| Time: 11 A.M., Thursday, June 16, 1904 Scene: Sandymount Strand, the beach just south of the mouth of the Liffey and the Pigeon House breakwater, which ex- tends the south bank of the Liffey out into Dublin Bay. Stephen has come from Dalkey to Dublin by public trans- portation, and he now idles away the hour and a half be- fore his scheduled meeting with Mulligan at 12:30 (which he ends up skipping) Organ: None Art: Philology Colors: green Symbol: tide Technique: monologue (male) Correspondences: Proteus--primal matter [impenetrability in space and in- evitable or uninterrupted extension in time];' Menelaus-- Kevin Egan [Telemachus's visit to the palace of Menelaus is reflected in Stephen's recall of hismission to Paris and of Kevin Egan's "palace"]; Megapenthus--Cocklepicker [Megapenthus was born before the walls of Troy, the son of Menelaus by a slave girl. Megapenthus's wedding feast is being celebrated when Telemachus arrives at Menela- us's mansion] Background: In Book 4 of The Odyssey, Telemachus is at the court of Menelaus, and Menelaus recounts the story of his journey home from Troy. Forced by adverse weather to detour by way of Egypt, when he set sail again he was becalmed on Pharos, a rocky island just west of the Nile delta. Menela- us did not know which of the gods had him "pinned down " for, it turned out, neglect of the rules of sacrifice; nor did he know how to continue his voyage home. The daug- hter of the "Ancient of the Sea," Proteus, second in command to Poseidon, took pity on Menelaus and inter- vened to tell him that her father had the power of proph- ecy. To get Proteus to speak, Menelaus would have to grasp and hold him even though he would "take the forms / of all beasts, and water, and blinding fire" in the attempt to escape. Menelaus did succeed, and Proteus answered his questions, telling him how to break the spell that bound him to Egypt and telling him also of the deaths of Ajax and Agamemnon and of the whereabouts of Odysseus, marooned and in bondage on Calypso's island. |
Ineluctable modality of the visible:1 at least that if no more, thought
through my eyes. Signatures of all things I am here to read,2 seaspawn
and seawrack, the nearing tide, that rusty boot. Snotgreen, bluesilver,
rust:
coloured signs.3 Limits of the diaphane. But he adds: in bodies.4 Then he was
aware of them bodies before of them coloured. How? By knocking his sconce
against them, sure.5 Go easy. Bald he was and a millionaire,6 maestro di co-
lor che sanno. Limit of the diaphane in. Why in? Diaphane, adiaphane7. If
you can put your five fingers through it it is a gate, if not a door.8 Shut
your eyes and see.
Stephen closed his eyes to hear his boots crush crackling wrack and shells.
You are walking through it howsomever. I am, a stride at a time. A very
short space of time through very short times of space. Five, six: the Nach-
einander.9 Exactly: and that is the ineluctable modality of the audible. O-
pen your eyes. No. Jesus! If I fell over a cliff that beetles o'er his
base,10
fell through the Nebeneinander ineluctably! I am getting on nicely in the
dark. My ash sword11 hangs at my side. Tap with it: they do. My two feet in
his boots are at the ends of his legs,12 Nebeneinander. Sounds solid: made by
the mallet of Los Demiurgos. Am I walking into eternity13 along Sandymount
strand? Crush, crack, crick, crick. Wild sea money.14 Dominie Deasy kens
them a'.15
Won't you come to Sandymount,
Madeline the Mare? 16
Rhythm begins, you see. I hear. Acatalectic tetrameter of iambs marching.
No, agallop: deeline the mare.
Open your eyes now. I will. One moment. Has all vanished since? If I open
and am for ever in the black adiaphane. Basta! 17 I will see if I can see.
See now. There all the time without you: and ever shall be, world without
end.18
They came down the steps from Leahy's terrace19 prudently, Frauen-
zimmer:20 and down the shelving shore flabbily, their splayed feet sinking
in the silted sand. Like me, like Algy, coming down to our mighty mother.21
Number one swung lourdily22 her midwife's bag, the other's gamp23 poked
in the beach. From the liberties,24 out for the day. Mrs Florence Mac-
Cabe, relict of the late Patk MacCabe,25 deeply lamented, of Bride Street.26
One of her sisterhood lugged me squealing into life. Creation from not-
hing.27 What has she in the bag? A misbirth with a trailing navelcord,
hushed in ruddy wool. The cords of all link back, strandentwining cable
of all flesh. That is why mystic monks.28 Will you be as gods?29 Gaze in
your omphalos.30 Hello! Kinch here. Put me on to Edenville. Aleph, alpha:31
nought, nought, one.32
Spouse and helpmate of Adam Kadmon:33 Heva, naked Eve. She had no navel.34
Gaze. Belly without blemish,35 bulging big, a buckler of taut vellum, no,
whiteheaped corn,36 orient and immortal, standing from everlasting to
everlasting.37 Womb of sin.38
Wombed in sin darkness I was too, made not begotten.39 By them, the man
with my voice and my eyes and a ghostwoman with ashes on her breath.
