at all times ready to hand, and I will stuff them
solicitously down
his
throat until he is fit to burst.
And another spirit was present, who was dressed
a little more loudly, a little bit flashily,
with slightly long and carefully trimmed gray hair,
and a wide black hat, and a gold watch chain,
and a ring on his little finger;
and he said, I will give this child
the most mysterious entertainment known to men;
I will open my temples to him, and show him
comedies and spectacles, and thrilling dramas
acted by people who have no idea what they mean;
I will fill his ears with music and human voices
coming to him across the silent air,
and bubbling up in his own room out of a box;
and I will seat him in the dark, and throw
before his astonished eyes a pageantry of living
so rich in action, emotion, triumph and tragedy,
that he could never experience or even see so much
in a thousand years of ordinary living;
I will also invite him into my night clubs,
and show him beautifully built and almost naked girls,
all washed and powdered, and tastefully set forth
in feathers and glittering glass;
and he will enjoy himself thoroughly,
while his ears are battered by the noise of bands,
and his nerves are set on edge, and his eyes are bright
with the lights and the joy of dancing,
and red with the smoke of tobacco.
And there was another spirit, much quieter, all in gray,
and wearing glasses, who spoke diffidently, and said,
I will do my best for him, I assure you;
my schools and libraries and colleges
are waiting patiently for him, with a thousand heads
ranged in rows upon our shelves,
and we will open those heads, the heads of all our great,
and spread the contents before him, and explain to him
carefully and earnestly what went on inside them;
