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Title: A Minor Poet and Other Verse

Author: Amy Levy

Release Date: April 22, 2018 [EBook #57022]

Language: English

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A Minor Poet

And other Verse

by

AMY LEVY

CAMEO SERIES

T.FISHER UNWIN PATERNOSTER SQ.

LONDON E.C. MDCCCXCI.

Second Edition

This volume is a reprint of that issued in 1884, with the addition of a sonnet and a translation, from a volume published in Cambridge in 1881, and now out of print.

Contents.

PAGE

To a Dead Poet

11

A MINOR POET

13

XANTIPPE

23

MEDEA

35

SINFONIA EROICA

58

TO SYLVIA

60

A GREEK GIRL

62

MAGDALEN

65

CHRISTOPHER FOUND

69

A DIRGE

74

THE SICK MAN AND THE NIGHTINGALE

76

TO DEATH

77

A JUNE-TIDE ECHO

78

TO LALLIE

80

IN A MINOR KEY

83

A FAREWELL

86

A CROSS-ROAD EPITAPH

87

EPITAPH

88

SONNET

89

TRANSLATED FROM GEIBEL

90

To a Dead Poet.

I KNEW not if to laugh or weep;

They sat and talked of you—

“ ’Twas here he sat; ’twas this he said!

’Twas that he used to do.

“Here is the book wherein he read,

The room, wherein he dwelt;

And he” (they said) “was such a man,

Such things he thought and felt.”

I sat and sat, I did not stir;

They talked and talked away.

I was as mute as any stone,

I had no word to say.

They talked and talked; like to a stone

My heart grew in my breast—

I, who had never seen your face

Perhaps I knew you best.

A Minor Poet.

“What should such fellows as I do,

Crawling between earth and heaven?”

HERE is the phial; here I turn the key

Sharp in the lock. Click!—there’s no doubt it turned.

This is the third time; there is luck in threes—

Queen Luck, that rules the world, befriend me now

And freely I’ll forgive you many wrongs!

Just as the draught began to work, first time,

Tom Leigh, my friend (as friends go in the world),

Burst in, and drew the phial from my hand,

(Ah, Tom! ah, Tom! that was a sorry turn!)

And lectured me a lecture, all compact

Of neatest, newest phrases, freshly culled

From works of newest culture: “common good;”

“The world’s great harmonies;” “must be content

With knowing God works all things for the best,

And Nature never stumbles.” Then again,

“The common good,” and still, “the common, good;”

And what a small thing was our joy or grief

When weigh’d with that of thousands. Gentle Tom,

But you might wag your philosophic tongue

From morn till eve, and still the thing’s the same:

I am myself, as each man is himself—

Feels his own pain, joys his own joy, and loves

With his own love, no other’s. Friend, the world

Is but one man; one man is but the world.

And I am I, and you are Tom, that bleeds

When needles prick your flesh (mark, yours, not mine).

I must confess it; I can feel the pulse

A-beating at my heart, yet never knew

The throb of cosmic pulses. I lament

The death of youth’s ideal in my heart;

And, to be honest, never yet rejoiced

In the world’s progress—scarce, indeed, discerned;

(For still it seems that God’s a Sisyphus

With the world for stone).

You shake your head. I’m base,

Ignoble? Who is noble—you or I?

I was not once thus? Ah, my friend, we are

As the Fates make us.

This time is the third;

The second time the flask fell from my hand,

Its drowsy juices spilt upon the board;

And there my face fell flat, and all the life

Crept from my limbs, and hand and foot were bound

With mighty chains, subtle, intangible;

While still the mind held to its wonted use,

Or rather grew intense and keen with dread,

An awful dread—I thought I was in Hell.

In Hell, in Hell! Was ever Hell conceived

By mortal brain, by brain Divine devised,

Darker, more fraught with torment, than the world

For such as I? A creature maimed and marr’d

From very birth. A blot, a blur, a note

All out of tune in this world’s instrument.

A base thing, yet not knowing to fulfil

Base functions. A high thing, yet all unmeet

For work that’s high. A dweller on the earth,

Yet not content to dig with other men

Because of certain sudden sights and sounds

(Bars of broke music; furtive, fleeting glimpse

Of angel faces ’thwart the grating seen)

Perceived in Heaven. Yet when I approach

To catch the sound’s completeness, to absorb

The faces’ full perfection, Heaven’s gate,

Which then had stood ajar, sudden falls to,

And I, a-shiver in the dark and cold,

Scarce hear afar the mocking tones of men:

“He would not dig, forsooth; but he must strive

For higher fruits than what our tillage yields;

Behold what comes, my brothers, of vain pride!”

Why play with figures? trifle prettily

With this my grief which very simply ’s said,

“There is no place for me in all the world”?

The world’s a rock, and I will beat no more

A breast of flesh and blood against a rock....

A stride across the planks for old time’s sake.

Ah, bare, small room that I have sorrowed in;

Ay, and on sunny days, haply, rejoiced;

We know some things together, you and I!

Hold there, you rangèd row of books! In vain

You beckon from your shelf. You’ve stood my friends

Where all things else were foes; yet now I’ll turn

My back upon you, even as the world

Turns it on me. And yet—farewell, farewell!

You, lofty Shakespere, with the tattered leaves

And fathomless great heart, your binding’s bruised

Yet did I love you less? Goethe, farewell;

Farewell, triumphant smile and tragic eyes,

And pitiless world-wisdom!

For all men

These two. And ’tis farewell with you, my friends,

More dear because more near: Theokritus;

Heine that stings and smiles; Prometheus’ bard;

(I’ve grown too coarse for Shelley latterly:)

And one wild singer of to-day, whose song

Is all aflame with passionate bard’s blood

Lash’d into foam by pain and the world’s wrong.

At least, he has a voice to cry his pain;

For him, no silent writhing in the dark,

No muttering of mute lips, no straining out

Of a weak throat a-choke with pent-up sound,

A-throb with pent-up passion....

Ah, my sun!

That’s you, then, at the window, looking in

To beam farewell on one who’s loved you long

And very truly. Up, you creaking thing,

You squinting, cobwebbed casement!

So, at last,

I can drink in the sunlight. How it falls

Across that endless sea of London roofs,

Weaving such golden wonders on the grey,

That almost, for the moment, we forget

The world of woe beneath them.

Underneath,

For all the sunset glory, Pain is king.

Yet, the sun’s there, and very sweet withal;

And I’ll not grumble that it’s only sun,

But open wide my lips—thus—drink it in;

Turn up my face to the sweet evening sky

(What royal wealth of scarlet on the blue

So tender toned, you’d almost think it green)

And stretch my hands out—so—to grasp it tight.

Ha, ha! ’tis sweet awhile to cheat the Fates,

And be as happy as another man.

The sun works in my veins like wine, like wine!

’Tis a fair world: if dark, indeed, with woe,

Yet having hope and hint of such a joy,

That a man, winning, well might turn aside,

Careless of Heaven....

O enough; I turn

From the sun’s light, or haply I shall hope.

I have hoped enough; I would not hope again:

’Tis hope that is most cruel.

Tom, my friend,

You very sorry philosophic fool;

’Tis you, I think, that bid me be resign’d,

Trust, and be thankful.

Out on you! Resign’d?

I’m not resign’d, not patient, not school’d in

To take my starveling’s portion and pretend

I’m grateful for it. I want all, all, all;

I’ve appetite for all. I want the best:

Love, beauty, sunlight, nameless joy of life.

There’s too much patience in the world, I think.

We have grown base with crooking of the knee.

Mankind—say—God has bidden to a feast;

The board is spread, and groans with cates and drinks;

In troop the guests; each man with appetite

Keen-whetted with expectance.

In they troop,

Struggle for seats, jostle and push and seize.

What’s this? what’s this? There are not seats for all!

