Robert A. Dun
THE SCENE AND THE ACT
For a long space motion fixed me.
Morning laid a flint of pale sun
On the rug. The fire fanned out slowly,
Warming. I watched a brown dog run
And turned to pick up wood. The sun
Fused life in my muscles, through the wool,
A dry glow in the skeleton.
I drank water at noon from a pool.
Waiting for supper, I grinned at my son,
Browned and dirty. Even, I had begun
To enjoy my wife. At night I read,
Monk's hood in the book, and no nerve strayed.
But now this paper with its wine ads,
Claret, Burgundy, la
Fran~aise,
Italy
And Spain, and movies, violence and lust
In
a dark seat, dark-haired bitches,
Tight hips, tight breasts, stallion arms,
Softly dark mahogany and silver
Glow and flicker in some English mansion
In
a Village Park or Flowered Hills: all these
Surround me like a scene
In
which I have no act.
They gall the slow coals in me
Like bark on a log of brick.
