How lorn they howled, with lifted head, To dim and distant isles that lay Wedged tight along a line of red, Caught in the closing gates of day "Twixt sky and sea and far away,-- It was the saddest sound to hear That ever struck on human ear.
They doleful called; and answered they The plaintive sea-cows far away,-- The great sea-cows that called from isles, Away across wide watery miles, With dripping mouths and lolling tongue, As if they called for captured young,--
The huge sea-cows that called the whiles Their great wide mouths were mouthing moss; And still they doleful called across From isles beyond the watery miles.
No sound can half so doleful be As sea-cows calling from the sea.
x.x.xV.
The drowned sun sank and died. He lay In seas of blood. He sinking drew The gates of sunset sudden to, Where shattered day in fragments lay, And night came, moving in mad flame: The night came, lighted as he came, As lighted by high summer sun Descending through the burning blue.
It was a gold and amber hue, And all hues blended into one.
The night spilled splendor where she came, And filled the yellow world with flame.
The moon came on, came leaning low Along the far sea-isles aglow; She fell along that amber flood A silver flame in seas of blood.
It was the strangest moon, ah me!
That ever settled on G.o.d"s sea.
x.x.xVI.
Slim snakes slid down from fern and gra.s.s, From wood, from fen, from anywhere; You could not step, you would not pa.s.s, And you would hesitate to stir, Lest in some sudden, hurried tread Your foot struck some unbruised head:
They slid in streams into the stream,-- It seemed like some infernal dream; They curved, and graceful curved across, Like graceful, waving sea-green moss,-- There is no art of man can make A ripple like a rippling snake!
x.x.xVII.
Abandoned, lorn, the lovers stood, Abandoned there, death in the air!
That beetling steep, that blazing wood,-- Red flame! and red flame everywhere!
Yet was he born to strive, to bear The front of battle. He would die In n.o.ble effort, and defy The grizzled visage of despair.
He threw his two strong arms full length As if to surely test their strength; Then tore his vestments, textile things That could but tempt the demon wings Of flame that girt them round about, Then threw his garments to the air As one that laughed at death, at doubt, And like a G.o.d stood grand and bare.
She did not hesitate; she knew The need of action; swift she threw Her burning vestments by, and bound Her wondrous wealth of hair that fell An all-concealing cloud around Her glorious presence, as he came To seize and bear her through the flame,-- An Orpheus out of burning h.e.l.l!
He leaned above her, wound his arm About her splendor, while the noon Of flood-tide, manhood, flushed his face, And high flames leapt the high headland!-- They stood as twin-hewn statues stand, High lifted in some storied place.
He clasped her close, he spoke of death,-- Of death and love in the same breath.
He clasped her close; her bosom lay Like ship safe anch.o.r.ed in some bay.
x.x.xVIII.
The flames! They could not stand or stay; Before the beetling steep, the sea!
But at his feet a narrow way, A short steep path, pitched suddenly Safe open to the river"s beach, Where lay a small white isle in reach,-- A small, white, rippled isle of sand Where yet the two might safely land.
And there, through smoke and flame, behold The priest stood safe, yet all appalled!
He reached the cross; he cried, he called; He waved his high-held cross of gold.
He called and called, he bade them fly Through flames to him, nor bide and die!
Her lover saw; he saw, and knew His giant strength would bear her through.
And yet he would not start or stir.
He clasped her close as death can hold, Or dying miser clasp his gold,-- His hold became a part of her.
He would not give her up! He would Not bear her waveward though he could!
That height was heaven; the wave was h.e.l.l.
He clasped her close,--what else had done The manliest man beneath the sun?
Was it not well? was it not well?
O man, be glad! be grandly glad, And kinglike walk thy ways of death!
For more than years of bliss you had That one brief time you breathed her breath.
Yea, more than years upon a throne That one brief time you held her fast, Soul surged to soul, vehement, vast,-- True breast to breast, and all your own.
Live me one day, one narrow night, One second of supreme delight Like that, and I will blow like chaff The hollow years aside, and laugh A loud triumphant laugh, and I, King-like and crowned, will gladly die.
Oh, but to wrap my love with flame!
With flame within, with flame without!
Oh, but to die like this, nor doubt-- To die and know her still the same!
To know that down the ghostly sh.o.r.e Snow-white she waits me evermore!
x.x.xIX.
He poised her, held her high in air,-- His great strong limbs, his great arm"s length!-- Then turned his knotted shoulders bare As birth-time in his splendid strength, And strode, strode with a lordly stride To where the high and wood-hung edge Looked down, far down upon the molten tide.
The flames leapt with him to the ledge, The flames leapt leering at his side.
XL.
He leaned above the ledge. Below He saw the black ship idly cruise,-- A midge below, a mile below.
His limbs were knotted as the thews Of Hercules in his death-throe.
The flame! the flame! the envious flame!
She wound her arms, she wound her hair About his tall form, grand and bare, To stay the fierce flame where it came.
The black ship, like some moonlit wreck, Below along the burning sea Crept on and on all silently, With silent pygmies on her deck.
That midge-like ship far, far below; That mirage lifting from the hill!
His flame-lit form began to grow,-- To grow and grow more grandly still.
The ship so small, that form so tall, It grew to tower over all.
A tall Colossus, bronze and gold, As if that flame-lit form were he Who once bestrode the Rhodian sea, And ruled the watery world of old: As if the lost Colossus stood Above that burning sea of wood.
And she, that shapely form upheld, Held high, as if to touch the sky, What airy shape, how shapely high,-- A G.o.ddess of the seas of eld!
Her hand upheld, her high right hand, As if she would forget the land; As if to gather stars, and heap The stars like torches there to light Her Hero"s path across the deep To some far isle that fearful night.
It was as if Colossus came, Came proudly reaching from the flame Above the sea in sheen of gold, His sea-bride leaping from his hold; The lost Colossus, and his bride In bronze perfection at his side: As if the lost Colossus came Companioned from the past, his bride With torch all faithful at his side: