Patience is a plant That grows not in all gardens.

You are made Of quite another clay.
FRA SEBASTIANO.
And thank God for it.
And now, being somewhat rested, I will tell you Why I have climbed these formidable stairs.
I have a friend, Francesco Berni, here, A very charming poet and companion, Who greatly honors you and all your doings, And you must sup with us.
MICHAEL ANGELO.
Not I, indeed.
I know too well what artists' suppers are.
You must excuse me.
FRA SEBASTIANO.
I will not excuse you.
You need repose from your incessant work; Some recreation, some bright hours of pleasure.
MICHAEL ANGELO.
To me, what you and other men call pleasure Is only pain.

Work is my recreation, The play of faculty; a delight like that Which a bird feels in flying, or a fish In darting through the water,--nothing more.
I cannot go.

The Sibylline leaves of life Grow precious now, when only few remain.
I cannot go.
FRA SEBASTIANO.
Berni, perhaps, will read A canto of the Orlando Inamorato.
MICHAEL ANGELO.
That is another reason for not going.
If aught is tedious and intolerable, It is a poet reading his own verses, FRA SEBASTIANO.
Berni thinks somewhat better of your verses Than you of his.

He says that you speak things, And other poets words.