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Table of Contents | |
Section | Page |
Start of eBook | 1 |
1 | |
INTRODUCTION | 1 |
THE DEATH-WAKE | 5 |
CHIMERA I | 5 |
SONG | 13 |
POEMS | 34 |
TO A SPIRIT | 34 |
TO A STORM-STAID BIRD | 35 |
HYMN TO ORION | 37 |
INTRODUCTION TO THE DEATH-WAKE
Piscatori Piscator
An angler to an angler
here,
To one who longed
not for the bays,
I bring a little gift and
dear,
A line of love,
a word of praise,
A common memory of the ways,
By Elibank and
Yair that lead;
Of all the burns, from all
the braes,
That yield their
tribute to the Tweed.
His boyhood found the waters
clean,
His age deplored
them, foul with dye;
But purple hills, and copses
green,
And these old
towers he wandered by,
Still to the simple strains
reply
Of his pure unrepining
reed,
Who lies where he was fain
to lie,
Like Scott, within
the sound of Tweed._
A.L.
The extreme rarity of The Death-Wake is a reason for its republication, which may or may not be approved of by collectors. Of the original edition the Author says that more than seventy copies were sold in the first week of publication, but thereafter the publisher failed in business. Mr. Stoddart recovered the sheets of his poem, and his cook gradually, and perhaps not injudiciously, expended them for domestic purposes.
Apart from its rarity, The Death-Wake has an interest of its own for curious amateurs of poetry. The year of its composition (1830) was the great year of Romanticisme in France, the year of Hernani, and of Gautier’s gilet rouge. In France it was a literary age given to mediaeval extravagance, to the dagger and the bowl, the cloak and sword, the mad monk and the were-wolf; the age of Petrus Borel and MacKeat, as well as of Dumas and Hugo. Now the official poetry of our country was untouched by and ignorant of the virtues and excesses of 1830. Wordsworth’s bolt was practically shot; Sir Walter was ending his glorious career; Shelley and Byron and Keats were dead, and the annus mirabilis of Coleridge was long gone by. Three young poets of the English-speaking race were producing their volumes, destined at first to temporary neglect. The year 1830 was the year of Mr. Tennyson’s Poems, chiefly Lyrical, his first book, not counting Poems by Two Brothers. It was also the year of Mr. Browning’s Pauline (rarer even than The Death-Wake); and it was the year which followed the second, and perhaps the most characteristic, poetical venture of Edgar Allan Poe. In Mr. Tennyson’s early lyrics, and in Mr. Poe’s, any capable judge must have recognised new notes of romance. Their accents are fresh and strange, their imaginations dwell in untrodden regions. Untouched by the French romantic poets, they yet unconsciously reply to their notes, as if some influence in the mental air were at work on both sides of the Channel, on both sides of the Atlantic.
His mood is that of Scott when Scott was young, and was so anxious to possess a death’s head and cross-bones. The malady is “most incident” to youth, but Mr. Stoddart wears his rue with a difference. The mad monkish lover of the dead nun Agathe has hit on precisely the sort of fantasy which was about to inspire Theophile Gautier’s Comedie de la Mort, or the later author of Gaspard de la Nuit, or Edgar Poe. There is here no “criticism of life;” it is a criticism of strange death; and, so far, may recall Beddoes’s Death’s Jest-Book, unpublished, of course, in 1830. Naturally this kind of poetry is “useless,” as Mr. Ruskin says about Coleridge, but, in its bizarre way, it may be beautiful.
The author, by a curious analogy with Theophile Gautier, was, in these days, a humourist as well as a poet. In the midst of his mad fancies and rare melodies he is laughing at himself, as Theophile mocked at Les Jeunes France. The psychological position is, therefore, one of the rarest. Mr. Stoddart was, first of all and before all, a hardy and enthusiastic angler. Between 1830 and 1840 he wrote a few beautiful angling songs, and then all the poetry of his character merged itself in an ardent love of Nature: of hill, loch and stream—above all, of Tweed, the fairest of waters, which he lived to see a sink of pollution. After 1831 we have no more romanticism from Mr. Stoddart. The wind, blowing where it listeth, struck on him as on an AEolian harp, and “an uncertain warbling made,” in the true Romantic manner. He did write a piece with the alluring name of Ajalon of the Winds, but not one line of it survives. The rest is not silence, indeed, for, in addition to his lays of trout and salmon, of Tweed and Teviot, Mr. Stoddart wrote a good deal of prose, and a good deal of perfectly common and uninspired verse. The Muse, which was undeniably with him for an hour, abandoned him, or he deserted her, being content to whip the waters of Tweed, and Meggat, and Yarrow. Perhaps unfavourable and unappreciative criticism, acting on a healthy and contented nature, drove him back into the common paths of men. Whatever the cause, the Death-Wake alone (save for a few angling songs) remains to give assurance of a poet “who died young.” It is needless to rewrite the biography, excellently done,
As a schoolboy, Mr. Stoddart was always rhyming of goblin, ghost, fairy, and all Sir Walter’s themes. At Edinburgh University he was a pupil of Christopher North (John Wilson), who pooh-poohed The Death-Wake in Blackwood. He also knew Aytoun, Professor Ferrier, De Quincey, Hartley Coleridge, and Hogg, and was one of the first guests of Tibbie Sheils, on the spit of land between St. Mary’s and the Loch of the Lowes. In verses of this period (1827) Miss Stoddart detects traces of Keats and Byron, but the lines quoted are much better in technique than Byron usually wrote.
The summer of 1830 Mr. Stoddart passed in Hogg’s company on Yarrow, and early in 1831 he published The Death-Wake. There is no trace of James Hogg in the poem, which, to my mind, is perfectly original. Wilson places it “between the weakest of Shelley and the strongest of Barry Cornwall.” It is really nothing but a breath of the spirit of romance, touching an instrument not wholly out of tune, but never to be touched again.
It is unnecessary to follow Mr. Stoddart through a long and happy life of angling and of literary leisure. He only blossomed once. His poem was plagiarised and inserted in Graham’s Magazine, by a person named Louis Fitzgerald Tasistro (vol. xx.). Mr. Ingram, the biographer of Edgar Poe, observes that Poe praised the piece while he was exposing Tasistro’s “barefaced robbery.”
The copy of The Death-Wake from which this edition is printed was once the property of Mr. Aytoun, author of Lays of the Scottish Cavaliers, and, I presume, of Ta Phairshon. Mr. Aytoun has written a prefatory sonnet which will be found in its proper place, a set of rhymes on the flyleaf at the end, and various cheerful but unfeeling notes. After some hesitation I do not print these frivolities.
The copy was most generously presented to me by Professor Knight of St. Andrews, and I have only seen one other example, which I in turn contributed to fill the vacant place in the shelves of Mr. Knight. His example, however, is far the more curious of the twain, by virtue of Aytoun’s annotations.
I had been wanting to see The Death-Wake ever since, as a boy, I read the unkind review of it in an ancient volume of Blackwood’s Magazine. In its “pure purple mantle” of glazed cloth, with paper label, it is an unaffectedly neat and well-printed little volume.
It would be unbecoming and impertinent to point out to any one who has an ear for verse, the charm of such lines as—
“A murmur far and far,
of those that stirred
Within the great encampment
of the sea.”
Or—
“A love-winged seraph
glides in glory by,
Striking the tent of its mortality.”
(An idea anticipated by the as yet unknown Omar Khayyam).
Or—
“Dost thou, in thy vigil,
hail
Arcturus in his chariot pale,
Leading him with a fiery flight
Over the hollow hill of night?”
These are wonderful verses for a lad of twenty-one, living among anglers, undergraduates, and, if with some society of the lettered, apparently with none which could appreciate or applaud him.
For the matter of the poem, the wild voyage of the mad monkish lover with the dead Bride of Heaven, it strikes, of course, on the common reef of the Romantic—the ridiculous. But the recurring contrasts of a pure, clear peace in sea and sky, are of rare and atoning beauty. Such a passage is—
“And the great ocean,
like a holy hall,
Where slept a seraph host
maritimal,
Was gorgeous with wings of
diamond.”
Once more, when the mad monk tells the sea-waves
“That ye have power
and passion, and a sound
As of the flying of an angel
round,
The mighty world, that ye
are one with Time,”
we recognise genuine imagination.
A sympathetic reader of The Death-Wake would perhaps have expected the leprosies and lunacies to drop off, and the genius, purged of its accidents, to move into a pure transparency. The abnormal, the monstrous, the boyish elements should have been burned away in the fire of the genius of poetry. But the Muses did not so will it, and the mystic wind of the spirit of song became of less moment to Mr. Stoddart than the breeze on the loch that stirs the
Mr. Stoddart died on November 22nd, 1880. His last walk was to Kelso Bridge “to look at the Tweed,” which now murmurs by his grave the self-same song that it sings beside Sir Walter’s tomb in Dryburgh Abbey. We leave his poem to the judgment of students of poetry, and to him we say his own farewell—
Sorrow, sorrow speed away
To our angler’s
quiet mound,
With the old pilgrim, twilight
grey,
Enter thou the
holy ground.
There he sleeps, whose heart
was twined
With wild stream
and wandering burn,
Wooer of the western wind,
Watcher of the
April morn.
A.L.
OR LUNACY
Sonnet to the Author
O wormy Thomas Stoddart
who inheritest
Rich thoughts
and loathsome, nauseous words, & rare!
Tell me, my friend, why is
it that thou ferretest
And gropest in
each death-corrupted lair?
Seek’st thou for maggots,
such as have affinity
With those in
thine own brain? or dost thou think
That all is sweet
which hath a horrid stink?
Why dost thou make Hautgout
thy sole divinity?
Here is enough
of genius to convert
Vile
dung to precious diamonds, and to spare,
Then why transform
the diamond into dirt,
And
change thy mind w^h. sh^d. be rich & fair
Into a medley of creations
foul,
As if a Seraph would become
a Goul?
W.E.A.
1834
An anthem of a sister choristry!
And like a windward murmur of the sea,
O’er silver shells, so solemnly it falls!
A dying music shrouded in deep walls,
That bury its wild breathings! And the moon,
Of glow-worm hue, like virgin in sad swoon,
Lies coldly on the bosom of a cloud,
Until the elf-winds, that are wailing loud,
Do minister unto her sickly trance,
Fanning the life into her countenance;
And there are pale stars sparkling, far and few
In the deep chasms of everlasting blue,
Unmarshall’d and ungather’d, one and one,
Like outposts of the lunar garrison.
