PARACELSUS IN EXCELSIS
" "DEING no longer human, why should I -D Pretend humanity or don the frail attire?
" "DEING no longer human, why should I -D Pretend humanity or don the frail attire?
Ezra-Pound-Provenca-English
At the g ^|j
Here in this "Middan-gard" what should avail me
Out of the booty and gain of my goings?
*
THE TREE
From " A Lume Spento. "
T STOOD still and was a tree amid the wood,
A Knowing the truth of things unseen before; Of Daphne and the laurel bow
And that god-feasting couple old
That grew elm-oak amid the wold.
'T was not until the gods had been
Kindly entreated, and been brought within Unto the hearth of their heart's home That they might do this wonder thing; Nathless I have been a tree amid the wood And many a new thing understood
That was rank folly to my head before.
AN IDYL FOR GLAUCUS
Nel suo aspetto tal dentro mifei Glauco nel gustar del? erba
guahlesilffe"**consorto in mar degli altri dei* PARADISO, i, 67-9. "As Glaucus tasting the grass that made
hint sea-fellow with the other gods. "
I
WHITHER he went I may not follow him.
His eyes Were strange to-day. They always were,
After their fashion, kindred of the sea.
i Anglo-Saxon, "Earth. " 22
? To-dayIfoundhim. Itwasverylong
That I had sought among the nets, and when I
asked
The fishermen, they laughed at me.
I sought long days amid the cliffs thinking to find The body-house of him, and then
There at the blue cave-mouth my joy
Grew pain for suddenness, to see him 'live. Whither he went I may not come, it seems
He is become estranged from all the rest,
And all the sea is now his wonder-house.
And he may sink unto strange depths, he tells me of, That have no light as we it deem. E'ennowhespeaksstrangewords. Ididnotknow One half the substance of his speech with me. And then when I saw naught he sudden leaped, And shot, a gleam of silver, down, away.
And I have spent three days upon this rock
And yet he comes no more.
He did not even seem to know
I watched him gliding through the vitreous deep.
n
They chide me that the skein I used to spin Holds not my interest now,
They mock me at the route. Well, I have come
again.
Last night I saw three white forms move,
Out past the utmost wave that bears the white foam
crest.
I somehow knew that he was one of them.
23
AnIdyl
? AnIdyl ^Glaucus
Oime, Oime! I think each time they come
^P *rom t^ie sea ^eart to our rea m
"
^ f a*1 They are more far-removed from the shore.
When first I found him here, he slept
E'en as he might after a long night's taking on the
deep,
And when he woke some whit the old kind smile
Dwelt round his lips and held him near to me. But then strange gleams shot through the grey-deep
eyes
As though he saw beyond and saw not me, And when he moved to speak it troubled him. And then he plucked at grass and bade me eat. And then forgot me for the sea its charm
And leapt him in the wave and so was gone.
in
I wonder why he mocked me with the grass.
I know not any more how long it is
Since I have dwelt not in my mother's house.
I know they think me mad, for all night long
I haunt the sea-marge, thinking I may find
Some day the herb he offered unto me. Perhapshedidnotjest; theysaysomesimpleshave More wide-spanned power than old wives draw
from them.
Perhaps, found I this grass, he 'd come again. Perhaps 't is some strange charm to draw him here, 'Thout which he may not leave his new-found crew That ride the two-foot coursers of the deep,
And laugh in storms and break the fishers' nets. Oime, Oime!
24
? SONG
Voices in the Wind.
We have worn the blue and vair,
And all the sea-caves
Know us of old, and know our new-found mate. There 's many a secret stair
The sea-folk climb . . .
Out of the Wind. Oime, Oime !
I wonder why the wind, even the wind doth seem To mock me now, all night, all night, and
I have strayed among the cliffs here.
They say, some day I '11 fall
Down through the sea-bit fissures, and no more Know the warm cloak of sun, or bathe
The dew across my tired eyes to comfort them. They try to keep me hid within four walls.
I will not stay !
Oime!
And the wind " Oime " saith, !
I am quite tired now.
I know the grass
Must grow somewhere along this Thracian coast, If only he would come some little while and find
it me.
ENDETH THE LAMENT FOR GLAUCUS 25
An Idyl for
Glaucus
? MARVOIL 1
A POOR clerk I, "Arnaut the less" they call me,
And because I have small mind to Day long, long day cooped on a stool
A-jumbling o' figures for Maitre Jacques Polin, I ha' taken to rambling the South here.
The Vicomte of Beziers 's not such a bad lot.
I made rimes to his lady this three year:
Vers and canzone, till that damn'd son of Aragon, Alfonso the half-bald, took to hanging
His helmet at Beziers.
Then came what might come, to wit: three men and
one woman,
Beziers off at Mont-Ausier, I and his lady Singing the stars in the turrets of Beziers, And one lean Aragonese cursing the seneschal To the end that you see, friends:
Aragon cursing in Aragon, Beziers busy at Beziers Bored to an inch of extinction,
Tibors all tongue and temper at Mont-Ausier, Me! in this damn'd inn of Avignon,
Stringing long verse for the Burlatz;
All for one half-bald, knock-knee'd king of the
Aragonese,
Alfonso, Quatro, poke-nose.
And if when I am dead
They take the trouble to tear out this wall here, They '11 know more of Arnaut of Marvoil Than half his canzoni say of him.
1
See note at end of volume. 26
sit
t
? As for will and testament I leave none,
Save this: "Vers and canzone to the Countess of
Beziers
In return for the first kiss she gave me. "
May her eyes and her cheek be fair
To all men except the King of Aragon,
And may I come speedily to Beziers
Whither my desire and my dream have preceded
me.
O hole in the wall here ! be thou my jongleur As ne'er had I other, and when the wind blows,
Sing thou the grace of the Lady of Beziers,
For even as thou art hollow before I fill thee with
this parchment,
So is my heart hollow when she filleth not mine eyes, And so were my mind hollow, did she not fill utterly
my thought.
Wherefore, O hole in the wall here,
When the wind blows sigh thou for my sorrow That I have not the Countess of Beziers Close in my arms here.
Even as thou shalt soon have this parchment.
O hole in the wall here, be thou my jongleur, And though thou sighest my sorrow in the wind,
Keep yet my secret in thy breast here; Even as I keep her image in my heart here.
Mihi pergamena deest. 27
Marvoil
? IN THE OLD AGE OF THE SOUL
DO not choose to dream; there cometh on me i Some strange old lust for deeds.
As to the nerveless hand of some old warrior The sword-hilt or the war-worn wonted helmet
Brings momentary life and long-fled cunning, So to my soul grown old
Grown old with many a jousting, many a foray, Grown old with many a hither-coming and hence-
going
Till now they send him dreams and no more deed ; So doth he flame again with might for action, Forgetful of the council of the elders,
Forgetful that who rules doth no more battle, Forgetful that such might no more cleaves to him; So doth he flame again toward valiant doing.
REVOLT
AGAINST THE CREPUSCULAR SPIRIT IN MODERN POETRY
WOULD shake off the lethargy of this our time, I and give
For shadows shapes of power, For dreams men.
"It is better to dream than do? "
Aye! and, No!
28
? Aye ! if we dream great deeds, strong men, Revolt Hearts hot, thoughts mighty.
No ! if we dream pale flowers,
Slow-moving pageantry of hours that languidly Drop as o'er-ripened fruit from sallow trees.
If so we live and die not life but dreams,
Great God, grant life in dreams, Not dalliance, but life !
Let us be men that dream,
Not cowards, dabblers, waiters
For dead Time to reawaken and grant balm For ills unnamed.
Great God, if we be damn'd to be not men but only
dreams,
Then tet us be such dreams the world shall tremble
at
And know we be its rulers though but dreams ! Then let us be such shadows as the world shall
tremble at
And know we be its masters though but shadow !
High God, if men are grown but pale sick
phantoms
That must live only in these mists and tempered
lights
And tremble for dim hours that knock o'er loud
Or tread too violent in passing them; 29
? Revolt Great God, if these thy sons are grown such thin
ephemera,
I bid thee grapple chaos and beget
Some new titanic spawn to pile the hills and stir This earth again.
AND THUS IN NINEVEH
YE! I am a poet and upon my tomb Shall maidens scatter rose leaves
And men myrtles, ere the night Slays day with her dark sword.
"Lo! this thing is not mine
Nor thine to hinder,
For the custom is full old,
And here in Nineveh have I beheld
Many a singer pass and take his place
In those dim halls where no man troubleth
His sleep or song.
And many a one hath sung his songs
More craftily, more subtle-souled than I;
And many a one now doth surpass
My wave-worn beauty with his wind of flowers, Yet am I poet, and upon my tomb
Shall all men scatter rose leaves ere the night Slay light with her blue sword.
"It is not, Raana, that my song rings highest Or more sweet in tone than any, but that I Am here a Poet, that doth drink of life
As lesser men drink wine. "
30
? THE WHITE STAG
HA* seen them mid the clouds on the heather. i Lo! they pause not for love nor for sorrow,
Yet their eyes are as the eyes of a maid to her lover, When the white hart breaks his cover
And the white wind breaks the morn.
"
Bid the world's hounds come to horn! "
'T is the white stag, Fame, we 're a-hunting,
PICCADILLY
tragical faces, BEAYUeTIthFatUwLe,re whole, and are so sunken;
And, O ye vile, ye that might have been loved, That are so sodden and drunken,
Who hath forgotten you? O wistful, fragile faces, few out of many!
The gross, the coarse, the brazen,
God knows I cannot pity them, perhaps, as I should
do,
But, oh, ye delicate, wistful faces,
Who hath forgotten you?
