Those Various Scalpels

Those
various sounds consistently indistinct, like intermingled
           echoes
    struck from thin glass successively at random — the
    inflection disguised: your hair, the tails of two
           fighting-cocks head to head in stone — like sculptured
           scimitars re-
peating the curve of your ears in reverse order: your eyes,
flowers of ice

and
snow sown by tearing winds on the cordage of disabled
           ships: your raised hand
    an ambiguous signature: your cheeks, those rosettes
    of blood on the stone floors of French châteaux, with
           regard to which guides are so affirmative:
    your other hand

a
bundle of lances all alike, partly hid by emeralds from
           Persia
and the fractional magnificence of Florentine
goldwork — a collection of half a dozen little objects
         made fine
with enamel in gray, yellow, and dragonfly blue: a lemon, a

pear
           and three bunches of grapes, tied with silver: your dress, a             
           magnificent square
    cathedral of uniform
and at the same time, diverse appearance — a species of
           vertical vineyard rustling in the storm of
conventional opinion. Are they weapons or scalpels?
           Whetted

to
brilliance by the hard majesty of that sophistication which
           is su-
    perior to opportunity, these things are rich
    instruments with which to experiment but surgery is
           not tentative: why dissect destiny with instruments
           which
are more highly specialized than the tissues of destiny itself?