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BOOK FIRST
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CANTO I
I
A yucca crowned in creamy bloom,A yucca freighted with perfume,
Breathed fragrance up the blossomed steep;
The warm sea winds lay half asleep,
Lay drowsing in the dreamy wold
By Saint Francisco's tawny Bay,
As if to fold, forever fold,
Worn, wearied wings and rest alway
In careless, languid Arcady.
II
Some clean, lean Eucalyptus trees,Wind-torn and tossing to the blue,
Kept ward above the silent two
Who sat the fragrant sundown seas
Above the sounding Golden Gate
Nor questioned overmuch of fate;
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With wealth of face and form untold!
And he was proud and passionate.
III
Ten thousand miles of mobile sea—This sea of all seas blent as one
Wide, unbound book of mystery,
Of awe, of sibyl prophecy,
Ere yet a ghost or misty ken
Of God's far, first Beginning when
Vast darkness lay upon the deep;
As when God's spirit moved upon
Such waters cradled in such sleep
Such night as never yet knew dawn,
Such night as weird atallaph weaves
But never mortal man conceives.
IV
He looked to heaven, God; but sheSaw only his face and the sea.
He said—his fond face leaned to hers,
The warmest of God's worshipers—
“In the beginning? Where and when,
Before the fashioning of men,
Swung first His high lamps to and fro,
To light us as we please to go?
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God spake, and said, ‘Let there be light’?
They still house where they housed, as then,
Dark curtained with majestic night—
Dusk Silence, in travail of Light
That knew not man or man's, at all—
Steel battle-ship or wood-built wall.
V
“Aye, these, these were the waters whenGod spake and knew His fair first-born—
That silent, new-born baby morn,
Such eons ere the noise of men.
His Southern Cross, high-built about
The deep, set in a town of stars,
Commemorates, forbids a doubt
That here first fell God's golden bars—
Red bars, with soft, white silver blent,
Broad sown from sapphire firmament.
VI
“Behold what wave-lights leap and runSwift up the shale from out the sea
Inwove with silver, gold and sun!
Light lingers in the tawny mane
Of wild oats waving lazily
Far upon the climbing poppy plain;
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Black night, white light, inwound as one.
But when, when fell that far, first dawn
With ways of gold to walk upon?
VII
“I know not when, but only knowThat darkness lay upon yon deep,
Lay cradled, as a child asleep,
And that God's spirit moved upon
These waters ere the burst of dawn
When first His high lamps to and fro
Swung forth to guide which way to go.
VIII
“I only know that Silence keepsHigh court forever still hereon,
That Silence lords alone these deeps,
The silence of God's house, and keeps
Inviolate yon water's face.
As if still His abiding place,
As ere that far, first burst of dawn
Ere fretful man set sail upon.
IX
“The deeps,” he mused, are still, as whenDusk Silence kept her curtained bed
Low moaning for the birth of dawn,
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As some ghoul nightmare most abhorred—
When she might laughing look upon
God's first-born glory, holy Light—
As when fond Eve exulting cried,
In mother-pain, with mother-pride,
“Behold the fair first-born of men!
I gat a man-child of the Lord!”
X
As one discerning some sweet nookOf wild oats, mantling yellow, pink,
Will pass, then turn and turn to look,
Then pass again to think and think,
Then try to not turn back again,
But try and try to quite forget
And, sighing, try and try in vain;
So you would turn and turn again
To her, her girlish woman's grace—
Full-flowered yet fond baby's face.
XI
Her wide, sweet mouth, an opened rose,Pushed out, reached out, as if to kiss;
A mobile mouth in proud repose
This moment, then unlike to this
As storm to calm, as day to night,
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This new-made woman was, the sun
And surged sea interwound in one.
XII
Her proud and ample lips pushed outAs kissing sea-winds unaware;
And then they arched in angry pout,
As if she cared yet did not care.
