Myth and Romance: Being a Book of Verses

Dionysia

The day is dead; and in the westThe slender crescent of the moon—Diana's crystal-kindled crest—Sinks hillward in a silvery swoon.What is the murmur in the dell?The stealthy whisper and the drip?—A Dryad with her leaf-light trip?Or Naiad o'er her fountain well?—Who, with white fingers for her comb,Sleeks her blue hair, and from its curlsShowers slim minnows and pale pearls,And hollow music of the foam.What is it in the vistaed waysThat leans and springs, and stoops and sways?—The naked limbs of one who flees?An Oread who hesitatesBefore the Satyr form that waits,Crouching to leap, that there she sees?Or under boughs, reclining cool,A Hamadryad, like a poolOf moonlight, palely beautiful?Or Limnad, with her lilied face,More lovely than the misty laceThat haunts a star and gives it grace?Or is it some Leimoniad,In wildwood flowers dimly clad?Oblong blossoms white as froth;Or mottled like the tiger-moth;Or brindled as the brows of death;Wild of hue and wild of breath.Here ethereal flame and milkBlent with velvet and with silk;Here an iridescent glowMixed with satin and with snow:Pansy, poppy and the paleSerpolet and galingale;Mandrake and anemone,Honey-reservoirs o' the bee;Cistus and the cyclamen,—Cheeked like blushing Hebe this,And the other white as isBubbled milk of Venus whenCupid's baby mouth is pressed,Rosy, to her rosy breast.And, besides, all flowers that mateWith aroma, and in hueStars and rainbows duplicateHere on earth for me and you.Yea! at last mine eyes can see!'Tis no shadow of the treeSwaying softly there, but she!—Mænad, Bassarid, Bacchant,What you will, who doth enchantNight with sensuous nudity.Lo! again I hear her pantBreasting through the dewy glooms—Through the glow-worm gleams and glowersOf the starlight;—wood-perfumesSwoon around her and frail showersOf the leaflet-tilted rain.Lo, like love, she comes again,Through the pale, voluptuous dusk,Sweet of limb with breasts of musk.With her lips, like blossoms, breathingHoneyed pungence of her kiss,And her auburn tresses wreathingLike umbrageous helichrys,There she stands, like fire and snow,In the moon's ambrosial glow,Both her shapely loins low-loopedWith the balmy blossoms, drooped,Of the deep amaracus.Spiritual yet sensual,Lo, she ever greets me thusIn my vision; white and tall,Her delicious body there,—Raimented with amorous air,—To my mind expresses allThe allurements of the world.And once more I seem to feelOn my soul, like frenzy, hurledAll the passionate past.—I reel,Greek again in ancient Greece,In the Pyrrhic revelries;In the mad and Mænad danceOnward dragged with violence;Pan and old Silenus andFaunus and a Bacchant bandRound me. Wild my wine-stained handO'er tumultuous hair is lifted;While the flushed and Phallic orgiesWhirl around me; and the margesOf the wood are torn and riftedWith lascivious laugh and shout.And barbarian there again,—Shameless with the shameless rout,Bacchus lusting in each vein,—With her pagan lips on mine,Like a god made drunk with wine,On I reel; and, in the revels,Her loose hair, the dance dishevels,Blows, and 'thwart my vision swimsAll the splendor of her limbs....So it seems. Yet woods are lonely.And when I again awake,I shall find their faces onlyMoonbeams in the boughs that shake;And their revels, but the rushOf night-winds through bough and brush.Yet my dreaming—is it moreThan mere dreaming? Is some doorOpened in my soul? a curtainRaised? to let me see for certainI have lived that life before?

