 | My Lyrical Life |  |
IV. PART IV.
I mused and mused in great astonishment,
While on, and on, the growing wonder went
Within, without, on wings that widelier spread.
“How many things,” oft to myself I had said,
“I have to ask, if one came from the dead.”
And now I had my wish. My thought could rise
No fleeter than the answer filled her eyes
And flashed electric utterance with the whole
Illumined figure of a living soul!
While on, and on, the growing wonder went
Within, without, on wings that widelier spread.
“How many things,” oft to myself I had said,
“I have to ask, if one came from the dead.”
And now I had my wish. My thought could rise
No fleeter than the answer filled her eyes
And flashed electric utterance with the whole
Illumined figure of a living soul!
“More Laws than Gravitation keep us down
To the old place from whence the soul had flown.
Not every one in death can get adrift
Freely for life. Some have no wings to lift
Their weary weight: the body of their sin
Which they so evilly have laboured in:
Others will touch as 'twere the window-sill
To flutter back upon the ground-floor still.
Others yet grovel like the beast belogged
In the old ways, to which they are self-clogged.
Just as the Spirits of an earlier race
Of Man in dwarfhood, kept their dwelling-place
On earth, and revelling in the moon's pale rays,
Were seen as Wee Folk in old wondering days.
To the old place from whence the soul had flown.
Not every one in death can get adrift
Freely for life. Some have no wings to lift
Their weary weight: the body of their sin
Which they so evilly have laboured in:
Others will touch as 'twere the window-sill
To flutter back upon the ground-floor still.
Others yet grovel like the beast belogged
In the old ways, to which they are self-clogged.
Just as the Spirits of an earlier race
Of Man in dwarfhood, kept their dwelling-place
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Were seen as Wee Folk in old wondering days.
“A-many wander this side of the grave
To get the last glimpse they can ever have
Of those they loved, who will be lost in light,
While they go darkling and are lost in night.
They see them sometimes in the world of breath;
They part for ever at the second death.
Others would blot from out the book of Time
The published proofs of their long-secret crime
That glare so guiltily to spirit-sight.
Teachers who called Good evil; darkness light;
Who see more clearly in the unclouding day,
Strive to recall the souls they led astray,
And find the world, that once hung on their breath,
Goes by them now; heedless, and deaf as Death.
Some, who have done a wrong that, unperceived,
Ran to a sea of sin, are sorely grieved,
And ready to spend the next life shut from bliss,
Might they but right the wrong they did in this:
So clear, so awful, when the past is seen,
Grows the dark mystery of might-have-been.
To get the last glimpse they can ever have
Of those they loved, who will be lost in light,
While they go darkling and are lost in night.
They see them sometimes in the world of breath;
They part for ever at the second death.
Others would blot from out the book of Time
The published proofs of their long-secret crime
That glare so guiltily to spirit-sight.
Teachers who called Good evil; darkness light;
Who see more clearly in the unclouding day,
Strive to recall the souls they led astray,
And find the world, that once hung on their breath,
Goes by them now; heedless, and deaf as Death.
Some, who have done a wrong that, unperceived,
Ran to a sea of sin, are sorely grieved,
And ready to spend the next life shut from bliss,
Might they but right the wrong they did in this:
So clear, so awful, when the past is seen,
Grows the dark mystery of might-have-been.
“This happened under the broad shining day,
Right in the rush of life that makes its way
Through London streets.
Right in the rush of life that makes its way
Through London streets.
Slowly, 'mid that swift throng,
A thoughtful man went mooningly along;
More lonely in that wilderness of men.
And at a corner where the Devil's den
Is palace-fronted now—all gilt and glass—
Illuminating nightly all who pass
By the broad way to Hell with gin and gas,
And souls are sloughed, like city sewage, down
Dead-Sea-ward, through the sink-holes of the town,
He heard a pitiful voice that took strange hold
Of him; ran through his blood in lightnings cold;
Mournful, remote, and hollow, as if the tomb
Had buried a live spirit in its gloom,
Monotonously praying on below
A vast unutterable weight of woe;
A voice that its own speaker would not know!
