Part 8

Lie closer, lean your face upon my side, Feel where the dew fell that has hardly dried, Hear how the blood beats that went nigh to swoon; The pleasure lives there when the sense has died; Ah God, ah God, that day should be so soon.

O my fair lord, I charge you leave me this: Is it not sweeter than a foolish kiss? Nay take it then, my flower, my first in June, My rose, so like a tender mouth it is: Ah God, ah God, that day should be so soon.

Love, till dawn sunder night from day with fire, Dividing my delight and my desire, The crescent life and love the plenilune, Love me though dusk begin and dark retire; Ah God, ah God, that day should be so soon.

Ah, my heart fails, my blood draws back; I know, When life runs over, life is near to go; And with the slain of love love's ways are strewn, And with their blood, if love will have it so; Ah God, ah God, that day should be so soon.

Ah, do thy will now; slay me if thou wilt; There is no building now the walls are built, No quarrying now the corner-stone is hewn, No drinking now the vine's whole blood is spilt; Ah God, ah God, that day should be so soon.

Nay, slay me now; nay, for I will be slain; Pluck thy red pleasure from the teeth of pain, Break down thy vine ere yet grape-gatherers prune, Slay me ere day can slay desire again; Ah God, ah God, that day should be so soon.

Yea, with thy sweet lips, with thy sweet sword; yea, Take life and all, for I will die, I say; Love, I gave love, is life a better boon? For sweet night's sake I will not live till day; Ah God, ah God, that day should be so soon.

Nay, I will sleep then only; nay, but go. Ah sweet, too sweet to me, my sweet, I know Love, sleep, and death go to the sweet same tune; Hold my hair fast, and kiss me through it so. Ah God, ah God, that day should be so soon.

A MATCH

If love were what the rose is, And I were like the leaf, Our lives would grow together In sad or singing weather, Blown fields or flowerful closes, Green pleasure or grey grief; If love were what the rose is, And I were like the leaf.

If I were what the words are, And love were like the tune, With double sound and single Delight our lips would mingle, With kisses glad as birds are That get sweet rain at noon; If I were what the words are, And love were like the tune.

If you were life, my darling, And I your love were death, We'd shine and snow together Ere March made sweet the weather With daffodil and starling And hours of fruitful breath; If you were life, my darling, And I your love were death.

If you were thrall to sorrow, And I were page to joy, We'd play for lives and seasons With loving looks and treasons And tears of night and morrow And laughs of maid and boy; If you were thrall to sorrow, And I were page to joy.

If you were April's lady, And I were lord in May, We'd throw with leaves for hours And draw for days with flowers, Till day like night were shady And night were bright like day; If you were April's lady, And I were lord in May.

If you were queen of pleasure, And I were king of pain, We'd hunt down love together, Pluck out his flying-feather, And teach his feet a measure, And find his mouth a rein; If you were queen of pleasure, And I were king of pain.

FAUSTINE

_Ave Faustina Imperatrix, morituri te salutant._

Lean back, and get some minutes' peace; Let your head lean Back to the shoulder with its fleece Of locks, Faustine.

The shapely silver shoulder stoops, Weighed over clean With state of splendid hair that droops Each side, Faustine.

Let me go over your good gifts That crown you queen; A queen whose kingdom ebbs and shifts Each week, Faustine.

Bright heavy brows well gathered up: White gloss and sheen; Carved lips that make my lips a cup To drink, Faustine,

Wine and rank poison, milk and blood, Being mixed therein Since first the devil threw dice with God For you, Faustine.

Your naked new-born soul, their stake, Stood blind between; God said "let him that wins her take And keep Faustine."

But this time Satan throve, no doubt; Long since, I ween, God's part in you was battered out; Long since, Faustine.

The die rang sideways as it fell, Rang cracked and thin, Like a man's laughter heard in hell Far down, Faustine,

A shadow of laughter like a sigh, Dead sorrow's kin; So rang, thrown down, the devil's die That won Faustine.

A suckling of his breed you were, One hard to wean; But God, who lost you, left you fair, We see, Faustine.

