Classic Poem

1. SHADOW .

Upon the very morn I should have wed
Death put his silence in a mourning house;
And, coming fresh from feast, I saw her lie
In stainless marriage samite, white and cold,
With orange blossoms in her hair, and gleams
Of the ungiven kisses of the bride
Playing about the edges of her lips.

Then I, Pygmalion, kiss'd her as she slept,
And drew my robe across my face whereon
The midnight revel linger'd dark, and pray'd;
And the sore trouble hollow'd out my heart
To hatred of a harsh unhallow'd youth
As I glode forth. Next, day by day, my soul
Grew conscious of itself and of its fief
Within the shadow of her grave: therewith,
Waken'd a thirst for silence such as dwells
Under the ribs of death: whence slowly grew
Old instincts that had trancid me to tears
In mine unsinew'd boyhood, sympathies
Full of faint odours and of music faint
Like buds of roses blowing; — till I felt
Her voice come down from heaven on my soul,
And stir it as a wind that droppeth down
Unseen, unfelt, unheard, until its breath
Troubles the shadows in a sleeping lake.

And the voice said, " Pygmalion," and " Behold,"
I answer'd, " I am here;" when thus the voice:
" Put men behind thee — take thy tools, and choose
A block of marble white as is a star,
Cleanse it and make it pure, and fashion it
After mine image: heal thyself: from grief
Comes glory, like a rainbow from a cloud.
For surely life and death, which dwell apart
In grosser human sense, conspire to make
The breathless beauty and eternal joy
Of sculptured shapes in stone. Wherefore thy life
Shall purify itself and heal itself
In the long toil of love made meek by tears."

I barr'd the entrance-door to this my tower
Against the hungry world, I hid above
The mastiff-murmur of the town, I pray'd
In my pale chamber. Then I wrought, and chose
A rock of marble white as is a star,
And to her silent image fashion'd clay,
And purified myself and heal'd myself
In the long toil of love made meek by tears.

2. The M ARBLE L IFE .

The multitudinous light oppress'd me not,
But smiled subdued, as a young mother smiles,
When fearful lest the sunbeam of the smile
Trouble the eyelids of the babe asleep.

As Ocean murmurs when the storm is past
And keeps the echoed thunders many days,
My solitude was troublous for a time:
Wherefore I should have harden'd; but the clay
Grew to my touch, and brighten'd, and assumed
Fantastic images of natural things,
Which, melting as the fleecy vapours melt
Around the shining cestus of the moon,
Made promise of the special shape I loved.
Withdrawing back, I gazed. The unshaped stone
Took outline in the dusk, as rocks unhewn
Seen from afar thro' floating mountain mists
Gather strange forms and human lineaments.
And thus mine eye was filled with what I sought
As with a naked image, thus I grew
Self-credulous of the form the stone would wear,
And creeping close I strove to fashion clay
After the vision. Day and night, I drew
New comfort from my grief; my tears became
As honey'd rain that makes the woodbine sweet,
Until my task assumed a precious strength
Wherewith I fortified mine inner ear
Against the pleadings of the popular tongue
That babbled at my door; and when there dawn'd
A hand as pure as milk and cold as snow,
A small white hand, a little radiant hand,
That peep'd out perfect from the changing mass,
And seem'd a portion of some perfect shape
Unfreed, imprison'd in the stone, — I wept
Warm tears of utter joy, and kiss'd the hand,
As sweet girl-mothers kiss the newly born,
Weak as a mother. Then I heard no more
The murmurous swarm beneath me, women and men;
But, hoarded in my toil, I counted not
The coming and the going of the sun:
Save when I swoon'd to sleep before the stone,
And dream'd, and dreaming saw the perfect shape
Emblazon'd, like the rainbow in a stream,
On the transparent tapestry of sleep.

Ah me, the joy, the glory, and the dream,
When like a living wonder senseless stone
Smiles to the beating of a heart that hangs
Suspended in the tumult of the blood!
To the warm touch of my creating hand
The marble was as snow; and like the snow
Whereon the molten sunshine gleams as blood,
It soften'd, glow'd, and changed. As one who stands
Beneath the cool and rustling dark to watch
The shadow of his silently beloved
Cross o'er the lighted cottage blind and feel
The brightness of the face he cannot see,
So stood I, trembling, while the shape unborn
Darken'd across the white and milky mass
And left the impress of its loveliness
To glorify and guide me. As I wrought
The Past came back upon me, like the ghost
Of the To-Come. Whate'er was pure and white,
Soft-shining with a snow-like chastity,
Came back from childhood, and from that dim land
Which lies behind the horizon of the sense,
Felt though forgotten; vanishings divine
Of the strange vapours many-shaped and fair
Which moisten sunrise when the eye of heaven
Openeth dimly from the underworld:
Faint instincts of the helpless babe that smiles
At the sweet pictures in its mother's eyes
And lieth with a halo round its head
Of beauty uncompleted: memories
Of young Love's vivid heaven-enthronid light,
By whose moist rays the pensive soul of youth
Was troubled at the fountains, like a well
Wherein the mirror'd motion of a star
Lies dewy and deep; — and, amid all, there dwelt
A vaguer glory, deeper sense of power,
Scarce conscious of itself yet ruling all,
Like the hid heart which rocks the jaded blood,
Brightens the cheek, throbs music to the brain.
Yet dwells within the breast scarce recognised,
Save when our pulses warn us and in fear
We pause to listen. — Even so at times
Those visions tranced me to a dumb dismay,
And, sudden music thronging in mine ears,
I hearken'd for that central loveliness
Whose magic guided and created all.

