Robert Browning: How to Know Him Part 33

II

"Yet now my heart leaps, O beloved! G.o.d's child with his dew On thy gracious gold hair, and those lilies still living and blue Just broken to twine round thy harp-strings, as if no wild heat Were now raging to torture the desert!"

III

Then I, as was meet, Knelt down to the G.o.d of my fathers, and rose on my feet, And ran o'er the sand burnt to powder. The tent was unlooped; I pulled up the spear that obstructed, and under I stooped; Hands and knees on the slippery gra.s.s-patch, all withered and gone, That extends to the second enclosure, I groped my way on Till I felt where the foldskirts fly open. Then once more I prayed, And opened the foldskirts and entered, and was not afraid But spoke, "Here is David, thy servant!" And no voice replied.

At the first I saw naught but the blackness: but soon I descried A something more black than the blackness--the vast, the upright Main prop which sustains the pavilion: and slow into sight Grew a figure against it, gigantic and blackest of all.

Then a sunbeam, that burst through the tent-roof, showed Saul.

IV

He stood as erect as that tent-prop, both arms stretched out wide On the great cross-support in the centre, that goes to each side; He relaxed not a muscle, but hung there as, caught in his pangs And waiting his change, the king-serpent all heavily hangs, Far away from his kind, in the pine, till deliverance come With the spring-time,--so agonized Saul, drear and stark, blind and dumb.

V

Then I tuned my harp,--took off the lilies we twine round its chords Lest they snap 'neath the stress of the noontide--those sunbeams like swords!

And I first played the tune all our sheep know, as, one after one, So docile they come to the pen-door till folding be done.

They are white and untorn by the bushes, for lo, they have fed Where the long gra.s.ses stifle the water within the stream's bed; And now one after one seeks its lodging, as star follows star Into eve and the blue far above us,--so blue and so far!

VI

--Then the tune for which quails on the corn-land will each leave his mate To fly after the player; then, what makes the crickets elate Till for boldness they fight one another; and then, what has weight To set the quick jerboa a-musing outside his sand house-- There are none such as he for a wonder, half bird and half mouse!

G.o.d made all the creatures and gave them our love and our fear, To give sign, we and they are his children, one family here.

VII

Then I played the help-tune of our reapers, their wine-song, when hand Grasps at hand, eye lights eye in good friendship, and great hearts expand And grow one in the sense of this world's life.--And then, the last song When the dead man is praised on his journey--"Bear, bear him along, With his few faults shut up like dead flowerets! Are balm seeds not here To console us? The land has none left such as he on the bier.

Oh, would we might keep thee, my brother!"--And then, the glad chaunt Of the marriage,--first go the young maidens, next, she whom we vaunt As the beauty, the pride of our dwelling.--And then, the great march Wherein man runs to man to a.s.sist him and b.u.t.tress an arch Naught can break; who shall harm them, our friends? Then, the chorus intoned As the Levites go up to the altar in glory enthroned.

But I stopped here: for here in the darkness Saul groaned.

VIII

And I paused, held my breath in such silence, and listened apart; And the tent shook, for mighty Saul shuddered: and sparkles 'gan dart From the jewels that woke in his turban, at once with a start, All its lordly male-sapphires, and rubies courageous at heart.

So the head: but the body still moved not, still hung there erect.

And I bent once again to my playing, pursued it unchecked, As I sang:--

IX

"Oh, our manhood's prime vigour! No spirit feels waste, Not a muscle is stopped in its playing nor sinew unbraced.

Oh, the wild joys of living! the leaping from rock up to rock, The strong rending of boughs from the fir-tree, the cool silver shock Of the plunge in a pool's living water, the hunt of the bear, And the sultriness showing the lion is couched in his lair.

And the meal, the rich dates yellowed over with gold dust divine, And the locust-flesh steeped in the pitcher, the full draught of wine, And the sleep in the dried river-channel where bulrushes tell That the water was wont to go warbling so softly and well.

How good is man's life, the mere living! how fit to employ All the heart and the soul and the senses forever in joy!

Hast thou loved the white locks of thy father, whose sword thou didst guard When he trusted thee forth with the armies, for glorious reward?

Didst thou see the thin hands of thy mother, held up as men sung The low song of the nearly-departed, and hear her faint tongue Joining in while it could to the witness, 'Let one more attest, I have lived, seen G.o.d's hand through a lifetime, and all was for best'?

Then they sung through their tears in strong triumph, not much, but the rest.

And thy brothers, the help and the contest, the working whence grew Such result as, from seething grape-bundles, the spirit strained true: And the friends of thy boyhood--that boyhood of wonder and hope, Present promise and wealth of the future beyond the eye's scope,-- Till lo, thou art grown to a monarch; a people is thine; And all gifts, which the world offers singly, on one head combine!

On one head, all the beauty and strength, love and rage (like the throe That, a-work in the rock, helps its labour and lets the gold go) High ambition and deeds which surpa.s.s it, fame crowning them,--all Brought to blaze on the head of one creature--King Saul!"

X

And lo, with that leap of my spirit,--heart, hand, harp and voice, Each lifting Saul's name out of sorrow, each bidding rejoice Saul's fame in the light it was made for--as when, dare I say, The Lord's army, in rapture of service, strains through its array, And upsoareth the cherubim-chariot--"Saul!" cried I, and stopped, And waited the thing that should follow. Then Saul, who hung propped By the tent's cross-support in the centre, was struck by his name.

Have ye seen when Spring's arrowy summons goes right to the aim, And some mountain, the last to withstand her, that held (he alone, While the vale laughed in freedom and flowers) on a broad bust of stone A year's snow bound about for a breastplate,--leaves grasp of the sheet?