A train of holy fathers windeth
by
The arches of an aged sanctuary,
With cowl, and scapular, and
rosary
On to the sainted oriel, where
stood,
By the rich altar, a fair
sisterhood—
A weeping group of virgins!
one or two
Bent forward to a bier, of
solemn hue,
Whereon a bright and stately
coffin lay,
With its black pall flung
over:—Agathe
Was on the lid—a
name. And who?—No more!
’Twas only Agathe.
’Tis
o’er, ’tis o’er,—
Her burial! and, under the
arcades,
Torch after torch into the
moonlight fades;
And there is heard the music,
a brief while,
Over the roofings of the imaged
aisle,
From the deep organ panting
out its last,
Like the slow dying of an
autumn blast.
A lonely monk is loitering within
The dusky area, at the altar seen,
Like a pale spirit kneeling in the light
Of the cold moon, that looketh wan and white
Through the deviced oriel; and he lays
His hands upon his bosom, with a gaze
To the chill earth. He had the youthful look
Which heartfelt woe had wasted, and he shook
At every gust of the unholy breeze,
That enter’d through the time-worn crevices.
A score of summers only o’er
his brow
Had pass’d—and
it was summer, even now,
The one-and-twentieth—from
a birth of tears,
Over a waste of melancholy
years!
And that brow was as
wan as if it were
Of snowy marble, and the raven
hair
That would have cluster’d
over, was all shorn,
And his fine features stricken
pale as morn.
He kiss’d a golden crucifix
that hung
Around his neck, and in a
transport flung
Himself upon the earth, and
said, and said
Wild, raving words, about
the blessed dead:
And then he rose, and in the
moonshade stood,
Gazing upon its light in solitude;
And smote his brow, at some
idea wild
That came across: then,
weeping like a child,
He falter’d out the
name of Agathe;
And look’d unto the
heaven inquiringly,
And the pure stars.
“Oh
shame! that ye are met,
To mock me, like old memories,
that yet
Break in upon the golden dream
I knew,
While she—she
lived: and I have said adieu
To that fair one, and to her
sister Peace,
That lieth in her grave.
When wilt thou cease
To feed upon my quiet!—thou
Despair!
That art the mad usurper,
and the heir,
Of this heart’s heritage!
Go, go—return,
And bring me back oblivion,
and an urn!
And ye, pale stars, may look,
and only find,
The wreck of a proud tree,
that lets the wind
Count o’er its blighted
boughs; for such was he
That loved, and loves, the
silent Agathe!”
And he hath left the sanctuary,
But he was, what none
knew, of lordly line,
That fought in the far land
of Palestine,
Where, under banners of the
cross, they fell,
Smote by the armies of the
infidel.
And Julio was the last; alone,
alone!
A sad, unfriended orphan,
that had gone
Into the world, to murmur
and to die,
Like the cold breezes that
are passing by!
And few they were that bade
him to their board;
His fortunes now were over,
and the sword
Of his proud ancestry dishonour’d—left
To moulder in its sheath—a
hated gift!
Ay! it was so; and Julio had
fain
Have been a warrior; but his
very brain
Grew fever’d at the
sickly thought of death,
And to be stricken with a
want of breath!—
To be the food of worms—inanimate,
And cold as winter,—and
as desolate!
And then to waste away, and
be no more
Than the dark dust!—The
thought was like a sore
That gather’d in his
heart; and he would say,—
“A curse be on their
laurels!” and decay
Came over them; the deeds
that they had done
Had fallen with their fortunes;
and anon
Was Julio forgotten, and his
line—
No wonder for this frenzied
tale of mine!
Oh! he was wearied of this passing scene!
But loved not death: his purpose was between
Life and the grave; and it would vibrate there,
Like a wild bird that floated far and fair
Betwixt the sun and sea!
He
went, and came,
And thought, and slept, and
still awoke the same,—
A strange, strange youth;
and he would look all night
Upon the moon and stars, and
count the flight
Of the sea waves, and let
the evening wind
Play with his raven tresses,
or would bind
Grottoes of birch, wherein
to sit and sing:
And peasant girls would find
him sauntering,
To gaze upon their features,
as they met,
In laughter, under some green
arboret.
At last, he became monk, and,
on his knees,
Said holy prayers, and with
wild penances
Made sad atonement; and the
solemn whim,
That, like a shadow, loiter’d
over him,
Wore off, even like a shadow.
He was cursed
With none of the mad thoughts
that were at first
The poison of his quiet; but
he grew
To love the world and its
wild laughter too,
As he had known before; and
wish’d again
To join the very mirth he
hated then!
He durst not break the vow—he
durst not be
The one he would—and
his heart’s harmony
Became a tide of sorrow.
Even so,
He felt hope die,—in
madness and in woe!
But there came one—and
a most lovely one
As ever to the warm light
of the sun
Threw back her tresses,—a
fair sister girl,
With a brow changing between
snow and pearl,
And the blue eyes of sadness,
fill’d with dew
Of tears,—like
Heaven’s own melancholy blue,—
So beautiful, so tender; and
her form
Was graceful as a rainbow
in a storm,
Scattering gladness on the
face of sorrow—
Oh! I had fancied of
the hues that borrow
Their brightness from the
sun; but she was bright
In her own self,—a
mystery of light!
With feelings tender as a
star’s own hue,
Pure as the morning star!
as true, as true;
For it will glitter in each
early sky,
And her first love be love
that lasteth aye!
And this was Agathe, young
Agathe,
A motherless, fair girl:
and many a day
She wept for her lost parent.
It was sad
To see her infant sorrow;
how she bade
The flow of her wild spirits
fall away
To grief, like bright clouds
in a summer day
Melting into a shower:
and it was sad
Almost to think she might
again be glad,
Her beauty was so chaste,
amid the fall
Of her bright tears.
Yet, in her father’s hall,
She had lived almost sorrowless
her days:
But he felt no affection for
the gaze
Of his fair girl; and when
she fondly smiled,
He bade no father’s
welcome to the child,
But even told his wish, and
will’d it done,
For her to be sad-hearted—and
a nun!
And so it was. She took
the dreary veil,
A hopeless girl! and the bright
flush grew pale
Upon her cheek: she felt,
as summer feels
The winds of autumn and the
winter chills,
That darken his fair suns.—It
was away,
Feeding on dreams, the heart
of Agathe!
The vesper prayers were said,
and the last hymn
Sung to the Holy Virgin.
In the dim,
Gray aisle was heard a solitary
tread,
As of one musing sadly on
the dead—
’Twas Julio; it was
his wont to be
Often alone within the sanctuary;
But now, not so—another:
it was she!
Kneeling in all her beauty,
like a saint
Before a crucifix; but sad
and faint
The tone of her devotion,
as the trill
Of a moss-burden’d,
melancholy rill.
And Julio stood before her;—’twas
as yet
The hour of the pale twilight—and
they met
Each other’s gaze, till
either seem’d the hue
Of deepest crimson; but the
ladye threw
Her veil above her features,
and stole by
Like a bright cloud, with
sadness and a sigh!
Yet Julio still stood gazing
and alone,
A dreamer!—“Is
the sister ladye gone?”
He started at the silence
of the air
That slumber’d over
him—she is not there.
And either slept not through
the live-long night,
Or slept in fitful trances,
with a bright,
Fair dream upon their eyelids:
but they rose
In sorrow from the pallet
of repose;
For the dark thought of their
sad destiny
Came o’er them, like
a chasm of the deep sea,
That was to rend their fortunes;
and at eve
They met again, but, silent,
took their leave,
As they did yesterday:
another night,
And neither spake awhile—A
pure delight
Had chasten’d love’s
first blushes: silently
Gazed Julio on the gentle
Agathe—
At length, “Fair Nun!”—She
started, and held fast
Her bright hand on her lip—“the
past, the past,
And the pale future!
There be some that lie
Under those marble urns—I
know not why,
But I were better in that
only calm,
Than be as I have been, perhaps,
and am.
The past!—ay! it
hath perish’d; never, never,
Would I recall it to be blest
for ever:
The future it must come—I
have a vow”—
And his cold hand rose trembling
to his brow.
“True, true, I have
a vow. Is not the moon
Abroad, fair Nun?”—“Indeed!
so very soon?”
Said Agathe, and “I
must then away.”—
“Stay, love! ’tis
early yet; stay, angel, stay!”
But she was gone:—yet
they met many a time
In the lone chapel, after
vesper chime—
They met in love and fear.
One
weary day,
And Julio saw not his loved
Agathe;
She was not in the choir of
sisterhood
That sang the evening anthem,
and he stood
Like one that listen’d
breathlessly awhile;
But stranger voices chanted
through the aisle.
She was not there; and, after
all were gone,
He linger’d: the
stars came—he linger’d on,
Like a dark fun’ral
image on the tomb
Of a lost hope. He felt
a world of gloom
Upon his heart—a
solitude—a chill.
The pale morn rose, and still,
he linger’d still.
And the next vesper toll’d;
nor yet, nor yet—
“Can Agathe be faithless,
and forget?”
It was the third sad eve,
he heard it said,
“Poor Julio! thy Agathe
is dead,”
And started. He had loiter’d
in the train
That bore her to the grave:
he saw her lain
In the cold earth, and heard
a requiem
Sung over her—To
him it was a dream!
A marble stone stood by the
sepulchre;
He look’d, and saw,
and started—she was there!
And Agathe had died; she that
was bright—
She that was in her beauty!
a cold blight
Fell over the young blossom
of her brow.
And the life-blood grew chill—She
is not, now.
She died, like zephyr falling
amid flowers!
Like to a star within the
twilight hours
Of morning—and
she was not! Some have thought
The Lady Abbess gave her a
mad draught,
That stole into her heart,
and sadly rent
The fine chords of that holy
instrument,
Until its music falter’d
fast away,
And she—she died,—the
lovely Agathe!
Again, and through the arras
of the gloom
Are the pale breezes moaning:
by her tomb
Bends Julio, like a phantom,
and his eye
Is fallen, as the moon-borne
tides, that lie
At ebb within the sea.
Oh! he is wan,
As winter skies are wan, like
ages gone,
And stars unseen for paleness;
it is cast,
As foliage in the raving of
the blast,
All his fair bloom of thoughts!
Is the moon chill,
That in the dark clouds she
is mantled still?
And over its proud arch hath
Heaven flung
A scarf of darkness?
Agathe was young!
And there should be the virgin
silver there,
The snow-white fringes delicately
fair!
He wields a heavy mattock
in his hands,
And over him a lonely lanthorn
stands
On a near niche, shedding
a sickly fall
Of light upon a marble pedestal,
Whereon is chisel’d
rudely, the essay
Of untaught tool, “Hic
jacet Agathe!”
