WASHINGTON HOSPITAL
That's right, sponge off his face. My name? Oh, yes,
James Frothingham, a reverend, have the church
At the corner of Ayer and Knox Streets, Methodist.
As I was passing by a vile saloon
Some men were entering the back room, saying
Is he dead or drunk, and such things. I looked in,
Went in at last and saw this fellow there,
Hunched, doubled down into a chair asleep,
Mud on his face as you saw, clothes bespattered,
The smell of drink upon him. Then we took him
And brought him here, I helped, a Christian duty.
But more important, if he wakes I'm here
To bring his soul to Christ before he dies—
And he is dying. Yes, it's plain enough
The snows of death are falling. Sponge his face,
And wash his hands! I never saw such hands
Slender and beautiful! Now you have sponged
His face, look at that brow—it terrifies—
He looks now like a god—who is this man?
I'll tell you all I know: These men were talking
And this is what they said: This is the fellow
They voted yesterday from booth to booth,
They voted him twenty times, and kept him drunk
To vote him. First they found him at the station,
A little tipsy, talking of his griefs.
The conductor put him off here, being drunk.
And so these fellows for election day
Took him in hand and voted him around,
This was the talk.
Look at the curse of drink!
If he had touched no drink, he had not been
Tipsy to fall into these ruffian hands,
Who gave him drink and drink and used him thus
To violate the suffrage, lose his life
Through drink, as he will lose it. He is dying,
Death comes of Sin—what plainer truth than this?
Sin blinds, too, for that brow could comprehend
All things by using what God gave to it.
I do not know his name, with your permission
I'll search his pockets—yes, here is a letter—
No signature, looks like a draught—I'll read:
"Why have you wounded me with words like these:
'He has great genius but no moral sense,'
And written to another! Oh my love!
By this love which I bear you, by the God
Who reigns in heaven do I swear to you
My soul is like a wandering star, consumed
By its own passion, fire, and the eternal
Longing for the eternal, wandering, erring,
But flaming, loving light, aspiring to
The Light of Lights, some sun, I do not know.
It is incapable of aught but honor.
And save for follies, trifles in excess,
Which I lament, but which in men of wealth,
Or worldly power would never raise a word,
I can recall no act of mine to bring
A blush to your cheek or to mine.
My love,
My erring which has counted, by the test
Of strength or weakness for the game of life,
Has been Quixotic honor, chivalry.
And to indulge this feeling I have paid,
Though it has been my true voluptuousness,
My highest, purest pleasure. Yes, for this
I threw away a fortune, glad to throw it,
Rather than suffer wrong, though trivial,
As worldly men would count it:—for a father's
Laughter at my writing turned away
To follow voices, and defied his will
To harness me to business. So it is
To keep my spirit spotless from the world,
As I have visioned things, I came at last
By this deserted shore, alone, alone,
Now quite alone since you withdrew yourself,
Took back your hand and left me to my way,
Traveled so long that I can see the tomb
At the vista's end not very far.
Oh, love,
Why is there not a heart that loves but mine?
If you had been a Magdalen, I had pressed
Your head against my breast and kept you there—
But you—my spirit drifts with stricken wings—
But you because of gossip, crawling words
About my drinking, lies as I shall prove,
Can hold a handkerchief upon your eyes
To hide tumultuous tears, extend your hand
And say farewell forever, cut our lives
Of days or months, fragile and trivial
Asunder—when your hand, your faith, your love
Had cured me of my spirit's desolation,
My terror of this solitude in life—
Or if it cured me not, I had been eased,
And you had gained for giving—what have you
For your decision? Sorrow, if you love me,
Perhaps a conscience whisper that you failed
In justice, sacrifice; perhaps the thought
Life with me drinking, to the excess you thought,
Is better than a life where I am not.
What have you gained? In a few years we two
Will be at one with earth—before it comes
Are not sweet hours together worth the cost
Of a little drink? You who have riches, need not
My labors for your bread, but need my love,
Which you crush out. But as to drink, I swear
I do not drink."
Ahem! the fellow stirs
But will not wake, I fear. You heard that last:
He swears he does not drink. Drink and untruth
Go always hand in hand. This letter's long—
Let's see what he comes up with at the last:
"But as to drink, I swear I do not drink—
How if I drank could I produce the works
I have produced? A giant's task, when drink
Sustains me not, is not my nutriment
As hock and soda water were for Byron,
But sets me flaming wild, a little drink
Will set me flaming, poisons me, I know.
And yet I must partake of drink sometimes
For life is flying, is recession, we
Are shrinking back into ourselves, at last
The arms we shrank from close about us—death's.
And there are souls born lonely; I am one.
And gifted with the glance of looking through
The shams, the opera bouffe, and I am one.
Often after a stretch of toil when I
Come out of the trance of writing spent and wracked,
I used to walk to High Bridge, sit and muse,
(For this brain never stops and that's my curse,)
Upon this monstrous world and why it is;
And why the souls who love the beautiful,
And love it only and are doomed to speak
Its wonder and its terror are alone,
Misunderstood and hunted, fouled by falsehood,
Have crumbs upon the steps, are licked by dogs,
Or else are starved. And why it is that I
Must go about, a beggar, with my songs
Exchanging them for bread. And then it is
When this poor brain like the creative stuff,
The central purpose, whirls, as I have written,
And will not stop—drink! for oblivion,
For rest, to get away from self, back faster
From the pursuing Nothing.
Yet, my love,
Think out what causes judgments, standards, tastes;
And why it was that Southey, Wordsworth won
The organic national praise and Shelley lost,
And Byron lost it—Southey the sycophant,
Wordsworth the dull adherent, renegade—
These two against these spirits who came here
To sing of Liberty—and look at me,
A wanderer and a poor, rejected man,
While usurers, slave owners rule the land,
And the cities reek with hypocrites, who step
On Freedom and on Beauty, are rewarded,
Praised, fed and honored for it. Then behold
Your friend who loves you, hunted, buffeted,
For a little drink, when in spite of drink and even
Because of drink, who knows? I have achieved,
Written these books. And what is life beside,
Whether with drink or whether with abstinence,
Except to sing your song and die, what course
Can stave the event, the wage of life, not sin?
Oh if you knew what love I have for you!
All of my powers are not enough to tell
How all my heart is yours, how I have found
Eternal things through you, cannot surrender
Your love, your heart, without I lose some life,
Some vital part of me—and yet farewell,
For you have willed it so, and I submit.
I rise up in my loneliness, seek the sun
To shine about me in my loneliness,
Submit and say farewell."
He spoke some words!
What was it that he said? His head rolls over.
The man is dead! What was it that he said?
Something about "no more" it seemed to me.
Whom shall we notify? Go tell the police!
Here! wait, I overlooked some writing—yes,
A name is on this letter—why, look here,
It's Edgar Allan Poe!—I know that name—
He wrote a poem once about sleigh bells—
His brow looks whiter, bigger than it did.
Cover him with a sheet—I'll tell the police!