The Last Song

She sleeps; he sings to her. The day was long,And, tired out with too much happiness,She fain would have him sing of old Provence;Quaint songs, that spoke of love in such soft tones,Her restless soul was straight besieged of dreams,And her wild heart beleagured of deep peace,And heart and soul surrendered unto sleep.—Like perfect sculpture in the moon she lies,Its pallor on her through heraldic panesOf one tall casement's gulèd quarterings.—Beside her couch, an antique table, weighedWith gold and crystal; here, a carven chair,Whereon her raiment,—that suggests sweet curvesOf shapely beauty,—bearing her limbs' impress,Is richly laid: and, near the chair, a glass,An oval mirror framed in ebony:And, dim and deep,—investing all the roomWith ghostly life of woven women and men,And strange fantastic gloom, where shadows live,—Dark tapestry,—which in the gusts—that twingeA grotesque cresset's slender star of light—Seems moved of cautious hands, assassin-like,That wait the hour.She alone, deep-hairedAs rosy dawn, and whiter than a rose,Divinely breasted as the Queen of Love,Lies robeless in the glimmer of the moon,Like Danaë within the golden shower.Seated beside her aromatic rest,In rapture musing on her loveliness,Her knight and troubadour. A lute, aslopeThe curious baldric of his tunic, glintsWith pearl-reflections of the moon, that seemThe silent ghosts of long-dead melodies.In purple and sable, slashed with solemn gold,Like stately twilight o'er the snow-heaped hills,He bends above her.—Have his hands forgotTheir craft, that they pause, idle on the strings?His lips, their art, that they cease, speechless there?—His eyes are set.... What is it stills to stoneHis hands, his lips? and mails him, head and heel,In terrible marble, motionless and cold?—Behind the arras, can it be he feels,Black-browed and grim, with eyes of sombre fire,Death towers above him with uplifted sword?

Romaunt of the Oak

"I rode to death, for I fought for shame—The Lady Maurine of noble name,"The fair and faithless!—Though life be longIs love the wiser?—Love made song"Of all my life; and the soul that creptBefore, arose like a star and leapt:"Still leaps with the love that it found untrue,That it found unworthy.—Now run me through!"Yea, run me through! for meet and well,And a jest for laughter of fiends in hell,"It is that I, who have done no wrong,Should die by the hand of Hugh the Strong,"Of Hugh her leman!—What else could beWhen the devil was judge twixt thee and me?"He splintered my lance, and my blade he broke—Now finish me thou 'neath the trysting oak!" …The crest of his foeman,—a heart of whiteIn a bath of fire,—stooped i' the night;Stooped and laughed as his sword he swung,Then galloped away with a laugh on his tongue....But who is she in the gray, wet dawn,'Mid the autumn shades like a shadow wan?Who kneels, one hand on her straining breast,One hand on the dead man's bosom pressed?Her face is dim as the dead's; as coldAs his tarnished harness of steel and gold.O Lady Maurine! O Lady Maurine!What boots it now that regret is keen?That his hair you smooth, that you kiss his browWhat boots it now? what boots it now?…She has haled him under the trysting oak,The huge old oak that the creepers cloak.She has stood him, gaunt in his battered arms,In its haunted hollow.—"Be safe from storms,"She laughed as his cloven casque she placedOn his brow, and his riven shield she braced.Then sat and talked to the forest flowersThrough the lonely term of the day's pale hours.And stared and whispered and smiled and wept,While nearer and nearer the evening crept.And, lo, when the moon, like a great gold bloomAbove the sorrowful trees did loom,She rose up sobbing, "O moon, come seeMy bridegroom here in the old oak-tree!"I have talked to the flowers all day, all day,For never a word had he to say."He would not listen, he would not hear,Though I wailed my longing into his ear."O moon, steal in where he stands so grim,And tell him I love him, and plead with him."Soften his face that is cold and sternAnd brighten his eyes and make them burn,"O moon, O moon, so my soul can seeThat his heart still glows with love for me!" …When the moon was set, and the woods were dark,The wild deer came and stood as stark,As phantoms with eyes of fire; or fledLike a ghostly hunt of the herded dead.And the hoot-owl called; and the were-wolf snarled;And a voice, in the boughs of the oak-tree gnarled,—Like the whining rush of the hags that rideTo the witches' sabboth,—crooned and cried.And wrapped in his mantle of wind and cloudThe storm-fiend stalked through the forest loud.When she heard the dead man rattle and groanAs the oak was bent and its leaves were blown,And the lightning vanished and shimmered his mail,Through the swirling sweep of the rain and hail,She seemed to hear him, who seemed to call,—"Come hither, Maurine, the wild leaves fall!"The wild leaves rustle, the wild leaves flee;Come hither, Maurine, to the hollow tree!"To the trysting tree, to the tree once green;Come hither, Maurine! come hither, Maurine!" …They found her closed in his armored arms—Had he claimed his bride on that night of storms?

