After Paradise or Legends of Exile With Other Poems: By Robert, Earl of Lytton (Owen Meredith) |
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 | After Paradise or Legends of Exile |  |
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POEMS.
125
TRANSFORMATIONS.
(A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM.)
1.
“Here at last alone,You and I together!
All the night our own,
And the warm June weather!
Not a soul in sight!
What we will, we may.
Nothing is by night
As it was by day.
Look around you! See,
All things change themselves.
Blossom, bower, and tree
Turn to Fays and Elves;
Trivial things and common
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Why should man and woman
Be less enterprising?
Fashion's formal creatures
We till now have been,
With prim-pattern'd features
And a borrow'd mien.
Now the mask is broken,
Now the fetters fall,
Wishes long unspoken
Now are all in all!
Wondrous transformation
Now, for you and me,
Waits our invocation.
Say, what shall we be?”
2.
“What you will,” said She.127
3.
“Look, then, and listen! For you must be waiting,Behind a high grating,
The sound of my signal. Along the wild land
I have gallop'd full speed on my coal-black steed
To free my love from my foeman's hand,
And lo! in the moonlight alert I stand
Close under the castle wall.
Look out, I am here!
Leap down, nor fear!
For into my rescuing arms you fall,
Safe and free. They are round you, see!
One saddle must serve us, so cling to me well,
And away, and away, thro' the night we flee!
But hark! 'Tis the clang of the 'larum bell.
Our pursuers awake. For dear life's sake
Cling to me closer, and closer still!
And speed, speed, my coal-black steed!
128
But clear'd is the river, and cross'd is the heath,
Deep into the sheltering woods we dart,
And O what a ride! for I feel your breath,
And how hot it burns! and I hear your heart,
And how loud it beats! as I laugh ‘We part
No more, come life come death!’”
4.
“No, no,”She sigh'd, “not so!
Too fiercely fleets your coal-black steed,
And pleasure faints in passion's speed,
And the bliss that lingers the best must be,”
Sigh'd She.
5.
“Listen, then, and look, once more!We are sailing round a southern island.
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Folded under many a moonlit highland.
Fragrant breathes the dusky shore,
And where dips the languid oar
Wavelets dimple flash and darkle,
Odours wander, fireflies sparkle:
Thro' them all our bark is gliding,
Gliding softly, gliding slowly:
Not a cloud their sweetness hiding,
All the heavens are husht and holy:
Midnight's panting pulse uncertain
Faintly fans the heaving curtain
O'er the silken-pillow'd seat
Where you lie with slipper'd feet,
Tresses loosed, and zone unbound;
While, my ribbon'd lute unslinging,
I, your troubadour, beside you,
O'er its chords, that trembling sound,
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List, and let its music guide you,
Till the goal of dreams be found!”
6.
“Ah, stay so!”She murmur'd low,
“Song and stream forever flow!
And, if this be dreaming, never
Let me wake, but dream for ever,
Dreaming thus, if dream it be!”
Then He:
7.
“As night's magic blends togetherMoonbeams, starbeams, odours, dews,
In a hush of happy weather,
Earth and heaven to interfuse;
So my song draws softly down
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Bounteous gift on gift bestowing:
First, that heaven, your face; and then
Heaven's divinest stars, those eyes
Under dewy lashes glowing;
Last, those lips, whose smile caresses
All their breath beatifies;
And the fragrance o'er me flowing
From those downward-shaken tresses,
Whose delicious wildernesses
Hide such haunts of happy sighs!”
8.
“Rise, ah rise!”Faint She whisper'd. “Hold me fast!
For away the fixt earth flies,
And I know not where we are.
What is coming? What is past?
132
Swiftly star succeeds to star
Till .... in what new world are we?”
“Love's,” said He.
9.
“Song and lute the spell obeying,Cease in silence sweeter, stronger,
Than song-singing or lute-playing:
And, entranced, I know no longer
Whither are my senses straying:
But I feel my spirit blending
With the bliss of thine, and ending
Tremulously lost in thee!”
10.
“Hush!” sigh'd She,“Lest this dream, if dream alone
133
By a breath should be undone.
For ah,” She sigh'd,
“I and thou, what are we now?”
And He replied,
“Thou art I, and I am thou,
And we are one!”
134
NORTH AND SOUTH
1
Far in the southern night she sleeps;And there the heavens are husht, and there,
Low murmuring from the moonlit deeps,
Faint music lulls the dreamful air.
No tears on her soft lashes hang,
On her calm lips no kisses glow.
The throb, the passion, and the pang
Are over now.
2
But I? From this full-peopled north,Whose midnight roar around me stirs,
How wildly still my heart goes forth
To haunt that silent home of hers!
There night by night, with no release,
These sleepless eyes the vision see,
And all its visionary peace
But maddens me.
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ATHENS.
(1865.)
The burnt-out heart of Hellas here behold!
Quench'd fire-pit of the quick explosive Past,
Thought's highest crater—all its fervours cold,
Ashes and dust at last!
Quench'd fire-pit of the quick explosive Past,
Thought's highest crater—all its fervours cold,
Ashes and dust at last!
And what Hellenic light is living now
To gild, not Greece, but other lands, is given:
Not where the splendour sank, the after-glow
Of sunset stays in heaven.
To gild, not Greece, but other lands, is given:
Not where the splendour sank, the after-glow
Of sunset stays in heaven.
But loud o'er Grecian ruins still the lark
Doth, as of old, Hyperion's glory hail,
And from Hymettus, in the moonlight, hark
The exuberant nightingale!
Doth, as of old, Hyperion's glory hail,
And from Hymettus, in the moonlight, hark
The exuberant nightingale!
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CINTRA.
(1868.)
1
In the brake are creakingThe tufted canes,
And the wind is streaking
With fugitive stains
A welkin haunted by hovering rains.
2
Low lemon-boughs underMy garden wall,
In the Quinta yonder,
By fits let fall
Here an emerald leaf, there a pale gold ball,
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3
On the black earth, studdedWith droplets bright.
From the fruit trees, budded,
Some pink, some white,
And now overflooded with watery light.
4
For the sun, thro' a chasmOf the colourless air,
With a jubilant spasm
From his broken lair
Upleaps and stands, for a moment, bare!
5
But a breath bewildersThe wavering weather;
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That put together
The vaporous walls of the cloud-bound ether
6
From the mountains hastenIn pale displeasure
To mortice and fasten
The bright embrasure,
Shutting behind it day's innermost azure.
7
On the bleak blue rimOf the lonesome lea,
Shapeless and dim
As far things at sea,
Mafra yon nebulous clump must be!
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8
Across the red furrowsTo where in the sides
Of the hills he burrows
(As a reptile hides)
The many-legg'd, long-back'd, aqueduct strides.
9
Just over the pines,As from tapers snuff'd,
A thin smoke twines
Till its course is luff'd
At the edge of the cliff, by the breeze rebuff'd;
10
Whence, downward turningA dubious haze,
140
It strays, delays,
And departs by a dozen different ways.
11
The chestnuts shiver,The olive trees
Recoil and quiver,
Stung by the breeze,
Like sleepers awaked by a swarm of bees.
12
Down glimmering lanesThe grey oxen go;
And the grumbling wains
They drag onward slow
Wail, as they wind in a woeful row,
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13
With fruits and casksTo the seaside land,
Where Colares basks
In a glory bland,
And from gardens o'erhanging the scented sand
14
Great aloes glistenAnd roses dangle.
But listen! listen!
The mule-bells jangle,
Rounding the rock-hewn path's sharp angle.
15
As their chime dies outThe dim woods among,
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And the distant song
Of the muleteers that have pass'd along,
16
From behind the hillWhence comes that roar,
Up the road so still
But a minute before?
'Tis a message arrived from the grieved sea shore.
17
And, tho' close it seems,Yet from far away
It is come, as in dreams
The announcements they
To the souls that can understand convey.
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18
For whenever you hear,As you hear it now,
That sound so clear,
You may surely know
Foul weather's at hand, tho' no wind should blow.
19
But the cork wood is sighing,It cannot find rest;
And the raven, flying
Around his black nest,
Hath signall'd the storm to the Sierra's crest.
20
Plaintive and sullen,Penalva moans;
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The granite bones
Of Cruzalta crackle with split pine cones;
21
Roused and uproariousThe huge oaks yell
Till the ghost of Honorius
Is scared from his cell,
Where not even a ghost could in quietude dwell;
22
For the woods all roundIts cork-clad walls
Are storm'd by the sound
Of the waterfalls
That have shatter'd their mountain pedestals.
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23
On the topmost shelfOf the Pena, fast
As the rock itself,
In a cluster vast
Stood castle and keep but a moment past;
24
Now, in what to the sightIs but empty air,
They are vanisht quite,
And the sharp peak, bare
As a shaven chin, is upslanted there.
25
Can a film of cloud,Like the fiat of Fate,
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Thus obliterate
The ponderous mass of a pile so great?
26
'Twas a fact, yet a breathHas that fact dispell'd.
So truth, underneath
A cloud compell'd
To hide her head, is no more beheld.
27
The achievement of years,By a minute effaced,
Departs, disappears,
And is all replaced
By a cold blank colourless empty waste.
147
28
All forms, alas,That remain or flee
As the winds that pass
May their choice decree,
Stand faster far than have stood by me
29
The man I served,And the woman I loved.
But what if they swerved
As their faith was proved,
When a mountain can be by a mist removed?
148
SORRENTO REVISITED.
(1885.)
On the lizarded wall and the gold-orb'd tree
Spring's splendour again is shining;
But the glow of its gladness awakes in me
Only a vast repining.
Spring's splendour again is shining;
But the glow of its gladness awakes in me
Only a vast repining.
To Sorrento, asleep on the soft blue breast
Of the sea that she loves, and dreaming,
Lone Capri uplifts an ethereal crest
In the luminous azure gleaming.
Of the sea that she loves, and dreaming,
Lone Capri uplifts an ethereal crest
In the luminous azure gleaming.
And the Sirens are singing again from the shore.
'Tis the song that they sang to Ulysses;
But the sound of a song that is sung no more
My soul in their music misses.
'Tis the song that they sang to Ulysses;
But the sound of a song that is sung no more
My soul in their music misses.
149
FRAGRANCE.
(A SPRING BALLAD.)
DEDICATION TO ---
Here Spring with her gifts is come.She hath given white buds to the hedge,
To the wandering swallow a home,
And a rose to your window ledge.
In return for the gifts she gave
A gift for herself she sought,
And I, of the best I have,
Gave to her a single thought.
That thought was a thought of you,
Spring laid it the leaves among,
There fed it on light and dew,
And return'd it to me in a song.
So the twice-given gift, as to me
Spring brought it, to you I bring:
For this song is the child of three,
Us two, and our playmate, Spring.
150
BALLAD.
1.
The soul of all the souls that have becomeSweet odours, I am Fragrance from afar.
Deep hid in Beauty's bosom was my home,
And known to me her inmost mysteries are.
2.
I know the secret of the Rose. She blushes,I know the reason why.
A hopeless passion in her heart she hushes
For the bright Beetle-Fly.
He was a bold and brilliant cavalier:
He woo'd her in the love-time of the year
A livelong summer day:
He woo'd her, and he won her: then betray'd her,
And, breaking all the vows that he had made her,
Upon a sky-built sunbeam sail'd away.
151
3.
Then the Rose wisht for wings to follow him,But all her wishings were of no avail.
What she could do, she did. In pilgrim trim
From bower to bower she wander'd down the dale,
And climb'd and climb'd, and peep'd into the dim
Nest of the Nightingale.
4.
The Nightingale beheld her, and averr'dThat she was fairest of the fair. He said,
“Fair crimson-wingèd creature, be a bird!
And I with thee, and none but thee, will wed.”
His amorous song the Rose resentful heard,
And shook her head.
5.
Into that amorous song there slid a tear.The Rose was weeping, sad at heart was she.
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Sang to her in the twilight from the tree.
“O wert thou but a bird! thou art so dear,
Thee would I mate with, and wed none but thee!”
“Nay,” sigh'd the Rose, “I seek mine absent fere,
A lover bold and born of high degree,
My heart is sad because he is not here,
Sir Scarabæus he!”
6.