Then languor balmier than the blood i' the veins
When youth and maiden mingle and the moon
Breathes on the odorous room wherein they lie
Chamber'd as in a folded rose's leaves,
Oppress'd me, and a lover's rapture fill'd
My soul to swooning. Lo, I kiss'd the stone,
And toy'd with the cold hand, and look'd for light
In the dim onward-looking marble eyes,
And smooth'd the hair until it seem'd to grow
Soft as the living ringlets tingling warm
Against a heaving bosom. ATher feet
I knelt, and tingled to the finger-tips
To gaze upon her breathless loveliness —
Like one who, shuddering, gazes on a shrine
From human eyes kept holy.
Then at last,
Fair-statured, noble, like an awful thing
Frozen upon the very verge of life,
And looking back along eternity
With rayless eyes that keep the shadow Time,
She rose before me in the milky stone,
White-limb'd, immortal; and I gazed and gazed
Like one that sees a vision, and in awe
Half hides his face, yet looks, and seems to dream.

3. The S IN .

B LUE night. I threw the lattice open wide,
Drinking the odorous air; and from my height
I saw the watch-fires of the town and heard
The gradual dying of the murmurous day.
Then, as the twilight deepen'd, on her limbs
The silver lances of the stars and moon
Were shatter'd, and the shining fragments fell
Resplendent aTher feet. The Cyprian star
Quiver'd to liquid emerald where it hung
On the ribb'd ledges of the darkening hills,
Gazing upon her; and, as in a dream,
Methought the marble, underneath that look,
Stirr'd — like a bank of stainless asphodels
Kiss'd into tumult by a wind of light.

Whereat there swam upon me utterly
A drowsy sense wherein my holy dream
Was melted, as a pearl in wine: bright-eyed,
Keen, haggard, passionate, with languid thrills
Of insolent unrest, I watch'd the stone,
And lo, I loved it: not as men love fame,
Not as the warrior loves his laurel wreath,
But with prelusion of a passionate joy
That threw me from the height whereon I stood
To grasp at Glory, and in impiousness
Of sweet communing with some living Soul
Chamber'd in that cold bosom. As I gazed,
There was a buzz of revel in mine ears,
And tinkling fragments of a song of love,
Warbled by wantons over wine-cups, swam
Wildly within the brain. — Then I was shamed
By her pale beauty, and I scorn'd myself,
And standing at the lattice dark and cool
Watch'd the dim winds of twilight enter in,
And draw a veil about that loveliness
White, dim, and breathed on by the common air.

But, like a snake's moist eye, the dewy star
Of lovers drew me; and I watched it grow
Large, soft, and tremulous; and as I gazed
In fascinated impotence of heart,
I pray'd the lifeless silence might assume
A palpable life, and soften into flesh,
And be a beautiful and human joy
To crown my love withal; and thrice the prayer
Blacken'd across my pale face with no word.
But thro' the woolly silver of a cloud
The cool star dripping emerald from the baths
Of Ocean brighten'd in upon my tower,
And touch'd the marble forehead with a gleam
Soft, green, and dewy; and I said " the prayer
Is heard!"
The live-long night, the breathless night
I waited in a darkness, in a dream,
Watching the snowy figure faintly seen,
And ofttimes shuddering when I seem'd to see
Life, like a taper burning in a skull,
Gleam thro' the rayless eyes: yea, wearily
I hearken'd thro' the dark and seem'd to hear
The low warm billowing of a living breast,
Or the slow motion of anointed limbs
New-stirring into life; and, shuddering,
Fearing the thing I hoped for, awful eyed,
On her cold breast I placed a hand as cold
And sought a fluttering heart. — But all was still,
And chill, and breathless; and she gazed right on
With rayless orbs, nor marvell'd at my touch:
White, silent, pure, ineffable, a shape
Rebuking human hope, a deathless thing,
Sharing the wonder of the Sun who sends
His long bright look thro' all futurity.

