Chapter 7
I slept and woke; even my sorrow's ogress Had turned into a fairy sweetly sad! And in my hands I found both, laurel bough And reed! I drank the fragrant morning breath Of pines; and taking up the laurel boughs, I wove with master hand the whole day long All kinds of laurel crowns for thee; and then I poured into the unaccustomed air Of thy small hut a flute's soft-flown complaint.
But from my bed, I lifted up mine eyes To the window's light and saw again, alas, The desert river bank, and, far beyond, The world that squandered diamonds and pearls And revelled in its joy of green dew-clad. Again they nodded secretly at me, Stretching their hands and feigning love! And even near thee, palsy struck I was, The paralytic on the river bank!
THE SIMPLE SONG
Thou camest far away from lands beyond! Thou wert not a gold sunlit cloud at sunset But mother of a honeyed tenderness That until then lay hidden in my mind's Tenderest shrine; the golden seal of a Young maiden's joy stamped with its touch! The evening star thou wert not; but thou wert The sister of a simple love that lay Hidden till then in my heart's inner depths.
Before me thou didst not unfold the spaces Of the blue skies; not didst thou lift mine eyes Towards the rough-hewn peak; nor didst thou open To me the way for distant palaces; Nor didst thou lead me by a secret path Untrod. But lifting with one hand the basket, Gently thou heldest with the other mine; And leading me to sit by ferns dew-clad And deep green grass and snow-white flowers, thou Badest me stoop and gather; and I stooped And gathered all my hands could reach: wall-flowers, Hyacinths, violets, and daffodils; And found beside them a May day anew.
Over their petals newly reaped and fresh That made the basket seem a cruel spring, I bent and wept for their deaths swift and fair; And lo, thou didst face them, a Life agleam!
THREE KISSES
A Dream flew down and stood before mine eyes-- Who knows from what unknown deep-hidden nest? It took the face of my own secret love And blew me with its hands three airy kisses:
The first air-kiss spread in my breast the din Of bitter and sweet life in waves of air; And the world's music sounded manifold, A tempest's roar and a sweet breath's caress.
The second air-kiss whispered low to me All whisperings that Silence stoops to sing Over bare wilderness and tombs and ruins, Songs that no soul nor even wind can hear.
The third air-kiss would bring to me, it seemed, Secrets from somewhere heard by none before. Perhaps, by some bright star, two spirits white Embraced each other as they passed in thought.
ISMENE
_To N.G. Polites, her father._
Where is the little girl and beautiful Who drew the milk of a full life and precious? She filled her home with fragrance, and away She sailed to anchor in another land.
She filled her home with fragrance, and on wings Swiftly she fled and passed away. Who knows Why she has left the flesh? Perhaps, she went Among the mystic joys of things unseen And things intangible to be herself Something new, something beyond compare or word.
And yet her house is wrapped in spider webs And longs for her. To her warm nest, will she Return? Perhaps, each time you feel, O home, Within your bosom something sweet and tender That cannot be explained, it may be she; Who knows? Then speak to her and say: "Do you, Too, long for me, O soul without return?"
THOUGHTS OF EARLY DAWN
Who are you that awake me in the morning? Not the reveille that sweetens with its sounds The soldier's hardy life. Nor can you be The chapel bell that slowly rings to prayer.
* * * * *
Your steps fall heavy on the road. You bring Thought, light, and sound, my sacred Trinity. What if you rouse the slave who goes to work? What if you call the prodigal to sleep?
* * * * *
Not many were the flowers; and few, the lilies; And I did long to reap the lily-treasure. I eyed the lilies all, and walked into The garden rich to clasp them in mine arms.
* * * * *
And in the garden, all the roses smiled; Under their veils, the violets bowed down. I passed them by. The pansies looked erect And scentless, wrapped in thought: by them, I stopped.
Sweet child, upon thy tomb, a rosebud blossomed; The hand would reach at it, but it cannot. And on its path the wind would blow on it; But ere he light, it dies into a kiss.
* * * * *
Like church lights shine the blossoms in the light; And butterflies are drunk with airy fragrance; Yet neither for fragrance nor for light, I come Into the quiet garden as before.
* * * * *
I come to see the children beautiful, Running and playing, full of beaming smiles, Children that make of grassy beds a heaven And rise like miracles among the flowers.
