The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock T.S. Eliot's "The Love song of J. Alfred Prufrock" is a poem which enters the consciousness of its title character, whose feelings, thoughts and emotions resemble a man experiencing a mid-life crisis. Throughout the poem, Prufrock questions himself. He does so not after a performed action, nor during, but nearly before. He deeply considers everything he does, so that the consequences of his actions may not attract the attention of a society he sees lurking behind him. The poem revolves around how he feels inadequate, how his hesitancy results in inaction which he then tries to rationalize. "Prufrock" is a weakened, severely fragmented personality, one paralyzed by possibility, with virtually no capacity for effective action (McNamara 358). The mood of this poem crosses the line between world and consciousness. The first three lines "Let us go then, you and I,/ when the evening is spread out against the sky/ like a patient etherized upon a table " he draws a comparison between the usual beauty and romance associated with the evening sky and the paralysis of an etherized patient awaiting surgery (Eliot 1-3). Robert McNamara, in his article "'Prufrock' and the Problem of Literary Narcissism" claims that with this descriptive metaphor the possibility at once expands and contracts because the patient may dream anything or do nothing (365). McNamara also poses a rhetorical question suggesting that this metaphor is also a symptom of Prufrock's psyche (365). This metaphor of paralysis gives an insight into the character's state of mind. Prufrock constantly questions himself throughout the poem. At the top of the stair case, he asks himself, "'Do I dare?' and 'Do I dare?'" (Eliot 38). His reluctance brings the response to the question, which his self-conscious answers for the people waiting, "(They will say: 'How his hair is growing