Some men must stand without the gates; and some

Must linger by the table, ill-supplied

With broken meats. One man gets meat for two,

The while another hungers. If I stand

Without the portals, seeing others eat

Where I had thought to satiate the pangs

Of mine own hunger; shall I then come forth

When all is done, and drink my Lord’s good health

In my Lord’s water? Shall I not rather turn

And curse him, curse him for a niggard host?

O, I have hungered, hungered, through the years,

Till appetite grows craving, then disease;

I am starved, wither’d, shrivelled.

Peace, O peace!

This rage is idle; what avails to curse

The nameless forces, the vast silences

That work in all things.

This time is the third,

I wrought before in heat, stung mad with pain,

Blind, scarcely understanding; now I know

What thing I do.

There was a woman once;

Deep eyes she had, white hands, a subtle smile,

Soft speaking tones: she did not break my heart,

Yet haply had her heart been otherwise

Mine had not now been broken. Yet, who knows?

My life was jarring discord from the first:

Tho’ here and there brief hints of melody,

Of melody unutterable, clove the air.

From this bleak world, into the heart of night,

The dim, deep bosom of the universe,

I cast myself. I only crave for rest;

Too heavy is the load. I fling it down.

EPILOGUE.

We knocked and knocked; at last, burst in the door,

And found him as you know—the outstretched arms

Propping the hidden face. The sun had set,

And all the place was dim with lurking shade.

There was no written word to say farewell,

Or make more clear the deed.

I search’d and search’d;

The room held little: just a row of books

Much scrawl’d and noted; sketches on the wall,

Done rough in charcoal; the old instrument

(A violin, no Stradivarius)

He played so ill on; in the table drawer

Large schemes of undone work. Poems half-writ;

Wild drafts of symphonies; big plans of fugues;

Some scraps of writing in a woman’s hand:

No more—the scattered pages of a tale,

A sorry tale that no man cared to read.

Alas, my friend, I lov’d him well, tho’ he

Held me a cold and stagnant-blooded fool,

Because I am content to watch, and wait

With a calm mind the issue of all things.

Certain it is my blood’s no turbid stream;

Yet, for all that, haply I understood

More than he ever deem’d; nor held so light

The poet in him. Nay, I sometimes doubt

If they have not, indeed, the better part—

These poets, who get drunk with sun, and weep

Because the night or a woman’s face is fair.

Meantime there is much talk about my friend.

The women say, of course, he died for love;

The men, for lack of gold, or cavilling

Of carping critics. I, Tom Leigh, his friend

I have no word at all to say of this.

Nay, I had deem’d him more philosopher;

For did he think by this one paltry deed

To cut the knot of circumstance, and snap

The chain which binds all being?

Xantippe.

(A FRAGMENT.)

“Xantippe” has appeared in the University Magazine, and in a collection of Verse published at Cambridge.

WHAT, have I waked again? I never thought

To see the rosy dawn, or ev’n this grey,

Dull, solemn stillness, ere the dawn has come.

The lamp burns low; low burns the lamp of life:

The still morn stays expectant, and my soul,

All weighted with a passive wonderment,

Waiteth and watcheth, waiteth for the dawn.

Come hither, maids; too soundly have ye slept

That should have watched me; nay, I would not chide—

Oft have I chidden, yet I would not chide

In this last hour;—now all should be at peace.

I have been dreaming in a troubled sleep

Of weary days I thought not to recall;

Of stormy days, whose storms are hushed long since;

Of gladsome days, of sunny days; alas

In dreaming, all their sunshine seem’d so sad,

As though the current of the dark To-Be

Had flow’d, prophetic, through the happy hours.

And yet, full well, I know it was not thus;

I mind me sweetly of the summer days,

When, leaning from the lattice, I have caught

The fair, far glimpses of a shining sea;

And, nearer, of tall ships which thronged the bay,

And stood out blackly from a tender sky

All flecked with sulphur, azure, and bright gold;

And in the still, clear air have heard the hum

Of distant voices; and methinks there rose

No darker fount to mar or stain the joy

Which sprang ecstatic in my maiden breast

Than just those vague desires, those hopes and fears,

Those eager longings, strong, though undefined,

Whose very sadness makes them seem so sweet.

What cared I for the merry mockeries

Of other maidens sitting at the loom?

Or for sharp voices, bidding me return

To maiden labour? Were we not apart—

I and my high thoughts, and my golden dreams,

My soul which yearned for knowledge, for a tongue

That should proclaim the stately mysteries

Of this fair world, and of the holy gods?

Then followed days of sadness, as I grew

To learn my woman-mind had gone astray,

And I was sinning in those very thoughts—

For maidens, mark, such are not woman’s thoughts—

(And yet, ’tis strange, the gods who fashion us

Have given us such promptings)....

Fled the years,

Till seventeen had found me tall and strong,

And fairer, runs it, than Athenian maids

Are wont to seem; I had not learnt it well—

My lesson of dumb patience—and I stood

At Life’s great threshold with a beating heart,

And soul resolved to conquer and attain....

Once, walking ’thwart the crowded market-place,

With other maidens, bearing in the twigs

White doves for Aphrodite’s sacrifice,

I saw him, all ungainly and uncouth,

Yet many gathered round to hear his words,

Tall youths and stranger-maidens—Sokrates—

I saw his face and marked it, half with awe,

Half with a quick repulsion at the shape....

The richest gem lies hidden furthest down,

And is the dearer for the weary search;

We grasp the shining shells which strew the shore,

Yet swift we fling them from us; but the gem

We keep for aye and cherish. So a soul,

Found after weary searching in the flesh

Which half repelled our senses, is more dear,

For that same seeking, than the sunny mind

Which lavish Nature marks with thousand hints

Upon a brow of beauty. We are prone

To overweigh such subtle hints, then deem,

In after disappointment, we are fooled....

And when, at length, my father told me all,

That I should wed me with great Sokrates,

I, foolish, wept to see at once cast down

The maiden image of a future love,

Where perfect body matched the perfect soul.

But slowly, softly did I cease to weep;

Slowly I ’gan to mark the magic flash

Leap to the eyes, to watch the sudden smile

Break round the mouth, and linger in the eyes;

To listen for the voice’s lightest tone—

Great voice, whose cunning modulations seemed

Like to the notes of some sweet instrument.

So did I reach and strain, until at last

I caught the soul athwart the grosser flesh.

Again of thee, sweet Hope, my spirit dreamed!

I, guided by his wisdom and his love,

Led by his words, and counselled by his care,

Should lift the shrouding veil from things which be,

And at the flowing fountain of his soul

Refresh my thirsting spirit....

And indeed,

In those long days which followed that strange day

When rites and song, and sacrifice and flow’rs,

Proclaimed that we were wedded, did I learn,

In sooth, a-many lessons; bitter ones

Which sorrow taught me, and not love inspired,

Which deeper knowledge of my kind impressed

With dark insistence on reluctant brain;—

But that great wisdom, deeper, which dispels

Narrowed conclusions of a half-grown mind,

And sees athwart the littleness of life

Nature’s divineness and her harmony,

Was never poor Xantippe’s....

I would pause

And would recall no more, no more of life,

Than just the incomplete, imperfect dream

Of early summers, with their light and shade,

Their blossom-hopes, whose fruit was never ripe;

But something strong within me, some sad chord

Which loudly echoes to the later life,

Me to unfold the after-misery

Urges, with plaintive wailing in my heart.

Yet, maidens, mark; I would not that ye thought

I blame my lord departed, for he meant

No evil, so I take it, to his wife.

’Twas only that the high philosopher,

Pregnant with noble theories and great thoughts,

Deigned not to stoop to touch so slight a thing

As the fine fabric of a woman’s brain—

So subtle as a passionate woman’s soul.