You have the face that suits a woman For her soul's screen-- The sort of beauty that's called human In hell, Faustine.

You could do all things but be good Or chaste of mien; And that you would not if you could, We know, Faustine.

Even he who cast seven devils out Of Magdalene Could hardly do as much, I doubt, For you, Faustine.

Did Satan make you to spite God? Or did God mean To scourge with scorpions for a rod Our sins, Faustine?

I know what queen at first you were, As though I had seen Red gold and black imperious hair Twice crown Faustine.

As if your fed sarcophagus Spared flesh and skin, You come back face to face with us, The same Faustine.

She loved the games men played with death, Where death must win; As though the slain man's blood and breath Revived Faustine.

Nets caught the pike, pikes tore the net; Lithe limbs and lean From drained-out pores dripped thick red sweat To soothe Faustine.

She drank the steaming drift and dust Blown off the scene; Blood could not ease the bitter lust That galled Faustine.

All round the foul fat furrows reeked, Where blood sank in; The circus splashed and seethed and shrieked All round Faustine.

But these are gone now: years entomb The dust and din; Yea, even the bath's fierce reek and fume That slew Faustine.

Was life worth living then? and now Is life worth sin? Where are the imperial years? and how Are you Faustine?

Your soul forgot her joys, forgot Her times of teen; Yea, this life likewise will you not Forget, Faustine?

For in the time we know not of Did fate begin Weaving the web of days that wove Your doom, Faustine.

The threads were wet with wine, and all Were smooth to spin; They wove you like a Bacchanal, The first Faustine.

And Bacchus cast your mates and you Wild grapes to glean; Your flower-like lips were dashed with dew From his, Faustine.

Your drenched loose hands were stretched to hold The vine's wet green, Long ere they coined in Roman gold Your face, Faustine.

Then after change of soaring feather And winnowing fin, You woke in weeks of feverish weather, A new Faustine.

A star upon your birthday burned, Whose fierce serene Red pulseless planet never yearned In heaven, Faustine.

Stray breaths of Sapphic song that blew Through Mitylene Shook the fierce quivering blood in you By night, Faustine.

The shameless nameless love that makes Hell's iron gin Shut on you like a trap that breaks The soul, Faustine.

And when your veins were void and dead, What ghosts unclean Swarmed round the straitened barren bed That hid Faustine?

What sterile growths of sexless root Or epicene? What flower of kisses without fruit Of love, Faustine?

What adders came to shed their coats? What coiled obscene Small serpents with soft stretching throats Caressed Faustine?

But the time came of famished hours, Maimed loves and mean, This ghastly thin-faced time of ours, To spoil Faustine.

You seem a thing that hinges hold, A love-machine With clockwork joints of supple gold-- No more, Faustine.

Not godless, for you serve one God, The Lampsacene, Who metes the gardens with his rod; Your lord, Faustine.

If one should love you with real love (Such things have been, Things your fair face knows nothing of, It seems, Faustine);

That clear hair heavily bound back, The lights wherein Shift from dead blue to burnt-up black; Your throat, Faustine,

Strong, heavy, throwing out the face And hard bright chin And shameful scornful lips that grace Their shame, Faustine,

Curled lips, long-since half kissed away, Still sweet and keen; You'd give him--poison shall we say? Or what, Faustine?

A CAMEO

There was a graven image of Desire Painted with red blood on a ground of gold Passing between the young men and the old, And by him Pain, whose body shone like fire, And Pleasure with gaunt hands that grasped their hire. Of his left wrist, with fingers clenched and cold, The insatiable Satiety kept hold, Walking with feet unshod that pashed the mire. The senses and the sorrows and the sins, And the strange loves that suck the breasts of Hate Till lips and teeth bite in their sharp indenture, Followed like beasts with flap of wings and fins. Death stood aloof behind a gaping grate, Upon whose lock was written _Peradventure_.

