 | Elegies and memorials |  |
9
ELEGIES.
13
I.
Ετελευτησε παρθενος . . . απηλθε δε εννεα και δεκατις.Eustath. ad Il. B.
“She died a maiden . . . departing at nineteen.
II.
Νυν δ' εκτος οικων, καπι γης αλλης φυγαςΚακως απωλου, σης κασιγνητης διχα.
Soph. Electra.
“Now far from home, a fugitive in other lands, sadly hast thou perished, severed from thy sister.”
[I.]
Two jewels lost—Oh, long-divided pair!
Backward through time I turn to look for them,
And one I find beneath a cypress stem
Hid many a summer deep—the other, where?
By time and space so far asunder tost,
That, in a dreamland early casketed,
This, in the after years so wildly lost—
Few miss them now, few count the long since dead.
Two phantoms cross the ocean to my soul;
One steals like moonlight o'er the darkening blue;
One seems to sweep through stormshine to its goal,
Then wild with heartbreak flashes out of view.
But now, so dim with mist the sky and sea,
None cares to stand and watch for them with me;
Yet tost by time and space so far apart,
Brother and Sister! meet within my heart!
Backward through time I turn to look for them,
And one I find beneath a cypress stem
Hid many a summer deep—the other, where?
By time and space so far asunder tost,
That, in a dreamland early casketed,
This, in the after years so wildly lost—
Few miss them now, few count the long since dead.
14
One steals like moonlight o'er the darkening blue;
One seems to sweep through stormshine to its goal,
Then wild with heartbreak flashes out of view.
But now, so dim with mist the sky and sea,
None cares to stand and watch for them with me;
Yet tost by time and space so far apart,
Brother and Sister! meet within my heart!
Erinna died, a flame extinguished soon—
For flame she was, of such enchanted fire
As once soared upward on Arabia's noon,
When the last Phœnix vanished from the pyre.
But half a child through all her childish time,
Still half a child in girlhood's strenuous prime,
By Duty's bride-ring with such passion worn,
By Fancy's sparkling, flowery, fairy wand,
That wrought grave wonders in her firm young hand—
By Nature's own sweet science at grey morn
Revealed, in wandering woodland-studies dear—
By these inspired, and ancient lore austere,
And the full heart that ever rushed to meet
The Fair and Good, and worship at their feet—
She lived on heights and knew not they were high,
On fire, and knew not other souls were cold;
She would have learnt it all, but was to die
Ere yet her eaglet-wings she could unfold
For her true mates to search the world, and ask
Her share in their appointed beauteous task.
Some task was waiting for her, so we deem,
Its hopes, its fears, its failures, all untried;
But now her little lifetime seems a dream,
So long ago, and so unknown she died.
Now the red rose-leaf on the pure young cheek,
More childlike as time moves, and leaves her there,
And eyes which sprang up ere the lips could speak,
Melt into shadow through the drooping hair.
Now all that girlhood, now that flushed, intense,
Young fever, are a whisper of the night,
A faint sweet resurrection, a strange sense
Of absence unexplained till morning light.
And whilst her memory in its crystal urn
Gleams fair as silver through the dust of years,
Cold evermore where sky and ocean burn
With azure fire that isle of sepulchres,
'Twixt purple passion-flower and whitest rose,
Where Death a garden's summer queen appears,
She sleeps—but others live for other tears.
For flame she was, of such enchanted fire
As once soared upward on Arabia's noon,
When the last Phœnix vanished from the pyre.
But half a child through all her childish time,
Still half a child in girlhood's strenuous prime,
By Duty's bride-ring with such passion worn,
By Fancy's sparkling, flowery, fairy wand,
That wrought grave wonders in her firm young hand—
By Nature's own sweet science at grey morn
Revealed, in wandering woodland-studies dear—
By these inspired, and ancient lore austere,
And the full heart that ever rushed to meet
The Fair and Good, and worship at their feet—
She lived on heights and knew not they were high,
15
She would have learnt it all, but was to die
Ere yet her eaglet-wings she could unfold
For her true mates to search the world, and ask
Her share in their appointed beauteous task.
Some task was waiting for her, so we deem,
Its hopes, its fears, its failures, all untried;
But now her little lifetime seems a dream,
So long ago, and so unknown she died.
Now the red rose-leaf on the pure young cheek,
More childlike as time moves, and leaves her there,
And eyes which sprang up ere the lips could speak,
Melt into shadow through the drooping hair.
Now all that girlhood, now that flushed, intense,
Young fever, are a whisper of the night,
A faint sweet resurrection, a strange sense
Of absence unexplained till morning light.