I think, if he had stooped a little, and cared,

I might have risen nearer to his height,

And not lain shattered, neither fit for use

As goodly household vessel, nor for that

Far finer thing which I had hoped to be....

Death, holding high his retrospective lamp,

Shows me those first, far years of wedded life,

Ere I had learnt to grasp the barren shape

Of what the Fates had destined for my life

Then, as all youthful spirits are, was I

Wholly incredulous that Nature meant

So little, who had promised me so much.

At first I fought my fate with gentle words,

With high endeavours after greater things;

Striving to win the soul of Sokrates,

Like some slight bird, who sings her burning love

To human master, till at length she finds

Her tender language wholly misconceived,

And that same hand whose kind caress she sought,

With fingers flippant flings the careless corn....

I do remember how, one summer’s eve,

He, seated in an arbour’s leafy shade,

Had bade me bring fresh wine-skins....

As I stood

Ling’ring upon the threshold, half concealed

By tender foliage, and my spirit light

With draughts of sunny weather, did I mark

An instant the gay group before mine eyes.

Deepest in shade, and facing where I stood,

Sat Plato, with his calm face and low brows

Which met above the narrow Grecian eyes,

The pale, thin lips just parted to the smile,

Which dimpled that smooth olive of his cheek.

His head a little bent, sat Sokrates,

With one swart finger raised admonishing,

And on the air were borne his changing tones.

Low lounging at his feet, one fair arm thrown

Around his knee (the other, high in air

Brandish’d a brazen amphor, which yet rained

Bright drops of ruby on the golden locks

And temples with their fillets of the vine),

Lay Alkibiades the beautiful.

And thus, with solemn tone, spake Sokrates:

“This fair Aspasia, which our Perikles

Hath brought from realms afar, and set on high

In our Athenian city, hath a mind,

I doubt not, of a strength beyond her race;

And makes employ of it, beyond the way

Of women nobly gifted: woman’s frail—

Her body rarely stands the test of soul;

She grows intoxicate with knowledge; throws

The laws of custom, order,’neath her feet,

Feasting at life’s great banquet with wide throat.”

Then sudden, stepping from my leafy screen,

Holding the swelling wine-skin o’er my head,

With breast that heaved, and eyes and cheeks aflame,

Lit by a fury and a thought, I spake:

“By all great powers around us! can it be

That we poor women are empirical?

That gods who fashioned us did strive to make

Beings too fine, too subtly delicate,

With sense that thrilled response to ev’ry touch

Of nature’s, and their task is not complete?

That they have sent their half-completed work

To bleed and quiver here upon the earth?

To bleed and quiver, and to weep and weep,

To beat its soul against the marble walls

Of men’s cold hearts, and then at last to sin!”

I ceased, the first hot passion stayed and stemmed

And frighted by the silence: I could see,

Framed by the arbour foliage, which the sun

In setting softly gilded with rich gold,

Those upturned faces, and those placid limbs;

Saw Plato’s narrow eyes and niggard mouth,

Which half did smile and half did criticise,

One hand held up, the shapely fingers framed

To gesture of entreaty—“Hush, I pray,

Do not disturb her; let us hear the rest;

Follow her mood, for here’s another phase

Of your black-browed Xantippe....”

Then I saw

Young Alkibiades, with laughing lips

And half-shut eyes, contemptuous shrugging up

Soft, snowy shoulders, till he brought the gold

Of flowing ringlets round about his breasts.

But Sokrates, all slow and solemnly,

Raised, calm, his face to mine, and sudden spake:

“I thank thee for the wisdom which thy lips

Have thus let fall among us: prythee tell

From what high source, from what philosophies

Didst cull the sapient notion of thy words?”

Then stood I straight and silent for a breath,

Dumb, crushed with all that weight of cold contempt;

But swiftly in my bosom there uprose

A sudden flame, a merciful fury sent

To save me; with both angry hands I flung

The skin upon the marble, where it lay

Spouting red rills and fountains on the white;

Then, all unheeding faces, voices, eyes,

I fled across the threshold, hair unbound—

White garment stained to redness—beating heart

Flooded with all the flowing tide of hopes

Which once had gushed out golden, now sent back

Swift to their sources, never more to rise....

I think I could have borne the weary life,

The narrow life within the narrow walls,

If he had loved me; but he kept his love

For this Athenian city and her sons;

And, haply, for some stranger-woman, bold

With freedom, thought, and glib philosophy....

Ah me! the long, long weeping through the nights,

The weary watching for the pale-eyed dawn

Which only brought fresh grieving: then I grew

Fiercer, and cursed from out my inmost heart

The Fates which marked me an Athenian maid.

Then faded that vain fury; hope died out;

A huge despair was stealing on my soul,

A sort of fierce acceptance of my fate,—

He wished a household vessel—well ’twas good,

For he should have it! He should have no more

The yearning treasure of a woman’s love,

But just the baser treasure which he sought.

I called my maidens, ordered out the loom,

And spun unceasing from the morn till eve;

Watching all keenly over warp and woof,

Weighing the white wool with a jealous hand.

I spun until, methinks, I spun away

The soul from out my body, the high thoughts

From out my spirit; till at last I grew

As ye have known me,—eye exact to mark

The texture of the spinning; ear all keen

For aimless talking when the moon is up,

And ye should be a-sleeping; tongue to cut

With quick incision, ’thwart the merry words

Of idle maidens....

Only yesterday

My hands did cease from spinning; I have wrought

My dreary duties, patient till the last.

The gods reward me! Nay, I will not tell

The after years of sorrow; wretched strife

With grimmest foes—sad Want and Poverty;—

Nor yet the time of horror, when they bore

My husband from the threshold; nay, nor when

The subtle weed had wrought its deadly work.

Alas! alas! I was not there to soothe

The last great moment; never any thought

Of her that loved him—save at least the charge,

All earthly, that her body should not starve....

You weep, you weep; I would not that ye wept;

Such tears are idle; with the young, such grief

Soon grows to gratulation, as, “her love

Was withered by misfortune; mine shall grow

All nurtured by the loving,” or, “her life

Was wrecked and shattered—mine shall smoothly sail.”

Enough, enough. In vain, in vain, in vain!

The gods forgive me! Sorely have I sinned

In all my life. A fairer fate befall

You all that stand there....

Ha! the dawn has come;

I see a rosy glimmer—nay! it grows dark;

Why stand ye so in silence? throw it wide,

The casement, quick; why tarry?—give me air—

O fling it wide, I say, and give me light!

Medea.

(A FRAGMENT IN DRAMA FORM, AFTER EURIPIDES.)

πάντων δ’ ὅσ’ ἔστ’ ἔμψυχα καὶ

γνώμην ἔχει γυναῖκές ἐσμεν

ἀθλιώτατον φυτόν:

PERSONS.

MEDEA.

ÆGEUS.

JASON.

NIKIAS.

} Citizens of Corinth.

Scene: Before MEDEA’S House.

[Enter MEDEA.]

MEDEA.

TO-DAY, to-day, I know not why it is,

I do bethink me of my Colchian home.

To-day, that I am lone and weary and sad,

I fain would call back days of pride and hope;

Of pride in strength, when strength was all unprov’d,

Of hope too high, too sweet, to be confined

In limits of conception.

I am sad

Here in this gracious city, whose white walls

Gleam snow-like in the sunlight; whose fair shrines

Are filled with wondrous images of gods;

Upon whose harbour’s bosom ride tall ships,

Black-masted, fraught with fragrant merchandise;

Whose straight-limbed people, in fair stuffs arrayed,

Do throng from morn till eve the sunny streets.

For what avail fair shrines and images?

What, cunning workmanship and purple robes?

Light of sweet sunlight, play and spray of waves?

When all around the air is charged and chill,

And all the place is drear and dark with hate?

Alas, alas, this people loves me not!

