Collected Poems: With Autobiographical and Critical Fragments By Frederic W. H. Myers: Edited by his Wife Eveleen Myers |
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 | Collected Poems: With Autobiographical and Critical Fragments |  |
147
I. PART I
THE TRANSLATION OF FAITH
I
High in the midst the pictured Pentecost
Showed in a sign the coming of the Ghost,
And round about were councils blazoned
Called by the Fathers in a day long dead,
Who once therein, as well the limner paints,
Upbuilt the faith delivered to the saints.
Showed in a sign the coming of the Ghost,
And round about were councils blazoned
Called by the Fathers in a day long dead,
Who once therein, as well the limner paints,
Upbuilt the faith delivered to the saints.
Without the council-hall, in dawning day,
The mass of men had left a narrow way
Where ever-burning lamps enlock the tomb
In golden glamour and in golden gloom.
There on the earth is peace, and in the air
An aspiration of eternal prayer;
So many a man in immemorial years
Has scarcely seen that image for his tears,
So oft have women found themselves alone
With Christ and Mary on the well-worn stone.
The mass of men had left a narrow way
Where ever-burning lamps enlock the tomb
In golden glamour and in golden gloom.
There on the earth is peace, and in the air
An aspiration of eternal prayer;
So many a man in immemorial years
Has scarcely seen that image for his tears,
So oft have women found themselves alone
With Christ and Mary on the well-worn stone.
148
Thereby the conclave of the bishops went,
With grave brows cherishing a dim intent,
As men who travelled on their eve of death
From every shore that man inhabiteth,
Not knowing wherefore, for the former things
Fade from old eyes of bishops and of kings.
With grave brows cherishing a dim intent,
As men who travelled on their eve of death
From every shore that man inhabiteth,
Not knowing wherefore, for the former things
Fade from old eyes of bishops and of kings.
With crimson raiment one from Bozrah came,
On brow and breast the rubies flashed in flame;
And this from Tyre, from Tunis that, and he
From Austral islands and the Austral sea;—
And many a swarthy face and stern was there,
And many a man who knows deep things and rare,
Knows the Chaldaic and the Coptic rite,
The Melchian-Greek and Ebio-Maronite,
Strange words of men who speak from long ago,
Lived not our lives, but what we know not know.
On brow and breast the rubies flashed in flame;
And this from Tyre, from Tunis that, and he
From Austral islands and the Austral sea;—
And many a swarthy face and stern was there,
And many a man who knows deep things and rare,
Knows the Chaldaic and the Coptic rite,
The Melchian-Greek and Ebio-Maronite,
Strange words of men who speak from long ago,
Lived not our lives, but what we know not know.
And some there were who never shall disdain
The Orders of their poverty and pain;
Amidst all pomp preferring for their need
The simple cowl and customary weed,—
Some white and Carmelite, and some alway
In gentle habit of Franciscan grey.
The Orders of their poverty and pain;
Amidst all pomp preferring for their need
The simple cowl and customary weed,—
Some white and Carmelite, and some alway
In gentle habit of Franciscan grey.
149
And lo, the sovereign Pontiff, Holy Sire,
Fulfilled anew the Catholic desire;—
Beneath the scroll of Peter's charge unfurled
He sat him at the centre of the world,
Attending till the deeds of God began,
And the One Sacrifice was slain for man.
Fulfilled anew the Catholic desire;—
Beneath the scroll of Peter's charge unfurled
He sat him at the centre of the world,
Attending till the deeds of God began,
And the One Sacrifice was slain for man.
But yet to me was granted to behold
A greater glory than the Pontiff's gold;—
To my purged eyes before the altar lay
A figure dreamlike in the noon of day;
Nor changed the still face, nor the look thereon,
At ending of the endless antiphon,
Nor for the summoned saints and holy hymn
Grew to my sight less delicate and dim:—
How faint, how fair that immaterial wraith!
But, looking long, I saw that she was Faith.
A greater glory than the Pontiff's gold;—
To my purged eyes before the altar lay
A figure dreamlike in the noon of day;
Nor changed the still face, nor the look thereon,
At ending of the endless antiphon,
Nor for the summoned saints and holy hymn
Grew to my sight less delicate and dim:—
How faint, how fair that immaterial wraith!
But, looking long, I saw that she was Faith.
II
Last in the midst of all a patriarch came,
Whose nation none durst ask him, nor his name,
Yet 'mid the Eastern sires he seemed as one
Fire-nurtured at the springing of the sun,
And in robe's tint was likest-hued to them
Who wear the Babylonian diadem.
His brows black yet and white unfallen hair
Set in strange frame the face of his despair,
And I despised not, nor can God despise,
The silent splendid anger of his eyes.
A hundred years of search for flying Truth
Had left them glowing with no gleam of youth,
A hundred years of vast and vain desire
Had lit and filled them with consuming fire;
Therethrough I saw his fierce eternal soul
Gaze from beneath that argent aureole;
I saw him bow his hoar majestic head,
I heard him, and he murmured, “Faith is dead.”
Whose nation none durst ask him, nor his name,
Yet 'mid the Eastern sires he seemed as one
Fire-nurtured at the springing of the sun,
And in robe's tint was likest-hued to them
Who wear the Babylonian diadem.
His brows black yet and white unfallen hair
Set in strange frame the face of his despair,
And I despised not, nor can God despise,
150
A hundred years of search for flying Truth
Had left them glowing with no gleam of youth,
A hundred years of vast and vain desire
Had lit and filled them with consuming fire;
Therethrough I saw his fierce eternal soul
Gaze from beneath that argent aureole;
I saw him bow his hoar majestic head,
I heard him, and he murmured, “Faith is dead.”
Through arch and avenue the rumour ran,
Shed from the mighty presence of the man;
Through arch and avenue and vault and aisle
He cast the terror of his glance awhile,
Then rose at once and spake with hurrying breath,
As one who races with a racing Death.
Shed from the mighty presence of the man;
Through arch and avenue and vault and aisle
He cast the terror of his glance awhile,
Then rose at once and spake with hurrying breath,
As one who races with a racing Death.
“How long ago our fathers followed far
That false flame of the visionary star!
Oh better, better had it been for them
To have perished on the edge of Bethlehem,
Or ere they saw the comet stoop and stay,
And knew the shepherds, and became as they!
Better for us to have been, as men may be,
Sages and silent by the Eastern sea,
Than thus in new delusion to have brought
Myrrh of our prayer, frankincense of our thought,
For One whom knowing not we held so dear,
For One who sware it, but who is not here.
Better for you, this shrine when ye began,
An earthquake should have hidden it from man,
Than thus through centuries of pomp and pain
To have founded and have finished it in vain,—
To have vainly arched the labyrinthine shade,
And vainly vaulted it, and vainly made
For saints and kings an everlasting home
High in the dizzying glories of the dome.
Since not one minute over hall or Host
Flutters the peerless presence of the Ghost,
Nor falls at all, for art or man's device,
On mumbled charm and mumming sacrifice,—
But either cares not, or forspent with care
Has flown into the infinite of air.
That false flame of the visionary star!
Oh better, better had it been for them
To have perished on the edge of Bethlehem,
Or ere they saw the comet stoop and stay,
And knew the shepherds, and became as they!
Better for us to have been, as men may be,
Sages and silent by the Eastern sea,
Than thus in new delusion to have brought
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For One whom knowing not we held so dear,
For One who sware it, but who is not here.
Better for you, this shrine when ye began,
An earthquake should have hidden it from man,
Than thus through centuries of pomp and pain
To have founded and have finished it in vain,—
To have vainly arched the labyrinthine shade,
And vainly vaulted it, and vainly made
For saints and kings an everlasting home
High in the dizzying glories of the dome.
Since not one minute over hall or Host
Flutters the peerless presence of the Ghost,
Nor falls at all, for art or man's device,
On mumbled charm and mumming sacrifice,—
But either cares not, or forspent with care
Has flown into the infinite of air.
Apollo left you when the Christ was born,
Jehovah when the temple's veil was torn,
And now, even now, this last time and again,
The presence of a God has gone from men.
Live in your dreams, if ye must live, but I
Will find the light, and in the light will die.”
Jehovah when the temple's veil was torn,
And now, even now, this last time and again,
The presence of a God has gone from men.
Live in your dreams, if ye must live, but I
Will find the light, and in the light will die.”
152
III
At that strange speech the sons of men amazed
Each on the other tremulously gazed,
When lo, herself,—herself the age to close,—
From where she lay the very Faith arose;
She stood as never she shall stand again,
And for an instant manifest to men:—
In figure like the Mother-maid who sees
The deepest heart of hidden mysteries,
On that strange night when from her eyes she shed
A holy glory on the painter's bed,
And Agnes and the angels hushed awhile,
Won by her sadness sweeter than a smile.
Such form she wore, nor yet henceforth will care
That form, or form at all, on earth to wear;
For those sweet eyes, which once, with flag unfurled,
So many a prince would follow through the world,—
That face, the light of dreams, the crown of day,
Lo, while we looked on her, was rapt away;
O mystic end and o evanished queen!
When shall we see thee as our sires have seen?
Each on the other tremulously gazed,
When lo, herself,—herself the age to close,—
From where she lay the very Faith arose;
She stood as never she shall stand again,
And for an instant manifest to men:—
In figure like the Mother-maid who sees
The deepest heart of hidden mysteries,
On that strange night when from her eyes she shed
A holy glory on the painter's bed,
And Agnes and the angels hushed awhile,
Won by her sadness sweeter than a smile.
Such form she wore, nor yet henceforth will care
That form, or form at all, on earth to wear;
For those sweet eyes, which once, with flag unfurled,
So many a prince would follow through the world,—
That face, the light of dreams, the crown of day,
Lo, while we looked on her, was rapt away;
O mystic end and o evanished queen!
When shall we see thee as our sires have seen?
And yet, translated from the Pontiff's side,
She did not die, o say not that she died!
She died not, died not, o the faint and fair!
She could not die, but melted into air.
She did not die, o say not that she died!
153
She could not die, but melted into air.
In that high dome I neither know nor say
What Power and Presence was alive that day,
No, nor what Faith, in what transfigured form,
Rode on the ghostly spaces of the storm:
For sight of eyes nor ear with hearing knew
That windless wind that where it listed blew;
Yet seeing eyes and ears that hear shall be
As dust and nothingness henceforth for me,
Who once have felt the blowing Spirit roll
Life on my life, and on my soul a Soul.
What Power and Presence was alive that day,
No, nor what Faith, in what transfigured form,
Rode on the ghostly spaces of the storm:
For sight of eyes nor ear with hearing knew
That windless wind that where it listed blew;
Yet seeing eyes and ears that hear shall be
As dust and nothingness henceforth for me,
Who once have felt the blowing Spirit roll
Life on my life, and on my soul a Soul.
And first the conclave and the choir, and then
The immeasurable multitude of men,
Bowed and fell down, bowed and fell down, as though
A rushing mighty wind had laid them low;
Yea to all hearts a revelation came,
As flying thunder and as flying flame;
A moment then the vault above him seemed
To each man as the heaven that he had dreamed;
A moment then the floor whereon he trod
Became the pavement of the courts of God;
And in the aisles was silence, in the dome
Silence, and no man knew that it was Rome.
The immeasurable multitude of men,
Bowed and fell down, bowed and fell down, as though
A rushing mighty wind had laid them low;
Yea to all hearts a revelation came,
As flying thunder and as flying flame;
A moment then the vault above him seemed
To each man as the heaven that he had dreamed;
A moment then the floor whereon he trod
Became the pavement of the courts of God;
And in the aisles was silence, in the dome
Silence, and no man knew that it was Rome.
Rome, Jan. 7, 1870.
Public Session of the Œcumenical Council, in St. Peter's, Rome, January 6, Feast of the Epiphany, 1870.
154
SAINT JOHN THE BAPTIST
O Jesus, if one minute, if one hour
Thou wouldst come hitherward and speak with John!
Nay, but be present only, nay, but come:
And I shall look, and as I look on thee
Find in thine eyes the answer and the end.
Thou wouldst come hitherward and speak with John!
Nay, but be present only, nay, but come:
And I shall look, and as I look on thee
Find in thine eyes the answer and the end.
And I am he who once in Nazareth,
A child, nor knowing yet the prophet's woe,
In childly fashion sought thee, and even then
Perceived a mute withdrawal, open eyes
That drooped not for caressing, brows that knew
Dominion, and the babe already king.
A child, nor knowing yet the prophet's woe,
In childly fashion sought thee, and even then
Perceived a mute withdrawal, open eyes
That drooped not for caressing, brows that knew
Dominion, and the babe already king.
Ah Mary, but thou also, thou as I,
With eager tremulous humilities,
With dumb appeal and tears that dared not flow,
Hast laid thy loving arms about the boy,
And clasped him wistfully and felt him far.
With eager tremulous humilities,
With dumb appeal and tears that dared not flow,
Hast laid thy loving arms about the boy,
And clasped him wistfully and felt him far.
And ever as I grew his loveliness
Grew with me, and the yearning turned to pain.
Then said I,—“Nay, my friends, no need is now
For John to tarry with you; I have seen,
I have known him; I go hence, and all alone
I carry Jesus with me till I die.”
Grew with me, and the yearning turned to pain.
155
For John to tarry with you; I have seen,
I have known him; I go hence, and all alone
I carry Jesus with me till I die.”
And that same day, being past the Passover,
I gat me to the desert, and stayed to see
Joseph and Mary holding each a hand
Of one that followed meekly; and I was gone,
And with strange beasts in the great wilderness
I laid me, fearing nothing, and hardly knew
On what rough meat in what unwonted ways
I throve, or how endured the frost and fire;
But moaned and carried in my heart for him
A first and holy passion, boy for boy,
And loved the hills that look on Nazareth
And every fount that pours upon the plain.
I gat me to the desert, and stayed to see
Joseph and Mary holding each a hand
Of one that followed meekly; and I was gone,
And with strange beasts in the great wilderness
I laid me, fearing nothing, and hardly knew
On what rough meat in what unwonted ways
I throve, or how endured the frost and fire;
But moaned and carried in my heart for him
A first and holy passion, boy for boy,
And loved the hills that look on Nazareth
And every fount that pours upon the plain.
Then once with trembling knees and heart afire
I ran, I sought him: but my Lord at home
Bright in the full face of the dawning day
Stood at his carpentry, and azure air
Inarched him, scattered with the glittering green:
I saw him standing, I saw his face, I saw
His even eyebrows over eyes grey-blue,
From whence with smiling there looked out on me
A welcome and a wonder,—“Mine so soon?”—
Ah me, how sweet and unendurable
Was that confronting beauty of the boy!
Jesus, thou knowest I had no answer then,
But leapt without a word, and flung away,
And dared not think thereof, and looked no more.