? EXULTATIONS
? / am an eternal spirit and the things I make are
but ephemera, yet I endure:
Yea, and the little earth crumbles beneath our feet
and we endure.
? TO CARLOS TRACY CHESTER
? NIGHT LITANY
oDIEU, purifiez nos coeurs! Purifiez nos coeurs!
Yea, the lines hast thou laid unto me
in pleasant places, And the beauty of this thy Venice
hast thou shown unto me Until is its loveliness become unto me
a thing of tears.
O God, what great kindness
have we done in times past
and forgotten it,
That thou givest this wonder unto us,
O God of waters?
O God of the night,
What great sorrow
Cometh unto us,
That thou thus repayest us
Before the time of its coming?
O God of silence,
Purifiez nos coeurs,
Purifiez nos coeurs, For we have seen
The glory of the shadow of the likeness of thine handmaid,
Yea, the glory of the shadow of thy Beauty hath walked
37
? Night Upon the shadow of the waters
Litany
In this thy Venice.
And before the holiness
Of the shadow of thy handmaid Have I hidden mine eyes, O God of waters.
O God of silence,
Purifiez nos coeurs,
Purifiez nos coeurs,
O God of waters,
make clean our hearts within us
And our lips to show forth thy praise, For I have seen the
Shadow of this thy Venice
Floating upon the waters, And thy stars
Have seen this thing, out of their far courses Have they seen this thing,
O God of waters, Even as are thy stars
Silent unto us in their far-coursing, Even so is mine heart
become silent within me.
Purifiez nos cosurs, O God of the silence,
Purifiez nos coeurs, O God of waters.
? SESTINA: ALTAFORTE
LOQUITUR : En Bertrans de Born.
Dante Alighieri put this man in hell for that he was a stirrer-up of strife.
Eccovi !
Judge ye !
Have I dug him up again ?
The scene is at his castle, Altaforte.
The " Leopard," the device of Richard (Coeur de Lion).
DAYMouN it all ! all this our South stinks peace.
whoreson come dog, Papiols,
music!
I have no life save when the swords clash. Butah! whenIseethestandardsgold,vair,purple,
opposing
And the broad fields beneath them turn crimson, Then howl I my heart nigh mad with rejoicing.
In hot summer have I great rejoicing
When the tempests kill the earth's foul peace, And the lightnings from black heav'n flash crimson, And the fierce thunders roar me their music
And the winds shriek through the clouds mad, op-
posing,
And through all the riven skies God's swords clash.
m
Hell grant soon we hear again the swords clash ! And the shrill neighs of destriers in battle rejoicing, Spiked breast to spiked breast opposing/
39
""
Papiols is his jongleur.
!
Let's to
? Sestina: Altaforte
Better one hour's stour than a year's peace with fat boards, bawds, wine and frail music! Bah ! there 's no wine like the blood's crimson !
IV
And I love to see the sun rise blood-crimson. And I watch his spears through the dark clash And it fills all my heart with rejoicing
And pries wide my mouth with fast music When I see him so scorn and defy peace,
His lone might 'gainst all darkness opposing.
The man who fears war and squats opposing
My words for stour, hath no blood of crimson, But is fit only to rot in womanish peace
Far from where worth 's won and the swords clash For the death of such sluts I go rejoicing;
Yea, I fill all the air with my music.
VI
Papiols, Papiols, to the music !
There 's no sound like to swords swords opposing, No cry like the battle's rejoicing
When our elbows and swords drip the crimson And our charges 'gainst "The Leopard's" rush
clash.
May God damn for ever all who cry "Peace! "
vn
And let the music of the swords make them crimson ! Hell grant soon we hear again the swords clash ! Hell blot black for alway the thought "Peace! "
40
? BALLAD OF THE GOODLY FERE1
SIMON ZELOTES SPEAKETH IT SOMEWHILE AFTER THE CRUCIFIXION
FA' we lost the goodliest fere o' all
L For the priests and the gallows tree? Aye lover he was of brawny men,
O' ships and the open sea.
When they came wi' a host to take Our Man His smile was good to see,
"First let these go! " quo' our Goodly Fere, "Or I '11 see ye damned," says he.
Aye he sent us out through the crossed high spears And the scorn of his laugh rang free,
"Why took ye not me when I walked about Alone in the town? " says he.
Oh we drank his "Hale" in the good red wine When we last made company,
No capon priest was the Goodly Fere, But a man o' men was he.
I ha* seen him drive a hundred men j
Wi' a bundle o cords swung free,
That they took the high and holy house For their pawn and treasury.
They '11 no' get him a' in a book, I think,
Though they write it cunningly;
No mouse of the scrolls was the Goodly Fere, But aye loved the open sea.
1
Fere=s Mate, Companion. 41
? Ballad of If think they
ha' snared our Fere
^^
"I '11 go to the feast," quo' our Goodly Fere,
"Though I go to the gallows tree. "
"Ye ha' seen me heal the lame and blind,
And wake the dead," says he,
"Ye shall see one thing to master all:
'T is how a brave man dies on the tree. "
A son of God was the Goodly Fere That bade us his brothers be.
I ha' seen him cow a thousand men. I have seen him upon the tree.
He cried no cry when they drave the nails And the blood gushed hot and free,
The hounds of the crimson sky gave tongue But never a cry cried he.
I ha' seen him cow a thousand men
On the hills o' Galilee,
They whined as he walked out calm between, Wi' his eyes like the grey o' the sea.
Like the sea that brooks no voyaging With the winds unleashed and free, Like the sea that he cowed at Genseret Wi' twey words spoke' suddently.
42
they the Goodly They are {QQ]B tQ
Goodly degree
? A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea,
If they think they ha' slain our Goodly Fere They are fools eternally.
I ha' seen him eat o' the honey-comb Sin' they nailed him to the tree.
PORTRAIT
"
From LaM&reInconnue. "
NOW would I weave her portrait out of all dim
splendour.
Of Provence and far halls of memory,
Lo, there come echoes, faint diversity
Of blended bells at even's end, or
As the distant seas should send her
The tribute of their trembling, ceaselessly Resonant. Outofalldreamsthatbe,
Say, shall I bid the deepest dreams attend her?
Nay ! For I have seen the purplest shadows stand Alway with reverent chere that looked on her, Silence himself is grown her worshipper
And ever doth attend her in that land
Wherein she reigneth, wherefore let there stir Naught but the softest voices, praising her.
THE EYES
Master, for we be a-weary, weary, RESATn,d would feel the fingers of the wind
Upon these lids that lie over us Sodden and lead-heavy.
43
Ballad of fere
? The Eyes
Rest, brother, for lo ! the dawn is without !
The yellow flame paleth And the wax runs low.
Free us, for without be goodly colours, Green of the wood-moss and flower-colours, And coolness beneath the trees.
Free us, for we perish
In this ever-flowing monotony Of ugly print marks, black Upon white parchment.
Free us, for there is one Whose smile more availeth
Than all the age-old knowledge of thy books: And we would look thereon.
NILS LYKKE
BEATUhTatIFarUeL, at a-plucking
infinite memories
my heart, Why will you be ever calling and a-calling,
And a-murmuring in the dark there?
And a-reaching out your long hands Between me and my beloved?
"
And why will you be ever a-casting The black shadow of your beauty On the white face of my beloved
And a-glinting in the pools of her eyes? " 44
? "FAIR HELENA" BY RACKHAM "What I love best in all the world? "
WHEToNthe purple twilight is unbound,
watch her tall
slow, grace
and its wistful And to know her face
loveliness,
is in the shadow there, Just by two stars beneath that cloud
The soft, dim cloud of her hair, And to think my voice
can reach to her
As but the rumour of some tree-bound stream,
Heard just beyond the forest's edge, Until she all forgets I am,
And knows of me
Naught but my dream's felicity.
GREEK EPIGRAM
and night are never weary, DAYNor yet is God of creating
For day and night their torch-bearers, The aube and the crepuscule.
So, when I weary of praising the dawn and the sun-
set,
Let me be no more counted among the immortals; But number me amid the wearying ones,
Let me be a man as the herd,
And as the slave that is given in barter.
45
? HISTRION
r
i N:
great
At times pass through us,
And we are melted into them, and are not Save reflexions of their souls.
Thus am I Dante for a space and am One Francois Villon, ballad-lord and thief Or am such holy ones I may not write, Lest blasphemy be writ against my name; This for an instant and the flame is gone.
'T is as in midmost us there glows a sphere Translucent, molten gold, that is the "I" And into this some form projects itself:
Christus, or John, or eke the Florentine; And as the clear space is not if a form 's
Imposed thereon,
So cease we from all being for the time,
And these, the Masters of the Soul, live on.
PARACELSUS IN EXCELSIS
" "DEING no longer human, why should I -D Pretend humanity or don the frail attire?
Men have I known and men, but never one Was grown so free an essence, or become So simply element as what I am.
The mist goes from the mirror and I see ! Behold ! the world of forms is swept beneath
46
O man hath dared to write this thing as yet,
And I how that the souls of all men yet know,
? Turmoil grown visible beneath our peace,
And we that are grown formless rise above, Fluids intangible that have been men,
We seem as statues round whose high risen base Some overflowing river is run mad;
In us alone the element of calm !
A SONG OF THE VIRGIN MOTHER In "Los Pastores de Belen. "
From the Spanish of Lope de Vega.
Paracel- s s if
.
f
k
AsS ye go through these palm-trees,
O
Sith sleepeth my child here Still ye the branches.
O Bethlehem palm-trees That move to the anger
Of winds in their fury,
Tempestuous voices, Make ye no clamour,
Run ye less swiftly,
Sith sleepeth the child here Still ye your branches.
