Below is a quotation, put into poetic lines, from Stephen's meditation while apparently making water -- 456-466 - in the Proteus episode of Joyce's Ulysses. It may well be that Stepehn is not urinating here, but masturbating. We are told at line 437 that "he lay back at full stretch over the sharp rocks, . ......." It could be, however, as in Laestrygonians, that he pees up (U.P: up). ) Is there an intentional ambiguity here as at the end of the "Calypso" chapter where Bloom mixes business with pleasure? (Later in "Nausicaa", Bloom says he was glad he saved himself.) The intention: the equation of masturbation with urination: elimination, the humblest of all creative acts.
Listen:
a four-worded wavespeech:
seesoo, hrss, rsseeiss ooos.
Vehement breath of waters
amid seasnakes, rearing horses, rocks.
In cups of rocks it slops:
flop, slop, slap:
bounded in barrels.
And, spent,
Its speech ceases.
It flows purling,
widely flowing,
floating foampool,
flower unfurling.
Under the upswelling tide
he saw writhing weeds lift
languidly and sway
reluctant arms, hising
up their petticoats,
In whispering water swaying
and upturning coy silver fronds.
Day by day:
night by night:
lifted, flooded and let fall.
Lord, they are weary:
and, whispered to,
they sigh.
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