— | |
| They walk like strangers out beyond my mind; | |
| Only of this world, which I see suddenly | 65 |
| Like clouds disclosed by lightnings. | |
| Love came to me suddenly; | |
| Hatred armed my hands once, | |
| And I knew remorse. | |
| Hunger and a red wound | 70 |
| Taught me the thin texture of life.” | |
| |
| “They say the sky is distance only, | |
| And the color of distance is blue. | |
| And that is why violets, who have the distance of fragility, | |
| Are blue. | 75 |
| Since there are larger worlds around us | |
| There must be smaller other-worlds within us, | |
| If one could find them.” | |
| |
| “We who are within the waiting-rooms of existence | |
| Should not peer into the deeper halls, | 80 |
| Nor tempt the attendants with our lauding curiosity.” | |
| |
| “Can you not watch how the ceilings and the walls | |
| Mark the backs of other rooms? | |
| Can you not let your mind tentatively therein?” | |
| |
| “No—I would still suspect it.” | 85 |
| |
| “Well—?” | |
| |
| “Well—I’ll be going; good-day?” | |
| |
| “Good day!” | |
| |
| And one man walked away, brushing from him crawling words; | |
| While the other sat still, | 90 |
| Wiping from his world | |
| The stains of conversation. | |
| |
