Byron from "Camino Real" by Tennessee Williams

That's very true, Senor. But a poet's vocation, which used to be my vocation, is to influence the heart in a gentler fashion than you have made your mark on that loaf of bread. He ought to purify it and lift it above its ordinary level. For what is the heart but a sort of--
(He makes a high, groping gesture in the air.)
--A sort of--instrument!--that translates noise into music, choas into--order . . .
(Abdullah ducks almost to the earth in an effort to stiffle his mirth. Gutman coughs to cover his own amusement.)
--a mysterious order!
(He raises his voice till it fills the plaza.)
--That was my vocation once upon a time, before it was obscured by vulgar plaudits!--Little by little it was lost among gondolas and palazzos!--masked balls, glittering salons, huge shadowy courts and torch-lit entrances!--Baroque facades, canopies and carpets, candelabra and gold plate among snowy damask, ladies with throats as slender as flower-stems, bending and breathing toward me their fragrant breath--
--Exposing their breasts to me!
Whispering, half-smiling!--And everywhere marble, the visible grandeur of marble, pink and gray marble, veined and tinted as flayed corrupting flesh,--and these provided agreeable distractions from the rather frightening solitude of a poet. Oh, I wrote many cantos in Venice and Constantinople and in Ravenna and Rome, on all of those Latin and Levantine excursions that my twisted foot led me into--but I wonder about them a little. They seem to improve as the wine in the bottle--dwindles . . . There is a passion for declivity in this world!
And lately I've found myself listening to hired musicians behind a row of artificial palm trees--instead of the single--pure-stringed instrument of my heart . . .
Well, then, it's time to leave here!
(He turns back to the stage.)
--There is a time for departure even when there's no certain place to go!
I'm going to look for one, now. I'm sailing to Athens. At least I can look up at the Acropolis, I can stand at the foot of it and look up at broken columns on the crest of a hill--if not purity, at least its recollection . . .
I can sit quietly looking for a long, long time in absolute silence, and possibly, yes, still possibly--
The old pure music will come to me again. Of course on the other hand I may hear only the little noise of insects in the grass . . .
But I am sailing to Athens! Make voyages!--Attempt them!--there's nothing else . . .