The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
(Prufrock among the Women)
by T. S. Eliot
   
“Sovegna vos al temps de mon dolor”  
     Poi s’ascose nel foco che gli affina.  
   
. . . Let us go then, you and I  
When the evening is spread out against the sky  
Like a patient etherized upon a table  
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets  
The muttering retreats 5
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels  
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:  
Streets that follow like a tedious argument  
Of insidious intent  
To lead you to an overwhelming question . . . 10
   
Oh do not ask “what is it?”  
Let us go and make our visit.  
   
In the room the women come and go  
Talking of Michelangelo.  
   
The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window panes 15
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window panes  
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening  
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains  
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys;  
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap, 20
And seeing that it was a soft October night  
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.  
   
And indeed there will be time  
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street  
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes; 25
There will be time, there will be time  
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;  
There will be time to murder and create,  
And time for all the works and days of hands  
That lift and drop a question on your plate: 30
Time for you and time for me,  
And time yet for a hundred indecisions  
And for a hundred visions and revisions  
Before the taking of a toast and tea.  
   
In the room the women come and go 35
Talking of Michelangelo.  
   
And indeed there will be time  
To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”  
Time to turn back and descend the stair  
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair 40
(They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”)  
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin  
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin —  
(They will say:  “But how his arms and legs are thin!”)  
Do I dare . . 45
Disturb the universe?  
In a minute there is time  
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse . . .  
   
For  
     I have known them all already, known them all  
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons 50
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;  
I know the voices dying with a dying fall  
Among the music from a farther room.  
     So how should I presume?  
   
And I have known the eyes already, known them all 55
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase  
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin  
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,  
Then how should I begin?  
— To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways? 60
     But how should I presume?  
   
And I have known the arms already, I have known them all  
Arms that are braceleted, and white, and bare  
(But, in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair)  
— Is it the skin, or perfume from a dress 65
     That makes me so digress?  
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.  
     And should I then presume? . .  
     And how should I begin? . . .  
   
Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets 70
     And seen the smoke which rises from the pipes  
     Of lonely men in shirtsleeves, leaning out of windows.  
   
I should have been a pair of ragged claws  
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas . . .  
   
And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully! 75
Smoothed by long fingers;  
Asleep . . . tired . . . or it malingers,  
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.  
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices  
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis? 80
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed;  
Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter,  
I am no prophet — and that’s no great matter:  
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker  
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker — 85
     And in short, I was afraid.  
   
And would it have been worth it, after all,  
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,  
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,  
Would it have been worth while 90
To have bitten off the matter with a smile  
To have squeezed the universe into a ball  
To roll it toward some overwhelming question —  
To say “I am Lazarus, come from the dead  
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all;” 95
— If one, settling a pillow by her head  
     Should say: “That is not what I meant, at all.  
          That is not it, at all.”  
   
And would it have been worth it, after all,  
Would it have been worth while 100
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets  
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor,  
And this, and so much more  
— It is impossible to say just what I mean!  
Perhaps it will make you wonder and smile: 105
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:  
Would it have been worth while  
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl  
And turning toward the window, should say “That is not it, at all;  
     “That is not what I meant, at all.” 110
   
No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor am meant to be;  
Am an attendant lord — one that will do  
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,  
Advise the prince:  withal, an easy tool;  
Deferential, glad to be of use, 115
Politic, cautious, and meticulous,  
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;  
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous;  
     Almost, at times, the Fool.  
   
I grow old . . . I grow old . . . 120
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.  
   
     Shall I part my hair behind?  Do I dare to eat a peach?  
I will wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.  
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.  
   
I do not think that they will sing to me. 125
   
I have seen them riding seaward on the waves,  
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back  
When the wind blows the water white and black.  
   
We have lingered in the chambers of the sea  
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown, 130
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.  
   
   
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock (Prufrock among the Women) — Although published in 1917, this poem appears in in Eliot’s college notebook, on which he had printed (and then crossed out) the title Inventions of the March Hare. Eliot later recollected that he had conceived the idea of the poem sometime in 1910.  In the notebook version, written in July of 1911, Eliot includes a thirty-eight line section titled “Prufrock’s Pervigilium,” of which he crossed out all but five lines, which appear here as lines 70-72, 73, and 74. When the poem actually appeared in print, Eliot had made numerous other small changes: he had altered and added punctuation, changed a few words, cut one line (line 105 here). He had also cut the subtitle (“Prufrock among the Women”).
 
“Sovegna vos al temps de mon dolor”
     Poi s’ascose nel foco che gli affina.
          
