With the starry skies around and above them And the roses whispering to and fro.
Ah, was it a song of the mystic morn When into their beating hearts the thorn Should pierce through the red wet crumpled roses And all the sorrow of love be born?
Ah, was it a cry of the wild wayside Whereby one day they must surely ride, Out of the purple garden of pa.s.sion To Calvary, to be crucified?
Only the sound of the distant sea Broke on the sh.o.r.es of Mystery, And tolled as a bell might toll for sorrow Till Time be tombed in Eternity;
And in their dreams they only heard Far away, one secret bird Sing, till the pa.s.sionate purple twilight Throbbed with the wonder of one sweet word:
One sweet word and the wonder awoke, And the leaves and the flowers and the starlight spoke In silent rapture the strange old secret That none e"er knew till the death-dawn broke;
One sweet whisper, and hand in hand They wandered in dreams through fairyland, Rapt in the star-bright mystical music Which only a child can understand.
But never a child in the world can tell The wonderful tale he knows so well, Though ever as old Time dies in the sunset It tolls and tolls like a distant bell.
_Love, love, love_; and they hardly knew The sense of the glory that round them grew; But the world was a wide enchanted garden; And the song, the song, the song rang true.
And they danced with the fairies in emerald rings Arched by the light of their rainbow wings, And they heard the wild green Harper striking A starlight over the golden strings.
_Love, oh love_; and they roamed once more Through a forest of flowers on a fairy sh.o.r.e, And the sky was a wild bright laugh of wonder And the West was a dream of the years of yore.
In other worlds I loved you, long ago: Love that hath no beginning hath no end: The heather whispers low and sweet and low, In other worlds I loved you, long ago; The meadows murmur and the firwoods know The message that the kindling East shall send; In other worlds I loved you, long ago: Love that hath no beginning hath no end.
IX
Out of the deep, my dream, out of the deep, Yrma, thy voice came to me in my sleep, And through a rainbow woven of human tears I saw two lovers wandering down the years; Two children, first, that roamed a sunset land, And then two lovers wandering hand in hand, Forgetful of their childhood"s Paradise, For nine more years had darkened in their eyes, And heaven itself could hardly find again Anwyl, the star-child, or the flower, Etain.
For on a day in May, as through the wood With earth"s new pa.s.sion beating in his blood He went alone, an empty-hearted youth, Seeking he knew not what white flower of truth Or beauty, on all sides he seemed to see Swift subtle hints of some new harmony, Yet all unheard, ideal, and incomplete, A silent song compact of hopes and fears, A music such as lights the wandering feet Of Yrma when on earth she reappears.
And he forgot that sad grey City of Pain, For all earth"s old romance returned again, And as he went, his dreaming soul grew glad To think that he might meet with Galahad Or Parsifal in some green glade of fern, Or see between the boughs a helmet burn And hear a joyous laugh kindle the sky As through the wood Sir Launcelot rode by With face upturned to take the sun like wine.
Ah, was it love that made the whole world shine Like some great angel"s face, blinded with bliss, While Anwyl dreamed of bold Sir Amadis And Guinevere"s white arms and Iseult"s kiss, And that glad island in a golden sea Where Arthur lives and reigns eternally?
Surely the heavens were one wide rose-white flame As down the path to meet him Yrma came; Ah, was it Yrma, with those radiant eyes, That came to greet and lead him through the skies, The skies that gloomed and gleamed so far above The little wandering prayers of human love?...
He had forgotten all except the gleam Of light when once he kissed her in a dream, ...
For surely then he knew that long before Their eyes had met upon some distant sh.o.r.e....
Ah, was it Yrma whose red lips he met Between the branches, where the leaves were wet?
Etain or Yrma, for it seemed her face Bent down upon him from some happy place And whispered to him, low and sweet and low, _In other worlds I loved you, long ago!_ And he, too, knew his love could never die, Because his queen was throned beyond the sky.
Yet In sweet mortal eyes he met her now And kissed Etain beneath the hawthorn bough, And dared to dream his infinite dream was true On earth and reign with Etain, dream he knew Why leaves were green and sides were fresh and blue; Yea, dream he knew, as children dream they know They knew all this a million years ago, And watched the sea-waves wistfully westward wend And heard a voice whispering in their flow And calling through the silent sunset-glow _Love that hath no beginning hath no end._
Ah, could they see in the Valley of Gloom That clove the cliffs behind the City; Ah, could they hear in the forest of Doom The peril that neared without pause or pity?
Behind the veils of ivy and vine, Wild musk-roses and white woodbine, In glens that were wan as with moonlit tears And rosy with ghosts of eglantine And pale as with lilies of long-past years, Ah, could they see, could they hear, could they know Behind that beautiful outward show, Behind the pomp and glory of life That seething old anarchic strife?