And whilst her memory in its crystal urn
Gleams fair as silver through the dust of years,
Cold evermore where sky and ocean burn
With azure fire that isle of sepulchres,
'Twixt purple passion-flower and whitest rose,
Where Death a garden's summer queen appears,
She sleeps—but others live for other tears.
16
II.
Ah, her young darling is not one of those!
His tale for her untold, its stormy close
Rent other hearts, but stirred not her repose;
Unguessed by her the strange and cheerless bed
Where rests, for ever rests, his weary head;
And nothing of their haunted life she knows,
For whom an awful star, 'twixt wind and wave,
Still hovers o'er a merciless despair,
Still hovers o'er their treasure hidden there,
Their treasure in a never-fathomed grave—
Who dare not look, but feel the ghastly gleam,
While years of silence tell them 'tis no dream—
To whom across the world and waste of sea,
A mute sad Shadow turns its solemn gaze,
Hopeless of home—“Forget me not,” It says:
“I am not lost, while Love remembers me.”
His tale for her untold, its stormy close
Rent other hearts, but stirred not her repose;
Unguessed by her the strange and cheerless bed
Where rests, for ever rests, his weary head;
And nothing of their haunted life she knows,
For whom an awful star, 'twixt wind and wave,
Still hovers o'er a merciless despair,
Still hovers o'er their treasure hidden there,
Their treasure in a never-fathomed grave—
Who dare not look, but feel the ghastly gleam,
While years of silence tell them 'tis no dream—
To whom across the world and waste of sea,
A mute sad Shadow turns its solemn gaze,
Hopeless of home—“Forget me not,” It says:
“I am not lost, while Love remembers me.”
Oh, faithful to the bidding of those eyes!
Oh, faithful to the tender heart of fire!
Love yearns for thee with unextinguished sighs,
But knows that with her death thy memory dies;
And dies with it one sacred sole desire,
To gather up the scattered dust of death,
To charm the long-lost phantom back to light,
And that dear semblance to all time bequeath—
Vain bitter prayer for bitter sweet delight!
In what strange lines of beauty should I draw thee?
In what sad purple dreamshine paint thee true?
How should I make them see who never saw thee?
How should I make them know who never knew?
Oh, faithful to the tender heart of fire!
Love yearns for thee with unextinguished sighs,
But knows that with her death thy memory dies;
And dies with it one sacred sole desire,
To gather up the scattered dust of death,
To charm the long-lost phantom back to light,
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Vain bitter prayer for bitter sweet delight!
In what strange lines of beauty should I draw thee?
In what sad purple dreamshine paint thee true?
How should I make them see who never saw thee?
How should I make them know who never knew?
Beauteous, mysterious, solitary boy,
Awakening slowly to the Poet's joy!
Fire-fountain of young genius, showering rays
Of ruby sparkle through thy dreariest days—
Heart in its hardy frame of manhood, ever
Kept fresh and dewy through the stony ways
And dust of toil, with all its vain endeavour—
Oh, pathos of the dreaming azure gaze,
Mute mirror of the wonders far away,
That once so witched with its unconscious blaze
The stranger-artist—quenchless to this day,
Like stars burnt out in ages long gone by,
Whose phantoms still are splendid in the sky—
So all with thee, dear love, is dark and blind;
With us, the smile, the flash, the glory, stay behind!
Awakening slowly to the Poet's joy!
Fire-fountain of young genius, showering rays
Of ruby sparkle through thy dreariest days—
Heart in its hardy frame of manhood, ever
Kept fresh and dewy through the stony ways
And dust of toil, with all its vain endeavour—
Oh, pathos of the dreaming azure gaze,
Mute mirror of the wonders far away,
That once so witched with its unconscious blaze
The stranger-artist—quenchless to this day,
Like stars burnt out in ages long gone by,
Whose phantoms still are splendid in the sky—
So all with thee, dear love, is dark and blind;
With us, the smile, the flash, the glory, stay behind!
But words tell nothing—How tell half the rest?
The fancy's quaint inventiveness of jest—
Wild, beautiful caprices of a speech
Now long unwritten, mute, and past from reach—
The rebel spirit's free-born questionings,
Past use and fashion, to the core of things—
But words tell nothing. Dim, how dim, alas!
My painting shows upon no magic glass.
The fancy's quaint inventiveness of jest—
18
Now long unwritten, mute, and past from reach—
The rebel spirit's free-born questionings,
Past use and fashion, to the core of things—
But words tell nothing. Dim, how dim, alas!
My painting shows upon no magic glass.
Ah, where to seek him? Many a desert place
Of lovely wonders once had known him well,
And pilgrim fancy follows on his trace;
But, when she seems to find his missing face,
And weeping prays him all his tale to tell—
No word she hears save, “Nevermore! Farewell!”
