University of Virginia Library

SCENE VI.

—Noema still lying senseless against Irad's crib. Irad asleep. Enter Aran.
ARAN.
(rousing Noema.
What ails thee, Noema? Why liest thou here?
Why not abed and sleeping?

NOEMA
(slowly opening her eyes).
Afrael! . . .
Ha! Aran!

ARAN.
Yes: whom else wouldst thou expect?

NOEMA.
None, surely. But I was not yet awake.
I must have fallen asleep.
[Rises from the ground.
What can I get thee?

ARAN.
Nothing.

NOEMA.
And how didst prosper at the Tower?

ARAN.
Rarely! 'spite Korah's ill-knit prophecies,
And Peleg's knock-kneed fears! Rarely, to-night!
I baffled them still better than this morn.
And ere another week of bondage crawls
To its tame end, will our determined point
Confront the haughty firmament, eye to eye,
And with Earth's menace equal Heaven's disdain.
Yet Peleg plots to balk me still, and finds
In Korah an accomplice. Dreamers both,
And slaves to the Unseen! 'Tis action wins,
And common wants, led by uncommon will.

NOEMA.
Betwixt the seen and the Unseen who shall draw
Infallible distinction? Couldst behold
What I this night beheld, thou wouldst no more
Tether thy reason to some narrow plot,
But give it scope to range through fenceless space,
With Fancy for its consort.

ARAN.
What didst see?

NOEMA.
I saw the Heavens and all the world of air
And festive Midnight's burnished cressets swung,
Invisibly, and in their motion free,
From the deep azure ceiling of the sky.
And I heard the planets sing, and watched the Earth
Dwindle in distance to a doubtful speck,
Then dwarfed beyond the cunning of the eye
To say 'twas anywhere.

ARAN.
I doubt thee not,
For thou wert ever of a dreaming mind,
Nor, when I caught thee prone by Irad's crib,
That thou such flimsy visions didst conceive.
But what of that? Sure now thou art awake,
And seest the Unseen was not seen at all.
How wouldst thou help our unfantastic work?
For somnolency's fumes yet never baked
One solid brick, nor slumber's filmy stuff
Provide the stable slime to set it with.

NOEMA.
'Twas in no dream that I the Heavens beheld,
But with the open eyes which on the look.
Whilst thou didst hold convention at the Tower,
I through ethereal strata piercing soared,
And proved, with my own sense, that did each course
Of thy presumptuous masonry annul
A league, and not a span, thou still wouldst strain
More idly at the sky than doth yon child,
A-tiptoe, towards some tantalising toy,
By thee at arm's-length held above thy head.

ARAN.
Spread thyself now one foot above the ground,
And stay there twenty seconds!

NOEMA.
Oh! I could not.
Earth lets not earth unaided quit its side;
'Tis too exacting. Spirit it was that loosed
My inert matter from the ground, and bore
This burden upwards; the same comely Spirit,
Who came unto our tents one twilight eve,
And twice has come again.

ARAN.
And ever comes
When there is none but thou to testify.
Conclusive witness, truly! Like enough,
He is a bubble of thy frothy brain,
Blown through the pipe of fancy. But if not,
And that some specious vagabond of air
Have with his idle wings and subtle talk
Seduced thine ear, and cozened all thy sense,
Why, dost not see, e'en blindworm as thou art,
That such a tricksy conjuror could cheat
Thy wildered credence so, thou hot wouldst swear
Thou hadst been round the Universe, while sooth
Thou hadst but shut thine eyes and opened them?
Tush! 'tis too childish. . . . Why, if Irad, there,
Babbled such folly, thou wouldst purge him straight,
Or whip him into soundness. Get thee to bed,
And sleep thyself—back into sanity!

[Exit.
NOEMA
(sol.)
Back into sanity! Am I insane?
Sometimes it nigh would seem so. For the hold
Which this conjunction with the gross maintains
Upon my lighter essence, bids me doubt
The wisdom of all longings to escape.
Do sane birds beat the bars of their small cage?
Do they not rather nibble the trim seed,
And drink the punctual water set for them,
Singing, for payment, taught if curtailed song?
Ay, it is madness, to aspire beyond
The unyielding limits of our quality;
And sanity, which turns the homely spit,
Trudges its narrow round contentedly,
And sups with satisfaction! Sane I am not,
Or life's recurring service would suffice.
Were it not well to touch the rest in all,
Touching them in so much? I have a body,
Sight, hearing, sense, members, and appetites,
Needs, aches, fatigues, pleasures, infirmities,
Twin unto theirs? Why then not twin all round?
Because I am insane, and they are not.
Is that the reason? Irad has a toy,
He sometimes plays with, where he jerks a ball,
Away from him it seems, but ere the string
Which holds it snaps, swift pulls it back again,
And lo! it drops into a hollow cup
That fits it most exactly! So this Something,
Which would into Infinity fly off,
To spin unfettered, Something trifles with,
But to draw back into a petty scoop!
Yet am I so insane, as but to dream
The deepest and most solid thoughts that dig
Into me their foundation? Did I dream
That I surveyed the Heavens? O no! no!
For dreams may be recalled, but never yet
Were dreams felt after waking; and I feel
The tingling sense of those enfolding wings
Even more than when they closely wrapped me round,
And shook me to convulsive consciousness.
O sweet insanity! take all that's sane,
And leave me nought but madness!

[She again sinks into a swoon.