I ran, I sought him: but my Lord at home
Bright in the full face of the dawning day
Stood at his carpentry, and azure air
Inarched him, scattered with the glittering green:
I saw him standing, I saw his face, I saw
His even eyebrows over eyes grey-blue,
156
A welcome and a wonder,—“Mine so soon?”—
Ah me, how sweet and unendurable
Was that confronting beauty of the boy!
Jesus, thou knowest I had no answer then,
But leapt without a word, and flung away,
And dared not think thereof, and looked no more.
And after that with wonder rose in me
Strange speech of early prophets, and a tale
First learnt and last forgotten, song that fell
With worship from the lonely Israelites,
Simeon and Anna; for these twain as one
Fast by the altar and in the courts of God
Led a long age in fair expectancy.
For all about them swept the heedless folk,
Unholy folk and market merchandise,
They each from each took courage, and with prayer
Made ready for the coming of a King.
So, when the waves of Noe on forest and hill
Ran ruinous, and all herbs had lost the life
Of greenness and the memory of air,
The cedar-trees alone on Lebanon
Spread steadfastly invulnerable arms.
Strange speech of early prophets, and a tale
First learnt and last forgotten, song that fell
With worship from the lonely Israelites,
Simeon and Anna; for these twain as one
Fast by the altar and in the courts of God
Led a long age in fair expectancy.
For all about them swept the heedless folk,
Unholy folk and market merchandise,
They each from each took courage, and with prayer
Made ready for the coming of a King.
So, when the waves of Noe on forest and hill
Ran ruinous, and all herbs had lost the life
Of greenness and the memory of air,
The cedar-trees alone on Lebanon
Spread steadfastly invulnerable arms.
That was no sleep when clear the vision came,
Bright in the night and truer than the day:—
For there with brows newborn and locks that flew
Was Adam, and his eyes remembered God;
And Eve, already fallen, already in woe,
Knowing a sweeter promise for the pain;
And after these, unknown, unknowable,
The grave gigantic visage of dead men,
With looks that are not ours, with speech to say
That no man dares interpret; then I saw
A maiden such as countrymen afield
Greet reverently, and love her as they see;
And after that a boy with face so fair,
With such a glory and a wonder in it,
I grieved to find him born upon the earth
To man's life and the heritage of sin;
And last of all that Mary whom I knew
Stood with such parted lips and face aglow
As long-since when the angel came to her;
And all these pointed forward, and I knew
That each was prophet and singer and sire and seer,
That each was priest and mother and maid and king,
With longing for the babe of Nazareth,
For that man-child who should be born and reign.
157
For there with brows newborn and locks that flew
Was Adam, and his eyes remembered God;
And Eve, already fallen, already in woe,
Knowing a sweeter promise for the pain;
And after these, unknown, unknowable,
The grave gigantic visage of dead men,
With looks that are not ours, with speech to say
That no man dares interpret; then I saw
A maiden such as countrymen afield
Greet reverently, and love her as they see;
And after that a boy with face so fair,
With such a glory and a wonder in it,
I grieved to find him born upon the earth
To man's life and the heritage of sin;
And last of all that Mary whom I knew
Stood with such parted lips and face aglow
As long-since when the angel came to her;
And all these pointed forward, and I knew
That each was prophet and singer and sire and seer,
That each was priest and mother and maid and king,
With longing for the babe of Nazareth,
For that man-child who should be born and reign.
And once again I saw him, in latter days
Fraught with a deeper meaning, for he came
To my baptizing, and the infinite air
Blushed on his coming, and all the earth was still;
Gently he spake; I answered; God from heaven
Called, and I hardly heard him, such a love
Streamed in that orison from man to man.
Then shining from his shoulders either-way
Fell the flood Jordan, and his kingly eyes
Looked in the east, and star-like met the sun.
Once in no manner of similitude,
And twice in thunderings and thrice in flame,
The Highest ere now hath shown him secretly;
But when from heaven the visible Spirit in air
Came verily, lighted on him, was alone,
Then knew I, then I said it, then I saw
God in the voice and glory of a man.
Fraught with a deeper meaning, for he came
158
Blushed on his coming, and all the earth was still;
Gently he spake; I answered; God from heaven
Called, and I hardly heard him, such a love
Streamed in that orison from man to man.
Then shining from his shoulders either-way
Fell the flood Jordan, and his kingly eyes
Looked in the east, and star-like met the sun.
Once in no manner of similitude,
And twice in thunderings and thrice in flame,
The Highest ere now hath shown him secretly;
But when from heaven the visible Spirit in air
Came verily, lighted on him, was alone,
Then knew I, then I said it, then I saw
God in the voice and glory of a man.
And one will say, “And wilt thou not forget
The unkindly king that hath forgotten thee?”
Nay, I remember; like my sires who sat
Faithful and stubborn by Euphrates' stream,
Nor in their age forgot Jerusalem,
Nor reared their children for another joy.
The unkindly king that hath forgotten thee?”
Nay, I remember; like my sires who sat
Faithful and stubborn by Euphrates' stream,
Nor in their age forgot Jerusalem,
Nor reared their children for another joy.
O Jesus, if thou knewest, if thou couldst know,
How in my heart through sleep and pain and prayer
Thy royalty remaineth; how thy name
Falls from my lips unbidden, and the dark
Is thick with lying shades that are not thou,—
Couldst thou imagine it, O tender soul!
At least in vision thou wouldst come to me;
I should not only hear of dumb that sing
And lame that leap around thee, and all thy ways
Joyful, and on thy breast another John.
159
Thy royalty remaineth; how thy name
Falls from my lips unbidden, and the dark
Is thick with lying shades that are not thou,—
Couldst thou imagine it, O tender soul!
At least in vision thou wouldst come to me;
I should not only hear of dumb that sing
And lame that leap around thee, and all thy ways
Joyful, and on thy breast another John.
How should I not remember? Is dusk of day
Forgetful, or the winter of the sun?
Have these another glory? or whom have I
In all the world but Jesus for my love?
Whereinsoever breath may rise and die
Their generations follow on, and earth
Each in their kind replenisheth anew,
Only like him she bears not nor hath borne
One in her endless multitude of men.
Forgetful, or the winter of the sun?
Have these another glory? or whom have I
In all the world but Jesus for my love?
Whereinsoever breath may rise and die
Their generations follow on, and earth
Each in their kind replenisheth anew,
Only like him she bears not nor hath borne
One in her endless multitude of men.
And these were ever about me; morn by morn
Mine eyes again desired him, and I saw
The thronging Hebrews thicken, and my heart
Sank, and the prophet served another day.
Mine eyes again desired him, and I saw
The thronging Hebrews thicken, and my heart
Sank, and the prophet served another day.
Yet sometimes when by chance the rulers came,
Encharnelled in their fatness, men that smile,
Sit in high seats, and swell with their desire,
My strong limbs shook, and my heart leapt and fell
With passion of sheer scorn, with speech that slew,
With glances that among them running dealt
Damnation, as on Egypt ran the flame.
For such men never when I look on them
Can keep their pride or smiling, but their brow
Droops from its base dominion, and their voice
Rings hollower with a stirring fear within,
Till flushes chill to paleness, and at length
From self-convicted eyes evanisheth
The false and fickle lumour of their joy.
160
Sit in high seats, and swell with their desire,
My strong limbs shook, and my heart leapt and fell
With passion of sheer scorn, with speech that slew,
With glances that among them running dealt
Damnation, as on Egypt ran the flame.
For such men never when I look on them
Can keep their pride or smiling, but their brow
Droops from its base dominion, and their voice
Rings hollower with a stirring fear within,
Till flushes chill to paleness, and at length
From self-convicted eyes evanisheth
The false and fickle lumour of their joy.
For quick and fitfully with feast and song
Men make a tumult round them, and console
With sudden sport a momentary woe;
But if thou take one hence, and set him down
In some strange jeopardy on enormous hills,
Or swimming at night alone upon the sea,
His lesser life falls from him, and the dream
Is broken which had held him unaware,
And with a shudder he feels his naked soul
In the great black world face to face with God.
Men make a tumult round them, and console
With sudden sport a momentary woe;
But if thou take one hence, and set him down
In some strange jeopardy on enormous hills,
Or swimming at night alone upon the sea,
His lesser life falls from him, and the dream
Is broken which had held him unaware,
And with a shudder he feels his naked soul
In the great black world face to face with God.
161
This also for that miserable man
Is a worse trouble than his heart can know,
That in the strait and sodden ways of sin
He has made him alien to the plenteous day,
Cut off from friendliness with woods that wave
And happy pasture and carousing sea,
And whatsoever loving things enjoy
Simply the kind simplicity of God.
For these are teachers; not in vain His seers
Have dwelt in solitudes and known that God
High up in open silence and thin air
More presently reveals him, having set
His chiefest temples on the mountain-tops,
His kindling altar in the hearts of men.
And these I knew with peace and lost with pain,
And oft for whistling wind and desert air
Lamented, and in dreams was my desire
For the flood Jordan, for the running sound
And broken glitters of the midnight moon.
But now all this fades from me, and the life
Of prophecy, and summers that I knew.
Yea, and though once I looked on many men
And spake them sweet and bitter speech, and heard
Such secrets as a tempest of the soul
Once in a lifetime washes black and bare
From desperate recesses of shut sin,
Yet all is quite forgotten, and to-day
From the strange past no sign remains with me
But simple and tremendous memories
Of morning and of even and of God.
Is a worse trouble than his heart can know,
That in the strait and sodden ways of sin
He has made him alien to the plenteous day,
Cut off from friendliness with woods that wave
And happy pasture and carousing sea,
And whatsoever loving things enjoy
Simply the kind simplicity of God.
For these are teachers; not in vain His seers
Have dwelt in solitudes and known that God
High up in open silence and thin air
More presently reveals him, having set
His chiefest temples on the mountain-tops,
His kindling altar in the hearts of men.
And these I knew with peace and lost with pain,
And oft for whistling wind and desert air
Lamented, and in dreams was my desire
For the flood Jordan, for the running sound
And broken glitters of the midnight moon.
But now all this fades from me, and the life
Of prophecy, and summers that I knew.
Yea, and though once I looked on many men
And spake them sweet and bitter speech, and heard
Such secrets as a tempest of the soul
Once in a lifetime washes black and bare
From desperate recesses of shut sin,
Yet all is quite forgotten, and to-day
From the strange past no sign remains with me
162
Of morning and of even and of God.
Ah me, ah me, for if a man desire
Gold or great wealth or marriage with a maid,
How easily he wins her, having served
Seven years perchance, and counting that for gain;
But whoso wants God only and lets life go,
Seeks him with sorrow, and pursues him far,
And finds him weeping, and in no long time
Again the High and Unapproachable
Evanishing escapeth, and that man
Forgets the life and struggle of the soul,
Falls from his hope, and dreams it was a dream.
Gold or great wealth or marriage with a maid,
How easily he wins her, having served
Seven years perchance, and counting that for gain;
But whoso wants God only and lets life go,
Seeks him with sorrow, and pursues him far,
And finds him weeping, and in no long time
Again the High and Unapproachable
Evanishing escapeth, and that man
Forgets the life and struggle of the soul,
Falls from his hope, and dreams it was a dream.
Yet back again perforce with sorrow and shame
Who once hath known him must return, nor long
Can cease from loving, nor endures alone
The dreadful interspace of dreams and day,
Once quick with God; nor is content as those
Who look into each other's eyes and seek
To find one strong enough to uphold the earth,
Or sweet enough to make it heaven: aha,
Whom seek they or whom find? for in all the world
There is none but thee, my God, there is none but thee.
Who once hath known him must return, nor long
Can cease from loving, nor endures alone
The dreadful interspace of dreams and day,
Once quick with God; nor is content as those
Who look into each other's eyes and seek
To find one strong enough to uphold the earth,
Or sweet enough to make it heaven: aha,
Whom seek they or whom find? for in all the world
There is none but thee, my God, there is none but thee.
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And this it is that links together as one
The sad continual companies of men;
Not that the old earth stands, and Ararat
Endureth, and Euphrates till to-day
Remembers where God walked beside the stream;
Nay rather that souls weary and hearts afire
Have everywhere besought him, everywhere
Have found and found him not; and age to age,
Though all else pass and fail, delivereth
At least the great tradition of their God.
The sad continual companies of men;
Not that the old earth stands, and Ararat
Endureth, and Euphrates till to-day
Remembers where God walked beside the stream;
Nay rather that souls weary and hearts afire
Have everywhere besought him, everywhere
Have found and found him not; and age to age,
Though all else pass and fail, delivereth
At least the great tradition of their God.
For even thus on Ur and Mahanaim
By Asian rivers gathering to the sea,
When the huge stars shone gold, and dim and still
Dewed in the dusk the innocent yearlings lay,
With constant eyes the serious shepherd-men
Renewed the old desiring, sought again
The mute eternal Presence; and for these
Albeit sometimes the sundering firmament
One moment to no bodily sense revealed
Unspeakably an imminence of love;—
Yet by no song have our forefathers known
To set the invisible in sight of men,
Nor in all years have any wisdom found
But patient hope and dumb humility.
By Asian rivers gathering to the sea,
When the huge stars shone gold, and dim and still
Dewed in the dusk the innocent yearlings lay,
With constant eyes the serious shepherd-men
Renewed the old desiring, sought again
The mute eternal Presence; and for these
Albeit sometimes the sundering firmament
One moment to no bodily sense revealed
Unspeakably an imminence of love;—
Yet by no song have our forefathers known
To set the invisible in sight of men,
Nor in all years have any wisdom found
But patient hope and dumb humility.
Yea, Lord, I know it, teach me yet anew
With what a fierce and patient purity
I must confront the horror of the world.
For very little space on either hand
Parts the sane mind from madness; very soon
By the intenser pressure of one thought
Or clearer vision of one agony
The soothfast reason trembles, all things fade
In blackness, and the demon enters in.—
I would I never may be left of thee,
O God, my God, in whatsoever ill;
Be present while thou strikest, thus shall grow
At least a solemn patience with the pain;—
When thou art gone, what is there in the world
Seems not dishonoured, desperate with sin?
The stars are threatful eyeballs, and the air
Hangs thick and heavy with the wrath of God,
And even pure pity in my heart congeals
To idle anger with thy ways and thee,
Nor any care for life remains to me,
Nor trust in love, nor fellowship with men,
But past my will the exasperated brain
Thinks bitter thoughts, and I no more am John.
With what a fierce and patient purity
I must confront the horror of the world.
164
Parts the sane mind from madness; very soon
By the intenser pressure of one thought
Or clearer vision of one agony
The soothfast reason trembles, all things fade
In blackness, and the demon enters in.—
I would I never may be left of thee,
O God, my God, in whatsoever ill;
Be present while thou strikest, thus shall grow
At least a solemn patience with the pain;—
When thou art gone, what is there in the world
Seems not dishonoured, desperate with sin?
The stars are threatful eyeballs, and the air
Hangs thick and heavy with the wrath of God,
And even pure pity in my heart congeals
To idle anger with thy ways and thee,
Nor any care for life remains to me,
Nor trust in love, nor fellowship with men,
But past my will the exasperated brain
Thinks bitter thoughts, and I no more am John.
