Ardours and Endurances Part 11

Come, ye sorrowful, and see The raindrops flaming goldenly On the stream's eddies overhead And dragonflies with drops of red In the crisp surface of each wing Threading slant rains that flash and sing, Or under the water-lily's cup, From darkling depths, roll slowly up The bronze flanks of an ancient bream Into the hot sun's shattered beam, Or over a sunk tree's bubbled bole The perch stream in a golden shoal: Come, ye sorrowful; our deep Holds dreams lovelier than sleep.

But if ye sons of Sorrow come Only wis.h.i.+ng to be numb: Our eyes are sad as bluebell posies, Our b.r.e.a.s.t.s are soft as silken roses, And our hands are tenderer Than the breaths that scarce can stir The sunlit eglantine that is Murmurous with hidden bees.

Come, ye sorrowful, and steep Your tired brows in a nectarous sleep.

Come, ye sorrowful, for here No voices sound but fond and clear Of mouths as lorn as is the rose That under water doth disclose, Amid her crimson petals torn, A heart as golden as the morn; And here are tresses languorous As the weeds wander over us, And brows as holy and as bland As the honey-coloured sand Lying sun-entranced below The lazy water's limpid flow: Come, ye sorrowful, and steep Your tired brows in a nectarous sleep.

Sweet water-voices! now must I _The Faun Unto your sorrowings reply. prepares But hark! or ever there can sound to reply._ On the lull air the first profound Few murmurs of my lyre's grave strings, A voice uprises. Who now sings The noon's and his own tristfulness?

A slim youth--in a shepherd's dress, Yet without sheep--who careless lies Upon the hill. His shepherd guise Tokens, perhaps, a poet's heart Which joys in wandering apart From the dinned ways where chariots roll, From the shrill sophist with his shoal Of gapers, from the angry mart, From the full eyes and empty heart Of babbling women, from the neat Aridity of paven street, A heart that wandering, musing, sings The joy, depth, pain of simple things:

_The Youth._ The earth is still; only the white sun climbs Through the green silence of the branching limes, MIDDAY IN Whose linked flowers hanging from the still tree-top ARCADIA.

Distil their soundless syrup drop by drop, While 'twixt the starry bracket of their lips The black bee drowsing floats and drowsing sips.

The flimsy leaves hang on the bright blue air Calm-suspended. Deep peace is everywhere Filled with the murmurous rumour of high noon.

Earth seems with open eyes to sink and swoon.

In the sky peace: where nothing moves Save the sun that smiles and loves.

A quivering peace is on the gra.s.s.

Through the noon gloam b.u.t.terflies pa.s.s, White and hot blue, only to where They can float flat and dream on the soft air....

The trees are asleep, beautiful, slumbrous trees!

Stirred only by the pa.s.sion of the breeze, That, like a warm wave welling over rocks, Loosens and lifts the ma.s.s of drowsing locks.

Earth, too, under the profound gra.s.s Sleeps and sleeps, and softly heaves her slumbrous ma.s.s.

The earth sleeps. Sleeps the newly-buried clay Or doth divinity trouble it to live alway?

No voice uplifts from under the rapt crust.

The dust cries to the unregarding dust.

Over the hill the stopped notes of twin reeds Speak like drops from an old wound that bleeds: A yokel's pipe an ancient pastoral sings Above the innumerable murmur of hid wings.

I hear the cadence, sorrowful and sweet, The oldest burthen of the earth repeat: All love, all pa.s.sion, all strife, all delight Are but the dreams that haunt earth's visioned night.

In her eternal consciousness the stir Of Alexander is no more to her Than you or I: being all part of dreams, The shadowiest shadow of a thing that seems, The images the lone pipe-player sees, Sitting and playing to the lone, noon breeze.

One note, one life!

They sleep: soon we as these!

XIV

Now plunge I into deepest woods, Where everlastingly there broods Such quiet and glamour as must be Beneath the thres.h.i.+ng upper sea.