And Julio hath bent him down
in speed,
Like one that doeth an unholy
deed.
There is a flagstone lieth
heavily
Over the ladye’s grave;
I wist of three
That bore it, of a blessed
verity!
But he hath lifted it in his
pure madness,
As it were lightsome as a
summer gladness,
And from the carved niche
hath ta’en the lamp,
And hung it by the marble
flagstone damp.
And he is flinging the dark,
chilly mould
Over the gorgeous pavement:
’tis a cold,
Sad grave, and there is many
a relic there
Of chalky bones, which, in
the wasting air,
Fell smouldering away; and
he would dash
His mattock through them,
with a cursed clash,
That made the lone aisle echo.
But anon
He fell upon a skull,—a
haggard one,
With its teeth set, and the
great orbless eye
Revolving darkness, like eternity—
And in his hand he held it,
till it grew
To have the fleshy features
and the hue
Of life. He gazed, and
gazed, and it became
Like to his Agathe—all,
all the same!
He drew it nearer,—the
cold, bony thing!—
To kiss the worm-wet lips.
“Ay! let me cling—
Cling to thee now, for ever!”
but a breath
Of rank corruption from its
jaws of death
Went to his nostrils, and
he madly laugh’d,
And dash’d it over on
the altar shaft,
Which the new risen moon,
in her gray light,
Had fondly flooded, beautifully
bright!
Again
he went
To his wild work, beside the
monument.
“Ha! leave, thou moon!
where thy footfall hath been
In sorrow amid heaven! there
is sin
Under thy shadow, lying like
a dew;
So come thou, from thy awful
arch of blue,
Where thou art even as a silver
throne
For some pale spectre-king;
come thou alone,
Or bring a solitary orphan
star
Under thy wings! afar, afar,
afar,
To gaze upon this girl of
radiancy,
In her deep slumbers—Wake
thee, Agathe!”
And Julio hath stolen the
dark chest
Where the fair nun lay coffin’d,
in the rest
That wakes not up at morning:
she is there,
An image of cold calm!
One tress of hair
Lingereth lonely on her snowy
brow;
But the bright eyes are closed
in darkness now;
And their long lashes delicately
rest
On the pale cheek, like sun-rays
in the west,
That fall upon a colourless,
sad cloud.
Humility lies rudely on the
proud,
But she was never proud; and
there she is,
A yet unwither’d flower
the autumn breeze
Hath blown from its green
stem! ’T is pale, ’t is pale,
But still unfaded, like the
twilight veil
That falleth after sunset;
like a stream
That bears the burden of a
silver gleam
Upon its waters; and is even
so,—
Chill, melancholy, lustreless,
and low!
Beauty in death! a tenderness
upon
The rude and silent relics,
where alone
Sat the destroyer! Beauty
on the dead!
The look of being where the
breath is fled!
The unwarming sun still joyous
in its light!
A time—a time without
a day or night!
Death cradled upon Beauty,
like a bee
Upon a flower, that looketh
lovingly!—
Like a wild serpent, coiling
in its madness,
Under a wreath of blossom
and of gladness!
And there she is; and Julio
bends o’er
The sleeping girl,—a
willow on the shore
Of a Dead Sea! that steepeth
its far bough
Into the bitter waters,—even
now
Taking a foretaste of the
awful trance
That was to pass on his own
countenance!
Yes! yes! and he is holding
his pale lips
Over her brow; the shade of
an eclipse
Is passing to his heart, and
to his eye,
That is not tearful; but the
light will die,
Leaving it like a moon within
a mist,—
The vision of a spell-bound
visionist!
He breathed a cold kiss on
her ashy cheek,
That left no trace—no
flush—no crimson streak,
But was as bloodless as a
marble stone,
Susceptible of silent waste
alone.
And on her brow a crucifix
he laid—
A jewel’d crucifix,
the virgin maid
Had given him before she died.
The moon
Shed light upon her visage—clouded
soon,
Then briefly breaking from
its airy veil,
Like warrior lifting up his
aventayle.
But Julio gazed on, and never
lifted
Himself to see the broken
clouds, that drifted
One after one, like infant
elves at play
Amid the night-winds, in their
lonely way—
Some whistling and some moaning,
some asleep,
And dreaming dismal dreams,
and sighing deep
Over their couches of green
moss and flowers,
And solitary fern, and heather
bowers.
The heavy bell toll’d
two, and, as it toll’d,
Julio started, and the fresh-turn’d
mould
He flung into the empty chasm
with speed,
And o’er it dropt the
flagstone. One could read
That Agathe lay there; but
still the girl
Lay by him, like a precious
and pale pearl,
That from the deep sea-waters
had been rent—
Like a star fallen from the
firmament!
He hides the grave-tools in
an aged porch,
To westward of the solitary
church;
And he hath clasp’d
around the melting waist
The beautiful, dead girl:
his cheek is press’d
To hers—Life warming
the cold chill of Death!
And over his pale palsy breathing
breath
His eye is sunk upon her—“Thou
must leave
The worm to waste for love
of thee, and grieve
Without thee, as I may not.
Thou must go,
My sweet betrothed, with me—but
not below,
Where there is darkness, dream,
and solitude,
But where is light, and life,
and one to brood
Above thee till thou wakest—Ha!
I fear
Thou wilt not wake for ever,
sleeping here,
Where there are none but winds
to visit thee,
And convent fathers, and a
choristry
Of sisters, saying, ’Hush!’—But
I will sing
Rare songs to thy pure spirit,
wandering
Down on the dews to hear me;
I will tune
The instrument of the ethereal
moon,
And all the choir of stars,
to rise and fall
In harmony and beauty musical.”
He is away—and
still the sickly lamp
Is burning next the altar;
there’s a damp,
Thin mould upon the pavement;
and, at morn,
The monks do cross them in
their blessed scorn
And mutter deep anathemas,
because
Of the unholy sacrilege, that
was
Within the sainted chapel,—for
they guess’d,
By many a vestige sad, how
the dark rest
Of Agathe was broken,—and
anon
They sought for Julio.
The summer sun
Arose and and set, with his
imperial disc
Toward the ocean-waters, heaving
brisk
Before the winds,—but
Julio came never:
He that was frantic as a foaming
river—
Mad as the fall of leaves
upon the tide
Of a great tempest, that have
fought and died
Along the forest ramparts,
and doth still
In its death-struggle desperately
reel
Round with the fallen foliage—he
was gone,
And none knew whither.
Still were chanted on
Sad masses, by pale sisters,
many a day,
And holy requiems sung for
Agathe!
CHIMERA II
A curse! a curse! the beautiful
pale wing
Of a sea-bird was worn with
wandering,
And, on a sunny rock beside
the shore,
It stood, the golden waters
gazing o’er;
And they were heaving a brown
amber flow
Of weeds, that glitter’d
gloriously below.
It was the sunset, and the
gorgeous hall
Of heaven rose up on pillars
magical
Of living silver, shafting
the fair sky
Between dark time and great
eternity.
They rose upon their pedestal
of sun,
A line of snowy columns! and
anon
Were lost in the rich tracery
of cloud
That hung along, magnificently
proud,
Predicting the pure star-light,
that beyond
The east was armouring in
diamond
About the camp of twilight,
and was soon
To marshal under the fair
champion moon,
That call’d her chariot
of unearthly mist,
Toward her citadel of amethyst.
A curse! a curse! a lonely
man is there
By the deep waters, with a
burden fair
Clasp’d in his wearied
arms—’Tis he; ’tis he
The brain-struck Julio, and
Agathe!
His cowl is back—flung
back upon the breeze,
His lofty brow is haggard
with disease,
As if a wild libation had
been pour’d
Of lightning on those temples,
and they shower’d
A dismal perspiration, like
a rain,
Shook by the thunder and the
hurricane!
He dropt upon a rock, and
by him placed,
Over a bed of sea-pinks growing
waste,
The silent ladye, and he mutter’d
wild,
Strange words, about a mother,
and no child.
“And I shall wed thee,
Agathe! although
Ours be no God-blest bridal—even
so!”
And from the sand he took
a silver shell,
That had been wasted by the
fall and swell
Of many a moon-borne tide
into a ring—
A rude, rude ring; it was
a snow-white thing,
Where a lone hermit limpet
slept and died,
In ages far away. “Thou
art a bride,
Sweet Agathe! Wake up;
we must not linger.”
He press’d the ring
upon her chilly finger,
And to the sea-bird, on its
sunny stone,
Shouted, “Pale priest!
thou liest all alone
Upon thy ocean altar, rise
away
To our glad bridal!”
and its wings of gray
All lazily it spread, and
hover’d by
With a wild shriek—a
melancholy cry!
Then swooping slowly o’er
the heaving breast
Of the blue ocean, vanish’d
in the west.
And Julio is chanting to his
bride,
A merry song of his wild heart,
that died
On the soft breeze through
pinks beside the sea,
All rustling in their beauty
gladsomely.
A rosary of stars, love! we’ll
count them as we go
Upon the laughing waters,
that are wandering below,
And we’ll o’er
the pearly moon-beam, as it lieth in the sea,
In beauty and in glory, like
a shadowing of thee!
A rosary of stars, love! a
prayer as we glide,
And a whisper in the wind,
and a murmur on the tide!
And we’ll say a fair
adieu to the flowers that are seen,
With shells of silver sown
in radiancy between.
A rosary of stars, love! the
purest they shall be,
Like spirits of pale pearls,
in the bosom of the sea;
Now help thee, virgin mother!
with a blessing as we go,
Upon the laughing waters,
that are wandering below!
He lifted the dead girl, and is away
To where a light boat, in its moorings lay,
Like a sea-cradle, rocking to the hush
Of the nurse waters. With a frantic rush
O’er the wild field of tangles he hath sped,
And through the shoaling waves that fell and fled
Upon the furrow’d beach.
The
snowy sail
Is hoisted to the gladly gushing
gale,
That bosom’d its fair
canvass with a breast
Of silver, looking lovely
to the west;
And at the helm there sits
the wither’d one,
Gazing and gazing on the sister
nun,
With her fair tresses floating
on his knee—
The beautiful, death-stricken
Agathe!
Fast, fast, and far away, the bark hath stood
Out toward the great heaving solitude,
That gurgled in its deeps, as if the breath
Went through its lungs, of agony and death!
The sun is lost within the
labyrinth
Of clouds of purple and pale
hyacinth,
That are the frontlet of the
sister Sky
Kissing her brother Ocean;
and they lie
Bathing in blushes, till the
rival queen
Night, with her starry tiar,
floateth in—
A dark and dazzling beauty!
that doth draw
Over the light of love a shade
of awe
Most strange, that parts our
wonder not the less
Between her mystery and loveliness!
