Enamels and Cameos and other Poems

Théophile Gautier

Enamels and Cameos and other Poems

THE GOD AND THE OPAL

TO THÉOPHILE GAUTIERGray caught he from the cloud, and green from earth,And from a human breast the fire he drew,And life and death were blended in one dew.A sunbeam golden with the morning's mirth,A wan, salt phantom from the sea, a girthOf silver from the moon, shot colour throughThe soul invisible, until it grewTo fulness, and the Opal Song had birth.And then the god became the artisan.With rarest skill he made his gem to glow,Carving and shaping it to beauty suchThat down the cycles it shall gleam to man,And evermore man's wonderment shall knowThe perfect finish, the immortal touch.Agnes Lee.

PREFACE

When empires lay riven apart,Fared Goethe at battle time's thunderTo fragrant oases of art,To weave his Divan into wonder.Leaving Shakespeare, he pondered the noteOf Nisami, and heard in his leisureThe hoopoe's weird monody float,And set it to soft Orient measure.As Goethe at Weimar delayedAnd dreamed in the fair garden closes,And, questing in sun or in shade,With Hafiz plucked redolent roses, —I, closed from the tempest that shookMy window with fury impassioned,Sat dreaming, and, safe in my nook,Enamels and Cameos fashioned.

AFFINITY – A PANTHEISTIC MADRIGAL

On an ancient temple gleaming,Two great blocks of marble highThrice a thousand years lay dreamingDreams against an Attic sky.Set within one silver whiteness,Two wave-tears for Venus shed,Two fair pearls of orient brightness,Through the waste of water sped.In the Generalife's fresh closes,By a Moorish light illumed,Two delicious, tender rosesBy a fountain met and bloomed.In the balm of May's bright weather,Where the domes of Venice rise,Lighted on Love's nest togetherTwo pale doves from azure skies.All things vanish into wonder,Marble, pearl, dove, rose on tree,Pearl shall melt and marble sunder,Flower shall fade and bird shall flee!Not a smallest part but lowlyThrough the crucible must pass,Where all shapes are molten slowlyIn the universal mass.Then as gradual Time disclosesMarbles melt to whitest skin,Roses red to lips of roses,And anew the lives begin.And again the doves are plightedIn the hearts of lovers, whileOcean pearls are reunited,Set within a coral smile.Thus affinity comes welling;By its beauty everywhereSoul a sister-soul foretelling,All awakened and aware.Quickened by a zephyr sunny,Or a perfume, subtlewise,As the bee unto the honey,Atom unto atom flies.And remembered are the hoursIn the temple, down the blue,And the talks amid the flowers,Near the fount of crystal dew,Kisses warm, and on the royalGolden domes the wings that beat;For the atoms all are loyal,And again must love and greet.Love forgotten wakes imperious,For the past is never dead,And the rose with joy deliriousBreathes again from lips of red.Marble on the flesh of maidenFeels its own white bloom, and faintKnows the dove a murmur ladenWith the echo of its plaint,Till resistance giveth over,And the barriers fall undone,And the stranger is the lover,And affinity hath won!You before whose face I tremble,Say – what past we know not ofCalled our fates to reassemble, —Pearl or marble, rose or dove?

