MIXTURE

All things seem fixed....
The little grass plots in brown repose,
The softly-rustling trees,
~~kikkk~~ Through the paving rooted deep.
The mellow autumn vintage flows
Through life, here yellowing the leaves,
That dance down whirling to their season's sleep,
Stirred by the drunken breeze.

The cots are fixed....
The patients come....and go...
Death conquers or the sap of health returns
To build the wreck and ruin of cities strong.
The doctors and the internes pass along,
The nurses flit, light-footed to and fro
To wet the dry tongue, soothe the flesh that burns.

And he stays fixed,
walls,
Like the ~~kikkk~~, like the cots.
And yellow is his blood,
Like the grass blades in the plots.
Seven times the brown-ripe season,
Has mellowed round him here,
Where the spirits of Hope and Pity meet and brood.

He is fixed,
Sans thought or reason.
When first they brought him in,
With the chancre corroding his throat,

FIXTURE

The poisons spreading within,
His mind was an oven of fire,
With all of his senses a float,
In that furnace of victims of sin,
Where the vengeance-crazed gods in their ire
Consign
Their unfortunate wrecks of desire.

There fixed,
But brave with the bravery of madness.
Day breaks, sun shines, rain falls,
Time patterns from season to season,
And he is fixed in those walls,
Without joy, without sadness.

Firmly fixed,
He looks with fixed eyes, empty eyes,
At the bountiful skies,
From the end of the long corridor.
All persons and things he calls friend
Sand difference... One questioned him, when it would end?
And he said with no life in his voice, in his eyes:
Jusqu'au mort!

FIXTURE

All things seem fixed....
The little grass plots in brown repose,
The softly-rustling trees,
Through the paving rooted deep.
The mellow autumn vintage flows
Through life, here yellowing the leaves,
That dance down whirling to their season's sleep,
Stirred by the drunken breeze.

The cots are fixed...
The patients come... and go...
Death conquers or the sap of health returns
To build the wreck and ruin of cities strong.
The doctors and the internes pass along,
The nurses flit, light-footed to and fro
To wet the dry tongue, soothe the flesh that burns.

And he stays fixed,
Like the walls, like the cots.
And yellow is his blood,
Like the grass blades in the plots.
Seven times the brown-ripe season,
Has mellowed round him here,
Where the spirits of Hope and Pity meet and brood.

2

FIXTURE

He is fixed,
Sans thought or reason.
When first they brought him in,
With the chancre corroding his throat,
The poisons spreading within,
His mind was an oven of fire,
With all of his senses afloat,
In that furnace of victims of sin,
Where the vengeance-crazed gods in their ire
Consign
Their unfortunate wrecks of desire.

Firmly fixed,
He looks with fixed eyes, empty eyes,
At the bountiful skies,
From the end of the long corridor.
All persons and things he calls friend
Sans difference... One questioned him, when it would end?
And he said with no life in his voice, in his eyes:
Jusqu'au mort!

SKELETON

MUMMY

All of his flesh has fallen away,
Between the skin and the bone,
Muscle and blood dried up in decay,
Leaving the skeleton.

And out of that skeleton has leaked
The last reserve of marrow,
The sappers unseen their vengeance have wreaked,
There is nothing left to harrow.

MUMMY

All of his flesh has fallen away
Between the skin and the bone,
Muscle and blood dried up in decay,
Leaving the skeleton.

THE VOID

He crouches strangely in the little bed
And earnestly stares blankly into space,
Reason forever more from him has fled,
A child's mind settles sadly on his face.

The classic loveliness of plain white walls,
The shadows softening the long, low ceiling,
Against the low dull lights at evening fall,
Impart to the sick room a holy feeling.

Maybe no hand once trembled with desire,
Sheer love of form, to touch that ugly brow,
But here disease-transformed, scourged by the fire,
Beauty the loftiest has touched it now.

THE VOID

He crouches strangely in the little bed
And earnestly stares blankly into space,
For his mind has fled,
A child's mind settles sadly on his face.
The classic loveliness of plain white walls,
The shadows softening the long, low ceiling,
Against the low dull lights at evening fall,
Impart to the sick room a holy feeling.

Maybe no hand once trembled with desire,
But there disease-transformed, scourged by the fire,
Beauty the loftiest has touched it now.

EPHEBE

1

The key was turned and opened wide the door,
And he was bidden and compelled to enter,
His spirit like lead within his body sore.
He passed within and to the awful center,
And found the monarch grim upon his throne,
Around which Strength was broken in his place,
And Beauty shrunken to a hollow moan,
And Love unmasked an obscene ugly face.

There might weakened received the knock-out blows,
After a little triumph in the ropes,
And Beauty hid her horror in the dust,
And the Diety of disease in white repose,
Warned from its purple place against all hopes,
Those stricken with the malady of Lust.

11

IF he had lived in high Renaissance days,
He might have moved a Michel Angelo;
And Raphael might have put angelic rays
Around his golden head and made it glow
With loveliness eternal like a star:
His figure would adorn an altar place,
And women feeling beauty at the bar,
Kneeling to God would dwell upon his face.

But in this Age of Hypocrites afraid
And smug of rank respectabilities,
He chose the dubious freedom of the shade,
The way of easy opportunities,
And mindless following a whim perverse,
Is victim of Desire's scourge and curse.

MORNING

The key was turned and opened wide the door,
And he was bidden and compelled to enter,
His spirit like lead within his body sore.
He passed within and to the x awful center,
 Grim upon And found the monarch his throne,
Around which Strength was broken in his place,
And Beauty shrunken to a hollow moan,
And Love unmasked an obscene ugly face.

There Might weakened received the knock-out blows,
After a little triumph in the ropes,
And Beauty hid her horror in the dust,
And the Diety of disease in white repose,
Warned from its purple place against all hopes,
Those stricken with the malady of Lust.

