Part 1 (1/2)
Poems 1916-1918.
by Francis Brett Young.
PROTHALAMION
When the evening came my love said to me: Let us go into the garden now that the sky is cool, The garden of black h.e.l.lebore and rosemary, Where wild woodruff spills in a milky pool.
Low we pa.s.sed in the twilight, for the wavering heat Of day had waned, and round that shaded plot Of secret beauty the thickets cl.u.s.tered sweet: Here is heaven, our hearts whispered, but our lips spake not.
Between that old garden and seas of lazy foam Gloomy and beautiful alleys of trees arise With spire of cypress and dreamy beechen dome, So dark that our enchanted sight knew nothing but the skies
Veiled with soft air, drench'd in the roses' musk Or the dusky, dark carnation's breath of clove; No stars burned in their deeps, but through the dusk I saw my love's eyes, and they were brimmed with love.
No star their secret ravished, no wasting moon Mocked the sad transience of those eternal hours: Only the soft, unseeing heaven of June, The ghosts of great trees, and the sleeping flowers.
For doves that crooned in the leafy noonday now Were silent; the night-jar sought his secret covers, Nor even a mild sea-whisper moved a creaking bough-- Was ever a silence deeper made for lovers?
Was ever a moment meeter made for love?
Beautiful are your closed lips beneath my kiss; And all your yielding sweetness beautiful-- Oh, never in all the world was such a night as this!
TESTAMENT
If I had died, and never seen the dawn For which I hardly hoped, lighting this lawn Of silvery gra.s.ses; if there had been no light, And last night merged into perpetual night; I doubt if I should ever have been content To have closed my eyes without some testament To the great benefits that marked my faring Through the sweet world; for all my joy was sharing And lonely pleasures were few. Unto which end Three legacies I'll send, Three legacies, already half possess'd: One to a friend, of all good friends the best, Better than which is nothing; yet another Unto thy twin, dissimilar spirit, Brother; The third to you, Most beautiful, most true, Most perfect one, to whom they all are due.
Quick, quick ... while there is time....
O best of friends, I leave you one sublime Summer, one fadeless summer. 'Twas begun Ere Cotswold hawthorn tarnished in the sun, When hedges were fledged with green, and early swallows Swift-darting, on curved wings, pillaged the fallows; When all our vale was dappled blossom and light, And oh, the scent of beanfields in the night!
You shall remember that rich dust at even Which made old Evesham like a street in heaven, Gold-paved, and washed within a wave of golden Air all her dreamy towers and gables olden.
You shall remember How arms sun-blistered, hot palms crack'd with rowing, Clove the cool water of Avon, sweetly flowing; And how our bodies, beautifully white, Stretch'd to a long stroke lengthened in green light, And we, emerging, laughed in childish wise, And pressed the kissing water from our eyes.
Ah, was our laughter childish, or were we wise?
And then, crown of the day, a tired returning With happy sunsets over Bredon burning, With music and with moonlight, and good ale, And no thought for the morrow.... Heavy phlox Our garden pathways bordered, and evening stocks, Those humble weeds, in sunlight withered and pale, With a night scent to match the nightingale, Gladdened with spiced sweetness sweet night's shadows, Meeting the breath of hay from mowing meadows: As humble was our joy, and as intense Our rapture. So, before I hurry hence, Yours be the memory.
One night again, When we were men, and had striven, and known pain, By a dark ca.n.a.l debating, unresigned, On the blind fate that shadows humankind, On the blind sword that severs human love...
Then did the hidden belfry from above On troubled minds in benediction shed The patience of the great anonymous dead Who reared those towers, those high cathedrals builded In solemn stone, and with clear fancy gilded A beauty beyond ours, trusting in G.o.d.
Then dared we follow the dark way they trod, And bowing to the universal plan Trust in the true and fiery spirit of Man.
And you, my Brother, You know, as knows one other, How my spirit revisiteth a room In a high wing, beneath pine-trees, where gloom Dwelleth, dispelled by resinous wood embers, Where, in half-darkness ... How the heart remembers...
We talked of beauty, and those fiery things To which the divine desirous spirit clings, In a wing'd rapture to that heaven flinging, Where beauty is an easy thing, and singing The natural speech of man. Like kissing swords Our wits clashed there; the brittle beauty of words Breaking, seemed to discover its secret heart And all the rapt elusiveness of Art.
Now I have known sorrow, and now I sing That a lovely word is not an idle thing; For as with stars the cloth of night is spangled, With star-like words, most lovelily entangled, The woof of sombre thought is deckt.... Ah, bright And cold they glitter in the spirit's night!
But neither distant nor dispa.s.sionate; For beauty is an armour against fate....