The Unknown Eros Part 4

XXIII. REMEMBERED GRACE.

Since succour to the feeblest of the wise Is charge of n.o.bler weight Than the security Of many and many a foolish soul's estate, This I affirm, Though fools will fools more confidently be: Whom G.o.d does once with heart to heart befriend, He does so till the end: And having planted life's miraculous germ, One sweet pulsation of responsive love, He sets him sheer above, Not sin and bitter shame And wreck of fame, But h.e.l.l's insidious and more black attempt, The envy, malice, and pride, Which men who share so easily condone That few ev'n list such ills as these to hide.

From these unalterably exempt, Through the remember'd grace Of that divine embrace, Of his sad errors none, Though gross to blame, Shall cast him lower than the cleansing flame, Nor make him quite depart From the small flock named 'after G.o.d's own heart,'

And to themselves unknown.

Nor can he quail In faith, nor flush nor pale When all the other idiot people spell How this or that new Prophet's word belies Their last high oracle; But constantly his soul Points to its pole Ev'n as the needle points, and knows not why; And, under the ever-changing clouds of doubt, When others cry, 'The stars, if stars there were, Are quench'd and out!'

To him, uplooking t'ward the hills for aid, Appear, at need display'd, Gaps in the low-hung gloom, and, bright in air, Orion or the Bear.

XXIV. VESICA PISCIS.

In strenuous hope I wrought, And hope seem'd still betray'd; Lastly I said, 'I have labour'd through the Night, nor yet Have taken aught; But at Thy word I will again cast forth the net!'

And, lo, I caught (Oh, quite unlike and quite beyond my thought,) Not the quick, shining harvest of the Sea, For food, my wish, But Thee!

Then, hiding even in me, As hid was Simon's coin within the fish, Thou sigh'd'st, with joy, 'Be dumb, Or speak but of forgotten things to far-off times to come.'

BOOK II.

I. TO THE UNKNOWN EROS.

What rumour'd heavens are these Which not a poet sings, O, Unknown Eros? What this breeze Of sudden wings Speeding at far returns of time from interstellar s.p.a.ce To fan my very face, And gone as fleet, Through delicatest ether feathering soft their solitary beat, With ne'er a light plume dropp'd, nor any trace To speak of whence they came, or whither they depart?

And why this palpitating heart, This blind and unrelated joy, This meaningless desire, That moves me like the Child Who in the flushing darkness troubled lies, Inventing lonely prophecies, Which even to his Mother mild He dares not tell; To which himself is infidel; His heart not less on fire With dreams impossible as wildest Arab Tale, (So thinks the boy,) With dreams that turn him red and pale, Yet less impossible and wild Than those which bashful Love, in his own way and hour, Shall duly bring to flower?

O, Unknown Eros, sire of awful bliss, What portent and what Delphic word, Such as in form of snake forebodes the bird, Is this?

In me life's even flood What eddies thus?

What in its ruddy orbit lifts the blood, Like a perturbed moon of Ura.n.u.s, Reaching to some great world in ungauged darkness hid; And whence This rapture of the sense Which, by thy whisper bid, Reveres with obscure rite and sacramental sign A bond I know not of nor dimly can divine; This subject loyalty which longs For chains and thongs Woven of gossamer and adamant, To bind me to my unguess'd want, And so to lie, Between those quivering plumes that thro' fine ether pant, For hopeless, sweet eternity?

What G.o.d unhonour'd hitherto in songs, Or which, that now Forgettest the disguise That G.o.ds must wear who visit human eyes, Art Thou?

Thou art not Amor; or, if so, yon pyre, That waits the willing victim, flames with vestal fire; Nor mooned Queen of maids; or, if thou'rt she, Ah, then, from Thee Let Bride and Bridegroom learn what kisses be!

In what veil'd hymn Or mystic dance Would he that were thy Priest advance Thine earthly praise, thy glory limn?

Say, should the feet that feel thy thought In double-center'd circuit run, In that compulsive focus, Nought, In this a furnace like the sun; And might some note of thy renown And high behest Thus in enigma be expressed: 'There lies the crown Which all thy longing cures.

Refuse it, Mortal, that it may be yours!

It is a Spirit, though it seems red gold; And such may no man, but by shunning, hold.

Refuse it, till refusing be despair; And thou shalt feel the phantom in thy hair.'

II. THE CONTRACT.

Twice thirty centuries and more ago, All in a heavenly Abyssinian vale, Man first met woman; and the ruddy snow On many-ridged Abora turn'd pale, And the song choked within the nightingale.

A mild white furnace in the thorough blast Of purest spirit seem'd She as she pa.s.s'd; And of the Man enough that this be said, He look'd her Head.

