Classic Poem

As Weddah and his troop were coming back
From their first foray, which success made brief,
Scouts met him and in sharp haste turned his track
On special mission to a powerful chief,
Who wavered still between the white and black,
And lurked for mere self-profit like a thief.
This errand well fulfilled, at last he came
To flush her tear-pearls with the ruby fame.

Into the camp full joyously he rode,
Leading his weary escort; as for him,
The love and trust that in his bosom glowed
Had laughed away all weariness of limb.
The sheikhs, his full report heard, all bestowed
Well-measured praises, brief and somewhat grim;
As veterans scanning the enormous night
In which this one star shone so bravely bright.

Then Abd-el-Aziz rose and left the tent,
And he accompanied with eager pace;
And marked not how his frank smiles as he went
Were unreflected in each well-known face;
How joyous greetings he on all sides sent
Brought hollow echoes as from caverned space:
His heart drank sweet wine 'mid the roses singing,
And thought the whole world with like revels ringing.

He entered with his uncle, and his glance
Sank disappointed. But the old man wept
With passion o'er him, eyeing him askance;
And made him eat and drink; and ever kept
Questioning, questioning, as to every chance
Throughout his absence; keen to intercept
The fatal, But my cousin? ready strung
Upon the tense lips by the eager tongue.

At length it flew, the lover's winged dart;
He sped it wreathed with flowers of hope and joy,
It pierced with iron point the old man's heart,
Who quivering cried: You are, then, still a boy!
Love, love, the sweet to meet, the smart to part,
Make all your world of pleasure and annoy!
Is this a time for dalliance in rose bowers?
The vultures gather; do they scent sweet flowers?

It is a time of woe and shame, of strife
Whose victory must be dolorous as defeat:
The sons of Ishmael clutch the stranger's knife
To stab each other; every corpse you meet
Has held a Moslem soul, an Arab life:
The town-serfs prisoned in stark fort and street
Exult while countless tents that freely roam
Perish like proud ships clashing in the foam.

We might learn wisdom from our foes and thralls!
The mongrels of a hundred barbarous races,
Who know not their own sires, appease their brawls,
Leave night and sunward set their impure faces,
To bay in concert round old Syrian walls,
And thrust their three gods on our holy places:
We have one Sire, one Prophet, and one Lord,
And yet against each other turn the sword.

Thus long he groaned with fevered bitterness,
Till, Say at least my Father she is well!
Stung prudence out of patience: Surely yes!
The children of the faith whom Azrael
Hath gathered, do they suffer our distress? —
But smitten by that word the lover fell,
As if at such rash mention of his name
That bird of God with wings of midnight came.

Deep in the shadow of those awful plumes
A night and day and night he senseless lay;
And Abd-el-Aziz cowered 'mid deeper glooms,
Silent in vast despair, both night and day:
It seemed two forms belonging to the tombs
Had been abandoned in that tent; for they
Were stark and still and mute alike, although
The one was conscious of their double woe.

At last death left the balance, and the scale
Of wretched life jarred earth: and in the morn
The lover woke, confused as if a veil
Of heavy dreams involved him; weak and worn
And cold at heart, and wondering what bale
Had wounded him and left him thus forlorn:
So still half-stunned with anguish he lay long,
Fretful to rend the shroud that wrapt his wrong.

He turned; and on the pillow, near his head,
He saw a toy, a trifle, that gave tongue
To mute disaster: forthwith on his bed
The coiled-snake Memory hissed and sprang and stung:
Then all the fury of the storm was shed
From the black swollen clouds that overhung;
The hot rain poured, the fierce gusts shook his soul,
Wild flashes lit waste gloom from pole to pole.

He hardly dared to touch the petty thing,
The talisman of this tremendous spell:
A purse of dark blue silk; a golden ring,
A letter in the hand he knew so well.
Still as he sought to read new gusts would fling
Wet blindness in his vision, and a knell
Of rushing thunder trample through his brain
And tread him down into the swoon again.

