lassilaenglish.wikispaces.comlassilaenglish.wikispaces.com/file/view/Eliot+Poems.d… · Web...

T.S. Eliot (1888–1965). Prufrock and Other Observations. 1920.

Morning at the Window

THEY are rattling breakfast plates in basement kitchens,And along the trampled edges of the streetI am aware of the damp souls of housemaidsSprouting despondently at area gates. The brown waves of fog toss up to me 5Twisted faces from the bottom of the street,And tear from a passer-by with muddy skirtsAn aimless smile that hovers in the airAnd vanishes along the level of the roofs.

http://www.bartleby.com/198/5.html

Rhapsody on a Windy Night

TWELVE o’clock.Along the reaches of the streetHeld in a lunar synthesis,Whispering lunar incantationsDissolve the floors of memory 5And all its clear relationsIts divisions and precisions,Every street lamp that I passBeats like a fatalistic drum,And through the spaces of the dark 10Midnight shakes the memoryAs a madman shakes a dead geranium. Half-past one,The street lamp sputtered,The street lamp muttered, 15The street lamp said, “Regard that womanWho hesitates toward you in the light of the doorWhich opens on her like a grin.You see the border of her dressIs torn and stained with sand, 20And you see the corner of her eyeTwists like a crooked pin.” The memory throws up high and dryA crowd of twisted things;A twisted branch upon the beach 25Eaten smooth, and polishedAs if the world gave upThe secret of its skeleton,Stiff and white.A broken spring in a factory yard, 30Rust that clings to the form that the strength has leftHard and curled and ready to snap.

Half-past two,The street-lamp said,“Remark the cat which flattens itself in the gutter, 35Slips out its tongueAnd devours a morsel of rancid butter.”So the hand of the child, automatic,Slipped out and pocketed a toy that was running along the quay.I could see nothing behind that child’s eye. 40I have seen eyes in the streetTrying to peer through lighted shutters,And a crab one afternoon in a pool,An old crab with barnacles on his back,Gripped the end of a stick which I held him. 45 Half-past three,The lamp sputtered,The lamp muttered in the dark. The lamp hummed:“Regard the moon, 50La lune ne garde aucune rancune,She winks a feeble eye,She smiles into corners.She smooths the hair of the grass.The moon has lost her memory. 55A washed-out smallpox cracks her face,Her hand twists a paper rose,That smells of dust and old Cologne,She is aloneWith all the old nocturnal smells 60That cross and cross across her brain.The reminiscence comesOf sunless dry geraniumsAnd dust in crevices,Smells of chestnuts in the streets, 65And female smells in shuttered rooms,And cigarettes in corridorsAnd cocktail smells in bars.” The lamp said,“Four o’clock, 70Here is the number on the door.Memory!You have the key,The little lamp spreads a ring on the stair,Mount. 75The bed is open; the tooth-brush hangs on the wall,Put your shoes at the door, sleep, prepare for life.” The last twist of the knife.


Journey of The Magi(with anchors for the primary symbols and images by James Dixon)

'A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a long journey: The ways deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter.' And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory, Lying down in the melting snow. There were times we regretted The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces, And the silken girls bringing sherbet. Then the camel men cursing and grumbling And running away, and wanting their liquor and women, And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters, And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly And the villages dirty and charging high prices: A hard time we had of it. At the end we preferred to travel all night, Sleeping in snatches, With the voices singing in our ears, saying That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley, Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation; With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness, And three trees on the low sky, And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow. Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel, Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver, And feet kicking the empty wine-skins. But there was no information, and so we continued And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember, And I would do it again, but set down This set down This: were we led all that way for Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly, We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death, But had thought they were different; this Birth was Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death. We returned to our places, these Kingdoms, But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation, With an alien people clutching their gods. I should be glad of another death.

