2 When the evening is spread out against the sky.
3 Like a patient etherized upon a table;.
4 Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,.
5 The muttering retreats.
6 Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels.
7 And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:.
8 Streets that follow like a tedious argument.
9 Of insidious intent.
10 To lead you to an overwhelming question .
11 Oh, do not ask, "What is it?" .
12 Let us go and make our visit.
13 In the room the women come and go.
14 Talking of Michelangelo. .
15 The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,.
16 The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes,.
17 Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,.
18 Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,.
19 Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,.
20 Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,.
21 And seeing that it was a soft October night,.
22 Curled once about the house, and fell asleep. .
23 And indeed there will be time.
24 For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,.
25 Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;.
26 There will be time, there will be time.
27 To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;.
28 There will be time to murder and create,.
29 And time for all the works and days of hands.
30 That lift and drop a question on your plate;.
31 Time for you and time for me,.
32 And time yet for a hundred indecisions,.
33 And for a hundred visions and revisions,.
34 Before the taking of a toast and tea. .
35 In the room the women come and go.
36 Talking of Michelangelo. .
37 And indeed there will be time.
38 To wonder, "Do I dare?" and, "Do I dare?".
39 Time to turn back and descend the stair,.
40 With a bald spot in the middle of my hair --.
41 (They will say: 'How his hair is growing thin!").
42 My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin, .
43 My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin -- .