He the divine child Is here a-wearied
Of weeping the earth-pain, Here for his rest would he
Cease from his mourning, 47
holy angels;
? A Song o/Only a little while,
**f V,ir8in Sith sleepeth this child here
Stay ye the branches.
Cold be the fierce winds, Treacherous round him. Ye see that I have not Wherewith to guard him, O angels, divine ones That pass us a-flying,
Sith sleepeth my child here Stay ye the branches.
Ya veis que no tengo Con que guardarlo,
O angeles santos
Que vais volando
For que duerme mi nino Tened los ramos!
SONG
thou thy dream
scorning, Love thou the wind
And here take warning
That dreams alone can truly be, For 't is in dream I come to thee.
48
LOVE
l base love Al
? PLANH FOR THE YOUNG ENGLISH KING THAT IS, PRINCE HENRY PLANTAGENET, ELDER
all the grief and woe and bitterness, IFAll dolour, ill and every evil chance
That ever came upon this grieving world Were set together, they would seem but light
Against the death of the young English King. Worth lieth riven and Youth dolorous,
The world o'ershadowed, soiled and overcast, Void of all joy and full of ire and sadness.
Grieving and sad and full of bitterness
Are left in teen the liegemen courteous,
The joglars supple and the troubadours.
O'er much hath ta'en Sir Death, that deadly warrior, In taking from them the young English King, Who made the freest hand seem covetous.
'Las ! Never was nor will be in this world
The balance for this loss in ire and sadness !
O skilful Death and full of bitterness,
Well mayst thou boast that thou the best chevalier That any folk e'er had, hast from us taken;
Sith nothing is that unto worth pertaineth
But had its life in the young English King,
And better were it, should God grant his pleasure That he should live than many a living dastard That doth but wound the good with ire and sadness.
49
BROTHER TO RICHARD "CCEUR DE LION
From the Provengal of Bertrans de Born, elk marrimen"
"
"
Si tuitli dolelhplor
? Planh for From this faint world, now full of bitterness EnJlisT* Love takes his wa^ and holds his J oy deceitful>
King
Sith no thing is but turneth unto anguish
And each to-day Vails less than yestere'en,
Let each man visage this young English King That was most valiant mid all worthiest men ! Gone is his body fine and amorous,
Whence have we grief, discord and deepest sadness.
Him, whom it pleased for our great bitterness To come to earth to draw us from misventure, Who drank of death for our salvacioun,
Him do we pray as to a Lord most righteous And humble eke, that the young English King He please to pardon, as true pardon is,
And bid go in with honoured companions
There where there is no grief, nor shall be sadness.
ALBA INNOMINATA From the Provencal.
FN a garden where the whitethorn spreads her r leaves
My lady hath her love lain close beside her,
Till the warder cries the dawn Ah dawn that
grieves !
Ah God ! Ah God ! That dawn should come so
soon!
50
? " Please God that night, dear night, should never Alba In- nominata
cease,
Nor that my love should parted be from me,
Nor watch cry 'Dawn' Ah dawn that slayeth
peace!
Ah God ! Ah God ! That dawn should come so
soon!
"Fair friend and sweet, thy lips ! Our lips again Lo, in the meadow there the birds give song !
Ours be the love and Jealousy's the pain !
Ah God! Ah God! That dawn should come so
soon!
"Sweet friend and fair, take we our joy again Down in the garden, where the birds are loud, Till the warder's reed astrain
Cry God! Ah God! That dawn should come so
soon!
" Of that sweet wind that comes from Far-Away Have I drunk deep of my Beloved's breath,
Yea ! of my Love's that is so dear and gay.
Ah God ! Ah God ! That dawn should come so
soon! "
Envoi
Fair is this damsel and right courteous,
And many watch her beauty's gracious ways.
Her heart toward love is no wise traitorous.
Ah God! Ah God! That dawn should come so
soon!
? LAUDANTES
wHEN your beauty is grown old in all men's
And my poor words are lost amid that throng,
Then you will know the truth of my poor words,
And mayhap dreaming of the wistful throng
That hopeless sigh your praises in their songs, You will think kindly then of these mad words.
I am torn, torn with thy beauty,
O Rose of the sharpest thorn !
O Rose of the crimson beauty,
Why hast thou awakened the sleeper?
Why hast thou awakened the heart within me, O Rose of the crimson thorn?
The unappeasable loveliness
is calling to me out of the wind,
And because your name
is written upon the ivory doors,
The wave in my heart is as a green wave, unconfined, Tossing the white foam toward you;
And the lotus that pours
Her fragrance into the purple cup
Is more to be gained with the foam Than are you with these words of mine.
52
? IV
He speaks to the moonlight concerning the Beloved.
Pale hair that the moon has shaken Down over the dark breast of the sea,
magic her beauty has shaken
About the heart of me;
Out of you have I woven a dream
That shall walk in the lonely vale
Betwixt the high hill and the low hill, Until the pale stream
Of the souls of men quench and grow still.
v
Voices speaking to the sun.
Red leaf that art blown upward and out and over The green sheaf of the world,
And through the dim forest and under
The shadowed arches and the aisles,
We, who are older than thou art,
Met and remembered when his eyes beheld her In the garden of the peach-trees,
In the day of the blossoming.
VI
1 stood on the hill of Yrma
when the winds were a-hurrying,
With the grasses a-bending
I followed them,
Through the brown grasses of Ahva unto the green of Asedon.
53
Laudantes
? Laudantes I have rested with the voices
in the gardens of Ahthor, I have lain beneath the peach-trees
in the hour of the purple:
Because I had awaited in
the garden of the peach-trees, Because I had feared not
in the forest of my mind, Mine eyes beheld the vision of the blossom
There in the peach-gardens past Asedon.
winds of Yrma, let her again come unto me, Whose hair ye held unbound in the gardens of
Ahthor!
vn
Because of the beautiful white shoulders and the rounded breasts
1 can in no wise forget my beloved of the peach-
trees,
And the little winds that speak when the dawn is
unfurled
And the rose-colour in the grey oak-leaf's fold
When it first comes, and the glamour that rests On the little streams in the evening; all of these Call me to her, and all the loveliness in the world Binds me to my beloved with strong chains of gold.
vm
If the rose-petals which have fallen upon my eyes And if the perfect faces which I see at times
54
? When my eyes are closed
Faces fragile, pale, yet flushed a little, like petals of roses :
If these things have confused my memories of her So that I could not draw her face
Even if I had skill and the colours,
Yet because her face is so like these things
They but draw me nearer unto her in my thought
And thoughts of her come upon my mind gently, As dew upon the petals of roses.
DC
He speaks to the rain.
O pearls that hang on your little silver chains, The innumerable voices that are whispering
Among you as you are drawn aside by the wind, Have brought to my mind the soft and eager speech Of one who hath great loveliness,
Which is subtle as the beauty of the rains That hang low in the moonshine and bring
The May softly among us, and unbind
The streams and the crimson and white flowers and
reach
Deep down into the secret places.
x
The glamour of the soul hath come upon me,
And as the twilight comes upon the roses, 55
Laudantei
? Laudantes Walking silently among them,
So have the thoughts of my heart
Gone out slowly in the twilight Toward my beloved,
Toward the crimson rose, the fairest.
PLANH
It is of the white thoughts that he saw in the Forest.
WHIOTE Poppy, heavy with dreams,
White Poppy, who art wiser than love,
Though I am hungry for their lips When I see them a-hiding
And a-passing out and in through the shadows There in the pine wood it is,
And they are white, White Poppy,
They are white like the clouds in the forest of the
sky
Ere the stars arise to their hunting.
White Poppy, who art wiser than love, 1 am come for peace, yea from the hunting Am I come to thee for peace.
Out of a new sorrow it is,
That my hunting hath brought me.
White Poppy, heavy with dreams, Though I am hungry for their lips
When I see them a-hiding
And a-passing out and in through the shadows
And it is white they are 56
? But if one should look at me with the old hunger in Plank
her eyes,
How will I be answering her eyes?
For I have followed the white folk of the forest.
Aye ! It 's a long hunting
And it 's a deep hunger I have when I see them
a-gliding
And a-flickering there, where the trees stand apart.
But oh, it is sorrow and sorrow When love dies-down in the heart.
57
? CANZONIERE
STUDIES IN FORM i
? " Ma qui la morta poesi risurga. "
? TO OLIVIA AND DOROTHY SHAKESPEAR
? OCTAVE
songs, fair songs, these golden usuries FINHeEr beauty earns as but just increment,
And they do speak with a most ill intent
Who say they give when they pay debtor's fees.
I call him bankrupt in the courts of song Who hath her gold to eye and pays her not, Defaulter do I call the knave who hath got Her silver in his heart and doth her wrong.
SONNET IN TENZONE LA MENTE
THOU mocked heart that cowerest by the door
And durst not honour hope with welcoming, How shall one bid thee for her honour sing,
When song would but show forth thy sorrow's
store?
What things are gold and ivory unto thee?
Go forth, thou pauper fool ! Are these for naught? Isheaveninlotusleaves? Whathastthouwrought, Or brought, or sought wherewith to pay the fee? "
IL CUORE
Ronsard me celebroit! behold I give
The age-old, age-old fare to fairer fair
And I fare forth into more bitter air;
Though mocked I go, yet shall her beauty live Till rimes unrime and Truth shall truth unlearn. "
63
"If naught I give, naught do I take return. *'
? : SONNET
on the tally-board of wasted days
IF write me for They daily
proud idleness, Let high Hell summons me, and I confess,
No overt act the preferred charge allays.
To-day I thought what boots it what I thought? Poppies and gold ! Why should I blurt it out? Or hawk the magic of her name about
Deaf doors and dungeons where no truth is brought ?