And she is there, that is
a pyramid
Whereon the stars, the statues
of the dead,
Are imaged over the eternal
hall,
A group of radiances majestical!
And Julio looks up, and there
they be,
And Agathe, and all the waste
of Sea,
That slept in wizard slumber,
with a shroud
Of night flung o’er
his bosom, throbbing proud
Amid its azure pulses; and
again
He dropt his blighted eye-orbs,
with a strain
Of mirth upon the ladye:—Agathe!
Sweet bride! be thou a queen,
and I will lay
A crown of sea-weed on thy
royal brow;
And I will twine these tresses,
that are now
Floating beside me, to a diadem;
And the sea foam will sprinkle
gem on gem,
And so will the soft dews.
Be thou the queen
Of the unpeopled waters, sadly
seen
By star-light, till the yet
unrisen moon
Issue, unveiled, from her
anderoon,
To bathe in the sea fountains:
let me say,
“Hail—hail
to thee! thrice hail, my Agathe!”
The warrior world was lifting
to the bent
Of his eternal brow magnificent,
The fiery moon, that in her
blazonry
Shone eastward, like a shield.
The throbbing sea
Felt fever on his azure arteries,
That shadow’d them with
crimson, while the breeze
Fell faster on the solitary
sail.
But the red moon grew loftier
and pale,
And the great ocean, like
the holy hall,
Where slept a seraph host
maritimal,
Was gorgeous, with wings of
diamond
Fann’d over it, and
millions beyond
Of tiny waves were playing
to and fro,
All musical, with an incessant
flow
Of cadences, innumerably heard
Between the shrill notes of
a hermit bird,
That held a solemn paean to
the moon.
A few devotional fair clouds
were soon
Breathed o’er the living
countenance of Heaven,
And under the great galaxies
were driven
Of stars that group’d
together, and they went
Like voyagers along the firmament,
And grew to silver in the
blessed light
Of the moon alchymist.
It was not night,
Not the dark deathly shadow,
that falls o’er
The eye-lid like a curse,
but far before
In splendour, struggling through
a fall of gloom,
In many a myriad gushes, that
do come
Direct from the eternal stars
beyond,
Like holy fountains pouring
diamond!
A sail! awake thee, Julio!
a sail!
And be not bending to thy
trances pale.
But he is gazing on the moonlit
brow
Of his dead Agathe, and fondly
now,
The light is silvering her
bloodless face
And the cold grave-clothes.
There is loveliness
As in a marble image, very
bright!
But stricken with a phantasy
of light
That is not given to the mortal
hue,
To life and breathing beauty:
and she too
Is more of the expressless
lineament,
Than of the golden thoughts
that came and went
Over her features like a living
tide
No while before.
A
sail is on the wide
And moving waters, and it
draweth nigh
Like a sea-cloud. The
elfin billows fly
Before it, in their armories
enthrall’d
Of radiant and moon-breasted
emerald;
And many is the mariner that
sees
The lone boat in the melancholy
breeze,
Waving her snowy canvass,
and anon
Their stately vessel with
a gallant run
Crowds by in all her glory;
but the cheer
Of men is pass’d into
a sudden fear,
And whisperings, and shakings
of the head—
The moon was streaming on
a virgin dead,
And Julio sat over her insane,
Like a sea demon! O’er
and o’er again,
Each cross’d him, as
the stately vessel stood
Far out into the murmuring
solitude!
But Julio saw not; he only
heard
A rushing, like the passing
of a bird,
And felt him heaving on the
foam, that flew
Along the startled billows;
and he knew
Of a strange sail, by broken
oaths that fell
Beside him, on the coming
of the swell.
They knew thou wert a queen,
my royal bride!
And made obeisance at thy
holy side.
They saw thee, Agathe! and
go to bring
Fair worshippers, and many
a poet-king,
To utter music at thy pearly
feet.—
Now, wake thee! for the moonlight
cometh sweet,
To visit in thy temple of
the sea;
Thy sister moon is watching
over thee!
And she is spreading a fair
mantle of
Pure silver, in thy lonely
palace, love!—
Now, wake thee! for the sea-bird
is aloof,
In solitude, below the starry
roof;
And on its dewy plume there
is a light
Of palest splendour, o’er
the blessed night.
Thy spirit, Agathe!—and
yet, thou art
Beside me, and my solitary
heart
Is throbbing near to thee:
I must not feel
The sweet notes of thy holy
music steal
Into my feverous and burning
brain,—
So wake not! and I’ll
hush thee with a strain
Of my wild fancy, till thou
dream of me,
And I be loved as I have loved
thee:—
SONG
’Tis light to love thee
living, girl, when hope is full and fair,
In the springtide of thy beauty,
when there is no sorrow there—
No sorrow on thy brow, and
no shadow on thy heart!
When, like a floating sea-bird,
bright and beautiful thou art!
’Tis light to love thee
living, girl—to see thee ever so,
With health, that, like a
crimson flower, lies blushing in the snow;
And thy tresses falling over,
like the amber on the pearl—
Oh! true it is a lightsome
thing, to love thee living, girl!
But when the brow is blighted,
like a star of morning tide,
And faded is the crimson blush
upon the cheek beside;
It is to love, as seldom love,
the brightest and the best,
When our love lies like a
dew upon the one that is at rest.
Because of hopes, that, fallen,
are changing to despair,
And the heart is always dreaming
on the ruin that is there,
Oh, true! ’tis weary,
weary, to be gazing over thee,
And the light of thy pure
vision breaketh never upon me!
He lifts her in his arms,
and o’er and o’er,
Upon the brow of chilliness
and hoar,
Repeats a silent kiss;—along
the side
Of the lone bark, he leans
that pallid bride,
Until the waves do image her
within
Their bosom, like a spectre—’Tis
a sin
Too deadly to be shadow’d
or forgiven,
To do such mockery in the
sight of Heaven!
And bid her gaze into the
startled sea,
And say, “Thy image,
from eternity,
Hath come to meet thee, ladye!”
and anon,
He bade the cold corse kiss
the shadowy one,
That shook amid the waters,
like the light
Of borealis in a winter night!
And after, he did strain her
sea-wet hair
Between his chilly fingers,
with a stare
Of mystery, that marvell’d
how that she
Had drench’d it so amid
the moonlit sea.
The morning rose, with breast
of living gold,
Like eastern phoenix, and
his plumage roll’d
In clouds of molted brilliance,
very bright!
And on the waste of waters
floated light.—
In truth, ’twas strange
to see that merry bark
Skimming the silver ocean,
like a shark
At play amid the beautiful
sea-green,
And all so sadly desolate
within.
And hours flew after hours,
a weary length,
Until the sunlight, in meridian
strength,
Threw burning floods upon
the wasted brow
Of that sea-hermit mariner;
and now
He felt the fire-light feed
upon his brain,
And started with intensity
of pain,
And wash’d him in the
sea; it only brought
Wild reason, like a demon,
and he thought
Strange thoughts, like dreaming
men—he thought how those
Were round him he had seen,
and many rose
His heart had hated; every
billow threw
Features before him, and pale
faces grew
Out of the sea by myriads:—the
self-same
Was moulded from its image,
and they came
In groups together, and all
said, like one,
“Be cursed!” and
vanish’d in the deep anon.
Then thirst, intolerable as
the breath
Of Upas, fanning the wild
wings of death,
Crept up his very gorge,—like
to a snake,
That stifled him, and bade
the pulses ache
Through all the boiling current
of his blood.
It was a thirst, that let
the fever flood
Fall over him, and gave a
ghastly hue
To his cramp’d lips,
until their breathing grew
White as a mist, and short,
and like a sigh,
Heaved with a struggle, till
it falter’d by.
And ever he did look upon
the corse
With idiot visage, like the
hag Remorse
That gloateth over on a nameless
deed
Of darkness and of dole unhistoried.
And were there that might
hear him, they would hear
The murmur of a prayer in
deep fear,
Through unbarr’d lips,
escaping by the half,
And all but smother’d
by a maniac laugh,
That follow’d it, so
sudden and so shrill,
That swarms of sea-birds,
wandering at will
Upon the wave, rose startled,
and away
Went flocking, like a silver
shower of spray!
And aye he called for water,
and the sea
Mock’d him with his
brine surges tauntingly,
And lash’d them over
on his fev’rous brow,
Volleying roars of curses:—“Stay
thee, now,
Avenger! lest I die; for I
am worn
Fainter than star-light at
the birth of morn;
Stay thee, great angel! for
I am not shriven,
But frantic as thyself:
Oh Heaven! Heaven!
But thou hast made me brother
of the sea,
“Lift up! and let me
see, that I may tell
Ye can be mad, and strange,
and terrible;
That ye have power, and passion,
and a sound
As of the flying of an angel
round
The mighty world; that ye
are one with time,
And in the great primordium
sublime
Were nursed together, as an
infant-twain,—
A glory and a wonder!
I would fain
Hold truce, thou elder brother!
for we are,
In feature, as the sun is
to a star,
So are we like, and we are
touch’d in tune
With lunacy as music; and
the moon,
That setteth the tides sentinel
before
Thy camp of waters, on the
pebbled shore,
And measures their great footsteps
to and fro,
Hath lifted up into my brain
the flow
Of this mad tide of blood.—Ay!
we are like
In foam and frenzy; the same
winds do strike,
The same fierce sun-rays,
from their battlement
Of fire! so, when I perish
impotent
Before the night of death,
they’ll say of me,
He died as mad and frantic,
as the sea!”
A cloud stood for the east,
a cloud like night,
Like a huge vulture, and the
blessed light
Of the great sun grew shadow’d
awfully:
It seem’d to mount up
from the mighty sea,
Shaking the showers from its
solemn wings,
And grew, and grew, and many
a myriad springs,
Were on its bosom, teeming
full of rain.
There fell a terrible and
wizard chain
Of lightning, from its black
and heated forge,
And the dark waters took it
to their gorge,
And lifted up their shaggy
flanks in wonder
With rival chorus to the peal
of thunder,
That wheel’d in many
a squadron terrible
The stern black clouds, and
as they rose and fell
They oozed great showers;
and Julio held up
His wasted hands, in likeness
of a cup,
And drank the blessed waters,
and they roll’d
Upon his cheeks like tears,
but sadly cold!—
’Twas very strange to
look on Agathe!
How the quick lightnings,
in their elfin play,
Stream’d pale upon her
features, and they were
Sickly, like tapers in a sepulchre!
