Chapter 13
But as I looked the god Began these words: "Before the iron stress Of the north pole's dominion fell, he trod The wastes of Europe, ere the Nile was made A granary for the east, or ere the clod In Babylon or India baked was laid For hovels, this man lived. Ten thousand years Before the earliest pyramid cast its shade Upon the desolate sands this thing of fears, Lusts, hungers, lived and hunted, woke and slept, Mated, produced its kind, with hairy ears, And tiger eyes sensed all that you accept In terms of thought or vision as the proof Of immanent Power or Love. But this skull kept The intangible meaning out. This heavy roof Of brutish bone above the eyes was dead Even to lower ethers, no behoof Of seasons, stars or skies took, though they bred Suspicions, fears, or nervous glances, thought, Which silent as a lizard's shadow fled Before it graved itself, passed over, wrought No vision, only pain, which he deemed pangs Of hunger or of thirst."
As you have sought The meaning of life's riddle, since it hangs In waking or in slumber just above The highest reach of prophecy, and fangs With poison of despair all moods but love, Behold its secret lettered on this brow Placed by your own!
This is the word thereof: _Change and progression from the glazed slough, Where life creeps and is blind, ascending up The jungled slopes for prey till spirits bow On Calvaries with crosses, take the cup Of martyrdom for truth's sake._
It may be Men of to-day make monstrous war, sleep, sup, Traffic, build shrines, as earliest history Records the earliest day, and that the race Is what it was in virtue, charity, And nothing better. But within this face No light shone from that realm where Hindostan, Delving in numbers, watching stars took grace And inspiration to explore the plan Of heaven and earth. And of the scheme the test Is not five thousand years, which leave the van Just where it was, but this change manifest In fifty thousand years between the mind Neanderthal's and Shelley's.
Man progressed Along these years, found eyes where he was blind, Put instinct under thought, crawled from the cave, And faced the sun, till somewhere heaven's wind Mixed with the light of Lights descending, gave To mind a touch of divinity, making whole An undeveloped growth.
As ships that brave Great storms at sea on masts a flaming coal From heaven catch, bear on, so man was wreathed Somewhere with lightning and became a soul. Into his nostrils purer fire was breathed Than breath of life itself, and by a leap, As lightning leaps from crag to crag, what seethed In man from the beginning broke the sleep That lay on consciousness of self, with eyes Awakened saw himself, out of the deep And wonder of the self caught the surmise Of Power beyond this world, and felt it through The flow of living.
And so man shall rise From this illumination, from this clue To perfect knowledge that this Power exists, And what man is to this Power, even as you Have left Neanderthal lost in the mists And ignorance of centuries untold. What would you say if learned geologists Out of the rocks and caverns should unfold The skulls of greater races, records, books To shame us for our day, could we behold Therein our retrogression? Wonder looks In vain for these, discovers everywhere Proof of the root which darkly bends and crooks Far down and far away; a stalk more fair Upspringing finds its proof, buds on the stalk The eye may see, at last the flowering flare Of man to-day!
I see the things which balk, Retard, divert, draw into sluices small, But who beholds the stream turned back to mock, Not just itself, but make equivocal A Universal Reason, Vision? No. You find no proof of this, but prodigal Proof of ascending Life!
So life shall flow Here on this globe until the final fruit And harvest. As it were until the glow Of the great blossom has the attribute In essence, color of eternal things, And shows no rim between its hues which suit The infinite sky's. Then if the dead earth swings A gleaned and stricken field amid the void What matters it to you, a soul with wings, Whether it be replanted or destroyed? Has it not served you?"
Now his voice was still, Which in such discourse had been thus employed. And in that lonely cavern dark and chill I heard again, "Then what is life?" And woke To find the moonlight on the window sill That which had seemed his presence. And a cloak, Whose hood was perked upon the moonbeams, made The skull of the Neanderthal. The smoke Blown from the fireplace formed the cavern's shade. And roaring winds blew down as they had tuned The voice which left me calm and unafraid.
