The Three Taverns Part 10

"No, you are never cruel. If once or twice I found you so, I could applaud and sing.

Jealous of -- What? You are not very wise.

Does not the good Book tell you anything?

"In David's time poor Michal had to go.

Jealous of G.o.d? Well, if you like it so."

The Old King's New Jester

You that in vain would front the coming order With eyes that meet forlornly what they must, And only with a furtive recognition See dust where there is dust, -- Be sure you like it always in your faces, Obscuring your best graces, Blinding your speech and sight, Before you seek again your dusty places Where the old wrong seems right.

Longer ago than cave-men had their changes Our fathers may have slain a son or two, Discouraging a further dialectic Regarding what was new; And after their unstudied admonition Occasional contrition For their old-fas.h.i.+oned ways May have reduced their doubts, and in addition Softened their final days.

Farther away than feet shall ever travel Are the vague towers of our unbuilded State; But there are mightier things than we to lead us, That will not let us wait.

And we go on with none to tell us whether Or not we've each a tether Determining how fast or far we go; And it is well, since we must go together, That we are not to know.

If the old wrong and all its injured glamour Haunts you by day and gives your night no peace, You may as well, agreeably and serenely, Give the new wrong its lease; For should you nourish a too fervid yearning For what is not returning, The vicious and unfused ingredient May give you qualms -- and one or two concerning The last of your content.

Lazarus

"No, Mary, there was nothing -- not a word.

Nothing, and always nothing. Go again Yourself, and he may listen -- or at least Look up at you, and let you see his eyes.

I might as well have been the sound of rain, A wind among the cedars, or a bird; Or nothing. Mary, make him look at you; And even if he should say that we are nothing, To know that you have heard him will be something.

And yet he loved us, and it was for love The Master gave him back. Why did He wait So long before He came? Why did He weep?

I thought He would be glad -- and Lazarus -- To see us all again as He had left us -- All as it was, all as it was before."

Mary, who felt her sister's frightened arms Like those of someone drowning who had seized her, Fearing at last they were to fail and sink Together in this fog-stricken sea of strangeness, Fought sadly, with bereaved indignant eyes, To find again the fading sh.o.r.es of home That she had seen but now could see no longer.

Now she could only gaze into the twilight, And in the dimness know that he was there, Like someone that was not. He who had been Their brother, and was dead, now seemed alive Only in death again -- or worse than death; For tombs at least, always until today, Though sad were certain. There was nothing certain For man or G.o.d in such a day as this; For there they were alone, and there was he -- Alone; and somewhere out of Bethany, The Master -- who had come to them so late, Only for love of them and then so slowly, And was for their sake hunted now by men Who feared Him as they feared no other prey -- For the world's sake was hidden. "Better the tomb For Lazarus than life, if this be life,"

She thought; and then to Martha, "No, my dear,"

She said aloud; "not as it was before.

Nothing is ever as it was before, Where Time has been. Here there is more than Time; And we that are so lonely and so far From home, since he is with us here again, Are farther now from him and from ourselves Than we are from the stars. He will not speak Until the spirit that is in him speaks; And we must wait for all we are to know, Or even to learn that we are not to know.

Martha, we are too near to this for knowledge, And that is why it is that we must wait.

Our friends are coming if we call for them, And there are covers we'll put over him To make him warmer. We are too young, perhaps, To say that we know better what is best Than he. We do not know how old he is.

If you remember what the Master said, Try to believe that we need have no fear.

Let me, the selfish and the careless one, Be housewife and a mother for tonight; For I am not so fearful as you are, And I was not so eager."

Martha sank Down at her sister's feet and there sat watching A flower that had a small familiar name That was as old as memory, but was not The name of what she saw now in its brief And infinite mystery that so frightened her That life became a terror. Tears again Flooded her eyes and overflowed. "No, Mary,"

She murmured slowly, hating her own words Before she heard them, "you are not so eager To see our brother as we see him now; Neither is He who gave him back to us.

I was to be the simple one, as always, And this was all for me." She stared again Over among the trees where Lazarus, Who seemed to be a man who was not there, Might have been one more shadow among shadows, If she had not remembered. Then she felt The cool calm hands of Mary on her face, And s.h.i.+vered, wondering if such hands were real.

"The Master loved you as He loved us all, Martha; and you are saying only things That children say when they have had no sleep.

Try somehow now to rest a little while; You know that I am here, and that our friends Are coming if I call."