Morgan le Fay

In dim samite was she bedight,And on her hair a hoop of gold,Like fox-fire in the tawn moonlight,Was glimmering cold.With soft gray eyes she gloomed and glowered;With soft red lips she sang a song:What knight might gaze upon her face,Nor fare along?For all her looks were full of spells,And all her words of sorcery;And in some way they seemed to say      "Oh, come with me!"Oh, come with me! oh, come with me!Oh, come with me, my love, Sir Kay!"—How should he know the witch, I trow,Morgan le Fay?How should he know the wily witch,With sweet white face and raven hair?Who by her art bewitched his heartAnd held him there.For soul and sense had waxed amortTo wold and weald, to slade and stream;And all he heard was her soft wordAs one adream.And all he saw was her bright eyes,And her fair face that held him still;And wild and wan she led him onO'er vale and hill.Until at last a castle layBeneath the moon, among the trees;Its Gothic towers old and grayWith mysteries.Tall in its hall an hundred knightsIn armor stood with glaive in hand;The following of some great King,Lord of that land.Sir Bors, Sir Balin, and Gawain,All Arthur's knights, and many mo;But these in battle had been slainLong years ago.But when Morgan with lifted handMoved down the hall, they louted low;For she was Queen of Shadowland,That woman of snow.Then from Sir Kay she drew away,And mocking at him by her side,—"Behold, Sir Knights, the knave who slewYour King," she cried.Then like one man those shadows raisedTheir swords, whereon the moon glanced gray;And clashing all strode from the wallAgainst Sir Kay.And on his body, bent and bowed,The hundred blades like one blade fell;While over all rang long and loudThe mirth of Hell.

The Dream of Roderick

Below, the tawny Tagus sweptPast royal gardens, breathing balm;Upon his couch the monarch slept;The world was still; the night was calm.Gray, Gothic-gated, in the rayOf moonrise, tower-and castle-crowned,The city of Toledo layBeneath the terraced palace-ground.Again, he dreamed, in kingly sportHe sought the tree-sequestered path,And watched the ladies of his CourtWithin the marble-basined bath.Its porphyry stairs and fountained baseShone, houried with voluptuous forms,Where Andalusia vied in graceWith old Castile, in female charms.And laughter, song, and water-splashRang round the place, with stone arcaded,As here a breast or limb would flashWhere beauty swam or beauty waded.And then, like Venus, from the waveA maiden came, and stood below;And by her side a woman slaveBent down to dry her limbs of snow.Then on the tesselated bank,Robed on with fragrance and with fire,—Like some exotic flower—she sank,The type of all divine desire.Then her dark curls, that sparkled wet,She parted from her perfect brows,And, lo, her eyes, like lamps of jetWithin an alabaster house.And in his sleep the monarch sighed,"Florinda!"—Dreaming still he moaned,"Ah, would that I had died, had died!I have atoned! I have atoned!" …And then the vision changed: O'erheadTempest and darkness were unrolled,Full of wild voices of the dead,And lamentations manifold.And wandering shapes of gaunt despairSwept by, with faces pale as pain,Whose eyes wept blood and seemed to glareFierce curses on him through the rain.And then, it seemed, 'gainst blazing skiesA necromantic tower sate,Crag-like on crags, of giant size;Of adamant its walls and gate.And from the storm a hand of mightRed-rolled in thunder, reached amongThe gate's huge bolts—that burst; and nightClanged ruin as its hinges swung.Then far away a murmur trailed,—As of sad seas on cavern'd shores,—That grew into a voice that wailed,"They come! they come! the Moors! the Moors!"And with deep boom of atabalsAnd crash of cymbals and wild pealOf battle-bugles, from its wallsAn army rushed in glimmering steel.And where it trod he saw the torchOf conflagration stalk the skies,And in the vanward of its marchThe monster form of Havoc rise.And Paynim war-cries rent the storm,Athwart whose firmament of flame,Destruction reared an earthquake formOn wreck and death without a name …And then again the vision changed:Where flows the Guadalete, see,The warriors of the Cross are rangedAgainst the Crescent's chivalry.With roar of trumpets and of drumsThey meet; and in the battle's vanHe fights; and, towering towards him, comesFlorinda's father, Julian;And one-eyed Taric, great in war:And where these couch their burning spears,The Christian phalanx, near and far,Goes down like corn before the shears.The Moslem wins: the Christian flies:"Allah il Allah," hill and plainReverberate: the rocking skies,"Allah il Allah," shout again.And then he dreamed the swing of swordsAnd hurl of arrows were no more;But, louder than the howling hordes,Strange silence fell on field and shore.And through the night, it seemed, he fled,Upon a white steed like a star,Across a field of endless dead,Beneath a blood-red scimitar.Of sunset: And he heard a moan,Beneath, around, on every hand—"Accurséd! Yea, what hast thou doneTo bring this curse upon thy land?"And then an awful sense of wings:And, lo! the answer—"'Twas his lustThat was his crime. Behold! E'en kingsMust reckon with Me. All are dust."

