Page:Selected Poems (Huxley).djvu/57

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TWO REALITIES.

A waggon passed with scarlet wheels
  And a yellow body, shining new.
"Splendid!" said I. "How fine it feels
To be alive, when beauty peels
  The grimy husk from life." And you

Said, "Splendid!" and I thought you'd seen
  That waggon blazing down the street;
But I looked and saw that your gaze had been
On a child that was kicking an obscene
  Brown ordure with his feet.

Our souls are elephants, thought I,
  Remote behind a prisoning grill,
With trunks thrust out to peer and pry
And pounce upon reality;
  And each at his own sweet will

Seizes the bun that he likes best
And passes over all the rest.