The collected poems of Arthur Edward Waite :: :: University of Virginia Library

Where never a sense of the world beyond
On the soul bewitch'd intrudes,
But to soft spells only is sense in bond,
And, if illusion, delight deludes;
Where the heart does not yearn
Past what eyes discern,
Or far in some land remote—
Perchance unfriendly, at least unknown—
Picture the bliss and the vision alone;
Here let me anchor a stranded boat,

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And taste the joy of the heart and eye
In the Blessed Life of Sorcery.

I have voyaged far and my sails are rent;
The mast is splinter'd; the rudder is bent.
I have been where billows their might expend
On pitiless walls at the known world's end,
But turret or window or hand extended
Found I none when the quest was ended,
While an icy blast o'er the pathless track
Seized me and toss'd me, and drove me back.

Here the air is heavy with spells;
From a sky overflowing the soft charm spills;
A loving litany breathes round wavering hills
And faintly chimes in the bosks from floral bells,
Or sighs in a veil on the surface of tarns and wells.
Here too the sheeted hyacinth meadows
Suspire and yearn,
Melt in the purple splendour, flicker and burn,
Through vistas of trees prolong'd and the musk-dark shadows
Of haunted dells.

Far off the glister of shining surf looks white;
How far, how soften'd comes the roll of the open sea!
And the long, low-breathing wind is hush'd as a wind may be.
The amber light of the afternoon is caught
And hidden in thickets and traps which mazy leaves have wrought,
Or talismanic figures of flowers that none can name—
But the nameless mystic people:
It moves in tongues of fire on vane and steeple,
On crumbling towers in pageants of auburn flame.

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Hark a little and hark, for close at hand
Is one light voice you can hear and understand
In the plash and purl of the brook!
Otherwise, over the open road, through leafy covert or lawn,
The silent wain by a silent team with its harvest-load is drawn,
Though the road may rise or fall;
And only shadow'd figures slip past through the ravish'd land,
For ever wearing the dreamful elfin look
And ever the wondering guise of him who has heard the faërie call.

But yet, and now, and surely a theme uplifted,
With subtle, mastering melody suddenly fills the air;
From the midst of a secret centre, suddenly rifted,
The penetrant vibrant music pulses everywhere;
Through every leaf and blade of grass is sent,
As over the strings of its instrument—
Sweeping, sweeping, sweeping. The earth, with its volume stored,
Is a quivering sounding-board,
And the sea, with melodious roar,
For ever and ever responds on the long, pulsating shore.

The faces of women are faces of strange enchanted flowers,
Giving forth fragrance of incense and sounds of flutes on the deep,
In the sweetest, stillest, and gravest charm of the tardy hours;
And the children are blossoms in bud, which smile in the light, and sleep.
White lilies, pallid and pure, in a shimmering cloud of pearls,
Are the choric bands of the girls;

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There are royal, ruddy roses of eager and splendid boys,
Heavy, yet lissom of limb, tan-faced, full of glories and joys.
Their moist lips full and intense,
Well over with rippling speech;
Yet a strange transfusion of sex and form and sense
Swims undeveloped in each;
And all the men in the land, if men be a part of the scheme,
Walk through the haunted places dissolved in vision and dream.

O holy, holy, holy, wild-sweet to the ear and eye,
Is the Blessed Life and the Haunted Life in the Land of Sorcery!

Will I not dwell in these ways for evermore?
Breathe harps and all ye strings in a world of strings,
With every voice in a world of voice and choir.
Breathe over sea and shore
Lowly and faintly and fading far away,
With a sudden tremor and hint of all unspeakable things,
As of dusk in the heart of the fire;
Lowly and faintly and fading far away,
Over the senses breathe till the senses swim;
Chant in the dells and dingles, among the groups so dim,
Standing at footpath ends—anthem, litany, hymn
Of the world's delight, from the pleasant rite
In the missal of Faërie!

The anthems swell and never a chord is lost,
The light of the Vision floats for ever around,
And a perfect peace of the heart, by an anxious thought uncross'd
Of the life in life, in this Blessed Life is found,
All under the purple sky,
Which swoons and falls in a mist—
Of opal and amethyst—
On fields and meadows and hills in the Land of Sorcery.