Classic Poem

In three monologues, with interruptions

1

BEFORE LIGHT

A MONG the first to wake. What wakes with me?
A blind wind and a few birds and a star.
With tremor of darkened flowers and whisper of birds,
Oh, with a tremor, with a tremor of heart —
Begins the day i' the dark. I, newly waked,
Grope backwards for my dreams, thinking to slide
Back unawares to dreams, in vain, in vain.
There is a sorrow for me in this day.
It watched me from afar the livelong night,
And now draws near, but has not touched me yet.
In from my garden flits the secret wind, —
My garden. — This great day with all its hours
(Its hours, my soul!) will be like other days
Among my flowers. The morning will awake,
Like to the lonely waking of a child
Who grows uneasily to a sense of tears,
Because his mother had come and wept and gone;
The morning grass and lilies will be wet,
In all their happiness, with mysterious dews.
And I shall leave the high noon in my garden,
The sun enthroned and all his court my flowers,
And go my journey as I live, — alone.
Then in the ripe rays of the later day
All the small blades of thin grass one by one,
Looked through with sun, will make each a long shade,
And daisies' heads will bend with butterflies.
And one will come with secrets at her heart,
Evening, whose darkening eyes hide all her heart,
And poppy-crowned move 'mid my lonely flowers.
And shall another, I wonder, come with her, —
I, with a heavy secret at my heart,
Uncrowned of all crowns to my garden and flowers?
Thou little home of mine, fair be thy day.
These things will be, but oh, across the hills,
Behind me in the dark, what things will be?
— Well, even if sorrow fills me through and through
Until my life be pain and pain my life,
Shall I not bear myself and my own life?
— A little life, O Lord, a little sorrow.
And I remember once when I was ill
That the whole world seemed breaking through with me,
Who lay so light and still; stillness availed not,
My weakness being a thing of power, I thought.

" Come to the Port to-morrow", says the letter,
And little more, except a few calm words,
Intended to prepare me (and I guess,
I guess for what). He never was too kind,
This man, the one i' the world, kin to my son,
Who knew my crime, who watched me with cold eyes,
And stayed me with calm hands, and hid the thing,
For horror more than pity; and took my son;
And mercifully let me ebb away
In this grey town of undesigned grey lives,
Five years already. To-day he sends for me.
And now I will prevent the dawn with prayers.

2

ABOUT NOON

She shut her five years up within the house.
And towards the noon she lifted up her eyes,
Looked to the gentle hills with a stirred heart,
Moved with the mystery of unknown places
Near to a long-known home; smiled, as she could,
A difficult smile that hurt half of her mouth,
Until she passed the streets and all sharp looks.

" Sharp looks, and since I was a child, sharp looks!
These know not, certainly, who scan me so,
That not a girl of all their brightest girls
Has such an eager heart for smiles as I.
It is no doubt the fault of my cold face
And reticent eyes that never make appeal,
Or plead for the small pale bewildered soul.
If they but knew what a poor child I am!
— Oh, born of all the past, what a poor child!
I could waste golden days and showers of words,
And laugh for nothing, and read my poets again,
And tend a voice I had, songless for ever; —
I would not if I might. I would not cease,
Not if I might, the penance and the pain
For that lost soul down somewhere in the past,
That soul of mine that did and knew such things,
If I could choose; and yet I wish, I wish,
Such little wishes, and so longingly.
Who would believe me, knowing what I am?

" Now from these noontide hills my home, my time,
My life for years lies underneath mine eyes,
And all the years that led up to these years.
I can judge now, and not the world for me.
And I, being what I am, and having done
What I have done, look back upon my youth
— Before my crime, I mean, — and testify:
It was not happy, no, it was not white,
It was not innocent, no, the young fair time.
The people and the years passed in my glass;
And all the insincerity of my thoughts
I laid upon the pure and simple Nature
(Now all the hills and fields are free of me),
Smiling at my elaborate sigh the smile
Of any Greek composing sunny gods.
And now begins my one true white child-time,
This time of desolate altars and all ruins.
For Pan is dead and the altars are in ruins.

" The world is full of endings for me, I find,
Emotions lost, and words and thoughts forgotten.
Yet amid all these last things, there is one,
But one Beginning, a seed within my soul.
Come quickly! and go by quickly, O my years!
Strip me of things and thoughts; as I have seen
The ilex changing leaves; for day by day
A little innocent life grows in my life,
A little ignorant life i' the world-worn life;
And I become a child with a world to learn,
Timorous, with another world to learn,
Timorous, younger, whiter towards my death."

She turned to the strange sea that five long years
Had sent her letters of his misty winds,
Beating a cry of storms in other lands,
And songs of mariners singing over seas;
And having long conjectured of his face,
Seeing his face, paused, thinking of the past.
Down the hills came she to the town and sea,
And met her child's friend where he waited her.
She swayed to his words unsaid, as the green canes
Murmur i' the quiet unto a wind that comes.