* * * * *
The brows of righteous men pass slow before me, Clouds calm and wide, full of refreshing rain; And from the lightless depths of hell, methinks I hear breast-beatings and dark blasphemies. And suddenly, I mingle speech with rime, The rime that above human things and woes, Like the Platonic Diotima, rises A prophetess upon a path sublime Towards worlds of thought and earth-transcending loves.
* * * * *
Whatever be thy substance, O bright gleam, Iron or stone, silver or wind, air-cloud Or dream, my longing is the same for thee! Within me thought and hands and art and science Struggle to build together the same temple. Maternal Rhea treasures in her breast All marbles: purple, green, and white. I searched And found them in your care, Taygetus Snake-like, and Cyclads fair, and Attica. And now the columns stand a forest speechless And motionless; and among them, the rhythms And thoughts move in slow measures constantly. And in their depths, light-written images Show Love that leads and Soul that follows him.
* * * * *
The axe and hammer of the priest black-robed Struck down the holy idols of the temples; And yet the soul of the ruins perished not! It climbed the heaven's spaces as a star Until new sculptured lilies came to life In master minds, the gardens of the wise. Thus axe and hammer of the priest black-robed Broke not the holy idols of the temples!
* * * * *
Sweet child, upon thy tomb a rosebud blossomed; Is it thy joy or grief? Thy heart or thou? If mind, remember me! If mouth, speak forth! "I am the movement of the motionless, The lightning flushing from the source of nothing!"
* * * * *
Thy cup is foaming with its black strong wine; Bring to our fountain thy white-foaming cup, And brighten into red thy black strong wine With the fresh water of our fountain here.
* * * * *
I have a thought of dew; a heart of flame! The wine vat boils; the spring flows fresh and cool; And I did mingle in my chiseled cup The black strong wine with the sweet water dew.
A hundred years! A hundred years are gone Of Grecian mornings and of Grecian sunsets! Make them a coffin wide, O carpenter, And bury them, the hapless dead, in silence!
* * * * *
A hundred dragons watch a queen black-robed, A widowed orphan queen in a lone castle; And they dig up the scattered fragments of An ancient and exhaustless treasure, once Her own, and bring them as their gifts to her! "I need no fragments! May the hour be cursed And you, dragons, who hold me prisoner! I dream of her, the living perfect land Where I was queen! While here, I am a slave!"
* * * * *
Loud-crying birds that fly toward the heights, White swans, and swans that cut so tenderly The silent waters of the lake in thoughts Of silent sorrow, tameless birds and weary! O swans that dream the conquest of the sun, And swans that wait the coming of deep sleep!
Within me lies a far and secret kingdom Where I can see lake-swans and winds like you!
* * * * *
My banished life has found a home near thee; And by thy grace, I am thy priest, O Phoebus! And taking from thy bright divinity, I made the sun-born maiden to thy glory! I lifted to thine image my loud praises, And lo, bells hoarse and tuneless answered them. Yet what of it? Thine endless praise I am, And paeans follow on my dithyrambs!
TO A MAIDEN WHO DIED
O little life, quenched by the blow of death Amidst the tender dreams of rosy dawn, I cannot lift thee into deathlessness Upon the chiseled glitter of the marble!
I am a humble bard; and thou, a music Silenced, whose strains my memory cannot Recall. Yet with a deeper bond my soul Thou bindest, O breath unpainted and unsung.
Like a far dawn, thou smiledst in my mind, A dawn most sweet and shy and fleeting. Then One day, over my child's pure head thou bentest With face abloom with smiles and fond caresses.
And something amber-like remained in me From thee, though thou didst pass; and in the evening Which in me rises slowly, the dream fairy Of the azure tales looks with thy face on me.
TO THE SINNER
Sinner, thy mother gave thee not the milk That makes the cheek a rose, the man a castle! Each nursing was a sin; each drop, a sickness! Within thee, ancient lives revive thrice-wretched.
Vices of ancestors unknown and instincts Of beastly fathers, ever travelling, Before they rose to light, thus to become Like smiles and fields of azure blue, came down To dwell in thee, a people of tormentors!
And one day, sinner, thine own mother gave To thee the wonder-working holy image To carry it to the sacred festival Of the illumined church with open gates Calling upon its throngs of worshippers.