It is not when man's heart is nighest heaven
He hath most need of servant-seraphim,—
Albeit that height be holy and God be still,
And lifted up he dies with his desire,
That only once the Highest for dear love's sake
Would set himself in whispers of a man:—
Nay, but much rather when one flat on earth
Knows not which way to grovel, or where to flee
From the overmastering agony of sin,
Then his deed tears him till he find one pure
To know it and forgive: “For God,” saith he,
“Still on the unjust sends unchangeable
These scornful boons of summer and of rain,
And howsoever I fall, with dawn and day
Floods me, and splendidly ignores my sin.”
He hath most need of servant-seraphim,—
Albeit that height be holy and God be still,
And lifted up he dies with his desire,
165
Would set himself in whispers of a man:—
Nay, but much rather when one flat on earth
Knows not which way to grovel, or where to flee
From the overmastering agony of sin,
Then his deed tears him till he find one pure
To know it and forgive: “For God,” saith he,
“Still on the unjust sends unchangeable
These scornful boons of summer and of rain,
And howsoever I fall, with dawn and day
Floods me, and splendidly ignores my sin.”
And how should pity and anger cease, or shame
Have done with blushes, till the prophet know
That God not yet hath quite despaired of men?
Oh that the heavens were rent and one came down
Who saw men's hurt with kindlier eyes than mine,
Fiercelier than I resented every wrong,
Sweated more painful drops than these that flow
In nightly passion for my people's sin,—
Died with it, lived beyond it,—nay, what now?
If this indeed were Jesus, this the Lamb
Whom age by age the temple-sacrifice
Not vainly had prefigured, and if so
In one complete and sacred agony
He lifted all the weight of all the world,—
And if men knew it, and if men clung to him
With desperate love and present memory,—
I know not how,—till all things fail in fire;
That were enough, and, o my God, for them,
For them there might be peace, but not for me.
Have done with blushes, till the prophet know
That God not yet hath quite despaired of men?
Oh that the heavens were rent and one came down
Who saw men's hurt with kindlier eyes than mine,
Fiercelier than I resented every wrong,
Sweated more painful drops than these that flow
In nightly passion for my people's sin,—
Died with it, lived beyond it,—nay, what now?
If this indeed were Jesus, this the Lamb
166
Not vainly had prefigured, and if so
In one complete and sacred agony
He lifted all the weight of all the world,—
And if men knew it, and if men clung to him
With desperate love and present memory,—
I know not how,—till all things fail in fire;
That were enough, and, o my God, for them,
For them there might be peace, but not for me.
And even Elias often on the hills
Towered in a flaming sunset, sick at heart;
Often with bare breast on the dewy earth
Lay all night long, and all night comfortless
Poured his abounding bitterness of soul:
I know that not without a wail he bore
The solitude of prophets till that day
When death divine and unbelievable
Blazed in the radiant chariot and blown fire,
Whereof the very memory melts mine eyes
And holds my heart with wonder: can it be
That thus obscurely to his ministers
Jehovah portioneth eternal love?
Towered in a flaming sunset, sick at heart;
Often with bare breast on the dewy earth
Lay all night long, and all night comfortless
Poured his abounding bitterness of soul:
I know that not without a wail he bore
The solitude of prophets till that day
When death divine and unbelievable
Blazed in the radiant chariot and blown fire,
Whereof the very memory melts mine eyes
And holds my heart with wonder: can it be
That thus obscurely to his ministers
Jehovah portioneth eternal love?
Here in the hazardous joy of woman and man
Consider with how sad and eager eyes
They lean together, and part, and gaze again,
Regretting that they cannot in so brief time,
With all that sweet abandonment, outpour
Their flowing infinity of tenderness.
God's fashion is another; day by day
And year by year he tarrieth; little need
The Lord should hasten; whom he loves the most
He seeks not oftenest, nor wooes him long,
But by denial quickens his desire,
And in forgetting best remembers him,
Till that man's heart grows humble and reaches out
To the least glimmer of the feet of God,
Grass on the mountain-tops, or the early note
Of wild birds in the hush before the day,—
Wherever sweetly in the ends of the earth
Are fragments of a peace that knows not man.
Consider with how sad and eager eyes
They lean together, and part, and gaze again,
Regretting that they cannot in so brief time,
With all that sweet abandonment, outpour
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God's fashion is another; day by day
And year by year he tarrieth; little need
The Lord should hasten; whom he loves the most
He seeks not oftenest, nor wooes him long,
But by denial quickens his desire,
And in forgetting best remembers him,
Till that man's heart grows humble and reaches out
To the least glimmer of the feet of God,
Grass on the mountain-tops, or the early note
Of wild birds in the hush before the day,—
Wherever sweetly in the ends of the earth
Are fragments of a peace that knows not man.
Then on our utter weakness and the hush
Of hearts exhausted that can ache no more,
On such abeyance of self and swoon of soul
The Spirit hath lighted oft, and let men see
That all our vileness alters God no more
Than our dimmed eyes can quench the stars in heaven:—
From years ere years were told, through all the sins,
Unknown sins of innumerable men,
God is himself for ever, and shows to-day
As erst in Eden, the eternal hope.
Of hearts exhausted that can ache no more,
On such abeyance of self and swoon of soul
The Spirit hath lighted oft, and let men see
That all our vileness alters God no more
Than our dimmed eyes can quench the stars in heaven:—
From years ere years were told, through all the sins,
Unknown sins of innumerable men,
God is himself for ever, and shows to-day
As erst in Eden, the eternal hope.
Wherefore if anywise from morn to morn
I can endure a weary faithfulness,
From minute unto minute calling low
On God who once would answer, it may be
He hath a waking for me, and some surprise
Shall from this prison set the captive free
And love from fears and from the flesh the soul.
I can endure a weary faithfulness,
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On God who once would answer, it may be
He hath a waking for me, and some surprise
Shall from this prison set the captive free
And love from fears and from the flesh the soul.
For even thus beside Gennesaret
In solemn night some demon-haunted man
Runs from himself, and nothing knows in heaven
But blackness, yet around him unaware
With standing hills and high expectancy,
With early airs and shuddering and calm,
The enormous morning quickens, and lake and tree
Perceive each other dimly in a dream:
And when at last with bodily frame forspent
He throws him on the beach to sleep or die,
That very moment rises full and fair
Thy sun, o Lord, the sun that brings the day.
In solemn night some demon-haunted man
Runs from himself, and nothing knows in heaven
But blackness, yet around him unaware
With standing hills and high expectancy,
With early airs and shuddering and calm,
The enormous morning quickens, and lake and tree
Perceive each other dimly in a dream:
And when at last with bodily frame forspent
He throws him on the beach to sleep or die,
That very moment rises full and fair
Thy sun, o Lord, the sun that brings the day.
I wait it; I have spoken; even now
This hour may set me in one place with God.
I hear a wantoning in Herod's hall,
And feet that seek me; very oft some chance
Leaps from the folly and the wine of kings;—
O Jesus, spirit and spirit, soul and soul,—
O Jesus, I shall seek thee, I shall find,
My love, my master, find thee, though I be
Least, as I know, of all men woman-born.
This hour may set me in one place with God.
I hear a wantoning in Herod's hall,
And feet that seek me; very oft some chance
Leaps from the folly and the wine of kings;—
O Jesus, spirit and spirit, soul and soul,—
O Jesus, I shall seek thee, I shall find,
My love, my master, find thee, though I be
Least, as I know, of all men woman-born.
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AMMERGAU
I
“Where is he gone? O men and maidens, whereIs gone the fairest amid all the fair?
Mine eyes desire him, and with dawning day
My heart goes forth to find him on the way.”
Ah, how that music lingers, and again
Returns the dying sweetness of the strain!
How clearly on my inner sense is borne
The fair fresh beauty of the mountain morn,
And cries of flocks afar, and mixed with these
The green delightful tumult of the trees,—
The birds that o'er us from the upper day
Threw flitting shade, and went their airy way,—
The bright-robed chorus and the silent throng,
And that first burst and sanctity of song!
In such a place with eager faces fair
Sat men of old in bright Athenian air,
170
Their welcome to the world-forsaken king,—
Awaited thus between the murmuring trees
The whisper of appeased Eumenides,
Till breath came thick and eyes no more could see
For sweet prevision of the end to be.
But ah, how hard a task to set again
The living Christ among the homes of men!
Have we not grown too faithless or too wise
For this old tale of many mysteries?
Will not this passion of the peasants seem
Like children's tears for terror of a dream?—
“Hosanna! whoso in the Highest Name,
Hosanna! cometh as Elias came,
Him Israel hails and honours, Israel showers
Before him all her hopes and all her flowers.”—
O Son of God! O blessed vision, stay!
O be my whole life centred in to-day!
Ah, let me dream that this indeed is He,
Mine eyes desired Him, and at last they see!
O be my whole life centred in to-day!
Ah, let me dream that this indeed is He,
Mine eyes desired Him, and at last they see!
Then as some loving wife, whose lord has come
Wounded but safe from a far battle home,
Yet must before the day's declining go
On a like quest against another foe,—
With throbbing breast his kingly voice she hears
Her eager gaze is dazzled with her tears,
Nor clearly can she place his tales apart
For the overwhelming passion of her heart,
For joy and love, for pity and for pain,
For thinking “He is come, he goes again!”—
In such confusion of the soul I saw
Their mighty pictures of the vanished Law,
Which, as they held, that Law to Gospel bound
With mystic meaning and design profound:—
Joseph by Dothan and the shepherd's well,
Tobias in the hand of Raphael,—
The crowding people who with joy descry
The food of angels fluttering from the sky;—
Ah, sweet that still upon this earth should be
So many simple souls in holy glee,
Such maids and men, unknowing shame or guile,
Whose whole bright nature beams into a smile!
Thro' all these scenes the fateful story ran,
Wounded but safe from a far battle home,
Yet must before the day's declining go
On a like quest against another foe,—
With throbbing breast his kingly voice she hears
171
Nor clearly can she place his tales apart
For the overwhelming passion of her heart,
For joy and love, for pity and for pain,
For thinking “He is come, he goes again!”—
In such confusion of the soul I saw
Their mighty pictures of the vanished Law,
Which, as they held, that Law to Gospel bound
With mystic meaning and design profound:—
Joseph by Dothan and the shepherd's well,
Tobias in the hand of Raphael,—
The crowding people who with joy descry
The food of angels fluttering from the sky;—
Ah, sweet that still upon this earth should be
So many simple souls in holy glee,
Such maids and men, unknowing shame or guile,
Whose whole bright nature beams into a smile!
And the grave presence of the Son of Man:
There was the evening feast, remembered long,
The mystic act and sacramental song;
There was the dreadful garden, rock and tree,
Waker and sleepers in Gethsemane;—
The selfsame forms that I so oft had seen
172
When heaven's cold light in cheerless afternoon
Changed while we knelt from sun to ghostly moon.
And one there was who on his deeds could draw
A gaze that half was horror, half was awe,
Who when the supper of the Lord was spread
Drank of the cup and ate the broken bread,
And then, with night without him and within,
Went forth and sinned the unutterable sin.
A gaze that half was horror, half was awe,
Who when the supper of the Lord was spread
Drank of the cup and ate the broken bread,
And then, with night without him and within,
Went forth and sinned the unutterable sin.
Better if never on his ways had shone
The Light which is men's life to look upon;
If he had worn a torpid age away
In the poor gains and pleasures of the day,
From toil to toil had been content to go,
Nor ever aim so high or fall so low!
The Light which is men's life to look upon;
If he had worn a torpid age away
In the poor gains and pleasures of the day,
From toil to toil had been content to go,
Nor ever aim so high or fall so low!
But, when he saw the Christ, he thought to fly
His own base self and selfish misery;
He trusted that before those heavenly eyes
All shameful thoughts were as a dream that dies,
And new life opened on him, great and free,
And lov on earth and paradise to be.
His own base self and selfish misery;
He trusted that before those heavenly eyes
All shameful thoughts were as a dream that dies,
And new life opened on him, great and free,
And lov on earth and paradise to be.
But ah! thro' all men some base impulse runs,
(The brute the father and the men the sons,)
Which if one harshly sets him to subdue,
With fiercer insolence it boils anew:
He ends the worst who with best hope began:
How hard is this! how like the lot of man!
(The brute the father and the men the sons,)
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With fiercer insolence it boils anew:
He ends the worst who with best hope began:
How hard is this! how like the lot of man!
When this man's best desire and highest aim
Had ended in the deed of traitorous shame,
When to his bloodshot eyes grew wild and dim
The stony faces of the Sanhedrim,—
When in his rage he could no longer bear
Men's voices nor the sunlight nor the air,
Nor sleep, nor waking, nor his own quick breath,
Nor God in heaven, nor anything but death,—
I bowed my head, and through my fingers ran
Tears for the end of that Iscariot man,
Lost in the hopeless struggle of the soul
To make the done undone, the broken whole.
O brother! howsoever, wheresoe'er
Had ended in the deed of traitorous shame,
When to his bloodshot eyes grew wild and dim
The stony faces of the Sanhedrim,—
When in his rage he could no longer bear
Men's voices nor the sunlight nor the air,
Nor sleep, nor waking, nor his own quick breath,
Nor God in heaven, nor anything but death,—
I bowed my head, and through my fingers ran
Tears for the end of that Iscariot man,
Lost in the hopeless struggle of the soul
To make the done undone, the broken whole.
Thou hidest now the hell of thy despair,
Hear that one heart can pity, one can know
With thee thy hopeless solitary woe.
But when the treacherous deed was planned and done,
The soldiers gathered, and the shame begun,
Thereat the indignant heavens in fierce disdain
Blew down a rushing and uproarious rain;
The tall trees wailed; ill-heard and scarcely seen
Were Jew and Roman those rough gusts between,
Only unmoved one still and towering form
Made, as of old, a silence in the storm.
The soldiers gathered, and the shame begun,
Thereat the indignant heavens in fierce disdain
174
The tall trees wailed; ill-heard and scarcely seen
Were Jew and Roman those rough gusts between,
Only unmoved one still and towering form
Made, as of old, a silence in the storm.
Then was the cross uplifted; strange to see
That final sign of sad humanity;
For men in childhood for their worship chose
The primal force by which as men they rose;
Then round their homes they bade with boyish grace
The hanging Bacchus swing his comely face;
And now, grown old, they can no more disdain
To look full-front upon the eyes of Pain,
But must all corners of the champaign fill
With bleeding images of this last ill,
Must on yon mountain's pinnacle enshrine
A crucifix, the dead for the divine.
That final sign of sad humanity;
For men in childhood for their worship chose
The primal force by which as men they rose;
Then round their homes they bade with boyish grace
The hanging Bacchus swing his comely face;
And now, grown old, they can no more disdain
To look full-front upon the eyes of Pain,
But must all corners of the champaign fill
With bleeding images of this last ill,
Must on yon mountain's pinnacle enshrine
A crucifix, the dead for the divine.
