 |
But the Raven, sitting lonely on that placid bust, spoke only That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour. Nothing farther then he uttered; not a feather then he fluttered, Till I scarcely more than muttered,—"Other friends have flown before; On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes have flown before." Then the bird said, "Nevermore."
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken, "Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock and store, Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore: Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore Of 'Never—nevermore.'"
But the Raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling, Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door; Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore, What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore— Meant in croaking "Nevermore."
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core; This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight gloated o'er, But whose velvet violet lining with the lamplight gloating o'er She shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer Swung by seraphim whose footfalls tinkled on the tufted floor. "Wretch," I cried, "thy God hath lent thee—by these angels he hath sent thee Respite—respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore! Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!" Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil! prophet still, if bird or devil! Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore, Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted— On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore: Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!" Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil—prophet still, if bird or devil! By that heaven that bends above us—by that God we both adore: Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn, It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore: Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore!" Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!" I shrieked, upstarting: "Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore! Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken! Leave my loneliness unbroken! quit the bust above my door! Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!" Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door; [14] And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming, And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;[15] And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor Shall be lifted—nevermore!
For a general introduction to the selections from Poe, the biographical and critical sketch in Chap. II should be read.
[Footnote 1: This was Mrs. Helen Stannard, the mother of one of Poe's schoolmates in Richmond. Her kind and gracious manner made a deep impression on his boyish heart, and soothed his passionate, turbulent nature. In after years this poem was inspired, as the poet tells us, by the memory of "the one idolatrous and purely ideal love" of his restless youth.]
[Footnote 2: The reference seems to be to the ancient Ligurian town of Nicaea, now Nice, in France. The "perfumed sea" would then be the Ligurian sea. But one half suspects that it was the scholarly and musical sound of the word, rather than any aptness of classical reference, that led to the use of the word "Nicaean."]
[Footnote 3: This appears to be Poe's indefinite and poetic way of saying that the lady's beauty and grace brought him an uplifting sense of happiness. After seeing her the first time, "He returned home in a dream, with but one thought, one hope in life—to hear again the sweet and gracious words that had made the desolate world so beautiful to him, and filled his lonely heart with the oppression of a new joy."—Ingram's Edgar Allan Poe, Vol. I, p. 32.]
[Footnote 4: Psyche was represented as so exquisitely beautiful that mortals did not dare to love, but only to worship her. The poet could pay no higher tribute to "Helen."]
[Footnote 5: This little poem—very beautiful in itself—illustrates Poe's characteristics as a poet: it is indefinite, musical, and intense.]
[Footnote 6: This poem is a tribute to his wife, to whom his beautiful devotion has already been spoken of. "I believe," says Mrs. Osgood, "she was the only woman whom he ever truly loved; and this is evidenced by the exquisite pathos of the little poem lately written, called 'Annabel Lee,' of which she was the subject, and which is by far the most natural, simple, tender, and touchingly beautiful of all his songs."]
[Footnote 7: This is Poe's poetic designation of America.]
[Footnote 8: "Virginia Clemm, born on the 13th of August, 1822, was still a child when her handsome cousin Edgar revisited Baltimore after his escapade at West Point. A more than cousinly affection, which gradually grew in intensity, resulted from their frequent communion, and ultimately, whilst one, at least, of the two cousins was but a child, they were married."—Ingram's Edgar Allan Poe, Vol. I, p. 136.]
[Footnote 9: These were the angels, to whom "Annabel Lee" was akin in sweet, gentle character. "A lady angelically beautiful in person, and not less beautiful in spirit."—Captain Mayne Reid.]
[Footnote 10: This may be literally true. At all events, it is related that he visited the tomb of "Helen"; and "when the autumnal rains fell, and the winds wailed mournfully over the graves, he lingered longest, and came away most regretfully."]
[Footnote 11: This admirable poem is an allegory. The "stately palace" is a man who after a time loses his reason. With this fact in mind, the poem becomes quite clear. The "banners yellow, glorious, golden" is the hair; the "luminous windows" are the eyes; the "ruler of the realm" is reason; "the fair palace door" is the mouth; and the "evil things" are the madman's fantasies. The poem is found in The Fall of the House of Usher.
Poe claimed that Longfellow's Beleaguered City was an imitation of The Haunted Palace. The former should be read in connection with the latter. Though some resemblance may be discerned, Longfellow must be acquitted of Poe's charge of plagiarism.]
[Footnote 12: This terrible lyric is also an allegory. The "theater" is the world, and the "play" human life. The "mimes" are men, created in the image of God, and are represented as the "mere puppets" of circumstance. The "Phantom chased for evermore" is happiness; but for all, the end is death and the grave.]
