1
If I could clap this in a cage and let that out we’d see colored wings
then to blind the sun but—the good ships are anchored up-stream and the
gorged seagulls flap heavily. At sea! At sea! That’s where the waves beat
kindliest. But no, singers are beggars or worse cannot man a ship songs
are their trade. Ku-whee! Ku-whee! It’s a wind in the lookout’s nest
talking of Columbus, whom no sea daunted, Columbus, chained below decks,
bound homeward.
* * * * *
_They built a replica of Columbus’ flagship the Santa Maria and took
it from harbor to harbor along the North Atlantic seaboard. The
insignificance of that shell could hardly be exaggerated when comparison
was made with even the very least of our present day sea-going vessels.
Thus was the magnificence of enterprise and the hardihood of one
Christopher Columbus celebrated at this late date._
2
You would learn—if you knew even one city—where people are a little
gathered together and where one sees—it’s our frontier you know—the
common changes of the human spirit: our husbands tire of us and we—let
us not say we go hungry for their caresses but for caresses—of a kind.
Oh I am no prophet. I have no theory to advance, except that it’s well
nigh impossible to know the wish till after. Cross the room to him if
the whim leads that way. Here’s drink of an eye that calls you. No need
to take the thing too seriously. It’s something of a will-o-the-whisp
I acknowledge. All in the pressure of an arm—through a fur coat often.
Something of a dancing light with the rain beating on a cab window.
Here’s nothing to lead you astray. What? Why you’re young still. Your
children? Yes, there they are. Desire skates like a Hollander as well as
runs pickaninny fashion. Really, there’s little more to say than: flowers
in a glass basket under the electric glare; the carpet is red, mostly,
a hodge-podge of zig-zags that pass for Persian fancies. Risk a _double
entendre_. But of a sudden the room’s not the same! It’s a strange blood
sings under some skin. Who will have the sense for it? The men sniff
suspiciously; you at least my dear had your head about you. It was a
tender nibble but it really did you credit. But think of what might be!
It’s all in the imagination. I give you no more credit than you deserve,
you will never rise to it, never be more than a rose dropped in the
river—but acknowledge that there is, ah there is a— You are such a clever
knitter. Your hands please. Ah, if I had your hands.
* * * * *
_A woman of marked discernment finding herself among strange companions
wishes for the hands of one of them and inasmuch as she feels herself
refreshed by the sight of these perfections she offers in return those
perfections of her own which appear to her to be most appropriate to the
occasion._
3
Truth’s a wonder. What difference is it how the best head we have greets
his first born these days? What weight has it that the bravest hair of
all’s gone waiting on cheap tables or the most garrulous lives lonely by
a bad neighbor and has her south windows pestered with caterpillars? The
nights are long for lice combing or moon dodging—and the net comes in
empty again. Or there’s been no fish in this ford since Christian was a
baby. Yet up surges the good zest and the game’s on. Follow at my heels,
there’s little to tell you you’ld think a stoopsworth. You’ld pick the
same faces in a crowd no matter what I’d say. And you’ld be right too.
The path’s not yours till you’ve gone it alone a time. But here’s another
handful of west wind. White of the night! White of the night. Turn back
till I tell you a puzzle: What is it in the stilled face of an old
mender-man and winter not far off and a darky parts his wool, and wenches
wear of a Sunday? It’s a sparrow with a crumb in his beak dodging wheels
and clouds crossing two ways.
* * * * *
_Virtue is not to be packed in a bag and carried off to the rag mill.
Perversions are righted and the upright are reversed, then the stream
takes a bend upon itself and the meaning turns a livid purple and drops
down in a whirlpool without so much as fraying a single fibre._