They clasped and sundered, did the coupler's will.40 From before the ages
He willed me and now may not will me away or ever. A lex eterna stays
about Him.41 Is that then the divine substance wherein Father and Son are
consubstantial? Where is poor dear Arius to try conclusions? Warring his
life long upon the contransmagnificandjewbangtantiality. Illstarred
heresiarch! In a Greek watercloset he breathed his last:42 euthanasia.
With beaded mitre and with crozier, stalled upon his throne, widower
of a widowed see,43 with upstiffed omophorion,44 with clotted hinderparts.
Airs romped round him, nipping and eager airs.45 They are coming, waves.
The whitemaned seahorses, champing, brightwindbridled, the steeds of
Mananaan.46
I mustn't forget his letter for the press. And after? The Ship,47 half
twelve. By the way go easy with that money like a good young imbecile.
Yes, I must.
His pace slackened. Here. Am I going to aunt Sara's48 or not? My con-
substantial father's voice. Did you see anything of your artist brother
Stephen lately? No? Sure he's not down in Strasburg terrace49 with his aunt
Sally? Couldn't he fly a bit higher than that,50 eh? And and and and tell us,
Stephen, how is uncle Si? O, weeping God, the things I married into! De
boys up in de hayloft. The drunken little costdrawer51 and his brother, the
cornet player. Highly respectable gondoliers!52 And skeweyed Walter sirring
his father, no less! Sir. Yes, sir. No, sir. Jesus wept:53 and no wonder, by
Christ!
I pull the wheezy bell of their shuttered cottage: and wait. They take me
for a dun, peer out from a coign of vantage.54
--It's Stephen, sir.
--Let him in. Let Stephen in.
A bolt drawn back and Walter welcomes me.
--We thought you were someone else.
In his broad bed nuncle55 Richie, pillowed and blanketed, extends over the
hillock of his knees a sturdy forearm. Cleanchested. He has washed the
upper moiety.
--Morrow, nephew. Sit down and take a walk.56
He lays aside the lapboard whereon he drafts his bills of costs for
the eyes of master Goff57 and master Shapland Tandy,58 filing consents and
common searches and a writ of Duces Tecum.59 A bogoak frame over his bald
head: Wilde's Requiescat.60 The drone of his misleading whistle brings
Walter back.
--Yes, sir?
--Malt for Richie and Stephen, tell mother. Where is she?
--Bathing Crissie, sir.
Papa's little bedpal. Lump of love.
--No, uncle Richie . . .
--Call me Richie. Damn your lithia61 water. It lowers. Whusky!
--Uncle Richie, really . . .
--Sit down or by the law Harry62 I'll knock you down.
Walter squints vainly for a chair.
--He has nothing to sit down on, sir.
--He has nowhere to put it, you mug. Bring in our chippendale chair.
Would you like a bite of something? None of your damned lawdeedaw airs
here. The rich of a rasher fried with a herring? Sure? So much the better.
We have nothing in the house but backache pills.
All'erta!
He drones bars of Ferrando's aria di sortita.63 The grandest number, Ste-
phen, in the whole opera. Listen.
His tuneful whistle sounds again, finely shaded, with rushes of the air,
his fists bigdrumming on his padded knees.
This wind is sweeter.
Houses of decay, mine, his and all. You told the Clongowes gentry you
had an uncle a judge and an uncle a general in the army. Come out of
them, Stephen. Beauty is not there. Nor in the stagnant bay of Marsh's
library64 where you read the fading prophecies of Joachim Abbas65. For
whom? The hundredheaded rabble of the cathedral close.66 A hater of his
kind ran from them to the wood of madness,67 his mane foaming in the
moon, his eyeballs stars. Houyhnhnm, horsenostrilled.68 The oval equine
faces, Temple, Buck Mulligan, Foxy Campbell, Lanternjaws.69 Abbas father,
furious dean,70 what offence laid fire to their brains? Paff! Descende,
calve, ut ne amplius decalveris.71 A garland of grey hair on his commi-
nated head72 see him me clambering down to the footpace (descende!),
clutching a monstrance, basiliskeyed. Get down, baldpoll! A choir
gives back menace and echo, assisting about the altar's horns,73 the
snorted Latin of jackpriests74 moving burly in their albs, tonsured
and oiled and gelded, fat with the fat of kidneys of wheat.75
And at the same instant perhaps a priest round the corner is elevating
it. Dringdring! And two streets off another locking it into a pyx. Dring-
adring!76 And in a ladychapel another taking housel all to his own cheek.