Eliot takes this epigraph from Dante’s Purgatorio, Canto XXVI. In this scene, the Provençal poet Arnaut Daniel comes from the flames of Purgatory to speak to Dante, saying “Sovegna vos al temps de mon dolor” or “Be mindful in due time of my sorrow.” Dante then notes, “Poi s’ascose nel foco che gli affina,” meaning “He dove back into that fire which refines them.” The sense we get is of great suffering, but also of hope, because when Daniel’s sins are eventually purged by the fires, he will ascend to heaven. When Eliot finally publishes this poem in 1917, he replaces this epigraph with another from Dante, this time from Inferno. This scene, from Canto XXVII, shows Count Guido da Montefeltro. He is in the Eighth Circle of Hell, the Circle of Evil (or False) Counselors, where the damned take the form of flickering flames, which remind Dante of fireflies. Guido speaks to Dante:
 

S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo
Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,
Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.

 
Translation:  “If I believed that my answer would be to someone who would ever return to earth, this flame would move no more, but because no one has ever returned alive from this gulf, if what I hear is true, I can reply with no fear of infamy.”
 
Michelangelo — Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564), painter, sculptor, and arguably the greatest of the Renaissance artists. His works include his famous statue of David and the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, among many others. He was also a poet.
 
fog . . . smoke — At the time, urban homes primarily used coal for heat. The coal, when burned, produced an acrid, yellow, sulferous smoke. Because London, which Eliot visited for the first time in the first half of 1911, is typically foggy during the cooler seasons, this sulferous smoke had a tendency to mix with the fog and hang in the air, causing burning eyes, nagging coughs, and all sorts of respiratory ailments. Of course, smoke + fog gives us the more modern term smog.
 
works and days — a reference to Works and Days by the Greek poet Hesiod (roughly 700 B.C.), a book that suggests that Man’s fate is to work, but that anyone willing to work will manage to live with at least a modicum of happiness; Hesiod is second only to Homer in his influence on early Hellenic (classical Greek) culture.
 
morning coat — a formal coat, almost always black, with tails
 
coffee spoons — At this times, a service of silverware had many more standard pieces than we typically see now. A coffee spoon (for stirring cream or sugar into a coffee cup) was considerably smaller than a teaspoon.
 
butt-ends — today called butts, the last inch or so of cigarettes that one discards after smoking because one can no longer hold onto them (cigarettes at the time were all unfiltered)
 
white, and bare — The suggestion is of a statue, since one cannot sculpt marble or other stone so finely as to reproduce body hair; the contrast is with “light brown hair” — suggesting flesh and warm-bloodedness — in the next line.
 

Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets — this line begins the section called “Prufrock’s Pervigilium,” not reproduced here

 
ices — sorbets or sherbets
 
my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter — The reference is to John the Baptist, a cousin of Jesus who baptizes him and announces him as the Messiah in the Gospels (specifically in Mark and Matthew). John is arrested, but King Herod apparently has no plans to do more to him. Herod’s wife, however, wishes John dead, and so conspires with her daughter Salome to trap Herod. Salome dances, and Herod offers her any gift she asks for. She asks for John’s head on a platter, and Herod (having made a promise) must have John beheaded.
 

Footman — a servant whose duties may include opening the door, standing tableside and fetching whatever is requested, and riding at the foot of a carriage so he can help people in and out of it.
 
Lazarus — The New Testament tells two stories of men named Lazarus. The more familiar one to most people recounts how Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead by entering his tomb and walking out with him. This story is told in John 11. In addition, Luke 16 relates a parable about Lazarus, a poor man, and Dives, a rich man. Both die, Lazarus goes to heaven and Dives to hell, where he begs Abraham to send Lazarus back to tell Dives’ brothers about the fate that awaits them if they do not change. However, Abraham tells Dives that if his brothers won’t listen to Moses and the prophets, they won’t listen to Lazarus either.
 
Perhaps it will make you wonder and smile — Eliot cut this line later; it does not appear in the published version.
 
magic lantern — a device that used light to project shapes and images onto a screen or wall, like a primitive slide projector
 
swell a progress — A progress is a royal or official procession through the countryside, but also refers to any group of actors and extras who march across a stage together, typically in a scene showing an official ceremony or a march into battle. Most of these actors do not have lines in the play, and thus their only function is to swell a progress, that is, to make the group look more impressive.
 
high sentence — serious thoughts expressed in formal language typical of a royal court or of a court of law
 

the bottoms of my trousers rolled — One may read this line in two ways. Either Prufrock is describing how he will have to begin to cuff his pants as he gets older (presumably because men shrink as they age), or he is referring to changing his style to be more fashionable: at this time, cuffed pants were just coming into style for the first time.
 
Shall I part my hair behind? — At this time, parting one’s hair in the back was a Bohemian style or affectation; in other words, it was the way all the young, avant-garde artists were styling their hair.
 
mermaids — Of course, mermaids are mythological creatures possessing the torso of a woman and the lower half of a fish. Mermaids supposedly called to sailors to tempt them into the water. Once with a mermaid, a man would live in a state of perpetual sexual bliss because the mermaid’s kiss allowed one to swim easily and breathe underwater. However, hearing a human voice would snap the man out of the mermaid’s spell; he would lose the ability to swim and breathe underwater, and he would drown.
 
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