Towards their bower Together as they went, With hearts conceiving torrents of content, And linger'd prologue fit for Paradise, He, gathering power From dear persuasion of the dim-lit hour, And doubted sanction of her sparkling eyes, Thus supplicates her conjugal a.s.sent, And thus she makes replies: 'Lo, Eve, the Day burns on the snowy height, But here is mellow night!'

'Here let us rest. The languor of the light Is in my feet.

It is thy strength, my Love, that makes me weak; Thy strength it is that makes my weakness sweet.

What would thy kiss'd lips speak?'

'See, what a world of roses I have spread To make the bridal bed.

Come, Beauty's self and Love's, thus to thy throne be led!'

'My Lord, my Wisdom, nay!

Does not yon love-delighted Planet run, (Haply against her heart,) A s.p.a.ce apart For ever from her strong-persuading Sun!

O say, Shall we no voluntary bars Set to our drift? I, Sister of the Stars, And Thou, my glorious, course-compelling Day!'

'Yea, yea!

Was it an echo of her coming word Which, ere she spake, I heard?

Or through what strange distrust was I, her Head, Not first this thing to have said?

Alway Speaks not within my breast The uncompulsive, great and sweet behest Of something bright, Not named, not known, and yet more manifest Than is the morn, The sun being just at point then to be born?

O Eve, take back thy "Nay."

Trust me, Beloved, ever in all to mean Thy blissful service, sacrificial, keen; But bondless be that service, and let speak--'

'This other world of roses in my cheek, Which hide them in thy breast, and deepening seek That thou decree if they mean Yea or Nay.'

'Did e'er so sweet a word such sweet gainsay!'

'And when I lean, Love, on you, thus, and smile So that my Nay seems Yea, You must the while Thence be confirm'd that I deny you still.'

'I will, I will!'

'And when my arms are round your neck, like this, And I, as now, Melt like a golden ingot in your kiss, Then, more than ever, shall your splendid word Be as Archangel Michael's severing sword!

Speak, speak!

Your might, Love, makes me weak, Your might it is that makes my weakness sweet.'

'I vow, I vow!'

'And are you happy, O, my Hero and Lord; And is your joy complete?'

'Yea, with my joyful heart my body rocks, And joy comes down from Heaven in floods and shocks, As from Mount Abora comes the avalanche.'

'My Law, my Light!

Then am I yours as your high mind may list.

No wile shall lure you, none can I resist!'

Thus the first Eve With much enamour'd Adam did enact Their mutual free contract Of virgin spousals, blissful beyond flight Of modern thought, with great intention staunch, Though un.o.bliged until that binding pact.

Whether She kept her word, or He the mind To hold her, wavering, to his own restraint, Answer, ye pleasures faint, Ye fiery throes, and upturn'd eyeb.a.l.l.s blind Of sick-at-heart Mankind, Whom nothing succour can, Until a heaven-caress'd and happier Eve Be join'd with some glad Saint In like espousals, blessed upon Earth, And she her Fruit forth bring; No numb, chill-hearted, shaken-witted thing, 'Plaining his little span, But of proud virgin joy the appropriate birth, The Son of G.o.d and Man.

III. ARBOR VITAE.

With honeysuckle, over-sweet, festoon'd; With bitter ivy bound; Terraced with funguses unsound; Deform'd with many a boss And closed scar, o'ercushion'd deep with moss; Bunch'd all about with pagan mistletoe; And thick with nests of the hoa.r.s.e bird That talks, but understands not his own word; Stands, and so stood a thousand years ago, A single tree.

Thunder has done its worst among its twigs, Where the great crest yet blackens, never pruned, But in its heart, alway Ready to push new verdurous boughs, whene'er The rotting saplings near it fall and leave it air, Is all antiquity and no decay.

Rich, though rejected by the forest-pigs, Its fruit, beneath whose rough, concealing rind They that will break it find Heart-succouring savour of each several meat, And kernell'd drink of brain-renewing power, With bitter condiment and sour, And sweet economy of sweet, And odours that remind Of haunts of childhood and a different day.

Beside this tree, Praising no G.o.ds nor blaming, sans a wish, Sits, Tartar-like, the Time's civility, And eats its dead-dog off a golden dish.

IV. THE STANDARDS.

That last, Blown from our Sion of the Seven Hills, Was no uncertain blast!

Listen: the warning all the champaign fills, And minatory murmurs, answering, mar The Night, both near and far, Perplexing many a drowsy citadel Beneath whose ill-watch'd walls the Powers of h.e.l.l, With armed jar And angry threat, surcease Their long-kept compact of contemptuous peace!

Lo, yonder, where our little English band, With peace in heart and wrath in hand, Have dimly ta'en their stand, Sweetly the light Shines from the solitary peak at Edgbaston, Whence, o'er the dawning Land, Gleam the gold blazonries of Love irate 'Gainst the black flag of Hate. {62} Envy not, little band, Your brothers under the Hohenzollern hoof Put to the splendid proof.

Your hour is near!