SONG BEFORE DEATH

(FROM THE FRENCH)

1795

Sweet mother, in a minute's span Death parts thee and my love of thee; Sweet love, that yet art living man, Come back, true love, to comfort me. Back, ah, come back! ah wellaway! But my love comes not any day.

As roses, when the warm West blows, Break to full flower and sweeten spring, My soul would break to a glorious rose In such wise at his whispering. In vain I listen; wellaway! My love says nothing any day.

You that will weep for pity of love On the low place where I am lain, I pray you, having wept enough, Tell him for whom I bore such pain That he was yet, ah! wellaway! My true love to my dying day.

ROCOCO

Take hands and part with laughter; Touch lips and part with tears; Once more and no more after, Whatever comes with years. We twain shall not remeasure The ways that left us twain; Nor crush the lees of pleasure From sanguine grapes of pain.

We twain once well in sunder, What will the mad gods do For hate with me, I wonder, Or what for love with you? Forget them till November, And dream there's April yet; Forget that I remember, And dream that I forget.

Time found our tired love sleeping, And kissed away his breath; But what should we do weeping, Though light love sleep to death? We have drained his lips at leisure, Till there's not left to drain A single sob of pleasure, A single pulse of pain.

Dream that the lips once breathless Might quicken if they would; Say that the soul is deathless; Dream that the gods are good; Say March may wed September, And time divorce regret; But not that you remember, And not that I forget.

We have heard from hidden places What love scarce lives and hears: We have seen on fervent faces The pallor of strange tears: We have trod the wine-vat's treasure, Whence, ripe to steam and stain, Foams round the feet of pleasure The blood-red must of pain.

Remembrance may recover And time bring back to time The name of your first lover, The ring of my first rhyme; But rose-leaves of December The frosts of June shall fret, The day that you remember, The day that I forget.

The snake that hides and hisses In heaven we twain have known; The grief of cruel kisses, The joy whose mouth makes moan; The pulse's pause and measure, Where in one furtive vein Throbs through the heart of pleasure The purpler blood of pain.

We have done with tears and treasons And love for treason's sake; Room for the swift new seasons, The years that burn and break, Dismantle and dismember Men's days and dreams, Juliette; For love may not remember, But time will not forget.

Life treads down love in flying, Time withers him at root; Bring all dead things and dying, Reaped sheaf and ruined fruit, Where, crushed by three days' pressure, Our three days' love lies slain; And earlier leaf of pleasure, And latter flower of pain.

Breathe close upon the ashes, It may be flame will leap; Unclose the soft close lashes, Lift up the lids, and weep. Light love's extinguished ember, Let one tear leave it wet For one that you remember And ten that you forget.

STAGE LOVE

When the game began between them for a jest, He played king and she played queen to match the best; Laughter soft as tears, and tears that turned to laughter, These were things she sought for years and sorrowed after.

Pleasure with dry lips, and pain that walks by night; All the sting and all the stain of long delight; These were things she knew not of, that knew not of her, When she played at half a love with half a lover.

Time was chorus, gave them cues to laugh or cry; They would kill, befool, amuse him, let him die; Set him webs to weave to-day and break to-morrow, Till he died for good in play, and rose in sorrow.

What the years mean; how time dies and is not slain; How love grows and laughs and cries and wanes again; These were things she came to know, and take their measure, When the play was played out so for one man's pleasure.

THE LEPER

Nothing is better, I well think, Than love; the hidden well-water Is not so delicate to drink: This was well seen of me and her.

I served her in a royal house; I served her wine and curious meat. For will to kiss between her brows, I had no heart to sleep or eat.

Mere scorn God knows she had of me, A poor scribe, nowise great or fair, Who plucked his clerk's hood back to see Her curled-up lips and amorous hair.

I vex my head with thinking this. Yea, though God always hated me, And hates me now that I can kiss Her eyes, plait up her hair to see

How she then wore it on the brows, Yet am I glad to have her dead Here in this wretched wattled house Where I can kiss her eyes and head.

Nothing is better, I well know, Than love; no amber in cold sea Or gathered berries under snow: That is well seen of her and me.