Who calls me idle? I have thought of her. Who calls me idle? By God's truth I 've seen The arrowy sunlight in her golden snares.
Let him among you all stand summonser
Who hath done better things ! Let whoso hath been With worthier works concerned, display his wares !
CANZON: THE YEARLY SLAIN (Written in reply to Manning's "Kor^k") . ^9
^-<-j ^-*? Ethuiusmodistantiaeususestfereinomnibuscantionibussuis
"
A rnaldus Danielis et nos eum. secut, sumus. DANTE, De Vulgari Eloquio, II. 10. )
red-leafed time hath driven out the rose AH! And crimson dew is fallen on the leaf
Ere ever yet the cold white wheat be sown That hideth all earth's green and sere and red ;
64
? The Moon-flower 's fallen and the branch is bare, Canzon:
Holding no honey for the starry bees;
The Maiden turns to her dark lord's demesne.
Fairer than Enna's field when Ceres sows
The stars of hyacinth and puts off grief,
Fairer than petals on May morning blown Through apple-orchards where the sun hath shed
His brighter petals down to make them fair; Fairer than these the Poppy-crowned One flees, And Joy goes weeping in her scarlet train.
m
The faint damp wind that, ere the even, blows
Piling the west with many a tawny sheaf,
Then when the last glad wavering hours are mown Sigheth and dies because the day is sped;
This wind is like her and the listless air Wherewith she goeth by beneath the trees,
The trees that mock her with their scarlet stain.
IV
Love that is born of Time and comes and goes ! Love that doth hold all noble hearts in fief!
As red leaves follow where the wind hath flown, So all men follow Love when Love is dead.
O Fate of Wind ! O Wind that cannot spare, But drivest out the Maid, and pourest lees
Of all thy crimson on the wold again,
65
Fear/y slain
? Kore my heart is, let it stand sans gloze ! Love's pain is long, and lo, love's joy is brief ! My heart erst alway sweet is bitter grown; As crimson ruleth in the good green's stead, So grief hath taken all mine old joy's share And driven forth my solace and all ease Where pleasure bows to all-usurping pain.
VI
Crimson the hearth where one last ember glows ! My heart's new winter hath no such relief,
Nor thought of Spring whose blossom he hath
known
Hath turned him back where Spring is banished. Barren the heart and dead the fires there,
Blow! O ye ashes, where the winds shall please, But cry, "Love also is the Yearly Slain. "
vn
Be sped, my Canzon, through the bitter air ! To him who speaketh words as fair as these, Say that I also know the "Yearly Slain. "
KORE
From the " Poems of Frederic Manning,'* published by John Murray, with whose permission we here reprint it.
Yea, she hath passed hereby and blessed the sheaves And the great garths and stacks and quiet farms, And all the tawny and the crimson leaves,
Yea, she hath passed with poppies in her arms Under the star of dusk through stealing mist
_ And blest the earth and gone while no man wist.
66
? With slow reluctant feet and weary eyes Kore And eyelids heavy with the coming sleep,
With small breasts lifted up in stress of sighs,
She passed as shadows pass amid the sheep
While the earth dreamed and only I was ware Of that faint fragrance blown from her soft hair.
The land lay steeped in peace of silent dreams, There was no sound amid the sacred boughs Nor any mournful music in her streams,
Only I saw the shadow on her brows,
Only I knew her for the Yearly Slain
And wept, and weep until she come again.
CANZON: THE SPEAR
[This fashion of stanza is used by Jaufre Rudel in the song "D'un amordelonh. " Themeasureistobesungratherthanspoken. ]
IS the clear light of love I praise
That steadfast gloweth o'er deep waters,
A clarity that gleams always.
Though man's soul pass through troubled waters, Strange ways tp him are opened.
To shore the beaten ship is sped
If only love of light give aid.
ii
That fair far spear of light now lays Its long gold shaft upon the waters. Ah ! might I pass upon its rays
To where it gleams beyond the waters, 67
? Canzon: Spear
Or might my troubled heart be fed UpOn the frail clear light there shed>
Then were my pain at last allay'd.
ni
Although the clouded storm dismays Many a heart upon these waters, The thought of that far golden blaze Giveth me heart upon the waters, Thinking thereof my bark is led
To port wherein no storm I dread; No tempest maketh me afraid.
IV
Yet when within my heart I gaze
Upon my fair beyond the waters, Meseems my soul within me prays
To pass straightway beyond the waters. Though I be alway banished
From ways and woods that she doth tread, One thing there is that doth not fade,
Deep in my heart that spear-print stays, That wound I gat beyond the waters,
Deeper with passage of the days
That pass as swift and bitter waters, While a dull fire within my head Moveth itself if word be said
Which hath concern with that far maid.
68
? VI
My love is lovelier than the sprays
Of eglantine above clear waters,
Or whitest lilies that upraise
Their heads in midst of moated waters.
No poppy in the May-glad mead Would match her quivering lips' red If 'gainst her lips it should be laid.
VII
The light within her eyes, which slays Base thoughts and stilleth troubled waters,
Is like the gold where sunlight plays Upon the still overshadowed waters.
When anger is there mingled
There comes a keener gleam instead,
Like flame that burns beneath thin jade.
vni
Know by the words here mingled
What love hath made my heart his stead, Glowing like flame beneath thin jade.
CANZON
TO BE SUNG BENEATH A WINDOW
I
HEART mine, art mine, whose embraces Clasp but wind that past thee bloweth?
E'en this air so subtly gloweth, Guerdoned by thy sun-gold traces
Canzon: spear
? Canzon That my heart is half afraid
For the fragrance on him laid; Even so love's might amazes !
Man's love follows many faces,
My love only one face knoweth;
Towards thee only my love floweth,
And outstrips the swift stream's paces. Were this love well here displayed,
As flame flameth 'neath thin jade
Love should glow through these my phrases.
HI
Though I Ve roamed through many places, None there is that my heart troweth
Fair as that wherein fair groweth
One whose land here interlaces
Tuneful words, that I Ve essayed. Let this tune be gently played Which my voice herward upraises.
IV
If my praise her grace effaces,
Then 't is not my heart that showeth, But the skilless tongue that soweth Words unworthy of her graces. Tongue, that hath me so betrayed, Were my heart but here displayed, Then were sung her fitting praises.
NOTE. The form and measure are those of Piere Vidal's " Ab ValentirvasmeVaire" Thesongisfitonlytobesung,and is not to be spoken.
70
? CANZON: OF INCENSE
[To this form sings Arnault Daniel, with seven stanzas instead of five. ]
gracious ways,
O Lady of my heart, have O'er all my thought their golden glamour cast;
As amber torch-flames, where strange men-at-arms Tread softly 'neath the damask shield of night,
Rise from the flowing steel in part reflected, So on my mailed thought that with thee goeth,
Though dark the way, a golden glamour falleth.
H
The censer sways
And glowing coals some art have To free what frankincense before held fast
Till all the summer of the eastern farms
Doth dim the sense, and dream up through the light, As memory, by new-born love corrected
With savour such as only new love knoweth Through swift dim ways the hidden pasts recalleth.
ra
On barren days,
At hours when I, apart, have
Bent low in thought of the great charm thou hast, Behold with music's many stringed charms
The silence groweth thou. O rare delight !
The melody upon clear strings inflected
Were dull when o'er taut sense thy presence floweth, With quivering notes' accord that never palleth.
THY
? Canzon:
OfIn-r . .
cense The glowing rays
IV
That from the low sun dart, have Turned gold each tower and every towering mast;
The saffron flame, that flaming nothing harms Hides Khadeeth's pearl and all the sapphire might Of burnished waves, before her gates collected: The cloak of graciousness, that round thee gloweth, Doth hide the thing thou art, as here befalleth.
v
All things worth praise
That unto Khadeeth's mart have
From far been brought through perils over-passed, All santal, myrrh, and spikenard that disarms The pard's swift anger; these would weigh but light 'Gainst thy delights, my Khadeeth! Whence
protected
By naught save her great grace that in him showeth, My song goes forth and on her mercy calleth.
VI
O censer of the thought that golden gloweth, Be bright before her when the evening falleth.
vn
Fragrant be thou as a new field one moweth, O song of mine that "Hers" her mercy calleth.
72
? CANZONE: OF ANGELS
HEthat is Lord of all the realms of light
Hath unto me from His
Granted such vision as hath wrought my joy.
Moving my spirit past the last defence
That shieldeth mortal things from mightier sight, Where freedom of the soul knows no alloy,
I saw what forms the lordly powers employ; Three splendours, saw I, of high holiness, From clarity to clarity ascending
Through all the roofless, tacit courts extending In aether which such subtle light doth bless
As ne'er the candles of the stars hath wooed; Know ye herefrom of their similitude.
II
Withdrawn within the cavern of his wings,
Grave with the joy of thoughts beneficent,
And finely wrought and durable and clear
If so his eyes showed forth the mind's content, So sate the first to whom remembrance clings, Tissued like bat's wings did his wings appear, Not of that shadowy colouring and drear,
But as thin shells, pale saffron, luminous;
Alone, unlonely, whose calm glances shed Friend's love to strangers though no word were
said,
Pensive his godly state he keepeth thus.
Not with his surfaces his power endeth,
But is as flame that from the gem extendeth.
73
magnificence
? Canzone: HI Of Angels
My second marvel stood not in such ease,
But he, the cloudy pinioned, winged him on Then from my sight as now from memory,
The courier aquiline, so swiftly gone !
The third most glorious of these majesties
Give aid, O sapphires of th' eternal see, And by your light illume pure verity.