[THE PATIENT]

Disease confines you here in this long room
And heavy-handed holds you to your bed,
And circles you an oval ring of gloom,
An aureole of pain around your head.

If ever yet you go out of this place,
Your flesh will no more youthful grow and strong,
Nor sorrow say farewell to your sick face,
Disease has held you in his grip so long.

Whether you be with sympathetic friends,
Amidst their joys a warning skeleton,
Or find an anchorage where sorrow blends
With understanding love and peace is won,

Always the shadow-ring will circle you,
Indelibly pain-starred your haunting brow,
Wearing its sombre, never-changing hue,
Ever the same as it is wearing now.

Your heart in its confinement may grow wise,
But oh your flesh will be as dead as dust!
Except the wonder of your burning eyes,
The awful beauty of their austere lust.

Before the noontide meal the final moan
Escaped him and we knew that he was ill done,
Done with sick physicians, medicine, Desire
And adolescent Passion just begun.

He should have ended struggle long before,
The doctors said, in four and twenty hours,
But he was very young and fought for life,
Like a brave youth against Death's tigerish powers.

Oh how Death tore and harried at his heart!
And how in fear and fever fought he back,
Trying to walk, to stand, to sit, to talk,
Until he was laid flat upon the rack.

One week before I watched him take the air,
But faltering he could not make the ax way,
His sinews were too macilent to fight
Tuber of lar-and chronic gonorrhea.

He turned away his tender rolling eyes,
Melting us speechless as our own they met,
When softly he called for, but could not smoke,
Coughing incessantly, a cigarette.

Each woeful moan went through our tortured nerves,
Our hearts puncturing as a spike a wheel,
Wounding us helpless there who nought could do,
To conjure Fate nor stop his certain seal.

The strong drugs even brought him no relief,
We marvelled at that his frame could bear the strain!
Stretched taut and quivering upon the cot,
It seemed a special instrument of pain.

Before the noon he gave the last sad mean,
Succumbing to the fierce assaulting germs,
That harshly finished their foul work to cast
His empty carcase to the waiting worms.

JOHN SIMON GUGGENHEIM MEMORIAL FOUNDATION

551 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y.

1934

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Hon. Simon Guggenheim Mrs. Simon Guggenheim
Francis H. Brownell Carroll A. Wilson
~~Charles D. Hilles~~ Charles D. Hilles
~~Roger W. Straus~~
Charles Earl

The Board of Trustees announce the award of John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowships, for the purposes specified, to the following-named persons:-

MR. CONRAD AIKEN, poet and novelist, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Creative writing, abroad.

DR. GEOFFROY ATKINSON, Professor of Romance Languages, Amherst College, Amherst, Massachusetts: A study of the influence of accounts of America, Africa and Asia printed in French upon the thought of the French Renaissance, abroad.

MISS PEGGY BACON, artist, New York City: Creative work in the graphic arts, abroad.

DR. KENNETH TOMPKINS BAINBRIDGE, Assistant Professor of Physics, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Continuation of researches in nuclear physics at the Cavendish Laboratory of the University of Cambridge. (Renewal)

DR. FRANCIS WILLIAM BERGSTROM, Assistant Professor of Chemistry, Stanford University, California: A study of the methods used in certain European institutions for the investigation of heterocyclic compounds containing nitrogen.

MISS KAY BOYLE, novelist and poet, Paris, France: Creative writing, abroad.

MR. HOWARD COOK, artist, Springfield, Massachusetts: Continuation of creative work in the graphic arts, in the United States. (Renewal)

DR. ROBERT BIGHAM BRODE, Professor of Physics, University of California, Berkeley, California: Research in the field of collisions of electrons with atoms, chiefly at the Cavendish Laboratory of the University of Cambridge.

DR. GEORGE OSWALD BURR, Associate Professor of Botany, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota: Studies in the field of photosynthesis, in certain European laboratories.

DR. DOUGLAS BUSH, Professor of English, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota: The writing of a critical history of classical mythology and traditions in English poetry from 1700 to the present, in England.

MR. WILLIAM HENRY CHAMBERLIN, journalist, Lippew, U.S.S.R.: Continuation of the writing of a history of the Russian Revolution from the downfall of Tsarism in March, 1917, until the adoption of the New Economic Policy in March, 1921, abroad. (Renewal)

MR. FRANCIS CRISS, artist, New York City: Creative work in painting, and study of fresco painting, abroad.

MR. STERLING DOW, archaeologist, American School of Classical Studies, Athens, Greece: Studies of Athenian inscriptions, especially in relation to the new documents from the American excavations of the Agora, by the use of newly developed criteria for dating, in Athens.

DR. ARNOLD DRESDEN, Professor of Mathematics, Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania: The preparation of a book on the calculus of variations, at Pisa and the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton.

MR. LEONARD EHRLICH, novelist, New York City: Continuation of creative writing, in the United States. (Renewal)

111

If ever yet you go out of this place,
Your flesh will no more youthful grow and strong
Nor sorrow say farewell to your sick face,
Disease has held you in his grip so long.

Whether you be with sympathetic friends,
Amidst their joys a warning skeleton,
Or find an anchorage where sorrow blends
With understanding love and peace is won.

Your heart in its confinement may grow wise,
But oh your flesh will be as dead as dust.¹
Except the wonder of your burning eyes,
The awful beauty of their austere lust.

IV

Before the noonday meal the final moan
Escaped him and we knew that he was done,
Done with physicians, medicine, Desire
And adolescent Passion just begun.

One week before I watched him take the air,
But faltering he could not make the way,
His sinews were too macilent to fight
Tubercular and chronic gonorrhea.