Page:Collected poems Robinson, Edwin Arlington.djvu/184

 Not all forbearing, still, when I am gone, Say Socrates wrought always for the best And for the wisest end. . . Give me the cup ! The truth is yours, God's universe is yours. . . Good-by. . . good citizens. . . give me the cup" ... Again we waited; and this time we knew Those lips of his that would not flicker down Had yet some fettered message for us there. We waited, and we watched him. All at once, With a faint flash, the clouded eyes grew clear, And then we knew the man was coming back. We watched him, and I listened. The man smiled And looked about him not regretfully, Not anxiously; and when at last he spoke, Before the long drowse came to give him peace, One word was all he said. "Trombones," he said. That evening, at "The Chrysalis" again, We smoked and looked at one another's eyes, And we were glad. The world had scattered ways For us to take, we knew; but for the time That one snug room where big beech logs roared smooth Defiance to the cold rough rain outside Sufficed. There were no scattered ways for us That we could see just then, and we were glad: We were glad to be on earth, and we rejoiced No less for Captain Craig that he was gone. We might, for his dead benefit, have run The gamut of all human weaknesses And uttered after-platitudes enough Wrecked on his own abstractions, and all such To drive away Gambrinus and the bead From Bernard's ale; and I suppose we might Have praised, accordingly, the Lord of Hosts