Poems by John Hay Part 16

Till the sunset s.h.i.+mmered athwart the room.

I rose to go. You stood so fair And dim in the dead day's tender gloom:

All at once, or ever I was aware, Flashed from you on me a warm strong wave Of pa.s.sion and power; in the silence there

I fell on my knees, like a lover, or slave, With my wild hands clasping your slender waist; And my lips, with a sudden frenzy brave,

A madman's kiss on your girdle pressed, And I felt your calm heart's quickening beat, And your soft hands on me one instant rest.

And if G.o.d had loved me, how endlessly sweet Had he let my heart in its rapture burst, And throb its last at your firm small feet!

And when I was forth, I shuddered at first At my imminent bliss. As a soul in pain, Treading his desolate path accursed,

Looks back and dreams through his tears' dim rain That by Heaven's wide gate the angels smile, Relenting, and beckon him back again,

And goes on, thrice d.a.m.ned by that devil's wile,-- So sometimes burns in my weary brain The thought that you loved me all the while.

Guy of the Temple

Down the dim West slow fails the stricken sun, And from his hot face fades the crimson flush Veiled in death's herald-shadows sick and gray.

Silent and dark the sombre valley lies Forgotten; happy in the late fond beams Glimmer the constant waves of Galilee.

Afar, below, in airy music ring The bugles of my host; the column halts, A wearied serpent glittering in the vale, Where rising mist-like gleam the tented camps.

Pitch my pavilion here, where its high cross May catch the last light lingering on the hill.

The savage shadows, struggling by the sh.o.r.e, Have conquered in the valley; inch by inch The vanquished light fights bravely to these crags To perish glorious in the sunset fire; Even as our hunted Cause so pressed and torn In Syrian valleys, and the trampled marge Of consecrated streams, displays at last Its narrowing glories from these steadfast walls.

Here in G.o.d's name we stand, and brighter far s.h.i.+nes the stern virtue of my martyr-host Through these invidious fortunes, than of old, When the still suns.h.i.+ne glinted on their helms, And dallying breezes woke their bridle-bells To tinkling music by the reedy sh.o.r.e Of calm Tiberias, where our angry Lord, Wroth at the deadly sin that cursed our camp, Denied and blinded us, and gave us up To the avenging sword of Saladin.

Yet would he not permit his truth to sink To utter loss amid that foundering fight, But led us, scarred and shattered from the spoil Of Paynim rage, the desert's thirsty death, To where beneath the sheltering crags we prayed And rested and grew strong. Heroes and saints To alien peoples shall they be, my brave And patient warriors; for in their stout hearts G.o.d's spirit dwells forever, and their hands Are swift to do his service on his foes.

The swelling music of their vesper-hymn Is rising fragrant from the shadowed vale Familiar to the welcoming gates of heaven.

_Mother of G.o.d! as evening falls Upon the silent sea_.

_ Mother of G.o.d! as evening falls Upon the silent sea, And shadows veil the mountain walls, We lift our souls to thee!

From lurking perils of the night, The desert's hidden harms, From plagues that waste, from blasts that smite, Defend thy men-at-arms!_

Ay! Heaven keep them! and ye angel-hosts That wait with fluttering plumes around the great White throne of G.o.d, guard them from scathe and harm!

For in your starry records never shone The memory of desert so great as theirs.

I hold not first, though peerless else on earth, That knightly valor, born of gentle blood And war's long tutelage, which hath made their name Blaze like a baleful planet o'er these lands; Firm seat in saddle, lance unmoved, a hand Wedding the hilt with death's persistent grasp; One-minded rush in fight that naught can stay.

Not these the highest, though I scorn not these, But rather offer Heaven with humble heart The deeds that heaven hath given us arms to do.

For when G.o.d's smile was with us we were strong To go like sudden lightning to our mark: As on that summer day when Saladin-- Pa.s.sing in scorn our host at Antioch, Who spent the days in revel, and shamed the stars With nightly scandal--came with all his host, Its gay battalia brave with saffron silks, Flaunting the banners of the Caliphate Beneath the walls of fair Jerusalem: And white and shaking came the Leper-King, Great Baldwin's blasted scion, and Tripoli And I, and twenty score of Temple Knights, To meet the myriads marshalled by the bright Untarnished flower of Eastern chivalry; A moment paused with level-fronting spears And moveless helms before that s.h.i.+ning host, Whose gay attire abashed the morning light, And then struck spur and charged, while from the ma.s.s Of rus.h.i.+ng terror burst the awful cry, _G.o.d and the Temple_! As the avalanche slides Down Alpine slopes, precipitous, cold and dark, Unpitying and unwrathful, grinds and crushes The mountain violets and the valley weeds, And drags behind a trail of chaos and death; So burst we on that field, and through and through The gay battalia brave with saffron silks, Crushed and abolished every grace and gleam, And dragged where'er we rode a sinuous track Of chaos and death, till all the plain was filled With battered armor, turbaned trunkless heads, With silken mantles blus.h.i.+ng angry gules And Bagdad's banners trampled and forlorn.