Then lightning lit her great, wide eyes,
As if black thunder walled the skies,
And all things took some touch of her,
The while she stood nor deigned to stir:
The while she saw with vision dim—
Saw all things, yet saw only him.
XIII
Such eyes as compass all the skies,That see all things yet naught have seen;
Such eyes of love or sorrow's eyes—
A martyr or a Magdalene?
How sad that all great souls are sad!
How sad that gladness is not glad—
That Love's sad sister is sweet Pain,
That only lips of beauty drain
Life's full-brimmed, glittering goblet dry,
And only drain the cup to die!
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XIV
The yellow of her poppy hairWas as red gold is, when at rest;
But when aroused was as the west
In sunset flame and then—take care!
Her tall, free-fashioned, supple form
Was now some sudden, tropic storm,
Was now some lily leaned at play.
What sea and sun, sunshine and shower,
Full flowered ere the noon of day,
Full June ere yet the morn of May,
This sun-born blossom of an hour—
Precocious Californian flower!
XV
She answered not but looked awayWith brown hand arched above her brow,—
As peers a boatman from his prow,—
To where white sea-doves wheeled at play.
She watched them long, then turned and sighed
And looking in his face she cried,
While blushing prettily, “Behold,
There is no mateless dove, not one!
And see! not one unhappy dove,
Ten thousand circling in the sun,
Entangled as the mesh of fate,
Yet each remains as true as gold
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See here! See there! Behold, above—
I think each dove would die for love.”
He watched the shallows spume the shore
And fleck the shelly, drifting shale,
Then far at sea his swift eyes swept
Where one tall, stately, snow-white sail
Its silent course majestic kept
And gloried in its alien mood,
As his own soul in solitude
XVI
“The shallows murmur and complain,The shallows turn with wind and tide,
They fringe with froth and moil the main;
They wail and will not be denied—
Poor, puny babes, unsatisfied!
XVII
“The lighthouse clings her beetling steepAbove the rock-sown, ragged shore
Where Scylla and Charybdis roar
And dangers lurk and shallows keep
Mad tumult in the house of sleep.
The shallows moan and moan alway—
The deeps have not one word to say.
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XVIII
“I reckon Silence as a graceThat was ere light had name or place;
A saint enshrined ere hand was laid
To fashioning of man or maid.
For, storm or calm, or sun or shade,
Fair Silence never truth betrayed;
For, ocean deep or dappled sky,
Saint Silence never told a lie.”
CANTO II
I
From out the surge of Sutro's steep,Beyond the Gate a rock uprears,
So sudden, savage, unawares
The very billows start and leap,
As frightened at its lifted face,
So shoreless, sealess, out of place:
A sea-washed, surge-locked isle, as lone
As lorn Napoleon on his throne—
His Saint Helena throne, where still
The dazed world in dumb wonder turns
To his high throned, imperious will
And incense burns and ever burns.
Here huge sea-lions climb and cling,
Despite of surge and sethe and shock,
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And one is named Napoleon, king.
Behold him lord the land, the sea,
In lone, unquestioned majesty!
II
She saw, she raised alert her headWith eager face and cheery said:
“What lusty, upheaved, bull-built neck!
What lungs to lift above the roar!
What captain on his quarter-deck
To mock the sea and scorn the shore!
I like that scar across his breast,
I like his ardent, lover's zest!”
III
The huge sea-beast uprose, uprose,As if to surely topple down;
He reached his black and bearded nose
Above his harem, gray, black, brown,
Sleek, shining, wet or steaming dry,
And mouthed and mouthed against the sky.
IV
What eloquence, what hot love pain!What land but this, what love but his?
What isle of bliss but this and this—
To roar and love and roar again?
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Loud thundered from his slippery throne;
Loud thundered in his Sappho's ear,
As if she could not, would not hear.
V
At last her heart was moved and sheRaised two bright eyes to his black beard,
Then sudden turned, as if she feared,
And threw her headlong in the sea,
Another Sappho, all for love.
While Phaon towered still above—
An instant only; yet once more
That upheaved head, that great bull neck,
That sea-born, bossed, bull-throated roar—
A poise, a plunge, a flash, a fleck,
And far down, caverned in the deep,
Where sea-green curtains swing and sweep
And varicolored carpets creep,
Soft emerald or amethyst,
Two lion lovers kept sweet tryst.
VI
She looked, looked long, then smiled, then sighed,A proud, pure soul unsatisfied,
Then sat dense grasses suddenly
And thrust a foot above the sea.
She threw her backward, arms wide out,
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O'er grass-set cushions sown in gold,
As she would sleep yet would not sleep.
She reached her wide hands fast about
And grasses, gold and manifold,
Of lowly blossoms, pink and blue,
She gathered in and laughing threw,
With bare-armed, heedless, happy grace—
Threw fragrant handfuls in his face.
And then as if to sleep she lay,
A babe nursed at the breast of May—
Lay back with wide eyes to the skies
And clouds of wondrous butterflies;
Such Mariposa blooms in air!
Such bloomy, golden, poppy hair!
And which were hers or poppy's gold
Without close care none could have told;
And which were butterflies or bloom,
To guess there was not guessing room,
The while, in quest of sweets or rest,
They fanned her face, they kissed her breast.
VII
That face like to a lilt of song—A face of sea-shell tint, with tide
Of springtime flowing fast and strong
And fearless in its maiden pride—
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Of heedless, wind-kissed, poppy gold,
Blown here, blown there, blown anywhere,
Soft-lifting, falling fold on fold,
As made gold poppies where she lay
Turn envious, turn green as May!
What wise face yet what wilful face,
A face that would not be denied
No more than gipsy winds that race
The sea bank in their saucy pride;
A form that knew yet only knew
The natural, the human, true.
VIII
Those two round mounds of Nineveh,What treasures of the past they knew!
But these two round mounds here to-day
Hold treasures richer far than they,
And prophecies more truly true.
Old Nineveh's twin mounds are dust;
They only know the ghostly past;
But these two new mounds hold in trust
The awful future, hold the vast
Unbounded empire, land or sea,
Henceforth, for all eternity.
Let pass dead pasts; far wiser turn
And delve the future; love and learn.
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IX
It seems she dreamed. She slept, we know,A happy, quiet little space,
Then thrust a round limb far below
And half-way turned aside her face,
And then she threw her arms wide out
In sleep, and so reached blind about,
As if for something she might find
From fortune-telling, gipsy wind.
X
The soft, warm winds from far awayWere weary, and they crept so near
They lay against her willing ear
As if they had so much to say.
And she, she seemed so glad to hear
The while she loving, sleeping lay
And dreamed of love nor dreamed of doubt,
But laughing thrust her form far out
And down the fragrant poppy steep
In playful, restless, happy sleep.
She sighed, she heaved her hilly breast,
As one who would but could not rest.
XI
How natural, how free, how fair,The while the happy winds on wings,
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A rippled, braided rim of white
And outstretched ankles exquisite.
What arms to hold a babe at breast—
Such breast as prudist never guessed!
What shapely limbs, what everything
That makes great woman great and good—
That makes for proud, pure motherhood!
XII
Such thews as mount the steeps of morn,Such limbs as love, not lust shall share,
Such legs as God has shaped to bear
The weight of ages, worlds unborn;
Such limbs as Lesbian shrines revealed
When comely, longing mothers kneeled;
Such thews as Phidias loved to hew,
Such limbs as Leighton loved to draw
When painting tall, Greek girls at play;
Such legs as blind old Homer saw,
As Marlowe knew but yesterday,
When Helen climbed in dreams for him
Her cloud-topped towers of Ilium.
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CANTO III
I
White sea-gulls glistened in the sun—Ten thousand if a single one—
And every sea-dove knew his mate.
Far, far at sea, the Farallones
Sent up a million plaintive moans
From sea-beasts moaning love, or hate.
