The poems of Madison Cawein

“Among the mountains of Carmarthen, lies a beautiful and romantic piece of water, named The Van Pools. Tradition relates, that after midnight, on New Year's Eve, there appears on this lake a being named The Spirit of the Van. She is dressed in a white robe, bound by a golden girdle; her hair is long and golden; her face is pale and melancholy.”—

Keightley's “Fairy Mythology.”

Midsummer-night; the Van. Through night's wan noon,
Wading the storm-scud of an eve of storm,
Pale o'er Carmarthen's peaks the mounting moon.—
Wilds of Carmarthen! sombre heights, that swarm
Girdling this water, as old giants might
Crouch, guarding some enchanted gem of charm,—

424

Wilds of Carmarthen, that for me each night
Reëcho prayers and pleadings,—all the year
Unanswered,—made to listening waters white!
Mountains, behold me yet again! Bend near!
Behold her lover! hers, that shape of snow,
Who dwells amid these pools; who will not hear
My heart's wild pleading, calling loud, now low,
Unhappy, to her, 'mid the lonely hills.

Whene'er a ripple trembles into glow,
Where yeasty moonshine scuds the foam, straight thrills
Heart's expectation through my veins, and high
With “she!” each pulse the exultation fills.
But she 'tis never. Once ... and then! would I,
Would I had perished, so beholding!—World,
'Twas you, O world, who would not let me die!

425

Once I beheld her!—If some fiend had curled
Stiff talons in my hair, and, twisting tight,
Had raised me high, then into Hell had hurled;
Fresh from that vision of her beauty white,
With Heaven in my soul, I, unamerced,
Shackled with tortures, yet might mock Hell's spite.

Immortal memory, quench in me this thirst!—
O starlike vision, that a moment clove
My sight, and then for ever left me curst!
Oh, make me mad with love, with all thy love!
Me, me, who seek thee 'mid these wilds when gloom
Storms or drip gold the sibylline stars above!—
Let thy high coming in a flash consume
The light of all the stars! and make me mad,
Mad with love's madness! fill me with sweet doom!

Sleep will I not now, for my soul is sad:
For, should I sleep, there might come other dreams,—

426

Sadder than thou art,—in thy beauty clad
And all thy tyranny. To me it seems
Better to wake here, underneath this pine,
Until thy face upon my vision gleams.—
Thou, who art wrought of elements divine,
And I of crasser clay, clay that will think,
“Since I am hers, why should she not be mine?”
Again, its usual phantom, on the brink
Of thy lone lake, I ask thee: “Must I yearn
Forever, haunted of that vision's wink?”—
When, glassing out great circles, which did urn
Some intense essence of interior light,
(As clouds, that clothe the moon, unbinding, burn,
Riven, erupt her orb, triumphant white,)
I saw, midmost the Van, a feathering fire
Dilating ivory-wan.—Expectant night
Tiptoed attentive, fearful to suspire.—
Wherefrom arose—what white divinity?
What godhead sensed with glory and desire?
Born for the moment for the eyes of me!
Then re-absorbed into the brassy gloom
Of whispering waves that sighed their ecstasy.

427

Thou! in whose path harmonious colors bloom,
Pale pearl and lilac, asphodel and rose,—
Like many flow'rs auroral of perfume,—
Thou leftst me thus, to marvel as who knows
He is not dead and yet it seems he is,
Since all his soul with spirit-rapture glows.—
O sylph-like brow! lips like an angel's kiss!
High immortality! whose face was such
As starlight in a lily's loveliness! ...
The gold that bound thee seemed too base to clutch
Thy chastity, though clear as golden gum
That almugs sweat, and fragrance to the touch!
Thy hair—not hair!—seemed rays, like those that come
Strained through the bubble of a chrysolite.—
No word I said: thy beauty struck me dumb.
Thy face, that is upon my soul's quick sight
Eternal seared, hath made of me a shade,
A wandering shadow of the day and night:
A seeker 'mid the hoary hills for aid,
The sole society of my sick heart, who
Shuns all companionship of man and maid:

428

Who, comrade of the mountain blossoms blue,
And intimate of old trees, goes dreaming they,—
As in that legendary world that drew
Oracles from lips in oaks—, may sometime say
Prophetic precepts to it: how were won
A spirit loved to love a mortal;—yea,
In vain.—
But one day, frog-like in the sun,
Beside a cave,—the nightshade vines made rank
And hairy henbane, where huge spiders spun,—
Wrinkled as Magic, I a grizzled, lank,
Squat something startled, naught save skin and hair;
With eyes wherein dwelt demons; flames, that shrank
And grew;—familiars, who fixed me with glare
As, raising claw-like hands when I drew near,
Frog-like he croaked, “Thou fool! go seek her there!
Woo her with thy heart's actions! making clear

429

Thy soul's white passage for her coming feet!—
In! in! thou fool! plunge in! Fear naught but fear!”

Yet I have waited many weeks. Repeat.
Acts of the heart with passionate offering
Of love whose anguish makes it seven times sweet.
Still all in vain, in vain. To-night I bring
My self alone; my soul unfearing, see!
My soul unto thee!—Shall the clay still cling
Clogging fulfillment? and achievement be
Balked still by flesh?—no! let me in—to die,
Haply; or, for a moment's mystery,
Gaze in thine eyes: one splendid instant lie
In thy white arms and bosom; and thy kiss,
My elemental immortality!—
Part of thy breathing waves, to laugh or hiss
In foam; or winds, that rock the awful deeps,
Or build with song vast temples for thy bliss.
Wherein, responsive as thy white hand sweeps
The chords of some sad shell, I'll dream and roam

430

Through glaucous chambers where the green day sleeps.
Dead not with death, what secrets hath thy home
Not mine then, epoched in exultant foam? ...
Deeper, down deeper! yea, at last I come!

University of Virginia Library

THE SPIRIT OF THE VAN

(Love Ideal)