He read: Farewell! In one sad word I weave
More thoughts than pen could write or tongue declare.
No other word can Om-el-Bonain leave
To Weddah, save her blessing; and her prayer
That he will quail not, though his heart must grieve,
That all his strength and valour, skill and care,
Shall be devoted loyally to serve
The sacred Tribe, and never self-ward swerve.

For verily the Tribe is all, and we
Are nothing singly save as parts of it:
The one great Nile flows ever to the sea,
The waterdrops for ever change and flit;
And some the first ooze snares, and some may be
The King's sweet draught, proud Cairo's mirror; fit
For all each service of the stream whose fame
They share, by which alone they have a name.

And since I know that you cannot forget,
And am too sure your love will never change,
I leave my image to your soul: but yet
Keep it as shrined and shrouded till the strange
Sad dream of life, illusion and regret,
Is ended; short must be its longest range.
Farewell! Hope gleams the wan lamp in a tomb
Above a corpse that waits the final doom.

This writing was a dear but cruel friend
That dragged him from the deep, and held him fast
Upon life's shore, who would have found an end,
Peace and oblivion. Turn from such a past
To such a future, and unquailing wend
Its infinite hopeless hours! he shrank aghast:
Yet in this utmost weakness swore to make
The dreadful sacrifice for her dear sake.

But when he stood as one about to fall,
And would go weep upon her tomb alone,
And Abd-el-Aziz had to tell him all,
The cry of anguish took a harsher tone:
Rich harem coverlets for funeral pall,
For grave a Syrian marriage couch and throne!
A human rival, breathing mortal breath,
And not the star-cold sanctity of Death!

This truth was as a potent poison-draught,
Fire in the entrails, wild fire in the brain,
Which kindled savage strength in him who quaffed
And did not die of its first maddening pain.
It struck him like the mere malignant shaft
Which stings a warrior into sense again,
Who lay benumbed with wounds, and would have died
Unroused: the fresh wound makes him crawl and hide.

A month he wandered in wild solitude;
And in that month grew old, and yet grew strong:
Now lying prone and still as death would brood
The whole long day through and the whole night long;
Now demon-driven day and night pursued
Stark weariness amidst the clamorous throng
Of thoughts that raged with memory and desire,
And parched, his bruised feet burning, could not tire.

When he came back, o'ermastered by his vow
To serve the Tribe through which he was unblest,
None gazed without remorse upon his brow,
None felt his glance without an aching breast:
Magnificent in beauty even now,
Ravaged by grief and fury and unrest,
He moved among them swift and stern of deed,
And always silent save in action's need.

And thus went forth, and unrejoicingly
Drank deep of war's hot wine: as one who drinks
And only grows more sullen, while yet he
Never the challenge of the full cup shrinks;
And rises pale with horror when the glee
Of careless revellers into slumber sinks,
Because the feast which could not give him joy
At least kept phantoms from their worst annoy.

The Lion of the Azra is come back
A meagre wolf! foes mocked, who mocked no more
When midnight scared them with his fresh attack
After the long day's fighting, and the war
Found him for ever wolf-like on their track,
As if consumed with slakeless thirst of gore:
Since he was cursed from slumber and repose,
He wreaked his restlessness on friends and foes.

The lightnings of his keen sword ever flashed
Without a ray of lightning in his glance;
His blade where blades were thickest clove or clashed
Without a war-cry: ever in advance
He sought out death; but death as if abashed
Adopted for its own his sword and lance,
And rode his steed, and swayed aside or blunted
The eager hostile weapons he affronted.

Once in the thick of battle as he raged
Thus cold and dumb amidst the furious cries,
Hassan the bard was near to him engaged,
And read a weird in those forlorn fixed eyes;
And singing of that combat they had waged
Gave voice to what surpassed his own surmise:
For our young Lion of the mateless doom
Shall never go a cold corpse to the tomb!

