Shifting Scenes and Other Poems By J. Stanyan Bigg |
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| ODE ON THE BIRTH OF BURNS.
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| II. |
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 | Shifting Scenes and Other Poems |  |
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ODE ON THE BIRTH OF BURNS.
I.
A hundred times, with clangorous shout and din,Have tower and steeple hailed the New Year in;
A myriad brazen throats, a hundred times,
Have wildly chanted forth their Christmas chimes;
A hundred times the ancient world hath rolled
Out of the lap of summer, warm with gold,
Into the bleaching wind and drenching rain,
Since first the wondrous peasant felt the air,
Since first above his head a mother's prayer
Went fluttering up to God, amid the angelic train.
II.
No royal palace was prepared for him;No silent courtiers slid from room to room,
Gathering together in the gorgeous gloom
Of purple hangings, drooping rich and dim;
For him no silver cressets shed their light,
No eager joy-bells sounded through the night
From city minster, or from village tower,
No loud hurrahs, sent from deep-chested men
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In celebration of his natal hour;
No hush of deep expectance filled the earth;
No cry rose rich with gladness at his birth;
The noble revelled at his sumptuous hall;
The beauty bloomed and languished at the ball;
The drowsy miller scolded at the mill;
The peasant slept beneath the misty hill;
The heavens were still; no shaggy lightnings came
To burn the midnight in their eager ire;
No mighty portent, with a pen of fire,
Scribbled upon the dark the poet's name;
He came and no man knew it; no man knew
The wondrous boon to Scotland given;
That there—beneath that grim and wintry blue—
A glorious poet, strong and true,
Had newly dropped from heaven!
III.
Nature herself lay still, and dumb, and cold;Gone were her summer garments fringed with gold,
Her gorgeous sunsets, streaked with crimson bars—
Darkling in violet depths, shot through with light—
Deepening in splendour as the enchantress, Night,
Gathered and creamed the dim light into stars;
Gone were her balms and blooms, her hum of bees,
Her sweet-mouthed zephyrs toying with the trees,
Her honeyed murmurings under hedge-rows dim,
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Her festival array of cups and flowers,
Full of rich nectar to the fiery brim;
Gone was the banquet and the golden sheen,
The lights were out, the revelry was o'er,
And she who, erstwhile, was a crownèd queen,
Shivered a beggar at her palace-door.
Giving scant welcome to the new-born child,
She seized him in her stiff arms, lank and cold,
And held him out upon the wintry wold,
To look upon the desolation, strange and wild,
Which weirdly shuddered down on farm and fold,
In rain, and sleet, and silent-falling snow—
Wrapping the heavens in a pall above,
And the dead earth in a white shroud below.
IV.
A wintry path, a future thick with gloom,Solid as adamant, before him lay,
Through which the poet cleft his lonely way,
'Mid menace and reproach and muttering doom,
Into the dawning of that better day
Which now has settled down upon his tomb.
For nature hath a Spartan mother's heart,
And, to prepare her noblest for their part
In the stern strife and struggle, she ordains
Rude tasks, hard fare, and bitter cups of pains—
Knowing the heroic stature is built higher
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Kingliest and grandest when his forehead glows
Beneath that burning zone—the martyr's crown of fire.
V.
And so he grew and wrestled for the right;True man! true bard! who battled with the strong;
And, having crowned his poverty with song,
He brought it boldly forth into the light,
Heedless of jibe or jeer; and all men sought
To see the wonder which the bard had wrought;
Great, as though under some enchanter's rod,
A shapeless block of stone had shimmered out a god!
VI.
He took his country to his inmost soul,And sang her joys and sorrows as his own;
And in his verse we hear her wild winds moan,
The rapid rustle of her brooks, and roll
Of her rude rivers, as they dash and foam
In tawny fury round the shepherd's home.
Her Doric speech, her heart of simple truth,
Her piety and strength, her tales of ruth,
Her fireside legends, and her wild romance
Glitter and gather in a rustic dance,
Laughing in garlands of perpetual youth,
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And Scottish faëries ring their silver chimes,
Goblin and ghost, warlock and witch uncouth,
And all the marvels of the olden times
Troop forth at his behest;
And every terror of his native land
Shakes out its elf-locks, bares its bony hand,
And every sportive whim, at his command,
Sits down the poet's guest.
VII.
Laughter and tears alike were at his nod,
Humour and wit ran sparkling rich as wine;
And at the rare carousal, half divine,
He sat amid his subjects, like a god
Waited upon by satyrs.
Humour and wit ran sparkling rich as wine;
And at the rare carousal, half divine,
He sat amid his subjects, like a god
Waited upon by satyrs.
Like a bee,
He sipped sweet honey from the bitterest flower;
And at his touch the starkest wintry tree
Rained down its apples in a golden shower.
Young men and maidens whisp'ring, still rehearse
Their joys and sorrows in his manly verse;
His witching words still well o'er budding lips,
Mantling soft cheeks in ruddy dimple-dips
And innocent laughters of the ancient prime;
And still, at hearthstone, and at rural fair,
Old men and matrons, heeding not that Time
Hath furrow'd cheek and brow, and blanch'd the glossy hair,
Chuckle and murmur o'er the magic rhyme,
Brimful of life and light, and all youth's dainty fare;
Nature, full-lipped, was singing in his heart;
And, though the wounded poet felt the smart
Of poverty, yet, like a bird in spring,
Soul-full of music, he did nought but sing,
And in the choral whole, he grandly bore his part.
He sipped sweet honey from the bitterest flower;
And at his touch the starkest wintry tree
Rained down its apples in a golden shower.
Young men and maidens whisp'ring, still rehearse
Their joys and sorrows in his manly verse;
His witching words still well o'er budding lips,
Mantling soft cheeks in ruddy dimple-dips
And innocent laughters of the ancient prime;
And still, at hearthstone, and at rural fair,
Old men and matrons, heeding not that Time
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Chuckle and murmur o'er the magic rhyme,
Brimful of life and light, and all youth's dainty fare;
Nature, full-lipped, was singing in his heart;
And, though the wounded poet felt the smart
Of poverty, yet, like a bird in spring,
Soul-full of music, he did nought but sing,
And in the choral whole, he grandly bore his part.
| Shifting Scenes and Other Poems | |