THE END OF THE SEARCH
_There's the dragon banner, says Old King Cole, And the tiger banner, he cries. Pantagruel breaks into a laugh As the monarch dries his eyes.--The Search_
_"The tiger banyer, that is what you call much Bad men in China, Amelica. The dragon banyer. That is storm, leprosy, no rice, what you call Nature. See! Nature!"--King Joy_
* * * * *
Said Old King Cole I know the banner Of dragon and tiger too, But I would know the vagrant fellows Who came to my castle with you.
* * * * *
And I would know why they rise in the morning And never take bread or scrip; And why they hasten over the mountain In a sorrowed fellowship.
* * * * *
Then said Pantagruel: Heard you not? One said he goes to Spain. One said he goes to Elsinore, And one to the Trojan plain.
* * * * *
Faith, if it be, said Old King Cole, There is a word that's more: Who is it goes to Spain and Troy? And who to Elsinore?
* * * * *
One may be Quixote, said Pantagruel, Out for the final joust. One may be Hamlet, said Pantagruel And one I think is Faust.
* * * * *
Whoever they be, said Pantagruel, Why stand at the window and drool? Let's out and catch the runaways While the morning hour is cool.
* * * * *
Pantagruel runs to the castle court, And King Cole follows soon. The cobblestones of the court yard ring To the beat of their flying shoon.
* * * * *
Pantagruel clutches the holy bottle, And King Cole clutches his crown. They throw the bolt of the castle gate And race them through the town.
* * * * *
They cross the river and follow the road, They run by the willow trees, And the tiger banner and dragon banner Wait for the morning breeze.
* * * * *
They clamber the wall and part the brambles, And tear through thicket and thorn. And a wild dove in an olive tree Does mourn and mourn and mourn.
* * * * *
A green snake starts in the tangled grass, And springs his length at their feet. And a condor circles the purple sky Looking for carrion meat.
* * * * *
And mad black flies are over their heads, And a wolf looks out of his hole. Great drops of sweat break out and run From the brow of Old King Cole.
* * * * *
Said Old King Cole: A drink, my friend, From the holy bottle, I pray. My breath is short, my feet run blood, My throat is baked as clay.
* * * * *
Anon they reach a mountain top, And a mile below in the plain Are the glitter of guns and a million men Led by an idiot brain.
* * * * *
They come to a field of slush and flaw Red with a blood red dye. And a million faces fungus pale Stare horribly at the sky.
* * * * *
They come to a cross where a rotting thing Is slipping down from the nails. And a raven perched on the eyeless skull Opens his beak and rails:
* * * * *
"If thou be the Son of man come down, Save us and thyself save." Pantagruel flings a rock at the raven: "How now blaspheming knave!"
* * * * *
"Come down and of my bottle drink, And cease this scurvy rune." But the raven flapped its wings and laughed Loud as the water loon.
* * * * *
Said Old King Cole: A drink, my friend, I faint, a drink in haste. But when he drinks he pales and mutters: "The wine has lost its taste."
* * * * *
"You have gone mad," said Pantagruel, "In faith 'tis the same old wine." Pantagruel drinks at the holy bottle But the flavor is like sea brine.
* * * * *
And there on a rock is a cypress tree, And a form with a muffled face. "I know you, Death," said Pantagruel, "But I ask of you no grace."
* * * * *
"Empty my bottle, sour my wine, Bend me, you shall not break." "Oh well," said Death, "one woe at a time Before I come and take."
* * * * *
"You have lost everything in life but the bottle, Youth and woman and friend. Pass on and laugh for a little space yet The laugh that has an end."
* * * * *
Pantagruel passes and looks around him Brave and merry of soul. But there on the ground lies a dead body, The body of Old King Cole.
* * * * *
And a Voice said: Take the body up And carry the body for me Until you come to a silent water, By the sands of a silent sea.
* * * * *
Pantagruel takes the body up And the dead fat bends him down. He climbs the mountains, runs the valleys With body, bottle and crown.
* * * * *
And the wastes are strewn with skulls, And the desert is hot and cursed. And a phantom shape of the holy bottle Mocks his burning thirst.
* * * * *
Pantagruel wanders seven days, And seven nights wanders he. And on the seventh night he rests him By the sands of the silent sea.
* * * * *
And sees a new made fire on the shore, And on the fire is a dish. And by the fire two travelers sleep, And two are broiling fish.