Dringdring! Down, up, forward, back. Dan Occam77 thought of that, invin-
cible doctor.78 A misty English morning79 the imp hypostasis80 tickled his
brain.Bringing his host down and kneeling he heard twine with his second
bell the first bell in the transept (he is lifting his) and, rising, heard (now
I am lifting) their two bells (he is kneeling) twang in diphthong.
Cousin Stephen,81 you will never be a saint. Isle of saints.82 You were aw-
fully holy, weren't you? You prayed to the Blessed Virgin that you might
not have a red nose. You prayed to the devil in Serpentine avenue83 that
the fubsy widow in front might lift her clothes still more from the wet
street.
O si, certo!84 Sell your soul for that, do, dyed rags pinned round a squaw.
More tell me, more still!! On the top of the Howth tram84 alone crying to
the rain: Naked women! Naked women! What about that, eh?
What about what? What else were they invented for?
Reading two pages apiece of seven books every night, eh? I was young.
You bowed to yourself in the mirror, stepping forward to applause ear-
nestly, striking face. Hurray for the Goddamned idiot! Hray! No-one
saw: tell no-one. Books you were going to write with letters for titles.
Have you read his F? O yes, but I prefer Q. Yes, but W is wonderful. O
yes, W. Remember your epiphanies85 written on green oval leaves, deeply
deep, copies to be sent if you died to all the great libraries of the world,
including Alexandria?86 Someone was to read them there after a few
thousand years, a mahamanvantara.87 Pico della Mirandola88 like. Ay, very
like a whale.88 When one reads these strange pages of one long gone one
feels that one is at one with one who once 89. . .
The grainy sand had gone from under his feet. His boots trod again a
damp crackling mast, razorshells, squeaking pebbles, that on the unnum-
bered pebbles beats,90 wood sieved by the shipworm, lost Armada.91 Un-
wholesome sandflats waited to suck his treading soles, breathing upward
sewage breath,91 a pocket of seaweed smouldered in seafire 92 under a
midden of man's ashes. He coasted them, walking warily. A porterbottle
stood up, stogged92 to its waist, in the cakey sand dough. A sentinel: isle
of dreadful thirst.93 Broken hoops on the shore; at the land a maze of
dark cunning nets; farther away chalkscrawled backdoors and on the
higher beach a dryingline with two crucified shirts. Ringsend: wigwams
of brown steersmen and master mariners.94 Human shells.
He halted. I have passed the way to aunt Sara's. Am I not going there?
Seems not. No-one about. He turned northeast and crossed the firmer sand
towards the Pigeonhouse.95
--Qui vous a mis dans cette fichue position?
--C'est le pigeon, Joseph.96
Patrice, home on furlough, lapped warm milk with me in the bar MacMahon.97
Son of the wild goose, Kevin Egan98 of Paris. My father's a bird, he lap-
ped the sweet lait chaud 99 with pink young tongue, plump bunny's face.
Lap, Lapin.100 He hopes to win in the gros lots.101 About the nature of women
he read in Michelet.102 But he must send me La vie de Jesus by M. Leo Taxil.103
Lent it to his friend.
--C'est tordant, vous savez. Moi, je suis socialiste. Je ne crois pas en
l'existence de Dieu. Faut pas le dire a mon pere.
--Il croit?
--Mon pere, oui.104
Schluss.105 He laps.
My Latin quarter hat. God, we simply must dress the character. I want
puce gloves.106 You were a student, weren't you? Of what in the other de-
vil's name? Paysayenn.107 P. C. N., you know: Physiques, Chimiques et Na-
turelles.108 Aha. Eating your groatsworth of mou en civet,109 fleshpots of
Egypt,110 elbowed by belching cabmen. Just say in the most natural tone:
when I was in Paris; boul' mich',111 I used to. Yes, used to carry punched
tickets to prove an alibi if they arrested you for murder somewhere.
