Poems Part 2

In the street, the tide of being, how it surges, how it rolls!

G.o.d! what base ign.o.ble faces, G.o.d! what bodies wanting souls, 'Mid this stream of human being, banked by houses tall and grim, Pale I stand this s.h.i.+ning morrow with a pant for woodlands dim, To hear the soft and whispering rain, feel the dewy cool of leaves, Watch the lightnings dart like swallows round the brooding thunder-eaves, To lose the sense of whirling streets, 'mong breezy crests of hills, Skies of larks, and hazy landscapes, with fine threads of silver rills,-- Stand with forehead bathed in sunset on a mountain's summer crown, And look up and watch the shadow of the great night coming down, One great life in my myriad veins, in leaves, in flowers, in cloudy cars, Blowing, underfoot, in clover; beating, overhead, in stars!

Once I saw a blissful harvest-moon, but not through forest-leaves; 'Twas not whitening o'er a country, costly with the piled sheaves; Rose not o'er the am'rous ocean, trembling round his happy isles; It came circling large and queenly o'er yon roof of smoky tiles, And I saw it with such feeling, joy in blood, in heart, in brain, I would give to call the affluence of that moment back again, Europe, with her cities, rivers, hills of prey, sheep-sprinkled downs,-- Ay, a hundred sheaves of sceptres! Ay, a planet's gathered crowns!

For with that resplendent harvest-moon, my inmost thoughts were shared By a bright and s.h.i.+ning maiden, hazel-eyed and golden-haired; One blest hour we sat together in a lone and silent place, O'er us, starry tears were trembling on the mighty midnight's face.

Gradual crept my arm around her, 'gainst my shoulder came her head, And I could but draw her closer, whilst I tremulously said,-- "Pa.s.sion as it runs grows purer, loses every tinge of clay, As from Dawn all red and turbid flows the white transparent Day, And in mingled lives of lovers, the array of human ills Breaks their gentle course to music, as the stones break summer rills."

"You should give the world," she murmured, "such delicious thoughts as these."

"They are fit to line portmanteaus;" "Nay," she whispered, "Memories."

And thereat she looked upon me with a smile so full of grace, All my blood was in a moment glowing in my ardent face!

Half-blind, I looked up to the host of palpitating stars, 'Gainst my sides my heart was leaping, like a lion 'gainst his bars, For a thought was born within me, and I said within my mind, "I will risk all in this moment, I will either lose or find."

"Dost thou love me?" then I whispered; for a minute after this, I sat and trembled in great blackness--On my lips I felt a kiss;-- Than a roseleaf's touch 'twas lighter,--on her face her hands she prest, And a heaven of tears and blushes was deep buried in my breast.

I could make _her_ faith, _my_ pa.s.sion, a wide mark for scorn and sneers, I could laugh a hollow laughter but for these hot bursting tears; In the strong hand of my frenzy, laws and statutes snapt like reeds, And furious as a wounded bull I tore at all the creeds; I rushed into the desert, where I stood with hopeless eyes, Glaring on vast desolations, barren sands, and empty skies!

Soon a trembling naked figure, to the earth my face was bowed, For the curse of G.o.d gloomed o'er me like a bursting thunder-cloud.

Rolled away that fearful darkness, pa.s.s'd my weakness, pa.s.s'd my grief, Washed with bitter tears I sat full in the suns.h.i.+ne of belief.

Weary eyes are looking eastward, whence the golden sun upsprings, Cry the young and fervid spirits, clad with ardour as with wings, "Life and Soul make wretched jangling, they should mingle to one Sire As the lovely voices mingle in a holy temple choir.

O! those souls of ours, my brothers! prisoned now in mortal bars, Have been riched by growth and travel, by the round of all the stars.

Soul, alas! is unregarded; Brothers! it is closely shut: All unknown as royal Alfred in the Saxon neatherd's hut, In the Dark house of the Body, cooking victuals, lighting fires, Swelters on the starry stranger, to our nature's base desires.

From its lips is 't any marvel that no revelations come?

We have wronged it; we do wrong it--'tis majestically dumb!

G.o.d! our souls are ap.r.o.ned waiters! G.o.d! our souls are hired slaves: Let us hide from Life, my Brothers! let us hide us in our graves.

O! why stain our holy childhoods? Why sell all for drinks and meats?

Why degrade, like those old mansions, standing in our pauper streets, Lodgings _once_ of kings and n.o.bles, silken stirs and trumpet's din, _Now_, where crouch 'mong rags and fever, shapes of squalor and of sin?"

Like a mist this wail surrounds me; Brothers, hush; the Lord Christ's hands Ev'n now are stretched in blessing o'er the sea and o'er the lands.