The Evening Wind pass'd by, and heard her boast,And to the Rose he whisper'd, laughing low,
“Poor Rose, thine absent lover thou hast lost,
For he is faithless, and forsaken thou!
I met him on my travels at the Court
Of Queen Spiræa of Ulmaria.
The Meadow Queen is she, and all amort
Sir Scarabæus, for her sake, that day
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I left him lying wounded in the dust,
And only know that, by the last report,
Thy gallant had received a mortal thrust.
Now all the common flowers that far and wide
Have envied thee because thou art so fair
Are laughing at thee. But whate'er betide,
Come thou with me, and I will bring thee where
Thou yet mayst find him in his fallen pride.”
The poor Rose hung her head, and, in despair,
“Had I but wings!” she sigh'd,
“Had I but wings!”
7.
With laughter light again,“Thou hast them,” that perfidious Wind replied,
“And I will show thee how to use them.” Then
He breathed upon the Rose, and, undenied,
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But, soon dissatisfied
With his sweet theft, along the thankless air
He tost the stolen petals here and there,
And off he hied.
8.
Me for himself he would have kept. But I
Beheld thee, as the Evening Wind went by
Bearing me with him. To the Wind I said
“Wait for me!” and I slid into thy soul.
When the Wind miss'd me he believed me dead,
And so went on without me to his goal,
Which he shall never reach, for every hour
It changes.
Beheld thee, as the Evening Wind went by
Bearing me with him. To the Wind I said
“Wait for me!” and I slid into thy soul.
When the Wind miss'd me he believed me dead,
And so went on without me to his goal,
Which he shall never reach, for every hour
It changes.
From that moment I became
The inmate of thy thoughts. I have the power
To perfume all the paths they haunt. My name
Another's lips must teach thine own to spell.
Untold I leave it, lest the Evening Star
Should guess it in thine eyes. With thee to dwell,
And thine to be for ever, from afar
I come with secrets laden, I can tell
To none but thee. So sweet my whispers are,
That with their fragrance fill'd is every thought
That I have breathed on. Maiden pure and fair,
A paradise of perfumes I have brought
That thy sweet soul may breathe in sweetest air.
Ah, keep it! The Soul's Fragrance lost, can aught
That loss repair?
The inmate of thy thoughts. I have the power
To perfume all the paths they haunt. My name
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Untold I leave it, lest the Evening Star
Should guess it in thine eyes. With thee to dwell,
And thine to be for ever, from afar
I come with secrets laden, I can tell
To none but thee. So sweet my whispers are,
That with their fragrance fill'd is every thought
That I have breathed on. Maiden pure and fair,
A paradise of perfumes I have brought
That thy sweet soul may breathe in sweetest air.
Ah, keep it! The Soul's Fragrance lost, can aught
That loss repair?
156
LINES
COMPOSED IN SLEEP.
This is the place. Here flourish'd Wicked Deeds
And wither'd, in a world without a name,
Buried ere ours was born. Fierce troops of Crimes
Weapon'd and crown'd, athwart a desert land
Of wasted loveliness, to reach this place
Travell'd in pomp: here settled, and here died,
Grown old and weak: and, dying left behind
No chronicle upon the bare rock graven
Of what they were or what they did. The lives
They cramm'd with evil, all their wicked loves,
Their wicked hates, Death and slow Time have turn'd
Into a sly grey silent ghostliness,
A stealth-footed Fear, that prowls for prey,
Creeps on the wretch who wanders here unwarn'd,
Catches him, with long fingers, by the head,
Nor lets him go till all his mind is gone.
And wither'd, in a world without a name,
Buried ere ours was born. Fierce troops of Crimes
Weapon'd and crown'd, athwart a desert land
Of wasted loveliness, to reach this place
Travell'd in pomp: here settled, and here died,
157
No chronicle upon the bare rock graven
Of what they were or what they did. The lives
They cramm'd with evil, all their wicked loves,
Their wicked hates, Death and slow Time have turn'd
Into a sly grey silent ghostliness,
A stealth-footed Fear, that prowls for prey,
Creeps on the wretch who wanders here unwarn'd,
Catches him, with long fingers, by the head,
Nor lets him go till all his mind is gone.
This was their city's tower'd acropolis,
This sprawling hoop of roofless ruin huge
Whose heart is hollowness. These broken ribs
Of crumbled stone and mounds of rippling grass
Were walls whose builders, when those walls were built,
Kings put to death, that none the plan might tell
Of secret chambers cruelly contrived
For lust and murder: and therein were born
Abominable pleasures. Round them now
Rank ivy rustles with the revelry
Of spangled reptiles. Down in a dry well
There hath been dwelling for three thousand years
An old white newt, whiter than leprosy.
He only knows the long-forgotten names
Of those strong scarlet blossoms on the brink That once were Sins. [OMITTED]
This sprawling hoop of roofless ruin huge
Whose heart is hollowness. These broken ribs
Of crumbled stone and mounds of rippling grass
Were walls whose builders, when those walls were built,
Kings put to death, that none the plan might tell
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For lust and murder: and therein were born
Abominable pleasures. Round them now
Rank ivy rustles with the revelry
Of spangled reptiles. Down in a dry well
There hath been dwelling for three thousand years
An old white newt, whiter than leprosy.
He only knows the long-forgotten names
Of those strong scarlet blossoms on the brink That once were Sins. [OMITTED]
These lines are the result of a slumber, not induced by any narcotic, from which the writer awoke under an extraordinarily vivid impression that he had composed in his sleep a poem of considerable length. Of the purport of the poem he retained only a vague and shadowy notion; but more than a hundred lines of it were lingering (as it seemed to him) so distinctly in his recollection that he hastened to write them down. His memory however (or the illusion which had usurped the function of memory) suddenly and completely failed him at the point where this fragment breaks off. He has never been able to complete it; and it is printed here, without alteration, as a psychological curiosity.
159
PROMETHEIA.
(FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND PRESS, ET CÆTERA.)
Mephistopheles
(ad spectatores)
“Am Ende hängen wir doch ab
Von Creaturen die wir machten.”—
Faust.—Second Part. (Birth of the Homunculus.)
(ad spectatores)
“Am Ende hängen wir doch ab
Von Creaturen die wir machten.”—
Faust.—Second Part. (Birth of the Homunculus.)
I. PART THE FIRST.
“God of the Gods, and Lord of Heaven! Since now
Repentant Power rejects not Reason's use,
Here on the Path of Progress stay not thou
Thy steps by me well-counsell'd!” (Thus to Zeus
Prometheus spake.) “From Earth's primordial womb
Mute to the birth her progeny are brought.
To death they go, as into life they come,
Condemn'd to suffer all and utter nought.
Read in the language of their longing eyes
The passionate petition of the dumb,
And grant the long'd-for gift, mere life denies,
A voice to Will, to Feeling, and to Thought!”
Repentant Power rejects not Reason's use,
Here on the Path of Progress stay not thou
Thy steps by me well-counsell'd!” (Thus to Zeus
Prometheus spake.) “From Earth's primordial womb
Mute to the birth her progeny are brought.
To death they go, as into life they come,
Condemn'd to suffer all and utter nought.
Read in the language of their longing eyes
The passionate petition of the dumb,
160
A voice to Will, to Feeling, and to Thought!”
But Zeus, mistrustful, murmur'd “To what end?”
“No end of ends,” he answer'd, “and in each
A fresh beginning! for with better fraught
Is every best, as world on world ascend,
In ceaseless self-upliftings, life's immense
Capacities of growth. Voice leads to speech,
Speech to intelligence, intelligence
To liberty, and liberty” .... “To what?”
Zeus interrupted. “Ever out of reach
Thy thoughts run on, and all thy language still
Sounds revolutionary.” “Still! why not?”
Prometheus laugh'd. “We share the imputed crime.
From revolutionary fountains flow
Fresh streams of force; and, tho' enthroned sublime
On spoil'd Olympus, what thyself wert thou
Without the Revolution, Son of Time?”
“Titan,” the God, with darkening aspect, sigh'd,
“It was to ravish, not retain, a throne
That on the Revolution we relied;
Wherein thy services have every one
Been well requited.” “Ay,” Prometheus cried,
“Witness Mount Caucasus!” “What's done is done,”
Zeus answer'd. “Not till thou hadst turn'd our foe
And filch'd our fire, did we retaliate thus.
But witness also thou, that (long ago
Recall'd with recompense from Caucasus)
Thee hath our later friendship favour'd so,
That thine is now copartnership with us
In all our own Olympian empery,
By thy weird wisdom guided. Why discuss
The unalterable past? Nor thou nor I
Fresh conflict crave. This much concede.” “I do,”
Prometheus mutter'd, “and the reason why
Full well, Fate-driven Thunderer, I know!
For thy reluctant power perforce obeys
The strict compulsions of Necessity.”
“Her iron yoke,” replied the God, “she lays
On Gods and Titans both, and none can close,
None ope, her hidden hand. Forget the days
That disunited us, nor indispose
A confidence that fain would rest assured
Rather in him sage Themis loves to praise,
Than in the perjured Titan who abjured
The cause of his own kindred.” “And for whose,
Ungrateful God?” “Nay, my Prometheus, mine
The cause, I know, for which thou didst change sides.”
“Not thine,” the indignant Titan cried, “not thine!
Nor thine nor thee, Monarch of Parricides
From Sire to Son, I sought! In god or worm
I care not where the sign of it I see,
But let me find, beneath the poorest germ,
Some promise of improvement, that to free
A hinder'd progress to a higher term
Needs all the aid a Titan can afford,
And mine shall not be wanting to confirm
The effort that aspires to overcome!”
“No end of ends,” he answer'd, “and in each
A fresh beginning! for with better fraught
Is every best, as world on world ascend,
In ceaseless self-upliftings, life's immense
Capacities of growth. Voice leads to speech,
Speech to intelligence, intelligence
To liberty, and liberty” .... “To what?”
Zeus interrupted. “Ever out of reach
Thy thoughts run on, and all thy language still
Sounds revolutionary.” “Still! why not?”
Prometheus laugh'd. “We share the imputed crime.
From revolutionary fountains flow
Fresh streams of force; and, tho' enthroned sublime
On spoil'd Olympus, what thyself wert thou
Without the Revolution, Son of Time?”
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“It was to ravish, not retain, a throne
That on the Revolution we relied;
Wherein thy services have every one
Been well requited.” “Ay,” Prometheus cried,
“Witness Mount Caucasus!” “What's done is done,”
Zeus answer'd. “Not till thou hadst turn'd our foe
And filch'd our fire, did we retaliate thus.
But witness also thou, that (long ago
Recall'd with recompense from Caucasus)
Thee hath our later friendship favour'd so,
That thine is now copartnership with us
In all our own Olympian empery,
By thy weird wisdom guided. Why discuss
The unalterable past? Nor thou nor I
Fresh conflict crave. This much concede.” “I do,”
Prometheus mutter'd, “and the reason why
Full well, Fate-driven Thunderer, I know!
162
The strict compulsions of Necessity.”
“Her iron yoke,” replied the God, “she lays
On Gods and Titans both, and none can close,
None ope, her hidden hand. Forget the days
That disunited us, nor indispose
A confidence that fain would rest assured
Rather in him sage Themis loves to praise,
Than in the perjured Titan who abjured
The cause of his own kindred.” “And for whose,
Ungrateful God?” “Nay, my Prometheus, mine
The cause, I know, for which thou didst change sides.”
“Not thine,” the indignant Titan cried, “not thine!
Nor thine nor thee, Monarch of Parricides
From Sire to Son, I sought! In god or worm
I care not where the sign of it I see,
But let me find, beneath the poorest germ,
Some promise of improvement, that to free
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Needs all the aid a Titan can afford,
And mine shall not be wanting to confirm
The effort that aspires to overcome!”
Zeus, shaking his sheaved thunders at the word,
Exclaim'd, “Inveterately venturesome!
Whom should the upstart overcome? Not me?”
“And why not thee,” Prometheus cried, “new lord
Of a usurpt dominion? Why not thee,
Thee and thy kindred all, whose starry home
To Kronos once belong'd, if its endeavour
Of higher worth than thine and theirs should be?
