402
Seek ye then that which art not there
In thine own glory let thyself rest.
Witness. Thy power is not bare.
PARTISAN REVIEW
Thou art King. Thou art at thy best.
Look then right before thee.
o
pen thine eyes and see.
At the foot of Mt. Serenity
Is thy cradle to eternity.
Utterly confused, Wilhelm said to himself explosively, What kind
of mishmash, claptrap is this! What does he want from me? Damn
him to hell, he might as well hit me on the head, and lay me out, kill
me. What does he give me this for? What's the purpose? Is it a de–
liberate test? Does he want to mix me up? He's already got me mixed
up completely. I was never good at riddles. Kiss those seven hundred
bucks good-by, and call it one more mistake in a long line of mistakes–
Oh, Mama, what a line! He stood near the shining window of a
fruit store, clutching Tamkin's paper, rather dazed, as though a charge
of photographer's flash powder had gone up in his eyes. But he's waiting
for my reaction. I have to say something to him about his poem. It
really is no joke. What will I tell him? Who is this King? The poem
is written
to
someone. But who? I can't even bring myself to talk. I
feel too choked and strangled. With all the books he reads, how come
the guy is so illiterate? And why do people just naturally assume that
you'll know what they're talking about? No. I don't know, and nobody
knows. The planets don't, the stars don't, infinite space doesn't. It
doesn't square with Planck's Constant or anything else. So what's the
good of it? Where's the need of it? What does he mean here by Mount
Serenity? Could it be a figure of speech for Mount Everest? As he
says people are all committing suicide, maybe those guys who climbed
Everest were only trying to kill themselves, and
if
we want peace we
should stay at the foot of the mountain. In the here-and-now. But it's
also here-and-now on the slope, and on the top, where they climbed
to seize the day.
Surface narry
is something he can't mean, I don't
believe. I'm about to start foaming at the mouth.
Thy cradle .
. .
Who
is resting in his cradle-in his glory? My thoughts are at an end. I
feel the wall. No more. So f--k it all! The money and everything. Take
it away! When I have the money, they eat me alive, like those
piranha
fish in the movie about the Brazilian jungle.
It
was hideous when they
ate up that Brahma bull in the river. He turned pale. Just like clay
and in five minutes nothing was left except the skeleton still in one
piece, floating away. When I haven't got it any more at least they'll
let me alone. "Well, what do you think of this?" said Dr. Tamkin. He
gave a special sort of wise smile, as though Wilhelm must now see what
kind of man he was dealing with.
"Nice. Very nice. Have you been writing long?"
"I've been developing this line of thought for years and years.
You follow it all the way?"
