The Flood of Thessaly The Girl of Provence, and Other Poems. By Barry Cornwall [i.e. Bryan Waller Procter] |
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GIRL OF PROVENCE. |
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 | The Flood of Thessaly |  |
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THE GIRL OF PROVENCE.
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[_]
The following passage (which occurs in “Collinson's Essay on Lunacy”) suggested the poem of the “Girl of Provence.” The reader will perceive, however, that it forms the material of only the concluding stanzas.
“The enthusiasm of a Girl from Provence had lately occupied my mind. It was a singular occurrence which I shall never forget. I was present at the national Museum when this Girl entered the Salle d' Apollon: she was tall, and elegantly formed, and in all the bloom of health. I was struck with her air, and my eyes involuntarily followed her steps. I saw her start as she cast her eyes on the statue of Apollo, and she stood before it as if struck with lightning, her eyes gradually sparkling with sensibility. She had before looked calmly around the Hall; but her whole frame seemed to be then electrified as if a transformation had taken place within her; and it has since appeared, that a transformation had taken place, and that her youthful breast had imbibed a powerful, alas! fatal passion. I remarked, that her companion (an elder sister it seems) could not force her to leave the statue, but with much entreaty, and she left the Hall with tears in her eyes, and all the expressions of tender sorrow. I set out the very same evening for Montmorency. I returned to Paris at the end of
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------ A dream of Love
Shaped by some solitary nymph, whose breast
Longed for a deathless lover from above.
Lord. Byron.—Ch. Harold.
Shaped by some solitary nymph, whose breast
Longed for a deathless lover from above.
Lord. Byron.—Ch. Harold.
I
If there be aught within thy pleasant land,Fair France, which to the poet help may be—
If thou art haunted by a Muse,—command
That now she cast her precious spell on me:
Bid that the verse I write be fair and free;
So may I, an untravelled stranger, sing
Like one who drinketh of Apollo's spring.
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II
For,—tho' I never beneath eastern sunsWandered, nor by Parnassus hill so high,
Nor where in beauty that bright fountain runs
Struck by the winged horse that scaled the sky,
Nor ever in the meads of Arcady,
In flowery Enna, or Thessalian shade,
Heard sweet the pastoral pipe at evening played,—
III
Yet have I chosen, from the throngs of taleWhich crowded on me in life's dreaming hours,
One—sad indeed, but such as may not fail
To attest the peerless king's undying powers,
Who, like a light amongst Elysian bowers
Still moveth, while the sun (his empty throne)
Floats onwards, in its weary round, alone.
IV
Ages and years have been and passed away,And Mirth with light and Hope with rain-bow wings
Have flown, and Grief borne slow on pinions gray,
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Whereby no longer now a poet sings:
Yet hast thou been, O Phœbus! well repaid
By the deep love of one Provencal maid.
V
Come!—with thy raven tresses loosely hung,Thou nymph translated to the skies! Breathe! Sigh!
Let thy dark odorous hair be round me flung
And twined (rich inspiration!) till I die
For love of thee—a shadow; so may I,
Stung to etherial life, declare thy pain:—
Till then, whate'er I sing—I sing in vain.
VI
Eva!—pale rose of Provence! where art thou?Thy harp is silent,—gone, thy home forlorn:
Mute anguish lieth on thy sister's brow:
Thy father's eye, (once proud and like a morn
Of sparkling June) is emptied of its scorn:—
Ah! bid me (and thou aid) in gentle verse
And words fair as thyself, thy tale rehearse.
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VII
In France—in sunny France, the fields are gay;Earth's fruits are richest there, and ripen soon:
The shrill lark welcometh a brighter day,
And, free and sheltered from the fiery noon,
The summer-sweet Acanthis sings her tune;
Or in the glassy waters looketh long,
Until the nightingale begins her song.
VIII
O Provence! in thy groves and vine-hung bowersDoth still that creature pine—that little bird
Who weeps her very soul away in showers
Of music,—only at the nightfall heard,
Yet sweeter far than any human word?
Still doth it pine?—or are the rose and thou
Deserted for some happier region now?