Justice. On the night of the seventeenth of February 1904 the prisoner
was seen by two witnesses.112 Other fellow did it: other me. Hat, tie,
overcoat, nose. Lui, c'est moi.113 You seem to have enjoyed yourself.
Proudly walking. Whom were you trying to walk like? Forget: a dispos-
sessed. With mother's money order, eight shillings, the banging door
of the post office slammed in your face by the usher. Hunger toothache.
Encore deux minutes.114 Look clock. Must get. Ferme.115 Hired dog! Shoot
him to bloody bits with a bang shotgun, bits man spattered walls all brass
buttons. Bits all khrrrrklak in place clack back. Not hurt? O, that's all
right. Shake hands. See what I meant, see? O, that's all right. Shake a
shake. O, that's all only all right.
You were going to do wonders, what? Missionary to Europe after fiery
Columbanus. Fiacre and Scotus116 on their creepystools117 in heaven spilt
from their pintpots, loudlatinlaughing: Euge! Euge!118 Pretending to speak
broken English as you dragged your valise, porter threepence, across the
slimy pier at Newhaven.119 Comment?120 Rich booty you brought back; Le
Tutu,121 five tattered numbers of Pantalon Blanc et Culotte Rouge;122 a
blue French telegram, curiosity to show:
--Mother dying come home father.
The aunt thinks you killed your mother. That's why she won't.
Then here's a health to Mulligan's Aunt
And I'll tell you the reason why.
She always kept things decent in
The Hannigan Famileye.123
His feet marched in sudden proud rhythm over the sand furrows, along
by the boulders of the south wall.124 He stared at them proudly, piled
stone mammoth skulls. Gold light on sea, on sand, on boulders. The
sun is there, the slender trees, the lemon houses.
Paris rawly waking, crude sunlight on her lemon streets. Moist pith of
farls125 of bread, the froggreen wormwood,126 her matin incense, court the
air. Belluomo127 rises from the bed of his wife's lover's wife, the kerchiefed
housewife is astir, a saucer of acetic acid128 in her hand. In Rodot's129 Yvonne
and Madeleine newmake their tumbled beauties, shattering with gold teeth
chaussons130 of pastry, their mouths yellowed with the pus131 of Flan breton.132
Faces of Paris men go by, their wellpleased pleasers,133 curled conquistadores.133
Noon slumbers.134 Kevin Egan rolls gunpowder135 cigarettes through fingers
smeared with printer's ink,136 sipping his green fairy as Patrice his white.137
About us gobblers fork spiced beans down their gullets. Un demi setier! 138
A jet of coffee steam from the burnished caldron. She serves me at his
beck. Il est Irlandais. Hollandais? Non fromage. Deux Irlandais, nous,
Irlande, vous savez ah, oui!139 She thought you wanted a cheese hollandais.
Your postprandial, do you know that word? Postprandial. There was a fel-
low I knew once in Barcelona, queer fellow, used to call it his post-
prandial. Well: slainte!140 Around the slabbed tables the tangle of wined
breaths and grumbling gorges. His breath hangs over our saucestained
plates, the green fairy's fang141 thrusting between his lips. Of Ireland,
the Dalcassians,142 of hopes, conspiracies, of Arthur Griffith143 now, A E,
pimander, good shepherd of men.144 To yoke me as his yokefellow, our crimes
our common cause.145 You're your father's son. I know the voice.146 His fustian
shirt, sanguineflowered, trembles its Spanish tassels147 at his secrets. M.
Drumont,148 famous journalist, Drumont, know what he called queen Victoria?
Old hag with the yellow teeth. Vieille ogresse with the dents jaunes.149
Maud Gonne,150 beautiful woman, La Patrie, M. Millevoye,151 Felix Faure, know
how he died?152 Licentious men. The froeken,153 bonne a tout 154faire, who
rubs male nakedness in the bath at Upsala. Moi faire, she said, tous les
messieurs.155 Not this monsieur, I said. Most licentious custom. Bath a most
private thing. I wouldn't let my brother, not even my own brother, most
lascivious thing. Green eyes, I see you. Fang, I feel.156 Lascivious people.
The blue fuse burns deadly between hands and burns clear. Loose tobacco-
shreds catch fire: a flame and acrid smoke light our corner. Raw facebones
under his peep of day boy's hat.157 How the head centre got away,158 authentic
version. Got up as a young bride, man, veil, orangeblossoms, drove out
the road to Malahide.159 Did, faith. Of lost leaders,160 the betrayed, wild
escapes. Disguises, clutched at, gone, not here.