Here burns no sun, but tawny light Pervades the vistas still and bright Of mazy boles and fallen leaves....

I press yet on. At length there cleaves The twilit hush a pillared gleam.

The leafed floor rises. 'Tis a beam Of sunlight fallen in a dell Beyond the mound. There will I dwell, Soothed by sunned quietude. For there A carved rock spouts and moists the air With gross-mouthed pour and rising spray....

But hark! what festive cries are they _Of the Which greet me as I top the mound? Satyrs' Feast._ Below, dispersed and sunk around The green and golden of the glen, Lie satyrs; in a leafy den, Silenus, crowned with vines and roses, Drowses and starts, blinks, drinks, and dozes.

Banqueting dishes strew the gra.s.s, Goblets of gold and peac.o.c.k gla.s.s, Flagons, urns, many a br.i.m.m.i.n.g bowl, And horns from which the flushed fruits roll.

High o'er the feast a fronded ash Hangs full of sunlight, and the splash Of the spring's leap or gurgeing flow Into the rippled pool below, Where lilies rock, shakes up a bright Eddy of golden tremulous light Over the leaves. The Oread, In a hooded lynx pelt clad, Smiles where she lolls ... the while twin fauns With stamping hooves and b.u.t.ting horns Join combat for a dripping cup She bears.

But now a shout goes up At sight of me:

_Satyr._ "We feast, we feast; For, lo! the flaming sun hath ceased _The Invitation._ To climb the curve of arid sky, And his meridian holds on high, Narrowing with his scorching beams The chestnut's shade, exhausting streams, Stilling the woodland singer's note, Piercing the eyes, shrinking the throat, Saddening the heart of man and beast.

Yet grieve not we but sprawl and feast.

Leap down, O Faun, then, from thy rocks, Leap down to us. Bedew thy locks With such cool spicy nards as dwell Within this ribbed and rosy sh.e.l.l; Around thy scalded temples twine Sprays of this fountain-wetted vine, And from this golden jorum sip Nectarous liquor--ay, and lip Smooth nectarines, thy sunk teeth clench In melon dripping sherds, and quench Thy salty thirst anew in flow Of sparkled or dark wines that glow With sober warmth and merriment, Until our gladdened voices blent Awake the vigour of our feet, And up we start the gra.s.s to beat With fervent foot, drink, dance again, And, ever at the loud refrain Clas.h.i.+ng our cups, dance on and on, Till the noontide lull is gone."

So join I them, and drink and sup, And fill again the great bowl up; And, drenched thus down, spin l.u.s.ty tales Of topping bouts 'twixt men and whales; Of the East's Emperor who hath A pool of wine to be his bath; Of Hercules his thirst, and how He did all Ethiopia plough, And plant with vines, his thirst to sate.

We will discuss the Ideal State, Whose sky is covered by a vine, Whose hills are cheese, whose rivers wine, Whose trees bear loaves brown, crisp and sweet, Whose citizens do nought but eat, But eat and drink, drink, eat, and snore, And eat again, and wish no more Than so to drink, snore, eat; who find In this true liberty of mind And true equality, in this Fraternity, law, earthly bliss.

So swill again and yet again, Till a fire flushes all the brain And, trolling l.u.s.tily and long, Each hearty throat bursts into song.

_Faun and Satyrs._ Avaunt, mild-eyed Melancholy!

Welcome, Mirth and maenad Folly! A DITHYRAMB See about the lifted bowl, TO DIONYSOS.

Wrinkled on its bossy scroll, Ribald nymphs and satyrs jolly Tussle with a prancing goat; While Silenus, kneeling, drolly Proffers a dry bowl unto 't---- Ay, and round the mazer's brim Boisterous Mermen shouting swim, And each burly arm lifts up, Wine that o'erbrims its conched cup; Wherefore pour a triple potion: If such can be dry in ocean, 'Tis as t.i.tans we must sup!