Major Images Found in "Journey of the Magi"First Five Lines: The first five lines were "lifted from Lancelot Andrewes's Nativity Sermon of 1622, and modified"; Eliot happened to be himself steeped in Andrewes at the time . . . but basically he used them because he needed a second voice to precipitate the poetic drama. They must be understood as being read by, or to, the magus and thereby occasioning his own flow of memory" (Barbour 190-91). Cities Hostile: According to Dean, these are "all places which remind the travellers, by their violent contrast, of the place of contentment they have deserted" ("Confrontation with Christianity" 76). Traveling through these forboding places, "Eliot's Magus hastens to end an unpleasant journey; what he 'regretted' is the vanishing of 'the silken girls bringing sherbet'" (Harris 840). Temperate valley: Dean points out that the early morning descent into a "temperate valley" evokes three significant Christian events: "The nativity and all the attendant ideas of the dawning of a new era . . . the empty tomb of Easter . . . as well the image of the Second Coming and the return of Christ from the East, dispelling darkness as the Sun of Righteousness" ("Confrontation with Christianity" 77). Wohlpart adds that the Magi's dawn arrival is "symbolic of the new life attained from their penance" (57). Beating the darkness: Dean notes Elizabeth Drew's view that "'beating the darkness' can refer to the triumph and victory of Christ, a conquering that could occur in the events of Christ's earthly life, or in His resurrection, or in His return in glory at the end of time" (Quoted in Dean, "Confrontation with Christianity" 77). Three trees: To Dean, the image of the three trees "seems clearly to be a reference to the crosses of Calvary" ("Confrontation with Christianity" 78). Barbour writes, "It is appropriate that his [the Magus'] language . . . unwittingly evoke [sic] the Crucifixion" (195). White horse: Dean refers to Robert Kaplan and Richard Wall's suggestion that "the white horse is 'perhaps a reference to the militaristic and conquering Christ of Revelation . . .'"; "However," he continues, "there is nothing in the poem to indicate that the horse is being ridden; on the contrary, it seems more natural to assume that the horse is riderless . . ." ("Confrontation with Christianity" 78). Dean also quotes Kaplan and Wall's speculation that the horse is symbolic of the "death of paganism under the onslaught of Christianity," and notes Nancy Hargrove's suggestion that "the horse's 'being old . . . perhaps represents the old dispensation that will fade away with Christ's birth'" (78). Satisfactory: R. D. Brown writes that "the obvious meaning [of the word "satisfactory"] is 'expiatory,' payment for a debt or sin" (137). Barbour, however, sees a more complex connotation: "The parenthetical remark/gesture dramatizes a certain drawing back at the end into something between understatement and velleity. The key word is the ambiguous 'satisfactory,' emphasized by rhythm and position, which for us, though not the magus, evokes the Thirty Nine Articles, expiation, and the Atonement" (194). In addition, E. F. Burgess sees the word "satisfactory" as evidence that "every condition of prophecy was met, leaving the alienated magus . . . stranded, suspended between the realization and the consummation of God's plan" (36). Old dispensation: Dean quotes Geneviene Foster's comment that "The birth of the new era involves the destruction of the old" ("Confrontation with Christianity" 79). Barbour writes that "The Birth he [the magus] saw began the death of his old world, old life, but did not, with the same certainty, give him anything new"; the magus is therefore "alienated from everything 'in the old dispensation'" (195). http://itech.fgcu.edu/faculty/wohlpart/alra/eliot.htm

http://itech.fgcu.edu/faculty/wohlpart/alra/eliot.htm


Portrait of a Lady

Thou hast committed—Fornication: but that was in another country,And besides, the wench is dead.

The Jew of Malta.

IAMONG the smoke and fog of a December afternoonYou have the scene arrange itself——as it will seem to do—With “I have saved this afternoon for you”;And four wax candles in the darkened room,Four rings of light upon the ceiling overhead, 5An atmosphere of Juliet’s tombPrepared for all the things to be said, or left unsaid.We have been, let us say, to hear the latest PoleTransmit the Preludes, through his hair and finger-tips.“So intimate, this Chopin, that I think his soul 10Should be resurrected only among friendsSome two or three, who will not touch the bloomThat is rubbed and questioned in the concert room.”—And so the conversation slipsAmong velleities and carefully caught regrets 15Through attenuated tones of violinsMingled with remote cornetsAnd begins. “You do not know how much they mean to me, my friends,And how, how rare and strange it is, to find 20In a life composed so much, so much of odds and ends,(For indeed I do not love it … you knew? you are not blind!How keen you are!)To find a friend who has these qualities,Who has, and gives 25Those qualities upon which friendship lives.How much it means that I say this to you—Without these friendships—life, what cauchemar!”Among the windings of the violinsAnd the ariettes 30Of cracked cornetsInside my brain a dull tom-tom beginsAbsurdly hammering a prelude of its own,Capricious monotoneThat is at least one definite “false note.” 35—Let us take the air, in a tobacco trance,Admire the monuments,Discuss the late events,Correct our watches by the public clocks.Then sit for half an hour and drink our bocks. 40

