For I have known them all already, known them all;
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?
And I have known the eyes already, known them all—
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?
And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: "I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all"
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say, "That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all."
And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor—
And this, and so much more?—
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
"That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all."
Kristen and I once spent a summer night on a porch, when we were in our new 20s. A man spat off Eliot while we just gazed at each other in disbelief. Not only was it impressive that he was old and hanging out with 21 year olds, but the fact that he could recite the entire poem... and when you really thought about it... he was Prufrock. I couldn't stop thinking about that man tonight. I haven't seen him since but for a brief moment in October. The guy looked like he had his chips ready to cash... and when he walked? He stared at the floor. It was like he was ashamed of something. Sometimes that's all you can see in the eyes of old men... and I always wonder what it's like, what do they think about with their faces scrunched up... what are their most favorite memories to visit?
I think about my dad a lot lately... and it makes me scared when I think that one day he might wear that same face. I know that's a terrible thing to say, it's awful... but I don't mean it terribly. I don't think it's possible for that to ever happen to my father anyway. I guess it's just the way I romanticize things in my head. I heard he was on a train the other day to the Alps with my brother and of course, the first thing I think is... 'Rilke'. I guess I think of my dad because tonight I realized that all of the great men and literary writers that I respect and look up to the most are solitary. My favorite books are about people who are alone. The last book that made me cry was Norwegian Wood... it could be the flux of everything, and the uncertainty of direction... but it's curious to me nonetheless. Why men? Why solitude? Why do these apparent themes even infiltrate my dreams? Maybe it's because Los Angeles is spawning up so suddenly... (tomorrow) and the last time I stayed in Los Angeles for a while, I read Women in coffee shops and wandered around the city aimlessly when Alex's apartment made me restless.
I've been dreaming about my friend from Brooklyn lately. It's always so Norwegian Wood too, from the two people in the fields... to the subway hopping and letter writing. Zee is always distressed in these dreams and everytime I try to help out, my feet sink into the ground and I can't move. I always wake up crying. So I write to him, right? I ask him if everything is ok.... when he responds... they aren't and he tells me we should embark on an adventure together. (But I can't.) But mostly Zee is the only one actually doing it, living it... and not conforming to the mold. And then there's dreams of my once best friend, the one things got heavy with and then faded. We never speak to each other in dreams, we just look at each other... in the last we were holding hands but still? He wouldn't say a word... and neither would I.
It's curious to me now too, that every man that I've ever become really close to are a bunch of Prufrocks. All my best friends are misunderstood men. I don't know if that says anything about me or not. But I've listened to all their stories... and I know how women misconstrue things... and maybe this is why I never trust most any woman, or man for that matter, especially when relationships are concerned. But they're all good men and their stories are sometimes trite and all the while fascinating. I've picked them up in drunken stupors and put them to bed and tiptoed out of their rooms... only to get coffee later that week and listen some more. I've never dated any of them... and the men that I have dated have had serious trust issues and bad relationships, whether it be with a parent... or some sort of fucked abandonment issues because they've been cheated on and this or that. I just hope that none of them end up like the Prufrock reciter.
I'm sure this had a point when I had originally started to write it... but I can't make sense of it now. I mostly just wanted to post an excerpt from that poem... and I guess now everybody knows that I sometimes sit in my room thinking about old men and get sad? Quirky, right? Not so much.
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.
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