The sun sank weary, flushed and worn,
The warm sea-winds sank tattered, torn,
The sun and sea lay welded, wed;
The day lay crouched upon the deep
Half closed, as eyes half closed in sleep,
Half closed, as some good book half read.
II
The sea was as an opal seaInlaid with scintillating light,
Yet close about and left and right
The sea lay banked and bossed in night,
As black as ever night may be.
III
The sundown sea all sudden thenLay argent, pallid, white as death.
As when some great thing dies; as when
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And heaves full length his somber bed.
The sundown sea now shone, mobile,
Translucent, flaming, molten steel,
Red, green, then tenfold more than red,
And then of every hue, a hint
Of doubloons spilling from the mint,
Alternate, changing, manifold,
Yet melting, minting all to gold.
IV
Far mountain peaks flashed flecks of goldAnd dashed with dappled flecks the skies.
“Behold,” said he, “the fleecy fold
Now slowly, surely, homeward hies.
Such cobalt blue, such sheep of gold,
Such gold as hath not place or name
In elsewhere land, because no seer
Hath seen or dauntless prophet told
Where stood the loom in primal peace
That wove the fair, first golden fleece.
Behold, what gold-flecked flocks of Light!
Ten million moving sheep of gold,
Wee lambs of gold that nudge their dams,
Great hornèd, wrinkled, heady rams!
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V
“Slow-shepherded, the golden sheep,With bent horns lowered to the deep,
Come home; the hollows of the sea
Receive and house them lovingly.
The little lambs of Light come home
And house them in the argent foam,
The while He counts them every one,
And shuts the Gate, for day is done.
VI
“Aye, day is done, the dying sunSinks wounded unto death to-night;
A great, hurt swan, he sinks to rest,
His wings all crimson, blood his breast!
What wide, low wings, reached left and right,
He sings, and night and swan are one—
One huge black swan of Helicon.
VII
“What crimson breast, what crimson wingsThe while he dies, and dying sings!
Yet safe is housed the happy fold,
The golden sheep, the fleece of gold
That lured the dauntless Argonaut—
The fleece that daring Jason sought.”
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VIII
She waking sighed, soft murmuring,As waters from some wood-walled spring:
“Oh happy, huge, horn-headed rams,
To guide and lead the golden fleece,
To ward the fold of fat increase
Fast mated to your golden dams!
With bridal gold, what golden bride,
What golden twin lambs, side by side!
Oh happy, happy nudging lambs,
Thrice happy, happy golden dams!’
IX
His face was still against the west;For still a flush of gold was there
That would not or that could not rest,
But seemed some night bird of the air.
At last, with half-averted head
And dreamfully, as dreaming, said:
“What banker gathers yonder gold
That sinks, sea-washed, beyond the deeps?
Lie there no sands to house and hold
This sunset gold in countless heaps?
There sure must be some far, fierce land,
Some Guinea shore, some fire-fed strand,
Some glowing, palm-set, pathless spot
Where all this sunset gold is stored,
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There sure must be, beyond this sea,
Some Argo's gold, some argosy,
Some golden fleece, long since forgot,
To wait the coming Argonaut.”
X
She sprang up sudden, savagely,And flushed, and paled, looked far away,
Grinding gold poppies with her heel.
She could not say, she could but feel.
She nothing said, because that they
Who really feel can rarely say.
And then she looked up, forth and far,
And pointed to the pale North Star,
The while her color went and came
From pink to white, from frost to flame.
XI
For this, the one forbidden theme,The one hard, dread, unquiet dream
That he should go, lead forth and far
Below the triple Arctic star,
As he had planned; and now to speak,
To hint—she heard with pallid cheek.
Hard had she tried, had fain forgot
How strong, strange men were trending far
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And he their Jason—Argonaut!
CANTO IV
I
How passing fair, how wondrous fairThis daughter of the yellow sun!
Her sunlit length and strength of hair
Seemed sun and gold inwound in one.