That azure feldspar hight the microcline, Or, on its wing, the Menelaus weareth
Such subtlety of shimmering as beareth This marvel onward through the crystalline, A splendid calyx that about her gloweth, Smiting the sunlight on whose ray she goeth.
Here in this "Middan-gard" what should avail me
Out of the booty and gain of my goings?
*
THE TREE
From " A Lume Spento. "
T STOOD still and was a tree amid the wood,
A Knowing the truth of things unseen before; Of Daphne and the laurel bow
And that god-feasting couple old
That grew elm-oak amid the wold.
'T was not until the gods had been
Kindly entreated, and been brought within Unto the hearth of their heart's home That they might do this wonder thing; Nathless I have been a tree amid the wood And many a new thing understood
That was rank folly to my head before.
AN IDYL FOR GLAUCUS
Nel suo aspetto tal dentro mifei Glauco nel gustar del? erba
guahlesilffe"**consorto in mar degli altri dei* PARADISO, i, 67-9. "As Glaucus tasting the grass that made
hint sea-fellow with the other gods. "
I
WHITHER he went I may not follow him.
His eyes Were strange to-day. They always were,
After their fashion, kindred of the sea.
i Anglo-Saxon, "Earth. " 22
? To-dayIfoundhim. Itwasverylong
That I had sought among the nets, and when I
asked
The fishermen, they laughed at me.
I sought long days amid the cliffs thinking to find The body-house of him, and then
There at the blue cave-mouth my joy
Grew pain for suddenness, to see him 'live. Whither he went I may not come, it seems
He is become estranged from all the rest,
And all the sea is now his wonder-house.
And he may sink unto strange depths, he tells me of, That have no light as we it deem. E'ennowhespeaksstrangewords. Ididnotknow One half the substance of his speech with me. And then when I saw naught he sudden leaped, And shot, a gleam of silver, down, away.
And I have spent three days upon this rock
And yet he comes no more.
He did not even seem to know
I watched him gliding through the vitreous deep.
n
They chide me that the skein I used to spin Holds not my interest now,
They mock me at the route. Well, I have come
again.
Last night I saw three white forms move,
Out past the utmost wave that bears the white foam
crest.
I somehow knew that he was one of them.
23
AnIdyl
? AnIdyl ^Glaucus
Oime, Oime! I think each time they come
^P *rom t^ie sea ^eart to our rea m
"
^ f a*1 They are more far-removed from the shore.
When first I found him here, he slept
E'en as he might after a long night's taking on the
deep,
And when he woke some whit the old kind smile
Dwelt round his lips and held him near to me. But then strange gleams shot through the grey-deep
eyes
As though he saw beyond and saw not me, And when he moved to speak it troubled him. And then he plucked at grass and bade me eat. And then forgot me for the sea its charm
And leapt him in the wave and so was gone.
in
I wonder why he mocked me with the grass.
I know not any more how long it is
Since I have dwelt not in my mother's house.
I know they think me mad, for all night long
I haunt the sea-marge, thinking I may find
Some day the herb he offered unto me. Perhapshedidnotjest; theysaysomesimpleshave More wide-spanned power than old wives draw
from them.
Perhaps, found I this grass, he 'd come again. Perhaps 't is some strange charm to draw him here, 'Thout which he may not leave his new-found crew That ride the two-foot coursers of the deep,
And laugh in storms and break the fishers' nets. Oime, Oime!
24
? SONG
Voices in the Wind.
We have worn the blue and vair,
And all the sea-caves
Know us of old, and know our new-found mate. There 's many a secret stair
The sea-folk climb . . .
Out of the Wind. Oime, Oime !
I wonder why the wind, even the wind doth seem To mock me now, all night, all night, and
I have strayed among the cliffs here.
They say, some day I '11 fall
Down through the sea-bit fissures, and no more Know the warm cloak of sun, or bathe
The dew across my tired eyes to comfort them. They try to keep me hid within four walls.
I will not stay !
Oime!
And the wind " Oime " saith, !
I am quite tired now.
I know the grass
Must grow somewhere along this Thracian coast, If only he would come some little while and find
it me.
ENDETH THE LAMENT FOR GLAUCUS 25
An Idyl for
Glaucus
? MARVOIL 1
A POOR clerk I, "Arnaut the less" they call me,
And because I have small mind to Day long, long day cooped on a stool
A-jumbling o' figures for Maitre Jacques Polin, I ha' taken to rambling the South here.
The Vicomte of Beziers 's not such a bad lot.
I made rimes to his lady this three year:
Vers and canzone, till that damn'd son of Aragon, Alfonso the half-bald, took to hanging
His helmet at Beziers.
Then came what might come, to wit: three men and
one woman,
Beziers off at Mont-Ausier, I and his lady Singing the stars in the turrets of Beziers, And one lean Aragonese cursing the seneschal To the end that you see, friends:
Aragon cursing in Aragon, Beziers busy at Beziers Bored to an inch of extinction,
Tibors all tongue and temper at Mont-Ausier, Me! in this damn'd inn of Avignon,
Stringing long verse for the Burlatz;
All for one half-bald, knock-knee'd king of the
Aragonese,
Alfonso, Quatro, poke-nose.
And if when I am dead
They take the trouble to tear out this wall here, They '11 know more of Arnaut of Marvoil Than half his canzoni say of him.
1
See note at end of volume. 26
sit
t
? As for will and testament I leave none,
Save this: "Vers and canzone to the Countess of
Beziers
In return for the first kiss she gave me. "
May her eyes and her cheek be fair
To all men except the King of Aragon,
And may I come speedily to Beziers
Whither my desire and my dream have preceded
me.
O hole in the wall here ! be thou my jongleur As ne'er had I other, and when the wind blows,
Sing thou the grace of the Lady of Beziers,
For even as thou art hollow before I fill thee with
this parchment,
So is my heart hollow when she filleth not mine eyes, And so were my mind hollow, did she not fill utterly
my thought.
Wherefore, O hole in the wall here,
When the wind blows sigh thou for my sorrow That I have not the Countess of Beziers Close in my arms here.
Even as thou shalt soon have this parchment.
O hole in the wall here, be thou my jongleur, And though thou sighest my sorrow in the wind,
Keep yet my secret in thy breast here; Even as I keep her image in my heart here.
Mihi pergamena deest. 27
Marvoil
? IN THE OLD AGE OF THE SOUL
DO not choose to dream; there cometh on me i Some strange old lust for deeds.
As to the nerveless hand of some old warrior The sword-hilt or the war-worn wonted helmet
Brings momentary life and long-fled cunning, So to my soul grown old
Grown old with many a jousting, many a foray, Grown old with many a hither-coming and hence-
going
Till now they send him dreams and no more deed ; So doth he flame again with might for action, Forgetful of the council of the elders,
Forgetful that who rules doth no more battle, Forgetful that such might no more cleaves to him; So doth he flame again toward valiant doing.
REVOLT
AGAINST THE CREPUSCULAR SPIRIT IN MODERN POETRY
WOULD shake off the lethargy of this our time, I and give
For shadows shapes of power, For dreams men.
"It is better to dream than do? "
Aye! and, No!
28
? Aye ! if we dream great deeds, strong men, Revolt Hearts hot, thoughts mighty.
No ! if we dream pale flowers,
Slow-moving pageantry of hours that languidly Drop as o'er-ripened fruit from sallow trees.
If so we live and die not life but dreams,
Great God, grant life in dreams, Not dalliance, but life !
Let us be men that dream,
Not cowards, dabblers, waiters
For dead Time to reawaken and grant balm For ills unnamed.
Great God, if we be damn'd to be not men but only
dreams,
Then tet us be such dreams the world shall tremble
at
And know we be its rulers though but dreams ! Then let us be such shadows as the world shall
tremble at
And know we be its masters though but shadow !
High God, if men are grown but pale sick
phantoms
That must live only in these mists and tempered
lights
And tremble for dim hours that knock o'er loud
Or tread too violent in passing them; 29
? Revolt Great God, if these thy sons are grown such thin
ephemera,
I bid thee grapple chaos and beget
Some new titanic spawn to pile the hills and stir This earth again.
AND THUS IN NINEVEH
YE! I am a poet and upon my tomb Shall maidens scatter rose leaves
And men myrtles, ere the night Slays day with her dark sword.
"Lo! this thing is not mine
Nor thine to hinder,
For the custom is full old,
And here in Nineveh have I beheld
Many a singer pass and take his place
In those dim halls where no man troubleth
His sleep or song.
And many a one hath sung his songs
More craftily, more subtle-souled than I;
And many a one now doth surpass
My wave-worn beauty with his wind of flowers, Yet am I poet, and upon my tomb
Shall all men scatter rose leaves ere the night Slay light with her blue sword.
"It is not, Raana, that my song rings highest Or more sweet in tone than any, but that I Am here a Poet, that doth drink of life
As lesser men drink wine. "
30
? THE WHITE STAG
HA* seen them mid the clouds on the heather. i Lo! they pause not for love nor for sorrow,
Yet their eyes are as the eyes of a maid to her lover, When the white hart breaks his cover
And the white wind breaks the morn.
"
Bid the world's hounds come to horn! "
'T is the white stag, Fame, we 're a-hunting,
PICCADILLY
tragical faces, BEAYUeTIthFatUwLe,re whole, and are so sunken;
And, O ye vile, ye that might have been loved, That are so sodden and drunken,
Who hath forgotten you? O wistful, fragile faces, few out of many!
The gross, the coarse, the brazen,
God knows I cannot pity them, perhaps, as I should
do,
But, oh, ye delicate, wistful faces,
Who hath forgotten you?
? EXULTATIONS
? / am an eternal spirit and the things I make are
but ephemera, yet I endure:
Yea, and the little earth crumbles beneath our feet
and we endure.