When Shame lay heavy on me, and I hid
My face, and almost hated her, my work,
Because she was so fair, so human fair,
Yea not divinely fair as that pure face
Which, when mine hour of loss and travail came,
Haunted me, out of heaven. Then the Dawn
Stared in upon her: when I open'd eyes,
And saw the gradual Dawn encrimson her
Like blood that blush'd within her, — and behold
She trembled — and I shriek'd!
With haggard eyes,
I gazed on her, my fame, my work, my love!
Red sunrise mingled with the first bright flush
Of palpable life — she trembled, stirr'd, and sigh'd —
And the dim blankness of her stony eyes
Melted to azure. Then, by slow degrees,
She tingled with the warmth of living blood:
Her eyes were vacant of a seeing soul,
But dewily the bosom rose and fell,
The lips caught sunrise, parting, and the breath
Fainted thro' pearly teeth.
I was as one
Who gazes on a goddess serpent-eyed,
And cannot fly, and knows to look is death.
O apparition of my work and wish!
The weight of awe oppress'd me, and the air
Swung as the Seas swing around drowning men.

4. D EATH IN L IFE .

A BOUTher brow the marble hair had clung
With wavy tresses, in a simple knot
Bound up and braided; but behold, her eyes
Droop'd downward, as she wonder'd aTherself,
Then flush'd to see her naked loveliness,
And trembled, stooping downward; and the hair
Unloosening fell, and brighten'd as it fell,
Till gleaming ringlets tingled to the knees
And cluster'd round abouTher where she stood
As yellow leaves around a lily's bud,
Making a fountain round her such as clips
A Naiad in the sunshine, pouring down
And throwing moving shadows o'er the floor
Whereon she stood and brighten'd.
Wondering eyed,
With softly heaving breast and outstretch'd arms,
Slow as an eyeless man who gropes his way,
She thrust a curving foot and touch'd the ground,
And stirr'd; and, downcast-lidded, saw not me.
Then as the foot descended with no sound,
The whole live blood grew pink within the veins
For joy of its own motion. Step by step,
She paced the chamber, groping till she gain'd
One sunlight-slip that thro' the curtain'd pane
Crept slant — a gleaming line on wall and floor;
And there, in light, she pausing sunn'd herself
With half-closed eyes; while flying gleams of gold
Sparkled like flies of fire among her hair,
And the live blood show'd brightlier, as wine
Gleams thro' a curd-white cup of porcelain.

There, stirring not, she paused and sunn'd herself,
With drooping eyelids that grew moist and warm,
What time, withdrawn into the further dark,
I watch'd her, nerveless, as a murderer stretch'd
Under a nightmare of the murder'd man.
And still she, downcast-lidded, saw me not;
But gather'd glory while she sunn'd herself,
Drawing deep breath of gladness such as earth
Breathes dewily in the sunrise after rain.

Then pray'd I, lifting up my voice aloud.
" O apparition of my work and wish!
Thou most divinely fair as she whose face
Haunted me, out of heaven! Raise thine eyes!
Live, love, as thou and I have lived and loved!
Behold me — it is I — Pygmalion.
Speak, Psyche, with thy human eyes and lips,
Speak, to Pygmalion, with thy human soul!"

And still she, downcast-lidded, saw me not,
But gather'd glory as she sunn'd herself.
Yet listen'd murmuring inarticulate speech,
Listen'd with ear inclined and fluttering lids,
As one who lying on a bed of flowers
Hearkeneth to the distant fall of waves,
That cometh muffled in the drowsy hum
Of bees pavilion'd among roses' leaves
Near to the ears that listen. So she stood
And listen'd to my voice, framing her lips
After the speech; nay, when the sound had ceased,
Still listen'd, with a shadow on her cheek —
Like the Soul's Music, when the Soul has fled,
Fading upon a dead Musician's face.

But, stooping in mine awe, with outstretch'd arms,
I crept to her; nor stirr'd she, till my breath
Was warm upon her neck: then raised she eyes
Of dewy azure, ring in ring of blue
Less'ning in passionate orbs whereon my face
Fell white with yearning wonder; when a cry
Tore her soft lips apart, the gleaming orbs
Widen'd to silvery terror, and she fled,
With yellow locks that shone and arms that waved,
And in the further darkness cower'd and moan'd,
Dumb as a ringdove that with fluttering wings
Watches a serpent in the act to spring.
What follow'd was a strange and wondrous dream
Wherein, half conscious, wearily and long
I wooed away her fears with gentle words,
Smooth gestures, and sweet smiles. — with kindness such
As calms the terror of a new-yean'd lamb,
So pure, it fears its shadow on the grass;
And all the while thick pulses of my heart
Throng'd hot in ears and eyelids, — for my Soul
Seem'd swooning, deaden'd in the sense, like one
Who sinks in snows, and sleeps, and wakes no more.

