Classic Poem

I

You ask, O Frank! how Love is born
Within these glowing climes of Morn,
Where envious veils conceal the charms
That tempt a Western lover's arms,
And how, without a voice or sound,
From heart to heart the path is found,
Since on the eye alone is flung
The burden of the silent tongue.
You hearken with a doubtful smile
Whene'er the wandering bards beguile
Our evening indolence with strains
Whose words gush molten through our veins, —
The songs of Love, but half confessed,
Where Passion sobs on Sorrow's breast,
And mighty longings, tender fears,
Steep the strong heart in fire and tears.
The source of each accordant strain
Lies deeper than the Poet's brain.
First from the people's heart must spring
The passions which he learns to sing;
They are the wind, the harp is he,
To voice their fitful melody, —
The language of their varying fate,
Their pride, grief, love, ambition, hate, —
The talisman which holds inwrought
The touchstone of the listener's thought;
That penetrates each vain disguise,
And brings his secret to his eyes.
For, like a solitary bird
That hides among the boughs unheard
Until some mate, whose carol breaks,
Its own betraying song awakes,
So, to its echo in those lays,
The ardent heart itself betrays.
Crowned with a prophet's honor, stands
The Poet, on Arabian sands;
A chief, whose subjects love his thrall, —
The sympathizing heart of all.

II

Vaunt not your Western maids to me,
Whose charms to every gaze are free:
My love is selfish, and would share
Scarce with the sun, or general air,
The sight of beauty which has shone
Once for mine eyes, and mine alone.
Love likes concealment; he can dress
With fancied grace the loveliness
That shrinks behind its virgin veil,
As hides the moon her forehead pale
Behind a cloud, yet leaves the air
Softer than if her orb were there.
And as the splendor of a star,
When sole in heaven, seems brighter far
So shines the eye, Love's star and sun,
The brighter, that it shines alone.
The light from out its darkness sent
Is Passion's life and element;
And when the heart is warm and young,
Let but that single ray be flung
Upon its surface, and the deep
Heaves from its unsuspecting sleep,
As heaves the ocean when its floor
Breaks over the volcano's core.
Who thinks if cheek or lip be fair?
Is not all beauty centred where
The soul looks out, the feelings move,
And Love his answer gives to love?
Look on the sun, and you will find
For other sights your eyes are blind.
Look — if the colder blood you share
Can give your heart the strength to dare —
In eyes of dark and tender fire:
What more can blinded love desire?

III

I was a stripling, quick and bold,
And rich in pride as poor in gold,
When God's good will my journey bent
One day to Shekh Abdallah's tent.
My only treasure was a steed
Of Araby's most precious breed;
And whether't was in boastful whim
To show his mettled speed of limb,
Or that presumption, which, in sooth,
Becomes the careless brow of youth, —
Which takes the world as birds the air,
And moves in freedom everywhere, —
It matters not. But 'midst the tents
I rode in easy confidence,
Till to Abdallah's door I pressed
And made myself the old man's guest.
My " Peace be with you! " was returned
With the grave courtesy he learned
From age and long authority,
And in God's name he welcomed me.
The pipe replenished, with its stem
Of jasmine wood and amber gem,
Was at my lips, and while I drew
The rosy-sweet, soft vapor through
In ringlets of dissolving blue,
Waiting his speech with reverence meet,
A woman's garments brushed my feet,
And first through boyish senses ran
The pulse of love which made me man.
The handmaid of her father's cheer,
With timid grace she glided near,
And, lightly dropping on her knee,
Held out a silver zerf to me,
Within whose cup the fragrance sent
From Yemen's sunburnt berries blent
With odors of the Persian rose.
That picture still in memory glows
With the same heat as then, — the gush
Of fever, with its fiery flush
Startling my blood; and I can see —
As she this moment knelt to me —
The shrouded graces of her form;
The half-seen arm, so round and warm;
The little hand, whose tender veins
Branched through the henna's orange stains;
The head, in act of offering bent;
And through the parted veil, which lent
A charm for what it hid, the eye,
Gazelle-like, large, and dark, and shy,
That with a soft, sweet tremble shone
Beneath the fervor of my own,
Yet could not, would not, turn away
The fascination of its ray,
But half in pleasure, half in fright,
Grew unto mine, and builded bright
From heart to heart a bridge of light.