Sit not like a mourner, Brother! by the grave of that dear Past, Throw the Present! 'tis thy servant only when 'tis overcast,-- Give battle to the leagued world, if thou'rt worthy, truly brave, Thou shalt make the hardest circ.u.mstance a helper or a slave, As when thunder wraps the setting sun, he struggles, glows with ire, Rifts the gloom with golden furrows, with a hundred bursts of fire, Melts the black and thund'rous ma.s.ses to a sphere of rosy light, Then on edge of glowing heaven smiles in triumph on the night.

Lo! the song of Earth--a maniac's on a black and dreary road-- Rises up, and swells, and grandeurs, to the loud triumphal ode-- Earth casts off a slough of darkness, an eclipse of h.e.l.l and sin, In each cycle of her being, as an adder casts her skin; Lo! I see long blissful ages, when these mammon days are done, Stretching like a golden ev'ning forward to the setting sun.

He sat one winter 'neath a linden tree In my bare orchard: "See, my friend," he said, "The stars among the branches hang like fruit, So, hopes were thick within me. When I'm gone The world will like a valuator sit Upon my soul, and say, 'I was a cloud That caught its glory from a sunken sun, And gradual burn'd into its native grey.'"

On an October eve, 'twas his last wish To see again the mists and golden woods; Upon his death-bed he was lifted up, The slumb'rous sun within the lazy west With their last gladness filled his dying eyes.

No sooner was he hence than critic-worms Were swarming on the body of his fame, And thus they judged the dead: "This Poet was An April tree whose vermeil-loaded boughs Promised to Autumn apples juiced and red, But never came to fruit." "He is to us But a rich odour,--a faint music-swell."

"Poet he was not in the larger sense; He could write pearls, but he could never write A Poem round and perfect as a star."

"Politic i' faith. His most judicious act Was dying when he did; the next five years Had fingered all the fine dust from his wings, And left him poor as we. He died--'twas shrewd!

And came with all his youth and unblown hopes On the world's heart, and touched it into tears."

LADY.

Would'st thou, too, be a poet?

WALTER.

Lady! ay!

A pa.s.sion has grown up to be a King, Ruling my being with as fierce a sway As the mad sun the prostrate desert sands, And it is _that_.

LADY.

Hast some great cherished theme?

WALTER.

Lovely in G.o.d's eyes, where, in barren s.p.a.ce, Like a rich jewel hangs His universe, Unwrinkled as a dew-drop, and as fair, In my poor eyes, my loved and chosen theme Is lovely as the universe in His.

LADY.

Wilt write of some young wanton of an isle Whose beauty so enamoured hath the sea, It clasps it ever in its summer arms And wastes itself away on it in kisses?

Or the hot Indes, on whose teeming plains The seasons four knit in one flowery band Are dancing ever? Or some older realm?

WALTER.

I will begin in the oldest; far in G.o.d.

When all the ages, and all suns, and worlds, And souls of men and angels, lay in Him Like unborn forests in an acorn cup.

LADY.

And how wilt thou begin it?

WALTER.

With old words!

With the soliloquy with which G.o.d broke The silence of the dead eternities.

At which most ancient words, O beautiful!

With showery tresses like a child from sleep, Uprose the splendid-mooned and jewelled night,-- The loveliest born of G.o.d.

LADY.

Then your first chorus Must be the shoutings of the morning stars!

What martial music is to marching men Should Song be to Humanity. In song The infant ages born and swathed are.

A beauteous menial to our wants divine, A shape celestial tending the dark earth With light and silver service like the moon, Is Poesy; ever remember this-- How wilt thou end it?

WALTER.

With G.o.d and Silence!

When the great universe subsides in G.o.d, Ev'n as a moment's foam subsides again Upon the wave that bears it.

LADY.

Why, thy plan Is wide and daring as a comet's path!

And doubtless 'twill contain the tale of earth By way of episode or anecdote.

This precious world which one pale marred face Dropt tears upon. This base and beggar world To your rich soul! O! Marc Anthony, With a fine scorn did toss your world away For Cleopatra's lips!--so rich, so poor.

SCENE III.

_Antique Room._ WALTER _pacing up and down._

WALTER.

Thou day beyond to-morrow! though my life Should cease in thee, I'd dash aside the hours That intervene to bring thee quicklier here.

Again to meet her in the windy woods!

When last we met she was as marble, calm: I, with thick-beating heart and sight grown dim, And leaping pulses and loud-ringing ears, And tell-tale blood that rushed into my face, And blabbed the love secreted in my heart.

She must have understood that crimson speech, And yet she frowned not. No, she never frowned I think that I am worthy to be loved.

Oh, could I lift my heart into her sight, As an old mountain lifts its martyr's cairn Into the pure sight of the holy heavens!

Would she but love me, I would live for her!