And on thy way, the luring harlot watched And stripped thee of thy mind; and as thy hands Struggled to clasp her, down the image fell, The sacred image, in the ditch's filth!
And forthwith even there, the plague began To visit thee! And crumbling down, thou didst Begin to groan and tremble nearer death Than the dead corpse on which the ravens feed! And Satan crouching upon thee rejoices!
And seeing it, thou strugglest painfully, Stretchest thy hands towards the ditch's filth, And darest a prayer to the saint defiled, Though still enflamed by thirst for the vile kiss!
A TALK WITH THE FLOWERS
Upon my passing, slow or swift, by you I lingered not, nor stooped to pluck you, flowers! I saw you as a vision skyward roaming, And I adored you just as thought and sky! My hand reached not to touch you sinfully, My flowers! For what is most beautiful Is also most remote. You were for me The music that the wind brings on its wings In perfect strains directly to the heart. I wished your dazzling could remain as that Of castles barred and inaccessible. From far thy fragrance came to me, O jasmine; And thy gleam, lily, like the eyes' light-kisses!
But since my darling child lay down to sleep The bitter sleep that knows no wakening, I am the cruel reaper always bending Above you, gathering you one by one, And ever binding you in royal garlands, And ever weaving you into rich robes For him! I wish to play new plays with him, And spread you over him as mine embrace! I wish to raise him as a flower garden Breathing into his grave the flower soul Of an immortal April. Oh, I wish ... Weak though I am, would all earth's verdancy Were a long dream and kiss for my beloved! Would that whatever is beyond man's touch, Air-born, transcending earth, or fleeting, all That has a sunbeam as its heart, a breeze as body, Fair vision, thought, or heaven--would that I Could close them into forms and scatter them Upon his flower-clad grave with you, sweet flowers!
In my paternal love, pure white, the flames Of passion burn; and then, the yellow languor Of a sick man! Thus did I love him, flowers! His father though they called me, I was his lover!
O flowers, did you know it? Was your life, So pure and little, ever touched by such A woe? Does not a quenchless longing stir you As you grow on the selfsame flower bough?
The body of my child, sent up from depths Unfathomed of a secret Fate unhoped, Was an epiphany of the fair bride, The bride undreamable, intangible Of a god's dream! Was he of mine own blood? I never thought whether he was to live, Grow, or advance in thought and deed; I was Drunk with his luring wine, his eyes, his face, His gait! The breath of blest Makaria Had blown on him! The stranger's song revolved Before my mind: "Thou little line so fine, Written with roses, line that wert his mouth, How dost thou give birth to that mighty trembling?"[22]
How often when he turned away his lips So beautiful in careless weariness From mine embrace, I felt the torturings Of a disease and drank the bitter draughts Of jealousy! How often, when he lay Reclining on mine arms and breathing gently, I thought I held the graspless image of Beauty light-born, and said: "What is there more For me to hope?" O flowers, did you know it? Can you, too, mingle your little hidden hearts Fed with sweet honey, the pure frankincense Of a thrice-blue and earth-transcending worship, With love's uneasy little tremblings?
Of jealousy! How often, when he lay Reclining on mine arms and breathing gently, I thought I held the graspless image of Beauty light-born, and said: "What is there more For me to hope?" O flowers, did you know it? Can you, too, mingle your little hidden hearts Fed with sweet honey, the pure frankincense Of a thrice-blue and earth-transcending worship, With love's uneasy little tremblings?
Oh, The bitterest and saddest blows, the blows That know no healing on this earth of ours, Come from our dearest! Thus he fled and left me A bitterness beyond all sorrow's pangs, O little flowers, flowers of dark death!
TO MY WIFE
Here bloomed our home; the young plant verdant blossomed In the cool shade of the fresh green grape-vine; And here the mystic moon, entwined in green, Descended like a first-seen ghost on us.
Here the two fountains of desire refreshed Our years: the one, before our eyes; the others, In dreams. The fair Muse silenced here care's crickets And stirred the sacred frenzy of the lyre.
Here we enjoyed our first-born's flutterings; And here the little gleaming face and round, Our second fruit, maddened us with pure joy! As the unhoped return of a longed friend, Here we received one day into our bosom The transitory child beyond compare, The third one, who transformed the worldly air About us into flowing wine for gods, An offering unto the gleaming light Of high Olympus, dwelling of the blessed!