IINow that lilacs are in bloomShe has a bowl of lilacs in her roomAnd twists one in her fingers while she talks.“Ah, my friend, you do not know, you do not knowWhat life is, you who hold it in your hands”; 45(Slowly twisting the lilac stalks)“You let it flow from you, you let it flow,And youth is cruel, and has no remorseAnd smiles at situations which it cannot see.”I smile, of course, 50And go on drinking tea.“Yet with these April sunsets, that somehow recallMy buried life, and Paris in the Spring,I feel immeasurably at peace, and find the worldTo be wonderful and youthful, after all.” 55 The voice returns like the insistent out-of-tuneOf a broken violin on an August afternoon:“I am always sure that you understandMy feelings, always sure that you feel,Sure that across the gulf you reach your hand. 60 You are invulnerable, you have no Achilles’ heel.You will go on, and when you have prevailedYou can say: at this point many a one has failed. But what have I, but what have I, my friend,To give you, what can you receive from me? 65Only the friendship and the sympathyOf one about to reach her journey’s end. I shall sit here, serving tea to friends.…” I take my hat: how can I make a cowardly amendsFor what she has said to me? 70You will see me any morning in the parkReading the comics and the sporting page.Particularly I remarkAn English countess goes upon the stage.A Greek was murdered at a Polish dance, 75Another bank defaulter has confessed.I keep my countenance,I remain self-possessedExcept when a street piano, mechanical and tiredReiterates some worn-out common song 80With the smell of hyacinths across the gardenRecalling things that other people have desired.Are these ideas right or wrong?

IIIThe October night comes down; returning as beforeExcept for a slight sensation of being ill at ease 85I mount the stairs and turn the handle of the door

And feel as if I had mounted on my hands and knees. “And so you are going abroad; and when do you return?But that’s a useless question.You hardly know when you are coming back, 90You will find so much to learn.”My smile falls heavily among the bric-à-brac. “Perhaps you can write to me.”My self-possession flares up for a second;This is as I had reckoned. 95“I have been wondering frequently of late(But our beginnings never know our ends!)Why we have not developed into friends.”I feel like one who smiles, and turning shall remarkSuddenly, his expression in a glass. 100My self-possession gutters; we are really in the dark. “For everybody said so, all our friends,They all were sure our feelings would relateSo closely! I myself can hardly understand.We must leave it now to fate. 105You will write, at any rate.Perhaps it is not too late.I shall sit here, serving tea to friends.” And I must borrow every changing shapeTo find expression … dance, dance 110Like a dancing bear,Cry like a parrot, chatter like an ape.Let us take the air, in a tobacco trance—Well! and what if she should die some afternoon,Afternoon grey and smoky, evening yellow and rose; 115Should die and leave me sitting pen in handWith the smoke coming down above the housetops;Doubtful, for quite a whileNot knowing what to feel or if I understandOr whether wise or foolish, tardy or too soon… 120Would she not have the advantage, after all?This music is successful with a “dying fall”Now that we talk of dying—And should I have the right to smile?


From The Hollow Men | 1925

Hollow MenMistah Kurtz—he dead.

A penny for the Old Guy

I

We are the hollow menWe are the stuffed men

Leaning togetherHeadpiece filled with straw. Alas!Our dried voices, whenWe whisper togetherAre quiet and meaninglessAs wind in dry grassOr rats’ feet over broken glassIn our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossedWith direct eyes, to death’s other KingdomRemember us—if at all—not as lostViolent souls, but onlyAs the hollow menThe stuffed men.

II

Eyes I dare not meet in dreamsIn death’s dream kingdomThese do not appear:There, the eyes areSunlight on a broken columnThere, is a tree swingingAnd voices areIn the wind’s singingMore distant and more solemnThan a fading star.