Yet never picture, wonderfully well
By hands of Dürer drawn or Raphael,
Nor wood by shepherds that one art who know
Carved in long nights behind the drifted snow,
Could with such holy sorrows flood and fill
The eyes made glimmering and the heart made still,
As that pale form whose outstretched limbs so long
Made kingship of the infamy of wrong,
O'er whose thorn-twined majestic brows ran down
Blood for anointing from the bitter crown.
By hands of Dürer drawn or Raphael,
Nor wood by shepherds that one art who know
Carved in long nights behind the drifted snow,
Could with such holy sorrows flood and fill
The eyes made glimmering and the heart made still,
175
Made kingship of the infamy of wrong,
O'er whose thorn-twined majestic brows ran down
Blood for anointing from the bitter crown.
Then from the lips of David's Son there brake
Such phrase as David in the Spirit spake,—
Ay, and four words with such a meaning fraught
As seemed an answer to my in most thought;—
O dreadful cry, and by no seer foreshewn,
“My God, my God, I die and am alone!”
Where is he gone? O men and maidens, where
Such phrase as David in the Spirit spake,—
Ay, and four words with such a meaning fraught
As seemed an answer to my in most thought;—
O dreadful cry, and by no seer foreshewn,
“My God, my God, I die and am alone!”
Is gone the fairest amid all the fair?
Mine eyes desire him, and with dawning day
My heart goes forth to find him on the way.
II
I, having seen, for certain days apart
Fared with a silent memory at my heart,
And in me great compassion grew for them
Who looked upon that feigned Jerusalem,
For I and all those thousands seemed to be
Like other thousands once in Galilee,
Save that no miracle's divine surprise
Met in the desert our expectant eyes,
No answer calmed our eager hearts enticed
By the mere name and very look of Christ.
Fared with a silent memory at my heart,
And in me great compassion grew for them
Who looked upon that feigned Jerusalem,
For I and all those thousands seemed to be
Like other thousands once in Galilee,
Save that no miracle's divine surprise
Met in the desert our expectant eyes,
176
By the mere name and very look of Christ.
So fondly in all ages man will cling
To the least shadow of a Friend and King,
To the faint hope of one to share, to know
The aspiration and the inner woe,—
Forgetting that the several souls of men
Are not like parted drops which meet again
When the tree shakes and to each other run
The kindred crystals glittering into one,—
But like those twin revolving stars which bear
A double solitude thro' the utmost air;
For these, albeit their lit immingled rays
Be living beryl, living chrysoprase,
Tho' burning orb on orb shall whirl and throw
Her amethystine and her golden glow,
Yet must they still their separate pathways keep
And sad procession thro' the eternal deep,
Apart, together, must for ever roll
Round a void centre to an unknown goal.
To the least shadow of a Friend and King,
To the faint hope of one to share, to know
The aspiration and the inner woe,—
Forgetting that the several souls of men
Are not like parted drops which meet again
When the tree shakes and to each other run
The kindred crystals glittering into one,—
But like those twin revolving stars which bear
A double solitude thro' the utmost air;
For these, albeit their lit immingled rays
Be living beryl, living chrysoprase,
Tho' burning orb on orb shall whirl and throw
Her amethystine and her golden glow,
Yet must they still their separate pathways keep
And sad procession thro' the eternal deep,
Apart, together, must for ever roll
Round a void centre to an unknown goal.
And thus I mused, and as men's musings will
Come round at last to their own sorrows still,
So mine, who in such words as these began
To mourn the solitary fate of man.
Come round at last to their own sorrows still,
So mine, who in such words as these began
To mourn the solitary fate of man.
“Thou, Virgil, too, wouldst gladly have been laid
In forest-arches of Thessalian shade,
Or on Laconian lawns have watched all day
The fleet and fair Laconian maidens play,
Till from the rustling of the leaves was shed
Deep sleep upon thy limbs and kingly head,
And Mother Earth diffused with calm control
Peace on her sweetest and her saddest soul.
There 'mid the peasants thou hadst dwelt with joy
The goatherd or the reaper or the boy,
Hadst changed thy fate for theirs, if change could be,
And given for love thy sad supremacy.
177
Or on Laconian lawns have watched all day
The fleet and fair Laconian maidens play,
Till from the rustling of the leaves was shed
Deep sleep upon thy limbs and kingly head,
And Mother Earth diffused with calm control
Peace on her sweetest and her saddest soul.
There 'mid the peasants thou hadst dwelt with joy
The goatherd or the reaper or the boy,
Hadst changed thy fate for theirs, if change could be,
And given for love thy sad supremacy.
“Wert thou not wise, my Master? better far
To live with them and be as these men are;
Better 'mid Phyllis and Lycoris set,—
Their soft eyes darker than the violet,—
With them to smile and sing, for them to bear
The lover's anguish and the fond despair,
Than thus to feel, for ever and forlorn,
The passions set new-risen and die new-born.
To live with them and be as these men are;
Better 'mid Phyllis and Lycoris set,—
Their soft eyes darker than the violet,—
With them to smile and sing, for them to bear
The lover's anguish and the fond despair,
Than thus to feel, for ever and forlorn,
The passions set new-risen and die new-born.
“For some men linger in their loves, but I
So soon have finished and so fast go by;
Nay, nor in answering gaze of friends can find
The one soul looking through the double mind:
I love them, but beneath their tenderest tone
This lonely heart is not the less alone;
I love them, but betwixt their souls and me
Are shadowy mountains and a sounding sea.
So soon have finished and so fast go by;
Nay, nor in answering gaze of friends can find
The one soul looking through the double mind:
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This lonely heart is not the less alone;
I love them, but betwixt their souls and me
Are shadowy mountains and a sounding sea.
“Oh heart that oftentimes wouldst gladly win
The whole world's love thy narrow walls within,
Wouldst answer speech with silence, sighs with sighs,
Tears with the effluence of enchanted eyes,—
Then oftentimes in bitterness art fain
To cast that love to the four winds again,
For indignation at the gulfs that bar
For ever soul from soul as star from star!
Sweet are the looks and words, the sigh and kiss,
But can the live soul live by these or this?—
From her sad temple she beholds in vain
The close caresses and the yearning strain;—
Who reaches, who attains her? who has known
Her queenly presence and her tender tone?
What brush has painted, or what song has sung
Her unbetrothèd beauty ever-young?
Only when strange musicians softly play
The ears are glad, and she an hour as they;—
To them the noise is heaven, and to her
A shadowy sweetness and a dying stir.
Ay and sometimes, to such as seek her well,
She in a momentary look can tell
Somewhat of lonely longings, and confess
A fragment of her passion's tenderness.
Ah, best to rest ere love with worship dies,
Pause at the first encounter of the eyes,
Pass on and dream while yet both souls are free,
‘That soul I could have loved, if love could be.’”
The whole world's love thy narrow walls within,
Wouldst answer speech with silence, sighs with sighs,
Tears with the effluence of enchanted eyes,—
Then oftentimes in bitterness art fain
To cast that love to the four winds again,
For indignation at the gulfs that bar
For ever soul from soul as star from star!
Sweet are the looks and words, the sigh and kiss,
But can the live soul live by these or this?—
From her sad temple she beholds in vain
The close caresses and the yearning strain;—
Who reaches, who attains her? who has known
Her queenly presence and her tender tone?
What brush has painted, or what song has sung
Her unbetrothèd beauty ever-young?
Only when strange musicians softly play
The ears are glad, and she an hour as they;—
To them the noise is heaven, and to her
A shadowy sweetness and a dying stir.
179
She in a momentary look can tell
Somewhat of lonely longings, and confess
A fragment of her passion's tenderness.
Ah, best to rest ere love with worship dies,
Pause at the first encounter of the eyes,
Pass on and dream while yet both souls are free,
‘That soul I could have loved, if love could be.’”
Thus I lamented, and upon me fell
A sense of solitude more sad than hell,
As one forgot, forsaken, and exiled
Of God and man, from woman and from child:—
Hush, hush, my soul, nor let thy speech draw near
That last and incommunicable fear;
All else shall poets sing, but this alone
The man who tells it never can have known.
A sense of solitude more sad than hell,
As one forgot, forsaken, and exiled
Of God and man, from woman and from child:—
Hush, hush, my soul, nor let thy speech draw near
That last and incommunicable fear;
All else shall poets sing, but this alone
The man who tells it never can have known.
Thank God! this dizzying and extreme despair
Not one short hour the human heart can bear,
For with that woe the o'erburdened spirit soon
Faints in the dark and falls into a swoon,
The body sickens with the slackening breath,
And the man dies, for this indeed is death.
Not one short hour the human heart can bear,
For with that woe the o'erburdened spirit soon
Faints in the dark and falls into a swoon,
The body sickens with the slackening breath,
And the man dies, for this indeed is death.
Lo for each separate soul the Eternal King
Hath separate ways for peace and comforting;
Then pardon if with such intent I tell
The bliss which in my low estate befell:—
For June midnight became the May midmorn,
In that enchanting home where I was born,
When first the child-heart woke, the child-eyes knew
The bud blush-roses and the sparkling dew.
There gleamed the lake where lone St. Herbert saw
The solemn mornings and the soundless awe,—
There were the ferns that shake, the becks that foam,
The Derwent river and the Cumbrian home,—
And there, as once, upon my infant head
His blameless hands the Priest of Nature spread,
Spake fitting words, and gave in great old age
The patriarch's blessing and the bard's presage.
Ah, with what sweet rebuke that vision came!
With how pure hope I called on Words-worth's name!
O if on earth's green bosom one could lay,
Like him, tired limbs and trustful head, and say,
“To thee, to thee, my mother, I resign
All of my life that still is only mine;
I want no separate pleasures, make me one
With springing seasons in the rain and sun:
To thy great heart our hearts for ever yearn;
Thy children wander, let thy child return!”
Hath separate ways for peace and comforting;
180
The bliss which in my low estate befell:—
For June midnight became the May midmorn,
In that enchanting home where I was born,
When first the child-heart woke, the child-eyes knew
The bud blush-roses and the sparkling dew.
There gleamed the lake where lone St. Herbert saw
The solemn mornings and the soundless awe,—
There were the ferns that shake, the becks that foam,
The Derwent river and the Cumbrian home,—
And there, as once, upon my infant head
His blameless hands the Priest of Nature spread,
Spake fitting words, and gave in great old age
The patriarch's blessing and the bard's presage.
Ah, with what sweet rebuke that vision came!
With how pure hope I called on Words-worth's name!
O if on earth's green bosom one could lay,
Like him, tired limbs and trustful head, and say,
“To thee, to thee, my mother, I resign
All of my life that still is only mine;
181
With springing seasons in the rain and sun:
To thy great heart our hearts for ever yearn;
Thy children wander, let thy child return!”
To such a man, by self-surrender wise,
With the one soul of all things in his eyes,
To such a life, embosomed and enfurled
In the old unspoken beauty of the world,
Might Nature with a sweet relenting show
More of herself than men by knowledge know;
Till, if he caught the soundless sighing breath
Wherewith the whole creation travaileth,—
If once to human ears revealed could be
The immemorial secret of the sea,—
By such great lessons might that man attain
A life which is not pleasure, is not pain,—
A life collected, elemental, strong,
A sacrosanct tranquillity of song,
Fed by the word unheard, the sight unseen,
The breath that passes man and God between,
When ere the end comes is the end begun,
And the One Soul has flown into the One.
With the one soul of all things in his eyes,
To such a life, embosomed and enfurled
In the old unspoken beauty of the world,
Might Nature with a sweet relenting show
More of herself than men by knowledge know;
Till, if he caught the soundless sighing breath
Wherewith the whole creation travaileth,—
If once to human ears revealed could be
The immemorial secret of the sea,—
By such great lessons might that man attain
A life which is not pleasure, is not pain,—
A life collected, elemental, strong,
A sacrosanct tranquillity of song,
Fed by the word unheard, the sight unseen,
The breath that passes man and God between,
When ere the end comes is the end begun,
And the One Soul has flown into the One.
Hereat my soul, which cannot spread for long
Her tethered pinions in the heaven of song,
To her poor home descending with a sigh
Looked through her windows on the earth and sky:
Where she had left the limbs she found them still,
In the same blackness, on the silent hill,
Yet for a while was her return sublime
With dying echoes of the cosmic chime,
And through the parted gloom there fell with her
Some ray from Sire or Son or Comforter;
For in mine ears the silence made a tune,
And to mine eyes the dark was plenilune,
And mountain airs and streams and stones and sod
Bare witness to the Fatherhood of God.
Her tethered pinions in the heaven of song,
To her poor home descending with a sigh
Looked through her windows on the earth and sky:
182
In the same blackness, on the silent hill,
Yet for a while was her return sublime
With dying echoes of the cosmic chime,
And through the parted gloom there fell with her
Some ray from Sire or Son or Comforter;
For in mine ears the silence made a tune,
And to mine eyes the dark was plenilune,
And mountain airs and streams and stones and sod
Bare witness to the Fatherhood of God.
Zurich, June 30, 1870.
183
THE IMPLICIT PROMISE OF IMMORTALITY
Or questi che dall' infima lacuna
Dell' universo insin qui ha vedute
Le vite spiritali ad una ad una,
Supplica a te per grazia di virtute
Tanto che possa con gli occhi levarsi
Più alto verso l' ultima salute.
Dante, Par. xxxiii. 22-28.
Dell' universo insin qui ha vedute
Le vite spiritali ad una ad una,
Supplica a te per grazia di virtute
Tanto che possa con gli occhi levarsi
Più alto verso l' ultima salute.
Dante, Par. xxxiii. 22-28.
Friend, and it little matters if with thee
In shadowed vales and night's solemnity
Heart has met heart, and soul with soul has known
A deathless kinship and one hope alone;—
Or if thy dear voice by mine ears unheard
Has never spoken me one wingèd word,
Nor mine eyes seen thee, nor my spirit guessed
The answering spirit hidden in thy breast;—
Known or unknown, seen once and loved for long,
Or only reached by this faint breath of song,
In thine imagined ears I pour again
A faltering message from the man in men,—
Thoughts that are born with summer, but abide
Past summer into sad Allhallowtide.
In shadowed vales and night's solemnity
Heart has met heart, and soul with soul has known
A deathless kinship and one hope alone;—
Or if thy dear voice by mine ears unheard
Has never spoken me one wingèd word,
Nor mine eyes seen thee, nor my spirit guessed
The answering spirit hidden in thy breast;—
Known or unknown, seen once and loved for long,
Or only reached by this faint breath of song,
In thine imagined ears I pour again
A faltering message from the man in men,—
Thoughts that are born with summer, but abide
Past summer into sad Allhallowtide.
184
The world without, men say, the needs within,
Which clash and make what we call sorrow and sin,
Tend to adjustment evermore, until
The individual and the cosmic will
Shall coincide, and man content and free
Assume at last his endless empery,
Seeking his Eden and his Heaven no more
By fabled streams behind him or before,
But feeling Pison with Euphrates roll
Round the great garden of his kingly soul.
