History

Close to midnight and the books are still open for the scholars to pore over.

One of them argues that The Renaissance was not so light and The Dark Ages not so dark. Another, unpictured behind the ghostly veil, quotes Hegel: We learn from history that we do not learn from history.

"O please", one replies, "just make some more coffee."

Hours pass as centuries are dissected.

Only provisional conclusions are come to. That the poor in 15th century France were oppressed; that the laboring class worked for two sous a day and half a pound of bread, performing the grunt work for the great building boom of the times; that the guilds and the church controlled day-to-day governance and that both groups expressed fealty to the crown.

Finally, sleep overtakes the scholars and the lights are doused.

In the morning they reconvene to consider the impact of Ezra Pound's interpretation of western civilization as presented in The Cantos, and listen to the poet read "With Usura."