This strong, fair people, marble-cold and smooth

As modelled marble. I, an alien here,

That well can speak the language of their lips,

The language of their souls may never learn.

And in their hands, I, that did know myself

Ere now, a creature in whose veins ran blood

Redder, more rapid, than flows round most hearts,

Do seem a creature reft of life and soul.

If they would only teach the subtle trick

By which their hearts are melted into love,

I’d strive to learn it. I am very meek.

They think me proud, but I am very meek,

Ready to do their bidding. Hear me, friends!

Friends, I am very hungry, give me love!

’Tis all I ask! is it so hard to give?

You stand and front me with your hostile eyes;

You only give me hatred?

Yet I know

Ye are not all unloving. Oft I see

The men and women walking in the ways,

Hand within hand, and tender-bated breath,

On summer evenings when the sky is fair.

O men and women, are ye then so hard?

Will ye not give a little of your love

To me that am so hungry?

[Enter ÆGEUS and NIKIAS, on the opposite side. MEDEA steps back on the threshold and pauses.]

Ha, that word!

’Tis Jason’s name they bandy to and fro.

I know not why, whene’er his name is spoke,

Once name of joy and ever name of love,

I wax white and do tremble; sudden seized

With shadowy apprehension. May’t forbode

No evil unto him I hold so dear;

And ever dearer with the waxing years:—

For this indeed is woman’s chiefest curse,

That still her constant heart clings to its love

Through all time and all chances; while the man

Is caught with newness; coldly calculates,

And measures pain and pleasure, loss and gain;

And ever grows to look with the world’s eye

Upon a woman, tho’ his, body and soul.

[She goes within.]

[The two citizens come forward.]

NIKIAS.

I, in this thing, do hold our Jason wise;

Kreon is mighty; Glaukê very fair.

ÆGEUS.

An ’twere for that—the Colchian’s fair enough.

NIKIAS.

I like not your swart skins and purple hair;

Your black, fierce eyes where the brows meet across.

By all the gods! when yonder Colchian

Fixes me with her strange and sudden gaze,

Each hair upon my body stands erect!

Zeus, ’tis a very tiger, and as mute!

ÆGEUS.

’Tis certain that the woman’s something strange.

NIKIAS.

Gods, spare me your strange women, so say I.

Give me gold hair, lithe limbs and gracious smiles,

And spare the strangeness.

ÆGEUS.

I do marvel much

How she will bear the tidings.

NIKIAS.

Lo, behold!

Here comes our Jason striding ’thwart the streets.

Gods! what a gracious presence!

ÆGEUS.

I perceive

The Colchian on the threshold. By her looks,

Our idle talk has reached her listening ears.

[Enter JASON. MEDEA reappears on the threshold.]

NIKIAS.

Let’s draw aside and mark them; lo, they meet.

[The two citizens withdraw, unperceived, to a further corner of the stage.]

MEDEA.

’Tis false, ’tis false. O Jason, they speak false!

JASON.

Your looks are wild, Medea; you bring shame

Upon this house, that stand with hair unbound

Beyond the threshold. Get you in the house.

MEDEA.

But not till you have answered me this thing.

JASON.

What is this thing that you would know of me?

MEDEA.

O I have heard strange rumours—horrible!

JASON.

Oft lies the horror of a tale in the ear

Of him that hears it. What is ’t you have heard?

MEDEA.

Almost, for fear, I dare not give it tongue.

But tell me this? Love, you have not forgot

The long years passed in this Corinthian home?

The great love I have borne you through the years?

Nor that far time when, in your mighty craft,

You came, a stranger, to the Colchian shore?

O strong you were; but not of such a strength

To have escaped the doom of horrid death,

Had not I, counting neither loss nor gain,

Shown you the way to triumph and renown.

JASON.

And better had I then, a thousand times,

Have fought with my good sword and fall’n or stood

As the high Fates directed; than been caught

In the close meshes of the magic web

Wrought by your hand, dark-thoughted sorceress.

NIKIAS.

Did you mark that? Jason speaks low and smooth;

Yet there is that within his level tones,

And in the icy drooping of his lids

(More than his words, tho’ they are harsh enough),

Tells me he hates her.

ÆGEUS.

Hush! Medea speaks.

MEDEA.

O gods, gods; ye have cursed me in this gift!

Is it for this, for this that I have striven?

Have wrestled in the darkness? wept my tears?

Have fought with sweet desires and hopes and thoughts?

Have watched when men were sleeping? for long days

Have shunned the sunlight and the breaths of Heaven?

Is it for this, for this that I have prayed

Long prayers, poured out with blood and cries and tears?

Lo, I who strove for strength have grown more weak

Than is the weakest. I have poured the sap

Of all my being, my life’s very life,

Before a thankless godhead; and am grown

No woman, but a monster. What avail

Charms, spells and potions, all my hard-won arts,

My mystic workings, seeing they cannot win

One little common spark of human love?

O gods, gods, ye have cursed me in this gift!

More should ye have withheld or more have giv’n;

Have fashioned me more weak or else more strong.

Behold me now, your work, a thing of fear—

From natural human fellowship cut off,

And yet a woman—sick and sore with pain;

Hungry for love and music of men’s praise,

But walled about as with a mighty wall,

Far from men’s reach and sight, alone, alone.

NIKIAS.

Behold her, how she waves about her arms

And casts her eyes to Heaven.

ÆGEUS.

Ay, ’tis strange—

Not as our women do, yet scarce unmeet.

NIKIAS.

Unmeet, unmeet? But Jason holds it so!

Mark you his white cheeks and his knitted brows,

What wrath and hate and scorn upon his face!

JASON.

Hear me, Medea, if you still can hear

That seem so strangely lifted from yourself:

But I, that know you long, do know you well,

A thing of moods and passions; so I bear

Once more with your wild words and savage gests,

Ay, and for all your fury speak you fair.

You say you love me. Can I deem it so,

When what does most advantage me and mine

You shrink to hear of? For I make no doubt,

Fleet-footed rumour did anticipate

The tidings I was hastening to bear,

When you, wide-eyed, unveiled, unfilleted,

Rushed out upon me.

Know then this once more:

That I have sworn to take as wedded wife

Glaukê, the daughter of our mighty king,

In this, in nowise hurting you and yours.

For you all fair provision I have made,

So but you get beyond the city walls

Before the night comes on. Our little ones—

They too shall journey with you. I have said.

And had I found you in a mood more mild,

Less swayed by savage passion, I had told

How this thing, which mayhap seems a thing hard,

Is but a blessing, wrapped and cloaked about

In harsh disguisements. For tho’ Kreon rule

To-day within the city; Kreon dead,

Who else shall rule there saving I alone,

The king’s son loved of him and other men?

And in those days Medea’s sons and mine

Shall stand at my right hand, grown great in power.

Medea, too, if she do but control

Her fiery spirit, may yet reign a queen

Above this land of Corinth. I have said.

NIKIAS.

Well said.

ÆGEUS.

But none the better that ’twas false.

NIKIAS.

I’d sooner speak, for my part, fair than true.

Mark Jason there; how firm his lithe, straight limbs;

How high his gold-curled head, crisped like a girl’s.

And yet for all his curled locks and smooth tones

Jason is very strong. I never knew

A man of such a strange and subtle strength.

ÆGEUS.

The Colchian speaks no word; and her swart hands,

Which waved, a moment since, and beat the air

In mad entreaty, are together clasped

Before her white robe in an iron clasp.

And her wild eyes, which erst did seek the heav’ns,

And now her lord and now again the earth,

Are set on space and move not. The tall shape

Stands there erect and still. This calm, I think,

Is filled with strangest portent.

NIKIAS.

O ye gods,

She is a pregnant horror as she stands.

ÆGEUS.

She speaks; her voice sounds as a sound far off.

MEDEA.

As you have said, O Jason, let it be.