As if unbreathing life were doomed to bear
Shut down on it the load of all the air.
He stopped.
A thoughtful man went mooningly along;
More lonely in that wilderness of men.
And at a corner where the Devil's den
Is palace-fronted now—all gilt and glass—
Illuminating nightly all who pass
By the broad way to Hell with gin and gas,
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Dead-Sea-ward, through the sink-holes of the town,
He heard a pitiful voice that took strange hold
Of him; ran through his blood in lightnings cold;
Mournful, remote, and hollow, as if the tomb
Had buried a live spirit in its gloom,
Monotonously praying on below
A vast unutterable weight of woe;
A voice that its own speaker would not know!
As if unbreathing life were doomed to bear
Shut down on it the load of all the air.
He stopped.
A woman clothed in rags he saw
With fixed beseeching eyes begin to draw
Him to her; left no power to say them nay.
With one stretched arm she begged; on the other lay,
Soft in a snow of gold, a Cherub Child!
So have you seen a Glowworm on the wild
Wide moorland; all the dusk a moment smiled.
With fixed beseeching eyes begin to draw
Him to her; left no power to say them nay.
With one stretched arm she begged; on the other lay,
Soft in a snow of gold, a Cherub Child!
So have you seen a Glowworm on the wild
Wide moorland; all the dusk a moment smiled.
“For the babe's sake he thrust a coin of gold
Into her hand! but, it fell through, and rolled
Ringing along the stones: he followed, found
It, brought it back and looked around:
There was no woman waiting with her hand
Outstretched, no Child, where he had seen them stand.
In vain he searched each by-way round about;
Through life even, never made the mystery out.
Into her hand! but, it fell through, and rolled
Ringing along the stones: he followed, found
It, brought it back and looked around:
There was no woman waiting with her hand
Outstretched, no Child, where he had seen them stand.
In vain he searched each by-way round about;
Through life even, never made the mystery out.
“The truth is, he was one of those who see
At times side-glimpses of eternity.
The Beggar was a Spirit, doomed to plead
With hurrying way-farers, who took no heed,
But passed her by, indifferent as the dead,
Till one should hear her voice and turn the head;
Doomed to stand there and beg for bread, in tears,
To feed her child that had been dead for years!
This was the very spot where she had spent
Its life for drink, and this the punishment;
She felt she had let it slip into the grave,
And now would give eternal life to save:
Heartless and deaf and blind the world went by,
Until this Dreamer came, with seeing eye;
The good Samaritan of souls had given
And wrought the change that was to her as Heaven.
At times side-glimpses of eternity.
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With hurrying way-farers, who took no heed,
But passed her by, indifferent as the dead,
Till one should hear her voice and turn the head;
Doomed to stand there and beg for bread, in tears,
To feed her child that had been dead for years!
This was the very spot where she had spent
Its life for drink, and this the punishment;
She felt she had let it slip into the grave,
And now would give eternal life to save:
Heartless and deaf and blind the world went by,
Until this Dreamer came, with seeing eye;
The good Samaritan of souls had given
And wrought the change that was to her as Heaven.
“It is not Crime alone brings Spirits back
To pull beside you in the wonted track.
Shadows of mortal care will cloud the brow
That should have shone as clear as sunlit snow:
And those who hindered here must help you now.
Not always can the soul forgive in heaven
Itself for deeds that have been long forgiven.
To pull beside you in the wonted track.
Shadows of mortal care will cloud the brow
That should have shone as clear as sunlit snow:
And those who hindered here must help you now.
Not always can the soul forgive in heaven
Itself for deeds that have been long forgiven.
“A wedded couple, bedded, snug as birds
In nested peace, one night must needs have words
Of strife before they slept. A foolish thing
Had on a sudden set them bickering;
Some wild-fire wisp had dropped a subtle spark
That kindled at a breath blown through the dark,
And all their passion burst in tongues of flame:
Their anger blinding both to personal blame.