Spurned lover. I was a strapping young gossoon161 at that time, I tell you.
I'll show you my likeness one day. I was, faith. Lover, for her love he
prowled with colonel Richard Burke,162 tanist of his sept,163 under the walls
of Clerkenwell and, crouching,164 saw a flame of vengeance hurl them upward
in the fog. Shattered glass and toppling masonry. In gay Paree he hides,
Egan of Paris, unsought by any save by me. Making his day's stations,165 the
dingy printingcase, his three taverns, the Montmartre166 lair he sleeps short
night in, rue de la Goutte-d'Or,167 damascened with flyblown faces of the gone.
Loveless, landless, wifeless. She is quite nicey comfy without her outcast
man, madame in rue Git-le-Coeur, canary and two buck lodgers. Peachy cheeks,
a zebra skirt, frisky as a young thing's. Spurned and undespairing. Tell
Pat you saw me, won't you? I wanted to get poor Pat a job one time. Mon
fils,168 soldier of France. I taught him to sing The Boys of Kilkenny are
Stout Roaring Blades.169 Know that old lay? I taught Patrice that. Old Kil-
kenny:170 saint Canice,171 Strongbow's castle on the Nore.172 Goes like this. O,
O. He takes me, Napper Tandy, by the hand.173
O, O the boys of
Kilkenny . . .
Weak wasting hand on mine. They have forgotten Kevin Egan, not he them.
Remembering thee, O Sion.174
He had come nearer the edge of the sea and wet sand slapped his boots.
The new air greeted him, harping in wild nerves, wind of wild air of
seeds of brightness.175 Here, I am not walking out to the Kish lightship,176
am I? He stood suddenly, his feet beginning to sink slowly in the qua-
king soil. Turn back.
Turning, he scanned the shore south, his feet sinking again slowly in
new sockets. The cold domed room of the tower waits. Through the barba-
cans the shafts of light are moving ever, slowly ever as my feet are
sinking, creeping duskward over the dial floor. Blue dusk, nightfall,
deep blue night. In the darkness of the dome they wait, their pushedback
chairs, my obelisk valise, around a board of abandoned platters. Who to
clear it? He has the key. I will not sleep there when this night comes.
A shut door of a silent tower, entombing their blind bodies, the pan-
thersahib and his pointer. Call: no answer. He lifted his feet up from
the suck and turned back by the mole of boulders.177 Take all, keep all. My
soul walks with me, form of forms.178 So in the moon's midwatches I pace the
path above the rocks, in sable silvered, hearing Elsinore's tempting flood.179
The flood is following me. I can watch it flow past from here. Get back
then by the Poolbeg road180 to the strand there. He climbed over the sedge
and eely oarweeds and sat on a stool of rock, resting his ashplant in a
grike.181
A bloated carcass of a dog lay lolled on bladderwrack.182 Before him the
gunwale of a boat, sunk in sand. Un coche ensable183 Louis Veuillot184 called
Gautier's185 prose. These heavy sands are language tide and wind have silted
here. And these, the stoneheaps of dead builders, a warren of weasel rats.
Hide gold there. Try it. You have some. Sands and stones. Heavy of the
past. Sir Lout's toys. Mind you don't get one bang on the ear. I'm the
bloody well gigant rolls all them bloody well boulders, bones for my
steppingstones. Feefawfum. I zmellz de bloodz odz an Iridzman.186
A point, live dog, grew into sight running across the sweep of sand. Lord,
is he going to attack me? Respect his liberty. You will not be master of
others or their slave. I have my stick. Sit tight. From farther away, walk-
ing shoreward across from the crested tide, figures, two. The two maries.187
They have tucked it safe mong the bulrushes.188 Peekaboo. I see you. No, the
dog. He is running back to them. Who?