Martha at last Arose, and went with Mary to the door, Where they stood looking off at the same place, And at the same shape that was always there As if it would not ever move or speak, And always would be there. "Mary, go now, Before the dark that will be coming hides him.

I am afraid of him out there alone, Unless I see him; and I have forgotten What sleep is. Go now -- make him look at you -- And I shall hear him if he stirs or whispers.

Go! -- or I'll scream and bring all Bethany To come and make him speak. Make him say once That he is glad, and G.o.d may say the rest.

Though He say I shall sleep, and sleep for ever, I shall not care for that . . . Go!"

Mary, moving Almost as if an angry child had pushed her, Went forward a few steps; and having waited As long as Martha's eyes would look at hers, Went forward a few more, and a few more; And so, until she came to Lazarus, Who crouched with his face hidden in his hands, Like one that had no face. Before she spoke, Feeling her sister's eyes that were behind her As if the door where Martha stood were now As far from her as Egypt, Mary turned Once more to see that she was there. Then, softly, Fearing him not so much as wondering What his first word might be, said, "Lazarus, Forgive us if we seemed afraid of you;"

And having spoken, pitied her poor speech That had so little seeming gladness in it, So little comfort, and so little love.

There was no sign from him that he had heard, Or that he knew that she was there, or cared Whether she spoke to him again or died There at his feet. "We love you, Lazarus, And we are not afraid. The Master said We need not be afraid. Will you not say To me that you are glad? Look, Lazarus!

Look at my face, and see me. This is Mary."

She found his hands and held them. They were cool, Like hers, but they were not so calm as hers.

Through the white robes in which his friends had wrapped him When he had groped out of that awful sleep, She felt him trembling and she was afraid.

At last he sighed; and she prayed hungrily To G.o.d that she might have again the voice Of Lazarus, whose hands were giving her now The recognition of a living pressure That was almost a language. When he spoke, Only one word that she had waited for Came from his lips, and that word was her name.

"I heard them saying, Mary, that He wept Before I woke." The words were low and shaken, Yet Mary knew that he who uttered them Was Lazarus; and that would be enough Until there should be more . . . "Who made Him come, That He should weep for me? . . . Was it you, Mary?"

The questions held in his incredulous eyes Were more than she would see. She looked away; But she had felt them and should feel for ever, She thought, their cold and lonely desperation That had the bitterness of all cold things That were not cruel. "I should have wept," he said, "If I had been the Master. . . ."

Now she could feel His hands above her hair -- the same black hair That once he made a jest of, praising it, While Martha's busy eyes had left their work To flash with laughing envy. Nothing of that Was to be theirs again; and such a thought Was like the flying by of a quick bird Seen through a shadowy doorway in the twilight.

For now she felt his hands upon her head, Like weights of kindness: "I forgive you, Mary. . . .

You did not know -- Martha could not have known -- Only the Master knew. . . . Where is He now?

Yes, I remember. They came after Him.

May the good G.o.d forgive Him. . . . I forgive Him.

I must; and I may know only from Him The burden of all this. . . . Martha was here -- But I was not yet here. She was afraid. . . .

Why did He do it, Mary? Was it -- you?

Was it for you? . . . Where are the friends I saw?

Yes, I remember. They all went away.

I made them go away. . . . Where is He now? . . .

What do I see down there? Do I see Martha -- Down by the door? . . . I must have time for this."

Lazarus looked about him fearfully, And then again at Mary, who discovered Awakening apprehension in his eyes, And s.h.i.+vered at his feet. All she had feared Was here; and only in the slow reproach Of his forgiveness lived his grat.i.tude.

Why had he asked if it was all for her That he was here? And what had Martha meant?

Why had the Master waited? What was coming To Lazarus, and to them, that had not come?

What had the Master seen before He came, That He had come so late?

"Where is He, Mary?"

Lazarus asked again. "Where did He go?"

Once more he gazed about him, and once more At Mary for an answer. "Have they found Him?

Or did He go away because He wished Never to look into my eyes again? . . .

That, I could understand. . . . Where is He, Mary?"

"I do not know," she said. "Yet in my heart I know that He is living, as you are living -- Living, and here. He is not far from us.

He will come back to us and find us all -- Lazarus, Martha, Mary -- everything -- All as it was before. Martha said that.

And He said we were not to be afraid."

Lazarus closed his eyes while on his face A tortured adumbration of a smile Flickered an instant. "All as it was before,"

He murmured wearily. "Martha said that; And He said you were not to be afraid . . .