IX
Once, how it used to fill the fragrant airWith melancholy sounds that touched the brain!
But that was when pale Eva bound her hair
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Alarmed the bird to most melodious pain.
Those days are gone.—Oh! is the twilight pale
Made amorous still by the lone nightingale?—
X
Fair Eva was De Varenne's gentle child,Most gentle, from a rugged sire descended,
As April springeth from the winter wild,
A thing of rain and light gracefully blended,
Weeping inheritor! whose life is ended
Almost before the trump of March is dumb;
Dying in showers ere green Spring hath come.
XI
Scarce eighteen summers by the Durance' side,Which freshens the Provencal vallies green
With its bright waters, did that maid abide,
Beheld by few, yet loved as soon as seen,
And ripening as her mother once had been,—
Scarce eighteen summers, ere a sorrow strange
Fell from the sky, and wrought mysterious change.
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XII
How gracefully she lived can many tell;How meekly too she bore her father's frown;
Though seldom on his patient child it fell,
And quickly then she smiled and soothed it down,
Or else would in harmonious measures drown
His wrath, (as water quells the angry flame)
Till Love returned, or slow Oblivion came.
XIII
Two children,—Eva and young Heloise,Were all that fortune to De Varenne gave,
When from his wars beyond the Pyrenees
He came to mourn upon Aurelia's grave.
Oh! why should sorrow weep and never save!
She died, sad mother, and her husband wept
When closer to his heart her children crept.
XIV
For once he wept; but quickly from his eyeThe fire that flashed therein dried up the tear,
And he assumed again that conduct high
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Hallowing the lives of those his daughters dear:
Better perhaps if Love alone had dwelt
Within, and awed their young hearts while they knelt.
XV
For her who bore them, when she drooped and died,Exceeding sorrow did those children feel,
And oft they wished to slumber by her side,
And to her ear their pretty griefs reveal;
At last a delicate bloom began to steal
Over their cheeks, and beauty waved and spread
About them, and with grace their every motion fed.
XVI
In Heloise a blither glance was seen,A firmer step, a brighter, darker eye;
Her words were clear, like sounds that run between
The forest branches when some brook is nigh;
And scorn sat smiling on her forehead high.
“Thou art De Varenne's girl,” the father said:
“And Eva?”—sighed that child, and hung her head.
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XVII
“Eva! thy sister thou resemblest not;She cheers my soul, and is ashamed to pine:
Her grief has died; why is not thine forgot?
Thou art thy mother's all, and she is mine.
My peerless child, I kiss thee,—my divine!
What a clear beauty laughs through her disdain!
My joy!” he said, and kissed his child again.
XVIII
And so—(one favoured, and the other wornBy harsh neglect, and care before its time,)
Fled on life's early hours, until its morn:
Then gleamed the eyes of one sad and sublime,
And in the other's laughed a sunnier clime,
A paradise of beauty bright and young,
And over all a heaven of love was flung.
XIX
Oh! radiant creature, fairer than the sun,How dim was she beside thee,—how dismayed!
Thou like the east where dancing splendours run,
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Yet peerless in your wild-wood leaves arrayed
Were both,—sweet children of the sylvan hours,
Subjects of Love, who dies in courts and costly bowers.
XX
In courts, where revel reigns, and passionate songFloats like a triumph on the Bacchant's breath,
Ah! what hath love to do,—unless prolong
Its rare existence to a lingering death?
And die it must in war, the soldier saith;
Its voice is shivered by the trumpet's tone:
It sees the fiery fight,—and lo! 'tis flown.
XXI
It hath no home upon the weltering seas;Or if it hideth there, on bitter food
It feeds, lone, trembling at each idle breeze,
Until 'tis blasted by the battle rude,
A gentle thing with gentle strength endued,
By absence kill'd,—by scorn;—as often slain
By poisonous pleasure as the sting of pain.
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XXII
Fair Love!—Beside the fountains and bright fields,By running waters and in mossy glades,
(Tasting whatever the green quiet yields)
He roams, from morning till the evening shades
Fall, and the world like a phantasma fades:
There roams he, like a Sylvan, whom the air
Worships,—unwing'd, and making all his care.