Fold on fold all at once it crowds thunderously down to his feet, And there fronts you, stark, black, but alive yet, your mountain of old, With his rents, the successive bequeathings of ages untold-- Yea, each harm got in fighting your battles, each furrow and scar Of his head thrust 'twixt you and the tempest--all hail, there they are!

--Now again to be softened with verdure, again hold the nest Of the dove, tempt the goat and its young to the green on his crest For their food in the ardours of summer. One long shudder thrilled All the tent till the very air tingled, then sank and was stilled At the King's self left standing before me, released and aware.

What was gone, what remained? All to traverse 'twixt hope and despair, Death was past, life not come: so he waited. Awhile his right hand Held the brow, helped the eyes left too vacant forthwith to remand To their place what new objects should enter: 'twas Saul as before.

I looked up and dared gaze at those eyes, nor was hurt any more Than by slow pallid sunsets in autumn, we watch from the sh.o.r.e, At their sad level gaze o'er the ocean--a sun's slow decline Over hills which, resolved in stern silence, o'erlap and entwine Base with base to knit strength more intensely; so, arm folded arm O'er the chest whose slow heavings subsided.

XI

What spell or what charm, (For awhile there was trouble within me,) what next should I urge To sustain him where song had restored him?--one filled to the verge His cup with the wine of this life, pressing all that it yields Of mere fruitage, the strength and the beauty; beyond, on what fields, Glean a vintage more potent and perfect to brighten the eye And bring blood to the lip, and commend them the cup they put by?

He saith, "It is good;" still he drinks not: he lets me praise life, Gives a.s.sent, yet would die for his own part.

XII

Then fancies grew rife Which had come long ago on the pasture, when round me the sheep Fed in silence--above, the one eagle wheeled slow as in sleep; And I lay in my hollow and mused on the world that might lie 'Neath his ken, though I saw but the strip 'twixt the hill and the sky: And I laughed--"Since my days are ordained to be pa.s.sed with my flocks, Let me people at least, with my fancies, the plains and the rocks, Dream the life I am never to mix with, and image the show Of mankind as they live in those fashions I hardly shall know!

Schemes of life, its best rules and right uses, the courage that gains, And the prudence that keeps what men strive for." And now these old trains Of vague thought came again; I grew surer; so, once more the string Of my harp made response to my spirit, as thus--

XIII

"Yea, my King,"

I began--"thou dost well in rejecting mere comforts that spring From the mere mortal life held in common by man and by brute: In our flesh grows the branch of this life, in our soul it bears fruit.

Thou hast marked the slow rise of the tree,--how its stem trembled first Till it pa.s.sed the kid's lip, the stag's antler; then safely outburst The fan-branches all round; and thou mindest when these too, in turn, Broke a-bloom and the palm-tree seemed perfect: yet more was to learn, E'en the good that comes in with the palm-fruit. Our dates shall we slight, When their juice brings a cure for all sorrow? or care for the plight Of the palm's self whose slow growth produced them? Not so! stem and branch Shall decay, nor be known in their place, while the palm-wine shall stanch Every wound of man's spirit in winter. I pour thee such wine.

Leave the flesh to the fate it was fit for! the spirit be thine!

By the spirit, when age shall o'ercome thee, thou still shalt enjoy More indeed, than at first when inconscious, the life of a boy.

Crush that life, and behold its wine running! Each deed thou hast done Dies, revives, goes to work in the world; until e'en as the sun Looking down on the earth, though clouds spoil him, though tempests efface, Can find nothing his own deed produced not, must everywhere trace The results of his past summer-prime,--so, each ray of thy will, Every flash of thy pa.s.sion and prowess, long over, shall thrill Thy whole people, the countless, with ardor, till they too give forth A like cheer to their sons, who in turn, fill the South and the North With the radiance thy deed was the germ of. Carouse in the past!

But the license of age has its limit; thou diest at last: As the lion when age dims his eyeball, the rose at her height, So with man--so his power and his beauty forever take flight.

No! Again a long draught of my soul-wine! Look forth o'er the years!

Thou hast done now with eyes for the actual; begin with the seer's!

Is Saul dead? In the depth of the vale make his tomb--bid arise A gray mountain of marble heaped four-square, till, built to the skies, Let it mark where the great First King slumbers: whose fame would ye know?

Up above see the rock's naked face, where the record shall go In great characters cut by the scribe,--Such was Saul, so he did; With the sages directing the work, by the populace chid,-- For not half, they'll affirm, is comprised there! Which fault to amend, In the grove with his kind grows the cedar, whereon they shall spend (See, in tablets 'tis level before them) their praise, and record With the gold of the graver, Saul's story,--the statesman's great word Side by side with the poet's sweet comment. The river's a-wave With smooth paper-reeds grazing each other when prophet-winds rave: So the pen gives unborn generations their due and their part In thy being! Then, first of the mighty, thank G.o.d that thou art!"

XIV

And behold while I sang ... but O Thou who didst grant me that day, And before it not seldom hast granted thy help to essay, Carry on and complete an adventure,--my shield and my sword In that act where my soul was thy servant, thy word was my word,-- Still be with me, who then at the summit of human endeavour And scaling the highest, man's thought could, gazed hopeless as ever On the new stretch of heaven above me--till, mighty to save, Just one lift of thy hand cleared that distance--G.o.d's throne from man's grave!

Let me tell out my tale to its ending--my voice to my heart Which can scarce dare believe in what marvels last night I took part, As this morning I gather the fragments, alone with my sheep, And still fear lest the terrible glory evanish like sleep!

For I wake in the gray dewy covert, while Hebron upheaves The dawn struggling with night on his shoulder, and Kidron retrieves Slow the damage of yesterday's sunshine.