Which clash and make what we call sorrow and sin,
Tend to adjustment evermore, until
The individual and the cosmic will
Shall coincide, and man content and free
Assume at last his endless empery,
Seeking his Eden and his Heaven no more
By fabled streams behind him or before,
But feeling Pison with Euphrates roll
Round the great garden of his kingly soul.
I answer that, so far, the type that springs
Seems like a race of strangers, not of kings
Less fit for earth, not more so; rather say
Grown like the dog who when musicians play
Feels each false note and howls, while yet the true
With doubtful pleasure tremulous thrill him through,
Since man's strange thoughts confuse him, and destroy
With half-guessed raptures his ancestral joy.
Seems like a race of strangers, not of kings
Less fit for earth, not more so; rather say
Grown like the dog who when musicians play
Feels each false note and howls, while yet the true
With doubtful pleasure tremulous thrill him through,
Since man's strange thoughts confuse him, and destroy
With half-guessed raptures his ancestral joy.
Meantime dim wonder on the untravelled way
Holds our best hearts, and palsies all our day;
One looks on God, and then with eyes struck blind
Brings a confusing rumour to mankind;
And others listen, and no work can do
Till they have got that God defined anew;
And in the darkness some have fallen, as fell
To baser gods the folk of Israel,
When with Jehovah's thunders heard too nigh
They wantoned in the shade of Sinai.
Holds our best hearts, and palsies all our day;
One looks on God, and then with eyes struck blind
Brings a confusing rumour to mankind;
185
Till they have got that God defined anew;
And in the darkness some have fallen, as fell
To baser gods the folk of Israel,
When with Jehovah's thunders heard too nigh
They wantoned in the shade of Sinai.
Take any of the sons our Age has nursed,
Fed with her food and taught her best and worst;
Suppose no great disaster; look not nigh
On hidden hours of his extremity;
But watch him like the flickering magnet stirred
By each imponderable look and word,
And think how firm a courage every day
He needs to bear him on life's common way,
Since even at the best his spirit moves
Thro' such a tourney of conflicting loves,—
Unwisely sought, untruly called untrue,
Beloved, and hated, and beloved anew;
Till in the changing whirl of praise and blame
He feels himself the same and not the same,
And often, overworn and overwon,
Knows all a dream and wishes all were done.
Fed with her food and taught her best and worst;
Suppose no great disaster; look not nigh
On hidden hours of his extremity;
But watch him like the flickering magnet stirred
By each imponderable look and word,
And think how firm a courage every day
He needs to bear him on life's common way,
Since even at the best his spirit moves
Thro' such a tourney of conflicting loves,—
Unwisely sought, untruly called untrue,
Beloved, and hated, and beloved anew;
Till in the changing whirl of praise and blame
He feels himself the same and not the same,
And often, overworn and overwon,
Knows all a dream and wishes all were done.
I know it, such an one these eyes have seen
About the world with his unworldly mien,
And often idly hopeless, often bent
On some tumultuous deed and vehement,
Because his spirit he can nowise fit
To the world's ways and settled rule of it,
But thro' contented thousands travels on
Like a sad heir in disinherison,
And rarely by great thought or brave emprise
Comes out about his life's perplexities,
Looks thro' the rifted cloudland, and sees clear
Fate at his feet and the high God anear.
About the world with his unworldly mien,
And often idly hopeless, often bent
On some tumultuous deed and vehement,
Because his spirit he can nowise fit
186
But thro' contented thousands travels on
Like a sad heir in disinherison,
And rarely by great thought or brave emprise
Comes out about his life's perplexities,
Looks thro' the rifted cloudland, and sees clear
Fate at his feet and the high God anear.
Ah let him tarry on those heights, nor dream
Of other founts than that Aonian stream!
Since short and fierce, then hated, drowned, and dim
Shall most men's chosen pleasures come to him,—
Not made for such things, nor for long content
With the poor toys of this imprisonment.
Ay, should he sit one afternoon beguiled
By some such joy as makes the wise a child,
Yet if at twilight to his ears shall come
A distant music thro' the city's hum,
So slight a thing as this will wake again
The incommunicable homeless pain,
Until his soul so yearns to reunite
With her Prime Source, her Master and Delight,
As if some loadstone drew her, and brain and limb
Ached with her struggle to get through to Him.
Of other founts than that Aonian stream!
Since short and fierce, then hated, drowned, and dim
Shall most men's chosen pleasures come to him,—
Not made for such things, nor for long content
With the poor toys of this imprisonment.
Ay, should he sit one afternoon beguiled
By some such joy as makes the wise a child,
Yet if at twilight to his ears shall come
A distant music thro' the city's hum,
So slight a thing as this will wake again
The incommunicable homeless pain,
Until his soul so yearns to reunite
With her Prime Source, her Master and Delight,
As if some loadstone drew her, and brain and limb
Ached with her struggle to get through to Him.
187
And is this then delusion? can it be
That like the rest high heaven is phantasy?
Can God's implicit promise be but one
Among so many visions all undone?
That like the rest high heaven is phantasy?
Can God's implicit promise be but one
Among so many visions all undone?
Nay, if on earth two souls thro' sundering fate
Can save their sisterhood inviolate,
If dimness and deferment, time and pain,
Have no more lasting power upon those twain
Than stormy thunderclouds which, spent and done,
Leave grateful earth still gazing on the sun,—
If their divine hope gladly can forgo
Such nearness as this wretched flesh can know,
While, spite of all that even themselves may do,
Each by her own truth feels the other true:—
Faithful no less is God, who having won
Our spirits to His endless unison
Betrays not our dependence, nor can break
The oath unuttered which His silence spake.
Can save their sisterhood inviolate,
If dimness and deferment, time and pain,
Have no more lasting power upon those twain
Than stormy thunderclouds which, spent and done,
Leave grateful earth still gazing on the sun,—
If their divine hope gladly can forgo
Such nearness as this wretched flesh can know,
While, spite of all that even themselves may do,
Each by her own truth feels the other true:—
Faithful no less is God, who having won
Our spirits to His endless unison
Betrays not our dependence, nor can break
The oath unuttered which His silence spake.
Oh dreadful thought, if all our sires and we
Are but foundations of a race to be,—
Stones which one thrusts in earth, and builds thereon
A white delight, a Parian Parthenon,
And thither long thereafter, youth and maid
Seek with glad brows the alabaster shade,
And in processions' pomp together bent
Still interchange their sweet words innocent,—
Not caring that those mighty columns rest
Each on the ruin of a human breast,—
That to the shrine the victor's chariot rolls
Across the anguish of ten thousand souls!
Are but foundations of a race to be,—
Stones which one thrusts in earth, and builds thereon
A white delight, a Parian Parthenon,
And thither long thereafter, youth and maid
188
And in processions' pomp together bent
Still interchange their sweet words innocent,—
Not caring that those mighty columns rest
Each on the ruin of a human breast,—
That to the shrine the victor's chariot rolls
Across the anguish of ten thousand souls!
“Well was it that our fathers suffered thus,”
I hear them say, “that all might end in us;
Well was it here and there a bard should feel
Pains premature and hurt that none could heal;
These were their preludes, thus the race began;
So hard a matter was the birth of Man.”
I hear them say, “that all might end in us;
Well was it here and there a bard should feel
Pains premature and hurt that none could heal;
These were their preludes, thus the race began;
So hard a matter was the birth of Man.”
And yet these too shall pass and fade and flee,
And in their death shall be as vile as we,
Nor much shall profit with their perfect powers
To have lived a so much sweeter life than ours,
When at the last, with all their bliss gone by,
Like us those glorious creatures come to die,
With far worse woe, far more rebellious strife
Those mighty spirits drink the dregs of life.
And in their death shall be as vile as we,
Nor much shall profit with their perfect powers
To have lived a so much sweeter life than ours,
When at the last, with all their bliss gone by,
Like us those glorious creatures come to die,
With far worse woe, far more rebellious strife
Those mighty spirits drink the dregs of life.
Nay, by no cumulative changeful years,
For all our bitter harvesting of tears,
Shalt thou tame man, nor in his breast destroy
The longing for his home which deadens joy;
He cannot mate here, and his cage controls
Safe bodies, separate and sterile souls;
And wouldst thou bless the captives, thou must show
The wild green woods which they again shall know.
For all our bitter harvesting of tears,
189
The longing for his home which deadens joy;
He cannot mate here, and his cage controls
Safe bodies, separate and sterile souls;
And wouldst thou bless the captives, thou must show
The wild green woods which they again shall know.
Therefore have we, while night serenely fell,
Imparadised in sunset's œnomel,
Beheld the empyrean, star on star
Perfecting solemn change and secular,
Each with slow roll and pauseless period
Writing the solitary thoughts of God.
Not blindly in such moments, not in vain,
The open secret flashes on the brain,
As if one almost guessed it, almost knew
Whence we have sailed and voyage where-unto;
Not vainly, for albeit that hour goes by,
And the strange letters perish from the sky,
Yet learn we that a life to us is given
One with the cosmic spectacles of heaven,—
Feel the still soul, for all her questionings,
Parcel and part of sempiternal things;
For us, for all, one overarching dome,
One law the order, and one God the home.
Imparadised in sunset's œnomel,
Beheld the empyrean, star on star
Perfecting solemn change and secular,
Each with slow roll and pauseless period
Writing the solitary thoughts of God.
Not blindly in such moments, not in vain,
The open secret flashes on the brain,
As if one almost guessed it, almost knew
Whence we have sailed and voyage where-unto;
Not vainly, for albeit that hour goes by,
And the strange letters perish from the sky,
Yet learn we that a life to us is given
One with the cosmic spectacles of heaven,—
Feel the still soul, for all her questionings,
Parcel and part of sempiternal things;
For us, for all, one overarching dome,
One law the order, and one God the home.
190
Ah, but who knows in what thin form and strange,
Through what appalled perplexities of change,
Wakes the sad soul, which having once forgone
This earth familiar and her friends thereon
In interstellar void becomes a chill
Outlying fragment of the Master Will;
So severed, so forgetting, shall not she
Lament, immortal, immortality?
Through what appalled perplexities of change,
Wakes the sad soul, which having once forgone
This earth familiar and her friends thereon
In interstellar void becomes a chill
Outlying fragment of the Master Will;
So severed, so forgetting, shall not she
Lament, immortal, immortality?
If thou wouldst have high God thy soul assure
That she herself shall as herself endure,
Shall in no alien semblance, thine and wise,
Fulfil her and be young in Paradise,
One way I know; forget, forswear, disdain
Thine own best hopes, thine utmost loss and gain,
Till when at last thou scarce rememberest now
If on the earth be such a man as thou,
Nor hast one thought of self-surrender,—no,
For self is none remaining to forgo,—
If ever, then shall strong persuasion fall
That in thy giving thou hast gained thine all,
Given the poor present, gained the boundless scope,
And kept thee virgin for the further hope.
That she herself shall as herself endure,
Shall in no alien semblance, thine and wise,
Fulfil her and be young in Paradise,
One way I know; forget, forswear, disdain
Thine own best hopes, thine utmost loss and gain,
Till when at last thou scarce rememberest now
If on the earth be such a man as thou,
Nor hast one thought of self-surrender,—no,
For self is none remaining to forgo,—
If ever, then shall strong persuasion fall
That in thy giving thou hast gained thine all,
Given the poor present, gained the boundless scope,
And kept thee virgin for the further hope.
This is the hero's temper, and to some
With battle-trumpetings that hour has come,
With guns that thunder and with winds that fall,
With closing fleets and voices augural;—
For some, methinks, in no less noble wise
Divine prevision kindles in the eyes,
When all base thoughts like frighted harpies flown
In her own beauty leave the soul alone;
When Love,—not rosy-flushed as he began,
But Love, still Love, the prisoned God in man,—
Shows his face glorious, shakes his banner free,
Cries like a captain for Eternity:—
O halcyon air across the storms of youth,
O trust him, he is true, he is one with Truth!
Nay, is he Christ? I know not; no man knows
The right name of the heavenly Anterôs,—
But here is God, whatever God may be,
And whomsoe'er we worship, this is He.
With battle-trumpetings that hour has come,
191
With closing fleets and voices augural;—
For some, methinks, in no less noble wise
Divine prevision kindles in the eyes,
When all base thoughts like frighted harpies flown
In her own beauty leave the soul alone;
When Love,—not rosy-flushed as he began,
But Love, still Love, the prisoned God in man,—
Shows his face glorious, shakes his banner free,
Cries like a captain for Eternity:—
O halcyon air across the storms of youth,
O trust him, he is true, he is one with Truth!
Nay, is he Christ? I know not; no man knows
The right name of the heavenly Anterôs,—
But here is God, whatever God may be,
And whomsoe'er we worship, this is He.
Ah, friend, I have not said it: who shall tell
In wavering words the hope unspeakable?
Which he who once has known will labour long
To set forth sweetly in persuasive song,
Yea, many hours with hopeless art will try
To save the fair thing that it shall not die,
Then after all despairs, and leaves to-day
A hidden meaning in a nameless lay.
In wavering words the hope unspeakable?
Which he who once has known will labour long
To set forth sweetly in persuasive song,
Yea, many hours with hopeless art will try
To save the fair thing that it shall not die,
Then after all despairs, and leaves to-day
A hidden meaning in a nameless lay.
192
ON ART AS AN AIM IN LIFE
Ein unbegreiflich holdes Sehnen
Trieb mich, durch Wald und Wiesen hinzugehn,
Und unter tausend heissen Thränen
Fühlt' ich mir eine Welt entstehn.
Goethe.
Trieb mich, durch Wald und Wiesen hinzugehn,
Und unter tausend heissen Thränen
Fühlt' ich mir eine Welt entstehn.
Goethe.
How was it that he knew it? ay, or where
Beholding an immortal in the air
Fixed he for aye, with swift touch unafraid,
That vision of the vision of a maid,
Whose hands are dropped, whose glowing eyes aspire
To some half-seen concent and heavenly quire,
While at her sacred feet forgotten lie
The useless tools of mortal minstrelsy?
Beholding an immortal in the air
Fixed he for aye, with swift touch unafraid,
That vision of the vision of a maid,
Whose hands are dropped, whose glowing eyes aspire
To some half-seen concent and heavenly quire,
While at her sacred feet forgotten lie
The useless tools of mortal minstrelsy?
True type of Art, which never long content
Can feed her flame with song or instrument,
Still from the bright supernal dream must draw
Light on her brows, and language, and a law,
If she her glorious message would renew,
Live her great life, and make the picture true,
Where stand that musical sweet maid anear
Saint and evangelist and sage and seer;
They watch Cecilia's eyes, but not for them
Opens on earth the heaven's Jerusalem.
