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The Triumph Of The Egg
A Book Of Impressions
From American Life
In Tales And Poems
By
Sherwood Anderson
In Clay By
Tennessee Mitchell
In the fields
Seeds on the air floating.
In the towns
Black smoke for a shroud.
In my breast
Understanding awake.
Mid American Chants.
To
Robert And John Anderson
Tales are people who sit on the doorstep of the house of my mind.
It is cold outside and they sit waiting.
I look out at a window.
The tales have cold hands,
Their hands are freezing.
A short thickly-built tale arises and threshes his arms about.
His nose is red and he has two gold teeth.
There is an old female tale sitting hunched up in a cloak.
Many tales come to sit for a few moments on the doorstep and then go away.It is too cold for them outside.The street before the door of the house of my mind is filled with tales.They murmur and cry out, they are dying of cold and hunger.
I am a helpless man—my hands tremble.
I should be sitting on a bench like a tailor.
I should be weaving warm cloth out of the threads of thought.
The tales should be clothed.
They are freezing on the doorstep of the house of my mind.
I am a helpless man—my hands tremble.
I feel in the darkness but cannot find the doorknob.
I look out at a window.
Many tales are dying in the street before the house of my mind.
There is a story.—I cannot tell it.—I have no words. The story isalmost forgotten but sometimes I remember.
The story concerns three men in a house in a street. If I could say thewords I would sing the story. I would whisper it into the ears ofwomen, of mothers. I would run through the streets saying it over andover. My tongue would be torn loose—it would rattle against my teeth.
The three men are in a room in the house. One is young and dandified.
He continually laughs.
There is a second man who has a long white beard. He is consumed withdoubt but occasionally his doubt leaves him and he sleeps.
A third man there is who has wicked eyes and who moves nervously aboutthe room rubbing his hands together. The three men are waiting—waiting.
Upstairs in the house there is a woman standing with her back