Myth and Romance Part 3

He who profanes thy perilous threshold,--where The ancient centuries lair, And, glacier-throned, thy monarch, Winter, nods,-- Let him beware!

Lest, coming on that h.o.a.ry presence there, Whose pitiless hand, Above that hungry land, An iceberg wields as sceptre, and whose crown The North Star is, set in a band of frost, He, too, shall feel the bitterness of that frown, And, turned to stone, forevermore be lost.

_Dionysia_

The day is dead; and in the west The slender crescent of the moon-- Diana's crystal-kindled crest-- Sinks hillward in a silvery swoon.

What is the murmur in the dell?

The stealthy whisper and the drip?-- A Dryad with her leaf-light trip?

Or Naiad o'er her fountain well?-- Who, with white fingers for her comb, Sleeks her blue hair, and from its curls Showers slim minnows and pale pearls, And hollow music of the foam.

What is it in the vistaed ways That leans and springs, and stoops and sways?-- The naked limbs of one who flees?

An Oread who hesitates Before the Satyr form that waits, Crouching to leap, that there she sees?

Or under boughs, reclining cool, A Hamadryad, like a pool Of moonlight, palely beautiful?

Or Limnad, with her lilied face, More lovely than the misty lace That haunts a star and gives it grace?

Or is it some Leimoniad, In wildwood flowers dimly clad?

Oblong blossoms white as froth; Or mottled like the tiger-moth; Or brindled as the brows of death; Wild of hue and wild of breath.

Here ethereal flame and milk Blent with velvet and with silk; Here an iridescent glow Mixed with satin and with snow: Pansy, poppy and the pale Serpolet and galingale; Mandrake and anemone, Honey-reservoirs o' the bee; Cistus and the cyclamen,-- Cheeked like blus.h.i.+ng Hebe this, And the other white as is Bubbled milk of Venus when Cupid's baby mouth is pressed, Rosy, to her rosy breast.

And, besides, all flowers that mate With aroma, and in hue Stars and rainbows duplicate Here on earth for me and you.

Yea! at last mine eyes can see!

'Tis no shadow of the tree Swaying softly there, but she!-- Maenad, Ba.s.sarid, Bacchant, What you will, who doth enchant Night with sensuous nudity.

Lo! again I hear her pant Breasting through the dewy glooms-- Through the glow-worm gleams and glowers Of the starlight;--wood-perfumes Swoon around her and frail showers Of the leaflet-tilted rain.

Lo, like love, she comes again, Through the pale, voluptuous dusk, Sweet of limb with b.r.e.a.s.t.s of musk.

With her lips, like blossoms, breathing Honeyed pungence of her kiss, And her auburn tresses wreathing Like umbrageous helichrys, There she stands, like fire and snow, In the moon's ambrosial glow, Both her shapely loins low-looped With the balmy blossoms, drooped, Of the deep amaracus.

Spiritual yet sensual, Lo, she ever greets me thus In my vision; white and tall, Her delicious body there,-- Raimented with amorous air,-- To my mind expresses all The allurements of the world.

And once more I seem to feel On my soul, like frenzy, hurled All the pa.s.sionate past.--I reel, Greek again in ancient Greece, In the Pyrrhic revelries; In the mad and Maenad dance Onward dragged with violence; Pan and old Silenus and Faunus and a Bacchant band Round me. Wild my wine-stained hand O'er tumultuous hair is lifted; While the flushed and Phallic orgies Whirl around me; and the marges Of the wood are torn and rifted With lascivious laugh and shout.

And barbarian there again,-- Shameless with the shameless rout, Bacchus l.u.s.ting in each vein,-- With her pagan lips on mine, Like a G.o.d made drunk with wine, On I reel; and, in the revels, Her loose hair, the dance dishevels, Blows, and 'thwart my vision swims All the splendor of her limbs....

So it seems. Yet woods are lonely.

And when I again awake, I shall find their faces only Moonbeams in the boughs that shake; And their revels, but the rush Of night-winds through bough and brush.