I for my part am nothing loth to break

A compact never in fair justice framed,

Seeing how much one gave and one how much.

For you, you thought: This maid has served me well,

And yet may serve me. When I touch her palm

The blood is set a-tingle in my veins;

For these things I will make her body mine.

And I, I stood before you, clean and straight,

A woman some deemed fair and all deemed wise;

A woman, yet no simple thing nor slight,

By nature fashioned in no niggard mould;

And looked into your eyes with eyes that spake:

Lo, utterly, for ever, I am yours.

And since that you, this gift I lavish laid

Low at your feet, have lightly held and spurned—

I in my two arms, thus, shall gather it up

So that your feet may not encounter it

Which is not worthy for your feet to tread!

Yet pause a moment, Jason. Haply now

In some such wise as this your thoughts run on:

I loved this woman for a little space;

Alas, poor soul, she loved me but too well—

It is the way with women! Some, I think,

Did deem her fierce; gods! she was meek enough,

Content with what I gave; when I gave not

Nothing importunate.

Ah, Jason, pause.

You never knew Medea. You forget,

Because so long she bends the knee to you,

She was not born to serfdom.

I have knelt

Too long before you. I have stood too long

Suppliant before this people. You forget

A redder stream flows in my Colchian veins

Than the slow flood which courses round your hearts,

O cold Corinthians, with whom I long have dwelt

And never ere this day have known myself.

Nor have ye known me. Now behold me free,

Ungyved by any chains of this man wrought;

Nothing desiring at your hands nor his.

Free, freer than the air or winged birds;

Strong, stronger than the blast of wintry storms;

And lifted up into an awful realm

Where is nor love, nor pity, nor remorse,

Nor dread, but only purpose.

There shall be

A horror and a horror in this land;

Woe upon woe, red blood and biting flame;

Most horrid death and anguish worse than death;

Deeds that shall make the shores of Hades sound

With murmured terror; with an awful dread

Shall move the generations yet unborn;

A horror and a horror in the land.

JASON.

Shrew, triple-linked with Hell, get you within.

Shame not my house! ’Tis your own harm you work.

[MEDEA goes within. JASON moves off slowly. ÆGEUS and NIKIAS go off conferring in whispers.]

SCENE II.

[Time—After an interval; the evening of the same day. Scene—A street. A crowd of people running to and fro.]

NIKIAS.

O horror, horror, have ye heard the tale?

ÆGEUS.

Alas, a bloody rumour reached mine ears

Of awful purport: that the king lies dead—

NIKIAS.

And by his side, his daughter; both caught up

In sudden toils of torment. With his grief

Jason is all distraught; behold her deed,

The swift and subtle tigress!

ÆGEUS.

Woe! Alas!

Woe for the state, woe for our Kreon slain,

For hapless Glaukê, for our Jason, woe!

But three times woe for her that did the deed—

Her womanhood sham’d; her children basely wrong’d.

NIKIAS.

Hold back your pity till the tale be told,

For never was there horror like to this.

Ere now in Corinth, haply, you have heard

How she did use for her crime’s instruments

The tender boys sprung from great Jason’s loins;

Bidding them bear the garments wrought in Hell

As bridal gifts to grace the marriage morn

Of gold-hair’d Glaukê. Serpent! Sorceress!

ÆGEUS.

Alas, consider; so the tigress springs

When that her cubs are menaced. ’Twas her love

That wrought the deed—evil, yet wrought for love.

NIKIAS.

Spare me such love. I never yet could deem,

Ev’n ere the horror, that Medea held

The love of human mothers in her breast.

For I have seen her, when her children played

Their innocent, aimless sports about her knees,

Or held her gown across the market-place,

Move all unheeding with her swart brows knit

And fierce eyes fixed; not, as is mothers’ wont,

Eager to note the winning infant ways,

A-strain to catch the babbling treble tones

Of soft lips clamouring for a kiss or smile.

And once I marked her (’twas a summer’s morn)

Turn suddenly and, stooping, catch and strain

One tender infant to her breast. She held

Her lips to his and looked into his eyes,

Not gladly, as a mother with her child,

But stirred by some strange passion; then the boy

Cried out with terror, and Medea wept.

ÆGEUS.

Your tale is strange.

NIKIAS.

Stranger is yet to come.

How that the Colchian did send forth her sons,

Innocent doers of most deadly deed,

Has reached your knowledge. When the deed was done,

And the dead king lay stretched upon the floor

Clutching his daughter in a last embrace,

Arose great clamour in the palace halls;

Wailing and cries of terror; women’s screams;

A rush of flying feet from hall to hall;

The clanging fall of brazen instruments

Upon the marble.

The two tender boys,

Half apprehending what thing had befallen,

Fled forth unmarked, and all affrighted reached

The house of Jason, where Medea stood

Erect upon the threshold. From afar

Sounded and surged the fiercely frighted roar

Of the roused city, and, like waves of the sea,

Grew nearer ev’ry beating of the pulse.

Forth from the inmost chambers fled the slaves,

Made fleet with sudden fear; the little ones

With arms outspread rushed to the Colchian,

And clung about her limbs and caught her robe,

Hiding their faces.

And Medea stood

Calm as a carven image. As the sound

Of wrath and lamentation drew more near,

The pale lips seemed to smile. But when she saw

Her children clinging round her, she stretched forth

One strong, swart hand and put the twain away,

And gathered up the trailing of her robe.

I saw the deed, I, Nikias, with these eyes!

Then spake she (Zeus! grant that I may not hear

Such tones once more from human lips!). She spake:

“I will not have ye, for I love ye not!”

Then all her face grew alien. Those around

Stood still, not knowing what she planned.

Then she

Forth from her gathered garment swiftly drew

A thing that gleamed and glinted; in the air

She held it poised an instant; then—O gods!

How shall I speak it?—on the marble floor

Was blood that streamed and spurted; blood that flow’d

From two slain, innocent babes!

ÆGEUS.

O woful day!

NIKIAS.

Then brake a cry from all about: a wail

Of lamentation. But above the sound

A fierce long shriek, that froze the blood i’ the veins,

Rang out and rose, cleaving the topmost cloud.

ÆGEUS.

O evil deed! O essence of all evil

Stealing the shape of woman!

NIKIAS.

After that

All is confusion; from all sides surged up

The people, cursing, weeping. ’Thwart the din

Each other moment the strained ear might catch

Medea’s name, or Jason’s, or the King’s;

And women wailed out “Glaukê” through their tears.

Then sudden came a pause; the angry roar

Died down into a murmur; and the throng

Grew still, and rolled aside like a clov’n sea.

And Jason strode between them till he reached

His own home’s threshold where the twain lay dead,

Long gazed he on their faces; then he turned

To the hush’d people; turned to them and spake:

(His face was whiter than the dead’s, his eyes

Like to a creature’s that has looked on Hell)

“Where is the woman?” Lo, and when they sought

Medea, no eye beheld her. And no man

Had looked upon her since that moment’s space

When steel had flashed and blood foamed in the air.

Then Jason stood erect and spake again:

“Let no man seek this woman; blood enough

Has stained our city. Let the furies rend

Her guilty soul; nor we pollute our hands

With her accursèd body....”

ÆGEUS.

Cease, my friend;

It is enough. You judged this thing aright;

This woman was dark and evil in her soul;

Black to her fiend-heart’s root; a festering plague

In our fair city’s midst.

NIKIAS.

Spake I not true?

[Night; outside the city. MEDEA leaning against a rock.]

Here let me rest; beyond men’s eyes, beyond

The city’s hissing hate. Why am I here?

Why have I fled from death? There’s sun on the earth,

And in the shades no sun;—thus much I know;

And sunlight’s good.

Wake I, or do I sleep?

I’m weary, weary; once I dream’d a dream

Of one that strove and wept and yearned for love

In a fair city. She was blind indeed.