She had been pillowed on his beating heart,
And in an instant they had sprung apart!
The arm that wound about her he withdrew,
And Night, with dark divorce, came 'twixt the two.
In nested peace, one night must needs have words
Of strife before they slept. A foolish thing
Had on a sudden set them bickering;
Some wild-fire wisp had dropped a subtle spark
That kindled at a breath blown through the dark,
And all their passion burst in tongues of flame:
Their anger blinding both to personal blame.
She had been pillowed on his beating heart,
And in an instant they had sprung apart!
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And Night, with dark divorce, came 'twixt the two.
“A little thing had plucked them palm from palm;
A little thing had broke their happy calm;
A little thing fall'n in the pleasant path
Of their life-stream, that turned to bubbling wrath!
And little might have made them yield and cling
Repentant; yea, a very little thing.
A touch would have sufficed to make the stream
Flow calm once more; dream out its happy dream.
A kiss have fused them into one again,
And saved them many a year of piteous pain.
'Twas such a little thing they had to do;
Both yearned to make it up, and this each knew.
If one could but have said ‘Good-night,’ scared Love
Would have come down to brood like Holy Dove.
And, being done, all would have been so well.
Not being done, it left the rift for Hell
To break through, and another triumph win,—
Ever the worst of Traitors are within:
But neither spoke, though long upon the wing
Love waited lingeringly listening!
A little thing had broke their happy calm;
A little thing fall'n in the pleasant path
Of their life-stream, that turned to bubbling wrath!
And little might have made them yield and cling
Repentant; yea, a very little thing.
A touch would have sufficed to make the stream
Flow calm once more; dream out its happy dream.
A kiss have fused them into one again,
And saved them many a year of piteous pain.
'Twas such a little thing they had to do;
Both yearned to make it up, and this each knew.
If one could but have said ‘Good-night,’ scared Love
Would have come down to brood like Holy Dove.
And, being done, all would have been so well.
Not being done, it left the rift for Hell
To break through, and another triumph win,—
Ever the worst of Traitors are within:
But neither spoke, though long upon the wing
Love waited lingeringly listening!
“Waking, he heard her in her slumbers weep,
And then he slept, and in the guise of Sleep
Death came for him, nor gave him time to say
‘Good-night,’ ‘Good-bye,’ and at his side she lay
A Widow! And upon that dark no day
Hath broke for her. For him, no hell nor heaven
Will open; praying still to be forgiven,
Night after night at her bedside he stands,
Wringing his soul as one may wring the hands;
By natural law of grievèd love; not sent
By Vengeance for unnatural punishment.
And then he slept, and in the guise of Sleep
Death came for him, nor gave him time to say
‘Good-night,’ ‘Good-bye,’ and at his side she lay
A Widow! And upon that dark no day
Hath broke for her. For him, no hell nor heaven
Will open; praying still to be forgiven,
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Wringing his soul as one may wring the hands;
By natural law of grievèd love; not sent
By Vengeance for unnatural punishment.
“The unslain shadows of the Martyrs slain,
Rise on their fields of old heart-ache and pain,
To fight their battle over and over again.
Half-buried hands, still thrust up through the sod,
From fields of carnage, prayerfully to God,
Will grasp the weapons of immortal war.
Freed spirits make their conquering battle-car
Of human hearts: they do but hold their breath
To smite unheard in their dark cloud of death.
They work for Freedom still, though out of sight;
They are torch-bearers in your mortal night.
The Tyrants may destroy the body; drench
The life out with the blood, but cannot quench
It! They may string the corses high in air,
But cannot keep the soul suspended there.
Rise on their fields of old heart-ache and pain,
To fight their battle over and over again.
Half-buried hands, still thrust up through the sod,
From fields of carnage, prayerfully to God,
Will grasp the weapons of immortal war.
Freed spirits make their conquering battle-car
Of human hearts: they do but hold their breath
To smite unheard in their dark cloud of death.