The ship! that self same ship,
that Julio knew
Had pass’d him, with
her panic-stricken crew,
She gleams amid the storm,
a shatter’d thing
Of pride and lordly beauty:
her fair wing
Of sail is wounded—the
proud pennon gone:
Dark, dark she sweepeth like
an eagle, on
Through waters that are battling
Then terribly he laugh’d,
and rose above
His soul-less bride—the
ladye of his love
Lifting him up, in all his
wizard glee;
And he did wave, before the
frantic sea,
His wasted arm. “Adieu!
adieu! adieu!
Thou sawest how we were; thou
sawest, too,
Thou wert not so; for in the
inmost shrine
Of my deep heart are thoughts
that are not thine.
And thou art gone, fair mariner!
in foam
And music-murmurs, to thy
blessed home—
Adieu! adieu! Thou sawest
how that she
Sleeps in her holy beauty,
tranquilly;
And when the fair and floating
vision breaks
From her pure brow, and Agathe
awakes—
Till then, we meet not; so
adieu, adieu!”
Still on before the sullen
tempest flew,
Fast as a meteor star, the
lonely bark:
And Julio bent over to the
dark,
The solitary sea, for close
beside
Floated the stringed harp
of one that died
In that wild shipwreck, and
he drew it home,
With madness, to his bosom:
the white foam
Was o’er its strings;
and on the streaming sail
He wiped them, running, with
his fingers pale,
Along the tuneless notes,
that only gave
Seldom responses to his wandering
stave!
TO THE HARP
I
Jewel! that lay before the
heart
Of some romantic
boy,
And startled music in her
home,
Of mystery and
joy!
II
The image of his love was
there;
And, with her
golden wings,
She swept her tone of sorrow
from
Thy melancholy
strings!
III
We drew thee, as an orphan
one,
From waters that
had cast
No music round thee, as they
went
In their pale
beauty past.
IV
No music but the changeless
sigh—
That murmur of
their own,
That loves not blending in
the thrill
Of thine aerial
tone.
V
The girl that slumbers at
our side
Will dream how
they are bent,
That love her even as they
love
Thy blessed instrument.
VI
And music, like a flood, will
break
Upon the fairy
throne
Of her pure heart, all glowing,
like
A morning star,
alone!
VII
Alone, but for the song of
him
That waketh by
her side,
And strikes thy chords of
silver to
His fair and sea-borne
bride.
VIII
Jewel! that hung before the
heart
Of some romantic
boy;
Like him, I sweep thee with
a storm
Of music and of
joy!
And Julio placed the trembling
harp before
The ladye, till the minstrel
winds came o’er
Its moisten’d strings,
and tuned them with a sigh.
“I hear thee, how thy
spirit goeth by,
In music and in love.
Oh Agathe!
Thou sleepest long, long,
long; and they will say
That seek thee,—’She
is dead—she is no more!’
But thou art cold, and I will
throw before
Thy chilly brow the pale and
snowy sheet.”
And he did lift it from her
marble feet,
The sea-wet shroud! and flung
it silently
Over her brow—the
brow of Agathe!
But, as a passion from the
mooded mind,
The storm had died, and wearily
the wind
Fell fast asleep at evening,
like one
That hath been toiling in
the fiery sun.
And the white sail dropt downward,
as the wing
Of wounded sea-bird, feebly
murmuring
Unto the mast. It was
a deathly calm,
And holy stillness, like a
shadow, swam
All over the wide sea, and
the boat stood.
Like her of Sodom, in the
solitude,
A snowy pillar, looking on
the waste.
And there was nothing but
the azure breast
Of ocean and the sky—the
sea and sky,
And the lone bark; no clouds
were floating by
Where the sun set, but his
great seraph light,
Went down alone, in majesty
and might;
And the stars came again,
a silver troop,
Until, in shame, the coward
shadows droop
Before the radiance of these
holy gems,
That bear the images of diadems!
And Julio fancied of a form
that rose
Before him from the desolate
repose
Of the deep waters—a
huge ghastly form,
As of one lightning-stricken
in a storm;
And leprosy cadaverous was
hung
Before his brow, and awful
terror flung
Around him like a pall—a
solemn shroud!—
A drapery of darkness and
of cloud!
And agony was writhing on
his lip,
Heart-rooted, awful agony
and deep,
Of fevers, and of plagues,
and burning blain,
And ague, and the palsy of
the brain—
A wierd and yellow spectre!
And his eyes
Were orbless and unpupil’d,
as the skies
Without the sun, or moon,
or any star:
And he was like the wreck
of what men are,—
A wasted skeleton, that held
the crest
Of Time, and bore his motto
on his breast!
There came a group before
of maladies,
And griefs, and Famine empty
as a breeze,—
A double monster, with a gloating
leer
Fix’d on his other half.
They drew them near,
One after one, led onward
by Despair,
That like the last of winter
glimmer’d there,—
A dismal prologue to his brother
Death,
Which was behind, and, with
the horrid breath
Of his wide baneful nostrils,
plied them on.
And often as they saw the
skeleton
Grisly beside them, the wild
phantasies
Grew mad and howl’d;
the fever of disease
Became wild frenzy—very
terrible!
And, for a hell of agony—a
hell
Of rage, was there, that fed
on misty things,
On dreams, ideas, and imaginings.
And some were raving on philosophy,
And some on love, and some
on jealousy,
And some upon the moon; and
these were they
That were the wildest; and
anon alway
Julio knew them by a something
dim
About their wasted features
like to him!
But Death was by, like shell
of pyramid
Among old obelisks, and his
eyeless head
Shook o’er the wiery
ribs, where darkness lay
The image of a heart—He
is away!
And Julio is watching, like
Remorse,
Over the pale and solitary
corse!
Shower soft light, ye stars,
that shake the dew
From your eternal blossoms!
and thou, too,
Moon! minded of thy power,
tide-bearing queen!
That hast a slave and votary
within
The great rock-fetter’d
deeps, and hearest cry
To thee the hungry surges,
rushing by
Like a vast herd of wolves,—fall
full and fair
On Julio as he sleepeth, even
there,
Amid the suppliant bosom of
the sea!—
Sleep! dost thou come, and
on thy blessed knee
With hush and whisper lull
the troubled brain
Of this death-lover?—Still
the eyes do strain
Their orbs on Agathe—those
raven eyes!
All earnest on the ladye as
she lies
In her white shroud.
They see not, though they are
As if they saw; no splendour
like a star
Is under their dark lashes:
they are full
Of dream and slumber—melancholy,
dull!
* * * * *
A wide, wide sea! and on its
rear and van
Amid the stars, the silent
meteors ran
All that still night, and
Julio with a cry
Woke up, and saw them flashing
fiercely by.
* * * * *
Full three times three, its
awful veil of night
Hath Heaven hung before the
blessed light;
And a fair breeze falls o’er
the sleeping sea,
Where Julio is watching Agathe!
By sun and darkness hath he
bent him over—
A mad, moon-stricken, melancholy
lover!
And hardly hath he tasted,
night or day,
Of drink or food, because
of Agathe!
He sitteth in a dull and dreary
mood,
Like statue in a ruin’d
solitude,
Bearing the brent of sunlight
and of shade
Over the marble of some colonnade.
The ladye, she hath lost the
pearly hue
Upon her gorgeous brow, where
tresses grew
Luxuriantly as thoughts of
tenderness,
That once were floating in
the pure recess
Of her bright soul. These
are not as they were,
But are as weeds above a sepulchre,
Wild waving in the breeze:
her eyes are now
Sunk deeply under the discolour’d
brow,
That is of sickly yellow,
and pale blue,
Unnaturally blending.
The same hue
Is on her cheek: it is
the early breath
Of cold Corruption, the ban
dog of Death,
Falling upon her features.—Let
it be,
And gaze awhile on Julio,
as he
Is gazing on the corse of
Agathe!
In truth, he seemeth like
no living one,
But is the image of a skeleton:
A fearful portrait from the
artist tool
Of Madness—terrible
and wonderful!
There was no passion there—no
feeling traced
Under those eyelids, where
had run to waste,
All that was wild, or beautiful,
or bright;
A very cloud was cast upon
their light,
That gave to them the heavy
hue of lead;
And they were lorn, and lustreless,
and dead!
He sate like vulture from
the mountains gray,
Unsated, that had flown full
many a day
O’er distant land and
sea, and was in pride
Alighted by the lonely ladye’s
side.
He sate like winter o’er
the wasted year—
Like melancholy winter, drawing
near
To its own death.—“Oh
me! the worm, at last,
Will gorge upon me, and the
autumn blast
Howl by!—Where?—where?—there
is no worm to creep
Amid the waters of the lonely
deep;
But I will take me Agathe
upon
This sorrowful, sore bosom,
and anon,
Down, down, through azure
silence, we shall go,
Unepitaph’d, to cities
far below;
Where the sea triton, with
his winding shell,
Shall sound our blessed welcome.
We shall dwell
With many a mariner in his
pearly home,
In bowers of amber weed and
“And there are shafted
pillars, that beyond,
Are ranged before a rock of
diamond,
Awfully heaving its eternal
heights,
From base of silver strewn
with chrysolites;
And over it are chasms of
glory seen,
With crimson rubies clustering
between,
On sward of emerald, with
leaves of pearl,
And topazes hung brilliantly
on beryl.
So Agathe!—but
thou art sickly sad,
And tellest me, poor Julio
is mad—
Ay, mad!—was he
not madder when he sware
A vow to Heaven? was there
no madness there,
That he should do—for
why?—a holy string
Of penances? No penances
will bring
The stricken conscience to
the blessed light
Of peace,—Oh!
I am lost, and there is night,
Despair and darkness, darkness
and despair,
And want, that hunts me to
the lion-lair
Of wild perdition: and
I hear them all—
All cursing me! The very
sun-rays fall
In curses, and the shadow
of the moon,
And the pale star light, and
the winds that tune
Their voices to the music
of the sea,—
And thou,—yes,
thou! my gentle Agathe!—
All curse me!—Oh!
that I were never, never!—
Or but a breathless fancy,
that was ever
Adrift upon the wilderness
of Time,
That knew no impulse, but
was left sublime
To play at its own will!—that
I were hush’d
At night by silver cataracts,
that gush’d
Through flowers of fairy hue,
He said, and gazing on the
lonely sea,
Far off he saw, like an ascending
cloud,
To westward, a bright island,
lifted proud
Amid the struggling waters,
and the light
Of the great sun was on its
clifted height,
Scattering golden shadow,
like a mirror;
But the gigantic billows sprung
in terror
Upon its rock-built and eternal
shore,
With silver foams that fell
in fury o’er
A thousand sunny breakers.