Kronides, never have I flatter'd, never
Deceived thee, or betray'd! Forget not thou
That in the Race of Uranus for ever
Power hath been lost and won by overthrow.
Unoverthrown, wouldst thou preserve it, dare
To rule without oppression! Fearless now,
Fling the lone scepter of a world-wide care
Into the lap of Freedom! Safest thus
Shall its supremacy remain, for there
Rebellion breathes not. Had not Kronos pent
Our Giant Brotherhood in Tartarus,
His might have been (thy treason to prevent)
The hundred-handed help he lack'd of us.
Confide in Liberty, the friend of all,
And live by all befriended! With her, grow
From growth to growth, in a perpetual
Increase of growing greatness! So shalt thou,
Still onward borne with all that's onward going,
Be never by-gone, never out of date!
'Tis at the price of ever greater growing
Eternity is granted to the great.”
Exclaim'd, “Inveterately venturesome!
Whom should the upstart overcome? Not me?”
“And why not thee,” Prometheus cried, “new lord
Of a usurpt dominion? Why not thee,
Thee and thy kindred all, whose starry home
To Kronos once belong'd, if its endeavour
Of higher worth than thine and theirs should be?
Kronides, never have I flatter'd, never
Deceived thee, or betray'd! Forget not thou
That in the Race of Uranus for ever
Power hath been lost and won by overthrow.
Unoverthrown, wouldst thou preserve it, dare
To rule without oppression! Fearless now,
164
Into the lap of Freedom! Safest thus
Shall its supremacy remain, for there
Rebellion breathes not. Had not Kronos pent
Our Giant Brotherhood in Tartarus,
His might have been (thy treason to prevent)
The hundred-handed help he lack'd of us.
Confide in Liberty, the friend of all,
And live by all befriended! With her, grow
From growth to growth, in a perpetual
Increase of growing greatness! So shalt thou,
Still onward borne with all that's onward going,
Be never by-gone, never out of date!
'Tis at the price of ever greater growing
Eternity is granted to the great.”
Zeus answer'd with an indecisive sigh.
“Prophet,” he said, “who, in the hoary Past
Where the old Gods and the old Ages lie,
Sole of thy kindred didst the hour forecast
Which thou alone survivest, prophecy
(If still the gift of prophecy thou hast)
What destiny for me, should I deny
The gift thou cravest, is reserved by Fate?”
“The sadness of immense satiety,”
Prometheus murmur'd. “Pause and meditate!”
He added. “I, the Spokesman of the Dumb,
Am also Seer of the Unseen.” “But what,”
Zeus sigh'd again, “will they next crave, to whom
The voice to crave it hath been granted?” “That
Shall they themselves inform thee by and by,”
Exclaim'd the surly Giant, and thereat
His shoulders huge he shrugg'd.
“Prophet,” he said, “who, in the hoary Past
165
Sole of thy kindred didst the hour forecast
Which thou alone survivest, prophecy
(If still the gift of prophecy thou hast)
What destiny for me, should I deny
The gift thou cravest, is reserved by Fate?”
“The sadness of immense satiety,”
Prometheus murmur'd. “Pause and meditate!”
He added. “I, the Spokesman of the Dumb,
Am also Seer of the Unseen.” “But what,”
Zeus sigh'd again, “will they next crave, to whom
The voice to crave it hath been granted?” “That
Shall they themselves inform thee by and by,”
Exclaim'd the surly Giant, and thereat
His shoulders huge he shrugg'd.
Without reply
Zeus mused awhile; but, spying Eros pass
Full-quiver'd for a chase of sweeter cry
Than Cynthia leads along the moonlit grass,
When, thro' the rustling grove and glimpsing sky,
Thin shadows, fast pursued by shadows, flee,
The God, impatient, glanced at Earth's mute mass;
Then waved an acquiescent hand, as he
Turn'd from the Titan with a faint “Alas,
Prometheus, thou art compromising me!”
Zeus mused awhile; but, spying Eros pass
Full-quiver'd for a chase of sweeter cry
166
When, thro' the rustling grove and glimpsing sky,
Thin shadows, fast pursued by shadows, flee,
The God, impatient, glanced at Earth's mute mass;
Then waved an acquiescent hand, as he
Turn'd from the Titan with a faint “Alas,
Prometheus, thou art compromising me!”
II. PART II.
Leaving in haste the Olympian Council Hall,
The apostate Titan down to Earth convey'd
The grudged concession wrung from Zeus. There, all
In conclave multitudinous array'd,
His clients he together call'd (from man
In fair Apollo's faultless image made,
To man's close copy, made on the same plan,
The flat-faced ape) and all the bars undid
Which had till then lock'd mercifully fast
The innumerable voices that, unchid,
Now into riotous utterance rush'd at last.
The apostate Titan down to Earth convey'd
The grudged concession wrung from Zeus. There, all
In conclave multitudinous array'd,
His clients he together call'd (from man
In fair Apollo's faultless image made,
To man's close copy, made on the same plan,
The flat-faced ape) and all the bars undid
167
The innumerable voices that, unchid,
Now into riotous utterance rush'd at last.
This done, preferring to appreciate
The concert from a distance, he return'd
To the Olympians—in whose looks irate
A relisht indignation he discern'd.
The Gods and Goddesses, the Demigods
And Demigoddesses, all demi-nude,
(As Classic Art's correctest periods
Prescribed to each the appropriate attitude)
Were listening, with more wonder than delight,
To the new noisiness of earthly things.
For quick and thick each animal appetite
Throbb'd into sudden sound from the loud strings
Of throats in thousands loosed; and left and right
Chirrupings, crowings, howlings, bellowings,
And barkings—bass and treble of mingled mirth
And pain—were now profusely vomited
In vehement hubbub from the vocal Earth.
The concert from a distance, he return'd
To the Olympians—in whose looks irate
A relisht indignation he discern'd.
The Gods and Goddesses, the Demigods
And Demigoddesses, all demi-nude,
(As Classic Art's correctest periods
Prescribed to each the appropriate attitude)
Were listening, with more wonder than delight,
To the new noisiness of earthly things.
For quick and thick each animal appetite
Throbb'd into sudden sound from the loud strings
Of throats in thousands loosed; and left and right
Chirrupings, crowings, howlings, bellowings,
And barkings—bass and treble of mingled mirth
168
In vehement hubbub from the vocal Earth.
Meanwhile, as with sloped shoulder, shuffling tread
Evasive, mien morose, and furtive eye,
Thro' Heaven's bright groups the burly Titan sped,
Their comments were not complimentary.
“Please to explain,” resentful Herè said,
“This new caprice, or stop that peacock's cry!
My bird will be a byword and a scoff
If this continues!” “Ah, Fair Majesty,
This new caprice is an old debt paid off,”
Prometheus answer'd. “Fops in pomp array'd
Must now reveal what's in them, to the ear,
Who, to the eye, have heretofore display'd
Only what's on them. But have thou no fear,
Thy favourite makes an admirable show—
From one so beautiful exact no more!”
Eos complain'd of the cock's clamorous crow,
Superfluously sounded o'er and o'er.
“Prometheus might at least,” she said, “for me
Have managed to contrive a less absurd
And indiscreetly strepitant minstrelsy
Than the loud shriek of that ridiculous bird!”
“Sweet Cousin, thine indulgence,” he replied,
“For the cicala's strains (I grant that these
Have not as yet been duly deified)
Leaves to less plaintive notes small chance to please
An ear compassionately prejudiced.
Sleep sounder, and wake later! What hath drawn
Thy blushing charms, untimely thus enticed,
O rosy-finger'd Daughter of the Dawn,
From that soft couch Love's self were fain to lie on?
Is it the memory of Cephalus,
Or else the expectation of Orion?”
Evasive, mien morose, and furtive eye,
Thro' Heaven's bright groups the burly Titan sped,
Their comments were not complimentary.
“Please to explain,” resentful Herè said,
“This new caprice, or stop that peacock's cry!
My bird will be a byword and a scoff
If this continues!” “Ah, Fair Majesty,
This new caprice is an old debt paid off,”
Prometheus answer'd. “Fops in pomp array'd
Must now reveal what's in them, to the ear,
Who, to the eye, have heretofore display'd
Only what's on them. But have thou no fear,
Thy favourite makes an admirable show—
From one so beautiful exact no more!”
Eos complain'd of the cock's clamorous crow,
169
“Prometheus might at least,” she said, “for me
Have managed to contrive a less absurd
And indiscreetly strepitant minstrelsy
Than the loud shriek of that ridiculous bird!”
“Sweet Cousin, thine indulgence,” he replied,
“For the cicala's strains (I grant that these
Have not as yet been duly deified)
Leaves to less plaintive notes small chance to please
An ear compassionately prejudiced.
Sleep sounder, and wake later! What hath drawn
Thy blushing charms, untimely thus enticed,
O rosy-finger'd Daughter of the Dawn,
From that soft couch Love's self were fain to lie on?
Is it the memory of Cephalus,
Or else the expectation of Orion?”
With jests sarcastic curtly answering thus
The just reproaches of the Gods, that great
Ungainly Titan strode from spot to spot,
Superbly heedless of the scorn and hate
His course provoked. Olympus loved him not,
Despite his ancient birth and lineage high;
And even the new-made Deities, whose past
Was but of yesterday, with sidelong eye
Look'd on him as a god of lower caste.
The restless spirit that from his peers in Heaven
Ever aloof the unquiet Giant held
Had to his strenuous Titanism given
A tone incongruously coarse. Impell'd
By unintelligible vehemence,
His uncouth grandeur grieved the fluent grace
Of the Olympian Quiet with intense
Abrupt explosive ardours; as apace
On its swift course, all rough with rocks and roots,
And fiercely fluttering with volcanic fire,
Some ravaged morsel of a mountain shoots
Across the cloven crystal of a lake
In whose clear depths stars and still clouds admire
The lucid forms their own reflections take.
170
Ungainly Titan strode from spot to spot,
Superbly heedless of the scorn and hate
His course provoked. Olympus loved him not,
Despite his ancient birth and lineage high;
And even the new-made Deities, whose past
Was but of yesterday, with sidelong eye
Look'd on him as a god of lower caste.
The restless spirit that from his peers in Heaven
Ever aloof the unquiet Giant held
Had to his strenuous Titanism given
A tone incongruously coarse. Impell'd
By unintelligible vehemence,
His uncouth grandeur grieved the fluent grace
Of the Olympian Quiet with intense
Abrupt explosive ardours; as apace
On its swift course, all rough with rocks and roots,
And fiercely fluttering with volcanic fire,
171
Across the cloven crystal of a lake
In whose clear depths stars and still clouds admire
The lucid forms their own reflections take.
Sole, Aphroditè (she, that Fairest Fair,
Whose sacred sweetness from its rancorous tooth
The Titan's biting wit was pleased to spare,
—She for whose solitary sake, in truth,
The sullen menace of his face at whiles
A fond mysterious fervour unavow'd
Made soft and luminous with hovering smiles,
Like summer lightnings thro' a sleeping cloud)
Sole, Aphroditè found a curious charm
In this grim God-born Mocker of the Gods;
And, waving to Prometheus her white arm,
She beckon'd him with amicable nods.
Submissive to her signal he drew near,
And with a questioning gaze the Goddess eyed.
“Titan, well done!” she whisper'd in his ear;
“What long on Earth I miss'd thou hast supplied.
I love the lion's roar, the ring-dove's coo:
By both alike love's needs are well express'd:
The amorous bull's deep bellowing charms me too.
But why hast thou withheld the last and best
Of all thy gifts from those who, tho' but few,
Most claim on thy solicitude possess'd?”
Prometheus, by astonishment tongue-tied,
An interrogatory eyebrow raised.
“Those larks and nightingales that yonder hide,”
The Goddess answer'd as on Earth she gazed,
“Inaudible and invisible to all!
Darkling they haunt the shadows round them furl'd,
Silent amidst the universal brawl
And babble of the emancipated world.
Yet heaven is husht to hear their minstrelsy:
For these the moon and stars are not too sweet,
For those the sun himself is not too high:
And shall they have no listeners? Hearts that beat
With base emotions find ignoble voice,
Wrath, and Unreason, and Vulgarity
Speak loud. Stupidity and Spite rejoice
In utterance unrestricted. Say, then, why
(Where Folly's fife with Envy's clarion vies)
Must these alone, the darlings of the Spring,
Whose souls are fill'd with lyric ecstacies,
Unheard, or even if heard unheeded, sing?”