? TO CARLOS TRACY CHESTER
? NIGHT LITANY
oDIEU, purifiez nos coeurs! Purifiez nos coeurs!
Yea, the lines hast thou laid unto me
in pleasant places, And the beauty of this thy Venice
hast thou shown unto me Until is its loveliness become unto me
a thing of tears.
O God, what great kindness
have we done in times past
and forgotten it,
That thou givest this wonder unto us,
O God of waters?
O God of the night,
What great sorrow
Cometh unto us,
That thou thus repayest us
Before the time of its coming?
O God of silence,
Purifiez nos coeurs,
Purifiez nos coeurs, For we have seen
The glory of the shadow of the likeness of thine handmaid,
Yea, the glory of the shadow of thy Beauty hath walked
37
? Night Upon the shadow of the waters
Litany
In this thy Venice.
And before the holiness
Of the shadow of thy handmaid Have I hidden mine eyes, O God of waters.
O God of silence,
Purifiez nos coeurs,
Purifiez nos coeurs,
O God of waters,
make clean our hearts within us
And our lips to show forth thy praise, For I have seen the
Shadow of this thy Venice
Floating upon the waters, And thy stars
Have seen this thing, out of their far courses Have they seen this thing,
O God of waters, Even as are thy stars
Silent unto us in their far-coursing, Even so is mine heart
become silent within me.
Purifiez nos cosurs, O God of the silence,
Purifiez nos coeurs, O God of waters.
? SESTINA: ALTAFORTE
LOQUITUR : En Bertrans de Born.
Dante Alighieri put this man in hell for that he was a stirrer-up of strife.
Eccovi !
Judge ye !
Have I dug him up again ?
The scene is at his castle, Altaforte.
The " Leopard," the device of Richard (Coeur de Lion).
DAYMouN it all ! all this our South stinks peace.
whoreson come dog, Papiols,
music!
I have no life save when the swords clash. Butah! whenIseethestandardsgold,vair,purple,
opposing
And the broad fields beneath them turn crimson, Then howl I my heart nigh mad with rejoicing.
In hot summer have I great rejoicing
When the tempests kill the earth's foul peace, And the lightnings from black heav'n flash crimson, And the fierce thunders roar me their music
And the winds shriek through the clouds mad, op-
posing,
And through all the riven skies God's swords clash.
m
Hell grant soon we hear again the swords clash ! And the shrill neighs of destriers in battle rejoicing, Spiked breast to spiked breast opposing/
39
""
Papiols is his jongleur.
!
Let's to
? Sestina: Altaforte
Better one hour's stour than a year's peace with fat boards, bawds, wine and frail music! Bah ! there 's no wine like the blood's crimson !
IV
And I love to see the sun rise blood-crimson. And I watch his spears through the dark clash And it fills all my heart with rejoicing
And pries wide my mouth with fast music When I see him so scorn and defy peace,
His lone might 'gainst all darkness opposing.
The man who fears war and squats opposing
My words for stour, hath no blood of crimson, But is fit only to rot in womanish peace
Far from where worth 's won and the swords clash For the death of such sluts I go rejoicing;
Yea, I fill all the air with my music.
VI
Papiols, Papiols, to the music !
There 's no sound like to swords swords opposing, No cry like the battle's rejoicing
When our elbows and swords drip the crimson And our charges 'gainst "The Leopard's" rush
clash.
May God damn for ever all who cry "Peace! "
vn
And let the music of the swords make them crimson ! Hell grant soon we hear again the swords clash ! Hell blot black for alway the thought "Peace! "
40
? BALLAD OF THE GOODLY FERE1
SIMON ZELOTES SPEAKETH IT SOMEWHILE AFTER THE CRUCIFIXION
FA' we lost the goodliest fere o' all
L For the priests and the gallows tree? Aye lover he was of brawny men,
O' ships and the open sea.
When they came wi' a host to take Our Man His smile was good to see,
"First let these go! " quo' our Goodly Fere, "Or I '11 see ye damned," says he.
Aye he sent us out through the crossed high spears And the scorn of his laugh rang free,
"Why took ye not me when I walked about Alone in the town? " says he.
Oh we drank his "Hale" in the good red wine When we last made company,
No capon priest was the Goodly Fere, But a man o' men was he.
I ha* seen him drive a hundred men j
Wi' a bundle o cords swung free,
That they took the high and holy house For their pawn and treasury.
They '11 no' get him a' in a book, I think,
Though they write it cunningly;
No mouse of the scrolls was the Goodly Fere, But aye loved the open sea.
1
Fere=s Mate, Companion. 41
? Ballad of If think they
ha' snared our Fere
^^
"I '11 go to the feast," quo' our Goodly Fere,
"Though I go to the gallows tree. "
"Ye ha' seen me heal the lame and blind,
And wake the dead," says he,
"Ye shall see one thing to master all:
'T is how a brave man dies on the tree. "
A son of God was the Goodly Fere That bade us his brothers be.
I ha' seen him cow a thousand men. I have seen him upon the tree.
He cried no cry when they drave the nails And the blood gushed hot and free,
The hounds of the crimson sky gave tongue But never a cry cried he.
I ha' seen him cow a thousand men
On the hills o' Galilee,
They whined as he walked out calm between, Wi' his eyes like the grey o' the sea.
Like the sea that brooks no voyaging With the winds unleashed and free, Like the sea that he cowed at Genseret Wi' twey words spoke' suddently.
42
they the Goodly They are {QQ]B tQ
Goodly degree
? A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea,
If they think they ha' slain our Goodly Fere They are fools eternally.
I ha' seen him eat o' the honey-comb Sin' they nailed him to the tree.
PORTRAIT
"
From LaM&reInconnue. "
NOW would I weave her portrait out of all dim
splendour.
Of Provence and far halls of memory,
Lo, there come echoes, faint diversity
Of blended bells at even's end, or
As the distant seas should send her
The tribute of their trembling, ceaselessly Resonant. Outofalldreamsthatbe,
Say, shall I bid the deepest dreams attend her?
Nay ! For I have seen the purplest shadows stand Alway with reverent chere that looked on her, Silence himself is grown her worshipper
And ever doth attend her in that land
Wherein she reigneth, wherefore let there stir Naught but the softest voices, praising her.
THE EYES
Master, for we be a-weary, weary, RESATn,d would feel the fingers of the wind
Upon these lids that lie over us Sodden and lead-heavy.
43
Ballad of fere
? The Eyes
Rest, brother, for lo ! the dawn is without !
The yellow flame paleth And the wax runs low.
Free us, for without be goodly colours, Green of the wood-moss and flower-colours, And coolness beneath the trees.
Free us, for we perish
In this ever-flowing monotony Of ugly print marks, black Upon white parchment.
Free us, for there is one Whose smile more availeth
Than all the age-old knowledge of thy books: And we would look thereon.
NILS LYKKE
BEATUhTatIFarUeL, at a-plucking
infinite memories
my heart, Why will you be ever calling and a-calling,
And a-murmuring in the dark there?
And a-reaching out your long hands Between me and my beloved?
"
And why will you be ever a-casting The black shadow of your beauty On the white face of my beloved
And a-glinting in the pools of her eyes? " 44
? "FAIR HELENA" BY RACKHAM "What I love best in all the world? "
WHEToNthe purple twilight is unbound,
watch her tall
slow, grace
and its wistful And to know her face
loveliness,
is in the shadow there, Just by two stars beneath that cloud
The soft, dim cloud of her hair, And to think my voice
can reach to her
As but the rumour of some tree-bound stream,
Heard just beyond the forest's edge, Until she all forgets I am,
And knows of me
Naught but my dream's felicity.
GREEK EPIGRAM
and night are never weary, DAYNor yet is God of creating
For day and night their torch-bearers, The aube and the crepuscule.
So, when I weary of praising the dawn and the sun-
set,
Let me be no more counted among the immortals; But number me amid the wearying ones,
Let me be a man as the herd,
And as the slave that is given in barter.
45
? HISTRION
r
i N:
great
At times pass through us,
And we are melted into them, and are not Save reflexions of their souls.
Thus am I Dante for a space and am One Francois Villon, ballad-lord and thief Or am such holy ones I may not write, Lest blasphemy be writ against my name; This for an instant and the flame is gone.
'T is as in midmost us there glows a sphere Translucent, molten gold, that is the "I" And into this some form projects itself:
Christus, or John, or eke the Florentine; And as the clear space is not if a form 's
Imposed thereon,
So cease we from all being for the time,
And these, the Masters of the Soul, live on.
PARACELSUS IN EXCELSIS
" "DEING no longer human, why should I -D Pretend humanity or don the frail attire?
Men have I known and men, but never one Was grown so free an essence, or become So simply element as what I am.
The mist goes from the mirror and I see ! Behold ! the world of forms is swept beneath
46
O man hath dared to write this thing as yet,
And I how that the souls of all men yet know,
? Turmoil grown visible beneath our peace,
And we that are grown formless rise above, Fluids intangible that have been men,
We seem as statues round whose high risen base Some overflowing river is run mad;
In us alone the element of calm !
A SONG OF THE VIRGIN MOTHER In "Los Pastores de Belen. "
From the Spanish of Lope de Vega.
Paracel- s s if
.
f
k
AsS ye go through these palm-trees,
O
Sith sleepeth my child here Still ye the branches.
O Bethlehem palm-trees That move to the anger
Of winds in their fury,
Tempestuous voices, Make ye no clamour,
Run ye less swiftly,
Sith sleepeth the child here Still ye your branches.
He the divine child Is here a-wearied
Of weeping the earth-pain, Here for his rest would he
Cease from his mourning, 47
holy angels;
? A Song o/Only a little while,
**f V,ir8in Sith sleepeth this child here
Stay ye the branches.