IV

From the fond trouble of my look
The zerf within her fingers shook,
As with a start, like one who breaks
Some happy trance of thought, and wakes
Unto forgotten toil, she rose
And passed. I saw the curtains close
Behind her steps: the light was gone,
But in the dark my heart dreamed on.
Some random words — thanks ill expressed —
I to the stately Shekh addressed,
With the intelligence which he,
My host, could not demand of me;
How, wandering in the desert chase,
I spied from far his camping-place,
And Arab honor bade me halt
To break his bread and share his salt.
Thereto, fit reverence for his name,
The praise our speech is quick to frame,
Which, empty though it seem, was dear
To the old warrior's willing ear,
And led his thoughts, by many a track,
To deeds of ancient prowess back,
Until my love could safely hide
Beneath the covert of his pride.
And when his " Go with God! " was said,
Upon El-Azrek's back I sped
Into the desert, wide and far,
Beneath the silver evening-star,
And, fierce with passion, without heed
Urged o'er the sands my snorting steed
As if those afrites, feared of man, —
Who watch the lonely caravan,
And, if a loiterer lags behind,
Efface its tracks with sudden wind,
Then fill the air with cheating cries,
And make false pictures to his eyes
Till the bewildered sufferer dies, —
Had breathed on me their demon breath
And spurred me to the hunt of Death.

V

Yet madness such as this was worth
All the cool wisdom of the earth,
And sweeter glowed its wild unrest
Than the old calm of brain and breast.
The image of that maiden beamed
Through all I saw, or thought, or dreamed,
Till she became, like Light or Air,
A part of life. And she shall share,
I vowed, my passion and my fate,
Or both shall fail me, soon or late,
In the vain effort to possess;
For Life lives only in success.
I could not, in her father's sight,
Purchase the hand which was his right,
And well I knew how quick denied
The prayer would be to empty pride;
But Heaven and Earth shall sooner move
Than bar the energy of Love.
The sinews of my life became
Obedient to that single aim,
And desperate deed and patient thought
Together in its service wrought.
Keen as a falcon, when his eye
In search of quarry reads the sky,
I stole unseen, at eventide,
Behind the well, upon whose side
The girls their jars of water leaned.
By one long, sandy hillock screened,
I watched the forms that went and came,
With eyes that sparkled with the flame
Up from my heart in flashes sent,
As one by one they came and went
Amid the sunset radiance cast
On the red sands: they came and passed,
And she, — thank God! — she came at last!

VI

Then, while her fair companion bound
The cord her pitcher's throat around,
And steadied with a careful hand
Its slow descent, upon the sand
At the Shekh's daughter's feet, I sped
A slender arrow, shaft and head
With breathing jasmine-flowers entwined,
And roses such as on the wind
Of evening with rich odors fan
The white kiosks of Ispahan.
A moment, fired with love and hope.
I stayed upon the yellow slope
El-Azrek's hoofs, to see her raise
Her startled eyes in sweet amaze, —
To see her make the unconscious sign
Which recognized the gift as mine,
And place, before she turned to part,
The flowery barb against her heart.

VII

Again the Shekh's divan I pressed:
The jasmine pipe was brought the guest,
And Mariam, lovelier than before,
Knelt with the steamy cup once more.
O bliss! within those eyes to see
A soul of love look out on me, —
A fount of passion, which is truth
In the wild dialect of Youth, —
Whose rich abundance is outpoured
Like worship at a shrine adored,
And on its rising deluge bears
The heart to raptures or despairs.
While from the cup the zerf contained
The foamy amber juice I drained,
A rose-bud in the zerf expressed
The sweet confession of her breast.
One glance of glad intelligence
And silently she glided thence.
" O Shekh! " I cried, as she withdrew,
(Short is the speech where hearts are true,)
" Thou hast a daughter; let me be
A shield to her, a sword to thee! "
Abdallah turned his steady eye
Full on my face, and made reply;
" It cannot be. The treasure sent
By God must not be idly spent.
Strong men there are, in service tried,
Who seek the maiden for a bride;
And shall I slight their worth and truth
To feed the passing flame of youth? "

VIII

" No passing flame! " my answer ran;
" But love which is the life of man,
Warmed with his blood, fed by his breath,
And, when it fails him, leaves but Death.
O Shekh, I hoped not thy consent;
But having tasted in thy tent
And Arab welcome, shared thy bread,
I come to warn thee I shall wed
Thy daughter, though her suitors be
As leaves upon the tamarind-tree.
Guard her as thou mayst guard, I swear
No other bed than mine shall wear
Her virgin honors, and thy race
Through me shall keep its ancient place.
Thou'rt warned, and duty bids no more;
For, when I next approach thy door,
Her child shall intercessor be
To build up peace 'twixt thee and me. "
A little flushed my boyish brow
But calmly then I spake, as now.
The Shekh, with dignity that flung
Rebuke on my impetuous tongue,
Replied: " The young man's hopes are fair;
The young man's blood would all things dare.
But age is wisdom, and can bring
Confusion on the soaring wing
Of reckless youth. Thy words are just,
But needless; for I still can trust
A father's jealousy to shield
From robber grasp the gem concealed
Within his tent, till he may yield
To fitting hands the precious store.
Go, then, in peace; but come no more. "

