Bulchevy's Book of English Verse Part 151

Algernon Charles Swinburne. 1837-1909

808. Chorus from 'Atalanta'

WHEN the hounds of spring are on winter's traces, The mother of months in meadow or plain Fills the shadows and windy places With lisp of leaves and ripple of rain; And the brown bright nightingale amorous Is half a.s.suaged for Itylus, For the Thracian s.h.i.+ps and the foreign faces.

The tongueless vigil, and all the pain.

Come with bows bent and with emptying of quivers, Maiden most perfect, lady of light, With a noise of winds and many rivers, With a clamour of waters, and with might; Bind on thy sandals, O thou most fleet, Over the splendour and speed of thy feet; For the faint east quickens, the wan west s.h.i.+vers, Round the feet of the day and the feet of the night.

Where shall we find her, how shall we sing to her, Fold our hands round her knees, and cling?

O that man's heart were as fire and could spring to her, Fire, or the strength of the streams that spring!

For the stars and the winds are unto her As raiment, as songs of the harp-player; For the risen stars and the fallen cling to her, And the southwest-wind and the west-wind sing.

For winter's rains and ruins are over, And all the season of snows and sins; The days dividing lover and lover, The light that loses, the night that wins; And time remember'd is grief forgotten, And frosts are slain and flowers begotten, And in green underwood and cover Blossom by blossom the spring begins.

The full streams feed on flower of rushes, Ripe gra.s.ses trammel a travelling foot, The faint fresh flame of the young year flushes From leaf to flower and flower to fruit; And fruit and leaf are as gold and fire, And the oat is heard above the lyre, And the hoofed heel of a satyr crushes The chestnut-husk at the chestnut-root.

And Pan by noon and Bacchus by night, Fleeter of foot than the fleet-foot kid, Follows with dancing and fills with delight The Maenad and the Ba.s.sarid; And soft as lips that laugh and hide The laughing leaves of the trees divide, And screen from seeing and leave in sight The G.o.d pursuing, the maiden hid.

The ivy falls with the Baccha.n.a.l's hair Over her eyebrows hiding her eyes; The wild vine slipping down leaves bare Her bright breast shortening into sighs; The wild vine slips with the weight of its leaves, But the berried ivy catches and cleaves To the limbs that glitter, the feet that scare The wolf that follows, the fawn that flies.

Algernon Charles Swinburne. 1837-1909

809. Hertha

I AM that which began; Out of me the years roll; Out of me G.o.d and man; I am equal and whole; G.o.d changes, and man, and the form of them bodily; I am the soul.

Before ever land was, Before ever the sea, Or soft hair of the gra.s.s, Or fair limbs of the tree, Or the flesh-colour'd fruit of my branches, I was, and thy soul was in me.

First life on my sources First drifted and swam; Out of me are the forces That save it or d.a.m.n; Out of me man and woman, and wild-beast and bird: before G.o.d was, I am.

Beside or above me Naught is there to go; Love or unlove me, Unknow me or know, I am that which unloves me and loves; I am stricken, and I am the blow.

I the mark that is miss'd And the arrows that miss, I the mouth that is kiss'd And the breath in the kiss, The search, and the sought, and the seeker, the soul and the body that is.

I am that thing which blesses My spirit elate; That which caresses With hands uncreate My limbs unbegotten that measure the length of the measure of fate.

But what thing dost thou now, Looking G.o.dward, to cry, 'I am I, thou art thou, I am low, thou art high'?

I am thou, whom thou seekest to find him; find thou but thyself, thou art I.

I the grain and the furrow, The plough-cloven clod And the ploughshare drawn thorough, The germ and the sod, The deed and the doer, the seed and the sower, the dust which is G.o.d.

Hast thou known how I fas.h.i.+on'd thee, Child, underground?

Fire that impa.s.sion'd thee, Iron that bound, Dim changes of water, what thing of all these hast thou known of or found?