XXIII
There, night and day are his. The radiant skyIs doubly beautiful, and sun, and shower,
And rainbows which upon the mountains lie,
And twice its common odour hath the flower,
And doubly filled with joy is every hour;
And music hangeth on the winds and floods,
And lingereth in the caves and desart woods:
XXIV
And in the populous forests thick with life,Which (deep and cool as Faunus ever knew)
Are haunted only by melodious strife,
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Feeding upon the fragrant summer dew:
And there the untiring seasons bring, for aye,
To night rich slumber, and fresh life to day.
XXV
And Beauty, in her own eternal form,(The same that witch'd the Dardan shepherd young)
Abideth.—Art doth never there deform
The amaranthine hues which life hath flung
O'er lips and cheeks to crimson blushes stung;
But free as is the elemental air
Nature and Beauty live,—and both are fair.
XXVI
And both might in De Varenne's home be seen,For there his daughters wore the early day,
The one entranced by some high perilous scene,
The other, fonder of a gentler lay,
Read how the Gods from their celestial way
Would wander for the Naiads' loves, or take
An earthly form,—and all for Beauty's sake.
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XXVII
She read how Jove from out the gates of lightCame downwards, shining like a mist of gold,
And how fond Semele became star-bright,
And Anaxareté a statue cold,
Prisoned, tho' dead, within her mortal mould:
She read of eyes made lovelier than the morn
Through love, and blinded by excess of scorn.
XXVIII
And so her gentle spirit, fed by timeWith radiant fable, from its earth up-grew,
(As mountain clouds float, erring but sublime,
Thro' the blue air) and hung on visions new,
Like wing'd Imagination false yet true:
And that imperial passion that doth reign
O'er every nerve, grew bright within her brain.—
XXIX
—How beautiful is morning, when the streamsOf light come running up the eastern skies!
How beautiful is life, in those young dreams
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Chained like the soul to truth;—but ah! it dics
Sometimes, and sometimes, with the adder's spite
Stings the true heart that nursed it, day and night.
XXX
And beautiful is great Apollo's page:But they who dare to read his burning lines
Go mad,—and ever after with blind rage
Rave of the skiey secrets and bright signs:
But all they tell is vain; for death entwines
The struggling utterance, and the words expire
Dumb,—self-consum'd, like some too furious fire.
XXXI
—One night a revel had been held, and danceAnd song had sounded in the ear of night,
And many a gallant that had grasped a lance,
And been the foremost in a bloody fight,
Then moved a measure with his lady bright,
And pressed her jewell'd arm and told his pain.
Alas! that Love should ever speak in vain!
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XXXII
Only the lonely Eva sate apart,—While young Chatillion in her sister's ear
Poured his love music, till her beating heart,
And eyes that glittering grew and large and clear,
And the strange transport and the crimson fear
That stained the beauty of their cheeks, betrayed
How much the lover loved, and how the maid.
XXXIII
The midnight lamps were o'er them, and the flareOf light, which shone at times and died away,
Glanced like the shifting sunshine on her hair,
And brought her ringlets out in rich array:
And there the lover's looks, like break of day,
Were seen, fixed—helpless:—Oh! a radiant spell
Was on him, and he knew its perils well.
XXXIV
But Eva, in the shadow dim, like oneWho sought her husband in the clouds, reclined;
A vestal of the world,—because the Sun
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Pale as a prophetess whose labouring mind
Gives out its knowledge; but her up-raised eyes
Shone with the languid light of one who loves or dies.
XXXV
So, in one bright creation (through the earthUnmatch'd) is love writ down:—no words are there,
But all is clear like some eternal birth
Of heaven,—a golden star,—the azure air:
Oh! I remember well how soft, how fair,
That vision shone,—how like a dream of youth,
How full of life, and love, and burning truth!
XXXVI
Masses of living cloud were there,—and are;And Love is there, unseen; and amorous light
Fills the dim ether; and the passionate war
Of kisses, like the silence of the night,
Is heard; and every branch and leaf is bright
With love; and in the trembling waters near,
Tamed by some presence, drinks the bending deer.