THE POEM OF WOMAN MARBLE OF PAROS

Unto the dreamer once whose heart she had,As she was showing forth her treasures rare,Minded she was to read a poem fair,The poem of her form with beauty glad.First stately and superb she swept beforeHis gazing eyes, with high, Infanta mien,Trailing behind her all the splendid sheenOf nacarat floods of velvet that she wore.Thus at the opera had he watched her bendFrom out her box, her body one bright flame,When all the air was ringing with her name,And every song made her fair praise ascend.Then had her art another way, for look!The weighty velvet dropped, and in its placeA pale and cloudy fabric proved the graceOf every line her glowing body took;Till softly from her shoulder marble-sweetThe veil diaphanous fell, the folds whereofCame fluttering downward like a snowy dove,To nestle in the wonder of her feet.She posed as for Apelles pridefully,A lovely flesh and marble womanhood: —Anadyomene, she upright stoodNaked upon the margent of the sea.Fairer than any foam-drops crystalline,Great pearls of Venice lay upon her breast,Jewels of milky wonder lightly pressedUpon the cool, fresh satin of her skin.Exhaustless as the waves that kiss the brim,Under the gleaming moon of many moods,Were all the strophes of her attitudes.What fascination sang her beauty's hymn!But soon, grown weary of an art antique,Of Phidias and of Venus, lo! againWithin another new and plastic strainShe grouped her charms unveiled and unique.Upon a cashmere opulently spread,Sultana of Seraglio then she lay,Laughing unto her little mirror gay,That laughed again with lips of coral red;The indolent, soft Georgian, posturingWith her long, supple narghile at lip,Showing the glorious fashion of her hip,One foot upon the other languishing.And, like to Ingres' Odalisque, supine,Defying prurient modesty turned she,Displaying in her beauty candidlyWonder of curve and purity of line.But hence, thou idle Odalisque! for lifeHath now its own fair picture to display —The diamond in its rare effulgent ray, —Beauty in Love hath reached its blossom rife.She sways her body, bendeth back her head.Her breathing comes more subtle and more fast.Rocked in her dream's alluring arms, at lastDown hath she fallen upon her costly bed.Her eyelids beat like fluttering pinions litUpon the darkened silver of her eyes.Her bright, voluptuous glances upward riseInto the vague and nacreous infinite.Deck her with sweet, lush violets, insteadOf death-flowers with their every pearl a tear;Scatter their purple clusters on her bier,Who of her being's ecstasy lies dead.And bear her very gently to her tomb —Her bed of white. There let the poet stay,Long hours upon his bended knees to pray,When night shall close around the funeral room.

A STUDY OF HANDS

IIMPERIAA sculptor showed to me one dayA hand, a Cleopatra's lure,Or an Aspasia's, cast in clay,Of masterwork a fragment pure.Seized in a snowy kiss, and fairAs lily in the argent riseOf dawn, like whitest poem thereIts beauty lay before mine eyes,Bright in its pallor lustreless,Reposing on a velvet bed,Its fingers, weighted with their dressOf jewels, delicately spread.A little parted lay the thumb,Showing the undulating line,Beautiful, graceful, subtlesome,Of its proud contour Florentine.Strange hand! I wonder if it toyedIn silken locks of Don Juan,Or on a gem-bright caftan joyedTo stroke the beard of some soldan;Whether, as courtesan or queen,Within its fingers fair and slightWas pleasure's gilded sceptre seen,Or sceptre of a royal might!But sweet and firm it must have lainFull oft its touch of power rareUpon the curling lion-maneOf some chimera caught in air.Imperial, idle fantasy,And love of soft, luxurious things,Frenzies of passion, wondrous, free,Impossible dream-flutterings!Romances wild, and poesyOf hasheech and of wine, vain speedsBeneath Bohemia's brilliant skyOn unrestrained and maddened steeds!All these were in the lines of it,Of that white book with magic scrolled,Where ciphers stood, by Venus writ,That Love had trembled to behold.IILACENAIREStrange contrast was the severed handOf Lacenaire, the murderer dead,Soaked in a powerful essence, andNear by upon a cushion spread.Letting a morbid fancy win,I touched, despite my loathing sane,The cold, hair-covered, slimy skin,Not yet washed clean of deathly stain.Yellow, uncanny, mummified,Like to a Pharaoh's hand it lay,And stretched its faun-shaped fingers wide,Crisp with temptation's awful play;As though an itch for flesh and goldLured them to horrors yet to be,Twisting them roughly as of old,Teasing their immobility.There every vice and passion's whimHad seamed the flesh abundantlyWith hideous hieroglyphs and grim,That headsmen read with fluency.There plainly writ in furrows fell,I saw the deeds of sin and soil,Scorchings from every fiery hellWherein corruptions seethe and boil.There was a track of Capri's vice,Of lupanars and gaming-scores,Fretted with wine and blood and dice,Like ennui of old emperors.Supple and fierce, it had some dowerOf grace unto the searching eye,Some brutal fascination's power,A gladiator's mastery.Cold aristocracy of crime!No plane inured, no hammer spentThe hand whose task for every timeHad but the knife for implement.The hand of Lacenaire! No clueTherein to labour's honest pride!False poet, and assassin true,The Manfred of the gutter died!Romances wild, and poesyOf hasheech and of wine, vain speedsBeneath Bohemia's brilliant skyOn unrestrained and maddened steeds!