They work for Freedom still, though out of sight;
They are torch-bearers in your mortal night.
The Tyrants may destroy the body; drench
The life out with the blood, but cannot quench
It! They may string the corses high in air,
But cannot keep the soul suspended there.
“Wide as the wings of Sleep by night are spread,
Are Freedom's Exiles scattered, and her dead
Have lain them wearily down beneath God's dome.
But every banished spirit hurries home,
Soon as the free, long-fettered life up-springs
Awave one day on mighty warrior-wings.
Each soul, let out, fights with the strength of seven,
Under God's shield, and on the side of Heaven.
Are Freedom's Exiles scattered, and her dead
Have lain them wearily down beneath God's dome.
But every banished spirit hurries home,
Soon as the free, long-fettered life up-springs
Awave one day on mighty warrior-wings.
Each soul, let out, fights with the strength of seven,
Under God's shield, and on the side of Heaven.
“The other world is not cut off from this:
Forgetfulness is not the gate of bliss.
At times the buried dead within you rise
To look out on their old world through your eyes;
They touch you with the waving of their wing,
Lightly as airs of heaven the Æolian string.
At times as Comforters above you stoop,
To lift the burden from you when ye droop!
As parents on their little ones may peep
Ere going to rest, they bend to bless your sleep.
They show you Pictures which are faintly wrought
In shadows that take life in waking thought.
With fruit from our Lord's Garden dear ones come
To bring you a foretaste: try to lure you home.
Forgetfulness is not the gate of bliss.
At times the buried dead within you rise
To look out on their old world through your eyes;
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Lightly as airs of heaven the Æolian string.
At times as Comforters above you stoop,
To lift the burden from you when ye droop!
As parents on their little ones may peep
Ere going to rest, they bend to bless your sleep.
They show you Pictures which are faintly wrought
In shadows that take life in waking thought.
With fruit from our Lord's Garden dear ones come
To bring you a foretaste: try to lure you home.
“With clap o' the shoulder, friends behind you steal
The old glad way which ye no longer feel:
They watch you as ye watch the darkened mind
Of some arrested spirit; try to unwind
A way to it; with drops of pity melt
The clod about it; have your fondness felt:
Even as ye turn your thoughts to them above,
Do they return to you; look back for love.
The old glad way which ye no longer feel:
They watch you as ye watch the darkened mind
Of some arrested spirit; try to unwind
A way to it; with drops of pity melt
The clod about it; have your fondness felt:
Even as ye turn your thoughts to them above,
Do they return to you; look back for love.
“They left you standing still at gaze upon
The cloud they entered, where the light last shone.
And while the wet eyes yearn and watch the track,
As if by that same way they might come back,
And through the dark ye stretch the ungrasped hand,
There, at some window of the soul, they stand
All whitely clothed with immortality,
Closer to you than flesh and blood can be.
The cloud is lifted from the vapoury bourne;
Although you know them not, the dead return;
To dry the Mourner's tear and hush the wail,
There's nought between you but a Viewless veil!
The cloud they entered, where the light last shone.
And while the wet eyes yearn and watch the track,
As if by that same way they might come back,
And through the dark ye stretch the ungrasped hand,
There, at some window of the soul, they stand
All whitely clothed with immortality,
Closer to you than flesh and blood can be.
The cloud is lifted from the vapoury bourne;
Although you know them not, the dead return;
To dry the Mourner's tear and hush the wail,
There's nought between you but a Viewless veil!
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“Old loves are with you in your dreams; but fear
Lest they should make their presence felt too near;
The face of Love in Heaven they dare not show,
Lest with its glory they might set aglow
Your earthly love, which leaps to embrace a bliss
That lives and dies in a consuming kiss.
So warm Laodamïa wooed her dead
Dear Husband's Shade, as if they were new-wed!
Lest they should make their presence felt too near;
The face of Love in Heaven they dare not show,
Lest with its glory they might set aglow
Your earthly love, which leaps to embrace a bliss
That lives and dies in a consuming kiss.