Zyps of Zirl

The Alps of the Tyrol are dark with pines,Where, foaming under the mountain spines,The Inn's long water sounds and shines.Beyond, are peaks where the morning weavesAn icy rose; and the evening leavesThe glittering gold of a thousand sheaves.Deep vines and torrents and glimmering haze,And sheep-bells tinkling on mountain ways,And fluting shepherds make sweet the days.The rolling mist, like a wandering fleece,The great round moon in a mountain crease,And a song of love make the nights all peace.Beneath the blue Tyrolean skiesOn the banks of the Inn, that foams and flies,The storied city of Innsbruck lies.With its mediæval streets, that crook,And its gabled houses, it has the lookOf a belfried town in a fairy-book.So wild the Tyrol that oft, 'tis said,When the storm is out and the town in bed,The howling of wolves sweeps overhead.And oft the burgher, sitting hereIn his walled rose-garden, hears the clearShrill scream of the eagle circling near.And this is the tale that the burghers tell:—The Abbot of Wiltau stood at his cellWhere the Solstein lifts its pinnacle.A mighty summit of bluffs and cragsThat frowns on the Inn; where the forest stagsHave worn a path to the water-flags.The Abbot of Wiltau stood below;And he was aware of a plume and bowOn the precipice there in the morning's glow.A chamois, he saw, from span to spanHad leapt; and after it leapt a man;And he knew 't was the Kaiser Maxmilian.But, see! though rash as the chamois he,His foot less sure. And verilyIf the King should miss … "Jesu, Marie!"The King hath missed!"—And, look, he falls!Rolls headlong out to the headlong walls.What saint shall save him on whom he calls?What saint shall save him, who struggles thereOn the narrow ledge by the eagle's lair,With hooked hands clinging 'twixt earth and air?The Abbot, he crosses himself in dread—"Let prayers go up for the nearly dead,And the passing-bell be tolled," he said."For the House of Hapsburg totters; see,How raveled the thread of its destiny,Sheer hung between cloud and rock!" quoth he.But hark! where the steeps of the peak reply,Is it an eagle's echoing cry?And the flitting shadow, its plumes on high?No voice of the eagle is that which rings!And the shadow, a wiry man who swingsDown, down where the desperate Kaiser clings.The crampons bound to his feet, he leapsLike a chamois now; and again he creepsOr twists, like a snake, o'er the fearful deeps."By his cross-bow, baldrick, and cap's black curl,"Quoth the Abbot below, "I know the churl!'T is the hunted outlaw Zyps of Zirl."Upon whose head, or dead or alive,The Kaiser hath posted a price.—Saints shriveThe King!" quoth Wiltau. "Who may contrive"To save him now that his foe is there?"—But, listen! again through the breathless airWhat words are those that the echoes bear?"Courage, my King!—To the rescue, ho!"The wild voice rings like a twanging bow,And the staring Abbot stands mute below.And, lo! the hand of the outlaw graspsThe arm of the King—and death unclaspsIts fleshless fingers from him who gasps.And how he guides! where the clean cliffs wedgeThem flat to their faces; by chasm and ledgeHe helps the King from the merciless edge.Then up and up, past bluffs that shunThe rashest chamois; where eagles sunFierce wings and brood; where the mists are spun.And safe at last stand Kaiser and churlOn the mountain path where the mosses curl—And this the revenge of Zyps of Zirl.