Whose sacred sweetness from its rancorous tooth
The Titan's biting wit was pleased to spare,
—She for whose solitary sake, in truth,
The sullen menace of his face at whiles
A fond mysterious fervour unavow'd
Made soft and luminous with hovering smiles,
Like summer lightnings thro' a sleeping cloud)
Sole, Aphroditè found a curious charm
In this grim God-born Mocker of the Gods;
And, waving to Prometheus her white arm,
She beckon'd him with amicable nods.
Submissive to her signal he drew near,
And with a questioning gaze the Goddess eyed.
172
“What long on Earth I miss'd thou hast supplied.
I love the lion's roar, the ring-dove's coo:
By both alike love's needs are well express'd:
The amorous bull's deep bellowing charms me too.
But why hast thou withheld the last and best
Of all thy gifts from those who, tho' but few,
Most claim on thy solicitude possess'd?”
Prometheus, by astonishment tongue-tied,
An interrogatory eyebrow raised.
“Those larks and nightingales that yonder hide,”
The Goddess answer'd as on Earth she gazed,
“Inaudible and invisible to all!
Darkling they haunt the shadows round them furl'd,
Silent amidst the universal brawl
And babble of the emancipated world.
Yet heaven is husht to hear their minstrelsy:
For these the moon and stars are not too sweet,
173
And shall they have no listeners? Hearts that beat
With base emotions find ignoble voice,
Wrath, and Unreason, and Vulgarity
Speak loud. Stupidity and Spite rejoice
In utterance unrestricted. Say, then, why
(Where Folly's fife with Envy's clarion vies)
Must these alone, the darlings of the Spring,
Whose souls are fill'd with lyric ecstacies,
Unheard, or even if heard unheeded, sing?”
The Titan's eye, with a soul-searching glare,
Sounded the secret dwelling undescried
In those small bosoms. “And what seest thou there?”
The Goddess ask'd him. Sighing he replied
“What I should have foreseen!” “But what is that?”
Full on the glorious beauty of her face
Prometheus gazed. “O Goddess, ask not what!
Thou who, supreme in beauty and in grace,
Art by adoring worlds proclaim'd divine,
What kindred could thy confident godhood trace
In a shy loveliness so unlike thine?
A loveliness of its own self afraid,
A Bastard Beauty, fearing to be seen,
Yet fainting to be loved, that seeks the shade!”
The Goddess laugh'd “What doth my Titan mean?
What bastard is he speaking of?” And he,
“Ay, 'tis a Beauty bastard-born, and not
Authentically certified to be,
A Beauty surreptitiously begot
From Heaven's embrace of Earth, and breathing, see,
Between them both in secrecy and shame
An unacknowledged life!” “But what,” said she,
Is this poor Heaven-born Earth-child's luckless name?”
“Its name,” Prometheus sigh'd, “is Poesy.”
“A woman?” “No.” “A man, then?” “Ah, still less!”
The glorious sexual Goddess blush'd outright,
“Is Hermes, then, a father?” “Nay, my guess
“Divines not Hermes.” “Zeus, then? am I right?”
“I doubt...” “If there's a doubt, 'tis Zeus! Suppress
The father's name, however. Well we know
The mother is the love tale's text, of course,
The father but the pretext. Name the mother!”
“But thou wouldst not believe me...” “Worse and worse!
'Tis Herè, then?” “Not Herè.” “There's no other
Of whom the thing's incredible—unless
Perchance 'tis Pallas?” “No alas, not she!”
“And why alas?” With keen suggestiveness,
For sole reply the Titan glowingly
Gazed on the Goddess, till she blush'd again,
“Matchless impertinent!” But he, unmoved,
“Goddess, I warn'd thee that thou wouldst not deign
To give me credit...” “For such pert unproved
Assertion? Fie, to say it to my face!”
“But I said nothing.” “And yet all implied.
What next, I wonder!” “Queen of every grace
And all that's beautiful,” Prometheus cried,
“Tell me thy parents!” “Known to all are they,
Zeus and Dione, both of them divine.”
“They!” cried the Titan, “they thy parents? Nay,
Great and dear Goddess, beauty such as thine
Had nobler birth! Those stupid Gods are not
The true begetters of a deity
Above their own. 'Twas otherwise begot.
Slid from the starry bosom of the sky,
A single drop of sacred ichor pure,
The mystic blood of Uranus, contain'd
In one bright bead thy whole progeniture:
Hid in the heart of Ocean it remain'd
Till there it brought thy wondrous self to birth:
And, even so, one glimpse of Heaven unstain'd,
That fell reflected in a glance from Earth
To Heaven uplifted, this new Beauty bore—
Which hath no sex, no mother, and no sire,
No kin on Earth, no home in Heaven—nay more,
'Tis neither man nor woman, but the soul,
Of the wide world's unsatisfied desire.
And thro' the universe, without a goal,
Its hungering heart must wander high and higher,
Till from the Gods it gain (as I, for those
Poor mortals yonder, snatch'd from Zeus his fire)
The immortality they dread to lose.”
Sounded the secret dwelling undescried
In those small bosoms. “And what seest thou there?”
The Goddess ask'd him. Sighing he replied
“What I should have foreseen!” “But what is that?”
Full on the glorious beauty of her face
Prometheus gazed. “O Goddess, ask not what!
174
Art by adoring worlds proclaim'd divine,
What kindred could thy confident godhood trace
In a shy loveliness so unlike thine?
A loveliness of its own self afraid,
A Bastard Beauty, fearing to be seen,
Yet fainting to be loved, that seeks the shade!”
The Goddess laugh'd “What doth my Titan mean?
What bastard is he speaking of?” And he,
“Ay, 'tis a Beauty bastard-born, and not
Authentically certified to be,
A Beauty surreptitiously begot
From Heaven's embrace of Earth, and breathing, see,
Between them both in secrecy and shame
An unacknowledged life!” “But what,” said she,
Is this poor Heaven-born Earth-child's luckless name?”
“Its name,” Prometheus sigh'd, “is Poesy.”
“A woman?” “No.” “A man, then?” “Ah, still less!”
175
“Is Hermes, then, a father?” “Nay, my guess
“Divines not Hermes.” “Zeus, then? am I right?”
“I doubt...” “If there's a doubt, 'tis Zeus! Suppress
The father's name, however. Well we know
The mother is the love tale's text, of course,
The father but the pretext. Name the mother!”
“But thou wouldst not believe me...” “Worse and worse!
'Tis Herè, then?” “Not Herè.” “There's no other
Of whom the thing's incredible—unless
Perchance 'tis Pallas?” “No alas, not she!”
“And why alas?” With keen suggestiveness,
For sole reply the Titan glowingly
Gazed on the Goddess, till she blush'd again,
“Matchless impertinent!” But he, unmoved,
“Goddess, I warn'd thee that thou wouldst not deign
To give me credit...” “For such pert unproved
176
“But I said nothing.” “And yet all implied.
What next, I wonder!” “Queen of every grace
And all that's beautiful,” Prometheus cried,
“Tell me thy parents!” “Known to all are they,
Zeus and Dione, both of them divine.”
“They!” cried the Titan, “they thy parents? Nay,
Great and dear Goddess, beauty such as thine
Had nobler birth! Those stupid Gods are not
The true begetters of a deity
Above their own. 'Twas otherwise begot.
Slid from the starry bosom of the sky,
A single drop of sacred ichor pure,
The mystic blood of Uranus, contain'd
In one bright bead thy whole progeniture:
Hid in the heart of Ocean it remain'd
Till there it brought thy wondrous self to birth:
And, even so, one glimpse of Heaven unstain'd,
177
To Heaven uplifted, this new Beauty bore—
Which hath no sex, no mother, and no sire,
No kin on Earth, no home in Heaven—nay more,
'Tis neither man nor woman, but the soul,
Of the wide world's unsatisfied desire.
And thro' the universe, without a goal,
Its hungering heart must wander high and higher,
Till from the Gods it gain (as I, for those
Poor mortals yonder, snatch'd from Zeus his fire)
The immortality they dread to lose.”
“But this new Beauty, do those bosoms small
Enshrine it?” ask'd the Goddess. “Ah, subdued,”
Prometheus murmur'd bitterly, “by all
The vulgar voices of the multitude
That loves its own monopoly of noise,
No homage hath the homeless one on Earth!
And vainly its unanswer'd song employs
The gift I gave. In darkness and in dearth,
By noise and glare engirt, unheard it sings,
Unseen it stirs. For this, from Zeus I craved,
What he denies me still, the gift of wings—
For birds—birds only—that in some sweet bird
Life's sweetest voice, from Earth's loud hubbub saved,
Might soar in song to Heaven, and there be heard.
Never while man breathes mortal breath shall he,
The Earthborn, hand or foot from Earth withdraw:
For there uplifted must his kingdom be
By agelong labour. Language, there, and Law
Hath he to found; create, for social power
And spacious trade, the Senate and the Mart;
Establish Science in her starry tower,
And mint the glowing miracles of Art.
Such is the task by me for man design'd!
But ever, as on Earth his task he plies,
Higher than foot and hand must heart and mind,
Uplifted o'er the earthly labour, rise.
Let mind and heart, then, heavenward pathways find
Upon the wings of every bird that flies,
While hand and foot stay fast to Earth confined;
Lest Earth should haply lose her fairest prize,
The hand of man: whose fingers five shall bind
Together all that his five wits' rejoice
To wrench from Time's tenacious treasuries,
As, guided onward by a wingèd voice,
Earth's wingless lord to his high future hies!”
Enshrine it?” ask'd the Goddess. “Ah, subdued,”
Prometheus murmur'd bitterly, “by all
The vulgar voices of the multitude
That loves its own monopoly of noise,
No homage hath the homeless one on Earth!
And vainly its unanswer'd song employs
178
By noise and glare engirt, unheard it sings,
Unseen it stirs. For this, from Zeus I craved,
What he denies me still, the gift of wings—
For birds—birds only—that in some sweet bird
Life's sweetest voice, from Earth's loud hubbub saved,
Might soar in song to Heaven, and there be heard.
Never while man breathes mortal breath shall he,
The Earthborn, hand or foot from Earth withdraw:
For there uplifted must his kingdom be
By agelong labour. Language, there, and Law
Hath he to found; create, for social power
And spacious trade, the Senate and the Mart;
Establish Science in her starry tower,
And mint the glowing miracles of Art.
Such is the task by me for man design'd!
But ever, as on Earth his task he plies,
Higher than foot and hand must heart and mind,
179
Let mind and heart, then, heavenward pathways find
Upon the wings of every bird that flies,
While hand and foot stay fast to Earth confined;
Lest Earth should haply lose her fairest prize,
The hand of man: whose fingers five shall bind
Together all that his five wits' rejoice
To wrench from Time's tenacious treasuries,
As, guided onward by a wingèd voice,
Earth's wingless lord to his high future hies!”
III. PART III.
The Titan quiver'd. Strenuous tremours ran
Thro' his huge limbs, rocking their heaviness
Like wind-rack'd oaks; and his deep eyes began
To glow with a prophetic passion. “Yes!
And then,” he murmur'd, “then the Race of Man
(Taught by that wingèd voice) perchance may guess
The giant purpose, the stupendous plan
That, brooding o'er its cloudy cradle, I
Have for the infant fashion'd. Changeless Gods,
What profits you your immortality?
Thro' endless self-repeating periods
To be the same for ever, is to be
For ever lacking life's divinest gift,
The faculty of growth. No inch can ye
Your future o'er your present selves uplift.
What good in such prolong'd ineptitude?
But to be ever growing young again,
From age to age eternally renew'd
With breath new-born, and ardour to attain
Goals ever new, by courses never done,
—This gift, to gods ungiven, or given in vain,
My forethought hath reserved for man alone!
Death was the blind condition jealous Zeus,
To balk my purpose, on mankind imposed,
But Death my purpose serves: for Death renews
Man's youth, whose course old age might else have closed.
Unprescient God, 'tis well thou couldst not guess
That to these hands the fetter forged by thee
Gave all required by their inventiveness
To shape the sword that cuts each fetter free!
