My life hardly holds on in this heavy obscene book.
This large book, obscene? Alas, hardly obscene
At the price of my life and the being that I am!
And this life, and this existence, of so many nights
And of days combined to sum up their scandal
To make of this volume that pyramidal
Surface, grafted on again, as innuendo?
My God, without that they are old as it would seem, due to
Fifty well-sounded years crowned with verbena
And with worries their foreheads formerly vainly proud
And now in the severities of splendor
And I said everything so that no one could ignore it
Everything –and nothing, so we knew nothing, of course, that mattered to me
Really – and seemingly steadfast, above all, to put out of here
Any caution or reticence, I kept all caution
Under guard, and you follow me when I guided
My idea, and it’s good, why, it’s not obscene
Nor heavy enough, this book where I strode onto the stage