Galleys of the Lochlanns189 ran here to beach, in quest of prey, their
bloodbeaked prows riding low on a molten pewter surf. Dane vikings, torcs
of tomahawks aglitter on their breasts190 when Malachi wore the collar of
gold.191 A school of turlehide whales stranded in hot noon, spouting, hobbling
in the shallows. Then from the starving cagework city a horde of jerkined
dwarfs, my people, with flayers' knives, running, scaling, hacking in green
blubbery whalemeat.192 Famine, plague and slaughters.193 Their blood is in
me, their lusts my waves. I moved among them on the frozen Liffey, that
I,
a changeling, among the spluttering resin fires.194 I spoke to no-one: none
to me.195
The dog's bark ran towards him, stopped, ran back. Dog of my enemy. I
just simply stood pale, silent, bayed about.196 Terribilia meditans.197 A
primrose doublet, fortune's knave,198 smiled on my fear. For that are you
pining, the bark of their applause? Pretenders: live their lives. The Bruce's
brother,199 Thomas Fitzgerald, silken knight,200 Perkin Warbeck,201 York's
false scion, in breeches of silk of whiterose ivory, wonder of a day, and
Lambert Simnel,202 with a tail of nans203 and sutlers, a scullion crowned. All
kings' sons.204 Paradise of pretenders205 then and now. He206 saved men from
drowning and you shake at a cur's yelping. But the courtiers who mocked
Guido
in Or san Michele were in their own house. House of . . .207 We don't want
any of your medieval abstrusiosities. Would you do what he did? A boat would
be near, a lifebuoy. Naturlich,208 put there for you. Would you or would you
not? The man that was drowned nine days ago off Maiden's rock.209 They are
waiting for him now. The truth, spit it out. I would want to. I would try. I
am not a strong swimmer. Water cold soft. When I put my face into it in the
basin at Clongowes. Can't see! Who's behind me? Out quickly, quickly! Do you
see the tide flowing quickly in on all sides, sheeting the lows of sand quick-
ly, shellcocoacoloured? If I had land under my feet. I want his life still
to be his, mine to be mine. A drowning man. His human eyes scream to me out
of horror of his death. I . . . With him together down . . . I could not save
her. Waters: bitter death: lost.
A woman and a man. I see her skirties. Pinned up, I bet.
Their dog ambled about a bank of dwindling sand, trotting, sniffing on all
sides. Looking for something lost in a past life. Suddenly he made off
like a bounding hare, ears flung back, chasing the shadow of a lowskimming
gull. The man's shrieked whistle struck his limp ears. He turned, bounded
back, came nearer, trotted on twinkling shanks. On a field tenney a buck,
trippant, proper, unattired.210 At the lacefringe of the tide he halted with
stiff forehoofs, seawardpointed ears. His snout lifted barked at the wave-
noise, herds of seamorse.211 They serpented towards his feet, curling,
unfurling many crests, every ninth,212 breaking, plashing, from far, from
farther out, waves and waves.
Cocklepickers. They waded a little way in the water and, stooping,
soused their bags and, lifting them again, waded out. The dog yelped
running to them, reared up and pawed them, dropping on all fours, again
reared up at them with mute bearish fawning. Unheeded he kept by them as
they came towards the drier sand, a rag of wolf's tongue redpanting from
his jaws. His speckled body ambled ahead of them and then loped off at a
calf's gallop. The carcass lay on his path. He stopped, sniffed, stalked
round it, brother, nosing closer, went round it, sniffling rapidly like a
dog all over the dead dog's bedraggled fell. Dogskull, dogsniff, eyes on
the ground, moves to one great goal.213 Ah, poor dogsbody! Here lies
poor dogsbody's body.
--Tatters! Out of that, you mongrel!
The cry brought him skulking back to his master and a blunt bootless kick
sent him unscathed across a spit of sand, crouched in flight. He slunk
back in a curve. Doesn't see me. Along by the edge of the mole he lollop-
ed, dawdled, smelt a rock. and from under a cocked hindleg pissed against
it. He trotted forward and, lifting again his hindleg, pissed quick short
at an unsmelt rock. The simple pleasures of the poor. His hindpaws then
scattered the sand: then his forepaws dabbled and delved. Something he
buried there, his grandmother.214 He rooted in the sand, dabbling, delving
and stopped to listen to the air, scraped up the sand again with a fury
of his claws, soon ceasing, a pard, a panther, got in spousebreach,215 vul-
turing the dead.
After he woke me last night same dream or was it? Wait. Open hallway.
Street of harlots. Remember. Haroun al Raschid.216 I am almosting it. That
man led me, spoke. I was not afraid. The melon he had he held against
my face. Smiled: creamfruit smell. That was the rule, said. In. Come.
Red carpet spread.217 You will see who.
Shouldering their bags they trudged, the red Egyptians.218 His blued feet
out of turnedup trousers slapped the clammy sand, a dull brick muffler
strangling his unshaven neck. With woman steps she followed: the ruffian
and his strolling mort.219 Spoils slung at her back. Loose sand and shell-
grit crusted her bare feet. About her windraw face hair trailed. Behind
her lord, his helpmate, bing awast to Romeville.220 When night hides her
body's flaws calling under her brown shawl from an archway where dogs
have mired. Her fancyman221 is treating two Royal Dublins222 in O'Loughlin's
of Blackpitts.223 Buss her, wap in rogues' rum lingo, for, O, my dimber
wapping dell!224 A shefiend's whiteness under her rancid rags. Fumbally's
lane225 that night: the tanyard226 smells.