Far above,
There stood a wild and solitary
grove
Of aged pines, all leafless
but their brows,
Where a green group of tempest-stricken
boughs
Was waving now and then, and
to and fro,
And the pale moss was clustering
below.
Then Julio saw, and bent his
head away
To the cold wasted corse of
Agathe,
And sigh’d; but ever
he would turn again
A gaze to that green island
on the main.
The bark is drifting through
the surf, beside
Its rocks of gray upon the
coming tide;
And lightly is it stranded
on the shore
Of pure and silver shells,
that lie before,
Glittering in the glory of
the sun;
And Julio hath landed him,
like one
That aileth of some wild and
weary pest;
And Agathe is folded on his
breast,—
A faded flower! with all the
vernal dews
From its bright blossom shaken,
and the hues
Become as colourless as twilight
air—
I marvel much, that she was
ever fair!
CHIMERA III
Another moon! and over the
blue night
She bendeth, like a holy spirit
bright,
Through stars that veil them
in their wings of gold;
As on she floateth with her
image cold
Enamell’d on the deep.
A sail of cloud
Is to her left, majestically
proud!
Trailing its silver drapery
away
In thin and fairy webs, that
are at play
Like stormless waves upon
a summer sea
Dragging their length of waters
lazily.
Ay! to the rocks! and thou
wilt see, I wist,
A lonely one, that bendeth
in the mist
Of moonlight, with a wild
and raven pall
Flung round him. Is he
mortal man at all?
For, by the meagre fire-light
that is under
Those eyelids, and the vizor
shade of wonder
Falling upon his features,
I would guess,
Of one that wanders out of
blessedness!
Julio! raise thee!—By
the holy mass!
I wot not of the fearless
one would pass
Thy wizard shadow. Where
the raven hair
Was shorn before, in many
a matted layer
It lieth now; and on a rock
beside
The sea, like merman at the
ebb of tide,
Feasting his wondrous vision
on Decay,
So art thou gazing over Agathe!
Ah me! but this is never the
fair girl,
With brow of light, as lovely
as a pearl,
That was as beautiful as is
the form
Of sea-bird at the breaking
of a storm.
The eye is open, with convulsive
strain—
A most unfleshly orb! the
stars that wane
Have nothing of its hue; for
it is cast
With sickly blood, and terribly
aghast!
And sunken in its socket,
like the light
Of a red taper in the lonely
night!
And there is not a braid of
her bright hair
But lieth floating in the
moonlight air,
Like the long moss, beside
a silver spring,
In elfin tresses, sadly murmuring.
The worm hath ’gan to
crawl upon her brow—
The living worm! and with
a ripple now,
Like that upon the sea, are
heard below,
The slimy swarms all ravening
as they go,
Amid the stagnate vitals,
with a rush;
And one might hear them echoing
the hush
Of Julio, as he watches by
the side
Of the dead ladye, his betrothed
bride!
And, ever and anon, a yellow
group
Was creeping on her bosom,
like a troop
Of stars, far up amid the
galaxy,
Pale, pale, as snowy showers;
and two or three
Were mocking the cold finger,
round and round,
With likeness of a ring; and,
as they wound
About its bony girth, they
had the hue
Of pearly jewels glistering
in dew.
That deathly stare! it is
an awful thing
To gaze upon; and sickly thoughts
will spring
Before it to the heart:
it telleth how
There must be waste where
there is beauty now.
The chalk! the chalk! where
was the virgin snow
Of that once heaving bosom!—even
so,—
The cold pale dewy chalk,
with yellow shade
Amid the leprous hues; and
o’er it played
The straggling moonlight,
and the merry breeze,
Like two fair elves, that,
by the murmuring seas,
Woo’d smilingly together;
but there fell
No life-gleam on the brow,
all terrible
Becoming, through its beauty,
like a cloud
That waneth paler even than
a shroud,
All gorgeous and all glorious
before;
For waste, like to the wanton
night, was o’er
Her virgin features, stealing
them away—
Ah me! ah me! and this is
Agathe?
“Enough! enough!
Oh God! but I have pray’d
To thee, in early daylight
and in shade,
And the mad curse is on me
still—and still!
I cannot alter the Eternal
will—
But—but—I
hate thee, Agathe! I hate
What lunacy hath bade me consecrate:
I am not mad!—not
now!—I do not feel
That slumberous and blessed
opiate steal
Up to my brain—Oh!
that it only would,
To people this eternal solitude
With fancies, and fair dreams,
and summer mirth,
Which is not now—And
yet, my mother earth,
I would not love to lie above
He gathers the cold limpets,
as they creep
On the grey rocks beside the
lonely deep;
And with a flint breaks through
into the shell,
And feeds him—by
the mass! he feasteth well.
And he hath lifted water in
a clam,
And tasted sweetly, from a
stream that swam
Down to the sea; and now is
turn’d away,
Again, again, to gaze on Agathe!
There is a cave upon that
isle—a cave
Where dwelt a hermit man;
the winter wave
Roll’d to its entrance,
casting a bright mound
Of snowy shells and fairy
pebbles round;
And over were the solemn ridges
strewn
Of a dark rock, that, like
the wizard throne
Of some sea-monarch, stood,
and from it hung
Wild thorn and bramble, in
confusion flung
Amid the startling crevices—like
sky,
Through gloom of clouds, that
sweep in thunder by.
A cataract fell over, in a
streak
Of silver, playing many a
wanton freak;
Midway, and musical, with
elfin glee
It bounded in its beauty to
the sea,
Like dazzling angel vanishing
away.
In sooth, ’twas pleasant
in the moonlight gray
To see that fairy fountain
leaping so,
Like one that knew not wickedness
nor woe!
The hermit had his cross and
rosary;
I ween like other hermits,
so was he;
A holy man, and frugal, and
at night
He prayed, or slept, or, sometimes,
by the light
Of the fair moon, went wandering
beside
The lonely sea, to hear the
silver tide
Rolling in gleesome music
to the shore:
The more he heard, he loved
to hear the more.
And there he is, his hoary
beard adrift
To the night winds, that sportingly
do lift
Its snow-white tresses; and
he leaneth on
A rugged staff, all weakly
and alone,
A childless, friendless man!
He
is beside
The ghastly Julio, and his
ghastlier bride.
’Twas wondrous strange
to gaze upon the two!
And the old hermit felt a
throbbing through
His pulses:—“Holy
virgin! save me, save!”
He deem’d of spectre
from the midnight wave,
And cross’d him thrice,
and pray’d, and pray’d again:—
“Hence! hence!”
“Father! thy hand upon
this brow of mine,
And tell me, is it cold?—But
she will twine
No wreath upon these temples,—never,
never!
For there she lieth, like
a streamless river
That stagnates in its bed.
Feel, feel me, here,
If I be madly throbbing in
the fear
For that cold slimy worm.
Ay! look and see
How dotingly it feeds, how
pleasantly!
And where it is, have been
the living hues
Of beauty, purer than the
very dews.
So, father! seest thou that
yonder moon
Will be on wane to-morrow,
soon and soon?
And I, that feel my being
wear away,
Shall droop beside to darkness;
so, but say
A prayer for the dead, when
I am gone,
And let the azure tide that
floweth on
Cover us lightly with its
murmuring surf
Like a green sward of melancholy
turf.
Thou mayest, if thou wilt,
thou mayest rear
A cenotaph on this lone island
here,
Of some rude mossy stone,
below a tree,
And carve an olden rhyme for
her and me
Upon its brow.”
He
bends, and gazes yet
Before his ghastly bride!
the anchoret
Sate by him, and hath press’d
a cross of wood
To his wan lips.
* * * * *
“My son! look up and tell thy dismal tale.
Thou seemest cold, and sorrowful, and pale.
Alas! I fear but thou hast strangely been
A child of curse, and misery, and sin.
And this—is she thy sister?”—“Nay! my bride.”
“A nun! and thou:”—“True, true! but then she died,
And was a virgin, and is virgin still,
Chaste as the moon, that taketh her pure fill
Of light from the great sun. But now, go by,
And leave me to my madness, or to die!
This heart, this brain are sore.—Come, come, and fold
Me round, ye hydra billows! wrapt in gold,
That are so writhing your eternal gyres
Before the moon, which, with a myriad tiars
Is crowning you, as ye do fall and kiss
Her pearly feet, that glide in blessedness!
Let me be torture-eaten, ere I die!
Let me be mangled sore with agony!
And be so cursed, so stricken by the spell
Of my heart’s frenzy, that a living hell
Be burning there!—Back! back! if thou art mad—
Methought thou wast, but thou art only sad.
Is this thy child, old man? look, look, and see!
In truth it is a piteous thing for thee
Page 28
To become childless—Well-a-well, go by!
Is there no grave? The quiet sea is nigh,
And I will bury her below the moon;
It may be but a trance or midnight swoon,
And she may wake. Wake, ladye! ha! methought
It was like her—Like her! and is it not?
My angel girl! my brain, my stricken brain!—
I know thee now!—I know myself again.”
He flings him on the ladye,
and anon,
With loathly shudder, from
that wither’d one
Hath torn him back. “Oh
me! no more—no more!
Thou virgin mother! Is
the dream not o’er,
That I have dreamt, but I
must dream again
For moons together, till this
weary brain
Become distemper’d as
the winter sea?
Good father! give me blessing;
let it be
Upon me as the dew upon the
moss.
Oh me! but I have made the
holy cross
A curse, and not a blessing!
let me kiss
The sacred symbol; for, by
this—by this!
I sware, and sware again,
as now I will—
Thou Heaven! if there be bounty
in thee still,
If thou wilt hear, and minister,
and bring
The light of comfort on some
angel wing
To one that lieth lone, do—do
it now;
By all the stars that open
on thy brow
Like silver flowers! and by
the herald moon
That listeth to be forth at
nightly noon,
Jousting the clouds, I swear!
and be it true,
As I have perjured me, that
I renew
Allegiance to thy God, and
bind me o’er
To this same penance, I have
done before!
That night and day I watch,
as I have been
Long watching, o’er
the partner of my sin!
That I taste never the delight
of food,
But these wild shell-fish,
that may make the mood
Of madness stronger, till
it grapple Death—
Despair—Eternity!”
He
saith, he saith,
And, on the jaundiced bosom
of the corse,
Lieth all frenzied; one would
see Remorse,
And hopeless Love, and Hatred,
struggling there,
And Lunacy, that lightens
up Despair,
And makes a gladness out of
agony.