Can feed her flame with song or instrument,
Still from the bright supernal dream must draw
Light on her brows, and language, and a law,
If she her glorious message would renew,
Live her great life, and make the picture true,
Where stand that musical sweet maid anear
Saint and evangelist and sage and seer;
193
Opens on earth the heaven's Jerusalem.
Thou whom with thrills, like the first thrills that stir
In a girl's heart when Love is waking her,
With set of soul like the blind strength that sways
Beneath the moon's clear face the watery ways,
God from a child has chosen and set apart
For this one priesthood and last shrine of Art,
See thou maintain thy calling; take no heed
Of such as tell thee there is little need
Of beauty on the earth till peace be here,
That, till some true sun make the world less drear,
All vainly flush in thy thin air withdrawn
Auroral streamers of the untimely dawn.
In a girl's heart when Love is waking her,
With set of soul like the blind strength that sways
Beneath the moon's clear face the watery ways,
God from a child has chosen and set apart
For this one priesthood and last shrine of Art,
See thou maintain thy calling; take no heed
Of such as tell thee there is little need
Of beauty on the earth till peace be here,
That, till some true sun make the world less drear,
All vainly flush in thy thin air withdrawn
Auroral streamers of the untimely dawn.
They err; no other way as yet is known
With God's dim purpose to unite our own,
Except for each to follow as he can
The central impulse that has made him man,
Live his true self, and find his work and rest
In toil or pleasure where that self is best.
With God's dim purpose to unite our own,
Except for each to follow as he can
The central impulse that has made him man,
Live his true self, and find his work and rest
In toil or pleasure where that self is best.
And hast thou chosen then? canst thou endure
The purging change of frost and calenture;
Accept the sick recoil, the weary pain
Of senses heightened, keener nerves and brain—
Suffer and love, love much and suffer long—
And live thro' all, and at the last be strong?
For hard the Aonian heights, and far and few
Their starry memories who have won thereto;
Who to the end loved love, who still the same
Followed lifelong the lonely road to fame;
And fame they found, with so great heart had they
Traversed that open unfrequented way.
Have courage; follow; yet no heart have I,
O soul elect, thy pains to prophesy,
Loth to myself to speak them, loth to know
That creatures born for love are born for woe.
The purging change of frost and calenture;
Accept the sick recoil, the weary pain
194
Suffer and love, love much and suffer long—
And live thro' all, and at the last be strong?
For hard the Aonian heights, and far and few
Their starry memories who have won thereto;
Who to the end loved love, who still the same
Followed lifelong the lonely road to fame;
And fame they found, with so great heart had they
Traversed that open unfrequented way.
Have courage; follow; yet no heart have I,
O soul elect, thy pains to prophesy,
Loth to myself to speak them, loth to know
That creatures born for love are born for woe.
Ay, if all else be spared thee, none the less
Enough, enough to bear is loneliness—
The hope that still, till hope with days be done,
Must seek the perfect friend and find not one;
Not one of all whom thine eyes' mastering flame
At will enkindles and at will can tame;—
Not one, O woman, of men strong and free
Whom thy mere presence makes the slaves of thee,
Yet thy king comes not, and the golden door
To thy heart's heart is shut for evermore.
Enough, enough to bear is loneliness—
The hope that still, till hope with days be done,
Must seek the perfect friend and find not one;
Not one of all whom thine eyes' mastering flame
At will enkindles and at will can tame;—
Not one, O woman, of men strong and free
Whom thy mere presence makes the slaves of thee,
Yet thy king comes not, and the golden door
To thy heart's heart is shut for evermore.
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Then oft thy very pulse shall sink away
Sick with the length of disenchanted day,
And after midnight, when the moon looks cold
On lawn and skies grey-azure and grey-gold,
So soft a passion to thy heart shall creep,
To change the dreamful for the dreamless sleep,
That turning round on that unrestful gloom
And peopled silence of thy lonely room,
Thou shalt need all the strength that God can give
Simply to live, my friend, simply to live.
Sick with the length of disenchanted day,
And after midnight, when the moon looks cold
On lawn and skies grey-azure and grey-gold,
So soft a passion to thy heart shall creep,
To change the dreamful for the dreamless sleep,
That turning round on that unrestful gloom
And peopled silence of thy lonely room,
Thou shalt need all the strength that God can give
Simply to live, my friend, simply to live.
Thou in that hour rejoice, since only thus
Can thy proud heart grow wholly piteous,
Thus only to the world thy speech can flow
Charged with the sad authority of woe
Since no man nurtured in the shade can sing
To a true note our psalm of conquering;
Warriors must chant it, whom our own eyes see
Red from the battle and more bruised than we,
Men who have borne the worst, have known the whole,
Have felt the last abeyance of the soul,
Low in the dust with rigid face have lain,
Self-scorned, self-spoiled, self-hated, and self-slain.
Can thy proud heart grow wholly piteous,
Thus only to the world thy speech can flow
Charged with the sad authority of woe
Since no man nurtured in the shade can sing
To a true note our psalm of conquering;
Warriors must chant it, whom our own eyes see
Red from the battle and more bruised than we,
Men who have borne the worst, have known the whole,
Have felt the last abeyance of the soul,
Low in the dust with rigid face have lain,
Self-scorned, self-spoiled, self-hated, and self-slain.
Since all alike we bear, but all apart,
One human anguish hidden at the heart,
All with eyes faint, with hopes that half endure,
Seek in the vault our vanished Cynosure,
And strain our helpless oarage, and essay
Thro' flood and fire the innavigable way.
One human anguish hidden at the heart,
196
Seek in the vault our vanished Cynosure,
And strain our helpless oarage, and essay
Thro' flood and fire the innavigable way.
In such dark places truth lies hid, and still
Man's wisdom comes on man against his will,
And his stern sibyl, ere her tale she tell,
Shows the shapes coiling at the gate of hell.
Man's wisdom comes on man against his will,
And his stern sibyl, ere her tale she tell,
Shows the shapes coiling at the gate of hell.
Such be thy sorrows, yet methinks for them
Thine Art herself has help and requiem;
Ah, when some painter, God-encompassed,
Finds the pure passion, lives among the dead,—
When angel eyes regarding thee enthral
Thy spirit in the light angelical,
And heaven and hope and all thy memories seem
Mixed with their being in a lovely dream,—
What place for anger? what to thee is this
That foe and friend judge justly or amiss?
No man can help or harm thee; far away
Their voices sound and like thin air are they;
Thou with the primal Beauty art alone,
And tears forgotten and a world thine own.
Thine Art herself has help and requiem;
Ah, when some painter, God-encompassed,
Finds the pure passion, lives among the dead,—
When angel eyes regarding thee enthral
Thy spirit in the light angelical,
And heaven and hope and all thy memories seem
Mixed with their being in a lovely dream,—
What place for anger? what to thee is this
That foe and friend judge justly or amiss?
No man can help or harm thee; far away
Their voices sound and like thin air are they;
Thou with the primal Beauty art alone,
And tears forgotten and a world thine own.
How oft Fate's sharpest blows shall leave thee strong
With some re-risen ecstasy of song!
How oft the unimagined message bound
In great sonatas and a stormy sound
Shall seize thee and constrain thee, and make thee sure
That this is true, and this, and these endure,—
Being at the root of all things, lying low,
Being Life, and Love, and God has willed it so.
With some re-risen ecstasy of song!
197
In great sonatas and a stormy sound
Shall seize thee and constrain thee, and make thee sure
That this is true, and this, and these endure,—
Being at the root of all things, lying low,
Being Life, and Love, and God has willed it so.
Ah, strange the bond that in one great life binds
All master-moments of all master-minds!
Strange the one clan that years nor wars destroy,
The undispersed co-heritage of joy.!
Strange that howe'er the sundering ages roll,
From age to age shall soul encounter soul,
Across the dying times, the world's dim roar,
Speak each with each, and live for evermore!
So have I seen in some deep wood divine
The dark and silvery stems of birch and pine;
Apart they sprang, rough earth between them lay
Tangled with brambles and with briars, but they
Met at their summits, and a rushing breeze
Inlocked the topmost murmur of the trees.
All master-moments of all master-minds!
Strange the one clan that years nor wars destroy,
The undispersed co-heritage of joy.!
Strange that howe'er the sundering ages roll,
From age to age shall soul encounter soul,
Across the dying times, the world's dim roar,
Speak each with each, and live for evermore!
So have I seen in some deep wood divine
The dark and silvery stems of birch and pine;
Apart they sprang, rough earth between them lay
Tangled with brambles and with briars, but they
Met at their summits, and a rushing breeze
Inlocked the topmost murmur of the trees.
If only thou to thine own self couldst be
As kind as God and Nature are to thee!
They lade thy bark for nought, they pile thereon
With vain largess the golden cargason,
If with thy royal joys not yet content
Thou needs must lavish all, till all be spent,
If thou wilt change for hurrying loves that die
Thy strength, thine art, thine immortality,—
If thou wilt see thy sweet soul burned like myrrh
Before such gods as have no gift for her.
As kind as God and Nature are to thee!
They lade thy bark for nought, they pile thereon
198
If with thy royal joys not yet content
Thou needs must lavish all, till all be spent,
If thou wilt change for hurrying loves that die
Thy strength, thine art, thine immortality,—
If thou wilt see thy sweet soul burned like myrrh
Before such gods as have no gift for her.
For even when once was God well pleased to shed
His thousand glories on a single head,
Amid our baffled lives and struggles dim,
To make one fair and all fair things for him—
Ah, what avail the eyes, the heart of flame,
The angel nature in the angel name?
Amid his fadeless art he fades away
Fair as his pictures but more frail than they,
Leaves deathless shrines, wherein sweet spirits dwell,
But not, not yet, the soul of Raphael.
His thousand glories on a single head,
Amid our baffled lives and struggles dim,
To make one fair and all fair things for him—
Ah, what avail the eyes, the heart of flame,
The angel nature in the angel name?
Amid his fadeless art he fades away
Fair as his pictures but more frail than they,
Leaves deathless shrines, wherein sweet spirits dwell,
But not, not yet, the soul of Raphael.
Yet there are lives that mid the trampling throng
With their prime beauty bloom at evensong,
Souls that with no confusing flutter rise,
Spread their wings once, and sail in Paradise,
Hearts for whom God has judged it best to know
Only by hearsay sin and waste and woe,
Bright to come hither and to travel hence
Bright as they came, and wise in innocence;
So simply fair, so brave and unbeguiled,
Set Christ among the twelve the wiser child.
Wilt thou forget? forget not; keep apart
A certain faithful silence in the heart;
Speak to no friend thereof, and rare and slow
Let thine own thoughts to that their treasure go:—
Ay, an unconscious look, a broken tone,
A soft breath near thee timing with thine own,
These are thy treasures; dearer these to thee
Than the whole store of lifelong memory;
Dearer than joys and passions, for indeed
Those are blown blossoms, this the single seed,
And life is winter for it, death is spring,
And God the sun and heaven the harvesting.
With their prime beauty bloom at evensong,
Souls that with no confusing flutter rise,
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Hearts for whom God has judged it best to know
Only by hearsay sin and waste and woe,
Bright to come hither and to travel hence
Bright as they came, and wise in innocence;
So simply fair, so brave and unbeguiled,
Set Christ among the twelve the wiser child.
Wilt thou forget? forget not; keep apart
A certain faithful silence in the heart;
Speak to no friend thereof, and rare and slow
Let thine own thoughts to that their treasure go:—
Ay, an unconscious look, a broken tone,
A soft breath near thee timing with thine own,
These are thy treasures; dearer these to thee
Than the whole store of lifelong memory;
Dearer than joys and passions, for indeed
Those are blown blossoms, this the single seed,
And life is winter for it, death is spring,
And God the sun and heaven the harvesting.
Oh would that life and strength and spirit and song
Could come so flowing, could endure so long,
As might suffice a little at least to praise
The charm and glory of these latter days—
To let the captive thoughts a moment fly
That rise unsummoned and unspoken die!
Oh were I there when oft in some still place
Imagined music flushes in the face,
And silent and sonorous, to and fro,
Thro' the raised head the marching phrases flow!
Were mine the fame, when all the air is fire
With light and life and beauty and desire,
When one, when one thro' all the electric throng
Hurtles the jewel arrows of her song,—
Then crashed from tier on tier, from hand and tongue,
The ringing glory makes an old world young!
O marvel, that deep-hid in earth should lie
So many a seed and source of harmony,
Which age on age have slept, and in an hour
Surge in a sea and flame into a flower;
Which are a mystery; which having wist
From his great heart the master-melodist
Strikes till the strong chords tremble and abound
With tyrannous reversion of sweet sound,
Till bar on bar, till quivering string on string,
Break from their maker, are alive and sing,
With force for ever on all hearts to roll
Wave after wave the ocean of his soul!
Could come so flowing, could endure so long,
As might suffice a little at least to praise
The charm and glory of these latter days—
To let the captive thoughts a moment fly
200
Oh were I there when oft in some still place
Imagined music flushes in the face,
And silent and sonorous, to and fro,
Thro' the raised head the marching phrases flow!
Were mine the fame, when all the air is fire
With light and life and beauty and desire,
When one, when one thro' all the electric throng
Hurtles the jewel arrows of her song,—
Then crashed from tier on tier, from hand and tongue,
The ringing glory makes an old world young!
O marvel, that deep-hid in earth should lie
So many a seed and source of harmony,
Which age on age have slept, and in an hour
Surge in a sea and flame into a flower;
Which are a mystery; which having wist
From his great heart the master-melodist
Strikes till the strong chords tremble and abound
With tyrannous reversion of sweet sound,
Till bar on bar, till quivering string on string,
Break from their maker, are alive and sing,
With force for ever on all hearts to roll
Wave after wave the ocean of his soul!
Yet ah how feeble, ah how faint and low
The organ peals, the silver trumpets blow!
Alas, the glorious thoughts which never yet
Have found a sound in fugue or canzonet,
Nor can the pain of their delight declare
With magic of sweet figures and blue air!
Oh could one once by grace of God disclose
The heart's last sigh, the secret of the rose!
But once set free the soul, and breathe away
Life in the light of one transcendent day!
The organ peals, the silver trumpets blow!
Alas, the glorious thoughts which never yet
201
Nor can the pain of their delight declare
With magic of sweet figures and blue air!
Oh could one once by grace of God disclose
The heart's last sigh, the secret of the rose!
But once set free the soul, and breathe away
Life in the light of one transcendent day!
Not thus has God ordained it; nay, but He
To silent hearts is present silently;
He waits till in thee perish pride and shame,
Sense of thyself, and all thy thoughts of fame;
Then when thy task is over, His begun,
He leads thy soul where all the Arts are one—
Leads to His shrine, and has of old unfurled
To chosen eyes the wonder of the world.
Then let no life but His, no love be near,
Only in thought be even the dearest dear!
No sound or touch must kindle or control
This mounting joy, this sabbath of the soul:
He gives a lonely rapture; ay, as now
From this dark height and Sanminiato's brow,
Watching the beautiful ensanguined day
From Bellosguardo fade and Fiesole,—
Oh look how bridge and river, and dome and spire
Become one glory in the rose-red fire,
Till starlit Arno thro' the vale shall shine
And sweep to sea the roar of Apennine!