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XXXVII
And in the midst—O girl! whose curling limbsA god has breathed on till they sting the brain
With beauty—Look! how in her eye there swims
Intolerable joy—[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
XXXVIII
Io!—fair Io!—thou didst dearly earn,By after wanderings and transformed hours,
The love of Jove.—Fair Eva! thou didst burn
Self-martyred in thy green Provencal bowers,
Consumed to dust before Apollo's powers.
Both fell from too much love.—Sweet woman, still
Is thy love-harvest filled with so much ill?
XXXIX
—That night of revelry the victim's mindShook in its height: firm reason and clear thought
Forsook her, and her soul awhile grew blind,
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Its way through perilous regions now forgot,
Through haunts of death and life, and the throng'd way
Of darkness,—to insufferable day.
XL
That night she lay within her silken nest,White creature, dreaming till the golden dawn;
When Phœbus, shaking off his skiey rest,
Descended. Trembling, like a frighted fawn,
She lay, bewildered, pale:—The orient morn
Wept, and the Hours blushed scarlet, and the array
Of Heaven, (stars, moon, and clouds,) were swept away.
XLI
No presence in the o'er-arching vault was seenSave his,—Apollo's; who, unlike a God,
Quitted his fiery height, and on the green
Starr'd with white hyacinths and daisies, trod:
And wheresoe'er he stepped the flushing sod
Threw flowers from out its heart, and from her room
Came odours, like the heliotrope's perfume.
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XLII
Awhile he stayed:—he gazed,—perhaps a thoughtThat so much beauty was not born to die,
Assailed him; but not long that pity wrought,
For through his brightening form and his large eye
Shot passion, shaming the immaculate sky,
Where kindness lives with love, and hate is known,
Like mortal follies, by its name alone.
XLIII
He took her, gently, in his radiant arms,And breathed on her, and bore her through the air,
Hushing from time to time her sweet alarms,
And whispering still that one so good and fair
Should dread no evil thought and know no care:
And still they flew, and around a lustre played,
Near them, as near a figure plays its shade.
XLIV
Their course seemed pointed to some southern shore.Over the waters where the trade-winds blew
They passed, and where men find the golden ore,
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While, far beneath, the Old world and the New
Stretched out their tiny shapes, and their thick chain
Of islands, spangling like bright gems the main.
XLV
And then they moved beneath a lovelier sky,O'er green savannahs where cool waters run;
O'er hills and valleys; o'er vast plains that lie
Flat,—desarts blistered by the Afric sun;
Over spice-groves and woods of cinnamon;
By Siam and Malay; and many a fair
Bright country basking in the Indian air.
XLVI
Whither they journeyed then, ah, who may tell!—Beyond all limits that the sailor knows;
Beyond the ocean; and beyond the swell
Of mountains; and beyond the Antarctic snows:
To some sweet haunt, 'tis told, where softly glows
Perpetual day,—some island of the air:
We know its beauty; but we know not where.
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XLVII
—Eternal forests, on whose boughs the SpringHung undecaying, fenced the place around,
And amorous vines, (like serpents without sting)
Clung to the trees, or trailed on the green ground,
And fountains threw on high a silver sound,
And glades interminably long, between
Whose branches sported the grey deer, were seen.
XLVIII
And from the clustering boughs the nightingaleSang her lament; while on a reedy stream,
Which murmured and far off was heard to fall,
The swan went sailing by, like a white dream;
And somewhere near did the lone cuckoo call,
But none made answer; and his amorous theme
The thrush loud uttered till it spoke of pain;
And many a creature sang, but seemed to sing in vain.
XLIX
There, rich with fruits, the tree of Paradise(The plantain) spread its large and slender leaves,
And there the pictur'd palm was seen to rise,
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(The willow) and sun-flowers like golden sheaves;
The lady lily paler than the moon,
And roses, laden with the breath of June.
L
And in the midst a crystal palace stoodOn pillars shining with immortal gold:
Its gates were golden, and some artist good
Had carved them till each nook and corner told
Some wonder of the Sun or story old;
And rainbow landscapes copied from the skies
Shone in the metal with a thousand dies.