They say the woman had a fiend at heart,

And afterwards—Hush, hush, I dream’d a dream.

How cold the air blows; how the night grows dark,

Wrapping me round in blackness. Darker too

Grows the deep night within. I cannot see;

I grope with weary hands; my hands are sore

With fruitless striving. I have fought with the Fates

And I am vanquished utterly. The Fates

Yield not to strife; nay, nor to many prayers.

Their ways are dark.

One climbs the tree and grasps

A handful of dead leaves; another walks,

Heedless, beneath the branches, and the fruit

Falls mellow at his feet.

This is the end:

I have dash’d my heart against a rock; the blood

Is drain’d and flows no more; and all my breast

Is emptied of its tears.

Thus go I forth

Into the deep, dense heart of the night—alone.

Sinfonia Eroica.

(TO SYLVIA.)

My Love, my Love, it was a day in June,

A mellow, drowsy, golden afternoon;

And all the eager people thronging came

To that great hall, drawn by the magic name

Of one, a high magician, who can raise

The spirits of the past and future days,

And draw the dreams from out the secret breast,

Giving them life and shape.

I, with the rest,

Sat there athirst, atremble for the sound;

And as my aimless glances wandered round,

Far off, across the hush’d, expectant throng,

I saw your face that fac’d mine.

Clear and strong

Rush’d forth the sound, a mighty mountain stream;

Across the clust’ring heads mine eyes did seem

By subtle forces drawn, your eyes to meet.

Then you, the melody, the summer heat,

Mingled in all my blood and made it wine.

Straight I forgot the world’s great woe and mine;

My spirit’s murky lead grew molten fire;

Despair itself was rapture.

Ever higher,

Stronger and clearer rose the mighty strain;

Then sudden fell; then all was still again,

And I sank back, quivering as one in pain.

Brief was the pause; then, ’mid a hush profound,

Slow on the waiting air swell’d forth a sound

So wondrous sweet that each man held his breath;

A measur’d, mystic melody of death.

Then back you lean’d your head, and I could note

The upward outline of your perfect throat;

And ever, as the music smote the air,

Mine eyes from far held fast your body fair.

And in that wondrous moment seem’d to fade

My life’s great woe, and grow an empty shade

Which had not been, nor was not.

And I knew

Not which was sound, and which, O Love, was you.

To Sylvia.

“O Love, lean thou thy cheek to mine,

And let the tears together flow”—

Such was the song you sang to me

Once, long ago.

Such was the song you sang; and yet

(O be not wroth!) I scarcely knew

What sounds flow’d forth; I only felt

That you were you.

I scarcely knew your hair was gold,

Nor of the heavens’ own blue your eyes.

Sylvia and song, divinely mixt,

Made Paradise.

These things I scarcely knew; to-day,

When love is lost and hope is fled,

The song you sang so long ago

Rings in my head.

Clear comes each note and true; to-day,

As in a picture I behold

Your turn’d-up chin, and small, sweet head

Misty with gold.

I see how your dear eyes grew deep,

How your lithe body thrilled and swayed,

And how were whiter than the keys

Your hands that played....

Ah, sweetest! cruel have you been,

And robbed my life of many things.

I will not chide; ere this I knew

That Love had wings.

You’ve robbed my life of many things—

Of love and hope, of fame and pow’r.

So be it, sweet. You cannot steal

One golden hour.

A Greek Girl.

I MAY not weep, not weep, and he is dead.

A weary, weary weight of tears unshed

Through the long day in my sad heart I bear;

The horrid sun with all unpitying glare

Shines down into the dreary weaving-room,

Where clangs the ceaseless clatter of the loom,

And ceaselessly deft maiden-fingers weave

The fine-wrought web; and I from morn till eve

Work with the rest, and when folk speak to me

I smile hard smiles; while still continually

The silly stream of maiden speech flows on:—

And now at length they talk of him that’s gone,

Lightly lamenting that he died so soon—

Ah me! ere yet his life’s sun stood at noon.

Some praise his eyes, some deem his body fair,

And some mislike the colour of his hair!

Sweet life, sweet shape, sweet eyes, and sweetest hair,

What form, what hue, save Love’s own, did ye wear?

I may not weep, not weep, for very shame.

He loved me not. One summer’s eve he came

To these our halls, my father’s honoured guest,

And seeing me, saw not. If his lips had prest

My lips, but once, in love; his eyes had sent

One love-glance into mine, I had been content,

And deemed it great joy for one little life;

Nor envied other maids the crown of wife:

The long sure years, the merry children-band—

Alas, alas, I never touched his hand!

And now my love is dead that loved not me.

Thrice-blest, thrice-crowned, of gods thrice-lovèd she—

That other, fairer maid, who tombward brings

Her gold, shorn locks and piled-up offerings

Of fragrant fruits, rich wines, and spices rare,

And cakes with honey sweet, with saffron fair;

And who, unchecked by any thought of shame,

May weep her tears, and call upon his name,

With burning bosom prest to the cold ground,

Knowing, indeed, that all her life is crown’d,

Thrice-crowned, thrice honoured, with that love of his;—

No dearer crown on earth is there, I wis.

While yet the sweet life lived, more light to bear

Was my heart’s hunger; when the morn was fair,

And I with other maidens in a line

Passed singing through the city to the shrine,

Oft in the streets or crowded market-place

I caught swift glimpses of the dear-known face;

Or marked a stalwart shoulder in the throng;

Or heard stray speeches as we passed along,

In tones more dear to me than any song.

These, hoarded up with care, and kept apart,

Did serve as meat and drink my hungry heart.

And now for ever has my sweet love gone;

And weary, empty days I must drag on,

Till all the days of all my life be sped,

By no thought cheered, by no hope comforted.

For if indeed we meet among the shades,

How shall he know me from the other maids?—

Me, that had died to save his body pain!

Alas, alas, such idle thoughts are vain!

O cruel, cruel sunlight, get thee gone!

O dear, dim shades of eve, come swiftly on!

That when quick lips, keen eyes, are closed in sleep,

Through the long night till dawn I then may weep.

Magdalen.

ALL things I can endure, save one.

The bare, blank room where is no sun;

The parcelled hours; the pallet hard;

The dreary faces here within;

The outer women’s cold regard;

The Pastor’s iterated “sin”;—

These things could I endure, and count

No overstrain’d, unjust amount;

No undue payment for such bliss—

Yea, all things bear, save only this:

That you, who knew what thing would be,

Have wrought this evil unto me.

It is so strange to think on still—

That you, that you should do me ill!

Not as one ignorant or blind,

But seeing clearly in your mind

How this must be which now has been,

Nothing aghast at what was seen.

Now that the tale is told and done,

It is so strange to think upon.

You were so tender with me, too!

One summer’s night a cold blast blew,

Closer about my throat you drew

The half-slipt shawl of dusky blue.

And once my hand, on a summer’s morn,

I stretched to pluck a rose; a thorn

Struck through the flesh and made it bleed

(A little drop of blood indeed!)

Pale grew your cheek; you stoopt and bound

Your handkerchief about the wound;

Your voice came with a broken sound;

With the deep breath your breast was riven;

I wonder, did God laugh in Heaven?

How strange, that you should work my woe!

How strange! I wonder, do you know

How gladly, gladly I had died

(And life was very sweet that tide)

To save you from the least, light ill?

How gladly I had borne your pain.

With one great pulse we seem’d to thrill,—

Nay, but we thrill’d with pulses twain.

Even if one had told me this,

“A poison lurks within your kiss,

Gall that shall turn to night his day:”

Thereon I straight had turned away—

Ay, tho’ my heart had crack’d with pain—And

never kiss’d your lips again.

At night, or when the daylight nears,

I hear the other women weep;

My own heart’s anguish lies too deep

For the soft rain and pain of tears.