* * * * *
Don Quixote and Hamlet are sleeping, And Faust is stirring the fire. But the fourth is a stranger with a face Starred with a great desire.
* * * * *
Pantagruel hungers, Pantagruel thirsts, Pantagruel falls to his knees. He flings down the body of Old King Cole As a man throws off disease.
* * * * *
And rolls his burden away and cries: "Take and watch, if you will. But as for me I go to France My bottle to refill."
* * * * *
"And as for me I go to France To fill this bottle up." He felt at his side for the holy bottle, And found it turned a cup.
* * * * *
And the stranger said: Behold our friend Has brought my cup to me. That is the cup whereof I drank In the garden Gethsemane.
* * * * *
Pantagruel hands the cup to Jesus Who dips it in sea brine. This is the water, says Jesus of Nazareth, Whereof I make your wine.
* * * * *
And Faust takes the cup from Jesus of Nazareth, And his lips wear a purple stain. And Faust hands the cup to Pantagruel With the dregs for him to drain.
* * * * *
Pantagruel drinks and falls into slumber, And Jesus strokes his hair. And Faust sings a song of Euphorion To hide his heart's despair.
* * * * *
And Faust takes the hand of Jesus of Nazareth, And they walk by the purple deep. Says Jesus of Nazareth: "Some are watchers, And some grow tired and sleep."
BOTANICAL GARDENS
He follows me no more, I said, nor stands Beside me. And I wake these later days In an April mood, a wonder light and free. The vision is gone, but gone the constant pain Of constant thought. I see dawn from my hill, And watch the lights which fingers from the waters Twine from the sun or moon. Or look across The waste of bays and marshes to the woods, Under the prism colors of the air, Held in a vacuum silence, where the clouds, Like cyclop hoods are tossed against the sky In terrible glory.
And earth charmed I lie Before the staring sphinx whose musing face Is this Egyptian heaven, and whose eyes Are separate clouds of gold, whose pedestal Is earth, whose silken sheathed claws No longer toy with me, even while I stroke them: Since I have ceased to tease her.
Then behold A breeze is blown out of a world becalmed, And as I see the multitudinous leaves Fluttered against the water and the light, And see this light unveil itself, reveal An inner light, a Presence, Secret splendor, I clap hands over eyes, for the earth reels; And I have fears of dieties shown or spun From nothingness. But when I look again The earth has stayed itself, I see the lake, The leaves, the light of the sun, the cyclop hoods Of thunder heads, yet feel upon my arm A hand I know, and hear a voice I know-- He has returned and brought with him the thought And the old pain.
The voice says: "Leave the sphinx. The garden waits your study fully grown." And I arise and follow down a slope To a lawn by the lake and an ancient seat of stone, And near it a fountain's shattered rim enclosing An Eros of light mood, whose sculptured smile Consciously dimples for the unveiled pistil of love, As he strokes with baby hand the slender arching Neck of a swan. And here is a peristyle Whose carven columns are pink as the long updrawn Stalks of tulips bedded in April snow. And sunk amid tiger lillies is the face Of an Asian Aphrodite close to the seat With feet of a Babylonian lion amid This ruined garden of yellow daisies, poppies And ruddy asphodel from Crete, it seems, Though here is our western moon as white and thin As an abalone shell hung under the boughs Of an oak, that is mocked by the vastness of sky between His boughs and the moon in this sky of afternoon. ... We walk to the water's edge and here he shows me Green scum, or stalks, or sedges, grasses, shrubs, That yield to trees beyond the levels, where The beech and oak have triumph; for along This gradual growth from algae, reeds and grasses, That builds the soil against the water's hands, All things are fierce for place and garner life From weaker things.
And then he shows me root stocks, And Alpine willow, growths that sneak and crawl Beneath the soil. Or as we leave the lake And walk the forest I behold lianas, Smilax or woodbine climbing round the trunks Of giant trees that live and out of earth, And out of air make strength and food and ask No other help. And in this place I see Spiral bryony, python of the vines That coils and crushes; and that banyan tree Whose spreading branches drop new roots to earth, And lives afar from where the parent trunk Has sunk its roots, so that the healthful sun Is darkened: as a people might be darkened By ignorance or want or tyranny, Or dogma of a jungle hidden faith. Why is it, think I, though I dare not speak, That this should be to forests or to men; That water fails, and light decreases, heat Of God's air lessens, and the soil goes spent, Till plants change leaves and stalks and seeds as well, Or migrate from the olden places, go In search of life, or if they cannot move Die in the ruthless marches.