Yet my dreaming--is it more Than mere dreaming? Is some door Opened in my soul? a curtain Raised? to let me see for certain I have lived that life before?

_The Last Song_

She sleeps; he sings to her. The day was long, And, tired out with too much happiness, She fain would have him sing of old Provence; Quaint songs, that spoke of love in such soft tones, Her restless soul was straight besieged of dreams, And her wild heart beleagured of deep peace, And heart and soul surrendered unto sleep.-- Like perfect sculpture in the moon she lies, Its pallor on her through heraldic panes Of one tall cas.e.m.e.nt's guled quarterings.-- Beside her couch, an antique table, weighed With gold and crystal; here, a carven chair, Whereon her raiment,--that suggests sweet curves Of shapely beauty,--bearing her limbs' impress, Is richly laid: and, near the chair, a gla.s.s, An oval mirror framed in ebony: And, dim and deep,--investing all the room With ghostly life of woven women and men, And strange fantastic gloom, where shadows live,-- Dark tapestry,--which in the gusts--that twinge A grotesque cresset's slender star of light-- Seems moved of cautious hands, a.s.sa.s.sin-like, That wait the hour.

She alone, deep-haired As rosy dawn, and whiter than a rose, Divinely breasted as the Queen of Love, Lies robeless in the glimmer of the moon, Like Danae within the golden shower.

Seated beside her aromatic rest, In rapture musing on her loveliness, Her knight and troubadour. A lute, aslope The curious baldric of his tunic, glints With pearl-reflections of the moon, that seem The silent ghosts of long-dead melodies.

In purple and sable, slashed with solemn gold, Like stately twilight o'er the snow-heaped hills, He bends above her.-- Have his hands forgot Their craft, that they pause, idle on the strings?

His lips, their art, that they cease, speechless there?-- His eyes are set.... What is it stills to stone His hands, his lips? and mails him, head and heel, In terrible marble, motionless and cold?-- Behind the arras, can it be he feels, Black-browed and grim, with eyes of sombre fire, Death towers above him with uplifted sword?

_Romaunt of the Oak_

"I rode to death, for I fought for shame-- The Lady Maurine of n.o.ble name,

"The fair and faithless!--Though life be long Is love the wiser?--Love made song

"Of all my life; and the soul that crept Before, arose like a star and leapt:

"Still leaps with the love that it found untrue, That it found unworthy.--Now run me through!

"Yea, run me through! for meet and well, And a jest for laughter of fiends in h.e.l.l,

"It is that I, who have done no wrong, Should die by the hand of Hugh the Strong,

"Of Hugh her leman!--What else could be When the devil was judge twixt thee and me?

"He splintered my lance, and my blade he broke-- Now finish me thou 'neath the trysting oak!" ...

The crest of his foeman,--a heart of white In a bath of fire,--stooped i' the night;

Stooped and laughed as his sword he swung, Then galloped away with a laugh on his tongue....

But who is she in the gray, wet dawn, 'Mid the autumn shades like a shadow wan?

Who kneels, one hand on her straining breast, One hand on the dead man's bosom pressed?

Her face is dim as the dead's; as cold As his tarnished harness of steel and gold.

O Lady Maurine! O Lady Maurine!

What boots it now that regret is keen?

That his hair you smooth, that you kiss his brow What boots it now? what boots it now?...

She has haled him under the trysting oak, The huge old oak that the creepers cloak.

She has stood him, gaunt in his battered arms, In its haunted hollow.--"Be safe from storms,"

She laughed as his cloven casque she placed On his brow, and his riven s.h.i.+eld she braced.

Then sat and talked to the forest flowers Through the lonely term of the day's pale hours.

And stared and whispered and smiled and wept, While nearer and nearer the evening crept.

And, lo, when the moon, like a great gold bloom Above the sorrowful trees did loom,

She rose up sobbing, "O moon, come see My bridegroom here in the old oak-tree!

"I have talked to the flowers all day, all day, For never a word had he to say.