LI
Upon those gates no sounding horn was hung:No warder answered from his watching tower:
But silence over all the place was flung,
Making it holy as Egeria's bower,
And gentle splendour, like the evening hour,
Mingled with shadows fine its finer ray,
And fed the place with beauty night and day.
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LII
All these the lover to his love displayed:—The palace whose bright top was hid in heaven,
The lustrous pillars and the long arcade,
The statue,—where it seemed some God had striven
With immortality,—and failed, yet given
The marble likeness of Apollo's smile,
His grace, his glance almost,—but not his guile.
LIII
There, a vast hall far spread and high was seen,So high—the falcon might have tired his wing
Nor touched the roof, whereon, with stars between
Shone Heaven's wide kingdoms, all,—a radiant ring,
And from the midst Apollo seemed to spring—
(Was he the phantom of her hopes,—no more?)
She trembled,—wept,—but still he seemed to soar.
LIV
And, far away from out that central hallRan arched passages diverging far,
Each with its doors and range of rooms, and all
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Shone spacious and the most harmonious jar
Of voices and irregular footsteps near
And busy words, like life, broke on her ear:
LV
And music, like the dissonance of Gods,Rich,—Bacchanalian, as when Hebe crowns
Their cups with kisses, and through all the abodes
Of Heaven a sudden shout breaks forth that drowns
The air with laughter, and shakes earthly towns
To dust, — immortal Music in her bower
Sung, till Apollo struck the golden hour.
LVI
Then, in that stillness, Eva heard a voiceFrom one unseen beside her. Thus it said:
‘Welcome my sovereign lady, and rejoice!
Fear not: but on the flowery pavements tread,
Or on these downy pillows rest your head,
Or bathe your beauty in the waters near,
Or drink,—behold, the nectarous draught is here.’
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LVII
She gazed,—and slowly from the marble groundO'er-strewed with flowers a golden table sprung,
Where fruits of matchless fragrance did abound,
And nameless dainties all together flung,
And on their boughs Hesperian apples hung,
And nectar ravishing to taste,—like gleams
From Circe's eyes, or love-enchanted dreams.
LVIII
Fair girl, she left untouched that nectarous wine,Fruits and ambrosian food, and strayed along
The pictured rooms, all fair (and some divine)
With skiey stories since made plain by song,
And women, an imperishable throng,
Lifted from earth to heaven by force of love,
And purified by light and the glance of Jove.
LIX
There ceilings spread abroad their cloudless hues,And stars shone from them, and the sounds of wings
Were heard like rushing waters, when they lose
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Ran like the fluid lightning, when it clings
(Or seems) around some pine or shattered oak,
And every room some bright and different marvel spoke.
LX
Through all the palace,—pillars, and arches wide,And floors, and roofs, (it seemed a mystic plan,
And only by the curious eye espied)
Instinct with light a living splendour ran,
As blood goes streaming through the heart of man,
And every hinge and joint was fed by fire,
Which flowed half hidden like some veiled desire.
LXI
All day she traversed her imperial home,With wonder gazing, and strange mute delight;
And then she prayed her absent love to come,
And bade him hurry the too slow twilight;
And then the coming of immortal night
She dreaded, its sublime and dark array;
And thus, 'tween fears and pleasure, fled the day.
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LXII
Twilight is come,—calm mournful hour, for thoseWhom years have quelled, whom cold dread thoughts engage,
But life hath fires before we reach its snows,
And youth treads fiercely on the ground that age
Shuns with a timid glance and sad presage;
And twilight hath no terrors, no repose,
For hearts where Love's impetuous spirit glows.
LXIII
Twilight is come: but where is he whose wordShould be as holy as the Heavens?—Afar
Through all the empyreal air no noise is heard,
Nor vision seen, nor bright descending star;
No sight, no sound; only the ebb and jar
Of meeting passions in one heart, until
A hymn arose which broke that silence chill.
1.
Apollo!—king Apollo!In what enchanted region dost thou stay?—
Is it in the azure air
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Which Thetis at the set of day
In the sea waters far away
Buildeth up, as blue and fair
As thy own bright kingdoms are?
