Classic Poem

——The talk is hushed,
In the domed theatre's self the lights go out
While other lights flash on the eyes,
As the concealing curtain slowly lifts
Upon a mimic world, or grave or gay,
As artist's hand hath wrought.

——The silent throng
Is bound together by one common aim,
One animating thought has brought them there
In rows that curve expectant towards the stage,
For they have come to see the self-same play.
But this the only bond that makes them one,
For each is here upon a different quest,
A difference rooted deep as are their lives;
For they have minds as various
As are the shells the ebbtide leaves upon
The shingle of some island beach.

For some are here on pure amusement bent,
Others come lured by the far fame of her
Who tonight will image forth the tragic fate
Of one who lived and died long since,
Or else imbue the shadowy figment of
A poet's dream with palpitating life.
Others there are in search of sparks to kindle
The slow fire of their torpid brains.
Others have wandered in they scarce know how;
As sand that sifts all imperceptibly
Into some ancient temple's columned hall,
The desert wind that urged it is so far
It hardly seems impelled by any law
But drifting aimlessly has drifted here.

Yet all have come to see the self-same play.
But what they take away is not the same,
For none can go beyond what he has known
And none can feel what was not felt before;
No wandering half-forgotten moment passed,
No volume read, no music heard, but now
Bears fruit in deeper comprehension.
For she whom we have come to see to-night
Is more to be divined and felt than seen,
And when she comes one yields one's heart perforce,
As one might yield some noble instrument
For her to draw its latent music forth.

For she herself vibrates to every thought,
And shades of feeling cross her face like clouds
That trail their shadows over distant hills.
Her being is like an aeolian harp
Clasped in a casement on some summer night
Whence every breeze that passes draws a sound,
Now harsh and wild, now sweet, now quaintly gay,
But always musical, and always true.

Her voice is vibrant with a thousand things;
Is sharp with pain, or choked with tears,
Or rich with love and longing.
Her little inarticulate sounds are sprung
From depths of inner meaning which embrace
A life's chaotic, vast experience.

As if a little, sudden gust of wind
Should blow aside the branches of a tree,
Revealing for an instant to our eyes
The deep night sky all twinkling full of stars,
And then the branch sweep back and shut it out
And leave us wondering, 'neath the rustling leaves.

And as the evening lengthens, bit by bit,
Little by little, we discern the real.
'Tis that which holds us spellbound far, far more
Than even her most consummate art can do,
Through all the passion of a simulated grief
And through the studied anguish learnt by rote
We feel the throbbing of a human soul,
A woman's heart that cries to God and fears!