Pale phantom! I would
fear and worship thee,
That hast the soul at will,
and gives it play,
Amid the wildest fancies far
away;
That thronest Reason, on some
wizard throne
Of fairy land, within the
milky zone,—
Some spectre star, that glittereth
beyond
The glorious galaxies of diamond.
Beautiful Lunacy! that shapest
flight
For love to blessed bowers
of delight,
And buildest holy monarchies
within
The fancy, till the very heart
is queen
Of all her golden wishes.
Lunacy!
Thou empress of the passions!
though they be
A sister group of wild, unearthly
forms,
Like lightnings playing in
their home of storms!
I see thee, striking at the
silver strings
Of the pure heart, and holy
music springs
Before thy touch, in many
a solemn strain,
Like that of sea-waves rolling
from the main!
But say, is Melancholy by
thy side,
With tresses in a raven shower,
that hide
Her pale and weeping features?
Is she never
Flowing before thee, like
a gloomy river,
The sister of thyself? but
cold and chill,
And winter-born, and sorrowfully
still,
And not like thee, that art
in merry mood,
And frolicksome amid thy solitude!
Fair Lunacy! I see thee,
with a crown
Of hawthorn and sweet daisies,
bending down
To mirror thy young image
in a spring;
And thou wilt kiss that shadow
of a thing
As soul-less as thyself.
’Tis tender, too,
The smile that meeteth thine!
the holy hue
Of health! the pearly radiance
of the brow!
All, all as tender—beautiful
as thou!
And wilt thou say, my sister,
there is none
Will answer thee? Thou
art—thou art alone,
A pure, pure being! but the
God on high
Is with thee ever, as thou
goest by.
Thou poetess! that harpest
to the moon,
And, in soft concert to the
silver tune
Of waters, play’d on
by the magic wind,
As he comes streaming, with
his hair untwined,
Dost sing light strains of
melody and mirth,—
I hear thee, hymning on thy
holy birth,
How thou wert moulded of thy
mother Love,
That came, like seraph, from
the stars above,
And was so sadly wedded unto
Sin,
That thou wert born, and Sorrow
was thy twin.
Sorrow and mirthful Lunacy!
that be
Together link’d for
time, I deem of ye
That ye are worshipp’d
as none others are,—
One as a lonely shadow, one
a star!
Is Julio glad, that bendeth,
even now,
To his wild purpose, to his
holy vow?
He seeth only in his ladye-bride
The image of the laughing
girl, that died
A moon before—The
same, the very same—
The Agathe that lisp’d
her lover’s name,
To him and to her heart:
that azure eye,
That shone through sunny tresses,
waving by;
The brow, the cheek, that
blush’d of fire and snow,
Both blending into one ethereal
glow;
And that same breathing radiancy,
that swam
Around her, like a pure and
blessed calm
Around some halcyon bird.
And, as he kiss’d
Her wormy lips, he felt that
he was blest!
He felt her holy being stealing
through
His own, like fountains of
the azure dew,
That summer mingles with his
golden light;
And he would clasp her, till
the weary night
Was worn away.
* * * * *
And
morning rose in form
Of heavy clouds, that knitted
into storm
The brow of Heaven, and through
her lips the wind
Came rolling westward, with
a track behind
Of gloomy billows, bursting
on the sea,
All rampant, like great lions
terribly,
And gnashing on each other:
But
they came,—the wind and sea,
And rain and thunder, that
in giant glee,
Sang o’er the lightnings
pale, as to and fro
They writhed, like stricken
angels!—White as snow
Roll’d billow after
billow, and the tide
Came forward as an army deep
and wide,
To charge with all its waters.
There was heard
A murmur far and far, of those
that stirr’d
Within the great encampment
of the sea,
And dark they were, and lifted
terribly
Their water-spouts like banners.
It was grand
To see the black battalions,
hand in hand
Striding to conflict, and
their helmets bent
Below their foamy plumes magnificent!
And Julio heard and laugh’d,
“Shall I be king
To your great hosts, that
ye are murmuring
For one to bear you to your
holy war?
There is no sun, or moon,
or any star,
To guide your iron footsteps
as ye go;
But I, your king, will marshal
you to flow
From shore to shore.
Then bring my car of shell,
That I may ride before you
terrible;
And bring my sceptre of the
amber weed,
And Agathe, my virgin bride,
shall lead
Your summer hosts, when these
are ambling low,
In azure and in ermine, to
and fro.”
He said, and madly, with his
wasted hand,
Swept o’er the tuneless
harp, and fast he spann’d
The silver chords, until a
rush of sound
Came from them, solemn—terrible—profound;
And then he dash’d the
instrument away
Into the waters, and the giant
play
Of billows threw it back unto
the shore,
A shiver’d, stringless
frame—its day of music o’er!
The tide, the rolling tide!
the multitude
Of the sea surges, terrible
and rude,
Tossing their chalky foam
along the bed
Of thundering pebbles, that
are shoring dread,
And fast retreating to the
gloomy gorge
Of waters, sounding like a
Titan forge!
It comes! it comes! the tide,
the rolling tide!
But Julio is bending to his
bride,
And making mirthful whispers
to her ear.
A cataract! a cataract is
near,
Of one stupendous billow,
and it breaks
Terribly furious, with a myriad
flakes
Of foam, that fly about the
haggard twain;
And Julio started, with a
sudden pain,
That shot into his heart;
his reason flew
Back to its throne; he rose,
The sea-bird sitteth lonely
by the side
Of the far waste of waters,
flapping wide
His wet and weary wings; but
he is gone,
The stricken Julio!—a
wave-swept stone
Stands there, on which he
sat, and nakedly
It rises looking to the lonely
sea;
But Julio is gone, and Agathe!
The waters swept them madly
to their core,—
The dead and living with a
frantic roar!
And so he died, his bosom
fondly set
On her’s; and round
her clay-cold waist were met
His bare and wither’d
arms, and to her brow
His lips were press’d.
Both, both are perish’d now!
He died upon her bosom in
a swoon;
And fancied of the pale and
silver moon,
That went before him in her
hall of blue:
He died like golden insect
in the dew,
Calm, calm, and pure; and
not a chord was rung
In his deep heart, but love.
He perish’d young,
But perish’d, wasted
by some fatal flame
That fed upon his vitals;
and there came
Lunacy sweeping lightly, like
a stream,
Along his brain—He
perish’d in a dream!
In
sooth, I marvel not,
If death be only a mysterious
thought,
That cometh on the heart,
and turns the brow
Brightless and chill, as Julio’s
is now;
For only had the wasting struggle
been
Of one wild feeling, till
it rose within
Into the form of death, and
nature felt
The light of the immortal
being melt
Into its happier home, beyond
the sea,
And moon, and stars, into
eternity!
The sun broke through his
dungeon long enthrall’d
By dismal cloud, and on the
emerald
Of the great living sea was
blazing down,
To gift the lordly billows
with a crown
Of diamond and silver.
From his cave
The hermit came, and by the
dying wave
Lone wander’d, and he
found upon the sand,
Below a truss of sea-weed,
with his hand
Around the silent waist of
Agathe,
The corse of Julio! Pale,
pale, it lay
Beside the wasted girl.
The fireless eye
Was open, and a jewell’d
rosary
Hung round the neck; but it
was gone,—the cross
That Agathe had given.
Amid
the moss,
The hermit scoop’d a
solitary grave
Below the pine-trees, and
he sang a stave,
Or two, or three, of some
old requiem
As in their narrow home he
buried them.
And many a day, before that
blessed spot
He sate, in lone and melancholy
thought,
Gazing upon the grave; and
one had guess’d
Of some dark secret shadowing
his breast.
And yet, to see him, with
his silver hair
Adrift and floating in the
sea-borne air,
And features chasten’d
in the tears of woe,
In sooth ’twas merely
sad to see him so!
A wreck of nature, floating
far and fast,
Upon the stream of Time—to
sink at last!
And he is wandering by the
shore again,
Hard leaning on his staff;
the azure main
Lies sleeping far before him,
with his seas
Fast folded in the bosom of
the breeze,
That like the angel Peace
hath dropt his wings
Around the warring waters.
Sadly sings
To his own heart that lonely
hermit man,
A tale of other days, when
passion ran
Along his pulses, like a troubled
stream,
And glory was a splendour,
and a dream!
He stoop’d to gather
up a shining gem,
That lay amid the shells,
as bright as them,—
It was a cross, the cross
that Agathe
Had given to her Julio:
the play
Of the fierce sunbeams fell
upon its face,
And on the glistering jewels—But
the trace
Of some old thought came burning
to the brain
Of the pale hermit, and he
shrunk in pain
Before the holy symbol.
It was not
Because of the eternal ransom
wrought
In ages far away, or he had
bent
In pure devotion sad and reverent;
But now, he started, as he
look’d upon
That jewell’d thing,
and wildly he is gone
Back to the mossy grave, away,
away:—
“My child! my child!
my own, own Agathe!”
It is her father,—he,—an
alter’d man!
His quiet had been wounded,
and the ban
Of misery came over him, and
froze
The bright and holy tides,
that fell and rose
In joy amid his heart.
To think of her,
That he had injured so, and
all so fair,
So fond, so like the chosen
of his youth,—
It was a very dismal thought,
in truth,
That he had left her hopelessly,
for aye,
Within the cloister-wall to
droop, and die!
And so he could not bear to
have it be;
But sought for some lone island
in the sea,
Where he might dwell in doleful
solitude,
And do strange penance in
his mirthless mood,
For this same crime, unnaturally
wild,
That he had done unto his
saintly child.
And ever he did think, when
he had laid
These lovers in the grave,
that, through the shade
Of ghastly features melting
to decay,
He saw the image of his Agathe.
And now the truth had flash’d
into his brain:
And he is fallen, with a shriek
of pain,
Upon the lap of pale and yellow
moss;
For long ago he gave that
blessed cross
To his fair girl, and knew
the relic still,
By many a thousand thoughts,
that rose at will
Before it, of the one that
was not now,
But, like a dream, had floated
from the brow
Of Time, that seeth many a
lovely thing
Fade by him, like a sea-wave
murmuring.
The heart is burst!—the
heart that stood in steel
To woman’s earnest tears,
and bade her feel
The curse of virgin solitude,—a
veil;
And saw the gladsome features
growing pale
Unmoved: ’tis rent,
like some eternal tower
The sea hath shaken, and its
stately power
Lies lonely, fallen, scatter’d
on the shore:
’Tis rent, like some
great mountain, that, before
The Deluge, stood in glory
and in might,
But now is lightning-riven,
and the night
Is clambering up its sides,
and chasms lie strewn,
Like coffins, here and there:
’tis rent! the throne
Where passions, in their awful
anarchy,
Stood sceptred! There
was heard an inward sigh,
That took the being, on its
troubled wings,
Far to the land of dim imaginings!
