John Kepler, from the chimney corner, watched
His wife Susannah, with her sleeves rolled back
Making a salad in a big blue bowl.
The thick tufts of his black rebellious hair
Brushed into sleek submission; his trim beard
Snug as the soft round body of a thrush
Between the white wings of his fan-shaped ruff
(His best, with the fine lace border) spoke of guests
Expected; and his quick grey humorous eyes,
His firm red whimsical pleasure-loving mouth,
And all those elvish twinklings of his face,
Were lit with eagerness. Only between his brows,
Perplexed beneath that subtle load of dreams,
Two delicate shadows brooded.
“What
does it mean?
Sir Henry Wotton’s letter breathed a hint
That Italy is prohibiting my book,”
He muttered. “Then, if Austria damns it
too,
Susannah mine, we may be forced to choose
Between the truth and exile. When he comes,
He’ll tell me more. Ambassadors, I suppose,
Can only write in cipher, while our world
Is steered to heaven by murderers and thieves;
But, if he’d wrapped his friendly warnings up
In a verse or two, I might have done more work
These last three days, eh, Sue?”
“Look,
John,” said she,
“What beautiful hearts of lettuce! Tell
me now
How shall I mix it? Will your English guest
Turn up his nose at dandelion leaves
As crisp and young as these? They’ve just
the tang
Of bitterness in their milk that gives a relish
And makes all sweet; and that’s philosophy,
John.
Now—these spring onions! Would his
Excellency
Like sugared rose-leaves better?”
“He’s
a poet,
Not an ambassador only, so I think
He’ll like a cottage salad.”
“A
poet, John!
I hate their arrogant little insect ways!
I’ll put a toadstool in.”
“Poets,
dear heart,
Can be divided into two clear kinds,—
One that, by virtue of a half-grown brain,
Lives in a silly world of his own making,
A bubble, blown by himself, in which he flits
And dizzily bombinates, chanting ‘I, I, I,’
For there is nothing in the heavens above
Or the earth, or hell beneath, but goes to swell
His personal pronoun. Bring him some dreadful
news
His dearest friend is burned to death,—You’ll
see
The monstrous insect strike an attitude
And shape himself into one capital I,
A rubric, with red eyes. You’ll see him
use
The coffin for his pedestal, hear him mouth
His ‘I, I, I’ instructing haggard grief
Concerning his odd ego. Does he chirp
Of love, it’s ‘I, I, I’ Narcissus,
love,
Myself, Narcissus, imaged in those eyes;
For all the love-notes that he sounds are made
After the fashion of passionate grasshoppers,