Awe silenced him who sang, and deep awe fell
On those who heard it round the campfire's blaze:
But when they questioned he had naught to tell;
The vision had departed from his gaze.
The verse took wing and was a mighty spell;
Upon the foe new terror and amaze,
To friends redoubled force; to one alone,
The hero's self, it long remained unknown.

While Weddah in the South with fiery will
Bore conquest wheresoe'er his banner flew,
Walid with royal heart and patient skill
Upon the Syrian confines triumphed too.
They never met: each felt a savage thrill
Which jarred his inmost being through and through
As still fresh fame the other's fame enlarged:
Each wished his rival in the ranks he charged.

And when the foemen sued at length for peace
To victors surfeited with war's alarms,
Save him who knew all rest in rest must cease,
They said: O warriors, not by your own arms,
Though they are mighty! may their might increase!
But more by Om-el-Bonain's fatal charms,
Possessing both who lost her and who won,
Have we been baffled, vanquished, and undone.

Whence Hassan sang his sudden daring ode
Of Beauty revelling in the storm of fight:
For if the warriors into battle rode,
Their hearts were kindled by her living light;
Either as sun that in pure azure glowed,
Or baleful star in deep despair's black night:
And whether by despair or joy she lit
Intenser fires perplexed the poet's wit.

And would you know why empires break asunder,
Why peoples perish and proud cities fall;
Seek not the captains where the steedclouds thunder,
Seek not the elders in the council hall;
But seek the chamber where some shining wonder
Of delicate beauty nestles, far from all
The turmoil, toying with adornments queenly,
And murmuring songs of tender love serenely.

The clashing cymbals and the trumpet's clangour
Are peacefuller than her soft trembling lute;
The armies raging with hot fire of anger
Are gentler than her gentle glances mute;
The restless rushings of her dainty languor
Outveer the wind, outspeed the barb's pursuit:
Well Hassan knows; who sings high laud and blessing
To this dear fatal riddle past all guessing.

As Weddah and his troop were coming back
From their first foray, which success made brief,
Scouts met him and in sharp haste turned his track
On special mission to a powerful chief,
Who wavered still between the white and black,
And lurked for mere self-profit like a thief.
This errand well fulfilled, at last he came
To flush her tear-pearls with the ruby fame.

Into the camp full joyously he rode,
Leading his weary escort; as for him,
The love and trust that in his bosom glowed
Had laughed away all weariness of limb.
The sheikhs, his full report heard, all bestowed
Well-measured praises, brief and somewhat grim;
As veterans scanning the enormous night
In which this one star shone so bravely bright.

Then Abd-el-Aziz rose and left the tent,
And he accompanied with eager pace;
And marked not how his frank smiles as he went
Were unreflected in each well-known face;
How joyous greetings he on all sides sent
Brought hollow echoes as from caverned space:
His heart drank sweet wine 'mid the roses singing,
And thought the whole world with like revels ringing.

He entered with his uncle, and his glance
Sank disappointed. But the old man wept
With passion o'er him, eyeing him askance;
And made him eat and drink; and ever kept
Questioning, questioning, as to every chance
Throughout his absence; keen to intercept
The fatal, But my cousin? ready strung
Upon the tense lips by the eager tongue.

At length it flew, the lover's winged dart;
He sped it wreathed with flowers of hope and joy,
It pierced with iron point the old man's heart,
Who quivering cried: You are, then, still a boy!
Love, love, the sweet to meet, the smart to part,
Make all your world of pleasure and annoy!
Is this a time for dalliance in rose bowers?
The vultures gather; do they scent sweet flowers?

It is a time of woe and shame, of strife
Whose victory must be dolorous as defeat:
The sons of Ishmael clutch the stranger's knife
To stab each other; every corpse you meet
Has held a Moslem soul, an Arab life:
The town-serfs prisoned in stark fort and street
Exult while countless tents that freely roam
Perish like proud ships clashing in the foam.