I think my heart has turn’d to stone,

A dull, dead weight that hurts my breast;

Here, on my pallet-bed alone,

I keep apart from all the rest.

Wide-eyed I lie upon my bed,

I often cannot sleep all night;

The future and the past are dead,

There is no thought can bring delight.

All night I lie and think and think;

If my heart were not made of stone,

But flesh and blood, it needs must shrink

Before such thoughts. Was ever known

A woman with a heart of stone?

The doctor says that I shall die.

It may be so, yet what care I?

Endless reposing from the strife?

Death do I trust no more than life.

For one thing is like one arrayed,

And there is neither false nor true;

But in a hideous masquerade

All things dance on, the ages through.

And good is evil, evil good;

Nothing is known or understood

Save only Pain. I have no faith

In God or Devil, Life or Death.

The doctor says that I shall die.

You, that I knew in days gone by,

I fain would see your face once more,

Con well its features o’er and o’er;

And touch your hand and feel your kiss,

Look in your eyes and tell you this:

That all is done, that I am free;

That you, through all eternity,

Have neither part nor lot in me.

Christopher Found.

I.

AT last; so this is you, my dear!

How should I guess to find you here?

So long, so long, I sought in vain

In many cities, many lands,

With straining eyes and groping hands;

The people marvelled at my pain.

They said: “But sure, the woman’s mad;

What ails her, we should like to know,

That she should be so wan and sad,

And silent through the revels go?”

They clacked with such a sorry stir!

Was I to tell? were they to know

That I had lost you, Christopher?

Will you forgive me for one thing?

Whiles, when a stranger came my way,

My heart would beat and I would say:

“Here’s Christopher!”—then lingering

With longer gaze, would turn away

Cold, sick at heart. My dear, I know

You will forgive me for this thing.

It is so very long ago

Since I have seen your face—till now;

Now that I see it—lip and brow,

Eyes, nostril, chin, alive and clear;

Last time was long ago; I know

This thing you will forgive me, dear.

II.

There is no Heaven—this is the best;

O hold me closer to your breast;

Let your face lean upon my face,

That there no longer shall be space

Between our lips, between our eyes.

I feel your bosom’s fall and rise.

O hold me near and yet more near;

Ah sweet; I wonder do you know

How lone and cold, how sad and drear,

Was I a little while ago;

Sick of the stress, the strife, the stir;

But I have found you, Christopher.

III.

If only you had come before!

(This is the thing I most deplore)

A seemlier woman you had found,

More calm, by courtesies more bound,

Less quick to greet you, more subdued

Of appetite; of slower mood.

But ah! you come so late, so late!

This time of day I can’t pretend

With slight, sweet things to satiate

The hunger-cravings. Nay, my friend,

I cannot blush and turn and tremble,

Wax loth as younger maidens do.

Ah, Christopher, with you, with you,

You would not wish me to dissemble?

IV.

So long have all the days been meagre,

With empty platter, empty cup,

No meats nor sweets to do me pleasure,

That if I crave—is it over-eager,

The deepest draught, the fullest measure,

The beaker to the brim poured up?

V.

Shelley, that sprite from the spheres above,

Says, and would make the matter clear,

That love divided is larger love;—

We’ll leave those things to the bards, my dear.

For you never wrote a verse, you see;

And I—my verse is not fair nor new.

Till the world be dead, you shall love but me,

Till the stars have ceased, I shall love but you.

EPILOGUE.

Thus ran the words; or rather, thus did run

Their purport. Idly seeking in the chest

(You see it yonder), I had found them there:

Some blotted sheets of paper in a case,

With a woman’s name writ on it: “Adelaide.”

Twice on the writing there was scored the date

Of ten years back; and where the words had end

Was left a space, a dash, a half-writ word,

As tho’ the writer minded, presently

The matter to pursue.

I questioned her,

That worthy, worthy soul, my châtelaine,

Who, nothing loth, made answer.

There had been

Another lodger ere I had the rooms,

Three months gone by—a woman.

“Young, sir? No.

Must have seen forty if she’d seen a day!

A lonesome woman; hadn’t many friends;

Wrote books, I think, and things for newspapers.

Short in her temper—eyes would flash and flame

At times, till I was frightened. Paid her rent

Most regular, like a lady.

Ten years back,

They say (at least Ann Brown says), ten years back

The lady had a lover. Even then

She must have been no chicken.

Three months since

She died. Well, well, the Lord is kind and just.

I did my best to tend her, yet indeed

It’s bad for trade to have a lodger die.

Her brother came, a week before she died:

Buried her, took her things, threw in the fire

The littered heaps of paper.

Yes, the sheets,

They must have been forgotten in the chest;—

I never knew her name was Adelaide.”

A Dirge.

“Mein Herz, mein Herz ist traurig

Doch lustig leuchtet der Mai.”

THERE’S May amid the meadows,

There’s May amid the trees;

Her May-time note the cuckoo

Sends forth upon the breeze.

Above the rippling river

May swallows skim and dart;

November and December

Keep watch within my heart.

The spring breathes in the breezes,

The woods with wood-notes ring,

And all the budding hedgerows

Are fragrant of the spring.

In secret, silent places

The live green things upstart;

Ice-bound, ice-crown’d dwells winter

For ever in my heart.

Upon the bridge I linger,

Near where the lime-trees grow;

Above, swart birds are circling,

Beneath, the stream runs slow.

A stripling and a maiden

Come wand’ring up the way;

His eyes are glad with springtime,

Her face is fair with May.

Of warmth and sun and sweetness

All nature takes a part;

The ice of all the ages

Weighs down upon my heart.

The Sick Man and the Nightingale.

(FROM LENAU.)

SO late, and yet a nightingale?

Long since have dropp’d the blossoms pale,

The summer fields are ripening,

And yet a sound of spring?

O tell me, didst thou come to hear,

Sweet Spring, that I should die this year;

And call’st across from the far shore

To me one greeting more?

To Death.

(FROM LENAU.)

IF within my heart there’s mould,

If the flame of Poesy

And the flame of Love grow cold,

Slay my body utterly.

Swiftly, pause not nor delay;

Let not my life’s field be spread

With the ash of feelings dead,

Let thy singer soar away.

A June-Tide Echo.

(AFTER A RICHTER CONCERT.)

IN the long, sad time, when the sky was grey,

And the keen blast blew through the city drear,

When delight had fled from the night and the day,

My chill heart whispered, “June will be here!

“June with its roses a-sway in the sun,

Its glory of green on mead and tree.”

Lo, now the sweet June-tide is nearly done,

June-tide, and never a joy for me!

Is it so much of the gods that I pray?

Sure craved man never so slight a boon!

To be glad and glad in my heart one day—

One perfect day of the perfect June.

Sweet sounds to-night rose up, wave upon wave;

Sweet dreams were afloat in the balmy air.

This is the boon of the gods that I crave—

To be glad, as the music and night were fair.

For once, for one fleeting hour, to hold

The fair shape the music that rose and fell

Revealed and concealed like a veiling fold;

To catch for an instant the sweet June spell.

For once, for one hour, to catch and keep

The sweet June secret that mocks my heart;

Now lurking calm, like a thing asleep,

Now hither and thither with start and dart.

Then the sick, slow grief of the weary years,

The slow, sick grief and the sudden pain;

The long days of labour, the nights of tears—

No more these things would I hold in vain.

I would hold my life as a thing of worth;

Pour praise to the gods for a precious thing.

Lo, June in her fairness is on the earth,

And never a joy does the niggard bring.

To Lallie.

(OUTSIDE THE BRITISH MUSEUM.)

UP those Museum steps you came,

And straightway all my blood was flame,

O Lallie, Lallie!

The world (I had been feeling low)

In one short moment’s space did grow

A happy valley.