Let me be no nearerIn death’s dream kingdomLet me also wearSuch deliberate disguisesRat’s coat, crowskin, crossed stavesIn a fieldBehaving as the wind behavesNo nearer—

Not that final meetingIn the twilight kingdom

III

This is the dead landThis is cactus landHere the stone imagesAre raised, here they receiveThe supplication of a dead man’s handUnder the twinkle of a fading star.

Is it like thisIn death’s other kingdom

Waking aloneAt the hour when we areTrembling with tendernessLips that would kissForm prayers to broken stone.

IV

The eyes are not hereThere are no eyes hereIn this valley of dying starsIn this hollow valleyThis broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

In this last of meeting placesWe grope togetherAnd avoid speechGathered on this beach of the tumid river

Sightless, unlessThe eyes reappearAs the perpetual starMultifoliate roseOf death’s twilight kingdomThe hope onlyOf empty men.

V

Here we go round the prickly pearPrickly pear prickly pearHere we go round the prickly pearAt five o’clock in the morning.

Between the ideaAnd the realityBetween the motionAnd the actFalls the Shadow For Thine is the Kingdom

Between the conceptionAnd the creationBetween the emotionAnd the responseFalls the Shadow Life is very long

Between the desireAnd the spasmBetween the potencyAnd the existenceBetween the essenceAnd the descentFalls the Shadow For Thine is the Kingdom

For Thine isLife isFor Thine is the

This is the way the world endsThis is the way the world endsThis is the way the world endsNot with a bang but a whimper.

http://poetry.poetryx.com/poems/784/http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/a_f/eliot/hollow.htm


The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

S’io credesse che mia risposta fosseA persona che mai tornasse al mondo,Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondoNon torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.

LET us go then, you and I,When the evening is spread out against the skyLike a patient etherized upon a table;Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,The muttering retreats 5Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotelsAnd sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:Streets that follow like a tedious argumentOf insidious intentTo lead you to an overwhelming question…. 10Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”Let us go and make our visit. In the room the women come and goTalking of Michelangelo. The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes, 15The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panesLicked 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, 20And seeing that it was a soft October night,Curled once about the house, and fell asleep. And indeed there will be timeFor the yellow smoke that slides along the street,Rubbing its back upon the window panes; 25

There will be time, there will be timeTo 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 handsThat lift and drop a question on your plate; 30Time 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 35Talking of Michelangelo. And indeed there will be timeTo 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— 40(They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”)My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin—(They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”)Do I dare 45Disturb the universe?In a minute there is timeFor decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse. For I have known them all already, known them all:Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons, 50I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;I know the voices dying with a dying fallBeneath the music from a farther room. So how should I presume? And I have known the eyes already, known them all— 55The 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 beginTo spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways? 60 And how should I presume? And I have known the arms already, known them all—Arms that are braceleted and white and bare(But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!)Is it perfume from a dress 65That 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 70And watched the smoke that rises from the pipesOf lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?… I should have been a pair of ragged clawsScuttling across the floors of silent seas.

. . . . . . . .And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully! 75Smoothed 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? 80But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter,I am no prophet—and here’s no great matter;I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker, 85And 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, 90To have bitten off the matter with a smile,To have squeezed the universe into a ballTo 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”— 95If 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, 100After 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: 105Would it have been worth whileIf 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.”

. . . . . . . . 110

No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;Am an attendant lord, one that will doTo swell a progress, start a scene or two,Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,Deferential, glad to be of use, 115Politic, 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 … 120I 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. 125 I have seen them riding seaward on the wavesCombing the white hair of the waves blown backWhen the wind blows the water white and black. We have lingered in the chambers of the seaBy sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown 130Till human voices wake us, and we drown.


Preludes

ITHE WINTER evening settles downWith smell of steaks in passageways.Six o’clock.The burnt-out ends of smoky days.And now a gusty shower wraps 5The grimy scrapsOf withered leaves about your feetAnd newspapers from vacant lots;The showers beatOn broken blinds and chimney-pots, 10And at the corner of the streetA lonely cab-horse steams and stamps.And then the lighting of the lamps.

IIThe morning comes to consciousnessOf faint stale smells of beer 15From the sawdust-trampled streetWith all its muddy feet that pressTo early coffee-stands. With the other masqueradesThat time resumes, 20One thinks of all the handsThat are raising dingy shadesIn a thousand furnished rooms.