Cold be the fierce winds, Treacherous round him. Ye see that I have not Wherewith to guard him, O angels, divine ones That pass us a-flying,
Sith sleepeth my child here Stay ye the branches.
Ya veis que no tengo Con que guardarlo,
O angeles santos
Que vais volando
For que duerme mi nino Tened los ramos!
SONG
thou thy dream
scorning, Love thou the wind
And here take warning
That dreams alone can truly be, For 't is in dream I come to thee.
48
LOVE
l base love Al
? PLANH FOR THE YOUNG ENGLISH KING THAT IS, PRINCE HENRY PLANTAGENET, ELDER
all the grief and woe and bitterness, IFAll dolour, ill and every evil chance
That ever came upon this grieving world Were set together, they would seem but light
Against the death of the young English King. Worth lieth riven and Youth dolorous,
The world o'ershadowed, soiled and overcast, Void of all joy and full of ire and sadness.
Grieving and sad and full of bitterness
Are left in teen the liegemen courteous,
The joglars supple and the troubadours.
O'er much hath ta'en Sir Death, that deadly warrior, In taking from them the young English King, Who made the freest hand seem covetous.
'Las ! Never was nor will be in this world
The balance for this loss in ire and sadness !
O skilful Death and full of bitterness,
Well mayst thou boast that thou the best chevalier That any folk e'er had, hast from us taken;
Sith nothing is that unto worth pertaineth
But had its life in the young English King,
And better were it, should God grant his pleasure That he should live than many a living dastard That doth but wound the good with ire and sadness.
49
BROTHER TO RICHARD "CCEUR DE LION
From the Provengal of Bertrans de Born, elk marrimen"
"
"
Si tuitli dolelhplor
? Planh for From this faint world, now full of bitterness EnJlisT* Love takes his wa^ and holds his J oy deceitful>
King
Sith no thing is but turneth unto anguish
And each to-day Vails less than yestere'en,
Let each man visage this young English King That was most valiant mid all worthiest men ! Gone is his body fine and amorous,
Whence have we grief, discord and deepest sadness.
Him, whom it pleased for our great bitterness To come to earth to draw us from misventure, Who drank of death for our salvacioun,
Him do we pray as to a Lord most righteous And humble eke, that the young English King He please to pardon, as true pardon is,
And bid go in with honoured companions
There where there is no grief, nor shall be sadness.
ALBA INNOMINATA From the Provencal.
FN a garden where the whitethorn spreads her r leaves
My lady hath her love lain close beside her,
Till the warder cries the dawn Ah dawn that
grieves !
Ah God ! Ah God ! That dawn should come so
soon!
50
? " Please God that night, dear night, should never Alba In- nominata
cease,
Nor that my love should parted be from me,
Nor watch cry 'Dawn' Ah dawn that slayeth
peace!
Ah God ! Ah God ! That dawn should come so
soon!
"Fair friend and sweet, thy lips ! Our lips again Lo, in the meadow there the birds give song !
Ours be the love and Jealousy's the pain !
Ah God! Ah God! That dawn should come so
soon!
"Sweet friend and fair, take we our joy again Down in the garden, where the birds are loud, Till the warder's reed astrain
Cry God! Ah God! That dawn should come so
soon!
" Of that sweet wind that comes from Far-Away Have I drunk deep of my Beloved's breath,
Yea ! of my Love's that is so dear and gay.
Ah God ! Ah God ! That dawn should come so
soon! "
Envoi
Fair is this damsel and right courteous,
And many watch her beauty's gracious ways.
Her heart toward love is no wise traitorous.
Ah God! Ah God! That dawn should come so
soon!
? LAUDANTES
wHEN your beauty is grown old in all men's
And my poor words are lost amid that throng,
Then you will know the truth of my poor words,
And mayhap dreaming of the wistful throng
That hopeless sigh your praises in their songs, You will think kindly then of these mad words.
I am torn, torn with thy beauty,
O Rose of the sharpest thorn !
O Rose of the crimson beauty,
Why hast thou awakened the sleeper?
Why hast thou awakened the heart within me, O Rose of the crimson thorn?
The unappeasable loveliness
is calling to me out of the wind,
And because your name
is written upon the ivory doors,
The wave in my heart is as a green wave, unconfined, Tossing the white foam toward you;
And the lotus that pours
Her fragrance into the purple cup
Is more to be gained with the foam Than are you with these words of mine.
52
? IV
He speaks to the moonlight concerning the Beloved.
Pale hair that the moon has shaken Down over the dark breast of the sea,
magic her beauty has shaken
About the heart of me;
Out of you have I woven a dream
That shall walk in the lonely vale
Betwixt the high hill and the low hill, Until the pale stream
Of the souls of men quench and grow still.
v
Voices speaking to the sun.
Red leaf that art blown upward and out and over The green sheaf of the world,
And through the dim forest and under
The shadowed arches and the aisles,
We, who are older than thou art,
Met and remembered when his eyes beheld her In the garden of the peach-trees,
In the day of the blossoming.
VI
1 stood on the hill of Yrma
when the winds were a-hurrying,
With the grasses a-bending
I followed them,
Through the brown grasses of Ahva unto the green of Asedon.
53
Laudantes
? Laudantes I have rested with the voices
in the gardens of Ahthor, I have lain beneath the peach-trees
in the hour of the purple:
Because I had awaited in
the garden of the peach-trees, Because I had feared not
in the forest of my mind, Mine eyes beheld the vision of the blossom
There in the peach-gardens past Asedon.
winds of Yrma, let her again come unto me, Whose hair ye held unbound in the gardens of
Ahthor!
vn
Because of the beautiful white shoulders and the rounded breasts
1 can in no wise forget my beloved of the peach-
trees,
And the little winds that speak when the dawn is
unfurled
And the rose-colour in the grey oak-leaf's fold
When it first comes, and the glamour that rests On the little streams in the evening; all of these Call me to her, and all the loveliness in the world Binds me to my beloved with strong chains of gold.
vm
If the rose-petals which have fallen upon my eyes And if the perfect faces which I see at times
54
? When my eyes are closed
Faces fragile, pale, yet flushed a little, like petals of roses :
If these things have confused my memories of her So that I could not draw her face
Even if I had skill and the colours,
Yet because her face is so like these things
They but draw me nearer unto her in my thought
And thoughts of her come upon my mind gently, As dew upon the petals of roses.
DC
He speaks to the rain.
O pearls that hang on your little silver chains, The innumerable voices that are whispering
Among you as you are drawn aside by the wind, Have brought to my mind the soft and eager speech Of one who hath great loveliness,
Which is subtle as the beauty of the rains That hang low in the moonshine and bring
The May softly among us, and unbind
The streams and the crimson and white flowers and
reach
Deep down into the secret places.
x
The glamour of the soul hath come upon me,
And as the twilight comes upon the roses, 55
Laudantei
? Laudantes Walking silently among them,
So have the thoughts of my heart
Gone out slowly in the twilight Toward my beloved,
Toward the crimson rose, the fairest.
PLANH
It is of the white thoughts that he saw in the Forest.
WHIOTE Poppy, heavy with dreams,
White Poppy, who art wiser than love,
Though I am hungry for their lips When I see them a-hiding
And a-passing out and in through the shadows There in the pine wood it is,
And they are white, White Poppy,
They are white like the clouds in the forest of the
sky
Ere the stars arise to their hunting.
White Poppy, who art wiser than love, 1 am come for peace, yea from the hunting Am I come to thee for peace.
Out of a new sorrow it is,
That my hunting hath brought me.
White Poppy, heavy with dreams, Though I am hungry for their lips
When I see them a-hiding
And a-passing out and in through the shadows
And it is white they are 56
? But if one should look at me with the old hunger in Plank
her eyes,
How will I be answering her eyes?
For I have followed the white folk of the forest.
Aye ! It 's a long hunting
And it 's a deep hunger I have when I see them
a-gliding
And a-flickering there, where the trees stand apart.
But oh, it is sorrow and sorrow When love dies-down in the heart.
57
? CANZONIERE
STUDIES IN FORM i
? " Ma qui la morta poesi risurga. "
? TO OLIVIA AND DOROTHY SHAKESPEAR
? OCTAVE
songs, fair songs, these golden usuries FINHeEr beauty earns as but just increment,
And they do speak with a most ill intent
Who say they give when they pay debtor's fees.
I call him bankrupt in the courts of song Who hath her gold to eye and pays her not, Defaulter do I call the knave who hath got Her silver in his heart and doth her wrong.
SONNET IN TENZONE LA MENTE
THOU mocked heart that cowerest by the door
And durst not honour hope with welcoming, How shall one bid thee for her honour sing,
When song would but show forth thy sorrow's
store?
What things are gold and ivory unto thee?
Go forth, thou pauper fool ! Are these for naught? Isheaveninlotusleaves? Whathastthouwrought, Or brought, or sought wherewith to pay the fee? "
IL CUORE
Ronsard me celebroit! behold I give
The age-old, age-old fare to fairer fair
And I fare forth into more bitter air;
Though mocked I go, yet shall her beauty live Till rimes unrime and Truth shall truth unlearn. "
63
"If naught I give, naught do I take return. *'
? : SONNET
on the tally-board of wasted days
IF write me for They daily
proud idleness, Let high Hell summons me, and I confess,
No overt act the preferred charge allays.
To-day I thought what boots it what I thought? Poppies and gold ! Why should I blurt it out? Or hawk the magic of her name about
Deaf doors and dungeons where no truth is brought ?
Who calls me idle? I have thought of her. Who calls me idle? By God's truth I 've seen The arrowy sunlight in her golden snares.