There was a friend, my friend, with you;

A meagre dame, in peacock blue

Apparelled quaintly:

This poet-heart went pit-a-pat;

I bowed and smiled and raised my hat;

You nodded—faintly.

My heart was full as full could be;

You had not got a word for me,

Not one short greeting;

That nonchalant small nod you gave

(The tyrant’s motion to the slave)

Sole mark’d our meeting.

Is it so long? Do you forget

That first and last time that we met?

The time was summer;

The trees were green; the sky was blue;

Our host presented me to you—

A tardy comer.

You look’d demure, but when you spoke

You made a little, funny joke,

Yet half pathetic.

Your gown was grey, I recollect,

I think you patronized the sect

They call “æsthetic.”

I brought you strawberries and cream,

I plied you long about a stream

With duckweed laden;

We solemnly discussed the—heat.

I found you shy and very sweet,

A rosebud maiden.

Ah me, to-day! You passed inside

To where the marble gods abide:

Hermes, Apollo,

Sweet Aphrodite, Pan; and where,

For aye reclined, a headless fair

Beats all fairs hollow.

And I, I went upon my way,

Well—rather sadder, let us say;

The world looked flatter.

I had been sad enough before,

A little less, a little more,

What does it matter?

In a Minor Key.

(AN ECHO FROM A LARGER LYRE.)

THAT was love that I had before,

Years ago, when my heart was young;

Ev’ry smile was a gem you wore,

Ev’ry word was a sweet song sung.

You came—all my pulses burn’d and beat.

(O sweet wild throbs of an early day!)

You went—with the last dear sound of your feet

The light wax’d dim and the place grew grey.

And I us’d to pace with a stealthy tread

By a certain house which is under a hill;

A cottage stands near, wall’d white, roof’d red—

Tall trees grow thick—I can see it still!

How I us’d to watch with a hope that was fear

For the least swift glimpse of your gown’s dear fold!

(You wore blue gowns in those days, my dear—

One light for summer, one dark for cold.)

Tears and verses I shed for you in show’rs;

I would have staked my soul for a kiss;

Tribute daily I brought you of flow’rs,

Rose, lily, your favourite eucharis.

There came a day we were doomed to part;

There’s a queer, small gate at the foot of a slope:

We parted there—and I thought my heart

Had parted for ever from love and hope.

* * * * *

Is it love that I have to-day?

Love, that bloom’d early, has it bloom’d late

For me, that, clothed in my spirit’s grey,

Sit in the stillness and stare at Fate?

Song nor sonnet for you I’ve penned,

Nor passionate paced by your home’s wide wall;

I have brought you never a flow’r, my friend,

Never a tear for your sake let fall.

And yet—and yet—ah, who understands?

We men and women are complex things!

A hundred tunes Fate’s inexorable hands

May play on the sensitive soul-strings.

Webs of strange patterns we weave (each owns)

From colour and sound; and like unto these,

Soul has its tones and its semitones,

Mind has its major and minor keys.

Your face (men pass it without a word)

It haunts my dreams like an odd, sweet strain;

When your name is spoken my soul is stirr’d

In its deepest depths with a dull, dim pain.

I paced, in the damp grey mist, last night

In the streets (an hour) to see you pass:

Yet I do not think that I love you—quite;

What’s felt so finely ’twere coarse to class.

And yet—and yet—I scarce can tell why

(As I said, we are riddles and hard to read),

If the world went ill with you, and I

Could help with a hidden hand your need;

But, ere I could reach you where you lay,

Must strength and substance and honour spend;

Journey long journeys by night and day—

Somehow, I think I should come, my friend!

A Farewell.

(AFTER HEINE.)

THE sad rain falls from Heaven,

A sad bird pipes and sings;

I am sitting here at my window

And watching the spires of “King’s.”

O fairest of all fair places,

Sweetest of all sweet towns!

With the birds, and the greyness and greenness,

And the men in caps and gowns.

All they that dwell within thee,

To leave are ever loth,

For one man gets friends, and another

Gets honour, and one gets both.

The sad rain falls from Heaven;

My heart is great with woe—

I have neither a friend nor honour,

Yet I am sorry to go.

A Cross-Road Epitaph.

“Am Kreuzweg wird begraben

Wer selber brachte sich um.”

WHEN first the world grew dark to me

I call’d on God, yet came not he.

Whereon, as wearier wax’d my lot,

On Love I call’d, but Love came not.

When a worse evil did befall,

Death, on thee only did I call.

Epitaph.

(ON A COMMONPLACE PERSON WHO DIED IN BED.)

THIS is the end of him, here he lies:

The dust in his throat, the worm in his eyes,

The mould in his mouth, the turf on his breast;

This is the end of him, this is best.

He will never lie on his couch awake,

Wide-eyed, tearless, till dim daybreak.

Never again will he smile and smile

When his heart is breaking all the while.

He will never stretch out his hands in vain

Groping and groping—never again.

Never ask for bread, get a stone instead,

Never pretend that the stone is bread.

Never sway and sway ’twixt the false and true,

Weighing and noting the long hours through.

Never ache and ache with the chok’d-up sighs;

This is the end of him, here he lies.

Sonnet.

MOST wonderful and strange it seems, that I

Who but a little time ago was tost

High on the waves of passion and of pain,

With aching heart and wildly throbbing brain,

Who peered into the darkness, deeming vain

All things there found if but One thing were lost,

Thus calm and still and silent here should lie,

Watching and waiting,—waiting passively.

The dark has faded, and before mine eyes

Have long, grey flats expanded, dim and bare;

And through the changing guises all things wear

Inevitable Law I recognise:

Yet in my heart a hint of feeling lies

Which half a hope and half is a despair.

Translated from Geibel.

O SAY, thou wild, thou oft-deceived heart,

What mean these noisy throbbings in my breast?

After thy long, unutterable woe

Wouldst thou not rest?

Fall’n from Life’s tree the sweet rose-blossom lies,

And fragrant youth has fled. What made to seem

This earth as fair to thee as Paradise,

Was all a dream.

The blossom fell, the thorn was left to me;

Deep from the wound the blood-drops ever flow,

All that I have are yearnings, wild desires,

And wrath and woe.

They brought me Lethe’s water, saying, “Drink!”

“Drink, for the draught is sweet,” I heard them say,

“Shalt learn how soft a thing forgetting is.”

I answered: “Nay.”

What tho’ indeed it were an idle cheat,

Nathless to me ’twas very fair and blest:

With every breath I draw I know that love

Reigns in my breast.

Let me go forth,—and thou, my heart, bleed on:

A lonely spot I seek by night and day,

That love and sorrow I may there breathe forth

In a last lay.

The Gresham Press,

UNWIN BROTHERS,

CHILWORTH AND LONDON.

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Table of Contents

A Minor Poet And other Verse

Contents.

To a Dead Poet.

A Minor Poet.

EPILOGUE.

Xantippe. (A FRAGMENT.)

Medea. (A FRAGMENT IN DRAMA FORM, AFTER EURIPIDES.)

Scene: Before Medea’s House.

SCENE II.

Sinfonia Eroica. (TO SYLVIA.)

To Sylvia.

A Greek Girl.

Magdalen.

Christopher Found.

I.

II.

III.

IV.

V.

EPILOGUE.

A Dirge.

The Sick Man and the Nightingale. (FROM LENAU.)

To Death. (FROM LENAU.)

A June-Tide Echo. (AFTER A RICHTER CONCERT.)

To Lallie. (OUTSIDE THE BRITISH MUSEUM.)

In a Minor Key. (AN ECHO FROM A LARGER LYRE.)

A Farewell. (AFTER HEINE.)

A Cross-Road Epitaph.

Epitaph. (ON A COMMONPLACE PERSON WHO DIED IN BED.)

Sonnet.

Translated from Geibel.