Quote #15

It is impossible to say just what I mean! But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen: Would it have been worth while If one, settling a Pillow or throwing off a shawl, And turning toward the window, should say: 'That is not it at all, That is not what I meant, at all.'

More from Thomas Stearns Eliot

  1. I am no prophet - and here's no great matter; I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker, And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my c…
  2. No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be; Am an attendant lord, one that will do To swell a progress, start a scene or two, Advise t…
  3. And I have known the arms already, known them all - Arms that are braceleted and white and bare [But in the lamplight, downed with light br…
  4. I grow old ... I grow old ... I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled. Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach? I shal…
  5. And I have known the eyes already, known them all - The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase, And when I am formulated, sprawling on a …
  6. We dwell with satisfaction upon the poet's difference from his predecessors, especially his immediate predecessors; we endeavour to find so…
  7. Do I dare Disturb the universe? In a minute there is time For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse. For I have known them al…
  8. Yet if the only form of tradition, of handing down, consisted in following the ways of the immediate generation before us in a blind or tim…

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