We might learn wisdom from our foes and thralls!
The mongrels of a hundred barbarous races,
Who know not their own sires, appease their brawls,
Leave night and sunward set their impure faces,
To bay in concert round old Syrian walls,
And thrust their three gods on our holy places:
We have one Sire, one Prophet, and one Lord,
And yet against each other turn the sword.

Thus long he groaned with fevered bitterness,
Till, Say at least my Father she is well!
Stung prudence out of patience: Surely yes!
The children of the faith whom Azrael
Hath gathered, do they suffer our distress? —
But smitten by that word the lover fell,
As if at such rash mention of his name
That bird of God with wings of midnight came.

Deep in the shadow of those awful plumes
A night and day and night he senseless lay;
And Abd-el-Aziz cowered 'mid deeper glooms,
Silent in vast despair, both night and day:
It seemed two forms belonging to the tombs
Had been abandoned in that tent; for they
Were stark and still and mute alike, although
The one was conscious of their double woe.

At last death left the balance, and the scale
Of wretched life jarred earth: and in the morn
The lover woke, confused as if a veil
Of heavy dreams involved him; weak and worn
And cold at heart, and wondering what bale
Had wounded him and left him thus forlorn:
So still half-stunned with anguish he lay long,
Fretful to rend the shroud that wrapt his wrong.

He turned; and on the pillow, near his head,
He saw a toy, a trifle, that gave tongue
To mute disaster: forthwith on his bed
The coiled-snake Memory hissed and sprang and stung:
Then all the fury of the storm was shed
From the black swollen clouds that overhung;
The hot rain poured, the fierce gusts shook his soul,
Wild flashes lit waste gloom from pole to pole.

He hardly dared to touch the petty thing,
The talisman of this tremendous spell:
A purse of dark blue silk; a golden ring,
A letter in the hand he knew so well.
Still as he sought to read new gusts would fling
Wet blindness in his vision, and a knell
Of rushing thunder trample through his brain
And tread him down into the swoon again.

He read: Farewell! In one sad word I weave
More thoughts than pen could write or tongue declare.
No other word can Om-el-Bonain leave
To Weddah, save her blessing; and her prayer
That he will quail not, though his heart must grieve,
That all his strength and valour, skill and care,
Shall be devoted loyally to serve
The sacred Tribe, and never self-ward swerve.

For verily the Tribe is all, and we
Are nothing singly save as parts of it:
The one great Nile flows ever to the sea,
The waterdrops for ever change and flit;
And some the first ooze snares, and some may be
The King's sweet draught, proud Cairo's mirror; fit
For all each service of the stream whose fame
They share, by which alone they have a name.

And since I know that you cannot forget,
And am too sure your love will never change,
I leave my image to your soul: but yet
Keep it as shrined and shrouded till the strange
Sad dream of life, illusion and regret,
Is ended; short must be its longest range.
Farewell! Hope gleams the wan lamp in a tomb
Above a corpse that waits the final doom.

This writing was a dear but cruel friend
That dragged him from the deep, and held him fast
Upon life's shore, who would have found an end,
Peace and oblivion. Turn from such a past
To such a future, and unquailing wend
Its infinite hopeless hours! he shrank aghast:
Yet in this utmost weakness swore to make
The dreadful sacrifice for her dear sake.

But when he stood as one about to fall,
And would go weep upon her tomb alone,
And Abd-el-Aziz had to tell him all,
The cry of anguish took a harsher tone:
Rich harem coverlets for funeral pall,
For grave a Syrian marriage couch and throne!
A human rival, breathing mortal breath,
And not the star-cold sanctity of Death!

This truth was as a potent poison-draught,
Fire in the entrails, wild fire in the brain,
Which kindled savage strength in him who quaffed
And did not die of its first maddening pain.
It struck him like the mere malignant shaft
Which stings a warrior into sense again,
Who lay benumbed with wounds, and would have died
Unroused: the fresh wound makes him crawl and hide.

