V. What the Thunder Said
	After the torchlight red on sweaty faces
	After the frosty silence in the gardens
	After the agony in stony places
	The shouting and the crying
	Prison and palace and reverberation
	Of thunder of spring over distant mountains
	He who was living is now dead
	We who were living are now dying
330	With a little patience
	Here is no water but only rock
	Rock and no water and the sandy road
	The road winding above among the mountains
	Which are mountains of rock without water
	If there were water we should stop and drink
	Amongst the rock one cannot stop or think
	Sweat is dry and feet are in the sand
	If there were only water amongst the rock
	Dead mountain mouth of carious teeth that cannot spit
340	Here one can neither stand nor lie nor sit
	There is not even silence in the mountains
	But dry sterile thunder without rain
	There is not even solitude in the mountains
	But red sullen faces sneer and snarl
	From doors of mudcracked houses
	If there were water
	And no rock
	If there were rock
	And also water
350	And water
	A spring
	A pool among the rock
	If there were the sound of water only
	Not the cicada
	And dry grass singing
	But sound of water over a rock
	Where the hermit-thrush sings in the pine trees
	Drip drop drip drop drop drop drop
	But here there is no water
360	Who is the third who walks always beside you?
	When I count, there are only you and I together
	But when I look ahead, up the white road
	There is always another one walking beside you,
	Gliding wrapt in a brown mantle, hooded
	I do not know whether a man or a woman
	--But who is that on the other side of you?
	What is that sound high in the air
	Murmur of maternal lamentation
	Who are those hooded hordes swarming
370	Over endless plains, stumbling in cracked earth
	Ringed by the flat horizon only
	What is the city over the mountains
	Cracks and reforms and bursts in violet air
	Falling towers
	Jerusalem Athens Alexandria
	Vienna London
	Unreal
	A woman drew her long black hair out tight
	And fiddled whisper music on those strings
380	And bats with baby faces in the violet light
	Whistled, and beat their wings
	And crawled head downward down a blackened wall
	And upside down in air were towers
	Tolling reminiscent bells, that kept the hours
	And voices singing out of empty cisterns and exhausted wells.
	In this decayed hole among the mountains,
	In the faint moonlight, the grass is singing
	Over the tumbled graves, about the chapel
	There is the empty chapel, only the wind's home.
390	It has no windows, and the door swings,
	Dry bones can harm no one.
	Only a cock stood on the rooftree
	Co co rico co co rico
	In a flash of lightning. Then a damp gust
	Bringing rain
	Ganga was sunken, and the limp leaves
	Waited for rain, while the black clouds
	Gathered far distant, over Himavant.
	The jungle crouched, humped in silence.
400	Then spoke the thunder
	DA
	Datta: what have we given?
	My friend, blood shaking my heart
	The awful daring of a moment's surrender
	Which an age of prudence can never retract,
	By this, and this only, we have existed,
	Which is not to be found in our obituaries
	Or in memories draped by the beneficent spider
	Or under seals broken by the lean solicitor
410	In our empty rooms
	DA
	Dayadhvam: I have heard the key
	Turn in the door once and turn once only
	We think of the key, each in his prison
	Thinking of the key, each confirms his prison
	Only at nightfall, aethereal rumors
	Revive for a moment a broken Coriolanus
	DA
	Damyata: the boat responded
420	Gaily, to the hand expert with sail and oar
	The sea was calm, your heart would have responded
	Gaily, when invited, beating obedient
	To controlling hands
	I sat upon the shore
	Fishing, with the arid plain behind me
	Shall I at least set my lands in order?
	London bridge is falling down falling down falling down
	Poi s'ascose nel foco che gli affina
	Quando fiam uti chelidon--O swallow swallow
430	Le prince d'Aquitaine à la tour abolie
	These fragments I have shored against my ruins
	Why then Ile fit you. Hieronymo's mad againe.
	Da. Dayadhvam. Damyata.
	Shantih shantih shantih
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08/13/97	xanax@enteract.com