But who first said the word to come?"
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My dear,It's who first thought the thought. You're searching, Joe,For things that don't exist; I mean beginnings.Ends and beginnings--there are no such things.There are only middles." "What is this?""This life?Our sitting here by lantern-light togetherAmid the wreckage of a former home?You won't deny the lantern isn't new.The stove is not, and you are not to me,Nor I to you." "Perhaps you never were?" "It would take me forever to reciteAll that's not new in where we find ourselves.New is a word for fools in towns who thinkStyle upon style in dress and thought at lastMust get somewhere. I've heard you say as much.No, this is no beginning." "Then an end?""End is a gloomy word." "Is it too lateTo drag you out for just a good-night callOn the old peach trees on the knoll to gropeBy starlight in the grass for a last peachThe neighbors may not have taken as their rightWhen the house wasn't lived in? I've been looking:I doubt if they have left us many grapes.Before we set ourselves to right the house,The first thing in the morning, out we goTo go the round of apple, cherry, peach,Pine, alder, pasture, mowing, well, and brook.All of a farm it is." "I know this much:I'm going to put you in your bed, if firstI have to make you build it. Come, the light." When there was no more lantern in the kitchen,The fire got out through crannies in the stoveAnd danced in yellow wrigglers on the ceiling,As much at home as if they'd always danced there.
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