All three are dead; that desolate
green isle
Is only peopled by the passing
smile
Of sun and moon, that surely
have a sense,
They look so radiant with
intelligence,—
So like the soul’s own
element,—so fair!
The features of a God lie
veiled there!
And mariners that have been
toiling far
Upon the deep, and lost the
polar star,
Have visited that island,
and have seen
That lover’s grave:
and many there have been
That sat upon the gray and
crumbling stone,
And started, as they saw a
skeleton
Amid the long sad moss, that
fondly grew
Through the white wasted ribs;
but never knew
Of those who slept below,
or of the tale
Of that brain-stricken man,
that felt the pale
And wandering moonlight steal
his soul away,—
Poor Julio, and the ladye
Agathe!
* * * * *
We found them,—children
of toil and tears,
Their birth of beauty shaded;
We left them in their early years
Fallen and faded.
We found them, flowers of summer
hue:
Their golden cups were lighted
With sparkles of the pearly dew—
We left them blighted!
We found them,—like
those fairy flowers;
And the light of morn lay holy
Over their sad and sainted bowers—
We left them, lowly.
We found them,—like
twin stars, alone,
In brightness and in feeling;
We left them,—and the curse was on
Their beauty stealing.
They rest in quiet, where they
are:
Their lifetime is the story
Of some fair flower—some silver star,
Faded in glory!
THE IRIS
A pale and broken Iris in
the mirror
Of a gray cloud,—as
gray as death,
Slow sailing in
the breath
Of thunder! Like a child,
that lies in terror
Through the dark
night, an Iris fair
Trembled midway
in air.
The blending of its elfin
hues
Was as the pure
enamel on
The early morning dews;
And gloriously
they shone,
Waving everyone his wing,
Like a young aerial thing!
That Iris came
Over the shells of gold, beside
The blue and waveless tide;
Its girdle, of
resplendent flame,
Met shore and sea, afar,
Like angel that shall stand
On flood and land,
Crown’d with a meteor
star.
The sea-bird, from her snowy
stone,
Beheld it floating on,
Like a bride that
bent her way
To the altar, standing lone,
In some cathedral
gray.
The melancholy
wave
Started at the
cry she gave,
Hailing the lovely child
Of the immortal
sun,—
A tender and a
tearful one,
Bounding away, with footsteps
wild!
Old Neptune on his silver
bed
The dazzling image
threw;
It laid like sunbeam
on the dew,
Its young tress-waving head.
The god upon the
shadow gazed,
And silently upraised
A gentle wave, that came and
kiss’d
Fair Iris in her holy rest.
Her pearly brow
grew pale:
It felt the sinful fire,
And from her queenly tiar
She drew the veil.
The sun-wing’d steeds
her sacred car
Wheel’d to her throne
of star.
Spirit! in deathless halo
zoned,
A chain of stars with wings
of diamond,—
Is music blended into thee
With holy light and immortality?
For, as thy shape
of glory swept
Through seas of darkness,
magic breathings fell
Around it, like
the notes that slept
In the wild caverns of a silver
shell.
Thou camest, as a lightning
spring
Through chasms of horrid cloud,
on scathless wing;
Old Chaos round him, like
a tiar,
Swathed the long rush of immaterial
fire;
As thou, descending
from afar,
Wast canopied with living
arch of light,
Pale pillars of
immortal star,
Burst through the curtains
of the moonless night.
Phantom of wonder! over thee,
Trembles the shadow of the
Deity;
For face to face, on lifted
throne,
Thou gazest to the glory-shrouded
One,
Where highest
in the azure height
Of universe, eternally he
turns
Myriads of worlds;
with blaze of light
Filling the hollow of their
golden urns.
Why comest thou, with feelings
bound
On thy birth-shore, the long
unenter’d ground?
To visit where thy being first,
Through the pale shell of
embryo nothing, burst?
Or, on celestial
errand bent,
To win to faith a sin enraptured
son,
And point the
angel lineament
Of mercy on a cross,—the
Bleeding One?
Spirit! I breathe no
sad adieu:
The altars where thou bendest
never knew
Sigh, tear, or sorrow, and
the night
No chariot drives behind the
wheel of light;
Where every seraph
is a sun,
And every soul an everlasting
star.—
Go to thy home,
thou peerless one!
Where glory and the Great
Immortal are!
HER, A STATUE
Her life is in the marble!
yet a fall
Of sleep lies on the heart’s
fair arsenal,
Like new shower’d snow.
You hear no whisper through
Those love-divided lips; no
pearly dew
Trembles on her pale orbs,
that seem to be
Bent on a dream of immortality!
She sleeps: her life
is sleep,—a holy rest!
Like that of wing-borne cloud,
that, in the west
Laves his aerial image, till
afar
The sunlight leaves him, melting
into star.
Did Phidias from her brow
the veil remove,
Uncurtaining the peerless
queen of love?
The fluent stone in marble
waves recoil’d,
Touch’d by his hand,
and left the wondrous child,
A Venus of the foam!
How softly fair
The dove-like passion on the
sacred air
Floats round her, nesting
in her wreathed hair,
That tells, though shadeless,
of its auburn hue,
Bathed in a hoar of diamond-dropping
dew!
How beautiful!—Was
this not one of eld,
That Chaos on his boundless
bosom held,
Till Earth came forward in
a rush of storm,
Closing his ribs upon her
wingless form?
How beautiful!—The
very lips do speak
Of love, and bid us worship:
the pale cheek
Seems blushing through the
marble—through the snow!
And the undrap’ried
bosom feels a flow
Of fever on its brightness;
every vein
At the blue pulse swells softly,
like a chain
Of gentle hills. I would
not fling a wreath
Of jewels on that brow, to
flash beneath
Those queenly tresses; for
itself is more
Than sea-born pearl of some
Elysian shore!
Such, with a heart like woman!
I would cast
Life at her foot, and, as
she glided past,
Would bid her trample on the
slavish thing—
Tell her, I’d rather
feel me withering
Under her step, than be unknown
for aye:
And, when her
pride had crush’d me, she might see
A love-wing’d spirit
glide in glory by
Striking the tent
of its mortality!
Trembler! a month is past,
and thou
Wert singing on
the thorn,
And shaking dew-drops from
the bough
In the golden
haze of morn!
My heart was just as thou,
as light—
As loving of the
breeze,
That kiss’d thee in
its elfin flight,
Through the green
acacia trees.
And now the winter snow-flakes
lie
All on thy widow’d
wing;
Trembler! methinks I hear
thee sigh
For the silver
days of spring.
But shake thy plume—the
world is free
Before thee—warbler,
fly!
Blest by a sunbeam and by
me,
Bird of my heart!
good-bye!
THE WOLF-DROVE
No night-star in the welkin
blue! no moonshade round the trees
That grew down to the sea-swept
foot of the ancient Pyrenees!
The cold gray mantle of the
mist, along the shoulders cast
Of those wild mountains, to
and fro, hung waving in the blast.
A snow-crown rising on their
brows, in royalty they stood,
As if they vice-reign’d
on a throne of winter solitude;
Those hills that rose far
upward, till in majesty they bent
Their world’s great
eye-orb on her own immortal lineament!
The howl, the long deep howl
was heard, the rushing like a wave
Of the wolf train from their
forest haunt, in some old mountain cave;
Like a sea-wave, when the
wind is horsed behind its foamy crest,
And it lifts upon the shell-built
shore, its azure-spotted breast.
They came with war-whoop,
following each other, like a thread,
Through the long labyrinth
of trees, in sunless archway spread;
Their gnarled trunks in shadowy
lines rose dimly, few by few,
Mail’d in their mossy
armouring,—a pathless avenue!
In sooth, there was a shepherd
girl by her aged father’s side;
He gazed upon her deep dark
eyes, in glory and in pride;
The mother’s soul was
living there,—the image full and wild,
Of one he loved—of
one no more, was beaming in her child.
And she was at her father’s
side, her raven tresses felt
Upon his care-worn cheek,
as gay and joyfully she knelt,
Kissing the old man’s
tears away, by the embers burning faint,
While she sung the holy aves,
and a vesper to her saint.
“Now bar the breezy
lattice, love!—but hist! how fares the night?
Methought I heard the wolf
abroad. Heaven help! I heard aright—
My mantle!—By the
Mother Saint! our flock is in the fold?
How think you, love? wake
up the hound, I ween the wolf is bold.”
“Stay, stay; ’tis
past!” “I hear it still; to rest, I pray,
to rest.”
“Nay, father! hold;
thou must not go;” and silently she press’d
The old man’s arm, and
bade him stay, for love of Heaven and her:
His danger was too wild a
thought, for so fond a girl to bear.
He kiss’d her, and they
parted then; but, through the lattice low,
She gazed amid the vine-twigs
pale, all cradled to and fro;
The holy whisper of the wind
stole lightly by the eaves,—
A sad dirge, sighing to the
fall of the winter-blighted leaves.
He comes not! ’Tis
a dreadful thing to hear them as they rave,
The savage wolf-train howling,
like the near burst of a wave.
She thought it was a father’s
cry she heard—a father’s cry!
And she flung her from the
cottage door, in startled agony.
Good Virgin save thee, gentle
girl! they are no knightly train
That mark thee for their sinless
prey—thou wilt not smile again;
The blood is streaming on
thy cheek; the heart it ceases slow;
A father gazes on his child—God
help a father’s woe!
Orion! old Orion! who dost
wait
Warder at heaven’s star-studded
gate,
On a throne where worlds might
meet
At thy silver sandal’d
feet,
All invisible to thee,
Gazing through immensity;
For thy crowned head is higher
Than the ramparts of earth-searching
fire,
And the comet his blooded
banner, there
Flings back upon the waveless
air.
Old Orion! holy hands
Have knit thy everlasting
bands,
Belted by the King of kings,
Under thy azure-sheathed wings,
With a zone of living light,
Such as bound the Apostate
might,
When from highest tower of
heaven,
His vaunting shape was wrathly
driven
To its wane, woe-wall’d
abode,
Rended from the eye of God!
Dost thou, in thy vigils,
hail
Arcturus on his chariot pale,
Leading his sons—a
fiery flight—
Over the hollow hill of night?
Or tellest of their watches
long,
To the sleepless, nameless
throng,
Shoaling in a wond’rous
gleam,
Like channel through the azure
stream
Of life reflected, as it flows,
In one broad ocean of repose,
Gushing from thy lips, Orion!
To the holy walls of Zion?
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London & Edinburgh