[Footnote 13: This poem was first published in the New York Evening Mirror, January 29, 1845. "In our opinion," wrote the editor, N. P. Willis, "it is the most effective single example of 'fugitive poetry' ever published in this country; and unsurpassed in English poetry for subtle conception, masterly ingenuity of versification, and consistent sustaining of imaginative lift."
The story of The Raven is given in prose by Poe in his Philosophy of Composition, which contains the best analysis of its structure: "A raven, having learned by rote the single word, 'Nevermore,' and having escaped from the custody of its owner, is driven at midnight, through the violence of a storm, to seek admission at a window from which a light still gleams,—the chamber window of a student, occupied half in poring over a volume, half in dreaming of a beloved mistress deceased. The casement being thrown open at the fluttering of the bird's wings, the bird itself perches on the most convenient seat out of the immediate reach of the student, who, amused by the incident and the oddity of the visitor's demeanor, demands of it, in jest and without looking for a reply, its name. The raven addressed answers with its customary word, 'Nevermore'—a word which finds immediate echo in the melancholy heart of the student, who, giving utterance aloud to certain thoughts suggested by the occasion, is again startled by the fowl's repetition of 'Nevermore.' The student now guesses the state of the case, but is impelled, by the human thirst for self-torture, and in part by superstition, to propound such queries to the bird as will bring him, the lover, the most of the luxury of sorrow, through the anticipated answer, 'Nevermore.'"]
[Footnote 14: As Poe explains, the raven is "emblematical of mournful and never-ending remembrance."]
[Footnote 15: From the position of the bird it has been held that the shadow could not possibly fall upon the floor. But the author says: "My conception was that of the bracket candelabrum affixed against the wall, high up above the door and bust, as is often seen in the English palaces, and even in some of the better houses in New York."]
* * * * *
SELECTIONS FROM PAUL HAMILTON HAYNE
For their generous permission to use Aethra, Under the Pines, Cloud Pictures, and Lyric of Action, the grateful acknowledgments of the editor are due to The Lothrop Publishing Company, Boston, who hold the copyright.
THE WILL AND THE WING [1]
To have the will to soar, but not the wings, Eyes fixed forever on a starry height, Whence stately shapes of grand imaginings Flash down the splendors of imperial light;
And yet to lack the charm [2] that makes them ours, The obedient vassals of that conquering spell, Whose omnipresent and ethereal powers Encircle Heaven, nor fear to enter Hell;
This is the doom of Tantalus [3]—the thirst For beauty's balmy fount to quench the fires Of the wild passion that our souls have nurst In hopeless promptings—unfulfilled desires.
Yet would I rather in the outward state Of Song's immortal temple lay me down, A beggar basking by that radiant gate, [4] Than bend beneath the haughtiest empire's crown!
For sometimes, through the bars, my ravished eyes Have caught brief glimpses of a life divine, And seen a far, mysterious rapture rise Beyond the veil [5] that guards the inmost shrine.
MY STUDY [6]
This is my world! within these narrow walls, I own a princely service;[7] the hot care And tumult of our frenzied life are here But as a ghost and echo; what befalls In the far mart to me is less than naught; I walk the fields of quiet Arcadies,[8] And wander by the brink of hoary seas, Calmed to the tendance of untroubled thought; Or if a livelier humor should enhance The slow-time pulse, 'tis not for present strife, The sordid zeal with which our age is rife, Its mammon conflicts crowned by fraud or chance, But gleamings of the lost, heroic life, Flashed through the gorgeous vistas of romance.
AETHRA [9]
It is a sweet tradition, with a soul Of tenderest pathos! Hearken, love!—for all The sacred undercurrents of the heart Thrill to its cordial music: Once a chief, Philantus, king of Sparta, left the stern And bleak defiles of his unfruitful land— Girt by a band of eager colonists— To seek new homes on fair Italian plains.[10] Apollo's [11] oracle had darkly spoken: "Where'er from cloudless skies a plenteous shower Outpours, the Fates decree that ye should pause And rear your household deities!" Racked by doubt Philantus traversed—with his faithful band Full many a bounteous realm; but still defeat Darkened his banners, and the strong-walled towns His desperate sieges grimly laughed to scorn! Weighed down by anxious thoughts, one sultry eve The warrior—his rude helmet cast aside— Rested his weary head upon the lap Of his fair wife, who loved him tenderly; And there he drank a generous draught of sleep. She, gazing on his brow, all worn with toil, And his dark locks, which pain had silvered over With glistening touches of a frosty rime, Wept on the sudden bitterly; her tears Fell on his face, and, wondering, he woke. "O blest art thou, my Aethra, my clear sky." He cried exultant, "from whose pitying blue A heart-rain falls to fertilize my fate: Lo! the deep riddle's solved—the gods spake truth!"
So the next night he stormed Tarentum,[12] took The enemy's host at vantage, and o'erthrew His mightiest captains. Thence with kindly sway He ruled those pleasant regions he had won,— But dearer even than his rich demesnes The love of her whose gentle tears unlocked The close-shut mystery of the Oracle!