Canst thou say in thine heart Thou hast seen with thine eyes With what cunning of art Thou wast wrought in what wise, By what force of what stuff thou wast shapen, and shown on my breast to the skies?

Who hath given, who hath sold it thee, Knowledge of me?

Has the wilderness told it thee?

Hast thou learnt of the sea?

Hast thou communed in spirit with night? have the winds taken counsel with thee?

Have I set such a star To show light on thy brow That thou sawest from afar What I show to thee now?

Have ye spoken as brethren together, the sun and the mountains and thou?

What is here, dost thou know it?

What was, hast thou known?

Prophet nor poet Nor tripod nor throne Nor spirit nor flesh can make answer, but only thy mother alone.

Mother, not maker, Born, and not made; Though her children forsake her, Allured or afraid, Praying prayers to the G.o.d of their fas.h.i.+on, she stirs not for all that have pray'd.

A creed is a rod, And a crown is of night; But this thing is G.o.d, To be man with thy might, To grow straight in the strength of thy spirit, and live out thy life as the light.

I am in thee to save thee, As my soul in thee saith; Give thou as I gave thee, Thy life-blood and breath, Green leaves of thy labour, white flowers of thy thought, and red fruit of thy death.

Be the ways of thy giving As mine were to thee; The free life of thy living, Be the gift of it free; Not as servant to lord, nor as master to slave, shalt thou give thee to me.

O children of banishment, Souls overcast, Were the lights ye see vanish meant Alway to last, Ye would know not the sun overs.h.i.+ning the shadows and stars overpast.

I that saw where ye trod The dim paths of the night Set the shadow call'd G.o.d In your skies to give light; But the morning of manhood is risen, and the shadowless soul is in sight.

The tree many-rooted That swells to the sky With frondage red-fruited, The life-tree am I; In the buds of your lives is the sap of my leaves: ye shall live and not die.

But the G.o.ds of your fas.h.i.+on That take and that give, In their pity and pa.s.sion That scourge and forgive, They are worms that are bred in the bark that falls off; they shall die and not live.

My own blood is what stanches The wounds in my bark; Stars caught in my branches Make day of the dark, And are wors.h.i.+pp'd as suns till the sunrise shall tread out their fires as a spark.

Where dead ages hide under The live roots of the tree, In my darkness the thunder Makes utterance of me; In the clash of my boughs with each other ye hear the waves sound of the sea.

That noise is of Time, As his feathers are spread And his feet set to climb Through the boughs overhead, And my foliage rings round him and rustles, and branches are bent with his tread.

The storm-winds of ages Blow through me and cease, The war-wind that rages, The spring-wind of peace, Ere the breath of them roughen my tresses, ere one of my blossoms increase.

All sounds of all changes, All shadows and lights On the world's mountain-ranges And stream-riven heights, Whose tongue is the wind's tongue and language of storm-clouds on earth-shaking nights;

All forms of all faces, All works of all hands In unsearchable places Of time-stricken lands, All death and all life, and all reigns and all ruins, drop through me as sands.

Though sore be my burden And more than ye know, And my growth have no guerdon But only to grow, Yet I fail not of growing for lightnings above me or deathworms below.

These too have their part in me, As I too in these; Such fire is at heart in me, Such sap is this tree's, Which hath in it all sounds and all secrets of infinite lands and of seas.

In the spring-colour'd hours When my mind was as May's There brake forth of me flowers By centuries of days, Strong blossoms with perfume of manhood, shot out from my spirit as rays.

And the sound of them springing And smell of their shoots Were as warmth and sweet singing And strength to my roots; And the lives of my children made perfect with freedom of soul were my fruits.

I bid you but be; I have need not of prayer; I have need of you free As your mouths of mine air; That my heart may be greater within me, beholding the fruits of me fair.

More fair than strange fruit is Of faiths ye espouse; In me only the root is That blooms in your boughs; Behold now your G.o.d that ye made you, to feed him with faith of your vows.