American Poetry, 1922 Part 15

Did she look (reft of her lover) at a face gone white under the chaplet of white virgin-breath?

Lais, exultant, tyrannizing Greece, Lais who kept her lovers in the porch, lover on lover waiting (but to creep where the robe brushed the threshold where still sleeps Lais), so she creeps, Lais, to lay her mirror at the feet of her who reigns in Paphos.

Lais has left her mirror, for she sees no longer in its depth the Lais' self that laughed exultant, tyrannizing Greece.

Lais has left her mirror, for she weeps no longer, finding in its depth a face, but other than dark flame and white feature of perfect marble.

_Lais has left her mirror_ (so one wrote) _to her who reigns in Paphos; Lais who laughed a tyrant over Greece, Lais who turned the lovers from the porch, that swarm for whom now Lais has no use; Lais is now no lover of the gla.s.s, seeing no more the face as once it was, wishing to see that face and finding this._

HELIODORA

He and I sought together, over the spattered table, rhymes and flowers, gifts for a name.

He said, among others, I will bring (and the phrase was just and good, but not as good as mine) "the narcissus that loves the rain."

We strove for a name, while the light of the lamps burnt thin and the outer dawn came in, a ghost, the last at the feast or the first, to sit within with the two that remained to quibble in flowers and verse over a girl's name.

He said, "the rain loving,"

I said, "the narcissus, drunk, drunk with the rain."

Yet I had lost for he said, "the rose, the lover's gift, is loved of love,"

he said it, "loved of love;"

I waited, even as he spoke, to see the room filled with a light, as when in winter the embers catch in a wind when a room is dank: so it would be filled, I thought, our room with a light when he said (and he said it first) "the rose, the lover's delight, is loved of love,"

but the light was the same.

Then he caught, seeing the fire in my eyes, my fire, my fever, perhaps, for he leaned with the purple wine stained in his sleeve, and said this: "Did you ever think a girl's mouth caught in a kiss is a lily that laughs?"

I had not.

I saw it now as men must see it forever afterwards; no poet could write again, "the red-lily, a girl's laugh caught in a kiss;"

it was his to pour in the vat from which all poets dip and quaff, for poets are brothers in this.

So I saw the fire in his eyes, it was almost my fire (he was younger) I saw the face so white; my heart beat, it was almost my phrase, I said, "surprise the muses, take them by surprise; it is late, rather it is dawn-rise, those ladies sleep, the nine, our own king's mistresses."

A name to rhyme, flowers to bring to a name, what was one girl faint and shy, with eyes like the myrtle (I said: "her underlids are rather like myrtle"), to vie with the nine?

Let him take the name, he had the rhymes, "the rose, loved of love,"

"the lily, a mouth that laughs,"

he had the gift, "the scented crocus, the purple hyacinth,"

what was one girl to the nine?

He said: "I will make her a wreath;"

he said: "I will write it thus: _'I will bring you the lily that laughs, I will twine with soft narcissus, the myrtle, sweet crocus, white violet, the purple hyacinth and, last, the rose, loved of love, that these may drip on your hair the less soft flowers, may mingle sweet with the sweet of Heliodora's locks, myrrh-curled.'_"

(He wrote myrrh-curled, I think, the first.)

I said: "they sleep, the nine,"

when he shouted swift and pa.s.sionate: "_that_ for the nine!

Above the mountains the sun is about to wake, _and to-day white violets shine beside white lilies adrift on the mountain side; to-day the narcissus opens that loves the rain_."

I watched him to the door, catching his robe as the wine-bowl crashed to the floor, spilling a few wet lees (ah, his purple hyacinth!); I saw him out of the door, I thought: there will never be a poet, in all the centuries after this, who will dare write, after my friend's verse, "a girl's mouth is a lily kissed."

TOWARD THE PIRaeUS

_Slay with your eyes, Greek, men over the face of the earth, slay with your eyes, the host, puny, pa.s.sionless, weak._

_Break, as the ranks of steel broke of the Persian host: craven, we hated them then: now we would count them G.o.ds beside these, sp.a.w.n of the earth._

_Grant us your mantle, Greek; grant us but one to fright (as your eyes) with a sword, men, craven and weak, grant us but one to strike one blow for you, pa.s.sionate Greek._

I

You would have broken my wings, but the very fact that you knew I had wings, set some seal on my bitter heart, my heart broke and fluttered and sang.

You would have snared me, and scattered the strands of my nest; but the very fact that you saw, sheltered me, claimed me, set me apart from the rest.

Of men--of _men_ made you a G.o.d, and me, claimed me, set me apart and the song in my breast, yours, yours forever-- if I escape your evil heart.

II

I loved you: men have writ and women have said they loved, but as the Pythoness stands by the altar, intense and may not move;

till the fumes pa.s.s over; and may not falter nor break, till the priest has caught the words that mar or make a deme or a ravaged town;

so I, though my knees tremble, my heart break, must note the rumbling, heed only the shuddering down in the fissure beneath the rock of the temple floor;

must wait and watch and may not turn nor move, nor break from my trance to speak so slight, so sweet, so simple a word as love.

III

What had you done had you been true, I can not think, I may not know.

What could we do were I not wise, what play invent, what joy devise?

What could we do if you were great?

(Yet were you lost, who were there, then, to circ.u.mvent the tricks of men?)

What can we do, for curious lies have filled your heart, and in my eyes sorrow has writ that I am wise.