That is life, he said. For even these, the giants scatter life Into the maws of death. That towering tree That for these hundred years has leafed itself, And through its leaves out of the magic air Drawn nutriment for annual girths, took root Out of an acorn which good chance preserved, While all its brother acorns cast to earth, To make trees, by a parent tree now gone, Were crushed, devoured, or strangled as they sprouted Amid thick jealous growth wherein they fell. All acorns but this one were lost.
Then he reads My questioning thought and shows me yuccas, cactus Whose thick leaves in the rainless places thrive. And shows me leaves that must have rain, and roots That must have water where the river flows. And how the spirit of life, though turned or driven This way or that beyond a course begun, Cannot be stayed or quenched, but moves, conforms To soil and sun, makes roots, or thickens leaves, Or thins or re-adjusts them on the stem To fashion forth itself, produce its kind. Nor dies not, rests not, nor surrenders not, Is only changed or buried, re-appears As other forms of life.
We had walked through A forest of sequoias, beeches, pines, And ancient oaks where I could see the trace Of willows, alders, ruined or devoured By the great Titans.
At last We reached my hill and sat and overlooked The garden at our feet, even to the place Of tiger lilies and of asphodel, By now beneath the self-same moon, grown denser: As where the wounded surface of the shell Thickens its shimmering stuff in spiral coigns Of the shell, so was the moon above the seat Beside the Eros and the Aphrodite Sunk amid yellow daisies and deep grass. And here we sat and looked. And here my vision Was over all we saw, but not a part Of what we saw, for all we saw stood forth As foreign to myself as something touched To learn the thing it is.
I might have asked Who owns this garden, for the thought arose With my surprise, who owns this garden, who Planted this garden, why and to what end, And why this fight for place, for soil and sun Water and air, and why this enmity Between the things here planted, and between Flying or crawling life and plants, and whence The power that falls in one place but arises Some other place; and why the unceasing growth Of all these forms that only come to seed, Then disappear to enrich the insatiate soil Where the new seed falls? But silence kept me there For wonder of the beauty which I saw, Even while the faculty of external vision Kept clear the garden separate from me, Envisioned, seen as grasses, sedges, alders, As forestry, as fields of wheat and corn, As the vast theatre of unceasing life, Moving to life and blind to all but life; As places used, tried out, as if the gardener, For his delight or use, or for an end Of good or beauty made experiments With seed or soils or crossings of the seed. Even as peoples, epochs, did the garden Lie to my vision, or as races crowding, Absorbing, dispossessing, killing races, Not only for a place to grow, but under A stimulus of doctrine: as Mahomet, Or Jesus, like a vital change of air, Or artifice of culture, made the garden, Which mortals call the world, grow in a way, And overgrow the world as neither dreamed. Who is the Gardener then? Or is there one Beside the life within the plant, within The python climbers, wandering sedges, root stalks, Thorn bushes, night-shade, deadly saprophytes, Goths, Vandals, Tartars, striving for more life, And praying to the urge within as God, The Gardener who lays out the garden, sprays For insects which devour, keeps rich the soil For those who pray and know the Gardener As One who is without and over-sees? ...
But while in contemplation of the garden, Whether from failing day or from departure Of my own vision in the things it saw, Bereft of penetrating thought I sank, Became a part of what I saw and lost The great solution.
As we sat in silence, And coming night, what seemed the sinking moon, Amid the yellow sedges by the lake Began to twinkle, as a fire were blown-- And it was fire, the garden was afire, As it were all the world had flamed with war. And a wind came out of the bright heaven And blew the flames, first through the ruined garden, Then through the wood, the fields of wheat, at last Nothing was left but waste and wreaths of smoke Twisting toward the stars. And there he sat Nor uttered aught, save when I sighed he said "If it be comforting I promise you Another spring shall come."
"And after that?" "Another spring--that's all I know myself, There shall be springs and springs!"