And Saladin, stunned and bewildered sore,-- The greatest prince, save in the grace of G.o.d, That now wears sword,--mounted his brother's barb, And, followed by a half-score followers, Sped to his castle Shaubec, over against The cliffs by Ascalon, and there abode: And sullenly made order that no more The royal nouba should be played for him Until he should erase the rusting stain Upon his knightly honor; and no more The nouba sounded by the Sultan's tent, Morning nor evening by the silent tent, Until the headlong greed of Chatillon Spread ruin on our cause from Montreale.

But greatest are my warriors, as I deem, In that their hearts, nearer than any else Keep true the pledge of perfect purity They pledged upon their sword-hilts long ago.

For all is possible to the pure in heart.

_Mother of G.o.d! thy starry smile Still bless us from above!

Keep pure our souls from pa.s.sion's guile, Our hearts from earthly love!

Still save each soul from guilt apart As stainless as each sword And guard undimmed in every heart The image of our Lord!_

O goodliest fellows.h.i.+p that the world has known, True hearts and stalwart arms! above your b.r.e.a.s.t.s Glitters no flash of wreathen amulet Forged against sword-stroke by the chanted rhythm Of charms accurst; but in each steadfast heart Blazes the light of cloudless purity, That like a splendid jewel glorifies With restless fire the gold that spheres it round, And marks you children of our G.o.d, whose lives He guards with the awful jealousy of love.

And even me that generous love has spared,-- Me, trustless knight and miserable man,-- Sad prey of dark and mutinous thoughts that tempt My sick soul into perjury and death-- Since his great love had pity of my pain, Has spared to lead these blameless warriors safe Into the desert from the blazing towns, Out of the desert to the inviolate hills Where G.o.d has roofed them with his hollow s.h.i.+eld.

Through all these days of tempest and eclipse His hand has led me and his wrath has flashed Its lightnings in the pathway of my sword.

And so I hope, and so my crescent faith Gains daily power, that all my prayers and tears And toils and blood and anguish borne for him May blot the accusing of my deadly sin From heaven's high compt, and give me rest in death; And lay the pallid ghost of mortal love, That fills with banned and mournful loveliness, Unblest, the haunted chambers of my soul.

My misery will atone,--my misery, Dear G.o.d, will surely atone! for not the sting Of macerating thongs, nor the slow horror Of crowns of th.o.r.n.y iron maddening the brows, Nor all that else pale hermits have devised To scourge the rebel senses in their shade Of caverned desolation, have the power To smart and goad and lash and mortify Like the great love that binds my ruined heart Relentless, as the insidious ivy binds The shattered bulk of some deserted tower, Enlacing slow and riving with strong hands Of pitiless verdure every seam and jut, Till none may tear it forth and save the tower.

So binds and masters me my hopeless love.

So through the desert, in the silent hills, I' the current of the battle's storm and stress, One thought has driven me,--that though men may call Me stainless Paladin, Knight leal and true To Christ and Our Lady, still I know myself A knight not after G.o.d's own heart, a soul Recreant, and whelmed in the forbidden sin.

For dearer to my sad heart than the cross I give my heart's best blood for are the eyes That long ago, when youth and hope were mine, I loved in thy still valleys, far Provence!

And sweeter to my spirit than the bells Of rescued Salem are the loving tones Of her dear voice, soft echoing o'er the years.

They haunt me in the stillness and the glare Of desert noontide when the horizon's line Swims faintly throbbing, and my shadow hides Skulking beneath me from the bra.s.sy sky.

And when night comes to soothe with breath of balm And pomp of stars the worn and weary world, Her eyes rise in my soul and make its day.

And even into the battle comes my love, s.n.a.t.c.hing the duty that I offer Heaven.

At closing of El-Majed's awful day, When the last quivering sunbeams, choked with dust And fume of blood, failed on the level plain, In the last charge, when gathered all our knights The precious handful who from morn had stemmed The fury of the mult.i.tudinous hosts Of Islam, where in youth's hot fire and pride Ramped the young lion-whelp, Ben-Saladin; As down the slope we rode at eventide, The dying sunlight faintly smiled to greet Our tattered guidons and our dinted helms And lance-heads blooming with the battle's rose.

Into the vale, dusk with the shadow of death, With silent lips and ringing mail we rode.

And something in the spirit of the hour, Or fate, or memory, or sorrow, or sin, Or love, which unto me is all of these, Possessed and bound me; for when dashed our troop In stormy clangor on the Paynim lines The soul of my dead youth came into me; Faded away my oath; the woes of Zion, G.o.d was forgot; blazed in my leaping heart, With instant flash, life's inextinguished fires; Plunging along each tense limb poured the blood Hot with its years of sleeping-smothered flame.

