The Poetical Works of George Barlow :: :: University of Virginia Library

I am as Adam, thou art Eve; we stand
Lonely at last upon a lonely star.
The lot of those who peopled earth was grand,
But our dispeopling doom is grander far.

We form the first link with a higher race:
All earth's old passions vanish into air.
I see the dawning angel in thy face;
I mark heaven's halo brightening round thy hair.

We, letting all old instincts fade and flee,
Dismissing all that marred the race's powers,
Shall add new glory to an unknown sea,
Mix tenderer fragrance with the unborn flowers.

For every blossom suffered at the birth
Of sin,—the fields took on a sombre hue:
Gladness forsook the green old festive earth;
The waves grew grey that once were joyous blue.

145

Love has to answer for the stormy past:
Love, guided well by woman's traitorous hand,
Has wrecked the stars—till this, the very last,
On which to-day with lonely feet we stand.

Thou art the culprit,—thou, with eyes so sweet
And lips that seem like pure half-opened flowers,
Hast forced the world's Creator to retreat:
The power to extinguish love at last is ours!

The Woman.

Nay! 'tis the power to make a new beginning
That's ours, to shed new splendour o'er the sea.
If love be sin, then very sweet is sinning:
Sin shall endure throughout eternity.

Was ever rose less pure in that it nestled,
Luxuriant, on some bosom warm and white?
When God with Chaos' ebon darkness wrestled,
It was to give love never-ending light.

Was ever star less brilliant at the casement,
Has ever moon with lesser lustre gleamed,
Watching some lover in sweet first amazement
Kissing the lips of which for years he dreamed?

146

Wilt thou resume with speechless exultation
The passionate raptures of past years untold,
See in my eyes the love-looks of a nation,
A century's sunshine in my hair of gold?

The flowers of all the past, the loves resplendent
That starlike lit old cities, hills, and plains,
Are all for thee,—on thee they wait attendant:
Lo! Cleopatra burns within my veins.

Holding my hand, quite fearless thou mayest enter
Strange bowers of love in many a far-off place:
For thee shall Fate with ardent touch concentre
All beauty in one incomparable face.

Wilt thou consent to make me mighty mother
Of timeless generations yet to arise?
Adam begat one world—beget another!
Make fruitful all the dark womb of the skies!

Be father of the years beyond man's numbering;
Propel afresh the life-throbs of the race
Along the channels where life pauses, slumbering:
Behold new starlight, gazing on my face!

147

Wilt thou consent, O mortal, firm, unfearing,
To crowd the lifeless heaven that o'er us gleams
With fleets of planets through the dark waves steering,
Lord of a kingdom mocking mortal dreams?

This thou canst do, and more,—the moment fateful,
August and solemn, calls thee to decide.
Above us loom vast starless heavens and hateful:
Around us stretch lone lifeless fields and wide.

Trust thou the power of fatherhood residing
Within thy soul to me—Disperse the gloom!
The winds of winter look to thee for guiding:
Raise the dead summers from their darkling tomb.

Lo! at thy word the June-days bright and burning
Shall flash their spears once more against the sun:
Within new lovers' hearts shall wake the old yearning;
Win me! even so our daughters shall be won.

New buoyant springs, whose young hearts leap for gladness,
Shall fill the warm pure air with scent of may:
New autumns, full of soft and tremulous sadness,
Feel at love's touch that sadness melt away.

148

Thou shalt be lord of all the circling seasons;
Lord of the summer, as of winter's snows:
Ruler and lord of all the dark sea's treasons;
Lord of the love that beckons from the rose.

Thou, the creator of the new world's rapture,
Shalt share the passionate life that is to be:
Preside, it may be, at some new Troy's capture,
Hold the steep pass at some Thermopylæ.

New cities shall be thine, new Londons greet thee;
New fiercer life than that which throbbed of old
Along the madding streets surge round thee and meet thee;
New sunsets tinge their skies with stormier gold.

Aye, like the waves of their own seas let nations
Rise into light, flash high, then disappear,—
Calm joys succeed to stormy tribulations,
And golden springs to many a snow-clad year.

New poets, mightier than the great who slumber,
Through the broad portals of the years shall move:
But all shall sing of me,—of all their number
Thorn-crowned, sin-marred, not one shall fail to love.

149

Music shall seek the skies, a form imperial:
But, as more skilled time's strong musicians grow,
Still must love render the wild strings ethereal;
I sway them, whether their hearts will or no.

New sculptors, marble-moulding, still for ever
Their heavenliest impulse from my form shall take.
Shall one curve pass from human memory? Never!
Dead marble shall be deathless for my sake.

Anew the vast cathedrals where love sleeping
Waited love's longed-for resurrection morn
Shall rise, and hear the sound of women weeping,
The passionate prayers of races yet unborn.

With kingly wealth impassioned Art combining
Shall raise bright palaces in many a land:
But ever love's shall be the heart designing,
And love's the shaping and adorning hand.

Nought shall evade us! by this sweet transgression,
This sin superb, if sin indeed it be,
We shall for ever stamp our own impression
On stars and sun, and towns and hills and sea.

150

Nor only heaven again in all its glory
Thou shalt compel time's hand to recreate:
Thou shalt rewrite the legend, the fierce story,
Of hell,—reprint man's epic poem of hate.

Again shall Torquemada's spirit sinister
Flash forth upon the world, blood-stained yet grand;
Ambassador for God, yet Satan's minister,
Climbing the stairs of heaven with dripping hand.

Again shall many a prelate's voice of thunder
Proclaim his own flock saved, the heathen doomed.
At hell's Bastille again shall sweet love wonder,
And weep for thousands in its vaults entombed.

Again shall man, invincible, eternal,
With thousand-throated laugh of mocking scorn
Roll back the gates barred by the hands infernal,
And flood night's dungeons with the sunlit morn.

Again shall battle's fierce throbs course and tingle
Through ardent souls on many a future sea:
Again smoke-vomiting iron fleets commingle;—
Their guns await one signal-flash from thee!

151

Thou hast to speak the word that hurls an ocean
Of sword-points at some far-off Waterloo
Against calm squares: thine is the intense emotion
Of combat, ever-fierce and ever-new.

Thine is the fury of battle—thine for ever
Love's pleasure; young lips pause at lips most sweet,—
Apart, they wait thy mandate.—Wilt thou never
Speak the one radiant word that bids them meet?

Thou hast the power to bid wild passion waken;
The power to bid great countless stars arise
Upon the night wherethrough with heart unshaken
The maid who seeks her lover peers and flies.

Hand thrills not hand till thou dost join them—never
Without thy will can one love-deed be done.
Thou canst blindfold the watchers,—thou for ever
Canst bring sweet darkness, and blindfold the sun.

The woman tremulous in her moonless chamber
Dreads lest love's foot i'the darkness go astray:
But thou canst light love's lamp of golden-amber,
The summer moon that shows love's foot the way.

152

Thou hast the power to unbar the morning's portal:
Thou canst restore the sun's kiss to the wave.
Love, slain by Fate, will rise up, vast, immortal,
If thou wilt summon Love's form from the grave.

Say to the drowséd waters, turning seaward,
“Awake!”—to heaven say, “Let the darkness flee!”
Scatter the soul's deep darkness, turning meward:
Lift up thine eyes, thy princely face, on me.

Wilt thou consent to be the king-creator
On whom the eyes of the ages shall be bent,—
Wilt thou, my slave, be to all else dictator,—
Wilt thou consent to love me?

The Man.

I consent.