VARIATIONS ON THE CARNIVAL OF VENICE

ION THE STREETThere is a popular old airThat every fiddler loves to scrape.'T is wrung from organs everywhere,To barking dog with wrath agape.The music-box has registeredIts phrases garbled and reviled.'T is classic to the household bird;Grandmother learned it as a child.The trumpet and the clarinet,In dusty gardens of the dance,Blow it to clerk and gay grisette,In shrill, unlovely resonance.And of a Sunday swarm the folkUnder the honeysuckle vine,Quaffing, the while they talk and smoke,The sun, the melody, the wine.It lurks within the wry bassoonThe blind man plays, the porch beneath.His poodle whimpers low the tune,And holds the cup between its teeth.The players of the light guitar,Decked with their flimsy tartans, pale,With voices sad, where feasters are,Through coffee-houses fling its wail.Great Paganini at a sign,One night, as with a needle's gleam,Picked up with end of bow divineThe little antiquated theme,And, threading it with fingers deft,He broidered it with colours bright,Till up and down the faded weftRan golden arabesques of light.IION THE LAGOONSTra la, tra la, la, la, la, – whoKnows not the theme's soft spell?Or sad or light or mock or true,Our mothers loved it well.The Carnival of Venice! LongAdown canals it came,Till, wafted on a zephyr's song,The ballet kept its fame.I seem, whene'er its phrase I hear,A gondola to view,With prow voluted, black and clear,Slip o'er the water blue;To see, her bosom covered o'erWith pearls, her body suave,The Adriatic Venus soarOn sound's chromatic wave.The domes that on the water dwellPursue the melodyIn clear-drawn cadences, and swellLike breasts of love that sigh.My chains around a pillar cast,I land before a fairAnd rosy-pale facade at last,Upon a marble stair.Oh! all dear Venice with her towers,Her boats, her masquers boon,Her sweet chagrins, her mad, gay hours,Throbs in that ancient tune.The tenuous, vibrant chords that smite,Rebuild in subtle wayThe city joyous, free and lightOf Canaletto's day!IIICARNIVALVenice robes her for the ball;Decked with spangles bright,Multi-coloured CarnivalTeems with laughter light.Harlequin with negro mask,Tights of serpent hue,Beateth with a note fantasqueHis Cassander true.Flapping loose his long, white sleeve,Like a penguin spread,Through a subtle semibrevePierrot thrusts his head.Sleek Bologna's doctor goesMaundering on a bass.Punchinello finds for noseQuaver on his face.Hurtling Trivellino fine,On a trill intent,Scaramouch to ColumbineGives the fan she lent.Gliding to the tune, I markOne veiled figure rise,While through satin lashes darkLuring gleam her eyes.Tender little edge of lace,Heaving with her breath!"Under is her own dear face!"An arpeggio saith.And beneath the mask I knowBloom of rosy lips,And the patch on chin of snow,As she by me trips!IVMOONLIGHTAmid the chatter gay and madSaint Mark to Lido wafts, a tuneLike as a rocket riseth gladAs fountain riseth to the moon.But in that air with laughter stirred,That shakes its bells far out to sea,Regret, a little stifled bird,Mingles its frail sob audibly.And in a mist of memory clad,Like dream well-nigh effaced, I viewThe sweet Beloved, fair and sad,Of dear, long-vanished days I knew.Ah, pale she is! My soul in tearsAn April day remembers yet: —We sought the violets by the meres,And in the grass our fingers met..The vibrant note of violinIs the child voice that struck my heart,Exquisite, plaintive, argentine,With all the anguish of its dart.So sweetly, falsely, doth it steal,So cruel, yet so tender, too,So cold, so burning, that I feelA deadly pleasure pierce me through;Until my heart, an archway deepWhose waters feed the fountain's lip,Lets tears of blood in silence weepInto my bosom drip by drip.O Carnival of Venice! – themeSo chilling sad, yet ever warm!Where laughter toucheth tears supreme, —How hast thou hurt me with thy charm!

