13. Mask

TO have your face left overnight

Flung on a board by a crazy sculptor;

To have your face drop off a board

And fall to pieces on a floor

Lost among lumps all finger-marked

—How now?

To be calm and level, placed high,

Looking among perfect women bathing

And among bareheaded long-armed men,

Corner dreams of a crazy sculptor,

And then to fall, drop clean off the board,

Four o’clock in the morning and not a dog

Nor a policeman anywhere—

Hoo hoo!

had it been my laughing face

maybe I would laugh with you,

but my lover’s face, the face I give

women and the moon and the sea!