The Man With The Trumpet

by Sherwood Anderson

　　They had tongues like me, and hair and eyes.

　　I got up out of my chair and said it as definitely as I could.

　　Their eyes wavered. Something slipped out of their grasp. Had I been white and strong and young enough I might have plunged through walls, gone outward into nights and days, gone into prairies, into distances-- gone outward to the doorstep of the house of God, gone to God's throne room with their hands in mine.

　　What I am trying to say is this--

　　By God I made their minds flee out of them.

　　Their minds came out of them as clear and straight as anything could be.

　　I said they might build temples to their lives.

　　I threw my words at faces floating in a street.

　　I threw my words like stones, like building stones.

　　I scattered words in alleyways like seeds.

　　I crept at night and threw my words in empty rooms of houses in a street.

　　I said that life was life, that men in streets and cities might build temples to their souls.

　　I whispered words at night into a telephone.

　　I told my people life was sweet, that men might live.

　　I said a million temples might be built, that doorsteps might be cleansed.

　　At their fleeing harried minds I hurled a stone.

　　I said they might build temples to themselves.