For there in many a dim blue glade Where the rank red poppies burned, And if perchance some dreamer strayed He nevermore returned, Cold incarnate memories Of earth"s retributory throes, Deadly desires and agonies Dark as the worm that never dies, In the outer night arose, And waited under those wonderful skies With Hydra heads and mocking eyes That winked upon the waning West From out the gloom of the oak-forest, Till all the wild profound of wood That o"er the haunted valley slept Glowed with eyes like pools of blood As, l.u.s.ting after a hideous food, Through the haggard vistas crept Without a cry, without a hiss, The serpent broods of the abyss.
Ancestral folds in darkness furled Since the beginnings of the world.
Ring upon awful ring uprose That obscure heritage of foes, The exceeding bitter heritage Which still a jealous G.o.d bestows From inappellable age to age, The ghostly worms that softly move Through every grey old corse of love And creep across the coffined years To batten on our blood and tears; And there were hooded shapes of death Gaunt and grey, cruel and blind, Stealing softly as a breath Through the woods that loured behind The City; hooded shapes of fear Slowly, slowly stealing near; While all the gloom that round them rolled With intertwisting coils grew cold.
And there with leer and gap-toothed grin Many a gaunt ancestral Sin With clutching fingers, white and thin, Strove to put the boughs aside; And still before them all would glide Down the wavering moon-white track One lissom figure, clad in black; Who wept at mirth and mocked at pain And murmured a song of the wind and the rain; His laugh was wild with a secret grief; His eyes were deep like woodland pools; And, once and again, as his face drew near In a rosy gloaming of eglantere, All the ghosts that gathered there Bowed together, naming his name: Lead us, ah thou _Shadow of a Leaf_, Child and master of all our shame, Fool of Doubt and King of Fools.
Now the linnet had ended his evensong, And the lark dropt down from his last wild ditty And ruffled his wings and his speckled breast Blossomwise over his June-sweet nest; While winging wistfully into the West As a fallen petal is wafted along The last white sea-mew sought for rest; And, over the gleaming heave and swell Of the swinging seas, Drowsily breathed the dreaming breeze.
Then, suddenly, out of the Valley of Gloom That clove the cliffs behind the City, Out of the silent forest of Doom That clothed the valley with clouds of fear Swelled the boom of a distant bell Once, and the towers of the City of Pain Echoed it, without hope or pity.
The tale of that tolling who can tell?
That dark old music who shall declare?
Who shall interpret the song of the bell?
_Is it nothing to you, all ye that hear_, Sorrowed the bell, _Is it nothing to you?
Is it nothing to you?_ the sh.o.r.e-wind cried, _Is it nothing to you?_ the cliffs replied.
But the low light laughed and the skies were blue, And this was only the song of the bell.
X
ANWYL
A darkened eas.e.m.e.nt in a darker room Was all his home, whence weary and bowed and white He watched across the slowly gathering gloom The slowly westering light.
Bitterness in his heavy-clouded eyes, Bitterness as of heaven"s intestine wars Brooded; he looked upon the unfathomed skies And whispered--to the stars--
Some day, he said, she will forget all this That she calls life, and looking far above See throned among the great eternities This dream of mine, this love;
Love that has given my soul these wings of fire To beat in glory above the sapphire sea, Until the wings of the infinite desire Close in infinity;
Love that has taken the glory of hawthorn boughs, And all the dreaming beauty of hazel skies, As ministers to the radiance of her brows And haunted April eyes;
Love that is hidden so deep beneath the dust Of little daily duties and delights, Till that reproachful face of hers grows just And G.o.d at last requites
A soul whose dream was deeper than the skies, A heart whose hope was wider than the sea, Yet could not enter through his true love"s eyes Their grey infinity.
And so I know I wound her all day long Because my heart must seem so far away; And even my love completes the silent wrong For all that it can say
Seems vast and meaningless to mortal sense; Its vague desire can never reach its goal Till knowledge vanishes in omniscience And G.o.d surrounds her soul, Breaking its barriers down and flooding in Through all her wounds in one almighty tide, Mingling her soul with that great Love wherein My soul waits, glorified.
XI
ETAIN
My love is dying, dying in my heart; There is no song in heaven for such as I Who watch the days and years of youth depart, The bloom decay and die;
The rose that withers in the hollow cheek, The leaden rings that mark us old and wise; And Time that writes what Pity dares not speak Around the fading eyes.
He dreams he loves; but only loves his dream; And in his dream he never can forget Abana seems a so much mightier stream And Pharpar wider yet;
The little deeds of love that light the shrine Of common daily duties with such gleams Of heaven, to me are scarcely less divine Than those poor wandering dreams
Of deeds that never happen! I give him this, This heart he cannot find in heaven above; This heart, this heart of all the eternities, This life of mine, this love;
Love that is lord of all the world at once And never bade the encircled spirit roam To the circle"s bound, beyond the moons and suns, But makes each heart its home, And every home the heart of s.p.a.ce and Time, And each and all a heaven if love could reign; One infinite untranscended heaven sublime With G.o.d"s own joy and pain.
Why, that was what G.o.d meant, to set us here In Eden, when he saw that all was good; And we have made the sun black with despair, And turned the moon to blood.
So has Love taught me that too learned tongue, And in his poorer wisdom made me wise; I grew so proud of the red drops we wrung From all philosophies.