So warm Laodamïa wooed her dead
Dear Husband's Shade, as if they were new-wed!
“And certain spirits are perplexed to find
How like their life to that they left behind
In natural nearness to their darlings here,
Who lose them just because they are so near
In life that grows impenetrably clear!
How like their life to that they left behind
In natural nearness to their darlings here,
Who lose them just because they are so near
In life that grows impenetrably clear!
“Many who tossed together on the sea,
And parted in the storm; lost utterly;
Find they were only wrecked to meet again,
Safe on the same shore, after all the pain.
God hath so many paths by which we come
To Him; through many doors He draws us Home.
'Tis but His wilderness of secret ways
That to our vision seems a trackless maze.
And parted in the storm; lost utterly;
Find they were only wrecked to meet again,
Safe on the same shore, after all the pain.
God hath so many paths by which we come
To Him; through many doors He draws us Home.
'Tis but His wilderness of secret ways
That to our vision seems a trackless maze.
“Others are horribly startled at the change
Revealed in death, all is so wondrous strange!
So many weeds, your blind world flung aside,
Are gathered up as flowers, thrice-glorified.
So many Masters in the realms of breath
Serve at the feet of those who are crowned in death.
So many who ruled the world are set to rule
Themselves for ages in a painful school.
The Invisible dawns! The sleepers wake to find
Less death in dying than in living blind:
And now the eyes their earthly scales let fall,
They see that they have never lived at all.
Revealed in death, all is so wondrous strange!
So many weeds, your blind world flung aside,
Are gathered up as flowers, thrice-glorified.
So many Masters in the realms of breath
Serve at the feet of those who are crowned in death.
So many who ruled the world are set to rule
Themselves for ages in a painful school.
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Less death in dying than in living blind:
And now the eyes their earthly scales let fall,
They see that they have never lived at all.
“I knew a follower of the strictest faith,
Whose dead religion rested on a death,
And frequent praying in the market-place,
With proclamation of his private grace;
Who sat among the loftiest Self-Elect,
But had not learned through life to walk erect—
Strait-waistcoated in stony pieties—
And when Death came—the Iconoclast who frees—
He could not stand without their rigid stay:
The Maker's image had but stamped the clay.
As one may don the fashion of a day,
On earth he wore the mask of Man awhile,
But when the Searchers stripped him, with a smile,
The wizened spirit shrank from man's disguise:
It fled, and fell, and wriggled, reptile-wise.
Some had been hailed immortals upon Earth—
Immortals prematurely brought to birth.
‘And are you happy in your Heaven,’ they said,
‘O Great One?’ But he sadly shook his head,
And with both clutching hands upheld his crown
That only kept on—toppling, tumbling down.
His earthly halo was a world too wide;
His glory of greatness shrank so when he died,
That blatant Fame evoked with her misfit
Derisive laughter from the Infinite.
Whose dead religion rested on a death,
And frequent praying in the market-place,
With proclamation of his private grace;
Who sat among the loftiest Self-Elect,
But had not learned through life to walk erect—
Strait-waistcoated in stony pieties—
And when Death came—the Iconoclast who frees—
He could not stand without their rigid stay:
The Maker's image had but stamped the clay.
As one may don the fashion of a day,
On earth he wore the mask of Man awhile,
But when the Searchers stripped him, with a smile,
The wizened spirit shrank from man's disguise:
It fled, and fell, and wriggled, reptile-wise.
Some had been hailed immortals upon Earth—
Immortals prematurely brought to birth.
‘And are you happy in your Heaven,’ they said,
‘O Great One?’ But he sadly shook his head,
And with both clutching hands upheld his crown
That only kept on—toppling, tumbling down.
His earthly halo was a world too wide;
His glory of greatness shrank so when he died,
That blatant Fame evoked with her misfit
Derisive laughter from the Infinite.
