Fire (verse)
Duggan, Eileen
October 13, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL 555 ing about notes: one took them as a concession to write for five...
...What captivating simplicity...
...business...
...Authors, for instance, have fascinated It's not the simple fires we know...
...It was the very perfection of study...
...I notice it chiefly in matters of the -covered, you will remember, with salt, pepper, mustoilette...
...And all my subsequent life has been filled with par- Whate'er in hell may lick or flow, allel examples...
...necessity, but without enthusiasm...
...Recall Lucy Desborough's that I suddenly saw the truth : In this universe, part dewberries, and Emma Woodhouse's scalloped oysters...
...as I do it myself, it is insipid or a bore slightly inhuman, as well-as if the sufferings which or a task in the heroic performance of which I get she endured at her study-table were so distressing in overheated and pricked...
...My laces never `fall.' My silks never That watch the living with desire, And if the home of such be hell, `cling.' My hair never, never coils smoothly, or lets It is not well...
...Where are they gone...
...it has the unity and pleasurable appearance of classic She seemed to feel that I was not only stupid but achievement...
...puffs, curious pins for catching up scarves and laces-all find me as susceptible as Pope ever was...
...I have watched people do many things-knit, write I spoke out my envy to her one day, and it was the letters, cut roses...
...And to gire see these things put to their appointed uses-to watch We used to say when rain-pools dried a toilette built up with these fairy tools-is, I have The water went to heaven side, always felt, a really high artistic privilege...
...depends on part, and soul on soul, and my neighbor Or take the meals set forth by the great commissary was an unconscious artist, told off by (to use the phrase of English letters, Charles Dickens-the kidney pies, we were fondest of at the time) "whatever gods may the egg-hots, the glorified bread and cheese...
...It might the immortal feast David Copperfield gave Traddles even be that our relations were reciprocal, and that I and the Micawbers...
...a lack of ordinary, decent sensibility...
...the Owl...
...me by saying, "I'm at my desk every day at eight, and EILEEN DUGGAN...
...itself be caught back by `a deft twist of the wrist.' It For all the saints would linger by is not a rite before a snowy altar...
...pations left over from the day, or anticipations of And if one heard a moan, a call, dinner...
...All was equable and full of sion of a desk and the fact of beginning at the magic purpose...
...ing others dress...
...Recall be" to stage a bit of the ideal for my benefit...
...It is all the same...
...It is a delusion...
...One said to oneself: "How delightful ! I, are...
...But these notes All the subtle difficulties of the literary art seem to were somehow different...
...It is not well...
...hear, even, in the intervals of silence which the delicate The water comes to life again absorptions of dressing make necessary, their smooth, Within its Easter shower of rain, almost inaudible passage to their places ! Yet," con- But all those flames that leapt and shone, tinued my friend sadly, "dressing myself is a dreary Where are they gone...
...She was on excellent terms with Pallas and hour of eight...
...But conto pass them over unperceived, as I had done, argued sider food in literature, especially English literature...
...As they do it, sombre fury of her repudiation which opened my eyes...
...Dainty creams in snowy jars, silver Do not believe it...
...October 13, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL 555 ing about notes: one took them as a concession to write for five hours...
...Or do you hope sue the inquiry so far: but I did speak of this whole that somewhere, after years of toil and meriting, you matter of vicariousness to a woman much older than will find, in an unknown valley or a cloudy city, a devil I, a wise, poetic woman of the world, who said such as those four made and consumed around the fire "You are right...
...It was then Reread Lamb's dissertation...
...from first to last, it To watch the soft flames shake and fly is just dressing-disenchanted, hurried, halted impa- As once on seawood nights they flew, tiently for a missing clasp, shot through with preoccu- Updarting birds of green and blue...
...Something always lets in the daylight on The air is rich with ghosts of fire the process...
...Writing remains the same knotty, drudging work, doggedly knitted brow, no futile anguish of soul, no all its peculiar horrors quite untouched by the possestormenting half-idea...
...About that brushes, faintly perfumed waters, bottles rosy and banquet hung a spirit-an essence-a somethingviolet, gold-stoppered and translucent, delicate powder- which will forever escape you...
...What saint would have his peace at all...
...It is perhaps a degree less their nature and so evident in their manifestations that enthralling to watch one's fellow-mortals eat...
...It is all very odd...
...You merely sit (at your sure method of setting them down, a certain creative desk) and write for five hours daily-and there you finality...
...How deftly they are caught back with And even vet there's no one knows the comb ! What pleasure to watch the pins put in, to Where all the flying color goes...
...Yet I have tried it, and for me the spell is bartoo, will take notes...
...I did not pur- Atlantic, but this side of paradise...
...How soft But when the embers broke and fell, are the coils [recollect, this was years ago] of an- We said the fire had gone to hell, other's hair...
...From a child, I have taken delight in watch- tard, and mushroom ketchup...
...Here, in short, there was no ren...
...Do you imagine that there is was an unconscious (a very unconscious) artist, told such punch anywhere, not merely this side of the off to stage a bit of the ideal for hers...
...There was a charm in her have been met and defeated...
Vol. 4 • October 1926 • No. 23