IX

My only sequin served to bribe
A cunning mother of the tribe
To Mariam's mind my plan to bring.
A feather of the wild dove's wing,
A lock of raven gloss and stain
Sheared from El-Azrek's flowing mane
And that pale flower whose fragrant cup
Is closed until the moon comes up, —
But then a tenderer beauty holds
Than any flower the sun unfolds, —
Declared my purpose. Her reply
Let loose the winds of ecstasy:
Two roses and the moonlight flower
Told the acceptance, and the hour, —
Two daily suns to waste their glow,
And then, at moonrise, bliss — or woe.

X

El-Azrek now, on whom alone
The burden of our fate was thrown,
Claimed from my hands a double meed
Of careful training for the deed.
I gave him of my choicest store —
No guest was ever honored more.
With flesh of kid, with whitest bread
And dates of Egypt was he fed;
The camel's heavy udders gave
Their frothy juice his thirst to lave:
A charger, groomed with better care,
The Sultan never rode to prayer.
My burning hope, my torturing fear,
I breathed in his sagacious ear;
Caressed him as a brother might,
Implored his utmost speed in flight,
Hung on his neck with many a vow,
And kissed the white star on his brow.
His large and lustrous eyeball sent
A look which made me confident,
As if in me some doubt he spied,
And met it with a human pride.
" Enough: I trust thee. 'T is the hour,
And I have need of all thy power.
Without a wing, God gives thee wings,
And Fortune to thy forelock clings. "

XI

The yellow moon was rising large
Above the Desert's dusky marge,
And save the jackal's whining moan,
Or distant camel's gurgling groan,
And the lamenting monotone
Of winds that breathe their vain desire
And on the lonely sands expire,
A silent charm, a breathless spell,
Waited with me beside the well.
She is not there, — not yet, — but soon
A white robe glimmers in the moon.
Her little footsteps make no sound
On the soft sand; and with a bound,
Where terror, doubt, and love unite
To blind her heart to all but flight,
Trembling, and panting, and oppressed,
She threw herself upon my breast.
By Allah! like a bath of flame
The seething blood tumultuous came
From life's hot centre as I drew
Her mouth to mine: our spirits grew
Together in one long, long kiss, —
One swooning, speechless pulse of bliss,
That, throbbing from the heart's core met
In the united lips. Oh, yet
The eternal sweetness of that draught
Renews the thirst with which I quaffed
Love's virgin vintage: starry fire
Leapt from the twilights of desire,
And in the golden dawn of dreams
The space grew warm with radiant beams,
Which from that kiss streamed o'er a sea
Of rapture, in whose bosom we
Sank down, and sank eternally.

XII

Now nerve thy limbs, El-Azrek! Fling
Thy head aloft, and like a wing
Spread on the wind thy cloudy mane!
The hunt is up: their stallions strain
The urgent shoulders close behind,
And the wide nostril drinks the wind.
But thou art, too, of Nedjid's breed,
My brother! and the falcon's speed
Slant down the storm's advancing line
Would laggard be if matched with thine.
Still leaping forward, whistling through
The moonlight-laden air, we flew;
And from the distance, threateningly,
Came the pursuer's eager cry.
Still forward, forward, stretched our flight
Through the long hours of middle night;
One after one the followers lagged,
And even my faithful Azrek flagged
Beneath his double burden, till
The streaks of dawn began to fill
The East, and freshening in the race,
Their goaded horses gained apace.
I drew my dagger, cut the girth,
Tumbled my saddle to the earth,
And clasped with desperate energies
My stallion's side with iron knees;
While Mariam, clinging to my breast,
The closer for that peril pressed.
They come! they come! Their shouts we hear,
Now faint and far, now fierce and near.
O brave El-Azrek! on the track
Let not one fainting sinew slack,
Or know thine agony of flight
Endured in vain! The purple light
Of breaking morn has come at last.
O joy! the thirty leagues are past;
And, gleaming in the sunrise, see,
The white tents of the Aneyzee!
The warriors of the waste, the foes
Of Shekh Abdallah's tribe, are those
Whose shelter and support I claim,
Which they bestow in Allah's name;
While, wheeling back, the baffled few
No longer venture to pursue.

XIII

And now, O Frank! if you would see
How soft the eyes that looked on me
Through Mariam's silky lashes, scan
Those of my little Solyman.
And should you marvel if the child
His stately grandsire reconciled
To that bold theft, when years had brought
The golden portion which he sought,
And what upon this theme befell,
The Shekh himself can better tell.