UNDER THE PINE [13]
To the memory of Henry Timrod
The same majestic pine is lifted high Against the twilight sky, The same low, melancholy music grieves Amid the topmost leaves,[14] As when I watched, and mused, and dreamed with him, Beneath these shadows dim.
O Tree! hast thou no memory at thy core Of one who comes no more? No yearning memory of those scenes that were So richly calm and fair, When the last rays of sunset, shimmering down, Flashed like a royal crown?
And he, with hand outstretched and eyes ablaze, Looked forth with burning [15] gaze, And seemed to drink the sunset like strong wine, Or, hushed in trance divine, Hailed the first shy and timorous glance from far Of evening's virgin star?
O Tree! against thy mighty trunk he laid His weary head; thy shade Stole o'er him like the first cool spell of sleep: It brought a peace so deep The unquiet passion died from out his eyes, As lightning from stilled skies.
And in that calm he loved to rest, and hear The soft wind-angels, clear And sweet, among the uppermost branches sighing: Voices he heard replying (Or so he dreamed) far up the mystic height, And pinions rustling light.
O Tree! have not his poet-touch, his dreams So full of heavenly gleams, Wrought through the folded dullness of thy bark, And all thy nature dark Stirred to slow throbbings, and the fluttering fire Of faint, unknown desire?
At least to me there sweeps no rugged ring That girds the forest king, No immemorial stain, or awful rent (The mark of tempest spent), No delicate leaf, no lithe bough, vine-o'ergrown, No distant, flickering cone,
But speaks of him, and seems to bring once more The joy, the love of yore; But most when breathed from out the sunset-land The sunset airs are bland, That blow between the twilight and the night, Ere yet the stars are bright;
For then that quiet eve comes back to me, When deeply, thrillingly, He spake of lofty hopes which vanquish Death; And on his mortal breath A language of immortal meanings hung, That fired his heart and tongue.
For then unearthly breezes stir and sigh, Murmuring, "Look up! 'tis I: Thy friend is near thee! Ah, thou canst not see!" And through the sacred tree Passes what seems a wild and sentient thrill— Passes, and all is still!—
Still as the grave which holds his tranquil form, Hushed after many a storm,— Still as the calm that crowns his marble brow, No pain can wrinkle now,— Still as the peace—pathetic peace of God— That wraps the holy sod,
Where every flower from our dead minstrel's dust Should bloom, a type of trust,— That faith which waxed to wings of heavenward might To bear his soul from night,— That faith, dear Christ! whereby we pray to meet His spirit at God's feet!
CLOUD PICTURES [16]
Here in these mellow grasses, the whole morn, I love to rest; yonder, the ripening corn Rustles its greenery; and his blithesome horn
Windeth the frolic breeze o'er field and dell, Now pealing a bold stave with lusty swell, Now falling to low breaths ineffable
Of whispered joyance. At calm length I lie, Fronting the broad blue spaces of the sky, Covered with cloud-groups, softly journeying by:
An hundred shapes, fantastic, beauteous, strange, Are theirs, as o'er yon airy waves they range At the wind's will, from marvelous change to change;
Castles, with guarded roof, and turret tall, Great sloping archway, and majestic wall, Sapped by the breezes to their noiseless fall!
Pagodas vague! above whose towers outstream Banners that wave with motions of a dream— Rising, or drooping in the noontide gleam;
Gray lines of Orient pilgrims: a gaunt band On famished camels, o'er the desert sand Plodding towards their prophet's Holy Land;
Mid-ocean,—and a shoal of whales at play, Lifting their monstrous frontlets to the day, Thro' rainbow arches of sun-smitten spray;
Followed by splintered icebergs, vast and lone, Set in swift currents of some arctic zone, Like fragments of a Titan's world o'erthrown;
Next, measureless breadths of barren, treeless moor, Whose vaporous verge fades down a glimmering shore, Round which the foam-capped billows toss and roar!
Calms of bright water—like a fairy's wiles, Wooing with ripply cadence and soft smiles, The golden shore-slopes of Hesperian Isles;
Their inland plains rife with a rare increase Of plumed grain! and many a snowy fleece Shining athwart the dew-lit hills of peace;
Wrecks of gigantic cities—to the tune Of some wise air-god built!—o'er which the noon Seems shuddering; caverns, such as the wan Moon
Shows in her desolate bosom; then, a crowd Of awed and reverent faces, palely bowed O'er a dead queen, laid in her ashy shroud—
A queen of eld—her pallid brow impearled By gems barbaric! her strange beauty furled In mystic cerements of the antique world.
Weird pictures, fancy-gendered!—one by one, 'Twixt blended beams and shadows, gold and dun, These transient visions vanish in the sun.