This is the spirit's worship: even so
I ween that in a dream and long ago,
Wearing together in her happy hour
The fruit of life and life's enchanting flower,
Herself, alone, essential and divine,
Came his own Florence to the Florentine,
And lily-sceptred in his vision stood
A city like the soul of womanhood.
To silent hearts is present silently;
He waits till in thee perish pride and shame,
Sense of thyself, and all thy thoughts of fame;
Then when thy task is over, His begun,
He leads thy soul where all the Arts are one—
Leads to His shrine, and has of old unfurled
To chosen eyes the wonder of the world.
Then let no life but His, no love be near,
Only in thought be even the dearest dear!
No sound or touch must kindle or control
This mounting joy, this sabbath of the soul:
He gives a lonely rapture; ay, as now
From this dark height and Sanminiato's brow,
Watching the beautiful ensanguined day
From Bellosguardo fade and Fiesole,—
Oh look how bridge and river, and dome and spire
Become one glory in the rose-red fire,
Till starlit Arno thro' the vale shall shine
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This is the spirit's worship: even so
I ween that in a dream and long ago,
Wearing together in her happy hour
The fruit of life and life's enchanting flower,
Herself, alone, essential and divine,
Came his own Florence to the Florentine,
And lily-sceptred in his vision stood
A city like the soul of womanhood.
Florence, Jan. 1871.
Tal che tanto ardo che nè mar nè fiume
Spegner potrian quel foco, ma piace
Poich' il mio ardor tanto di ben mi face
Ch' ardendo ognor piu d' arder mi consuma.—
Spegner potrian quel foco, ma piace
Poich' il mio ardor tanto di ben mi face
Ch' ardendo ognor piu d' arder mi consuma.—
Raphael.
203
TWO SISTERS
First SisterWhen dusk descends and dews begin
She sees the forest ghostly fair,
And, half in heaven, is drinking in
The moonlit melancholy air:
The sons of God have charge and care
Her maiden grace from foes to keep,
And Jesus sends her unaware
A maiden sanctity of sleep.
Second Sister
In dreams, in dreams, with sweet surprise
I see the lord of all these things;
From night and nought with eager eyes
He comes, and in his coming sings:
His gentle port is like a king's,
His open face is free and fair,
And lightly from his brow he flings
The young abundance of his hair.
204
Oh who hath watched her kneel to pray
In hours forgetful of the sun?
Or seen beneath the dome of day
The hovering seraph seek the nun?
Her weary years at last have won
A life from life's confusion free:
What else is this but heaven begun
Pure peace and simple chastity?
Second Sister
Oh never yet to mortal maid
Such sad divine division came
From all that stirs or makes afraid
The gentle thoughts without a name;
Through all that lives a sacred shame,
A pulse of pleasant trouble, flows,
And tips the daisy's tinge of flame,
And blushes redder in the rose.
First Sister
From lifted head the golden hair
Is soft and blowing in the breeze,
And softly on her brows of prayer
The summer-shadow flits and flees:
Then parts a pathway thro' the trees,
A vista sunlit and serene,
And there and then it is she sees
What none but such as she have seen.
205
Oh if with him by lea and lawn
I pressed but once the silvery sod,
And scattered sparkles of the dawn
From aster and from golden-rod,
I would not tread where others trod,
Nor dream as other maidens do,
Nor more should need to ask of God,
When God had brought me thereunto.
206
SIMMENTHAL
Far off the old snows evernew
With silver edges cleft the blue
Aloft, alone, divine;
The sunny meadows silent slept,
Silence the sombre armies kept,
The vanguard of the pine.
With silver edges cleft the blue
Aloft, alone, divine;
The sunny meadows silent slept,
Silence the sombre armies kept,
The vanguard of the pine.
In that thin air the birds are still,
No ringdove murmurs on the hill
Nor mating cushat calls;
But gay cicalas singing sprang,
And waters from the forest sang
The song of waterfalls.
No ringdove murmurs on the hill
Nor mating cushat calls;
But gay cicalas singing sprang,
And waters from the forest sang
The song of waterfalls.
O Fate! a few enchanted hours
Beneath the firs, among the flowers,
High on the lawn we lay,
Then turned again, contented well,
While bright about us flamed and fell
The rapture of the day.
Beneath the firs, among the flowers,
High on the lawn we lay,
Then turned again, contented well,
While bright about us flamed and fell
The rapture of the day.
And softly with a guileless awe
Beyond the purple lake she saw
The embattled summits glow;
She saw the glories melt in one,
The round moon rise, while yet the sun
Was rosy on the snow.
Beyond the purple lake she saw
The embattled summits glow;
207
The round moon rise, while yet the sun
Was rosy on the snow.
Then like a newly singing bird
The child's soul in her bosom stirred;
I know not what she sung:—
Because the soft wind caught her hair,
Because the golden moon was fair,
Because her heart was young.
The child's soul in her bosom stirred;
I know not what she sung:—
Because the soft wind caught her hair,
Because the golden moon was fair,
Because her heart was young.
I would her sweet soul ever may
Look thus from those glad eyes and grey,
Unfearing, undefiled:
I love her; when her face I see,
Her simple presence wakes in me
The imperishable child.
Look thus from those glad eyes and grey,
Unfearing, undefiled:
I love her; when her face I see,
Her simple presence wakes in me
The imperishable child.
208
ON AN INVALID
Lo, as the poet finds at will
Than tenderest words a tenderer still
For one beside him prest;
So from the Lord a mercy flows,
A sweeter balm from Sharon's rose,
For her that loves him best.
Than tenderest words a tenderer still
For one beside him prest;
So from the Lord a mercy flows,
A sweeter balm from Sharon's rose,
For her that loves him best.
And ere the early throstles stir
With some sweet word from God for her
The morn returns anew;
For her His face in the east is fair,
For her His breath is in the air,
His rainbow in the dew.
With some sweet word from God for her
The morn returns anew;
For her His face in the east is fair,
For her His breath is in the air,
His rainbow in the dew.
At such an hour the promise falls
With glory on the narrow walls,
With strength on failing breath;
There comes a courage in her eyes,
It gathers for the great emprize,
The deeds of after death.
With glory on the narrow walls,
With strength on failing breath;
There comes a courage in her eyes,
It gathers for the great emprize,
The deeds of after death.
Albeit thro' this preluding woe
Subdued and softly she must go
With half her music dumb,
What heavenly hopes to her belong,
And what a rapture, what a song,
Shall greet His kingdom come!
Subdued and softly she must go
With half her music dumb,
209
And what a rapture, what a song,
Shall greet His kingdom come!
So climbers by some Alpine mere
Walk very softly thro' the clear
Unlitten dawn of day:
The morning star before them shows
Beyond the rocks, beyond the snows,
Their never-travelled way.
Walk very softly thro' the clear
Unlitten dawn of day:
The morning star before them shows
Beyond the rocks, beyond the snows,
Their never-travelled way.
Or so, ere singers have begun,
The master-organist has won
The folk at eve to prayer:
So soft the tune, it only seems
The music of an angel's dreams
Made audible in air.
The master-organist has won
The folk at eve to prayer:
So soft the tune, it only seems
The music of an angel's dreams
Made audible in air.
But when the mounting treble shakes,
When with a noise the anthem wakes
A song forgetting sin,—
Thro' all her pipes the organ peals,
With all her voice at last reveals
The storm of praise within.
When with a noise the anthem wakes
A song forgetting sin,—
Thro' all her pipes the organ peals,
With all her voice at last reveals
The storm of praise within.
The trump! the trump! how pure and high!
How clear the fairy flutes reply!
How bold the clarions blow!
Nor God Himself has scorned the strain,
But hears it and shall hear again,
And heard it long ago.
How clear the fairy flutes reply!
How bold the clarions blow!
Nor God Himself has scorned the strain,
But hears it and shall hear again,
And heard it long ago.
210
WOULD GOD IT WERE EVENING
Imprisoned in the soul and in the sin,Imprisoned in the body and the pain,
The accustomed hateful memories within,
Without the accustomed limbs that ache again:—
Alas! a melancholy peace to win
With all their notes the nightingales complain,
And I such music as is mine begin,
Awake for nothing, and alive in vain.
I find few words and falter; then in scorn
My lips are silent; uncreate, unborn,
Evanishes the visionary lay;
While from clear air upon my soul forlorn
Falls thro' the heedless splendour of the morn
A sadness as the sadness of to-day.
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WOULD GOD IT WERE MORNING
My God, how many times ere I be deadMust I the bitterness of dying know?
How often like a corpse upon my bed
Compose me and surrender me and so
Thro' hateful hours and ill-remembered
Between the twilight and the twilight go
By visions bodiless obscurely led
Thro' many a wild enormity of woe?
And yet I know not but that this is worst
When with that light, the feeble and the first,
I start and gaze into the world again,
And gazing find it as of old accurst
And grey and blinded with the stormy burst
And blank appalling solitude of rain.
212
HIGH TIDE AT MIDNIGHT
No breath is on the glimmering ocean-floor,No blast beneath the windless Pleiades,
But thro' dead night a melancholy roar,
A voice of moving and of marching seas,—
The boom of thundering waters on the shore
Sworn with slow force by desolate degrees
Once to go on, and whelm for evermore
Earth and her folk and all their phantasies.
Then half-asleep in the great sound I seem
Lost in the starlight, dying in a dream
Where overmastering Powers abolish me,—
Drown, and thro' dim euthanasy redeem
My merged life in the living ocean-stream
And soul environing of shadowy sea.
213
ON A GRAVE AT GRINDELWALD
Here let us leave him; for his shroud the snow,
For funeral-lamps he has the planets seven,
For a great sign the icy stair shall go
Between the heights to heaven.
For funeral-lamps he has the planets seven,
For a great sign the icy stair shall go
Between the heights to heaven.
One moment stood he as the angels stand,
High in the stainless eminence of air;
The next, he was not, to his fatherland
Translated unaware.
High in the stainless eminence of air;
The next, he was not, to his fatherland
Translated unaware.
214
AFTER AN INTERVIEW
So while the careless crowd have gazed and gone
Sits one man stedfast in a chosen place,
And of all faces which they gaze upon
Desires one only face:
Sits one man stedfast in a chosen place,
And of all faces which they gaze upon
Desires one only face:
For early morning finds the lover there,
Also at eventide his eyes are dim,
Till at the last he slowly is aware
His soul has flown from him.
Also at eventide his eyes are dim,
Till at the last he slowly is aware
His soul has flown from him.
So also he whom vanished organ-lays
Have stung to jubilance and thrilled to tears
Sits with sonorous memories of praise
Tranced in his echoing ears:
Have stung to jubilance and thrilled to tears
Sits with sonorous memories of praise
Tranced in his echoing ears:
Thro' all his blood the billowy clangours roll,
Thro' all his body leaps the living strain,
And sweetly, stilly, in his hidden soul
The soft notes sink again.
Thro' all his body leaps the living strain,
And sweetly, stilly, in his hidden soul
The soft notes sink again.
215
Then while the trooping singers outward range
He waits enthralled in that superb surprise:
Like airy ghosts they pass him by, nor change
His wide and wistful eyes.
He waits enthralled in that superb surprise:
Like airy ghosts they pass him by, nor change
His wide and wistful eyes.
So stays he in high heaven a little space,
Then treads the portal which the others trod,
And issues into silence, face to face
With darkness and with God.
Then treads the portal which the others trod,
And issues into silence, face to face
With darkness and with God.
216
LOVE AND FAITH
Lo if a man, magnanimous and tender,
Lo if a woman, desperate and true,
Make the irrevocable sweet surrender,
Show to each other what the Lord can do,—
Lo if a woman, desperate and true,
Make the irrevocable sweet surrender,
Show to each other what the Lord can do,—
Each, as I know, a helping and a healing,
Each to the other strangely a surprise,
Heart to the heart its mystery revealing,
Soul to the soul in melancholy eyes,—
Each to the other strangely a surprise,
Heart to the heart its mystery revealing,
Soul to the soul in melancholy eyes,—
Where wilt thou find a riving or a rending
Able to sever them in twain again?
God hath begun, and God's shall be the ending,
Safe in His bosom and aloof from men.
Able to sever them in twain again?
God hath begun, and God's shall be the ending,
Safe in His bosom and aloof from men.
Her thou mayest separate but shalt not sunder,
Tho' thou distress her for a little while;—
Rapt in a worship, ravished in a wonder,
Stayed on the stedfast promise of a smile,
Tho' thou distress her for a little while;—
Rapt in a worship, ravished in a wonder,
Stayed on the stedfast promise of a smile,
217
Scarcely she knoweth if his arms have found her—
Waves of his breath make tremulous the air—
Or if the thrill within her and around her
Be but the distant echo of his prayer.
Waves of his breath make tremulous the air—
Or if the thrill within her and around her
Be but the distant echo of his prayer.
Nay, and much more; for love in his demanding
Will not be bound in limits of our breath,
Calls her to follow where she sees him standing
Fairer and stronger for the plunge of death;—
Will not be bound in limits of our breath,
Calls her to follow where she sees him standing
Fairer and stronger for the plunge of death;—
Waketh a vision and a voice within her
Sweeter than dreams and clearer than complaint,
“Is it a man thou lovest, and a sinner?
No! but a soul, o woman, and a saint!”
Sweeter than dreams and clearer than complaint,
“Is it a man thou lovest, and a sinner?
No! but a soul, o woman, and a saint!”
Well,—if to her such prophecy be given,
Strong to illuminate when sight is dim,
Then tho' my Lord be holy in the heaven
How should the heavens sunder me from Him?
Strong to illuminate when sight is dim,
Then tho' my Lord be holy in the heaven
How should the heavens sunder me from Him?
She and her love,—how dimly has she seen him
Dark in a dream and windy in a wraith!
I and my Lord,—between me and between Him
Rises the lucent ladder of my faith.
Dark in a dream and windy in a wraith!
218
Rises the lucent ladder of my faith.
Ay, and thereon, descending and ascending,
Suns at my side and starry in the air,
Angels, His ministers, their tasks are blending,
Bear me the blessing, render Him the prayer.
Suns at my side and starry in the air,
Angels, His ministers, their tasks are blending,
Bear me the blessing, render Him the prayer.
219
A PRAYER
O for one minute hark what we are saying!
This is not pleasure that we ask of Thee!
Nay, let all life be weary with our praying,
Streaming of tears and bending of the knee:—
This is not pleasure that we ask of Thee!
Nay, let all life be weary with our praying,
Streaming of tears and bending of the knee:—
Only we ask thro' shadows of the valley
Stay of thy staff and guiding of thy rod,
Only, when rulers of the darkness rally,
Be thou beside us, very near, O God!
Stay of thy staff and guiding of thy rod,
Only, when rulers of the darkness rally,
Be thou beside us, very near, O God!