SYMPHONY IN WHITE MAJOR

In the Northern tales of eld,From the Rhine's escarpments highSwan-women radiant were beheld,Singing and floating by,Or, leaving their plumage brightOn a bough that was bending low,Displaying skin more gleaming whiteThan the white of their down of snow.At times one comes our way, —Of all she is pallidest,White as the moonbeam's shivering rayOn a glacier's icy crest.Her boreal bloom doth winOur eyes to feasting rareOn rich delight of nacreous skin,And a wealth of whiteness fair.Her rounded breasts, pale globesOf snow, wage insolent warWith her camellias and her robesOf whiteness nebular.In such white wars supremeShe wins, and weft and flowerLeave their revenge's right, and seemYellowed with envy's hour.On the white of her shoulder bare,Whose marble Paros lends,As through the Polar twilight fair,Invisible frost descends.What beaming virgin snow,What pith a reed within,What Host, what taper, did bestowThe white of her matchless skin?Was she made of a milky dropOn the blue of a winter heaven?The lily-blow on the stem's green top?The foam of the sea at even?Of the marble still and cold,Wherein the great gods dwell?Of creamy opal gems that holdFaint fires of mystic spell?Or the organ's ivory keys?Her wingèd fingers oftLike butterflies flit over these,With kisses pending soft.Of the ermine's stainless fold,Whose white, warm touches fallOn shivering shoulders and on bold,Bright shields armorial?Of the phantom flowers of frostEnscrolled on the window clear?Of the fountain drop in the chill air lost,An Undine's frozen tear?Of May bent low with the sweetsOf her bountiful white-thorn bloom?Of alabaster that repeatsThe pallor of grief and gloom?Of the feathers of doves that slipAnd snow on the gable steep?Of slow stalactite's tear-white dripIn cavernous places deep?Came she from Greenland floesWith Seraphita forth?Is she Madonna of the Snows?A sphinx of the icy North,Sphinx buried by avalanche,The glacier's guardian ghost,Whose frozen secrets hide and blanchIn her white heart innermost?What magic of what far nameShall this pale soul ignite?Ah! who shall flush with rose's flameThis cold, implacable white?

COQUETRY IN DEATH

I beg ye grant, when low I lie,Before ye close my coffin-bed,A little black beneath mine eye,And on my cheek a touch of red!Ah, make me beautiful as now!For I would be upon my bier,As on the night of his avowCharming and bloomful, gay and dear.For me no linen winding-sheet!But gown me very grand and bright.Bring forth my frock of muslin sweet,With many ruffles soft and white.My favourite frock! I wore it well,Who wore it at love's flowering.And since his look upon it fell,I've kept it as a sacred thing.For me no funeral coronet,No tear-embroidered cushion place;But o 'er my fair lace pillow letMy hair droop free about my face.Dear pillow! Often did it mark,In mad, sweet nights our brows unlit,And, all within the gondola dark,Did count our kisses infinite.About my waxen hands supine,Folded in prayer at life's deep gloam,My rosary of opals twine,Blessed by His Holiness at Rome.I'll finger it, when bedded coldWhere never one shall rise. How oftHis lips upon my lips have toldA Pater and an Ave soft!

HEART'S DIAMOND

Every lover deep hath setIn a sacred nook apartSome dear token for the heartIn its hope or its regret.One hath nested safe awayBlackest ringlet ever seen,Over which an azure sheenLieth, as on wing of jay.One from shoulder pale as milkTook a tress more golden-fineThan the threads that softly shineIn the silk-worm's wonder-silk.In its hiding mystical,Memory's reliquary sweet,Glances of another greetGloves with fingers white and small.And another yet may listTo inhale a faint perfumeOf the violets from her room,Freshly given – faded, kissed.Here a slipper's curving graceOne with sighing treasureth.There another guards a breathIn a mask's light edge of lace.I've no slipper to revere,Neither glove nor tress nor flower;But I cherish for love's dowerA divine, adorèd tear, —Fallen from the blue above,Clearest dew, heaven's drop for me,Pearl dissolved secretlyIn the chalice of my love.To mine eyes the dim-worn dewBeams, a gem of Orient worth,Standing from the parchment forth,Diamond of a sapphire blue, —Steadfast, lustreful and deep!Tear that fell unhoped, unsought,On a song my soul once wrought,From an eye unused to weep.

