The Complete Poetical Works of Robert Buchanan :: :: University of Virginia Library

Up with a start I waken groaning,
And hear sweet Honeydew's voice intoning.
Only a dream!—and in church I am again,
Half asleep, in the midst of the sham again!

Hark! how the soft-eyed, soft-voiced creature
Preaches, with sweetness in every feature!
The ladies listen, the maids sit dutiful,
The spinsters quiver, and murmur, ‘Beautiful!’

Surely as every Sunday passes
The scented silken superior classes
Flutter flounces and flash like sunny dew
Around the Reverend Mr. Honeydew.

Cambric handkerchiefs scatter scent about,
Pomaded heads are devoutly bent about,
Silks are rustling, lips are muttering,
To the dear man's emotional pausing and fluttering.

The actor with his shaven cheek here
Studies his art and learns to speak here;
Every period properly weighted is,
With gentle matter the sermon freighted is.

Sir Midas, portly and resplendent,
With the little Midases attendant,
And Lady Midas, all eyes upon her here,
Sit and smile in the pew of honour here.

Even the agnostic and revolter
Gather before this Chapel's altar,
For none of the bigot's mad insanity
Deforms dear Honeydew's Christianity.

In such an excellent pastor's leading,
So full of brightness and dainty breeding,
Even the faith ecclesiastical
Seems entertaining and less fantastical!

The preacher is an excellent fellow!
His matter and manner are ever mellow. . . .
But afar the tempest of Hell is thundering,
The Figure preaching, the Devil wondering!

Strange as some low and far-off thunderpeal
Heard in the still heat of a summer day,
While shepherds looking upward in the sun
See purple banks of cloud that ominously
Roll in the distance, came the speaker's words;
And as they ended we beheld indeed
Hell, or Creation adumbrating Hell,
Breathing with ululations of despair.
Hearing the wails of sin, the moans of men,
The hopeless, ceaseless wash of weary lives
Which sigh for sunlight or some shore of peace,
We pitied that supreme despairing Shape
Who treads the waves of woe with luminous feet,
And since He cannot still them, grows as sad
As the wild waters He is walking on.
And all were silent until Barbara rose
And sigh'd: ‘The sun is sinking in the west;
Our happy day is ended—let us go!’
And murmuring like bees around the queen
We wandered slowly to the river-side.

Now like a gentle herdsman stood the sun
Pausing upon the brae-tops while he drove
His fleecy flocks of cloud into their fold
Beneath the faintly glimmering evening star;
And coming from the shadow of the woods,
Hushing our cries, we saw the gloaming grow,
The trees behind us black, the prospects dim,
But all things looming large in lustrous air,

The river-pools as full of deep strange light
As the still sky. The air, too, seem'd alive
With ominous sound akin to that strange light:
The bull-frogs croaking from the river shallows,
The cat-owl calling from the distant glade,
The murmuring waterfall now faintly heard
Drowsy and half asleep. Then from the woods
Rang sudden laughter, sharp and silvery clear,
Of merry maidens, and the music seem'd
As hollow as a bell, and when we spoke
Our voices had an eerie and empty sound
As if through vast and echoing corridors
We walked in awe.

But soon upon the stream
Our bright flotilla homeward sailed again,
And ere we reached the silent Priory woods
The azure gates of darkness, swinging wide,
Revealed the lucent starry-paven floors,
And all the lamps of heaven ranged in rows
Each in its order round the Altar-steps,
From which a pale and silver-vestured Moon
Pour'd bright ablution and upraised the Host.

Then, as the glory wrapt us round and round,
And the dark river, sparkling to our oars,
Flash'd back the dewy splendour, soft and low
Some voices joined in song; and thus they sang:—

Storm in the night! and a voice in the Storm is crying:
‘They have taken my Lord, and I know not where He is lying!’

‘I sat in the Tomb by His side, with a soul unshaken,
I chafed His clay-cold hands,—for I knew He must waken.

‘Before He closed His eyes, He said to the weeping—
“'Tis but a little while—I shall wake from sleeping!”

Cold and stiff He lay, not seeing or hearing;
The Tomb was sealed with a rock,—but I sat unfearing.

‘For a light lay on His eyes, and His face was gleaming;
I heard Him sigh in His sleep, and thought “He is dreaming!”

‘And then, with a thunder-peal, the rock was riven;
Bright, in the mouth of the Tomb, stood Angels of Heaven!

‘He did not stir, though I whispered, “Master, awaken!”. .
Then brightness blinded my eyes,—and lo, He was taken!

‘I woke in the Tomb alone, and the wind chill'd through me:
“O Master,” I moan'd, “remember Thy promise to me!”

‘I crept through the night and sought Him. . . . Hither and their
The swift Moon walk'd, and the white-tooth'd Sea ran with her.

‘I stole from palace to palace, from prison to prison,
I found no trace of my Lord, though they said “He hath risen!”

‘I heard the Nations weeping—I questioned the Nations:
One said, “He is dead!” another, “He lives—have patience!”

‘Twice—on the desert sands, in the City Holy,
I have found two piercèd footprints, vanishing slowly!

‘Wearily still I wander and still pursue Him—
He promised and I await Him, wailing unto Him!

‘And now they say, “He is dead—hath the world forsaken.”
Ah no, He hath promised!—hath waken'd,—or will awaken!’

Storm in the night! and a voice in the Storm still crying:
‘They have taken my Lord, and I know not where He is lying!’