220
A LAST APPEAL
O somewhere, somewhere, God unknown,
Exist and be!
I am dying; I am all alone;
I must have Thee!
Exist and be!
I am dying; I am all alone;
I must have Thee!
God! God! my sense, my soul, my all,
Dies in the cry:—
Saw'st thou the faint star flame and fall?
Ah! it was I.
Dies in the cry:—
Saw'st thou the faint star flame and fall?
Ah! it was I.
221
TENERIFFE
I
Atlantid islands, phantom-fair,Throned on the solitary seas,
Immersed in amethystine air,
Haunt of Hesperides!
Farewell! I leave Madeira thus
Drowned in a sunset glorious,
The Holy Harbour fading far
Beneath a blaze of cinnabar.
II
What sights had burning eve to showFrom Tacoronte's orange-bowers,
From palmy headlands of Ycod,
From Orotava's flowers!
When Palma or Canary lay
Cloud-cinctured in the crimson day,—
Sea, and sea-wrack, and rising higher
Those purple peaks 'twixt cloud and fire.
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III
But oh the cone aloft and clearWhere Atlas in the heavens withdrawn
To hemisphere and hemisphere
Disparts the dark and dawn!
O vaporous waves that roll and press!
Fire-opalescent wilderness!
O pathway by the sunbeams ploughed
Betwixt those pouring walls of cloud!
IV
We watched adown that glade of fireCelestial Iris floating free;
We saw the cloudlets keep in choir
Their dances on the sea;
The scarlet, huge, and quivering sun
Feared his due hour was overrun,—
On us the last he blazed, and hurled
His glory on Columbus' world.
V
Then ere our eyes the change could tell,Or feet bewildered turn again,
From Teneriffe the darkness fell
Head-foremost on the main:—
A hundred leagues was seaward thrown
The gloom of Teyde's towering cone,—
Full half the height of heaven's blue
That monstrous shadow overflew.
223
VI
Then all is twilight; pile on pileThe scattered flocks of cloudland close,
An alabaster wall, erewhile
Much redder than the rose!—
Falls like a sleep on souls forspent
Majestic Night's abandonment;
Wakes like a waking life afar
Hung o'er the sea one eastern star.
VII
O Nature's glory, Nature's youth,Perfected sempiternal whole!
And is the World's in very truth
An impercipient Soul?
Or doth that Spirit, past our ken,
Live a profounder life than men,
Awaits our passing days, and thus
In secret places calls to us?
VIII
O fear not thou, whate'er befallThy transient individual breath;—
Behold, thou knowest not at all
What kind of thing is Death:
And here indeed might Death be fair,
If Death be dying into air,—
If souls evanished mix with thee,
Illumined Heaven, eternal Sea.
224
A LETTER FROM NEWPORT
Φαιη κ' αθανατους και αγηπως εμμεναι αιει,
ος τοτ' επαντιασει', οτ' Ιαονες αθροοι ειεν.
ος τοτ' επαντιασει', οτ' Ιαονες αθροοι ειεν.
The crimson leafage fires the lawn,
The piled hydrangeas blazing glow;
How blue the vault of breezy dawn
Illumes the Atlantic's crested snow!
'Twixt sea and sands how fair to ride
Through whispering airs a starlit way,
And watch those flashing towers divide
Heaven's darkness from the darkling bay!
The piled hydrangeas blazing glow;
How blue the vault of breezy dawn
Illumes the Atlantic's crested snow!
'Twixt sea and sands how fair to ride
Through whispering airs a starlit way,
And watch those flashing towers divide
Heaven's darkness from the darkling bay!
Ah, friend, how vain their pedant's part,
Their hurrying toils how idly spent,
How have they wronged the gentler heart
Which thrills the awakening continent,
Who have not learnt on this bright shore
What sweetness issues from the strong,
Where flowerless forest, cataract-roar,
Have found a blossom and a song!
Their hurrying toils how idly spent,
How have they wronged the gentler heart
Which thrills the awakening continent,
Who have not learnt on this bright shore
What sweetness issues from the strong,
Where flowerless forest, cataract-roar,
Have found a blossom and a song!
Ah, what imperial force of fate
Links our one race in high emprize!
Nor aught henceforth can separate
Those glories mingling as they rise;
For one in heart, as one in speech,
At last have Child and Mother grown,—
Fair Figures! honouring each in each
A beauty kindred with her own.
Links our one race in high emprize!
Nor aught henceforth can separate
Those glories mingling as they rise;
225
At last have Child and Mother grown,—
Fair Figures! honouring each in each
A beauty kindred with her own.
Through English eyes more calmly soft
Looks from grey deeps the appealing charm;
Reddens on English cheeks more oft
The rose of innocent alarm:—
Our old-world heart more gravely feels,
Has learnt more force, more self-control;
For us through sterner music peals
The full accord of soul and soul.
Looks from grey deeps the appealing charm;
Reddens on English cheeks more oft
The rose of innocent alarm:—
Our old-world heart more gravely feels,
Has learnt more force, more self-control;
For us through sterner music peals
The full accord of soul and soul.
But ah, the life, the smile untaught,
The floating presence feathery-fair!
The eyes and aspect that have caught
The brilliance of Columbian air!
No oriole through the forest flits
More sheeny-plumed, more gay and free;
On no nymph's marble forehead sits
Proudlier a glad virginity.
The floating presence feathery-fair!
The eyes and aspect that have caught
The brilliance of Columbian air!
No oriole through the forest flits
More sheeny-plumed, more gay and free;
On no nymph's marble forehead sits
Proudlier a glad virginity.
So once the Egyptian, gravely bold,
Wandered the Ionian folk among,
Heard from their high Letôon rolled
That song the Delian maidens sung;
Danced in his eyes the dazzling gold,
For with his voice the tears had sprung,—
“They die not, these! they wax not old,
They are ever-living, ever-young!”
Wandered the Ionian folk among,
Heard from their high Letôon rolled
That song the Delian maidens sung;
Danced in his eyes the dazzling gold,
For with his voice the tears had sprung,—
“They die not, these! they wax not old,
They are ever-living, ever-young!”
226
Spread then, great land! thine arms afar,
Thy golden harvest westward roll;
Banner with banner, star with star,
Ally the tropics and the pole;—
There glows no gem than these more bright
From ice to fire, from sea to sea;
Blossoms no fairer flower to light
Through all thine endless empery.
Thy golden harvest westward roll;
Banner with banner, star with star,
Ally the tropics and the pole;—
There glows no gem than these more bright
From ice to fire, from sea to sea;
Blossoms no fairer flower to light
Through all thine endless empery.
And thou come hither, friend! thou too
Their kingdom enter as a boy;
Fed with their glorious youth renew
Thy dimmed prerogative of joy:—
Come with small question, little thought,
Through thy worn veins what pulse shall flow,
With what regrets, what fancies fraught,
Shall silver-footed summer go:—
Their kingdom enter as a boy;
Fed with their glorious youth renew
Thy dimmed prerogative of joy:—
Come with small question, little thought,
Through thy worn veins what pulse shall flow,
With what regrets, what fancies fraught,
Shall silver-footed summer go:—
If round one fairest face shall meet
Those many dreams of many fair,
And wandering homage seek the feet
Of one sweet queen, and linger there;
Or if strange winds betwixt be driven,
Unvoyageable oceans foam,
Nor this new earth, this airy heaven,
For thy sad heart can find a home.
Those many dreams of many fair,
And wandering homage seek the feet
Of one sweet queen, and linger there;
Or if strange winds betwixt be driven,
Unvoyageable oceans foam,
Nor this new earth, this airy heaven,
For thy sad heart can find a home.
Newport, R.I., Sept. 1879.
227
EPITHALAMIUM
To him our wisest, him our best,
What praise or guerdon could we bring?
What crown of ours could show confest
Our crownless unanointed king?—
Our hearts we gave him; strong and true
His heart replied, to help or heal,
Yet dumbly in his look we knew
A nameless infinite appeal.
What praise or guerdon could we bring?
What crown of ours could show confest
Our crownless unanointed king?—
Our hearts we gave him; strong and true
His heart replied, to help or heal,
Yet dumbly in his look we knew
A nameless infinite appeal.
Wealth, honours, fame,—hope's common range,—
We named and smiled and passed them by:—
No shine or shade without could change
The vision of that inward eye.
That temple by great thoughts upbuilt
Was void and stedfast, cold and fair;
No wine was on its altar spilt,
A god unknown was worshipped there.
We named and smiled and passed them by:—
No shine or shade without could change
The vision of that inward eye.
That temple by great thoughts upbuilt
Was void and stedfast, cold and fair;
No wine was on its altar spilt,
A god unknown was worshipped there.
Yet rarely thro' its heights he heard
Egerian echoes floating free;
An unbeholden presence stirred
His brow's austere serenity.
Then from the altar flashed the flame,
Flowed on the hearth the fervid wine,—
From heaven and air the answer came
And stood a Spirit in the shrine.
Egerian echoes floating free;
An unbeholden presence stirred
His brow's austere serenity.
228
Flowed on the hearth the fervid wine,—
From heaven and air the answer came
And stood a Spirit in the shrine.
One voice alone, one only hand,
The immaterial gift could give,
Could bid the world-wide soul expand,
A heart within the great heart live:—
No word of praise she sought to say,
For him no worldly crown to win,
But with a look, and in a day,
She gave a kingdom from within.
The immaterial gift could give,
Could bid the world-wide soul expand,
A heart within the great heart live:—
No word of praise she sought to say,
For him no worldly crown to win,
But with a look, and in a day,
She gave a kingdom from within.
O fate ordained, august, secure,
And Love the child that never dies,
When to the stainless earth is pure
And life all wisdom to the wise!
Aye shall the inner hope endure
That looks from their illumined eyes;
Thro' this the very world stands sure,
And souls like these are Paradise.
And Love the child that never dies,
When to the stainless earth is pure
And life all wisdom to the wise!
Aye shall the inner hope endure
That looks from their illumined eyes;
Thro' this the very world stands sure,
And souls like these are Paradise.
229
IN HENRY VII.'S CHAPEL, WESTMINSTER ABBEY
O holy heart of England! inmost shrineOf Mary's grace divine;
Proud aisles, where all things noble, all things high,
Her sweet soul magnify;
Vaults where the bones of mighty kings are laid,
Blest by a Mother-Maid!
One heart, great shrine, thou knewest then, be sure,
As thine own Mistress pure;
Eyes that like hers by supplication bless,
And reign by lowliness.
Oh solemn hour, and on Love's altar sent
Sun-fire for sacrament,
When in the age-old answers she and I
Made each to each reply;—
Ay, for a moment rose and were alone
With Him who was our own,
While wide on earth heaven's height made luminous
Shone, and the Lord on us.
230
Proclaimed the twain made one,—
Amid the banners of his Order spake
That oath no age can break!
Voice of a Ruler born to soothe and sway
Man on his wandering way,
Dowered with the courage glad, the wisdom mild,
Which keep the sage a child;
Whose high thoughts immanent have built him fair
A shrine in the upper air
Stainless, and still, and ever oftener trod
By messengers of God!
While to that voice amid those memories heard
Answered her underword,
No wonder if the Eternal Presence then
Seemed mute no more to men,
Nor gulf betwixt, nor any darkness shed
On souls miscalled the dead;
Since we and they, henceforth or long ago,
One life alone can know;—
Since from seas under earth to stars above
There is no joy but love,
Nor in God's house shall any glory be
Save God and such as she.
231
STANZAS ON MR. WATTS' COLLECTED WORKS
Elysian beauty, melancholy grace,
Brought from a pensive, though a happy place.
Brought from a pensive, though a happy place.
I
For many a year the master wrought,And wisdom deepened slow with years;
Guest-chambers of his inmost thought
Were filled with shapes too stern for tears;—
Yet Joy was there, and murmuring Love,
And Youth that hears with hastened breath,
But, throned in peace all these above,
The unrevealing eyes of Death.
II
Faces there were which won him yet,Fair daughters of an iron age:
In iron truth pourtrayed he set
Warrior and statesman, bard and sage.
232
The ancestral bent of stock and stem;
More of their hearts than yet they knew
Thro' their own gaze looked out on them.
III
Yet oftenest in the past he walked,With god or hero long gone by,
Oft, like his pictured Genius, talked
With rainbow forms that span the sky:
Thereto his soul hath listed long,
When silent voices spake in air,—
Hath mirrored many an old-world song
Remote and mystic, sad and fair.
IV
For here the Thracian, vainly wise,Close on the light his love has led;—
Oh hearken! her melodious cries
Fade in the mutter of the dead:—
“Farewell! from thy embrace I pass,
Drawn to the formless dark alone:
I stretch my hands,—too weak, alas!
And I no more, no more thine own.”
V
And here is she whom Art aflameSmote from the rock a breathing maid;
Calm at the fiery call she came,
Looked on her lover unafraid;
233
And love, till love with life had flown,
Or still with things unborn to rest,
Ideal beauty, changeless stone.
VI
Ah! which the sweeter? she who stands,A soul to woe that moment born,—
Regretfully her aimless hands
Drooping by Psyche's side forlorn?—
Woke with a shock the god unknown,
And sighing flushed, and flying sighed:
Grey in the dawning stands alone
His desolate and childly bride.
VII
Or she whose soft limbs swiftly spedThe touch of very gods must shun,
And, drowned in many a boscage, fled
The imperious kisses of the sun?
Mix, mix with Daphne, branch and frond,
O laurel-wildness, laurel-shade!
Let Nature's life,—no love beyond,—
Make all the marriage of the maid!
VIII
Or she who, deep in Latmian trees,Stoops from the height her silver sheen?
Dreams in a dream her shepherd sees
The crescent car, the bending queen.
234
A closer bond or longer stay:
The boy sleeps still; her orb renews
Its echoless unmated way.
IX
All these some hope unanswered know,Some laws that prison, fates that bar;
Baffled their spirit-fountains flow
Towards things diviner and afar.
Such dole at heart their painter felt,
Within, without, such sights to see;
Who in our monstrous London dwelt,
And half remembered Arcady.
X
Ah, sure, those springs of joy and painBy some remote recall are stirred;
His ancient Guardians smile again,
And touch a colour, speak a word.
Not all asleep thy gods of Greece
Lie tumbled on the Coan shore:—
O painter! thou that knew'st their peace
Must half remember evermore!
XI
So gazed on Phidias' Warrior-maid,Methinks, Ægina's kingly boy:—
She stood, her Gorgon shield displayed,
Too great for love, too grave for joy.
235
This world, this life, with day grew dim;
Some glimmering of the Primal Fair
Pre-natal memories woke in him.
XII
Then as he walked, like one who dreamed,Thro' silent highways silver-hoar,
More wonderful that city seemed,
And he diviner than before:—
A voice was calling, All is well;
Clear in the vault Selene shone,
And over Plato's homestead fell
The shadow of the Parthenon.
| Collected Poems: With Autobiographical and Critical Fragments | |