2.
Oh, King of life and light!O peerless Archer! O triumphant God!
Behold!—the golden rod
Now pointeth to the promised hour,—twilight;
And she who loves thee so
Is pale and full of woe.—
No wave nor throne have I,
No bower nor golden grove,
No palace built on high,
To tempt thee not to rove,
But truth, and such a love
As would not shame the sky,—
If these be nothing, Time
Shall teach me how to die.
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3.
Yet come not, great Apollo! come not here;The hour has vanished, and thou needs must sta
In those sea waters far away:—
For me,—neglect and fear
Are my fit bridal cheer:
An earthly creature what had I to do
With sights of heaven or pleasures of the skies!
Oh! master and my king, thy slave despise!
Now from thy station wheresoe'er it be—
Within the waving sea
Or in the pathless blue—
Look down, in thy divine
Disdain, and from thy lips
Shed darkness and eclipse,
The fit requital for a love like mine!—
LXIV
She ended; and above, as from a cloud,The eternal sun broke forth:—no shape was there,
No voice, but soft winds all the branches bowed,
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And beauty looked so lovely that despair
Fled, and innocuous warmth and cheering light
Fell on the mournful girl like some late lost delight.
LXV
No tear now stained her cheek; no failing tonesTelling of anguish hid, or dull with pain;
But grief is given to the wind that moans
Amongst the forest boughs, and to the main
And to the rivers all who must complain
Yet feel no sorrow to the end of time—
As years all filled with blood are freed of crime.
LXVI
But when the twilight fell, that gentle childFelt a strange terror, till a voice she knew
(It was Apollo's) spoke, but oh! so mild,
So like familiar tones we know are true!
And his too fiery glance was quenched in dew:
“Eva, my mortal love, the day has burned
To its decline, and lo! I have returned.”
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LXVII
So spake he, and the maid with downcast eyes,And flushing forehead which had lost its snow,
Him answered, (while her breast like summer-skies
Spread out its breathing paradise below,
And rose and fell as billows swell and flow)—
“My master! art thou here?”—and with a sigh
Raising her eyes, she saw him smiling nigh.
LXVIII
Oh! never was a smile so full of scornAs that which glanced along his curved lip;
And his eyes sparkled like the approach of morn;
Yet sweeter were his words than winds that sip
The dew from hyacinths:—Oh! canst thou strip
Thy bird of plumage, and her sweet despair,
Which flowed in music to thee, never spare?—
LXIX
“Apollo! king Apollo!”—That wild cryWas heard in Ilium when its end was near,
From Priam's Sybil daughter, who with an eye
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Saw the red ruin and the flashing spear
Through all the darkness of the untold to-morrow,
And heard the Spartan's cry, the Trojan's sorrow:
LXX
Apollo! king Apollo!—Is thy scornNot dead,—and were Cassandra's tears in vain?
Her words (an oracle)—her life forlorn,
Stung through by unbelief and fierce disdain?—
Her crowned exile and her death of pain?—
Still dost thou ask new love and fresh despair,
And hopes born but to perish?—Spare! O spare!
LXXI
I speak in vain:—The chariot of the hourIs rolling onwards,—over kings and slaves,
Passionate spirits, and the crimson flower
Of love, which Hermes' magic never saves,—
Over rebellions and the gloom of graves,—
Through light and darkness, and the eternal woe
Of life,—to regions which no thought may know.
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LXXII
Older than ruin, or the dust that hidesPersepolis or Balbec, and yet fair
Like early manhood, the great Phantom rides
(Time or the Hour) above us:—Where, O where?—
Through Hell, and Heaven, in Earth, and the wide Air;
Invisibly he goes, and without sound,
Like Death, a tyrant,—shapeless but uncrowned.
LXXIII
He passes:—Oh! not all the suns that shine,Not all the Autumn floods nor Winter's rain,
Nor all that poets tell of, though divine,
Shall clear thy annals of so foul a stain:—
He passes, and is gone;—and I complain
Unto the silence; and return dismayed
To tell thy latest grief, sad Provence maid!—
LXXIV
The hour has passed;—and Night, who laughs at time,Shakes out her spangled hair in loose array,
And, clasped with coronets of gems sublime,
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(She bright successor) a whole world must pay
Low adoration,—while the sleepless care
Must watch her glittering vigils shining fair.