How strangely silent, unaware,
Unconscious quite of strength or grace
Or peril of her beauteous face,
She stood, the first-born of a race,
A proud, new race, scarce yet begun.
How tall she stood, free debonair—
How stately and how supple, tall,
The time she loosened and let fall
Her tossed and mighty Titian hair!
II
So beautiful she was, as oneFrom out some priceless picture-book!
You could but love, you had no choice
But love and turn again to look.
How young she was and yet how old!—
Red orange ripened in the sun
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The calm strength of her lifted face,
The low notes of her tuneful voice,
Were mint-marks of that wondrous race
But scarcely born nor known as yet
Beyond yon yellow hills that fret
Warm sea-winds with their waving pine.
A princess of that royal line
Of kings who came and silent passed,
Yet, passing, set bold, royal hand
And mighty mint-mark on the land,
And set it there to last and last,
As if in bronzen copper cast.
III
He, too, was born of men who wooedThe savage walks of solitude,
And hewed close, clean to nature's laws—
Of men who knew not tears or fears,
Of men full-sexed, yet men who knew
Not sex till perfect manhood was.
When men had thews of antique men,
And one stood with the strength of ten;
When men gat men who dared to do;
Gat men of heart who dwelt apart,
As Adam dwelt, when giants grew
And men as gods drew ample breath—
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Ere drunkenness of sex had done
The silly world to willing death.
IV
What royal parentage, what trueNobility, those men who knew
The light, who chased the yellow sun
From sea to sea triumphantly,
And westward fought and westward won,
As never daring man had done.
V
They housed with God upon the height;Companioned with the peak, the pin
They led the red-lit firing line.
Walled 'round by room and room and room,
They read God's open book at night,
And drank His star-distilled perfume;
By day they dared the trackless west
And chased the battling sun to rest.
VI
Such sad, mad marches to the sea,Such silent sacrifice, such trust!
Such months of marching, misery,
Such mountains heaped with heroes' dust!
Yet what stout thews the fearless few
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The cleansing fire and laid hold
To hammer out their house of gold!
VII
Their cities zone their sea of seas,Their white tents top the mountain's crest.
The coward? He trenched not with these.
The weakling? He was laid to rest.
Each man stood forth a man, such men
As God wrought not since time began,
Each man a hero, lion each.
Behold what length of limb, what length
Of life, of love, what daring reach
To deep-hived honeycomb! What strength!
How clean his hands, how stout his heart
To dare, to do, camp, court or mart.
He stands so tall, so clean, he hears
The morning music of the spheres.
VIII
He loved her, feared her, far apart,He kept his ways and dreamed his dreams;
He sang strange songs, he tuned his heart
To music of the pines that preach
Such sermons on such holy themes
As only he who climbs can reach.
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IX
He would not selfish pluck one roseTo wear upon his breast a day
And let its perfume pass away
With any wind that comes or goes.
Why, he might walk God's garden through
Nor touch one bud nor fright one bird.
The music of the spheres he heard,
The harmony he breathed, he knew.
He never marred God's harmony
With one harsh thought. The favored few
Who cared to live above the sod
And lift glad faces up to God
He knew loved all as well as he,
Had equal right to rose or tree.
X
And he must spare all to the dayTheir willing feet should pass the way
God in His garden walked at eve.
And as for weaklings who by turn
Would jest or jeer, he could but grieve,
And pity all and silent say:
“Let us lead forth, make fair the way;
By time and stress they, too, will learn
Which way to live, to love, to turn.”
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XI
The long, lean Polar bear uprose,Outreached a paw, a bare, black nose,
As if to still hold hard control,
By glacier steep or ice-packed main,
His mighty battlemented snows.
He bared his yellow teeth in vain;
Then backed against his bleak North Pole
He sulked and shook his icy chain.
And he who dared not pluck a rose,
As if in chorus with his pine,
Must up and lead the battle line
Beyond the awesome Arctic chine.