A month he wandered in wild solitude;
And in that month grew old, and yet grew strong:
Now lying prone and still as death would brood
The whole long day through and the whole night long;
Now demon-driven day and night pursued
Stark weariness amidst the clamorous throng
Of thoughts that raged with memory and desire,
And parched, his bruised feet burning, could not tire.

When he came back, o'ermastered by his vow
To serve the Tribe through which he was unblest,
None gazed without remorse upon his brow,
None felt his glance without an aching breast:
Magnificent in beauty even now,
Ravaged by grief and fury and unrest,
He moved among them swift and stern of deed,
And always silent save in action's need.

And thus went forth, and unrejoicingly
Drank deep of war's hot wine: as one who drinks
And only grows more sullen, while yet he
Never the challenge of the full cup shrinks;
And rises pale with horror when the glee
Of careless revellers into slumber sinks,
Because the feast which could not give him joy
At least kept phantoms from their worst annoy.

The Lion of the Azra is come back
A meagre wolf! foes mocked, who mocked no more
When midnight scared them with his fresh attack
After the long day's fighting, and the war
Found him for ever wolf-like on their track,
As if consumed with slakeless thirst of gore:
Since he was cursed from slumber and repose,
He wreaked his restlessness on friends and foes.

The lightnings of his keen sword ever flashed
Without a ray of lightning in his glance;
His blade where blades were thickest clove or clashed
Without a war-cry: ever in advance
He sought out death; but death as if abashed
Adopted for its own his sword and lance,
And rode his steed, and swayed aside or blunted
The eager hostile weapons he affronted.

Once in the thick of battle as he raged
Thus cold and dumb amidst the furious cries,
Hassan the bard was near to him engaged,
And read a weird in those forlorn fixed eyes;
And singing of that combat they had waged
Gave voice to what surpassed his own surmise:
For our young Lion of the mateless doom
Shall never go a cold corpse to the tomb!

Awe silenced him who sang, and deep awe fell
On those who heard it round the campfire's blaze:
But when they questioned he had naught to tell;
The vision had departed from his gaze.
The verse took wing and was a mighty spell;
Upon the foe new terror and amaze,
To friends redoubled force; to one alone,
The hero's self, it long remained unknown.

While Weddah in the South with fiery will
Bore conquest wheresoe'er his banner flew,
Walid with royal heart and patient skill
Upon the Syrian confines triumphed too.
They never met: each felt a savage thrill
Which jarred his inmost being through and through
As still fresh fame the other's fame enlarged:
Each wished his rival in the ranks he charged.

And when the foemen sued at length for peace
To victors surfeited with war's alarms,
Save him who knew all rest in rest must cease,
They said: O warriors, not by your own arms,
Though they are mighty! may their might increase!
But more by Om-el-Bonain's fatal charms,
Possessing both who lost her and who won,
Have we been baffled, vanquished, and undone.

Whence Hassan sang his sudden daring ode
Of Beauty revelling in the storm of fight:
For if the warriors into battle rode,
Their hearts were kindled by her living light;
Either as sun that in pure azure glowed,
Or baleful star in deep despair's black night:
And whether by despair or joy she lit
Intenser fires perplexed the poet's wit.

And would you know why empires break asunder,
Why peoples perish and proud cities fall;
Seek not the captains where the steedclouds thunder,
Seek not the elders in the council hall;
But seek the chamber where some shining wonder
Of delicate beauty nestles, far from all
The turmoil, toying with adornments queenly,
And murmuring songs of tender love serenely.

The clashing cymbals and the trumpet's clangour
Are peacefuller than her soft trembling lute;
The armies raging with hot fire of anger
Are gentler than her gentle glances mute;
The restless rushings of her dainty languor
Outveer the wind, outspeed the barb's pursuit:
Well Hassan knows; who sings high laud and blessing
To this dear fatal riddle past all guessing.