LYRIC OF ACTION [17]
'Tis the part of a coward to brood O'er the past that is withered and dead: What though the heart's roses are ashes and dust? What though the heart's music be fled? Still shine the grand heavens o'erhead, Whence the voice of an angel thrills clear on the soul, "Gird about thee thine armor, press on to the goal!"
If the faults or the crimes of thy youth Are a burden too heavy to bear, What hope can re-bloom on the desolate waste Of a jealous and craven despair? Down, down with the fetters of fear! In the strength of thy valor and manhood arise, With the faith that illumes and the will that defies.
"Too late!" through God's infinite world, From his throne to life's nethermost fires, "Too late!" is a phantom that flies at the dawn Of the soul that repents and aspires. If pure thou hast made thy desires, There's no height the strong wings of immortals may gain Which in striving to reach thou shalt strive for in vain.
Then, up to the contest with fate, Unbound by the past, which is dead! What though the heart's roses are ashes and dust? What though the heart's music be fled? Still shine the fair heavens o'erhead; And sublime as the seraph [18] who rules in the sun Beams the promise of joy when the conflict is won!
For a general introduction to the following poems, see Chapter III. The selections are intended to exhibit the poet's various moods and themes.
[Footnote 1: This poem, which appeared in the volume of 1855 under the title Aspirations, gives expression to a strong literary impulse. It was genuine in sentiment, and its aspiring spirit and forceful utterance gave promise of no ordinary achievement.]
[Footnote 2: An act or formula supposed to exert a magical influence or power.
"Then, in one moment, she put forth the charm Of woven paces and of waving hands." —Tennyson's Merlin and Vivien.
Compare the first scene in Faust where the Earth-spirit comes in obedience to a "conquering spell."]
[Footnote 3: Tantalus was a character of Greek mythology, who, for divulging the secret counsels of Zeus, was afflicted in the lower world with an insatiable thirst. He stood up to the chin in a lake, the waters of which receded whenever he tried to drink of them.]
[Footnote 4: The poet evidently had in mind the lame man who was "laid daily at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful."—Acts iii. 2.]
[Footnote 5: A reference to the veil that hung before the Most Holy Place, or "inmost shrine," of the temple. Compare Exodus xxvi. 33.]
[Footnote 6: This sonnet, which appeared in the volume of 1859, reveals the retiring, meditative temper of the poet. To him quiet reflection was more than action. He loved to dwell in spirit with the good and great of the past. The rude struggles of the market-place for wealth and power were repugnant to his refined and sensitive nature.]
[Footnote 7: Something served for the refreshment of a person; here an intellectual feast fit for a prince.]
[Footnote 8: Arcady, or Arcadia, is a place of ideal simplicity and contentment; so called from a picturesque district in Greece, which was noted for the simplicity and happiness of its people.]
[Footnote 9: This poem will serve to illustrate Hayne's skill in the use of blank verse. It is a piece of rare excellence and beauty. The name of the heroine is pronounced Ee-thra.]
[Footnote 10: This migration occurred about 708 B.C.]
[Footnote 11: Apollo was one of the major deities of Grecian mythology. He was regarded, among other things, as the god of song or minstrelsy, and also as the god of prophetic inspiration. The most celebrated oracle of Apollo was at Delphi.]
[Footnote 12: A town in southern Italy, now Taranto. It was in ancient times a place of great commercial importance.]
[Footnote 13: For the occasion of this poem, see page 61. The poet had a peculiar fondness for the pine, which in one of his poems he calls—
"My sylvan darling! set 'twixt shade and sheen, Soft as a maid, yet stately as a queen!"
It is the subject of a half-dozen poems,—The Voice of the Pines, Aspect of the Pines, In the Pine Barrens, The Dryad of the Pine, The Pine's Mystery, and The Axe and the Pine,—all of them in his happiest vein.]
[Footnote 14: In The Pine's Mystery we read:—
"Passion and mystery murmur through the leaves, Passion and mystery, touched by deathless pain, Whose monotone of long, low anguish grieves For something lost that shall not live again."]
[Footnote 15: Hayne's very careful workmanship is rarely at fault; but here there seems to be an infelicitous epithet that amounts to a sort of tautology. "Eyes ablaze" would necessarily "look forth with burning gaze."]
[Footnote 16: This poem illustrates the poet's method of dealing with Nature. He depicts its beauty as discerned by the artistic imagination. He is less concerned with the messages of Nature than with its lovely forms. This poem, in its felicitous word-painting, reminds us of Tennyson, though it would be difficult to find in the English poet so brilliant a succession of masterly descriptions.
With this poem may be compared Hayne's Cloud Fantasies, a sonnet that brings before us, with great vividness, the somber appearance of the clouds in autumn. See also A Phantom in the Clouds. No other of our poets has dwelt so frequently and so delightfully on the changing aspects of the sky.
Compare Shelley's The Cloud.]