IIIYou tossed a blanket from the bed,You lay upon your back, and waited; 25You dozed, and watched the night revealingThe thousand sordid imagesOf which your soul was constituted;They flickered against the ceiling.And when all the world came back 30And the light crept up between the shutters,And you heard the sparrows in the gutters,You had such a vision of the streetAs the street hardly understands;

Sitting along the bed’s edge, where 35You curled the papers from your hair,Or clasped the yellow soles of feetIn the palms of both soiled hands.

IVHis soul stretched tight across the skiesThat fade behind a city block, 40Or trampled by insistent feetAt four and five and six o’clock;And short square fingers stuffing pipes,And evening newspapers, and eyesAssured of certain certainties, 45The conscience of a blackened streetImpatient to assume the world. I am moved by fancies that are curledAround these images, and cling:The notion of some infinitely gentle 50Infinitely suffering thing. Wipe your hand across your mouth, and laugh;The worlds revolve like ancient womenGathering fuel in vacant lots.


T.S. Eliot (1888–1965). Poems. 1920.

The Hippopotamus

Similiter et omnes revereantur Diaconos, ut mandatum Jesu Christi; et Episcopum, ut Jesum Christum, existentem filium Patris; Presbyteros autem, ut concilium Dei et conjunctionem Apostolorum. Sine his Ecclesia non vocatur; de quibus suadeo vos sic habeo.

S. Ignatii Ad Trallianos. And when this epistle is read among you, cause that it be read also in the church of the Laodiceans.

THE BROAD-BACKED hippopotamusRests on his belly in the mud;Although he seems so firm to usHe is merely flesh and blood. Flesh and blood is weak and frail, 5Susceptible to nervous shock;While the True Church can never failFor it is based upon a rock. The hippo’s feeble steps may errIn compassing material ends, 10While the True Church need never stirTo gather in its dividends.

The ’potamus can never reachThe mango on the mango-tree;But fruits of pomegranate and peach 15Refresh the Church from over sea. At mating time the hippo’s voiceBetrays inflexions hoarse and odd,But every week we hear rejoiceThe Church, at being one with God. 20 The hippopotamus’s dayIs passed in sleep; at night he hunts;God works in a mysterious way—The Church can sleep and feed at once. I saw the ’potamus take wing 25Ascending from the damp savannas,And quiring angels round him singThe praise of God, in loud hosannas. Blood of the Lamb shall wash him cleanAnd him shall heavenly arms enfold, 30Among the saints he shall be seenPerforming on a harp of gold. He shall be washed as white as snow,By all the martyr’d virgins kist,While the True Church remains below 35Wrapt in the old miasmal mist.


Whispers of Immortality

WEBSTER was much possessed by deathAnd saw the skull beneath the skin;And breastless creatures under groundLeaned backward with a lipless grin. Daffodil bulbs instead of balls 5Stared from the sockets of the eyes!He knew that thought clings round dead limbsTightening its lusts and luxuries. Donne, I suppose, was such anotherWho found no substitute for sense; 10To seize and clutch and penetrate,Expert beyond experience, He knew the anguish of the marrowThe ague of the skeleton;No contact possible to flesh 15Allayed the fever of the bone.

. . . . . . . .Grishkin is nice: her Russian eye

Is underlined for emphasis;Uncorseted, her friendly bustGives promise of pneumatic bliss. 20 The couched Brazilian jaguarCompels the scampering marmosetWith subtle effluence of cat;Grishkin has a maisonette; The sleek Brazilian jaguar 25Does not in its arboreal gloomDistil so rank a feline smellAs Grishkin in a drawing-room. And even the Abstract EntitiesCircumambulate her charm; 30But our lot crawls between dry ribsTo keep our metaphysics warm.