Never the freezing forest, which the grim
North-easter sets a-tremble with one sigh,
Through all its plumy pine-tops in the sky,
Then rends with crash and uproar limb from limb—
Shall shut again its cedarn gates on him,
Nor whisper age-long secrets any more
Around the daring, dreaming hermit's door.
Oft the gold moon shall climb her midnight stair,
Above drear summits of the hemlock-tree—
With pale auroras decked, like streaming hair,
And from her chilly throne shall seek him there—
But her young lonely Poet, where is he?
From his wild prison where the stealthy Death
Went whispering through the trees with poniard breath,
Down thy snow gallery, thou steel-bound river,
Long since that poet passed away for ever.
Of lovely wonders once had known him well,
And pilgrim fancy follows on his trace;
But, when she seems to find his missing face,
And weeping prays him all his tale to tell—
No word she hears save, “Nevermore! Farewell!”
Never the freezing forest, which the grim
North-easter sets a-tremble with one sigh,
Through all its plumy pine-tops in the sky,
Then rends with crash and uproar limb from limb—
Shall shut again its cedarn gates on him,
Nor whisper age-long secrets any more
Around the daring, dreaming hermit's door.
Oft the gold moon shall climb her midnight stair,
Above drear summits of the hemlock-tree—
With pale auroras decked, like streaming hair,
And from her chilly throne shall seek him there—
19
From his wild prison where the stealthy Death
Went whispering through the trees with poniard breath,
Down thy snow gallery, thou steel-bound river,
Long since that poet passed away for ever.
Ah, where to seek him? For no longer now
In richer wilds and skied with fiercer blue,
The beauteous frown of sleep upon his brow,
Dreaming he lies, deep in the dawn's chill dew;
No more his flocks their desert pasture roam,
No more he toils, a miner in the wild;
But ah! for ever, evermore exiled,
For ever lost the solemn hope of home!
Brave, hardy wanderer, still through loss and pain
Athirst for beauty in earth, sky, and sea,
For thee no glaring prize, no vulgar gain
Was destined—but sweet Nature wedded thee;
And caught thee up with her to heaven's third height,
And things, by man unspeakable, she told—
Oh, what a soul was swept into the night!
Oh, what a heart in the cold deep lies cold!
What passion buried there its joy and pain!
Oh, sea and storm! Oh, homeward bound in vain!
Oh, home bereft, what long expectant years
Closed with that darling life in hopeless tears!
In richer wilds and skied with fiercer blue,
The beauteous frown of sleep upon his brow,
Dreaming he lies, deep in the dawn's chill dew;
No more his flocks their desert pasture roam,
No more he toils, a miner in the wild;
But ah! for ever, evermore exiled,
For ever lost the solemn hope of home!
Brave, hardy wanderer, still through loss and pain
Athirst for beauty in earth, sky, and sea,
For thee no glaring prize, no vulgar gain
Was destined—but sweet Nature wedded thee;
And caught thee up with her to heaven's third height,
And things, by man unspeakable, she told—
Oh, what a soul was swept into the night!
Oh, what a heart in the cold deep lies cold!
What passion buried there its joy and pain!
Oh, sea and storm! Oh, homeward bound in vain!
20
Closed with that darling life in hopeless tears!
III.
Vain broken promise of unfinished lives!
From your untimely ashes what survives?
Who shall fulfil your unlived half of life?
Who win the crown of your unfoughten strife?
Is your lost future like the dusky shade
The new moon carries in her golden boat?
Ah, no; for in full royalty arrayed
The perfect orb through ether yet shall float;
But neither light nor colour comes to thee,
Faint outline of a life that shall not be!
On that blank page, the student, Fancy, reads
The unwrit story of what should have been,
Sees, mournful paradox, the never seen,
And knows what was not. Yet the grief which needs,
For life's support, a faith and not a dream,
Holds that the spirit in its sigh supreme
With sudden flame shall interpenetrate
Some form unearthly in some unknown state,
A beauteous mystery of meeting bliss
Reserving for the souls that weep and wait.
But vainly towards that state we strain from this;
The earthly heart, the face, the self we miss,
'Tis that which was we fain would re-create.
We talk in earth's old language to our lost,
With our own sighs revivify its ghost:
The form Love meets advancing through the gloom,
Is but the reflex of her own desire,
Flashed on the glass, as in a darkening room
We meet ourselves.—Love once within the tomb,
Shall not that reflex of herself expire?
Can any form our thought may fashion here
Have life beyond this bounding atmosphere?
From your untimely ashes what survives?
Who shall fulfil your unlived half of life?
Who win the crown of your unfoughten strife?
