Responsibilities Part 10

WISE MAN

A strange place that to fish in.

FOOL

They spread them out on the hills that they may catch the feet of the angels; but every morning just before the dawn, I go out and cut the nets with the shears and the angels fly away.

WISE MAN

(_Speaking with excitement_) Ah, now I know that you are Teigue the Fool. You say that I am wise, and yet I say, there are no angels.

FOOL

I have seen plenty of angels.

WISE MAN

No, no, you have not.

FOOL

They are plenty if you but look about you. They are like the blades of gra.s.s.

WISE MAN

They are plenty as the blades of gra.s.s--I heard that phrase when I was but a child and was told folly.

FOOL

When one gets quiet. When one is so quiet that there is not a thought in one's head maybe, there is something that wakes up inside one, something happy and quiet, and then all in a minute one can smell summer flowers, and tall people go by, happy and laughing, but they will not let us look at their faces. Oh no, it is not right that we should look at their faces.

WISE MAN

You have fallen asleep upon a hill, yet, even those that used to dream of angels dream now of other things.

FOOL

I saw one but a moment ago--that is because I am lucky. It was coming behind me, but it was not laughing.

WISE MAN

There's nothing but what men can see when they are awake. Nothing, nothing.

FOOL

I knew you would drive them away.

WISE MAN

Pardon me, Fool, I had forgotten who I spoke to.

Well, there are your four pennies--Fool you are called, And all day long they cry, 'Come hither, Fool.'

[_The Fool goes close to him._

Or else it's, 'Fool, be gone.'

[_The Fool goes further off._

Or, 'Fool, stand there.'

[_The Fool straightens himself up._

Or, 'Fool, go sit in the corner.'

[_The Fool sits in the corner._

And all the while What were they all but fools before I came?

What are they now, but mirrors that seem men, Because of my image? Fool, hold up your head.

[_Fool does so._

What foolish stories they have told of the ghosts That fumbled with the clothes upon the bed, Or creaked and shuffled in the corridor, Or else, if they were pious bred, Of angels from the skies, That coming through the door, Or, it may be, standing there, Would solidly out stare The steadiest eyes with their unnatural eyes, Aye, on a man's own floor.

[_An angel has come in. It should be played by a man if a man can be found with the right voice, and may wear a little golden domino and a halo made of metal. Or the whole face may be a beautiful mask, in which case the last sentence on page 136 should not be spoken._

Yet it is strange, the strangest thing I have known, That I should still be haunted by the notion That there's a crisis of the spirit wherein We get new sight, and that they know some trick To turn our thoughts for their own ends to frenzy.

Why do you put your finger to your lip, And creep away?

[_Fool goes out._

(_Wise Man sees Angel._) What are you? Who are you?

I think I saw some like you in my dreams, When but a child. That thing about your head,-- That brightness in your hair--that flowery branch; But I have done with dreams, I have done with dreams.

ANGEL

I am the crafty one that you have called.

WISE MAN

How that I called?

ANGEL

I am the messenger.

WISE MAN

What message could you bring to one like me?