Three thoughts I make my pleasure of: First I take heart and think of this: That knight's gold hair she chose to love, His mouth she had such will to kiss.

Then I remember that sundawn I brought him by a privy way Out at her lattice, and thereon What gracious words she found to say.

(Cold rushes for such little feet-- Both feet could lie into my hand. A marvel was it of my sweet Her upright body could so stand.)

"Sweet friend, God give you thank and grace; Now am I clean and whole of shame, Nor shall men burn me in the face For my sweet fault that scandals them."

I tell you over word by word. She, sitting edgewise on her bed, Holding her feet, said thus. The third, A sweeter thing than these, I said.

God, that makes time and ruins it And alters not, abiding God, Changed with disease her body sweet, The body of love wherein she abode.

Love is more sweet and comelier Than a dove's throat strained out to sing. All they spat out and cursed at her And cast her forth for a base thing.

They cursed her, seeing how God had wrought This curse to plague her, a curse of his. Fools were they surely, seeing not How sweeter than all sweet she is.

He that had held her by the hair, With kissing lips blinding her eyes, Felt her bright bosom, strained and bare, Sigh under him, with short mad cries

Out of her throat and sobbing mouth And body broken up with love, With sweet hot tears his lips were loth Her own should taste the savour of,

Yea, he inside whose grasp all night Her fervent body leapt or lay, Stained with sharp kisses red and white, Found her a plague to spurn away.

I hid her in this wattled house, I served her water and poor bread. For joy to kiss between her brows Time upon time I was nigh dead.

Bread failed; we got but well-water And gathered grass with dropping seed. I had such joy of kissing her, I had small care to sleep or feed.

Sometimes when service made me glad The sharp tears leapt between my lids, Falling on her, such joy I had To do the service God forbids.

"I pray you let me be at peace, Get hence, make room for me to die." She said that: her poor lip would cease, Put up to mine, and turn to cry.

I said, "Bethink yourself how love Fared in us twain, what either did; Shall I unclothe my soul thereof? That I should do this, God forbid."

Yea, though God hateth us, he knows That hardly in a little thing Love faileth of the work it does Till it grow ripe for gathering.

Six months, and now my sweet is dead A trouble takes me; I know not If all were done well, all well said, No word or tender deed forgot.

Too sweet, for the least part in her, To have shed life out by fragments; yet, Could the close mouth catch breath and stir, I might see something I forget.

Six months, and I sit still and hold In two cold palms her cold two feet. Her hair, half grey half ruined gold, Thrills me and burns me in kissing it.

Love bites and stings me through, to see Her keen face made of sunken bones. Her worn-off eyelids madden me, That were shot through with purple once.

She said, "Be good with me; I grow So tired for shame's sake, I shall die If you say nothing:" even so. And she is dead now, and shame put by.

Yea, and the scorn she had of me In the old time, doubtless vexed her then. I never should have kissed her. See What fools God's anger makes of men!

She might have loved me a little too, Had I been humbler for her sake. But that new shame could make love new She saw not--yet her shame did make.

I took too much upon my love, Having for such mean service done Her beauty and all the ways thereof, Her face and all the sweet thereon.

Yea, all this while I tended her, I know the old love held fast his part: I know the old scorn waxed heavier, Mixed with sad wonder, in her heart.

It may be all my love went wrong-- A scribe's work writ awry and blurred, Scrawled after the blind evensong-- Spoilt music with no perfect word.

But surely I would fain have done All things the best I could. Perchance Because I failed, came short of one, She kept at heart that other man's.