And in a dream I charged, and in a dream I smote resistless; foemen in my path Fell unregarded, like the wayside flowers Clipped by the truant's staff in daisied lanes.

For over me burned l.u.s.trous the dear eyes Of my beloved; I strove as at a joust To gain at end the guerdon of her smile.

And ever, as in the dense melee I dashed, Her name burst from my lips, as lightning breaks Out of the plunging wrack of summer storms.

O my lost love! Bright o'er the waste of years-- That bliss and beauty s.h.i.+nes upon my soul; As far beyond yon desert hangs the sun, Gilding with tender beam the barren stretch Of sands that intervene. In this still light The old sweet memories glimmer back to me.

Fair summers of my youth,--the idle days I wandered in the bosky coverts hid In the dim woods that girt my ancient home; The blue young eyes I met and wors.h.i.+pped there; The love that growing turned those gloomy wilds To faery dells, and filled the vernal air With light that bathed the hills of Paradise; The warm, long days of rapturous summer-time, When through the forests thick and lush we strayed, And love made our own suns.h.i.+ne in the shades.

And all things fair and graceful in the woods I loved with liberal heart; the violets Were dear for her dear eyes, the quiring birds That caught the musical tremble of her voice.

O happy twilights in the leafy glooms!

When in the glowing dusk the winsome arts And maiden graces that all day had kept Us twain and separate melted away In blus.h.i.+ng silence, and my love was mine Utterly, utterly, with clinging arms And quick, caressing fingers, warm red lips, Where vows, half uttered, drowned in kisses, died; Mine, with the starlight in her pa.s.sionate eyes; The wild wind of the woodland breathing low To wake the elfin music of the leaves, And free the prisoned odors of the flowers, In honor of young Love come to his throne!

While we under the stars, with twining arms And mutual lips insatiate, gave our souls-- Madly forgetting earth and heaven--to love!

_In desert march or battles flame, In fortress and in field, Our war-cry is thy holy name, Thy love our joy and s.h.i.+eld!

And if we falter, let thy power Thy stern avenger be, And G.o.d forget us in the hour We cease to think of thee!_

Curse me not, G.o.d of Justice and of Love!

Pitiful G.o.d, let my long woe atone!

I cannot deem but G.o.d has pitied me; Else why with painful care have I been saved, Whenever tossed and drenched in the fierce tide Of Saladin's victories by the walls profaned Of Jaffa, on the sands of far Daroum, Or in the battle thundering on the downs Of Ramlah, or the b.l.o.o.d.y day that shed Red horrors on high Gaza's parapets?

For never a storm of fatal fight has raged In Islam's track of rout and ruin swept From Egypt to Gebail, but when the ebb Of battle came I and my host have lain, Scarred, scorched, safe somewhere on its fiery sh.o.r.e.

At Marcab's lingering siege, where day by day We told the Moslem legions toiling slow, Planting their engines, delving in their mines To quench in our destruction this last light Of Christendom, our fortress in the crags, G.o.d's beacon swung defiant from the stars; One thunderous night I knew their miners groped Below, and thought ere morn to die, in crush And tumult of the falling citadel.

And pondering of my fate--the broken storm Sobbing its life away--I was aware There grew between me and the quieting skies A face and form I knew,--not as in dreams, The sad dishevelled loveliness of earth, But lighter than the thin air where she swayed,-- Gold hair flame-fluttered, eyes and mouth aglow With lambent light of spiritual joy.

With sweet command she beckoned me away And led me vaguely dreaming, till I saw Where the wild flood in sudden fury had burst A pa.s.sage through the rocks: and thence I led My host unharmed, following her luminous eyes, Until the East was gray, and with a smile Wooing me heavenward still she pa.s.sed away Into the rosy trouble of the dawn.

And I believe my love is shrived in heaven, And I believe that I shall soon be free.

For ever, as I journey on, to me Waking or sleeping come faint whisperings And fancies not of earth, as if the gates Of near eternity stood for me ajar, And ghostly gales come blowing o'er my soul Fraught with the amaranth odors of the skies.

I go to join the Lion-Heart at Acre, And there, after due homage to my liege, And after patient penance of the church, And after final devoir in the fight, If that my G.o.d be gracious, I shall die.

And so I pray--Lord pardon if I sin!-- That I may lose in death's imbittered wave, The stain of sinful loving, and may find In glory again the love I lost below, With all of fair and bright and unattained, Beautiful in the cheris.h.i.+ng smile of G.o.d, By the glad waters of the River of Life!

Night hangs above the valley; dies the day In peace, casting his last glance on my cross, And warns me to my prayers. _Ave Maria!

Mother of G.o.d! the evening fades On wave and hill and lea_,

_And in the twilight's deepening shades We lift our souls to thee!