CÆDMON.
(Cædmon relates his dream before the Abbess Hilda.)
Because I had no power in me for song,
But songless sat, the singing folk among,
And had no joy to see the harps draw near,
But felt my want as keen as shame or fear,
I turned away dejectedly my face,
And came alone to guard the lonely place.
The night was silent and the level air,
Which had day-long the summer heats to bear,
Seemed by the moonlight cooled and purified;
And from the hall, by glad folk occupied,
I heard the voices with the music blend.
Then, as one friendless, yearning for a friend;
Or as a blind man made a prey to night,
Mad, almost, with sick longing after light;
Or as a deaf man, with men singing round,
Dead to the dear companionship of sound;
Or as a dumb man, speechless all his days,
The tongueless sorrow pleading in his face;
Or as a lover who may never press
Close to his heart his loved one's loveliness, —
Even as one and all of these I seemed,
Till, weary with my grief, I slept and dreamed.
But through my sleep I felt my sorrow still,
As one, tormented by some bodily ill,
Has consciousness of pain through deepest sleep;
My eyelids quivered, but I could not weep,
When suddenly one called me by my name,
And all my sleep was lightened as with flame.
Then lifting up my eyes I looked, and, lo!
One stood beside me whom I might not know.
His face was fair and tender, grave and wise;
The mouth had patience, and the large, clear eyes
Had exaltation of the seer's gaze,
Noting, from far, inevitable days.
“Cædmon,” he said, “I charge thee now to sing.”
And I made answer, my voice faltering, —
“Dost thou not know for this I have no power;
Can lighten never thus the heaviest hour?
My heart is even like a dry well-head
That holds no water man's sore thirst to stead;
My life is like a lamp which, being broken,
Lies, of the light that should have been a token.
My soul is like a harp, with harp-strings shivered,
Ere once to music keen as pain they quivered;
Lonely I am, and most exceeding friendless,
And as my grief seems, so my days seem endless.”
Oh, those strong, steadfast eyes that gazed on mine,
With what unwonted splendor did they shine!
Under their irresistible control
New life began to pulsate through my soul,
Till for some inner, nameless joy I smiled,
As smiles the mother when the coming child
First stirs within her; and I said: “O thou
Who dost this vision to my soul allow,
Whom all the companies of dreams obey,
A little longer let this sweet dream stay.”
Then silent did I lie, a rapturous space,
With eyes that fed upon the stranger's face.
Again he called aloud: “O Cædmon, sing!”
I answered, humbly, no more faltering, —
“Of what, my master, shall I sing, forsooth?
What theme is fit for my untutored mouth?”
“Sing of Creation, and the matchless might
That shaped the world and gave it day and night, —
The day for labor and the night for rest.”
Such was his answer, such his high behest.
Then as a woman when her hour has come,
For splendid, sovereign pain, is no more dumb,
But cries out in her travail, and is torn
Spirit from body till the babe be born,
I cried in pain, a mighty, passionate cry,
The travail of my soul to testify;
Then wept, then laughed, with some divine, strange mirth;
Then Heaven fulfilled me, and the song had birth,
And sleep was rent as with a thunder-stroke,
And with my song upon my lips I woke.
And all the night they stayed with me, those words,
Nor did they leave me with awakening birds
In virginal, cold daybreak; and I knew
The utmost wonder of my dream come true;
And what the words were, if ye will it so,
Most fain am I that you and all should know.
