An aged man is but a paltry thing, a tattered coat upon a stick. I hate journalists. There is nothing in them but tittering jeering emptiness. They have all made what Dante calls the Great Refusal. . . . The shallowest people on the ridge of the earth. I balanced all, brought all to mind, the years to come seemed waste of breath, a waste of breath the years behind, in balance with this life, this death. I at midnight by the clock may creep into your bed. I am of a healthy long lived race, and our minds improve with age. How far away the stars seem, and how far is our first kiss, and ah, how old my heart. Come Fairies, take me out of this dull world, for I would ride with you upon the wind and dance upon the mountains like a flame! Come away, O human child: To the waters and the wild with a fairy, hand in hand, For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand. TOIL and grow rich, what's that but to lie with a foul witch and after, drained dry, to be brought to the chamber where lies one long sought with despair. But I, being poor, have only my dreams. I have spread my dreams under your feet; tread softly, because you tread on my dreams. |