White thy fambles, red thy gan
And thy quarrons dainty is.
Couch a hogshead with me then.
In the darkmans clip and kiss.227
Morose delectation228 Aquinas tunbelly229 calls this, frate porcospino.230
Unfallen Adam rode and not rutted.231 Call away let him: Thy quarrons dain-
ty is. Language no whit worse than his. Monkwords, marybeads232 jabber
on their girdles: roguewords, tough nuggets patter in their pockets.
Passing now.
A side eye at my Hamlet hat.233 If I were suddenly naked here as I sit? I
am not. Across the sands of all the world, followed by the sun's flaming
sword, to the west, trekking to evening lands.234 She trudges, schlepps, trains,
drags, trascines her load.235 A tide westering, moondrawn, in her wake. Tides,
myriadislanded, within her, blood not mine, oinopa ponton,236 a winedark sea.
Behold the handmaid of the moon.237 In sleep the wet sign calls her hour, bids
her rise. Bridebed, childbed, bed of death, ghostcandled. Omnis caro ad te
veniet.238 He comes, pale vampire, through storm his eyes, his bat sails
bloodying the sea, mouth to her mouth's kiss.239
Here. Put a pin in that chap, will you? My tablets.240 Mouth to her kiss.
No. Must be two of em. Glue em well. Mouth to her mouth's kiss.
His lips lipped and mouthed fleshless lips of air: mouth to her moomb.
Oomb, allwombing tomb. His mouth moulded issuing breath, unspeeched:
ooeeehah: roar of cataractic planets, globed, blazing, roaring way-
awayawayawayaway. Paper. The banknotes, blast them. Old Deasy's letter.
Here. Thanking you for the hospitality tear the blank end off. Turning
his back to the sun he bent over far to a table of rock and scribbled
words. That's twice I forgot to take slips from the library counter.
His shadow lay over the rocks as he bent, ending. Why not endless till
the farthest star? Darkly they are there behind this light, darkness
shining in the brightness,241 delta of Cassiopeia,242 worlds. Me sits there
with his augur's rod of ash,243 in borrowed sandals, by day beside a livid
sea, unbeheld, in violet night walking beneath a reign of uncouth stars.
I throw this ended shadow from me, manshape ineluctable, call it back.
Endless, would it be mine, form of my form? Who watches me here? Who
ever anywhere will read these written words?244 Signs on a white field.245
Somewhere to someone in your flutiest voice. The good bishop of Cloyne246
took the veil of the temple out of his shovel hat:247 veil of space with col-
oured emblems hatched on its field. Hold hard. Coloured on a flat: yes, that's
right. Flat I see, then think distance, near, far, flat I see, east, back. Ah,
see now! Falls back suddenly, frozen in stereoscope. Click does the trick.
You find my words dark. Darkness is in our souls do you not think? Flutier.
Our souls, shamewounded by our sins, cling to us yet more, a woman to her
lover clinging, the more the more.
She trusts me, her hand gentle, the longlashed eyes. Now where the blue
hell am I bringing her beyond the veil? Into the ineluctable modality of
the ineluctable visuality. She, she, she. What she? The virgin at Hodges
Figgis' window248 on Monday looking in for one of the alphabet books you
were going to write. Keen glance you gave her. Wrist through the braided
jesse of her sunshade. She lives in Leeson park249 with a grief and kickshaws,
a lady of letters. Talk that to someone else, Stevie: a pickmeup.250 Bet she
wears those curse of God stays suspenders251 and yellow stockings, darned
with lumpy wool. Talk about apple dumplings, piuttosto.252 Where are your
wits?
Touch me. Soft eyes. Soft soft soft hand. I am lonely here. O, touch
me soon, now. What is that word known to all men?253 I am quiet here alone.
Sad too. Touch, touch me.