Here was thy youth, even when care oppressed thee, A fair Venetian painting, the blithe work Of a light-beaming Titian, that revealed Pure shining joy in thy lithe body's form.
Here bloomed our home; the young plant verdant blossomed, Hidden in the cool shade of the green vine. Now, nothing remains. Only the mystic moon Weeps in a palace voiceless, wide, and gloomy!
The life that died here wished for April as Grave-digger, and a flower-bed as grave. Oh, who had cursed it? Nothing but a tomb Was found for it! A tomb unfit and graceless!
THE ANSWER
Take me and hear me, Hamadryads fair, And Aegipans, Wood-Nymphs, and shepherd gods! The bridal beds are set! The forest glades, In flurry! The Flower Festival has come! The bacchic revelry bursts forth in glow And frenzy! Where is nature and where is Its end? I know not whether I am myself; Great Pan, it seems, dwells in my bosom here.
O wonder! I do live the holy life And wild of purest nature's elements! O God of the golden crown, the three fair Graces And the Nine Sisters of the Song gave me The gift of tranquil visions beautiful! I filled me with the foam-begotten beauty Of all! I hear the nightingales' sweet song In answer to the song of Sophocles! The woes of Aeschylus resound prophetic, Ocean-born! Face to face with me, as swift As glance, green-clad Atlantides rise forth From the abyss and sink in it again.
Phoenicians battling with the sea brought me From far away; I am the reveller World-wandering! Arts, talks, and images Are bristling in the air! Take me, O Nymphs Into your bosom! Satyrs, hear my words!
Yet Satyrs, Centaurs, Hamadryad Nymphs, And golden-spoken Hellades at once Made answer to my pleading with one voice From cities, mountains, forests, cliffs, and plains:
"Gods' wine is not for thee, O reveller!"
And the lithe Tanagraean maiden spoke With awe-inspiring prophetess Cassandra, Ivy-crowned Maenads, Gods Olympian, And the song-nourished Hellades; they spoke From the far cave of fair Calypso to The wisdom-haunted Alexandria:
"Silence! Pale monk and idle chatterer! Silence! Turn back to thy lone cloister cell."
And the Pindaric heroes laugh in scorn With the white goddesses of marble wrought By Scopas' hand; laugh, and their laughter-peals Are echoed loud and deep from far away!
THOUGHT
More than the godlike gleams of sculptured stone, More than the golden rhythms the poet weaves, Who knows if a good act unknown, some wound's Balsam, shines not with brighter lasting beams?
Who knows if for some god's unfailing ear, The dogged sin and filthy vice are not A thrice-wise and tempestuous harmony Of melodies sung by Virtue's lips serene?
Bright shine the temples of Fair Art; bright shine The rainbows heavenly of Thought; and bright, The chariots of warriors triumphant! Yet in the temple of the Universe, Can they be costlier than the mute Thought And Glory of the flower, at whose birth The dawn rejoices and whose early death The saddened evening silently laments?
The thoughtful sage high-rising smites the gates Of the Infinite and questions every Sphinx; Yet who knows if the soldier with no will, Obeying blindly, is not nearer Truth?
O struggle vast! Who knows what power measures The measureless and creates the great? Is it the matchless thought of the endowed, Or the dim soul of multitudes that bursts, Thoughtless of reason, into life? Who knows?
The holy man lifts up his hand to bless With readiness; yet who needs more such blessing? Is it the free-born bird that makes its nest Wherever its strong wings would waft it, or The flowery plant bound by a bit of earth?
Which is the light of Truth? Is it the Law That is all eyes or is it some blind love? What leads us there? The hidden path where bent And trembling we seek our way, or the wide road That makes us fly with wingèd confidence?
O Thought, thou dream-crowned maiden, ever wrestling With a blood-filled, swift woman masculine, Whose bosom, thine or hers, is doomed to yield The destined milk to nourish and to heal Our sickened life with health Olympian?
O Thought, thou angel, ever wrestling on With a strong giant flinging his hundred hands About thy neck to strangle thee, wilt thou Battle with sword or lily? Oh, the world Will crumble ere thy struggle finds an end!
THE SINNER
O hapless one, when thou wert born, there came The Fate thrice-blessed and clasped thee in her arms To bless thee with a hero's mighty deeds And wrap thee in the purple of a king, The Fate whose blessings teem with light and might.