Mankind must die! The fiat forth is gone.
Die? When I heard that word of doom proclaim'd,
More self-restraint I needed to suppress
A shout of joy, than when my strangled groan
Burst not the bitten lips its anguish shamed,
And not a cry revealed the dumb distress
Of my Caucasian martyrdom. By Death
The Race of Man shall be from age to age
Replenisht with the perdurable breath
Of endless birth, and vigour to engage
In ventures new. Death's sickle, as it reaps
The old grain, to the young the soil restores,
And still the harvest springs, and the soil keeps
Still fresh for growth its disencumber'd pores.
A man is dead, long live Mankind! From soul
To soul each life's acquest triumphantly
Passes in sure succession. Ages roll,
And in a hundred ages (what care I
How many births as many deaths succeed?)
Man's Race, enrich'd a hundredfold thereby,
Remains as young as ever. Oft with heed
Have I the Ocean watch'd, and watch'd the shore.
The sand, rejected by the wave's wild shock,
Gathers in heaps and, growing more and more,
And high and higher, hardens till at last
The wave returning breaks upon a rock,
And is itself rejected. Tost and cast
By Time's recurrent waves, son after sire,
From death to death, like that sea-driven sand,
Grains of Humanity, with past on past
Your greatening future pile, and high and higher,
Based on each others' buried shoulders, stand!”
Thro' his huge limbs, rocking their heaviness
Like wind-rack'd oaks; and his deep eyes began
To glow with a prophetic passion. “Yes!
And then,” he murmur'd, “then the Race of Man
180
The giant purpose, the stupendous plan
That, brooding o'er its cloudy cradle, I
Have for the infant fashion'd. Changeless Gods,
What profits you your immortality?
Thro' endless self-repeating periods
To be the same for ever, is to be
For ever lacking life's divinest gift,
The faculty of growth. No inch can ye
Your future o'er your present selves uplift.
What good in such prolong'd ineptitude?
But to be ever growing young again,
From age to age eternally renew'd
With breath new-born, and ardour to attain
Goals ever new, by courses never done,
—This gift, to gods ungiven, or given in vain,
My forethought hath reserved for man alone!
Death was the blind condition jealous Zeus,
181
But Death my purpose serves: for Death renews
Man's youth, whose course old age might else have closed.
Unprescient God, 'tis well thou couldst not guess
That to these hands the fetter forged by thee
Gave all required by their inventiveness
To shape the sword that cuts each fetter free!
Mankind must die! The fiat forth is gone.
Die? When I heard that word of doom proclaim'd,
More self-restraint I needed to suppress
A shout of joy, than when my strangled groan
Burst not the bitten lips its anguish shamed,
And not a cry revealed the dumb distress
Of my Caucasian martyrdom. By Death
The Race of Man shall be from age to age
Replenisht with the perdurable breath
Of endless birth, and vigour to engage
182
The old grain, to the young the soil restores,
And still the harvest springs, and the soil keeps
Still fresh for growth its disencumber'd pores.
A man is dead, long live Mankind! From soul
To soul each life's acquest triumphantly
Passes in sure succession. Ages roll,
And in a hundred ages (what care I
How many births as many deaths succeed?)
Man's Race, enrich'd a hundredfold thereby,
Remains as young as ever. Oft with heed
Have I the Ocean watch'd, and watch'd the shore.
The sand, rejected by the wave's wild shock,
Gathers in heaps and, growing more and more,
And high and higher, hardens till at last
The wave returning breaks upon a rock,
And is itself rejected. Tost and cast
By Time's recurrent waves, son after sire,
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Grains of Humanity, with past on past
Your greatening future pile, and high and higher,
Based on each others' buried shoulders, stand!”
“What art thou muttering?” Aphroditè said.
“Mysterious dreamer, dost thou meditate
The Gods' destruction?” High his shaggy head
The Titan lifted, and replied elate,
“Not thine, Anadyomenè, not thine!
Passion's imperishable autocrat,
Thee only of the Gods I deem divine,
And permanent is thy sweet power as Fate.
Receive mine oath, and aid me!”
“Mysterious dreamer, dost thou meditate
The Gods' destruction?” High his shaggy head
The Titan lifted, and replied elate,
“Not thine, Anadyomenè, not thine!
Passion's imperishable autocrat,
Thee only of the Gods I deem divine,
And permanent is thy sweet power as Fate.
Receive mine oath, and aid me!”
“How? In what?”
“Inspire in Zeus the wish to be a bird
That he may woo a mortal.”
“Inspire in Zeus the wish to be a bird
That he may woo a mortal.”
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Letting fall
Sweet lids o'er sunny eyes as this she heard,
The Goddess smiled, and answer'd “Is that all?”
Sweet lids o'er sunny eyes as this she heard,
The Goddess smiled, and answer'd “Is that all?”
IV. PART IV.
Pretentious patrons of mankind, what pranks
However monstrous has your pride disdain'd
For pushing forward its own purpose? Thanks
To your activity, what tears have stain'd
The trophies of man's progress! What a sea
Of blood, to float your cockle-boats, been shed!
Your fellow man from prejudice to free,
Your fellow man's incorrigible head
Have you chopp'd off with philanthropic glee,
By basketfuls, benign Philanthropists!
And, promising a better life instead,
This life have you, evangelising Priests,
With penance fill'd! Your famed philosophies,
By way of throwing light on what men find
Compassionately dark, burn out their eyes,
Vaunting Philosophers! In vain mankind
For refuge from its benefactors sighs.
However monstrous has your pride disdain'd
For pushing forward its own purpose? Thanks
To your activity, what tears have stain'd
The trophies of man's progress! What a sea
Of blood, to float your cockle-boats, been shed!
Your fellow man from prejudice to free,
Your fellow man's incorrigible head
Have you chopp'd off with philanthropic glee,
By basketfuls, benign Philanthropists!
And, promising a better life instead,
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With penance fill'd! Your famed philosophies,
By way of throwing light on what men find
Compassionately dark, burn out their eyes,
Vaunting Philosophers! In vain mankind
For refuge from its benefactors sighs.
His purposes humane the Titan's mind
Found less inhuman means to realise.
He merely made a god ridiculous.
When Zeus had, for the sake of Ganymede,
Assumed an eagle's form, succumbing thus
To Aphroditè's influence, thro' that deed
The Son of Asia and Iäpetus
His end attain'd. For how thenceforth could Zeus
(Plagued by the importunate solicitings
Of such a crafty counsellor) refuse
Even to the meanest bird a pair of wings?
Promiscuous benefits can rarely claim
A better origin. To elevate
One favourite, lest it should incur the blame
Of personal preference in affairs of State,
Some dozen mediocrities as high
The Crown must needs advance. If, still irate,
The Public Voice protests, to brave its cry
There are at least thirteen instead of one:
The wrong, moreover, that is done thereby
To no one in particular is done:
'Tis but a general calamity,
And that is an indignity to none.
Found less inhuman means to realise.
He merely made a god ridiculous.
When Zeus had, for the sake of Ganymede,
Assumed an eagle's form, succumbing thus
To Aphroditè's influence, thro' that deed
The Son of Asia and Iäpetus
His end attain'd. For how thenceforth could Zeus
(Plagued by the importunate solicitings
Of such a crafty counsellor) refuse
Even to the meanest bird a pair of wings?
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A better origin. To elevate
One favourite, lest it should incur the blame
Of personal preference in affairs of State,
Some dozen mediocrities as high
The Crown must needs advance. If, still irate,
The Public Voice protests, to brave its cry
There are at least thirteen instead of one:
The wrong, moreover, that is done thereby
To no one in particular is done:
'Tis but a general calamity,
And that is an indignity to none.
Yet vast and irremediable was
The failure of Prometheus. From the day
He universalised the voice, alas,
Whilst every vulgar brute could say his say,
To souls refined and delicate remain'd
No refuge from the hubbub all around
But their own silence: and such souls refrain'd
(Dumfounded quite by a disgust profound)
From audible utterance. The loquacious zest
Of Earth's coarse crowd had in the finer few
Life's highest note unknowingly suppress'd.
That was the Titan's first mistake. A new
And worse one he fell into, in his quest
Of means to mend it: for he did but brew
A base resentment in the human breast
By giving wings to birds. Man's envy drew
Between the smallest sparrow and himself
Comparisons, from one grudged point of view,
Displeasing to the self-conceited elf.
A third mistake Prometheus might have then
Committed, and from Zeus in some weak mood
The envied gift of wings for envious men
Perchance obtain'd, had Man's Ingratitude
Not prematurely ended his career.
The failure of Prometheus. From the day
He universalised the voice, alas,
Whilst every vulgar brute could say his say,
To souls refined and delicate remain'd
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But their own silence: and such souls refrain'd
(Dumfounded quite by a disgust profound)
From audible utterance. The loquacious zest
Of Earth's coarse crowd had in the finer few
Life's highest note unknowingly suppress'd.
That was the Titan's first mistake. A new
And worse one he fell into, in his quest
Of means to mend it: for he did but brew
A base resentment in the human breast
By giving wings to birds. Man's envy drew
Between the smallest sparrow and himself
Comparisons, from one grudged point of view,
Displeasing to the self-conceited elf.
A third mistake Prometheus might have then
Committed, and from Zeus in some weak mood
The envied gift of wings for envious men
Perchance obtain'd, had Man's Ingratitude
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Mortals, and mortals to a man agreed
In censuring all attempts to interfere
With their mortality, men first decreed
The Abolition of the Gods: and here,
Prometheus held their sacrilegious deed
Was justifiable, altho' severe:
But men no sooner from the Gods were freed,
Than of a Titan's aid so sure they were
Their godless freedom had no further need,
That they forthwith proclaim'd it everywhere
Mankind's Titanic Patron had become
To man no more than an enormous myth;
The monstrous trance of dreaming Heathendom,
Not to be any longer trusted with
Traditional influence on the human mind.
Thus, having fail'd to benefit the few,
And by the ungrateful multitude malign'd,
A sad self-exile, seeking to eschew
The sight of his own failure in mankind,
Prometheus from man's fatuous world withdrew.
In censuring all attempts to interfere
With their mortality, men first decreed
The Abolition of the Gods: and here,
Prometheus held their sacrilegious deed
Was justifiable, altho' severe:
But men no sooner from the Gods were freed,
Than of a Titan's aid so sure they were
Their godless freedom had no further need,
That they forthwith proclaim'd it everywhere
Mankind's Titanic Patron had become
To man no more than an enormous myth;
The monstrous trance of dreaming Heathendom,
Not to be any longer trusted with
Traditional influence on the human mind.
Thus, having fail'd to benefit the few,
And by the ungrateful multitude malign'd,
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The sight of his own failure in mankind,
Prometheus from man's fatuous world withdrew.
But first to his lame brother he resign'd
His slighted scepter. Epimetheus sought
To avenge Prometheus, and rebuke men's blind
Ingratitude for gifts that cost them nought.
Strict penalties to granted prayers he join'd,
And punish'd with a knowledge dearly bought
The pride that had disdainfully declined
Gratuitous instruction. Afterthought
Succeeded Forethought as the Ruling Power
Of Progress, and the Race of Man was taught
A painful prudence by Pandora's dower
Of ever unanticipated woes
From wishes born.
His slighted scepter. Epimetheus sought
To avenge Prometheus, and rebuke men's blind
Ingratitude for gifts that cost them nought.
Strict penalties to granted prayers he join'd,
And punish'd with a knowledge dearly bought
The pride that had disdainfully declined
Gratuitous instruction. Afterthought
Succeeded Forethought as the Ruling Power
Of Progress, and the Race of Man was taught
A painful prudence by Pandora's dower
Of ever unanticipated woes
From wishes born.
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The formidable place
Of his first martyrdom Prometheus chose
For his last refuge from a thankless race.
There, wandering far and farther out of sight,
Along waste ways indefinite as those
Traced by the shadows travelling in the flight
Of silent clouds o'er solitary snows,
“Rash Race of Suicides!” he mused in scorn,
“You to your own precocious appetite
Have fall'n a prey: your future yet unborn
You have devour'd: and, fumbled ere unfurl'd,
Broken is all its promise in the bud!