He lay back at full stretch over the sharp rocks, cramming the scribbled
note and pencil into a pock his hat. His hat down on his eyes. That is
Kevin Egan's movement I made, nodding for his nap, sabbath sleep. Et
vidit Deus. Et erant valde bona.254 Alo! Bonjour. Welcome as the flowers
in May.255 Under its leaf he watched through peacocktwittering lashes the
southing sun. I am caught in this burning scene. Pan's hour, the faunal
noon. Among gumheavy serpentplants, milkoozing fruits, where on the
tawny waters leaves lie wide. Pain is far.256
And no more turn aside and brood. 257
His gaze brooded on his broadtoed boots, a buck's castoffs, Nebeneinander.258
He counted the creases of rucked leather wherein another's foot had nested
warm. The foot that beat the ground in tripudium,259 foot I dislove. But you
were delighted when Esther Osvalt's260 shoe went on you: girl I knew in Paris.
Tiens, quel petit pied! 261 Staunch friend, a brother soul: Wilde's love that
dare not speak its name.262 His arm: Cranly's arm. He now will leave me. And
the blame? As I am. As I am. All or not at all.263
In long lassoes from the Cock lake264 the water flowed full, covering
green-goldenly lagoons of sand, rising, flowing. My ashplant will float away.
I shall wait. No, they will pass on, passing, chafing against the low rocks,
swirling, passing. Better get this job over quick. Listen: a fourworded
wavespeech: seesoo, hrss, rsseeiss, ooos. Vehement breath of waters
amid seasnakes, rearing horses, rocks. In cups of rocks it slops: flop,
slop, slap: bounded in barrels. And, spent, its speech ceases. It flows
purling, widely flowing, floating foampool, flower unfurling.
Under the upswelling tide he saw the writhing weeds lift languidly and
sway reluctant arms, hising up their petticoats,265 in whispering water
swaying and upturning coy silver fronds. Day by day: night by night:
lifted, flooded and let fall. Lord, they are weary; and, whispered to,
they sigh. Saint Ambrose266 heard it, sigh of leaves and waves, waiting,
awaiting the fullness of their times, diebus ac noctibus iniurias patiens
ingemiscit.267 To no end gathered; vainly then released, forthflowing, wend-
ing back: loom of the moon. Weary too in sight of lovers, lascivious men,
a naked woman shining in her courts,268 she draws a toil of waters.
Five fathoms out there. Full fathom five thy father lies.269 At one, he said.
Found drowned.270 High water at Dublin bar.271 Driving before it a loose drift
of rubble, fanshoals of fishes, silly shells. A corpse rising saltwhite
from the
undertow, bobbing a pace a pace a porpoise landward.272 There he is. Hook
it quick. Pull. Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor.273 We have him.
Easy now.
Bag of corpsegas sopping in foul brine. A quiver of minnows, fat of a
spongy titbit, flash through the slits of his buttoned trouserfly. God
becomes man becomes fish becomes barnacle goose becomes featherbed
mountain.274 Dead breaths I living breathe, tread dead dust, devour a urinous
offal from all dead. Hauled stark over the gunwale he breathes upward
the stench of his green grave, his leprous nosehole snoring to the sun.
A seachange275 this, brown eyes saltblue. Seadeath,276 mildest of all deaths
known to man. Old Father Ocean.277 Prix de Paris:277 beware of imitations.
Just you give it a fair trial.278 We enjoyed ourselves immensely.
Come. I thirst.279 Clouding over. No black clouds anywhere, are there?
Thunderstorm. Allbright he falls, proud lightning of the intellect,280
Lucifer, dico, qui nescit occasum.281 No. My cockle hat and staff and
hismy sandal shoon.282 Where? To evening lands.283 Evening will find itself.
He took the hilt of his ashplant, lunging with it softly, dallying still.
Yes, evening will find itself in me, without me. All days make their end.
By the way next when is it Tuesday will be the longest day.284 Of all the
glad new year, mother,285 the rum tum tiddledy tum. Lawn Tennyson,286 gentle-
man poet. Gia.287 For the old hag with the yellow teeth.288 And Monsieur Dru-
mont,289 gentleman journalist. Gia. My teeth are very bad. Why, I wonder.
Feel. That one is going too. Shells. Ought I go to a dentist, I wonder,
with that money? That one. This. Toothless Kinch, the superman. Why is
that, I wonder, or does it mean something perhaps?290
My handkerchief. He threw it. I remember. Did I not take it up?
His hand groped vainly in his pockets. No, I didn't. Better buy one.
He laid the dry snot picked from his nostril on a ledge of rock, care-
fully. For the rest let look who will.
Behind. Perhaps there is someone.
He turned his face over a shoulder, rere regardant.291 Moving through
the air high spars of a threemaster, her sails brailed up on the crosstrees,
homing, upstream, silently moving, a silent ship.292