The Glowworm

How long had I sat there and had not beheldThe gleam of the glow-worm till something compelled!…The heaven was starless, the forest was deep,And the vistas of darkness stretched silent in sleep.And late 'mid the trees had I lingered untilNo thing was awake but the lone whippoorwill.And haunted of thoughts for an hour I satOn a lichen-gray rock where the moss was a mat.And thinking of one whom my heart had held dear,Like terrible waters, a gathering fear.Came stealing upon me with all the distressOf loss and of yearning and powerlessness:Till the hopes and the doubts and the sleepless unrestThat, swallow-like, built in the home of my breast,Now hither, now thither, now heavenward flew,Wild-winged as the winds are: now suddenly drew,My soul to abysses of nothingness whereAll light was a shadow, all hope, a despair:Where truth, that religion had set upon high,The darkness distorted and changed to a lie:And dreams of the beauty ambition had fedLike leaves of the autumn fell blighted and dead.And I rose with my burden of anguish and doom,And cried, "O my God, had I died in the womb!"Than born into night, with no hope of the morn,An heir unto shadows, to live so forlorn!"All effort is vain; and the planet called FaithSinks down; and no power is real but death."Oh, light me a torch in the deepening darkSo my sick soul may follow, my sad heart may mark!"—And then in the darkness the answer!—It cameFrom Earth not from Heaven—a glimmering flame,Behold, at my feet! In the shadow it shoneMysteriously lovely and dimly alone:An ember; a sparkle of dew and of glower;Like the lamp that a spirit hangs under a flower:As goldenly green as the phosphorus starA fairy may wear in her diadem's bar:An element essence of moonlight and dawnThat, trodden and trampled, burns on and burns on.And hushed was my soul with the lesson of lightThat God had revealed to me there in the night:Though mortal its structure, material its form,The spiritual message of worm unto worm.

Ghosts

Was it the strain of the waltz that, repeating"Love," so bewitched me? or only the gleamThere of the lustres, that set my heart beating,Feeling your presence as one feels a dream?For, on a sudden, the woman of fashion,Soft at my side in her diamonds and lace,Vanished, and pale with reproach or with passion,You, my dead sweetheart, smiled up in my face.Music, the nebulous lights, and the siftingFragrance of women made amorous the air;Born of these three and my thoughts you came drifting,Clad in dim muslin, a rose in your hair.There in the waltz, that followed the lancers,Hard to my breast did I crush you and hold;Far through the stir and the throng of the dancersOnward I bore you as often of old.Pale were your looks; and the rose in your tressesPaler of hue than the dreams we have lost;—"Who," then I said, "is it sees or who guesses,Here in the hall, that I dance with a ghost?"Gone! And the dance and the music are ended.Gone! And the rapture dies out of the skies.And, on my arm, in her elegance splendid,The woman of fashion smiles up in my eyes.Had I forgotten? and did you remember?—You, who are dead, whom I cannot forget;You, for whose sake all my heart is an emberCovered with ashes of dreams and regret.

The Purple Valleys

Far in the purple valleys of illusionI see her waiting, like the soul of music,With deep eyes, lovelier than cerulean pansies,Shadow and fire, yet merciless as poison;With red lips, sweeter than Arabian storax,Yet bitterer than myrrh.—O tears and kisses!O eyes and lips, that haunt my soul forever!Again Spring walks transcendent on the mountains:The woods are hushed: the vales are blue with shadows:Above the heights, steeped in a thousand splendors,Like some vast canvas of the gods, hangs burningThe sunset's wild sciography: and slowlyThe moon treads heaven's proscenium,—night's statelyWhite queen of love and tragedy and madness.Again I know forgotten dreams and longings;Ideals lost; desires dead and buriedBeside the altar sacrifice erectedWithin the heart's high sanctuary. StrangelyAgain I know the horror and the rapture,The utterless awe, the joy akin to anguish,The terror and the worship of the spirit.Again I feel her eyes pierce through and through me;Her deep eyes, lovelier than imperial pansies,Velvet and flame, through which her fierce will holds me,Powerless and tame, and draws me on and onwardTo sad, unsatisfied and animal yearnings,Wild, unrestrained—the brute within the human—To fling me panting on her mouth and bosom.Again I feel her lips like ice and fire,Her red lips, odorous as Arabian storax,Fragrance and fire, within whose kiss destructionLies serpent-like. Intoxicating languorsResistlessly embrace me, soul and body;And we go drifting, drifting—she is laughing—Outcasts of God, into the deep's abysm.

