Hilda Doolittle - Asphodel

“What were you saying, darling?” “Darling” brought something with it. It was that Naples faun that held the wine jar or was it the marble bronze of the moss-green Narcissus? Was Narcissus still standing in the Naples gallery, with his naif yet so sophisticated gesture, his hand lifted, his head bent forward? Bronze that had been burned as they were burned beneath lava, smoke, ashes, dust, death, years, obliteration. Self of self was so buried. Who had said “darling”? Hermione leaned standing against the table, leaned standing and leaned staring. Who had said what? Who was she? Where was she? Moss green of a small bronze that had been unearthed and was still unpolluted? Should she be the same underneath, after it was all over? Would she be the same, herself the same, a statue buried beneath the kisses of the war, no, beneath the kisses of her husband? Did husband, “my husband” make it any better? What was she going to do, say? What would she think? Her thoughts were not her thoughts. They came from outside. But everyone was like that now, exalté, hungry, it was wonderful not wanting to eat, not worth it, exaltation. Exalted. They were exalted. “Mademoiselle could not drown her exaltation in the dead sea.” A French man had said that but she couldn’t now remember. Someone was coming toward her. “Jerrold.”

“How did you think the party went?” “Has it gone?” Why did she say that? It was a sort of cheap rejoinder, not worthy. Voices in the street. Someone might be returning. People had a way of straggling back for forgotten cigarettes, cases or lost papers or bits of uniforms, “I say Darrington, my word, I’ve left my” (whatever it was) “with you.” Did they make excuses to come back? People, people, people. People loving Darrington. Did they love Hermione? Darrington’s laugh. If only she were more robust, stronger. People loved Darrington. Boy in Blue, boy in khaki. Why do you love Darrington? All the men loving all the men and who could blame them, “you people don’t understand a thing about it.” No, they didn’t understand, knew nothing of the war, scrounging bread off Fritz. Did they really scrounge bread, why did they say such horrible things, “the whole place stank of Fritzes.” One came to accept such statements, over the top. You see, Troy town was down. Town, down. You see there isn’t any use struggling against Darrington for a world away, a world away, a world away the Winged Samothracian Victory is waiting. O if I would die and be out of it. What good is the food after you do get it, waiting in line with filthy devils, really hungry people who do care, do awfully care, after all, we’ve fed our faces all our lives and the things are so filthy when we do get them, they’re no use. Over the top of Troy town. Someone had returned.

“Who’s scratching?” “I don’t know. Don’t let’s open.” “But we can’t leave them there. It might be Captain Trent.” “Damn. Trent’s business isn’t now ours.” “Why not?” “Are you mad? He’s an Irish rebel—” “So’s Merry.” “That’s different.”

One had to admit it was different when one opened the door and saw her standing like a stage-set, all perfect, like a good curtain call, her strange mauve and old gilt gown making a picture of her. Merry was tall (though she sometimes seemed so tiny) standing against the velvet black drop curtain that was the black-black of the raid-darkened hall. “O, it’s Merry.” She was standing and now in a moment something in Hermione took fire, took flame. Something flamed up in Hermione like the white flame, the white flower boys wore now (invisible to but few of the rest) fastened to their blue or dark-blue or horizon blue or fawn brown uniforms. Merry. “O it’s Merry.” And in speaking Hermione felt something flame up in her, a ghost, a ghost of long ago and a strange poignant hurt that Mary (it was Mary then and Maria della Trinità) had given her. Her name was Princess Lointaine then and Maria della Trinità and that was long ago across a chasm and George Lowndes with his kisses, his scape-goat kisses was out of it, but you couldn’t say Merry was. Names, people. People, names. Merry came from across the chasm the other side, gold daffodils, someone reading poetry, things that weren’t any more true. Names make people. People make names. Her smile was the same jasmine white ghost thing that that flower was, that invisible flower that boys wore pinned so lightly. The flower of Merry’s smile was ghost-jasmine, she wasn’t alive really. Was she alive? How had she got there? Why did she stand there? She hadn’t rung the front bell downstairs. “How did you get in?” “Some of the people from the top-floor were rushing back from somewhere.” “O it’s those munition workers doing night shift. They have the top floor.” But why tell Merry that? Who were girls having the top floor, doing night shift while the rest of them danced and the glasses made islands and the boy with one arm stared and made her heart leap and fall down (a fish half dead that leaps on dry land) and her soul reach out, reach out saying look my white flower is as white as yours but she hadn’t, didn’t say it. “Wh-aats — up?” It was Darrington. Merry walked forward. She walked as an actress who has had her cue. She would, it was apparent, fall forward at the right moment into one of the big chairs. Her cue would be step to right, stagger unsteadily, fall gracefully. But she hadn’t spoken her lines yet. Darrington was standing. Hermione was standing. Take two paces to the right, pull the curtains that are already pulled for there is a faint rumble (a stage rumble) far and far and far. Stage rumble. It reminded her of a melo-dramatic Civil War play that she had seen as a school girl. Rushings, uniforms blue and grey. “They are firing on Richmond to-night.” That play was called “Shenandoah.” What was this? On leave? Permission. Take your choice ladies and gentlemen for we can’t choose the parts we play but we can name our own show. Call it “Permission.” Damn good show. They are firing on Richmond to-night. Troy town was obviously down. “Whaat-s — up?”

“Rather tired, that’s all.” Merry sat in the chair, she didn’t stagger but this didn’t seem right. She had come to say something, wasn’t saying it. Why did she stare white and white, jasmine-white? “Old Trent?” Darrington was a brute. You could see that Darrington was a brute. It couldn’t be possible that he said it and it hadn’t happened. They were in the wrong play. They are firing on Richmond to-night. This was the wrong play. They should be wearing crinolines, being Southern ladies, all made up crinolines, on with the dance let joy be unconfined . Soldiers weren’t real. There were boys wearing flowers but they were different. Darrington wore no flower. He would not be killed. You could tell when they would be killed for the flowers were white and ghost-white and white and jasmine white and the fragrance of the flowers reached you across dead Fritzes, across bread scrounged, across scrounging and billets and tight places and Mademoiselle in the family way. There were flowers and soldiers. The boys were flowers. Darrington was a soldier but why if he now felt it that way couldn’t he have gone in the beginning? Captain Trent (pre-war Captain) was at least a real soldier not this pretence and was it true that Darrington had got the gas-helmets when he was a runner (a private, Private Jerrold Darrington 171892 and the rest of it, how often she had written it) was it true that he had got the officers out of a “tight place,” someone said he had done something decent but he was a runner and got somewhere and there was a gas attack and they sent him back for his commission. Maybe it was true. Private Jerrold Darrington and what difference now? What difference now? She liked him better then and the men (navvies) had called him Jerry and now things were different and things were different and the things were different. “Old Trent?” Who exactly was he? They are firing on Richmond to-night.