Part 10 (2/2)

The Nymph wan-glimmering by her wan fount's verge?

The Dryad at timid gaze by the wood-side?

The Oread jutting light On one up-strained sole from the rock-ledge?

The Nereid tip-toe on the scud o' the surge, With whistling tresses dank athwart her face, And all her figure poised in lithe Circean grace?

Why withers their lament?

Their tresses tear-besprent, Have they sighed hence with trailing garment-hem?

O sweet, O sad, O fair, I catch your flying hair, Draw your eyes down to me, and dream on them!

A s.p.a.ce, and they fleet from me. Must ye fade-- O old, essential candours, ye who made The earth a living and a radiant thing-- And leave her corpse in our strained, cheated arms?

Lo ever thus, when Song with chorded charms Draws from dull death his lost Eurydice, Lo ever thus, even at consummating, Even in the swooning minute that claims her his, Even as he trembles to the impa.s.sioned kiss Of reincarnate Beauty, his control Clasps the cold body, and foregoes the soul!

Whatso looks lovelily Is but the rainbow on life's weeping rain.

Why have we longings of immortal pain, And all we long for mortal? Woe is me, And all our chants but chaplet some decay, As mine this vanis.h.i.+ng--nay, vanished Day.

The low sky-line dusks to a leaden hue, No rift disturbs the heavy shade and chill, Save one, where the charred firmament lets through The scorching dazzle of Heaven; 'gainst which the hill, Out-flattened sombrely, Stands black as life against eternity.

Against eternity?

A rifting light in me Burns through the leaden broodings of the mind: O blessed Sun, thy state Uprisen or derogate Dafts me no more with doubt; I seek and find.

If with exultant tread Thou foot the Eastern sea, Or like a golden be Sting the West to angry red, Thou dost image, thou dost follow That King-Maker of Creation, Who, ere h.e.l.las hailed Apollo, Gave thee, angel-G.o.d, thy station; Thou art of Him a type memorial.

Like Him thou hang'st in dreadful pomp of blood Upon thy Western rood; And His stained brow did veil like thine to-night, Yet lift once more Its light, And, risen, again departed from our ball, But when It set on earth arose in Heaven.

Thus hath He unto death His beauty given: And so of all which form inheriteth The fall doth pa.s.s the rise in worth; For birth hath in itself the germ of death, But death hath in itself the germ of birth.

It is the falling acorn buds the tree, The falling rain that bears the greenery, The fern-plants moulder when the ferns arise.

For there is nothing lives but something dies, And there is nothing dies but something lives.

Till skies be fugitives, Till Time, the hidden root of change, updries, Are Birth and Death inseparable on earth; For they are twain yet one, and Death is Birth.

AFTER-STRAIN

Now with wan ray that other sun of Song Sets in the bleakening waters of my soul: One step, and lo! the Cross stands gaunt and long 'Twixt me and yet bright skies, a presaged dole.

Even so, O Cross! thine is the victory.

Thy roots are fast within our fairest fields; Brightness may emanate in Heaven from thee, Here thy dread symbol only shadow yields.

Of reaped joys thou art the heavy sheaf Which must be lifted, though the reaper groan; Yea, we may cry till Heaven's great ear be deaf, But we must bear thee, and must bear alone.

Vain were a Simon; of the Antipodes Our night not borrows the superfluous day.

Yet woe to him that from his burden flees, Crushed in the fall of what he cast away.

Therefore, O tender Lady, Queen Mary, Thou gentleness that dost enmoss and drape The Cross's rigorous austerity, Wipe thou the blood from wounds that needs must gape.

”Lo, though suns rise and set, but crosses stay, I leave thee ever,” saith she, ”light of cheer.”

'Tis so: yon sky still thinks upon the Day, And showers aerial blossoms on his bier.

Yon cloud with wrinkled fire is edged sharp; And once more welling through the air, ah me!

How the sweet viol plains him to the harp, Whose panged sobbings throng tumultuously.

Oh, this Medusa-pleasure with her stings!

This essence of all suffering, which is joy!

I am not thankless for the spell it brings, Though tears must be told down for the charmed toy.

No; while soul, sky, and music bleed together, Let me give thanks even for those griefs in me, The restless windward stirrings of whose feather Prove them the brood of immortality.

My soul is quitted of death-neighbouring swoon, Who shall not slake her immitigable scars Until she hear ”My sister!” from the moon, And take the kindred kisses of the stars.

_EPILOGUE TO_ ”A JUDGEMENT IN HEAVEN”

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