“I have seen the foolish slaves of luxury,
Who loll at ease and live deliciously;
In Pleasure's poppy-garden drowse and press
With amorous arms my Lady Idleness;
Who, floating downward in voluptuous dream,
Just lean to catch the sparkles from Life's stream
That runs with Siren-sound and dizzying dance,
And hides its wrecks with winking radiance,—
Who, risen from life's feast, came reeling thence
Immortals, drunken with the fumes of Sense;
I've seen them in a pleasure-seeking group,
At Death's low door with mock politeness stoop,
And wantonly they went, nodding the head,
As though to lightsome music they were led:
Heedless the merry madcaps came before
The awful gate, as 'twere a Playhouse door;
It opened, and the darlings entered in
As to the secret Paradise of Sin!
But in a moment what a change there was.
In front of them there rose a mocking glass
In place of drop-scene—this was not a Play—
In which they stared, and could not turn away,
But still stared on, in silence one and all,
To see their finery fade, their feathers fall;
In this grim moulting of the plumes of pride
They had to lay all ornaments aside;
And on the face of every Woman and Man,
Like wet paint on a mask, the colours ran;
The skin grew writhled, and within the head
Their eyes looked like gray ghosts of hopes long dead.
Who loll at ease and live deliciously;
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With amorous arms my Lady Idleness;
Who, floating downward in voluptuous dream,
Just lean to catch the sparkles from Life's stream
That runs with Siren-sound and dizzying dance,
And hides its wrecks with winking radiance,—
Who, risen from life's feast, came reeling thence
Immortals, drunken with the fumes of Sense;
I've seen them in a pleasure-seeking group,
At Death's low door with mock politeness stoop,
And wantonly they went, nodding the head,
As though to lightsome music they were led:
Heedless the merry madcaps came before
The awful gate, as 'twere a Playhouse door;
It opened, and the darlings entered in
As to the secret Paradise of Sin!
But in a moment what a change there was.
In front of them there rose a mocking glass
In place of drop-scene—this was not a Play—
In which they stared, and could not turn away,
But still stared on, in silence one and all,
To see their finery fade, their feathers fall;
In this grim moulting of the plumes of pride
They had to lay all ornaments aside;
And on the face of every Woman and Man,
Like wet paint on a mask, the colours ran;
The skin grew writhled, and within the head
Their eyes looked like gray ghosts of hopes long dead.
“The naked image of their own Selves they see,
Stripped in the Mirror of Eternity;
Worm-eaten through and through with thoughts that prey
On life itself, and eat the soul away.
Wine-cups await them; though well-kept for years
The wine, it had been made of human tears,
And tasted bitter! Fruit was given to eat,
The fruit of their own life; so smiling-sweet
It looked! like apples when the shining round
Is made of rose-leaf on a golden ground;
The crimson and the golden melting through,
Right to the core, in one delicious hue.
But these were Apples of the Dead-Sea shore;
Ashes without, and maggots at the core.
Saluting their fine nostrils Odours rise;
The scent of lifelong human sacrifice!
The brother's blood, that climbs to them and cries.
Then are they led where healing waters wait
To wash the soilèd soul; repristinate
The image of God so earthily concealed;
But while they lave find, more and more revealed,
Deeper disfigurement and deadlier stain,
As wetted marble shows the darker grain.
Stripped in the Mirror of Eternity;
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On life itself, and eat the soul away.
Wine-cups await them; though well-kept for years
The wine, it had been made of human tears,
And tasted bitter! Fruit was given to eat,
The fruit of their own life; so smiling-sweet
It looked! like apples when the shining round
Is made of rose-leaf on a golden ground;
The crimson and the golden melting through,
Right to the core, in one delicious hue.
But these were Apples of the Dead-Sea shore;
Ashes without, and maggots at the core.
Saluting their fine nostrils Odours rise;
The scent of lifelong human sacrifice!
The brother's blood, that climbs to them and cries.
Then are they led where healing waters wait
To wash the soilèd soul; repristinate
The image of God so earthily concealed;
But while they lave find, more and more revealed,
Deeper disfigurement and deadlier stain,
As wetted marble shows the darker grain.
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