[Footnote 17: It is not often that Hayne assumed the hortatory tone found in this poem. In artistic temperament he was akin to Keats rather than to Longfellow. Even in his didactic poems, he is meditative and descriptive rather than hortatory. The artist in him hardly ever gave place to the preacher.]
[Footnote 18: The seraph's name was Uriel, that is, God's Light. In Revelation (xix. 17) we read, "And I saw an angel standing in the sun." Milton calls him—
"The Archangel Uriel—one of the seven Who in God's presence, nearest to his throne, Stand ready at command." —Paradise Lost, Book III, 648-650.]
* * * * *
SELECTIONS FROM HARRY TIMROD
TOO LONG, O SPIRIT OF STORM [1]
Too long, O Spirit of storm, Thy lightning sleeps in its sheath! I am sick to the soul of yon pallid sky, And the moveless sea beneath.
Come down in thy strength on the deep! Worse dangers there are in life, When the waves are still, and the skies look fair, Than in their wildest strife.
A friend I knew, whose days Were as calm as this sky overhead; But one blue morn that was fairest of all, The heart in his bosom fell dead.
And they thought him alive while he walked The streets that he walked in youth— Ah! little they guessed the seeming man Was a soulless corpse in sooth.
Come down in thy strength, O Storm! And lash the deep till it raves! I am sick to the soul of that quiet sea, Which hides ten thousand graves.
A CRY TO ARMS [2]
Ho! woodsmen of the mountain side! Ho! dwellers in the vales! Ho! ye who by the chafing tide Have roughened in the gales! Leave barn and byre,[3] leave kin and cot, Lay by the bloodless spade; Let desk, and case, and counter rot, And burn your books of trade.
The despot roves your fairest lands; And till he flies or fears, Your fields must grow but armed bands, Your sheaves be sheaves of spears! Give up to mildew and to rust The useless tools of gain; And feed your country's sacred dust With floods of crimson rain!
Come, with the weapons at your call— With musket, pike, or knife; He wields the deadliest blade of all Who lightest holds his life. The arm that drives its unbought blows With all a patriot's scorn, Might brain a tyrant with a rose, Or stab him with a thorn.
Does any falter? let him turn To some brave maiden's eyes, And catch the holy fires that burn In those sublunar skies. Oh! could you like your women feel, And in their spirit march, A day might see your lines of steel Beneath the victor's arch.
What hope, O God! would not grow warm When thoughts like these give cheer? The Lily calmly braves the storm, And shall the Palm Tree fear? No! rather let its branches court The rack [4] that sweeps the plain; And from the Lily's regal port Learn how to breast the strain!
Ho! woodsmen of the mountain side! Ho! dwellers in the vales! Ho! ye who by the roaring tide Have roughened in the gales! Come! flocking gayly to the fight, From forest, hill, and lake; We battle for our Country's right, And for the Lily's sake!
ODE [5]
I
Sleep sweetly in your humble graves, Sleep, martyrs of a fallen cause; Though yet no marble column craves The pilgrim here to pause.
II
In seeds of laurel in the earth The blossom of your fame is blown, And somewhere, waiting for its birth, The shaft is in the stone![6]
III
Meanwhile, behalf [7] the tardy years Which keep in trust your storied tombs, Behold! your sisters bring their tears, And these memorial blooms.
IV
Small tributes! but your shades will smile More proudly on these wreaths to-day, Than when some cannon-molded pile [8] Shall overlook this bay.
V
Stoop, angels, hither from the skies! There is no holier spot of ground Than where defeated valor lies, By mourning beauty crowned.
FLOWER-LIFE [9]
I think that, next to your sweet eyes, And pleasant books, and starry skies, I love the world of flowers; Less for their beauty of a day, Than for the tender things they say, And for a creed I've held alway, That they are sentient powers.[10]
It may be matter for a smile— And I laugh secretly the while I speak the fancy out— But that they love, and that they woo, And that they often marry too, And do as noisier creatures do, I've not the faintest doubt.
And so, I cannot deem it right To take them from the glad sunlight, As I have sometimes dared; Though not without an anxious sigh Lest this should break some gentle tie, Some covenant of friendship, I Had better far have spared.
And when, in wild or thoughtless hours, My hand hath crushed the tiniest flowers, I ne'er could shut from sight The corpses of the tender things, With other drear imaginings, And little angel-flowers with wings Would haunt me through the night.
Oh! say you, friend, the creed is fraught With sad, and even with painful thought, Nor could you bear to know That such capacities belong To creatures helpless against wrong, At once too weak to fly the strong Or front the feeblest foe?
So be it always, then, with you; So be it—whether false or true— I press my faith on none; If other fancies please you more, The flowers shall blossom as before, Dear as the Sibyl-leaves [11] of yore, But senseless every one.