I am grown blind with all these things: It may be now she hath in sight Some better knowledge; still there clings The old question. Will not God do right?[3]

[3] En ce temps-la estoyt dans ce pays grand nombre de ladres et de meseaulx, ce dont le roy eut grand desplaisir, veu que Dieu dust en estre moult griefvement courrouce. Ores il advint qu'une noble damoyselle appelee Yolande de Sallieres estant atteincte et touste guastee de ce vilain mal, tous ses amys et ses parens ayant devant leurs yeux la paour de Dieu la firent issir fors de leurs maisons et oncques ne voulurent recepvoir ni reconforter chose mauldicte de Dieu et a tous les hommes puante et abhominable. Ceste dame avoyt este moult belle et gracieuse de formes, et de son corps elle estoyt large et de vie lascive. Pourtant nul des amans qui l'avoyent souventesfois accollee et baisee moult tendrement ne voulust plus heberger si laide femme et si detestable pescheresse. Ung seul clerc qui feut premierement son lacquays et son entremetteur en matiere d'amour la recut chez luy et la recela dans une petite cabane. La mourut la meschinette de grande misere et de male mort: et apres elle deceda ledist clerc qui pour grand amour l'avoyt six mois durant soignee, lavee, habillee et deshabillee tous les jours de ses mains propres. Mesme dist-on que ce meschant homme et mauldict clerc se rememourant de la grande beaute passee et guastee de ceste femme se delectoyt maintesfois a la baiser sur sa bouche orde et lepreuse et l'accoller doulcement de ses mains amoureuses. Aussy est-il mort de ceste mesme maladie abhominable. Cecy advint pres Fontainebellant en Gastinois. Et quand ouyt le roy Philippe ceste adventure moult en estoyt esmerveille.

_Grandes Chroniques de France, 1505._

A BALLAD OF BURDENS

The burden of fair women. Vain delight, And love self-slain in some sweet shameful way, And sorrowful old age that comes by night As a thief comes that has no heart by day, And change that finds fair cheeks and leaves them grey, And weariness that keeps awake for hire, And grief that says what pleasure used to say; This is the end of every man's desire.

The burden of bought kisses. This is sore, A burden without fruit in childbearing; Between the nightfall and the dawn threescore, Threescore between the dawn and evening. The shuddering in thy lips, the shuddering In thy sad eyelids tremulous like fire, Makes love seem shameful and a wretched thing, This is the end of every man's desire.

The burden of sweet speeches. Nay, kneel down, Cover thy head, and weep; for verily These market-men that buy thy white and brown In the last days shall take no thought for thee. In the last days like earth thy face shall be, Yea, like sea-marsh made thick with brine and mire, Sad with sick leavings of the sterile sea. This is the end of every man's desire.

The burden of long living. Thou shalt fear Waking, and sleeping mourn upon thy bed; And say at night "Would God the day were here," And say at dawn "Would God the day were dead." With weary days thou shalt be clothed and fed, And wear remorse of heart for thine attire, Pain for thy girdle and sorrow upon thine head; This is the end of every man's desire.

The burden of bright colours. Thou shalt see Gold tarnished, and the grey above the green; And as the thing thou seest thy face shall be, And no more as the thing beforetime seen. And thou shalt say of mercy "It hath been," And living, watch the old lips and loves expire, And talking, tears shall take thy breath between; This is the end of every man's desire.

The burden of sad sayings. In that day Thou shalt tell all thy days and hours, and tell Thy times and ways and words of love, and say How one was dear and one desirable, And sweet was life to hear and sweet to smell, But now with lights reverse the old hours retire And the last hour is shod with fire from hell; This is the end of every man's desire.

The burden of four seasons. Rain in spring, White rain and wind among the tender trees; A summer of green sorrows gathering, Rank autumn in a mist of miseries, With sad face set towards the year, that sees The charred ash drop out of the dropping pyre, And winter wan with many maladies; This is the end of every man's desire.

The burden of dead faces. Out of sight And out of love, beyond the reach of hands, Changed in the changing of the dark and light, They walk and weep about the barren lands Where no seed is nor any garner stands, Where in short breaths the doubtful days respire, And time's turned glass lets through the sighing sands; This is the end of every man's desire.

The burden of much gladness. Life and lust Forsake thee, and the face of thy delight; And underfoot the heavy hour strews dust, And overhead strange weathers burn and bite; And where the red was, lo the bloodless white, And where truth was, the likeness of a liar, And where day was, the likeness of the night; This is the end of every man's desire.

L'ENVOY