Is your lost future like the dusky shade
The new moon carries in her golden boat?
Ah, no; for in full royalty arrayed
The perfect orb through ether yet shall float;
But neither light nor colour comes to thee,
Faint outline of a life that shall not be!
On that blank page, the student, Fancy, reads
The unwrit story of what should have been,
Sees, mournful paradox, the never seen,
And knows what was not. Yet the grief which needs,
For life's support, a faith and not a dream,
Holds that the spirit in its sigh supreme
With sudden flame shall interpenetrate
Some form unearthly in some unknown state,
A beauteous mystery of meeting bliss
Reserving for the souls that weep and wait.
21
The earthly heart, the face, the self we miss,
'Tis that which was we fain would re-create.
We talk in earth's old language to our lost,
With our own sighs revivify its ghost:
The form Love meets advancing through the gloom,
Is but the reflex of her own desire,
Flashed on the glass, as in a darkening room
We meet ourselves.—Love once within the tomb,
Shall not that reflex of herself expire?
Can any form our thought may fashion here
Have life beyond this bounding atmosphere?
Yet, long-lost sister! can a soul like thine
Drop from the march of Nature's foremost line
So early, so unmissed? Can all her pride
In that rich promise be so cast aside?
Oh, long-lost brother! Shall the myriad years
Make plain to Man this mystery of tears?
Shall light come ever to this blind sad Earth
That knows not what is death nor what is birth?
It will, but not to me. Earth yet shall know,
By a new light, the secret of her past,
Shall ask no more, “Why do I suffer so?”
But smile in one great harmony at last.
And we, with faith in what we shall not see,
May call the dead whose tomb is in our heart,
To rise and take their own unconscious part
Of service in the glory that shall be.
For, could we link their memories to the chain
Of souls whose lights in long procession move
From Past to Future, so might yearning love
Behold their buried beauty live again,
To glide with solemn purifying glow
Along the endless way the ages go;
Might joy o'er something added—casting in
Such jewels—to the world's great treasure heap;
And here and there some living souls might win
To reverent fellowship with souls that sleep.
Drop from the march of Nature's foremost line
So early, so unmissed? Can all her pride
In that rich promise be so cast aside?
Oh, long-lost brother! Shall the myriad years
Make plain to Man this mystery of tears?
Shall light come ever to this blind sad Earth
That knows not what is death nor what is birth?
It will, but not to me. Earth yet shall know,
By a new light, the secret of her past,
Shall ask no more, “Why do I suffer so?”
But smile in one great harmony at last.
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May call the dead whose tomb is in our heart,
To rise and take their own unconscious part
Of service in the glory that shall be.
For, could we link their memories to the chain
Of souls whose lights in long procession move
From Past to Future, so might yearning love
Behold their buried beauty live again,
To glide with solemn purifying glow
Along the endless way the ages go;
Might joy o'er something added—casting in
Such jewels—to the world's great treasure heap;
And here and there some living souls might win
To reverent fellowship with souls that sleep.
Oh, perfect Race to be! Oh, perfect Time!
Maturity of Earth's unhappy youth!
Race whose undazzled eyes shall see the truth,
Made wise by all the errors of your prime!
Oh, Bliss and Beauty of the ideal Day!
Forget not, when your march has reached its goal,
The rich and reckless waste of heart and soul
You left so far behind you on your way!
Forget not, Earth, when thou shalt stretch thy hands
In blessing o'er thy happy sons and daughters,
And lift in triumph thy maternal head,
Circling the sun with music from all lands,
In anthems like the noise of many waters—
Forget not, Earth, thy disappointed Dead!
Forget not, Earth, thy disinherited!
Forget not the forgotten! Keep a strain
Of divine sorrow in sweet undertone
For all the dead who lived and died in vain!
Imperial Future, when in countless train
The generations lead thee to thy throne,
Forget not the Forgotten and Unknown!
Maturity of Earth's unhappy youth!
Race whose undazzled eyes shall see the truth,
Made wise by all the errors of your prime!
Oh, Bliss and Beauty of the ideal Day!
Forget not, when your march has reached its goal,
The rich and reckless waste of heart and soul
You left so far behind you on your way!
Forget not, Earth, when thou shalt stretch thy hands
In blessing o'er thy happy sons and daughters,
23
Circling the sun with music from all lands,
In anthems like the noise of many waters—
Forget not, Earth, thy disappointed Dead!
Forget not, Earth, thy disinherited!
Forget not the forgotten! Keep a strain
Of divine sorrow in sweet undertone
For all the dead who lived and died in vain!
Imperial Future, when in countless train
The generations lead thee to thy throne,
Forget not the Forgotten and Unknown!
L.
| Elegies and memorials | |