Yet, though I give you no reply, It were not hard to justify My creed to partial ears; But, conscious of the cruel part, My rhymes would flow with faltering art, I could not plead against your heart, Nor reason with your tears.
SONNET [12]
Poet! if on a lasting fame be bent Thy unperturbing hopes, thou wilt not roam Too far from thine own happy heart and home; Cling to the lowly earth and be content!
So shall thy name be dear to many a heart; So shall the noblest truths by thee be taught; The flower and fruit of wholesome human thought Bless the sweet labors of thy gentle art.
The brightest stars are nearest to the earth, And we may track the mighty sun above, Even by the shadow of a slender flower. Always, O bard, humility is power! And thou mayest draw from matters of the hearth Truths wide as nations, and as deep as love.
SONNET [13]
Most men know love but as a part of life;[14] They hide it in some corner of the breast, Even from themselves; and only when they rest In the brief pauses of that daily strife,
Wherewith the world might else be not so rife, They draw it forth (as one draws forth a toy To soothe some ardent, kiss-exacting boy) And hold it up to sister, child, or wife.
Ah me! why may not love and life be one?[15] Why walk we thus alone, when by our side, Love, like a visible God, might be our guide? How would the marts grow noble! and the street, Worn like a dungeon floor by weary feet, Seem then a golden court-way of the Sun!
THE SUMMER BOWER [16]
It is a place whither I have often gone For peace, and found it, secret, hushed, and cool, A beautiful recess in neighboring woods. Trees of the soberest hues, thick-leaved and tall. Arch it o'erhead and column it around, Framing a covert, natural and wild, Domelike and dim; though nowhere so enclosed But that the gentlest breezes reach the spot Unwearied and unweakened. Sound is here A transient and unfrequent visitor; Yet, if the day be calm, not often then, Whilst the high pines in one another's arms Sleep, you may sometimes with unstartled ear Catch the far fall of voices, how remote You know not, and you do not care to know. The turf is soft and green, but not a flower Lights the recess, save one, star-shaped and bright— I do not know its name—which here and there Gleams like a sapphire set in emerald. A narrow opening in the branched roof, A single one, is large enough to show, With that half glimpse a dreamer loves so much, The blue air and the blessing of the sky. Thither I always bent my idle steps, When griefs depressed, or joys disturbed my heart, And found the calm I looked for, or returned Strong with the quiet rapture in my soul.[17] But one day, One of those July days when winds have fled One knows not whither, I, most sick in mind With thoughts that shall be nameless, yet, no doubt, Wrong, or at least unhealthful, since though dark With gloom, and touched with discontent, they had No adequate excuse, nor cause, nor end, I, with these thoughts, and on this summer day, Entered the accustomed haunt, and found for once No medicinal virtue. Not a leaf Stirred with the whispering welcome which I sought, But in a close and humid atmosphere, Every fair plant and implicated bough Hung lax and lifeless. Something in the place, Its utter stillness, the unusual heat, And some more secret influence, I thought, Weighed on the sense like sin. Above I saw, Though not a cloud was visible in heaven, The pallid sky look through a glazed mist Like a blue eye in death. The change, perhaps, Was natural enough; my jaundiced sight, The weather, and the time explain it all: Yet have I drawn a lesson from the spot, And shrined it in these verses for my heart. Thenceforth those tranquil precincts I have sought Not less, and in all shades of various moods; But always shun to desecrate the spot By vain repinings, sickly sentiments, Or inconclusive sorrows. Nature, though Pure as she was in Eden when her breath Kissed the white brow of Eve, doth not refuse, In her own way and with a just reserve, To sympathize with human suffering;[18] But for the pains, the fever, and the fret Engendered of a weak, unquiet heart, She hath no solace; and who seeks her when These be the troubles over which he moans, Reads in her unreplying lineaments Rebukes, that, to the guilty consciousness, Strike like contempt.
For a general introduction to the following selections, see Chapter IV. The poet's verse is perfectly clear. He prefers to
"Cling to the lowly and be content."
[Footnote 1: This poem, which first appeared in Russell's Magazine, exhibits one of Timrod's characteristics: he does not describe Nature for its own sake, as Hayne often does, but for the sake of some truth or lesson in relation to man. The lesson of this poem is that a life of uninterrupted ease and comfort is not favorable to the development of noble character.]
[Footnote 2: This selection illustrates the fierce energy of the poet's martial lyrics. Compare Bannockburn by Burns, which Carlyle said "should be sung with the throat of the whirlwind."]
[Footnote 3: Byre is a cow-stable.]
[Footnote 4: Rack, usually wrack, signifies ruin or destruction.]
[Footnote 5: This lyric, which was sung on the occasion of decorating the graves of the Confederate dead in Magnolia Cemetery, Charleston, South Carolina, in 1867, has been much admired, especially the last stanza.]
