FRA SEBASTIANO.
Wait, for I am out of breath
In climbing your steep stairs.
MICHAEL ANGELO.
Ah, my Bastiano,
If you went up and down as many stairs
As I do still, and climbed as many ladders,
It would be better for you. Pray sit down.
Your idle and luxurious way of living
Will one day take your breath away entirely.
And you will never find it.
FRA SEBASTIANO.
Well, what then?
That would be better, in my apprehension,
Than falling from a scaffold.
MICHAEL ANGELO.
That was nothing
It did not kill me; only lamed me slightly;
I am quite well again.
FRA SEBASTIANO.
But why, dear Master,
Why do you live so high up in your house,
When you could live below and have a garden,
As I do?
MICHAEL ANGELO.
From this window I can look
On many gardens; o'er the city roofs
See the Campagna and the Alban hills;
And all are mine.
FRA SEBASTIANO.
Can you sit down in them,
On summer afternoons, and play the lute
Or sing, or sleep the time away?
MICHAEL ANGELO.
I never
Sleep in the day-time; scarcely sleep at night.
I have not time. Did you meet Benvenuto
As you came up the stair?
FRA SEBASTIANO.
He ran against me
On the first landing, going at full speed;
Dressed like the Spanish captain in a play,
With his long rapier and his short red cloak.
Why hurry through the world at such a pace?
Life will not be too long.
MICHAEL ANGELO.
It is his nature,—
A restless spirit, that consumes itself
With useless agitations. He o'erleaps
The goal he aims at. Patience is a plant
That grows not in all gardens. You are made
Of quite another clay.