SPRING'S FIRST SMILE

While up and down the earth men pant and plod,March, laughing at the showers and days unsteady,And whispering secret orders to the sod,For Spring makes ready.And slyly when the world is sleeping yet,He smooths out collars for the Easter daisies,And fashions golden buttercups to setIn woodland mazes.Coif-maker fine, he worketh well his plan.Orchard and vineyard for his touch are prouder.From a white swan he hath a down to fanThe trees with powder.While Nature still upon her couch doth lean,Stealthily hies he to the garden closes,And laces in their bodices of greenPale buds of roses.Composing his solfeggios in the shade,He whistles them to blackbirds as he treadeth,And violets in the wood, and in the gladeSnowdrops, he spreadeth.Where for the restless stag the fountain wells,His hidden hand glides soft amid the cresses,And scatters lily-of-the-valley bells,In silver dresses.He sinks the sweet, vermilion strawberriesDeep in the grasses for thy roving fingers,And garlands leaflets for thy forehead's ease,When sunshine lingers.When, labour done, he must away, turns heOn April's threshold from his fair creating,And calleth unto Spring: "Come, Spring – for see,The woods are waiting!"

CONTRALTO

There lies within a great museum's hall,Upon a snowy bed of carven stone,A statue ever strange and mystical,With some fair fascination all its own.And is it youth or is it maiden sweet,A goddess or a god come down to sway?Love fearful, hesitating, turns his feet,Nor any word's avowal will betray.Sideways it lieth, with averted face,Stretching its lovely limbs, half mischievous,Unto the curious crowd, an idle graceLighting its marble form luxurious.For fashioning of its evil beauty broughtThe sexes twain each one its magic dower.Man whispers "Aphrodite!" in his thought,And woman "Eros!" wondering at its power.Uncertain sex and certain grace, that seemTo melt forever in a fountain's kiss,Waters that whelm the body as they gleamAnd merge, and it is one with Salmacis.Ardent chimera, effort venturesomeOf Art and Pleasure – figure fanciful!Into thy presence with delight I come,Loving thy beauty strange and multiple.Though I may never close to thee draw nigh,How often have my glances pierced the taut,Straight fold of thine austerest drapery,Fast at the end about thine ankle caught!O dream of poet passing every bound!My thought hath built a fancy of thy form,Till it is molten into silver sound,And boy and girl are one in cadence warm.O tone divine, O richest tone of earth,The beautiful, bright statue's counterpart!Contralto, thou fantastical of birth,The voice's own Hermaphrodite thou art!Thou art the plaintive dove, the linnet rare,Perched on one rose tree, mellow in one note.Thou art fair Juliet and Romeo fair,Singing across the night with one warm throat.Thou art the young wife of the castellan,Chaffing an amorous page below her bower, —Upon her balcony the lady wan,The lover at the base of her high tower.Thou art the yellow butterfly that swings,Pursuing soft a butterfly of snow,In spiral flights and subtle traversings,One winging high, the other winging low;The angel flitting up and down the goldOf the bright stair's aerial extent,The bell in whose alloy of mighty mouldArc voice of bronze and voice of silver blentYea, melody and harmony art thou,Song with its true accompaniment, and graceMatched unto force, – the woman plighting vowTo her Belovèd with a close embrace;Or thou art Cinderella doomed to spendHer night before the embers of the fire,Deep in a conversation with her friend,The cricket, as the latter hours expire;Or Arsaces, the great and valorous,Waging his righteous battle for a realm,Or Tancred with his breastplate luminous,Cuirassed and splendid with his sword and helm;Or Desdemona with her willow song,

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