[Footnote 6: It is interesting to know that this prediction has been fulfilled. A monument of granite now stands above the dead.]
[Footnote 7: Behalf, instead of in behalf of, is a rather hazardous construction.]
[Footnote 8: A noble bronze figure of a color bearer on a granite pedestal now commemorates the fallen heroes.]
[Footnote 9: This poem first appeared in the Southern Literary Messenger in 1851. The first stanza of this half-playful, half-serious piece, mentions the objects in which the poet most delighted.]
[Footnote 10: This belief has been frequently held, and has some support from recent scientific experiments. But that this sentiency goes as far as the poet describes, is of course pure fancy.]
[Footnote 11: The sibyls (Sybil is an incorrect form) were, according to ancient mythology, prophetic women. The sibylline leaves or books contained their teachings, and were preserved with the utmost care in Rome. The sibyl of Cumae conducted Aeneas through the under world, as narrated in the sixth book of Virgil's Aeneid.]
[Footnote 12: This sonnet expresses the poet's creed, to which his practice was confirmed. This fact imparts unusual simplicity to his verse—a simplicity that strikes us all the more at the present time, when an over-refinement of thought and expression is in vogue.]
[Footnote 13: This sonnet, on the commonest of all poetic themes, treats of love in a deep, serious way. It is removed as far as possible from the sentimental.]
[Footnote 14: This line reminds us of a well-known passage in Byron:— "Man's love is of man's life a thing apart; 'Tis woman's whole existence. Man may range The court, camp, church, the vessel and the mart; Sword, gown, gain, glory, offer in exchange Pride, fame, ambition, to fill up his heart, And few there are whom these cannot estrange."]
[Footnote 15: This is the divine ideal, the realization of which will bring the true "Golden Age." "God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him."—I John iv. 16.]
[Footnote 16: This poem first appeared in the Southern Literary Messenger in 1852. It will serve to show Timrod's manner of using blank verse. It will be observed that "a lesson" is again the principal thing.]
[Footnote 17: This recalls the closing lines of Longfellow's Sunrise on the Hills:—
"If thou art worn and hard beset With sorrows that thou wouldst forget, If thou wouldst read a lesson that will keep Thy heart from fainting and thy soul from sleep, Go to the woods and hills! No tears Dim the sweet look that Nature wears."]
[Footnote 18: Compare the following lines from Bryant's Thanatopsis:—
"To him who in the love of Nature holds Communion with her visible forms, she speaks A various language; for his gayer hours She has a voice of gladness, and a smile And eloquence of beauty, and she glides Into his darker musings, with a mild And healing sympathy, that steals away Their sharpness, ere he is aware."]
* * * * *
SELECTIONS FROM SIDNEY LANIER
SONG OF THE CHATTAHOOCHEE [1]
Out of the hills of Habersham, Down the valleys of Hall,[2] The hurrying rain,[3] to reach the plain, Has run the rapid and leapt the fall, Split at the rock and together again, Accepted his bed, or narrow or wide, And fled from folly on every side, With a lover's pain to attain the plain, Far from the hills of Habersham, Far from the valleys of Hall.
All down the hills of Habersham, All through the valleys of Hall, The rushes cried, Abide, abide; The wilful water weeds held me thrall, The laurel, slow-laving,[4] turned my tide, The ferns and the fondling grass said stay, The dewberry dipped for to win delay,[5] And the little reeds sighed Abide, abide, Here in the hills of Habersham, Here in the valleys of Hall.
High over the hills of Habersham, Veiling the valleys of Hall, The hickory told me manifold Fair tales of shade, the poplar tall Wrought me her shadowy self to hold, The chestnut, the oak, the walnut, the pine, Overleaning, with flickering meaning and sign, Said, Pass not so cold these manifold Deep shades of the hills of Habersham, These glades in the valleys of Hall.
And oft in the hills of Habersham, And oft in the valleys of Hall, The white quartz shone, and the smooth brook-stone Barred[6] me of passage with friendly brawl, And many a metal lay sad, alone, And the diamond, the garnet, the amethyst, And the crystal that prisons a purple mist, Showed lights like my own from each cordial stone[7] In the clefts of the hills of Habersham, In the beds of the valleys of Hall.
But oh, not the hills of Habersham, And oh, not the valleys of Hall, Shall hinder the rain from attaining the plain,[8] For downward the voices of duty call— Downward to toil and be mixed with the main. The dry fields burn and the mills are to turn, And a thousand meadows [9] mortally yearn, And the final [10] main from beyond the plain Calls o'er the hills of Habersham, And calls through the valleys of Hall.