LXXV
That night—Oh! never shall its silent hours,Its love—its darkness be profaned by me:
If I must tell, be it of vine-leaf bowers
Where Bacchanal delight is loud and free,
Or Aphrodite's home hung round with flowers,
Or coral branches from her native sea;
For love is her wide boast: but clouds should hide
The young hot blushes of a human bride.
LXXVI
And yet night came (voluptuous night!) and sleepWeighed down the eye-lids of Apollo's bride,
Who sank into a tremulous slumber deep,
Believing now his falling locks she spied,
Or heard him breathing odours by her side,
Or felt his burning kisses on her lips,
Or saw his eyes bent o'er her, in eclipse.
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LXXVII
And once she dreamed he said “Awake! arise,Daughter of clay: Behold! the truth is plain:
Thou hast looked love on me with impious eyes,
On me—a God, and with enchantments vain
Bound me, and thou must die.” A thrilling pain
Traversed her heart, while thus the Pythian spoke,
And sleep was scared by terror, and she woke.
LXXVIII
She rose, and saw him in his beauty laidBeside her: O'er his limbs a tender light
Hung floating, and his head looked all arrayed
With a halo, as the glow-worm looks by night,
Or like a lunar rainbow pale and bright,—
Encompassed and enshrined by the clear breath
Of Heaven, which saves immortal frames from death:
LXXIX
And on his lips there lay a rose-red leafCourting the kiss she gave, and did not fade—
(How could it feel a touch so soft and brief?)
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Over his throat, and then shrank back afraid
Gazing upon the God—who calmly slept,
While to her couch the trembling creature crept.
LXXX
This past she slept, and of sky-piercing towersShe dreamed, and banquets held beneath the moon,
And trod on stars, and through illumin'd bowers
Paced like a dancer, whom some eager tune
Leads on to pleasure which must perish soon:
Yet still by her white side Apollo lay,
(She dreamed) 'till darkness faded into day.
LXXXI
The morning broke, and she was Phœbus' bride:And evening fell:—But did the God return?—
He came not,—he came never to her side;
But her bright Dream (for 'twas a dream) did burn
Madness upon her, and the world did spurn
Her story for a folly:—yet she believed;
And o'er her widow'd passion meekly grieved.
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LXXXII
Like Ariadne, when in pale despairThe Athenian left her,—so sad Eva pined,
And so she went complaining to the air,
And gave her tresses to the careless wind:—
The colour of her fate was on her mind,
Dark, death-like, and despairing;—and her eye
Shone lustrous like the light of prophecy.
LXXXIII
Over the grassy meads,—beside lone streams,To perilous heights which no weak step could reach
She wandered, feeding her unearthly dreams
With musing, and would move the tremulous beech
And shuddering aspen with imploring speech;
For nothing that did live, save they (who sighed)
Pitied the downfall of her amorous pride.—
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LXXXIV
—There is a story:—that some lady cameTo Paris; and while she—('tis years ago!)
Was gazing at the marbles, and the fame
Of colour which threw out a sunset glow,
A tall girl entered, with staid steps and slow,
The immortal hall where Phœbus stood arrayed
In stone,—and started back, trembling, dismayed.
LXXXV
Yet still she looked, tho' mute, and her clear eyeFed on the image till a rapture grew,
Chasing the cloudy fear that hovered nigh,
And filling with soft light her glances blue;
And still she trembled, for a pleasure new
Thrilled her young veins, and stammering accents ran
Over her tongue, as thus her speech began:—
114
LXXXVI
“Apollo! king Apollo!—art thou here?Art thou indeed returned?”—and then her eyes
Outwept her joy, and hope and passionate fear
Seized on her heart, as tow'rds the dazzling prize
She moved, like one who sees a shape that flies,
And stood entranced before the marble dream,
Which made the Greek immortal, like his theme.