Sweeney among the Nightingales

APENECK SWEENEY spreads his kneesLetting his arms hang down to laugh,The zebra stripes along his jawSwelling to maculate giraffe. The circles of the stormy moon 5Slide westward toward the River Plate,Death and the Raven drift aboveAnd Sweeney guards the horned gate. Gloomy Orion and the DogAre veiled; and hushed the shrunken seas;

10

The person in the Spanish capeTries to sit on Sweeney’s knees Slips and pulls the table clothOverturns a coffee-cup,Reorganized upon the floor 15She yawns and draws a stocking up; The silent man in mocha brownSprawls at the window-sill and gapes;The waiter brings in orangesBananas figs and hothouse grapes; 20 The silent vertebrate in brownContracts and concentrates, withdraws;Rachel née RabinovitchTears at the grapes with murderous paws; She and the lady in the cape 25

Are suspect, thought to be in league;Therefore the man with heavy eyesDeclines the gambit, shows fatigue, Leaves the room and reappearsOutside the window, leaning in, 30Branches of wistariaCircumscribe a golden grin; The host with someone indistinctConverses at the door apart,The nightingales are singing near 35The Convent of the Sacred Heart, And sang within the bloody woodWhen Agamemnon cried aloud,And let their liquid droppings fallTo stain the stiff dishonoured shroud. 40


Gerontion

Thou hast nor youth nor ageBut as it were an after dinner sleepDreaming of both.

HERE I am, an old man in a dry month,Being read to by a boy, waiting for rain.I was neither at the hot gatesNor fought in the warm rainNor knee deep in the salt marsh, heaving a cutlass, 5Bitten by flies, fought.My house is a decayed house,And the jew squats on the window sill, the owner,Spawned in some estaminet of Antwerp,Blistered in Brussels, patched and peeled in London. 10The goat coughs at night in the field overhead;Rocks, moss, stonecrop, iron, merds.The woman keeps the kitchen, makes tea,Sneezes at evening, poking the peevish gutter. I an old man, 15A dull head among windy spaces. Signs are taken for wonders. “We would see a sign”:The word within a word, unable to speak a word,Swaddled with darkness. In the juvescence of the yearCame Christ the tiger 20 In depraved May, dogwood and chestnut, flowering judas,To be eaten, to be divided, to be drunkAmong whispers; by Mr. SilveroWith caressing hands, at Limoges

Who walked all night in the next room; 25By Hakagawa, bowing among the Titians;By Madame de Tornquist, in the dark roomShifting the candles; Fraulein von KulpWho turned in the hall, one hand on the door. Vacant shuttlesWeave the wind. I have no ghosts, 30An old man in a draughty houseUnder a windy knob. After such knowledge, what forgiveness? Think nowHistory has many cunning passages, contrived corridorsAnd issues, deceives with whispering ambitions, 35Guides us by vanities. Think nowShe gives when our attention is distractedAnd what she gives, gives with such supple confusionsThat the giving famishes the craving. Gives too lateWhat’s not believed in, or if still believed, 40In memory only, reconsidered passion. Gives too soonInto weak hands, what’s thought can be dispensed withTill the refusal propagates a fear. ThinkNeither fear nor courage saves us. Unnatural vicesAre fathered by our heroism. Virtues 45Are forced upon us by our impudent crimes.These tears are shaken from the wrath-bearing tree. The tiger springs in the new year. Us he devours. Think at lastWe have not reached conclusion, when IStiffen in a rented house. Think at last 50I have not made this show purposelesslyAnd it is not by any concitationOf the backward devilsI would meet you upon this honestly.I that was near your heart was removed therefrom 55To lose beauty in terror, terror in inquisition.I have lost my passion: why should I need to keep itSince what is kept must be adulterated?I have lost my sight, smell, hearing, taste and touch:How should I use it for your closer contact? 60 These with a thousand small deliberationsProtract the profit of their chilled delirium,Excite the membrane, when the sense has cooled,With pungent sauces, multiply varietyIn a wilderness of mirrors. What will the spider do, 65Suspend its operations, will the weevilDelay? De Bailhache, Fresca, Mrs. Cammel, whirledBeyond the circuit of the shuddering BearIn fractured atoms. Gull against the wind, in the windy straitsOf Belle Isle, or running on the Horn, 70White feathers in the snow, the Gulf claims,And an old man driven by the TradesTo a a sleepy corner. Tenants of the house,Thoughts of a dry brain in a dry season. 75

lassilaenglish.wikispaces.comlassilaenglish.wikispaces.com/file/view/Eliot+Poems.d… · Web...

Documents

Transcript of lassilaenglish.wikispaces.comlassilaenglish.wikispaces.com/file/view/Eliot+Poems.d… · Web...