XII
No airy sighs, no tales to tell;He knew God is, that all is well,
That death is but a name, a date,
A milestone by the stormy road,
Where you may lay aside your load
And bow your face and rest and wait,
Defying fear, defying fate.
XIII
How fair is San Francisco BayWhen golden stars consort and when
The moon pours silver paths for men,
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Huge ships, black-bellied, lay below
Broad, yellow flags from silken Chind,
Round, blood-red banners from Nippon,
Like to her sun at sudden dawn—
Brave battle-ships as white as snow,
With bannered stars tossed to the wind,
Warm as a kiss when love is kind.
XIV
'Twas twilight, such soft, twilight nightAs only Californians know,
When faithful love is forth, and when
The Bay lies bathed in mellow light;
And perfumed breath and softened breeze
Blows far from Honolulu's seas—
From sundown seas in afterglow—
When Song sits at the feet of men
And pipes, low-voiced as mated dove,
For love to measure step with love.
XV
And yet, for all the perfumed seas,The peace, the silent harmonies,
The two stood mute, estranged before
Her high-built, stately, opened door
High up the terraced, plunging hill
As hushed as death, as white and still.
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XVI
The moon, amid her yellow fleet,With full, white sail, moved on and on,
And drew, as loving hearts are drawn,
All seas of earth fast following,
As slow she sailed her sapphire seas.
Then, as if pausing, pitying,
She poured down at their very feet
Broad silver ways to walk upon
Which way they would, or east or west,
Which way they would, or worst or best.
XVII
Her voice was low, low leaned her head,Her two white hands all helpless prest
As if to hush her aching breast,
As if to bid her aching heart
To silent bear its bitter part,
The while she choking, sobbing, said:
“Then here, for all our poppy days,
Here, here, the parting of the ways?”
XVIII
“Aye, so you will it. Here divideThe ways, forever and a day.
You, you—you women lead the way—
You lead where love hangs crucified,
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Where cunning, cold men mouth sweet lies
And make pure love their merchandise.
You heedless lead to hollow lands
Of bloodless hearts and nerveless hands;
I will not rival such, nay, nay
Not look on such, save with disgust.”
XIX
Her head sank lower still: her hair,Her heavy hair, great skeins of gold,
Hung loosened, heedless, fold on fold,
As if she cared not, could not care;
She tried to speak but nothing said;
She could but press her aching heart,
Step back a pace and shudder, start,
The while she slowly moved her head,
As if to say; but nothing said.
XX
Her silence lit his soul with rage,He strode before her, forth and back,
A lion strident in his cage,
Hard bound within his iron track.
And then he paused, shook back his head,
And fronting her half savage said;
“My father, yours, each Argonaut
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Came forth and conquered mightily.
XXI
“God, what great loves, what lovers whenThese westmost states were born of men,
When giants gripped their hands and came
With nerves of steel and souls of flame—
Could you not wait within yon Gate,
As their loves dared to wait and wait?
An hundred thousand Didos sat
Atlantic's sea-bank nor forgot,
The while their lovers westmost fought,
But patient sat as Dido, when
She waved Æneas back again
And bravely dared to smile thereat.
XXII
“Hear me! All Europe, rind to core,Is rotting, crumbling, base to top.
Withhold the gold and silver prop
Our dauntless fathers hewed of yore
From yonder seamed Sierras' core,
And such a toppling you may hear
As never fell on mortal ear.
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XXIII
“What's London town but sorrow's townAnd sins, such as I dare not name?
Such thousands creeping up and down
Its dreary streets in draggled shame!
What's London but a market pen—
Its hundred thousand lewd, rude men?
What's London but a town of stone,
Its thousand thousand women prone?
XXIV
“What's Paris but a printed screen,A gaudy gauze that scant conceals
The sensuous nakedness between
The folds it but the more reveals?
What's Paris but a circus, fair,
To tempt this west world's open purse
With tawdry trinkets, toys bizarre?
Ah, would that she were nothing worse!