Avaunt, brow and visage pious: None but Bacchus boys come nigh us!

Raise the bowl and shout his name: Io, Bacchus! for a flame Chafes in our blood, O Bromios!

Fire no water e'er could quench, And its heat must scorify us If with wine we do not drench.

Wherefore overbrim the cup: This to Jove now drink I up, Who upon thy first of days s.n.a.t.c.hed thee and cowed thy natal blaze, Even as 'tis now the merry Strength of this thy vintaged berry, That the scorching danger stays.

To the vine now! let its golden Leaves about our brows be folden.

To the swarthy hand that trims it!

To the grape! the sun that dims it!

To the pipe that doth embolden Purpled stamping feet to riot O'er the vatted winepress olden!

To the cavern's depth, chill, quiet!

Last to wine's own ruddy sprite, Wakes in rheumy eyes a light-- Ay, and ripens youth to man; Wine which more works than wisdom can; Wine that welcomes hardy morrows; Wine that turns to song our sorrows; Wine the only magian!

Deep now! every bowl enhances The world's beauty; see there dances In the sky the leaping sun!

'Nay, can thine eye catch but one?'

'Six now spin.' 'A seventh advances, Flares and vomits, swerves and blazes, Now bursts and countlessly it prances, Pulsing to my frantic paces!'

'I flame,--gyrate!' 'I shoot out heat!'

'My tricked speech trips, and trip my feet!'

'The earth runs round and heav'n is wheeling!'

'I sway; I reel.' 'Earth's wrecked and reeling!'

'Dance on.' 'Earth's gone.' 'All's white and clear!'

'Ah! Ah! Behind the blaze I hear The Oread's laughter pealing!'

Avaunt, grief! Descend, O holy Fierce Bacchic rapture, divine folly!

XV

Forth from the forest wend I slowly, _Of the Faun's While in my ears yet rings the holy Further Wanderings._ Dithyramb. The noon is past, But the sun rages. There is cast A dumbness yet o'er earth and sky.

Down to the river then will I, Slowly about its depths to swim, While the stream fondles every limb And soothes its ache. Deep I will dip, And, blowing, raise my locks, that drip Till the slim Hyads troop to see, And revel, too, and play with me, Hanging my ears with humid weed Or mounting me as water steed.

Then, musing I will on, and so Stray to where a silver slow River circles through the meads, Wherein the mooching great ox feeds, And turns a slow eye round the sky, Wondering if he can ever die.

And there, mayhap, 'twill come to pa.s.s I'll hear a sweet voice in the gra.s.s, And yet shall mark no singer nigh, Till, gently peering, I espy A solemn, elfish child who sits Unseen mid towering gra.s.s, and knits An endless, endless daisy chain, Crooning the while some soft refrain Her mother sings her when she closes Her twilit eyes.

_Little Girl._ Three red, red, roses-- One each for father and mother, and one, The reddest of all, for her baby son.

None for wee Amoret? Oh, none! for she Some day, when she grows up, a red rose will be!

Then, crossed-legged mid the meadow-sweet, _Of the Faun's I will sink down, laugh low, and greet Converse with Her blue, inquiring, childish eyes a Small With mine, sharp, merry, brown, and wise, She-Child._ And tell her tales--of Jack who slew Ten giants; or Mirabel who flew On a white owl to find the Prince And give to him the Golden Quince Would change him from a roaring bull To a youth blithe and beautiful; Or tales of the Goblin and the Sloth, Who watched the moon and swore an oath To find out what she was: how these Explored her mines and found her--cheese.

Thus will I sit and both amuse Until I rise and beg excuse: Off 'to El Raschid in a.s.syria'

Or 'the Grand-d.u.c.h.ess of Illyria,'

Or 'to ask the maiden moon Why one only of her shoon She left us last night in the sky, And not her silver self, and why She always climbs the self-same track?

Lets no one ever see her back?'

XVI