Let him among you all stand summonser
Who hath done better things ! Let whoso hath been With worthier works concerned, display his wares !
CANZON: THE YEARLY SLAIN (Written in reply to Manning's "Kor^k") . ^9
^-<-j ^-*? Ethuiusmodistantiaeususestfereinomnibuscantionibussuis
"
A rnaldus Danielis et nos eum. secut, sumus. DANTE, De Vulgari Eloquio, II. 10. )
red-leafed time hath driven out the rose AH! And crimson dew is fallen on the leaf
Ere ever yet the cold white wheat be sown That hideth all earth's green and sere and red ;
64
? The Moon-flower 's fallen and the branch is bare, Canzon:
Holding no honey for the starry bees;
The Maiden turns to her dark lord's demesne.
Fairer than Enna's field when Ceres sows
The stars of hyacinth and puts off grief,
Fairer than petals on May morning blown Through apple-orchards where the sun hath shed
His brighter petals down to make them fair; Fairer than these the Poppy-crowned One flees, And Joy goes weeping in her scarlet train.
m
The faint damp wind that, ere the even, blows
Piling the west with many a tawny sheaf,
Then when the last glad wavering hours are mown Sigheth and dies because the day is sped;
This wind is like her and the listless air Wherewith she goeth by beneath the trees,
The trees that mock her with their scarlet stain.
IV
Love that is born of Time and comes and goes ! Love that doth hold all noble hearts in fief!
As red leaves follow where the wind hath flown, So all men follow Love when Love is dead.
O Fate of Wind ! O Wind that cannot spare, But drivest out the Maid, and pourest lees
Of all thy crimson on the wold again,
65
Fear/y slain
? Kore my heart is, let it stand sans gloze ! Love's pain is long, and lo, love's joy is brief ! My heart erst alway sweet is bitter grown; As crimson ruleth in the good green's stead, So grief hath taken all mine old joy's share And driven forth my solace and all ease Where pleasure bows to all-usurping pain.
VI
Crimson the hearth where one last ember glows ! My heart's new winter hath no such relief,
Nor thought of Spring whose blossom he hath
known
Hath turned him back where Spring is banished. Barren the heart and dead the fires there,
Blow! O ye ashes, where the winds shall please, But cry, "Love also is the Yearly Slain. "
vn
Be sped, my Canzon, through the bitter air ! To him who speaketh words as fair as these, Say that I also know the "Yearly Slain. "
KORE
From the " Poems of Frederic Manning,'* published by John Murray, with whose permission we here reprint it.
Yea, she hath passed hereby and blessed the sheaves And the great garths and stacks and quiet farms, And all the tawny and the crimson leaves,
Yea, she hath passed with poppies in her arms Under the star of dusk through stealing mist
_ And blest the earth and gone while no man wist.
66
? With slow reluctant feet and weary eyes Kore And eyelids heavy with the coming sleep,
With small breasts lifted up in stress of sighs,
She passed as shadows pass amid the sheep
While the earth dreamed and only I was ware Of that faint fragrance blown from her soft hair.
The land lay steeped in peace of silent dreams, There was no sound amid the sacred boughs Nor any mournful music in her streams,
Only I saw the shadow on her brows,
Only I knew her for the Yearly Slain
And wept, and weep until she come again.
CANZON: THE SPEAR
[This fashion of stanza is used by Jaufre Rudel in the song "D'un amordelonh. " Themeasureistobesungratherthanspoken. ]
IS the clear light of love I praise
That steadfast gloweth o'er deep waters,
A clarity that gleams always.
Though man's soul pass through troubled waters, Strange ways tp him are opened.
To shore the beaten ship is sped
If only love of light give aid.
ii
That fair far spear of light now lays Its long gold shaft upon the waters. Ah ! might I pass upon its rays
To where it gleams beyond the waters, 67
? Canzon: Spear
Or might my troubled heart be fed UpOn the frail clear light there shed>
Then were my pain at last allay'd.
ni
Although the clouded storm dismays Many a heart upon these waters, The thought of that far golden blaze Giveth me heart upon the waters, Thinking thereof my bark is led
To port wherein no storm I dread; No tempest maketh me afraid.
IV
Yet when within my heart I gaze
Upon my fair beyond the waters, Meseems my soul within me prays
To pass straightway beyond the waters. Though I be alway banished
From ways and woods that she doth tread, One thing there is that doth not fade,
Deep in my heart that spear-print stays, That wound I gat beyond the waters,
Deeper with passage of the days
That pass as swift and bitter waters, While a dull fire within my head Moveth itself if word be said
Which hath concern with that far maid.
68
? VI
My love is lovelier than the sprays
Of eglantine above clear waters,
Or whitest lilies that upraise
Their heads in midst of moated waters.
No poppy in the May-glad mead Would match her quivering lips' red If 'gainst her lips it should be laid.
VII
The light within her eyes, which slays Base thoughts and stilleth troubled waters,
Is like the gold where sunlight plays Upon the still overshadowed waters.
When anger is there mingled
There comes a keener gleam instead,
Like flame that burns beneath thin jade.
vni
Know by the words here mingled
What love hath made my heart his stead, Glowing like flame beneath thin jade.
CANZON
TO BE SUNG BENEATH A WINDOW
I
HEART mine, art mine, whose embraces Clasp but wind that past thee bloweth?
E'en this air so subtly gloweth, Guerdoned by thy sun-gold traces
Canzon: spear
? Canzon That my heart is half afraid
For the fragrance on him laid; Even so love's might amazes !
Man's love follows many faces,
My love only one face knoweth;
Towards thee only my love floweth,
And outstrips the swift stream's paces. Were this love well here displayed,
As flame flameth 'neath thin jade
Love should glow through these my phrases.
HI
Though I Ve roamed through many places, None there is that my heart troweth
Fair as that wherein fair groweth
One whose land here interlaces
Tuneful words, that I Ve essayed. Let this tune be gently played Which my voice herward upraises.
IV
If my praise her grace effaces,
Then 't is not my heart that showeth, But the skilless tongue that soweth Words unworthy of her graces. Tongue, that hath me so betrayed, Were my heart but here displayed, Then were sung her fitting praises.
NOTE. The form and measure are those of Piere Vidal's " Ab ValentirvasmeVaire" Thesongisfitonlytobesung,and is not to be spoken.
70
? CANZON: OF INCENSE
[To this form sings Arnault Daniel, with seven stanzas instead of five. ]
gracious ways,
O Lady of my heart, have O'er all my thought their golden glamour cast;
As amber torch-flames, where strange men-at-arms Tread softly 'neath the damask shield of night,
Rise from the flowing steel in part reflected, So on my mailed thought that with thee goeth,
Though dark the way, a golden glamour falleth.
H
The censer sways
And glowing coals some art have To free what frankincense before held fast
Till all the summer of the eastern farms
Doth dim the sense, and dream up through the light, As memory, by new-born love corrected
With savour such as only new love knoweth Through swift dim ways the hidden pasts recalleth.
ra
On barren days,
At hours when I, apart, have
Bent low in thought of the great charm thou hast, Behold with music's many stringed charms
The silence groweth thou. O rare delight !
The melody upon clear strings inflected
Were dull when o'er taut sense thy presence floweth, With quivering notes' accord that never palleth.
THY
? Canzon:
OfIn-r . .
cense The glowing rays
IV
That from the low sun dart, have Turned gold each tower and every towering mast;
The saffron flame, that flaming nothing harms Hides Khadeeth's pearl and all the sapphire might Of burnished waves, before her gates collected: The cloak of graciousness, that round thee gloweth, Doth hide the thing thou art, as here befalleth.
v
All things worth praise
That unto Khadeeth's mart have
From far been brought through perils over-passed, All santal, myrrh, and spikenard that disarms The pard's swift anger; these would weigh but light 'Gainst thy delights, my Khadeeth! Whence
protected
By naught save her great grace that in him showeth, My song goes forth and on her mercy calleth.
VI
O censer of the thought that golden gloweth, Be bright before her when the evening falleth.
vn
Fragrant be thou as a new field one moweth, O song of mine that "Hers" her mercy calleth.
72
? CANZONE: OF ANGELS
HEthat is Lord of all the realms of light
Hath unto me from His
Granted such vision as hath wrought my joy.
Moving my spirit past the last defence
That shieldeth mortal things from mightier sight, Where freedom of the soul knows no alloy,
I saw what forms the lordly powers employ; Three splendours, saw I, of high holiness, From clarity to clarity ascending
Through all the roofless, tacit courts extending In aether which such subtle light doth bless
As ne'er the candles of the stars hath wooed; Know ye herefrom of their similitude.
II
Withdrawn within the cavern of his wings,
Grave with the joy of thoughts beneficent,
And finely wrought and durable and clear
If so his eyes showed forth the mind's content, So sate the first to whom remembrance clings, Tissued like bat's wings did his wings appear, Not of that shadowy colouring and drear,
But as thin shells, pale saffron, luminous;
Alone, unlonely, whose calm glances shed Friend's love to strangers though no word were
said,
Pensive his godly state he keepeth thus.
Not with his surfaces his power endeth,
But is as flame that from the gem extendeth.
73
magnificence
? Canzone: HI Of Angels
My second marvel stood not in such ease,
But he, the cloudy pinioned, winged him on Then from my sight as now from memory,
The courier aquiline, so swiftly gone !
The third most glorious of these majesties
Give aid, O sapphires of th' eternal see, And by your light illume pure verity.
That azure feldspar hight the microcline, Or, on its wing, the Menelaus weareth
Such subtlety of shimmering as beareth This marvel onward through the crystalline, A splendid calyx that about her gloweth, Smiting the sunlight on whose ray she goeth.