Yet was I conscious of a hollow void,
A yearning in the tumult of the blood,
Her presence fill'd not, quell'd not; and I search'd
Her eyes for meanings that they harbour'd not,
Her face for beauty that disturb'd it not.
'Twas Psyche's face, and yet 'twas noTher face,
A face most fair, yet not so heavenly fair,
As hers who, when my time of travail came,
Haunted me, out of heaven. For its smile
Brought no good news from realms beyond the sun,
The lips framed heavenly nor human speech,
And to the glorious windows of the eyes
No Soul clomb up — to look upon the stars,
And search the void for glimpses of the peaks
Of that far land of morning whence it comes.

Then, further, I was conscious that my face
Had lull'd her fears; that close to me she came
Tamer than beast, and toy'd with my great beard,
And murmur'd sounds like prattled infants' speech,
And yielding to my kisses kissed again.
Whereat, in scorn of my pale Soul, I cried,
" Here will I feast in honour of this night!"
And spread the board with meats and fruits and wine,
And drew the curtain with a wave of arm
Bidding the sunlight welcome: lastly, snatch'd
A purple robe of richness from the wall,
And flung it o'er her while she kiss'd and smiled,
Girdling the waist with clasp and cord of gold.

Then sat we, side by side. She, queenly stoled,
Amid the gleaming fountain of her hair,
With liquid azure orbs and rosy lips
Gorgeous with honey'd kisses; I, like a man
Who loves fair eyes and knows they are a fiend's,
And in them sees a heav'n he knows is hell.
For, like a glorious feast, she ate and drank,
Staining her lips in crimson wine, and laugh'd
To feel the vinous bubbles froth and burst
In veins whose sparking blood was meet to be
A spirit's habitation. Cup on cup
I drain'd in fulness — careless as a god —
A haggard bearded head upon a breast
In tumult like a sun-kist bed of flowers.

But ere, suffused with light, the eyes of Heaven
Widen'd to gaze upon the white-arm'd Moon,
Stiller than stone we reign'd there, side by side.
Yea, like a lonely King whose Glory sits
Beside him, — impotent of life but fair, —
Brightly apparellid I sat above
The tumult of the town, as on a throne,
Watching her wearily; while far away
The sunset dark'd like dying eyes that shut
Under the waving of an angel's wing.

5. S HADOW .

T HREE days and nights the vision dwelt with me,
Three days and nights we dozed in dreadful state,
Look'd piteously upon by sun and star;
But the third night there pass'd a homeless sound
Across the city underneath my tower,
And lo! there came a roll of muffled wheels,
A shrieking and a hurrying to and fro
Beneath, and I gazed forth. Then far below
I heard the people shriek " A pestilence!"
But, while they shriek'd, they carried forth their Dead,
And flung them out upon the common ways,
And moaning fled: while far across the hills
A dark and brazen sunset ribb'd with black
Glared, like the sullen eyeballs of the plague.

I turn'd to her, the partner of my height:
She, with bright eyeballs sick with wine, and hair
Gleaming in sunset, on a couch asleep.
And lo! a horror lifted up my scalp,
The pulses plunged upon the heart, and fear
Froze my wide eyelids. Peacefully she lay
In purple stole array'd, one little hand
Bruising the downy cheek, the other still
Clutching the dripping goblet, and the light,
With gleams of crimson on the ruinous hair,
Spangling a blue-vein'd bosom whence the robe
Fell back in rifled folds; but dreadful change
Grew pale and hideous on the waxen face,
And in her sleep she did not stir, nor dream.
Therefore, it seem'd, Death pluck'd me by the sleeve,
And, sweeping past, with lean forefinger touch'd
The sleeper's brow and smiled; when, shrinking back,
I turn'd my face away, and saw afar
The brazen sullen sunset ribb'd with black
Glare on her, like the eyeballs of the plague!

O apparition of my work and wish!
Shrieking I fled, my robe across my face,
And left my glory and my woe behind,
And sped, thro' pathless woods, o'er moonlit peaks,
Toward sunrise; — nor have halted since that hour,
But wander far away, a homeless man,
Prophetic, orphan'd both of name and fame.
Nay, like a timid Phantom evermore
I come and go with haggard warning eyes;
And some, that sit with lemans over wine,
Or dally idly with the glorious hour,
Turn cynic eyes away and smile aside;
And some are saved because they see me pass,
And, shuddering, yet constant to their task,
Look up for comfort to the silent stars.