No more can I redeem you from a world
Where Genius, bringing fire, found only mud
Wherefrom to make an image of itself.
Ah, what to you is left for which to live,
To toil, to suffer? Perishable pelf,
Lust without love, coarse pleasures that contrive
Their own defeat, and joy that never stays!
What with those aspirations will you do,
Which should have been as pinions to upraise
Humanity above the Gods? Pursue
The trivial tenour of your thankless days
From things desired to things possest in vain,
But there my gifts can aid you not, I know!
Alas, and what will now be their worse pain,
In whom those gifts their glowing poësies
With aching pangs commingle? Woe to you,
Poor children of my frustrate enterprise!
Poets, can you be silent?”
Of his first martyrdom Prometheus chose
For his last refuge from a thankless race.
There, wandering far and farther out of sight,
Along waste ways indefinite as those
Traced by the shadows travelling in the flight
Of silent clouds o'er solitary snows,
“Rash Race of Suicides!” he mused in scorn,
“You to your own precocious appetite
Have fall'n a prey: your future yet unborn
You have devour'd: and, fumbled ere unfurl'd,
Broken is all its promise in the bud!
No more can I redeem you from a world
Where Genius, bringing fire, found only mud
Wherefrom to make an image of itself.
Ah, what to you is left for which to live,
To toil, to suffer? Perishable pelf,
Lust without love, coarse pleasures that contrive
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What with those aspirations will you do,
Which should have been as pinions to upraise
Humanity above the Gods? Pursue
The trivial tenour of your thankless days
From things desired to things possest in vain,
But there my gifts can aid you not, I know!
Alas, and what will now be their worse pain,
In whom those gifts their glowing poësies
With aching pangs commingle? Woe to you,
Poor children of my frustrate enterprise!
Poets, can you be silent?”
That austere
And somber martyr's reminiscent eye
Survey'd the snow-ribb'd crags around him there,
And the lost Titan murmur'd, with a sigh
Soon frozen in their freezing atmosphere,
“If not .... well, learn to suffer, even as I!”
And somber martyr's reminiscent eye
Survey'd the snow-ribb'd crags around him there,
And the lost Titan murmur'd, with a sigh
Soon frozen in their freezing atmosphere,
“If not .... well, learn to suffer, even as I!”
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A SIGH.
The Passion and the pain of yoreSlow time hath still'd in vain,
Since all that I can feel no more
I yearn to feel again.
NECROMANCY.
Why didst thou let me deem thee lost for years,Youth of my heart? And, now that I have shed
O'er thy false grave long-since-forgotten tears,
And put away my mourning for the dead,
And learn'd to live without thee half content,
What brings thee back alive, tho' in disguise?
For thou, with this fair stranger's beauty blent,
Art smiling on me thro' another's eyes.
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URIEL.
(A MYSTERY.)
DEDICATION.
To you, the dead and gone, bright-eyed DesiresWhose beauty lights no more my dwindled day,
Here, sitting lone beside forsaken fires,
I dedicate this lay.
1.
I heard a Voice by night, that call'd to me “Uriel! Uriel!”The night was dark, and nothing could I see,
Yet knew I by the Voice that it was She
Whom my soul loves so well
That when She calls Her follower I must be,
Whether She call from Heaven or from Hell.
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2.
Then to the Voice “What is thy will?” said I.But for sole response thro' the darkness fell,
Repeated with the same importunate cry,
Mine own name only, “Uriel! Uriel!”
I could not sleep nor rest upon my bed,
So I rose up, and thro' the husht house pass'd
With steps unlighted (for my lamp was dead)
Out on the heath.
3.
That Voice flew onward fast,Still calling, and still onward after it
I follow'd, far outsped: for there, beneath
The moonless heaven, not even a marsh-fire lit
Night's fearful sameness; and athwart the heath,
Not fast and free as flew the Voice that led,
But halting oft, my steps went stumblingly.
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From what it toucht; and, tho' I could not see,
I felt that, where I trod, the plain was spread
With corpses. Heap'd so thick they seem'd to be,
That I, at every moment, fear'd to tread
Upon a dead man's face. Yet, undeterr'd,
My feet obey'd a will not mine, whose spell
Their course constrain'd. For still that Voice I heard,
And still the Voice call'd “Uriel! Uriel!”
4.
At last a livid light began to growLow down in heaven. It was the moon that, pent
Behind a slowly crumbling cloud till now,
Athwart thin flakes of worn-out vapour sent
A filmy gleam. And I could see thereby
The corpses that lay litter'd on the heath.
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Was staring at me with the stare of death:
Harness'd in rusty mail from head to heel
Was each dead body: and each dead right hand
Grasp'd by the hilt a blade of bloodstain'd steel,
But broken was each blade. And, while I scann'd
Those dead men's faces, I began to feel
A sadness which I could not understand:
But unto me it seem'd that I had seen,
And known, and loved them, somewhere, long ago:
Tho' when, or where, and all that was between
That time and this (if what perplex'd me so
With mimic memories had indeed once been)
I knew no longer. On this fatal plain
Vast battle must have once been waged, so keen
That none was spared by the relentless foe
For unmolested burial of the slain.
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5.
And, as I gazed upon them, wondering whyThese unrememberable faces seem'd
Mysteriously familiar to mine eye,
The cloudy light that on their corselets gleam'd
Grew clearer, and a sound began to swell
Moaning along the heath: the swarthy sky
Was scourged by a strong wind: the moonlight stream'd,
Flooding the land: and on the dead men fell
Its frigid splendour. Then stark upright rose
Each dead man, shouting “Uriel! Uriel!”
And in the windy air aloft all those
Arm'd corpses waved their shatter'd swords.
6.
I cried,“What are ye? and what name is it you bear?
Corpses or ghosts? Is Life with Death allied,
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Of Desolation?” And they all replied
“Thine is our name, for thine our Legions were,
And thine would still be, if thou hadst not died.
But corpse or ghost thou art thyself, and how
Should we thy death survive? It is not well
When the dead do not know the dead, nor know
The date of their own death-day, Uriel!
Our leader bold in many a fight wast thou,
And we fought bravely. But thy foes and ours
Were strongest. And the strife is over now,
And we be all dead men. And those tall towers
We built are fallen, all our banners torn,
All our swords broken, all our strong watch fires
Quencht, and in death have we been left forlorn
Of sepulture, tho' sons of princely sires,
Born to find burial fair with saints and kings,
Where, over trophied tombs, the taper shines
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And priestly perfumes soothe memorial shrines.
And that is why we cannot find repose
In the bare quiet of unburied death;
But ever, when at night the wild wind blows
Upon the barren bosom of this heath,
Our dead flesh tingles, and revives, and glows
With the brief passion of a borrow'd breath,
Breathed by the wind: and on as the wind goes
Go with the wind we must, where'er that be,
A lonesome pilgrimage along the night,
Till the wind falls again, and with it we.
Farewell!”
7.
The wild wind swept them from my sight
Even as they spake, and all the heath was bare.
Sighingly the wind ceased. The night was still.
The dead were gone. Only the moonlight there
Upon the empty heath lay clear and chill.
Then I remember'd long-forgotten things,
And all my loss. I could no farther fare
Along that haunted heath; for my heart's strings
Were aching, gnaw'd by an immense despair.
Flat on the spot where last they stood I fell,
And clutch'd the wither'd fern, as one that clings
Fast to a grave where all he loved lies dead,
And wept, and wept, and wept.
Even as they spake, and all the heath was bare.
Sighingly the wind ceased. The night was still.
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Upon the empty heath lay clear and chill.
Then I remember'd long-forgotten things,
And all my loss. I could no farther fare
Along that haunted heath; for my heart's strings
Were aching, gnaw'd by an immense despair.
Flat on the spot where last they stood I fell,
And clutch'd the wither'd fern, as one that clings
Fast to a grave where all he loved lies dead,
And wept, and wept, and wept.
“Rise Uriel,”
The Voice I knew still call'd, “and follow me!”
But I could only weep, so vast a well
Of tears within me flow'd. At last I said
“What heart or hope have I to follow thee?
Are not the Legions lost, that at thy call
To mine own overthrow and theirs I led?
For I have seen again their faces all,
And death was all I saw there.” “Let them be!”
The Voice replied. “The dead shall live again
When we have reach'd the goal whereto I go,
And there shalt thou rejoin them. Nor till then
Canst thou thyself return to life, for thou
Thyself art also fall'n among the slain.
But look upon me, faithless one, and know
That I am life in death, and joy in pain,
And light in darkness.”
The Voice I knew still call'd, “and follow me!”
But I could only weep, so vast a well
Of tears within me flow'd. At last I said
“What heart or hope have I to follow thee?
Are not the Legions lost, that at thy call
To mine own overthrow and theirs I led?
For I have seen again their faces all,
And death was all I saw there.” “Let them be!”
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When we have reach'd the goal whereto I go,
And there shalt thou rejoin them. Nor till then
Canst thou thyself return to life, for thou
Thyself art also fall'n among the slain.
But look upon me, faithless one, and know
That I am life in death, and joy in pain,
And light in darkness.”
8
I look'd up, and saw,In glory that was not of mere moon light,
(Glory that fill'd me with a great glad awe)
Shining above me, Her my soul loves well,
Like a white Angel, And along the night
Her voice still call'd me “Uriel! Uriel!”
Again I follow'd. And it seem'd that days
And nights, and weeks, and months, and years went by,
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Thro' worlds and worlds. And ever was mine eye
Fixt on that beckoning Form with faithful gaze.
And seasons little cared for—shine or shade,
Or heat or cold—pursued us. Many a Spring,
And many a Summer, many an Autumn, stay'd
My panting path, and round me strove to fling
Their fervid arms, and many a Winter made
His frozen fingers meet and fiercely cling
In lean embrace that long my course delay'd,
And Pain and Pleasure both essay'd to wring
My purpose from me. But still, sore afraid
Lest I should lose my Guide by tarrying,
Forward I press'd whenever the Voice said
“Uriel! Uriel! linger not!”
9.
At last
We reach'd what seem'd the end of a dead world.
Wall'd round it was by mountains bare and vast,
And thro' them one thin perilous pathway curl'd
Into an unknown land of ice and snow,
Where nothing lived, nor aught was left to freeze
But frost. There was a heap of bones below;
Above, a flock of vultures. Under these,
Hard by a stream that long had ceased to flow,
A miserable, squalid, lean old man,
Nursing a broken harp upon his knees,
Sat in the frozen pass. His eyes were wan,
But full of spiteful looks. She my soul loved,
Fair as a skyward Seraph on the wing,
Before me up that perilous pathway moved,
Calling me from above, and beckoning.
But he that sat before the pass began
To twang his harp, which had but one shrill string,
(Whose notes like icy needles thro' me ran)
And with a crack'd and creaking voice to sing
“O fool, infatuated fool, forbear!
For yonder is the Land of Ice and Snow,
And She is dead that beckoneth to thee there,
And dead forever are the dead I know.”
We reach'd what seem'd the end of a dead world.
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And thro' them one thin perilous pathway curl'd
Into an unknown land of ice and snow,
Where nothing lived, nor aught was left to freeze
But frost. There was a heap of bones below;
Above, a flock of vultures. Under these,
Hard by a stream that long had ceased to flow,
A miserable, squalid, lean old man,
Nursing a broken harp upon his knees,
Sat in the frozen pass. His eyes were wan,
But full of spiteful looks. She my soul loved,
Fair as a skyward Seraph on the wing,
Before me up that perilous pathway moved,
Calling me from above, and beckoning.
But he that sat before the pass began
To twang his harp, which had but one shrill string,
(Whose notes like icy needles thro' me ran)
And with a crack'd and creaking voice to sing
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For yonder is the Land of Ice and Snow,
And She is dead that beckoneth to thee there,
And dead forever are the dead I know.”
Whilst thus that lean old man, with eyes aglare,
Sang to his broken harp's one string below,
The vultures scream'd above in the bleak air
“Dead are the dead forever!”
Sang to his broken harp's one string below,
The vultures scream'd above in the bleak air
“Dead are the dead forever!”
10.
“What art thou,
Malignant wretch?” I cried. The old man said
“I am the Ancient Porter of this Pass,
Beyond which lies the Land of Ice and Snow.