The Land

of Illusion

ISo we had come at last, my soul and I,Into that land of shadowy plain and peak,On which the dawn seemed ever about to breakOn which the day seemed ever about to die.IILong had we sought fulfillment of our dreams,The everlasting wells of Joy and Youth;Long had we sought the snow-white flow'r of Truth,That blooms eternal by eternal streams.IIIAnd, fonder still, we hoped to find the sweetImmortal presence, Love; the bird DelightBeside her; and, eyed with sidereal night,Faith, like a lion, fawning at her feet.IVBut, scorched and barren, in its arid well,We found our dreams' forgotten fountain-head;And by black, bitter waters, crushed and dead,Among wild weeds, Truth's trampled asphodel.VAnd side by side with pallid Doubt and Pain,Not Love, but Grief did meet us there: afarWe saw her, like a melancholy star,Or pensive moon, move towards us o'er the plain.VISweet was her face as song that sings of home;And filled our hearts with vague, suggestive spellsOf pathos, as sad ocean fills its shellsWith sympathetic moanings of its foam.VIIShe raised one hand and pointed silently,Then passed; her eyes, gaunt with a thirst unslaked,Were worlds of woe, where tears in torrents ached,Yet never fell. And like a winter sea,—VIIIWhose caverned crags are haunts of wreck and wrath,That house the condor pinions of the storm,—My soul replied; and, weeping, arm in arm,To'ards those dim hills, by that appointed path,IXWe turned and went. Arrived, we did discernHow Beauty beckoned, white 'mid miles of flowers,Through which, behold, the amaranthine HoursLike maidens went each holding up an urn;XWherein, it seemed—drained from long chalicesOf those slim flow'rs—they bore mysterious wine;A poppied vintage, full of sleep divineAnd pale forgetting of all miseries.XIThen to my soul I said, "No longer weep.Come, let us drink; for hateful is the sky,And earth is full of care, and life's a lie.So let us drink; yea, let us drink and sleep."XIIThen from their brimming urns we drank sweet must,While, all around us, rose-crowned faces laughedInto our eyes; but hardly had we quaffedWhen, one by one, these crumbled into dust.XIIIAnd league on league the eminence of blooms,That flashed and billowed like a summer sea,Rolled out a waste of thorns and tombs; where beeAnd butterfly and bird hung dead in loomsXIVOf worm and spider. And through tomb and brier,A thin wind, parched with thirsty dust and sand,Went wailing as if mourning some lost landOf perished empire, Babylon or Tyre.XVLong, long with blistered feet we wandered inThat land of ruins, through whose sky of brassHate's Harpy shrieked; and in whose iron grassThe Hydra hissed of undestroyable Sin.XVIAnd there at last, behold, the House of Doom,—Red, as if Hell had glared it into life,Blood-red, and howling with incessant strife,—With burning battlements, towered in the gloom.XVIIAnd throned within sat Darkness.—Who might gazeUpon that form, that threatening presence there,Crowned with the flickering corpse-lights of Despair,And yet escape sans madness and amaze?XVIIIAnd we had hoped to find among these hillsThe House of Beauty!—Curst, yea, thrice accurst,The hope that lures one on from last to firstWith vain illusions that no time fulfills!XIXWhy will we struggle to attain, and strive,When all we gain is but an empty dream?—Better, unto my thinking, doth it seemTo end it all and let who will survive;XXTo find at last all beauty is but dust;That love and sorrow are the very same;That joy is only suffering's sweeter name;And sense is but the synonym of lust.XXIFar better, yea, to me it seems to die;To set glad lips against the lips of Death—The only thing God gives that comforteth,The only thing we do not find a lie.