The Poems and Prose of Ernest Dowson, With a Memoir by Arthur Symons Part 12

PIERROT The birds awake! It is the voice of day!

THE LADY Farewell, dear youth! They summon me away.

[_The light changes, it grows daylights and music imitates the twitter of the birds. They stand gazing at the morning: then Pierrot sinks back upon his bed, he covers his face in his hands._]

THE LADY[_Bending over him_.]

Music, my maids! His weary senses steep In soft untroubled and oblivious sleep, With mandragore anoint his tired eyes, That they may open on mere memories, Then shall a vision seem his lost delight, With love, his lady for a summer's night.

Dream thou hast dreamt all this, when thou awake, Yet still be sorrowful, for a dream's sake.

I leave thee, sleeper! Yea, I leave thee now, Yet take my legacy upon thy brow: Remember me, who was compa.s.sionate, And opened for thee once, the ivory gate.

I come no more, thou shalt not see my face When I am gone to mine exalted place: Yet all thy days are mine, dreamer of dreams, All silvered over with the moon's pale beams: Go forth and seek in each fair face in vain, To find the image of thy love again.

All maids are kind to thee, yet never one Shall hold thy truant heart till day be done.

Whom once the moon has kissed, loves long and late, Yet never finds the maid to be his mate.

Farewell, dear sleeper, follow out thy fate.

[_The Moon Maiden withdraws: a song is sung from behind: it is full day_.]

THE MOON MAIDEN'S SONG.

Sleep! Cast thy canopy Over this sleeper's brain, Dim grow his memory, When he awake again.

Love stays a summer night, Till lights of morning come; Then takes her winged flight Back to her starry home.

Sleep! Yet thy days are mine; Love's seal is over thee: Far though my ways from thine, Dim though thy memory.

Love stays a summer night, Till lights of morning come; Then takes her winged flight Back to her starry home.

[_When the song is finished, the curtain falls upon Pierrot sleeping._]

THE END.

DECORATIONS

BEYOND

Love's aftermath! I think the time is now That we must gather in, alone, apart The saddest crop of all the crops that grow, Love's aftermath.

Ah, sweet,--sweet yesterday, the tears that start Can not put back the dial; this is, I trow, Our harvesting! Thy kisses chill my heart, Our lips are cold; averted eyes avow The twilight of poor love: we can but part, Dumbly and sadly, reaping as we sow, Love's aftermath.

DE AMORE

Shall one be sorrowful because of love, Which hath no earthly crown, Which lives and dies, unknown?

Because no words of his shall ever move Her maiden heart to own Him lord and destined master of her own: Is Love so weak a thing as this, Who can not lie awake, Solely for his own sake, For lack of the dear hands to hold, the lips to kiss, A mere heart-ache?

Nay, though love's victories be great and sweet, Nor vain and foolish toys, His crowned, earthly joys, Is there no comfort then in love's defeat?

Because he shall defer, For some short span of years all part in her, Submitting to forego The certain peace which happier lovers know; Because he shall be utterly disowned, Nor length of service bring Her least awakening: Foiled, frustrate and alone, misunderstood, discrowned, Is Love less King?

Grows not the world to him a fairer place, How far soever his days Pa.s.s from his lady's ways, From mere encounter with her golden face?

Though all his sighing be vain, Shall he be heavy-hearted and complain?

Is she not still a star, Deeply to be desired, wors.h.i.+pped afar, A beacon-light to aid From bitter-sweet delights, Love's masquerade?

Though he lose many things, Though much he miss: The heart upon his heart, the hand that clings, The memorable first kiss; Love that is love at all, Needs not an earthly coronal; Love is himself his own exceeding great reward, A mighty lord!

Lord over life and all the ways of breath, Mighty and strong to save From the devouring grave; Yea, whose dominion doth out-tyrant death, Thou who art life and death in one, The night, the sun; Who art, when all things seem: Foiled, frustrate and forlorn, rejected of to-day Go with me all my way, And let me not blaspheme.

THE DEAD CHILD

Sleep on, dear, now The last sleep and the best, And on thy brow, And on thy quiet breast Violets I throw.

Thy scanty years Were mine a little while; Life had no fears To trouble thy brief smile With toil or tears.

Lie still, and be For evermore a child!

Not grudgingly, Whom life has not defiled, I render thee.

Slumber so deep, No man would rashly wake; I hardly weep, Fain only, for thy sake.

To share thy sleep.

Yes, to be dead, Dead, here with thee to-day,-- When all is said 'Twere good by thee to lay My weary head.

The very best!

Ah, child so tired of play, I stand confessed: I want to come thy way, And share thy rest.

CARTHUSIANS

Through what long heaviness, a.s.sayed in what strange fire, Have these white monks been brought into the way of peace, Despising the world's wisdom and the world's desire, Which from the body of this death bring no release?

Within their austere walls no voices penetrate; A sacred silence only, as of death, obtains; Nothing finds entry here of loud or pa.s.sionate; This quiet is the exceeding profit of their pains.

From many lands they came, in divers fiery ways; Each knew at last the vanity of earthly joys; And one was crowned with thorns, and one was crowned with bays, And each was tired at last of the world's foolish noise.

It was not theirs with Dominic to preach G.o.d's holy wrath, They were too stern to bear sweet Francis' gentle sway; Theirs was a higher calling and a steeper path, To dwell alone with Christ, to meditate and pray.

A cloistered company, they are companionless, None knoweth here the secret of his brother's heart: They are but come together for more loneliness, Whose bond is solitude and silence all their part.

O beatific life! Who is there shall gainsay, Your great refusal's victory, your little loss, Deserting vanity for the more perfect way, The sweeter service of the most dolorous Cross.

Ye shall prevail at last! Surely ye shall prevail!

Your silence and austerity shall win at last: Desire and mirth, the world's ephemeral lights shall fail, The sweet star of your queen is never overcast.

We fling up flowers and laugh, we laugh across the wine; With wine we dull our souls and careful strains of art; Our cups are polished skulls round which the roses twine: None dares to look at Death who leers and lurks apart.

Move on, white company, whom that has not sufficed!

Our viols cease, our wine is death, our roses fail: Pray for our heedlessness, O dwellers with the Christ!

Though the world fall apart, surely ye shall prevail.