And all the dwellers in that land are dead,
And dead forever are the dead I know.
And this, my harp—I know not when, alas!
But all its strings were broken long ago,
Save one, which time makes tough. The others were
Of sweeter tone, but this sounds more intense.
And, for my name, some say it is Despair,
And others say it is Experience.”
Malignant wretch?” I cried. The old man said
“I am the Ancient Porter of this Pass,
Beyond which lies the Land of Ice and Snow.
And all the dwellers in that land are dead,
And dead forever are the dead I know.
And this, my harp—I know not when, alas!
But all its strings were broken long ago,
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Of sweeter tone, but this sounds more intense.
And, for my name, some say it is Despair,
And others say it is Experience.”
Thereat he laugh'd, and shook his sordid rags,
And his wan eyes with sullen malice gleam'd.
And loud again, upon the icy crags,
In that bleak air above, the vultures scream'd.
And his wan eyes with sullen malice gleam'd.
And loud again, upon the icy crags,
In that bleak air above, the vultures scream'd.
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SCORN.
1
Dim on its slighted altar diedThe sacred fire no victim fed:
The god, who craved a gift denied,
His own dread image seized instead:
And headlong he hurl'd it the flames among,
Thus choosing rather self-immolation
Than a form that in vain to a faithless throng
From his shrine appeal'd for a grudged oblation.
The flames around it wreathed:
The image was consumed,
And into ashes fell.
The god upon them breathed,
Their fading spark relumed,
And utter'd this oracle:—
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2
“Go, dust wherein my power hath dwelt,Avenge on man a wrong divine,
And the proud pain a god hath felt
In some poor human soul enshrine!”
The roused ashes arose and went forth on the wind:
The divinity hid in them, high and low
Hovering, sought where its force might find
Means to greaten, and grow, and glow.
A soul it found at last,
A great soul wrong'd by fame,
A grandeur grown forlorn:
Into that soul it past
Burningly, and became
Wrong'd Grandeur's angel, Scorn.
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STRANGERS.
(A RHAPSODY.)
Children are born, about whose lucid brows
The blue veins, visibly meandering, stream
Transparent: children in whose wistful eyes
Are looks like lost dumb creatures in a crowd,
That roam, and search, and find not what they seek.
These children are life's aliens. The wise nurse
Shakes her head, murmuring “They will not live!”
A piteous prophecy, yet best for them
The death that, pitifully premature,
Remits the pitiless penalty of birth;
Letting the lost ones steal away unhurt,
Because unnoticed, from a world not theirs.
The blue veins, visibly meandering, stream
Transparent: children in whose wistful eyes
Are looks like lost dumb creatures in a crowd,
That roam, and search, and find not what they seek.
These children are life's aliens. The wise nurse
Shakes her head, murmuring “They will not live!”
A piteous prophecy, yet best for them
The death that, pitifully premature,
Remits the pitiless penalty of birth;
Letting the lost ones steal away unhurt,
Because unnoticed, from a world not theirs.
Strangers and star-born strayaways forlorn,
Who come so careless of the outlandish wealth
You carry with you, dropping as you go
Treasures beyond the reach of Orient Kings,
What seek you here where your unvalued gifts
Shall leave you beggars for an alms denied?
Earth yields not their equivalent. No field
So profitless but some poor price it hath;
A spurious picture or a spavin'd horse
May find in time their willing purchasers;
But never for its worth shall you exchange
A soul's unmarketable opulence.
And when at last, of those who (unenrich'd
By your impovrishment) the gift forget,
Your thirst and hunger crave a broken crust,
A drop of water from the wayside well,
Stripes shall correct such importunities.
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You carry with you, dropping as you go
Treasures beyond the reach of Orient Kings,
What seek you here where your unvalued gifts
Shall leave you beggars for an alms denied?
Earth yields not their equivalent. No field
So profitless but some poor price it hath;
A spurious picture or a spavin'd horse
May find in time their willing purchasers;
But never for its worth shall you exchange
A soul's unmarketable opulence.
And when at last, of those who (unenrich'd
By your impovrishment) the gift forget,
Your thirst and hunger crave a broken crust,
A drop of water from the wayside well,
Stripes shall correct such importunities.
Linger not! live not! give not! Hide your gifts,
Ungiven, deeper than Remembrance digs
Among the haunted ruins she explores
For riches lost. And if abrupt mischance
Their buried store reveal, without a blush
Disown it, for a lie may sometimes save
A miser's life. The truth would serve as well,
Were truth not unbelievable; for, stored
In coin not current here and gems unprized,
Your treasures are worth nothing to the wretch
They tempt to make them, by a murder, his.
But this the assassins know not, and ill-arm'd,
Ill-arm'd and worse than weaponless, are you!
To whose inefficacious grasp was given
In solemn mockery the seraphic sword
That only archangelic hands can hold.
Your own have clutch'd it by the burning blade,
And, when you wield it, 'tis yourselves you wound. [OMITTED]
Ungiven, deeper than Remembrance digs
210
For riches lost. And if abrupt mischance
Their buried store reveal, without a blush
Disown it, for a lie may sometimes save
A miser's life. The truth would serve as well,
Were truth not unbelievable; for, stored
In coin not current here and gems unprized,
Your treasures are worth nothing to the wretch
They tempt to make them, by a murder, his.
But this the assassins know not, and ill-arm'd,
Ill-arm'd and worse than weaponless, are you!
To whose inefficacious grasp was given
In solemn mockery the seraphic sword
That only archangelic hands can hold.
Your own have clutch'd it by the burning blade,
And, when you wield it, 'tis yourselves you wound. [OMITTED]
211
You that have Feeling, think you to have all?
Poor fools, and you have absolutely nought!
In reckonings of this world's arithmetic
Everything else is something by itself,
Feeling alone is nothing. Could you add
That nothing to what counts for anything,
Forthwith a tenfold potency perchance
The unreckonable zero might bestow
Upon the reckon'd unit. But what boots
A value so vicarious?
Poor fools, and you have absolutely nought!
In reckonings of this world's arithmetic
Everything else is something by itself,
Feeling alone is nothing. Could you add
That nothing to what counts for anything,
Forthwith a tenfold potency perchance
The unreckonable zero might bestow
Upon the reckon'd unit. But what boots
A value so vicarious?
Yours the spell
Whose all-transfigurating sorceries
Convert the dust man grovels in to gold;
Robing the pauper royal in the pomp
Of princely exultations, changing night
To morning, death to life, the wilderness
To paradise; beatifying pain,
Cleansing impurity, and strewing thick
The gulphs of Hell with starry gleams of Heaven.
But use it not! Unsanction'd miracles
Are sentenced sins. Writ large for all to read,
About the world's street corners Reason posts
“Beware of the Miraculous!” Whereto
Prudence appends, the placard to complete,
“Miracles are forbidden!” Use it not,
Your gift unblest! Lo, Virtue's High Priest comes,
Calls the Sanhedrim's long-phylacteried train,
Consults the scriptured scrolls, within them finds
No warrant for the wonders you perform,
And them and you doth anathematise.
Whose all-transfigurating sorceries
Convert the dust man grovels in to gold;
Robing the pauper royal in the pomp
Of princely exultations, changing night
To morning, death to life, the wilderness
To paradise; beatifying pain,
Cleansing impurity, and strewing thick
212
But use it not! Unsanction'd miracles
Are sentenced sins. Writ large for all to read,
About the world's street corners Reason posts
“Beware of the Miraculous!” Whereto
Prudence appends, the placard to complete,
“Miracles are forbidden!” Use it not,
Your gift unblest! Lo, Virtue's High Priest comes,
Calls the Sanhedrim's long-phylacteried train,
Consults the scriptured scrolls, within them finds
No warrant for the wonders you perform,
And them and you doth anathematise.
Linger not! live not! give not! All your gifts
Shall turn to stones and scourges in the hands
That crave them, and to live is to be lost.
Shall turn to stones and scourges in the hands
That crave them, and to live is to be lost.
213
Thou starry snowflake, whose still flight transforms
The frozen crystal's constellated crown
To an ethereal feather, seek not here,
Celestial stranger, seek not here on earth,
Where Purity were nameless but for thee,
The warmth that wastes, the fervours that defile!
Upon our wither'd branches hang not thou
Thy votive wreaths, nor our bleak paths invest
With thy pale presence! Vainly dost thou cling
About our fasten'd casements, vainly spread
So close beside our doors thy spotless couch.
Behind them dwells Ingratitude. The voice
That welcomed thine arrival will anon
Resent thy lingering, and exclaim “Enough!”
Trust not the looks that smile, the lips that sigh,
“I love thee!” For to-day those words mean “Come!”
To-morrow “Go!” Men's words are numberless,
And yet in man's speech only the same word
Means “No” to-morrow that meant “Yes” to-day.
The frozen crystal's constellated crown
To an ethereal feather, seek not here,
Celestial stranger, seek not here on earth,
Where Purity were nameless but for thee,
The warmth that wastes, the fervours that defile!
Upon our wither'd branches hang not thou
Thy votive wreaths, nor our bleak paths invest
With thy pale presence! Vainly dost thou cling
About our fasten'd casements, vainly spread
So close beside our doors thy spotless couch.
Behind them dwells Ingratitude. The voice
That welcomed thine arrival will anon
Resent thy lingering, and exclaim “Enough!”
Trust not the looks that smile, the lips that sigh,
“I love thee!” For to-day those words mean “Come!”
To-morrow “Go!” Men's words are numberless,
And yet in man's speech only the same word
214
Linger not, live not, give not, you forlorn
Gift-laden strangers! With your gifts ungiven,
And so at least undesecrated, die! [OMITTED]
Gift-laden strangers! With your gifts ungiven,
And so at least undesecrated, die! [OMITTED]
What fills with such invincibility
The frail seed striving thro' the stubborn soil?
The sun so long one herbless spot caress'd,
That in the darkling germ beneath it stirr'd
A tender trouble, and that trouble seem'd
A promise. “Can it be, the Sun himself
Hath sought me? He so glorious, he so great,
And I so dark, so insignificant!
Dear Sun, with all the strength thy love reveal'd,
Responding to thy summons, I am here!”
And the rich life of granaried Lybia glows
Revelling already in a single grain.
The frail seed striving thro' the stubborn soil?
The sun so long one herbless spot caress'd,
That in the darkling germ beneath it stirr'd
A tender trouble, and that trouble seem'd
A promise. “Can it be, the Sun himself
Hath sought me? He so glorious, he so great,
And I so dark, so insignificant!
Dear Sun, with all the strength thy love reveal'd,
Responding to thy summons, I am here!”
215
Revelling already in a single grain.
Doth the Sun answer, “Little one, too much
Thou hast responded, now respond no more”?
No, for throughout the illimitable heights
And deeps of boundless Being, to attain
It scarce suffices, at the most and best,
To tend beyond the unattainable,
And too much love is still not love enough.
The Sun may set, but all his rising wrought
To life's enraptured consciousness remains.
The Sun disowns not, even when he deserts,
What he put forth his fervours to evoke.
Man's love alone its doing disavows,
And makes denial of its dearest deed. [OMITTED]
Thou hast responded, now respond no more”?
No, for throughout the illimitable heights
And deeps of boundless Being, to attain
It scarce suffices, at the most and best,
To tend beyond the unattainable,
And too much love is still not love enough.
The Sun may set, but all his rising wrought
To life's enraptured consciousness remains.
The Sun disowns not, even when he deserts,
What he put forth his fervours to evoke.
Man's love alone its doing disavows,
And makes denial of its dearest deed. [OMITTED]
216
Beneath a dead bird's long-uncared-for cage,
That hangs forgotten in the cloister'd court
Of some lone uninhabitable house,
From the chink'd pavement slowly creeping comes
A thin weak stem that opens like a heart,
And puts forth tenderly two tiny hands
Of benediction to that cage forlorn,
Then dies, as tho' its little life had done
All it was born to do. The flint-set earth
Requites the dead bird's gift—one casual seed,
And from her stony breast a blossom blows.