" I sent for you, mind, for your sake alone.
— No, my dear ward is well. But it has chanced
(I know it's a hard thing for you to bear,
But you are strong, I know) that he has learnt
What I had faithfully kept, — your life, your past,
Your secret. Well, we hope that you repent,
At least, your son and I."

" God bless my son,
My little son hopes I repent at least."

" When he had read the papers — by mischance —
I would have kept them from him, broken down,
Beside himself at first, though the young heart
Recovered and is calm now, he resolved
On the completest parting, for he thinks
He could not live under one sky with you.
But being unwilling to disturb you now
And vex you in your harmless life, gives up
His hopes in England, his career, and sails
To-night to make a new life in the States.
As to the question of your seeing him
(He is in the town here), I persuaded him
To let you choose, this being probably
The last time in this world. It rests with you."

" I pray you, as we pray morning and night,
Save me from the sick eyes of my one child;
But let me see my one child once. Amen.

" I never came across the hills before
In all these years; now all these years are done.
Who would have said it, yesterday at this hour?
Now my son knows, and I have crossed the hills,
And sure my poor face faces other things.
Not back! not home! anything, anything,
Anything — no, don't turn, I am very calm.
Not back the way I came to-day, not home.
Oh, anything but home and a long life."

" Am I the arbiter? Besides, what fate
Can you desire more merciful than home
And hidden life? And then remember him.
You have borne the separation as it seems
With the most perfect patience. And your life
Ending (as to the world), owes this at least —
It is not much — to his bright beginning life,
Absence and perfect silence till you die.
I've done my duty, as I think, to both.
If you seemed in the least to ask for pity
I well could pity you. I hope that time
Will bring you a softer heart. Good-bye."
" Good-bye."
3

AT TWILIGHT

Gone, O my child forsaking me, my flower.
Yet I forsaken pity you with tears,
Gone while I learn a world to learn a world.
I am to have no part with you again,
And you have many things to share; it's keen, —
I love you, I love you; but more keen is this, —
That you will have no part with me again;
And what have I to share? Pain, happy child.
Gone, gone into the west, for ever gone,
O little one, my flower; not you alone,
My son who are leaving me, but he, the child
Of five years back. That is the worst farewell.
I had not thought him lost until to-day.
But he had kept with me until to-day; —
Never seen, never heard; but he was there,
Behind the door on which I laid my hand,
Out in the garden when I sat within,
A turn of road before me in my walks.
As others greet a presence I did greet
An absence, O my sweet, my sweet surprise!
How will it be now? for he is so changed
I hardly knew the face I saw pass by.
And yet it is the one that must of needs
Grow from that long ago face innocent,
Grave with the presage of a human life.
So, child, giving again in thought my kiss,
My last, long since, I kiss you tall and changed
In that one kiss, and kiss you a man and old,
And so I kiss you dead. And yet, O child,
O child, a certain soul goes from my days;
They fall together like a rosary told,
Not aves now, but beads, — you being gone.

I was not worthy to be comfortless,
I find, and feasts broke in upon my fasts;
And innocent distractions and desires
Surprised me in my penitential tears.
For my absent child God gives me a child in Spring;
New seasons and the fresh and innocent earth,
Ever new years and children of the years,
Kin to the young thoughts of my weary heart,
Chime with the young thoughts of my weary heart,
My kin in all the world. And He Himself
Is young i' the quiet time of cold and snows.
(Mary! who fledst to Egypt with Him; Joseph!
And thou whose tomb I kissed in Padua,
Protect this perilous childhood in my heart!)
But oh, to-night, I know not why, to-night
Out of the earth and sky, out of the sea
My consolations fade. These empty arms
I stretch no more unto the beautiful world,
But clasp them close about the lonely heart
No other arms will clasp. What is thy pain,
What is thy pain, inexplicable heart?
Sorrow for ruined and for desolate days.
Failing in penitence, I, who fail in all,
Leave all my thoughts alone, and lift mine eyes
Quietly to One who makes amends for me.
Peace, O my soul, for thou hast failed in all:
(One thought, at last, that I might take to Heaven!)

It's well I never guessed this thing before, —
I mean the weakness and the littleness
Of that which by God's grace begins in me.
Oh, earthly hopes and wishes, stay with me
(He will be patient); linger, O my loves
And phases of myself, and play with this
New life of grace (as He whose gift it is
Played with the children, a child). How could I bear
To see how little is perfect yet — a speck
If all things else should suddenly wither away?
(And yet they wither away, they wither away.)
Less than I knew, less than I know am I,
Returning childless, but, O Father, a child.

She therefore turned unto the Eastern hills,
Thrilled with a west wind sowing stars. She saw
Her lonely upward way climb to the verge
And ending of the day-time; and she knew
The downward way in presence of the night.
She heard the fitful sheep-bells in the glen
Move like a child's thoughts. There she felt the earth
Lonely in space. And all things suddenly
Shook with her tears. She went with shadowless feet,
Moving along the shadow of the world,
Faring alone to home and a long life,
Setting a twilight face to meet the stars.