LXXXVII
Life in each limb is seen, and on the browAbsolute God;—no stone nor mockery shape
But the resistless Sun,—the rage and glow
Of Phœbus as he tried in vain to rape
Evergreen Daphne, or when his rays escape
Scorching the Lybian desart or gaunt side
Of Atlas, withering the great giant's pride.
LXXXVIII
And round his head and round his limbs have clungLife and the flush of Heaven, and youth divine,
And in the breathed nostril backwards flung,
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Right through the marble, which will never pine
To paleness though a thousand years have fled,
But looks above all fate, and mocks the dead.
LXXXIX
Yet stands he not as when blithely he guidesTameless Eoüs from the golden shores
Of morning, nor when in calm strength he rides
Over the scorpion, while the lion roars
Seared by his burning chariot which out-pours
Floods of eternal light o'er hill and plain,
But, like a triumph, o'er the Python slain:
XC
He stands with serene brow and lip upcurl'dBy scorn, such as Gods felt, when on the head
Of beast or monster or vain man they hurled
Thunder, and loosed the lightning from its bed,
Where it lies chained, by blood and torment fed;
His fine arm is outstretched,—his arrow flown,
And the wrath flashes from his eyes of stone,
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XCI
Like Day—or liker the fierce morn, (so young)—Like the sea-tempest which against the wind
Comes dumb, while all its terrible joints are strung
To death and rapine:—Ah! if he unbind
His marble fillet now and strike her blind—
Away, away!—vain fear! unharmed she stands,
With fastened eyes and white beseeching hands.
XCII
—Alas! that madness, like the worm that stings,Should dart its venom through the tender brain!
Alas! that to all ills which darkness brings
Fierce day should send abroad its phantoms plain,
Shook from their natural hell, (a hideous train)
To wander through the world, and vex it sore,
Which might be happy else for ever-more.
XCIII
Lust, and the dread of death, and white Despair,(A wreck, from changed friends and hopes all fled),
Ambition which is sleepless, and dull care
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From love which strikes the heart and sears the head,
The lightning of the passions,—in whose ray
Eva's bright spirit wasted, day by day.
XCIV
She was Apollo's votary, (so she deemed)His bride, and met him in his radiant bowers,
And sometimes, as his priestess pale beseemed,
She strewed before his image, like the Hours,
Delicate blooms, spring buds and summer flowers,
Faint violets, dainty lilies, the red rose,—
What time his splendour in the Eastern glows.
XCV
And these she took and strewed before his feet,And tore the laurel (his own leaf) to pay
Homage unto its God, and the plant sweet
That turns its bosom to the sunny ray,
And all which open at the break of day,
And all which worthy are to pay him due
Honour,—pink, saffron, crimson, pied, or blue.
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XCVI
And ever, when was done her flowery toil,She stood (idolatress!) and languished there,
She and the God, alone;—nor would she spoil
The silence with her voice, but with mute care
Over his carved limbs a garment fair
She threw, still worshipping with amorous pain,
Still watching ever his divine disdain.
XCVII
—Time past:—and when that German lady cameAgain to Paris, where the image stands,
(It was in August, and the hot sun-flame
Shot thro' the windows)—midst the gazing bands
She sought for her whose white-beseeching hands
Spoke so imploringly before the stone,
(The Provence girl)—she asked; but she was gone.
XCVIII
Whither none knew;—Some said that she would comeAlways at morning with her blooming store,
And gaze upon the marble, pale and dumb,
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The girl to death; for o'er her eyes and o'er
Her paling cheek hues like the grave were spread:
And one at last knew further;—She was dead.
XCIX
She died, mad as the winds,—mad as the seaWhich rages for the beauty of the moon,
Mad as the poet is whose fancies flee
Up to the stars to claim some boundless boon,
Mad as the forest when the tempests tune
Their breath to song and shake its leafy pride,
Yet trembling like its shadows:—So she died.
C
She died at morning when the gentle streamsOf day came peering thro' the far east sky,
And that same light which wrought her maddening dreams,
Brought back her mind. She awoke with gentle cry,
And in the light she loved she wished to die:—
She perished, when no more she could endure,
Hallowed before it, like a martyr pure.
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