That hangs forgotten in the cloister'd court
Of some lone uninhabitable house,
From the chink'd pavement slowly creeping comes
A thin weak stem that opens like a heart,
And puts forth tenderly two tiny hands
Of benediction to that cage forlorn,
Then dies, as tho' its little life had done
All it was born to do. The flint-set earth
Requites the dead bird's gift—one casual seed,
And from her stony breast a blossom blows.
But, pouring forth Uranian star-seed, strew
Incipient heavens thro' all the hollowness
Of human gratitude for gifts divine,
And nothing from the sowing of such seed
Shall blossom but the bitterness of death. [OMITTED]
Incipient heavens thro' all the hollowness
Of human gratitude for gifts divine,
And nothing from the sowing of such seed
Shall blossom but the bitterness of death. [OMITTED]
217
The sun-led seasons, the revolving years,
Day with his glory, night with all her stars,
The present, and the future, and the past,
And earth, and heaven, should but a bauble be!
The unvalued gift of an extravagant soul,
Given undemanded, broken by a breath,
The sport of one exorbitant desire,
The easy spoil of one minute mischance,
And all for nothing! What? the unheedful flint
Spares room to house the blossom that requites
A chance seed fallen from a dead bird's cage,
And nothing, nothing, in the long long years,
That bring to other losses soon or late
The loss of loss remember'd, shall arise?
Nothing, not even a penitential tear,
A fleeting sigh, a momentary smile,
The benediction of a passing thought
218
The quite-forgotten gift of too much love! [OMITTED]
All other loss comparison avails
To lessen, and all other ills worse ill
May mitigate. Defeated monarchs find
Cold comfort left in Cæsar's legions lost:
The ruin'd merchant in the bankrupt State:
The bedless beggar in the bed-rid lord.
The sight of Niobe dries many tears,
And by the side of open graves are graves
Long seal'd, like old wounds cicatrised by time.
But this is an immitigable ill,
A lastingly incomparable loss,
A forfeiture of refuge that exiles
Its victim even from the lonest lodge
219
Commiserate each other. The excess
Of one o'erweening moment hath ursurpt
The whole dominion of eternity;
Yet even the usurpation was a fraud,
For what seem'd all was nothing; and its dupes,
Who mourn that moment's loss, have with it lost
The right to say that it was ever theirs. [OMITTED]
Sceptic, approach and, into this abysm
Of torment gazing, tremblingly believe!
Behold in Hell the soul's appalling proof
Of her dread immortality! What else
Could for a moment undestroy'd endure
The least of such annihilating pangs?
Transmute them into corporal sufferings. Hurl
Their victim from the visionary top
Of some sky'd tower, and on its flinted base
Shatter his crumpled carcass: if the heart
Still beats, lay bare each lacerated nerve
And sear with scorching steel the sensitive flesh:
Or lift the bleeding ruins of the wretch,
Lay them in down, bandage with cruel care
The broken limbs, and nurse to life again
Their swooning anguish: then from eyes that burn
Chase slumber, and to lips that parch deny
Release from thirst. It boots not! Flesh and blood
Death to his painless sanctuary takes,
And life's material mechanism stops.
The first pang is the last. But all these pangs
(And add to these what worse, if worse there be,
The torturer's teeming art hath yet devised)
Attain not the tenth part of those endured
Without cessation by the soul that loves,
When love is only suffering. What escape,
What refuge, from self-torment hath the soul?
Or what for love is left unoverthrown
By love's own overthrow?
Of torment gazing, tremblingly believe!
Behold in Hell the soul's appalling proof
Of her dread immortality! What else
Could for a moment undestroy'd endure
The least of such annihilating pangs?
Transmute them into corporal sufferings. Hurl
220
Of some sky'd tower, and on its flinted base
Shatter his crumpled carcass: if the heart
Still beats, lay bare each lacerated nerve
And sear with scorching steel the sensitive flesh:
Or lift the bleeding ruins of the wretch,
Lay them in down, bandage with cruel care
The broken limbs, and nurse to life again
Their swooning anguish: then from eyes that burn
Chase slumber, and to lips that parch deny
Release from thirst. It boots not! Flesh and blood
Death to his painless sanctuary takes,
And life's material mechanism stops.
The first pang is the last. But all these pangs
(And add to these what worse, if worse there be,
The torturer's teeming art hath yet devised)
Attain not the tenth part of those endured
Without cessation by the soul that loves,
221
What refuge, from self-torment hath the soul?
Or what for love is left unoverthrown
By love's own overthrow?
The growth of love,
Outgrowing the wide girdle of the world,
Hath in itself absorb'd sun, moon, and stars,
Life, Death, and Thought's illimitable realm,
Leaving in Time no moment, and in Space
No point, its omnipresence kindles not
To palpitant incandescence—and what then?
A word, nay not so much, a breath unbreathed,
A look, and all this universe of love,
Cramm'd with the curse of Tantalus, becomes
A pitiless infinitude of fierce
Importunate impossibilities,
Where nothing is but what may never be. [OMITTED]
Outgrowing the wide girdle of the world,
Hath in itself absorb'd sun, moon, and stars,
Life, Death, and Thought's illimitable realm,
Leaving in Time no moment, and in Space
No point, its omnipresence kindles not
To palpitant incandescence—and what then?
A word, nay not so much, a breath unbreathed,
A look, and all this universe of love,
Cramm'd with the curse of Tantalus, becomes
A pitiless infinitude of fierce
Importunate impossibilities,
Where nothing is but what may never be. [OMITTED]
222
Among the ruins of a world destroy'd
What art thou seeking? Its destroyer? Look!
He stands before thee. And thou knowst him not.
The traitor of thy perisht universe
Hath perisht with it. Nay, that world and he,
Whose creature and creator was thyself,
Save in thyself existed not. Away,
Disown'd survivor of what never was! [OMITTED]
There is a sigh that hath no audible sound,
And, like a ghost that hath no visible form,
Breathing unheard thro' solitudes unseen,
Its presence haunts the Desert of the Heart.
Fata Morgana! Fair Enchantress, Queen
Of all that ever-quivering quietness,
There dost thou dreaming dwell, and there create
Those fervid desolations of delight,
Where dwell with thee the joys that never were!
And, like a ghost that hath no visible form,
Breathing unheard thro' solitudes unseen,
223
Fata Morgana! Fair Enchantress, Queen
Of all that ever-quivering quietness,
There dost thou dreaming dwell, and there create
Those fervid desolations of delight,
Where dwell with thee the joys that never were!
And, when in darkness fades the phantom scene,
The wizard stars that nightly trembling light
That undiscover'd loneliness are looks
From eyes that love no longer. All the winds
That whisper there are breaths of broken vows
And perjured promises. The pale mirage
That haunts the simmering hyaline above
Is all the work of ghosts, and its bright wastes
Teem with fantastic specters of the swoons
Of prostrate passions, hopes become despairs,
And dreams of bliss unblest. In that weird sky
There is no peace, but a perpetual trance
Of torturous ecstasy. Vext multitudes
Of frantic apparitions mingle there,
And part, and vanish, waving vaporous arms
Of supplication—to each other lured,
And by each other pantingly repulsed.
The goblin picture of a passionate world
Painted on nothingness! And all the sands,
Heaved by the sultry sighings of the heart
Of this unquietable solitude,
Are waves that everlastingly roll on
O'er wrecks deep-sunken in a shoreless sea
Whose bed is vast oblivion. Out of sight,
Into that sea's abysmal bosom pour'd,
Flow all desires unsatisfied, all pains
Unpitied, all affections unfulfill'd,
And sighs, and tears, and smiles misunderstood.
The wizard stars that nightly trembling light
That undiscover'd loneliness are looks
From eyes that love no longer. All the winds
That whisper there are breaths of broken vows
And perjured promises. The pale mirage
That haunts the simmering hyaline above
Is all the work of ghosts, and its bright wastes
Teem with fantastic specters of the swoons
Of prostrate passions, hopes become despairs,
And dreams of bliss unblest. In that weird sky
224
Of torturous ecstasy. Vext multitudes
Of frantic apparitions mingle there,
And part, and vanish, waving vaporous arms
Of supplication—to each other lured,
And by each other pantingly repulsed.
The goblin picture of a passionate world
Painted on nothingness! And all the sands,
Heaved by the sultry sighings of the heart
Of this unquietable solitude,
Are waves that everlastingly roll on
O'er wrecks deep-sunken in a shoreless sea
Whose bed is vast oblivion. Out of sight,
Into that sea's abysmal bosom pour'd,
Flow all desires unsatisfied, all pains
Unpitied, all affections unfulfill'd,
And sighs, and tears, and smiles misunderstood.
There all the adventurous argosies that sail'd
In search of undiscover'd worlds, reduced
To undiscoverable wrecks, remain.
And there perchance, at last, no more estranged
From all around them, since not stranger they
Than all things else, where all things else are strange.
In that wide strangeness unrejected rest
The world's rejected strangers—loves unloved,
And lives unlived, and longings unappeased.
225
To undiscoverable wrecks, remain.
And there perchance, at last, no more estranged
From all around them, since not stranger they
Than all things else, where all things else are strange.
In that wide strangeness unrejected rest
The world's rejected strangers—loves unloved,
And lives unlived, and longings unappeased.
226
ALLEGRO, ANDANTE, ADAGIO.
1
A Sage had thro' the world fared far and wide:And what had made on him the most impression,
Friends ask'd him: to whose question he replied
By this confession:
2
“A traveller, whom it was my chance to meetDeparting and arriving. For this man
Mounted upon a fiery steed and fleet
His way began;
3
And yet more eager even than his horseThe man himself. With whip, and spur, and cry
So fast he urged it on its rapid course
That by and by
227
4
The horse, o'er-ridden, on the road expired.To go afoot its rider was constrain'd;
But now the man, although himself untired,
From haste refrain'd;
5
And, turning neither to the left nor right,He with deliberate stride began to wend
Right onward, resolute to reach ere night
His journey's end.
6
A peasant proffer'd him an ass for sale:That mode of travelling seem'd not to his mind:
Scornful he scann'd the beast from head to tail—
'Twas lame and blind:
228
7
But, since no better means remain'd, he boughtAnd mounted it. The ass at a snail's pace
Jogg'd onward awkwardly, not caring aught
For speed or grace;
8
Yet, all ungoaded, ere the day was doneIt brought the traveller to his place of rest.
'Twas there I met him, when the sinking sun
Was in the west.
9
Mean was the hostel, but of wide resort.He ask'd me how 'twas named, then sigh'd ‘Already?’
As tho' to him the journey seem'd too short,
The pace too steady.
229
10
Whereat I marvell'd that a man who show'dSuch haste at starting, and arrived so late,
Should sigh to quit the sorry beast he rode,
When reach'd the gate.”
11
The listeners, when this trivial tale they heard,Found nothing in it to impress their mind:
For such things happen daily, they averr'd,
To all mankind.
12
“And for that reason, and because you sayThat such things happen in the common range
Of every man's experience every day,
I find it strange,”
230
14
The Sage replied, “Upon his journey bound,That traveller started on a steed all fire
And mettle; yet too slow its space he found
For his desire;
15
And when, no longer by his courser carriedIn headlong haste, but free to pause or stray,
He might have sometimes turn'd aside, or tarried
To admire the way,
16
Less haste was not more leisure: the man stillKept the main road, nor paused to pluck a flower,
Or snatch a solace from the wayside rill,
The woodland bower;
231
17
Desiring only ere the day was doneTo reach, tho' with diminisht speed at best,
By pertinaciously still plodding on,
His destined rest:
18
Yet when his sole means left were those combiningThe sloth and weakness of a grizzled ass,
He found the pace too swift, and sigh'd, repining,
‘So soon? Alas!’”
19
“Your traveller was a fool,” the listeners cried,“But what of that? 'Tis nothing strange or new.”
“My traveller was a man,” the Sage replied,
“Like all of you.”
232
20
“For some of you are riding,” said the Sage,“A swift horse, your still swifter spirits spurn:
And some an ass some walk. Youth, Manhood, Age,
Each in its turn,
21
Are but the means that bring man, slow or fast,Whither he grieves to be. The slowest pace
He finds the swiftest, as he nears at last
His resting place.
22
And only one of all the things I've seenMore moves my wonder than this traveller's lot.”
“And what is that?” they ask'd. “Yourselves, I ween,
Who wonder not.”
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