Wise Man

Go to your mother, go--yet do not go. What can she say? If I am dumb you are lost; And yet, because the sands are running out, I have but a moment to show it all in. Children, The sap would die out of the blades of grass Had they a doubt. They understand it all, Being the fingers of God's certainty, Yet can but make their sign into the air; But could they find their tongues they'd show it all; But what am I to say that am but one, When they are millions and they will not speak--

[Children have run out.

But they are gone; what made them run away?

[The Fool comes in with a dandelion.

Look at me, tell me if my face is changed, Is there a notch of the fiend's nail upon it Already? Is it terrible to sight? Because the moment's near.

[Going to glass.

I dare not look, I dare not know the moment when they come. No, no, I dare not. (Covers glass.) Will there be a footfall, Or will there be a sort of rending sound, Or else a cracking, as though an iron claw Had gripped the threshold stone?

[Fool has begun to blow the dandelion.

What are you doing?