What's Paris but a piteous mart
For west-world mothers crazed to trade
Some silly, simpering, weak maid
For thread-bare, out-at-elbows rank—
To outworn, weak degenerate
Whose bank is but the faro bank,
Whose grave bounds all his real estate;
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A duel and a ruined maid!
XXV
“What's Berlin, Dresden, sorry Rome,But traps that take you unaware?
Behold yon paintings, right at home,
Where nature paints with patient care
Such splendid pictures, sea and shore,
As all the world should bow before;
Such pictures hanging to the skies
Against the walls of Paradise,
From base to bastion, as should wake
Piave's painter from the dust;
Such walls of color crowned in snow,
Such steeps, such deeps, profoundly vast,
As old-time Art had died to know,
And knowing, died content, as he
Who looked from Nimo's steep to see,
Just once, the Promised Land, and passed!
And yet, for all yon scene, this sea,
You will not bide, Penelope?”
XXVI
“Then go, since you so will it, go!My way lies yonder, forth and far
Beneath yon gleaming northmost star
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Lo, there leads duty, hope, as when
This westmost world demanded men:
Such men as led the firing line
When blood ran free as festal wine;
Such men as when, fast side by side,
Our fathers fought and fighting died.”
XXVII
“But go—good by! Go see againThe noisy circus, since you must;
Its painted women that disgust,
Its nauseating monkey men;
But mark you, Beautiful, the moth
That loves that luring, sensuous light—
Nay, hear! I am not wilful, wroth;
I love with such exceeding might,
My beautiful, my all, my life,
I would not, could not take to wife
My lily tainted by the touch,
The breath, the very sight of such.
XXVIII
“Shall I see leprous apes lean o'erMy rose, breathe, touch it if they may,
With breath that is a very stench,
The while they bow and bend before,
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And smirk in double-meaning French?
XXIX
“You shrink back angered? Well, adieu;What, not a hand? What, not a touch? ...
My crime is that I love too much,
My crime is that I love too true,
Love you, love you, not part of you—
Yea, how much less the rose that droops
In fevered halls where folly stoops!
XXX
“Yon splendid, triple, midnight starIs mine; I follow fast and sure,
Because it guides so far, so far
From fevered follies that allure
Your soul, your splendid, spotless soul
To wreck where siren billows roll—
Good night! What, turn aside your face
That I might never see again
Its lifted glory and proud grace,
As some brave beacon light! Well, then, ...
Ha, ha! Let's laugh lest one may weep—
How steep your hill seems, steeps how steep!
How deep down seems the misty town,
How lone, how dark, how distant down!
37
As you have turned your face to-night,
As you have turned your face from me,
My heartless, lost Penelope.”
XXXI
Then sudden up she tossed her head,And, face to his face, proudly said:
“Penelope! To wait and weave!
Penelope! To wait and wait,
As waits a dog within his gate;
To weave and unweave, grieve and grieve,
As some weak harem favorite
Tight fenced from action, life, and light!
XXXII
“Why, I should not have sat one dayTo that dull-threaded, thudding loom,
With cowards crowding fast for room
To say what brave men dare not say!
Why, I had snatched down from the wall
His second sword that sad, first day
And set its edge to end it all!—
Had hewn that loom to splinters, yea,
Had slashed the warp, enmeshed the woof
And called that dog and put to proof
Each silly suitor hounding me,
Then hoisted sail and bent to sea!
38
XXXIII
“Penelope! Penelope!Of all fool tales in history
I think this tale the foolishest!
Why I, the favored of that land,
Had such fools come to seek my hand,
Had ranged in line the sexless list
And frankly answered with my fist!”
XXXIV
He passed. She paused. Each helpless handFell down, fell heavy down as lead;
She tried but could not understand.
At last she raised once more her head,
Set firm her lips, stepped back a pace,
Looked long his far star in the face,
Stood stately, still, as fixed as fate,
Till all the east flushed sudden red;
Then as she turned within she said,
“I cannot, will not, will not wait.”
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