Yet there, the other Fate, the bitch of ruin Unspoken and of voiceless death, kept watch; And she led thee away from the blue shore With lilies sown, to the salt marsh of terror And the sheer precipice of fearful trembling!
Nor could thy baby hands grasp more than this, A cheerless tatter from the sacred veil Of thy good mother Fate, the veil embroidered With the star-spangled sky by master hand!
O hapless One, while virgin joy bathes thee Abundant and thy tears are yet a baby's, Something within thee groans, the muffled madness Of fettered murderers, the madness of Lone cells. And while thou showest the calm life Of tame things and of love in thy still nook, Thou breedest fettered wraths and bridled hatreds. Should they burst forth, ruin and wilderness Would reign. O hapless One, the greenest spots Even of thy existence are but full Of pitfalls opened wide and yawning void! No dawning was thy lot; even those boughs Young of thine early years were parched with drought! Whatever white thou touchedst was defiled! And thine old age, if thou couldst bare thy youth, Would shriek with fear and fly from thy youth's face!
A sneering power or a grace divine Mercilessly nailed down thy hands and will, O cowardly, decrepit, idle man, Infirm and hapless, starless night enclosed In a weak child! Death will not come to thee As to the toiling laborer who toils The whole day long, and towards evening, sleep, Even before he lies, in bed to rest, Creeps sweetly upon him and seals his eyes.
Thy death shall be laden with graspless horror Such as one feels who sinned in secrecy And dreads each hour detection of his sin, Trial, death sentence, and the hangman's rope.
O hapless One, would that in thy death struggle Her bosom might still shine before thine eyes, The good Fate's breast, who blessed thy birth with goodness, The Fate whose blessings teem with light and might! Would that thou couldst show her the humble shred Torn from the star-wrought sacred veil of hers And tell her: "See, in the deep darkness smiles Something, a dawn on which I still hold fast!"
O hapless One! Would that the mighty heroes And royal purples and the blessings full Of light and might and all thou knewest not In thy dark empty life could shine upon Thy passing as the lights of distant stars!
THE END
A wedding guest, I travel far abroad! The bride, thrice-beautiful; the groom, a wizard; And I ride swiftly to the wedding feast. The land is far, and I must travel on; An endless path before me leads away.
And the far land a vision was! The steed, A smoke! The wedding, angels' shadows fleet! While I,--O cruel wakening!--lie down For ever palsy-stricken and bed-ridden!
And only you, old tunes familiar, I hold. I hold you as a dying darling child, Languid and glowing with the fever's heat, Holds on to his dear plaything, with white wings New-grown for his long journey, even I, The child unskilled, dream-roaming, stript of will!
Old tunes familiar, waft me upon Your shining wings for healing or for death To the cool shadow of the pure-white home And lay me gently on a loving bosom.
THE PALM TREE
TO DOSINES, WHO HEARD IT FIRST.
THE PALM TREE
_Once in a garden about a palm tree's shade, some blue flowers, here very dark and there very light, talked with each other. A poet who now is dead, passed by; and he put their talk into these rhythms:_
O Palm Tree, someone's hand has cast us here; Was it the hand led by a cursed Fate, Or moved by mind of good intent? Who knows? What impulse seized us from the cave of sleep Below to bring us to the surface here? Is it a savior's or destroyer's power That sets us motionless beneath thy shade? And is thy shade the shade of life or death?
* * * * *
The glare of the hot sun drowned everything; Gluttonous locusts groped for food about; And then, a rain. The flowers, that had drooped To sleep, awake to drink the drops of dew. And then, the clear sky's festival begins More azure than before to spread above thee.
Only thy trembling crest drops here and there Some large and shining rain-pearls on the earth.
* * * * *
The garden glitters with a new-born life; And each bird dreams it is a nightingale; Only from thy lone heights like bullets fall Thy pearl-clear drops, and oh, the pain thereof! The dew drops make a crown for everything; The gurgling waters are a balm to all; Why should this god-sent goodness of all things Be blow for us and suffering and flame?
* * * * *
How cruelly thy bullets fall and smite! No ear above and not an eye before us! Beneath thy shade we live; thy trunk is world To us; thy crown, a star-spun sky, our sky! If thou art a god merciless, reveal Thyself! If not, but nod and give us calm! Either cease slaying us one by one, or pour On us at once a flood to drown us all!