THE CRYSTAL [11]
At midnight, death's and truth's unlocking time, When far within the spirit's hearing rolls The great soft rumble of the course of things— A bulk of silence in a mask of sound— When darkness clears our vision that by day Is sun-blind, and the soul's a ravening owl For truth, and flitteth here and there about Low-lying woody tracts of time and oft Is minded for to sit upon a bough, Dry-dead and sharp, of some long-stricken tree And muse in that gaunt place,—'twas then my heart, Deep in the meditative dark, cried out:
Ye companies of governor-spirits grave, Bards, and old bringers-down of flaming news From steep-walled heavens, holy malcontents, Sweet seers, and stellar visionaries, all That brood about the skies of poesy, Full bright ye shine, insuperable stars; Yet, if a man look hard upon you, none With total luster blazeth, no, not one But hath some heinous freckle of the flesh Upon his shining cheek, not one but winks His ray, opaqued with intermittent mist Of defect; yea, you masters all must ask Some sweet forgiveness, which we leap to give, We lovers of you, heavenly-glad to meet Your largess so with love, and interplight Your geniuses with our mortalities.
Thus unto thee, O sweetest Shakspere sole,[12] A hundred hurts a day I do forgive ('Tis little, but, enchantment! 'tis for thee): Small curious quibble; ... Henry's fustian roar Which frights away that sleep he invocates;[13] Wronged Valentine's [14] unnatural haste to yield; Too-silly shifts of maids that mask as men In faint disguises that could ne'er disguise— Viola, Julia, Portia, Rosalind;[15] Fatigues most drear, and needless overtax Of speech obscure that had as lief be plain.
... Father Homer, thee, Thee also I forgive thy sandy wastes Of prose and catalogue,[16] thy drear harangues That tease the patience of the centuries, Thy sleazy scrap of story,—but a rogue's Rape of a light-o'-love,[17]—too soiled a patch To broider with the gods.
Thee, Socrates,[18] Thou dear and very strong one, I forgive Thy year-worn cloak, thine iron stringencies That were but dandy upside-down,[19] thy words Of truth that, mildlier spoke, had manlier wrought.
So, Buddha,[20] beautiful! I pardon thee That all the All thou hadst for needy man Was Nothing, and thy Best of being was But not to be.
Worn Dante,[21] I forgive The implacable hates that in thy horrid hells Or burn or freeze thy fellows, never loosed By death, nor time, nor love.
And I forgive Thee, Milton, those thy comic-dreadful wars [22] Where, armed with gross and inconclusive steel, Immortals smite immortals mortalwise, And fill all heaven with folly.
Also thee, Brave Aeschylus,[23] thee I forgive, for that Thine eye, by bare bright justice basilisked, Turned not, nor ever learned to look where Love Stands shining.
So, unto thee, Lucretius [24] mine, (For oh, what heart hath loved thee like to this That's now complaining?) freely I forgive Thy logic poor, thine error rich, thine earth Whose graves eat souls and all.
Yea, all you hearts Of beauty, and sweet righteous lovers large: Aurelius [25] fine, oft superfine; mild Saint A Kempis,[26] overmild; Epictetus,[27] Whiles low in thought, still with old slavery tinct; Rapt Behmen,[28] rapt too far; high Swedenborg,[29] O'ertoppling; Langley,[30] that with but a touch Of art hadst sung Piers Plowman to the top Of English songs, whereof 'tis dearest, now, And most adorable; Caedmon,[31] in the morn A-calling angels with the cowherd's call That late brought up the cattle; Emerson, Most wise, that yet, in finding Wisdom, lost Thy Self, sometimes; tense Keats, with angels' nerves Where men's were better; Tennyson, largest voice Since Milton, yet some register of wit Wanting,—all, all, I pardon, ere 'tis asked, Your more or less, your little mole that marks Your brother and your kinship seals to man. But Thee, but Thee, O sovereign Seer of time, But Thee, O poets' Poet, Wisdom's Tongue, But Thee, O man's best Man, O love's best Love, O perfect life in perfect labor writ, O all men's Comrade, Servant, King, or Priest,— What if or yet, what mole, what flaw, what lapse, What least defect or shadow of defect, What rumor, tattled by an enemy, Of inference loose, what lack of grace Even in torture's grasp, or sleep's, or death's,— Oh, what amiss may I forgive in Thee, Jesus, good Paragon, thou Crystal Christ?[32]
SUNRISE [33]
In my sleep I was fain of their fellowship, fain Of the live-oak, the marsh, and the main. The little green leaves would not let me alone in my sleep; Up breathed from the marshes, a message of range and of sweep, Interwoven with waftures of wild sea-liberties, drifting, Came through the lapped leaves sifting, sifting, Came to the gates of sleep.
Then my thoughts, in the dark of the dungeon-keep Of the Castle of Captives hid in the City of Sleep, Upstarted, by twos and by threes assembling: The gates of sleep fell a-trembling Like as the lips of a lady that forth falter yes, Shaken with happiness: The gates of sleep stood wide.
I have waked, I have come, my beloved! I might not abide: I have come ere the dawn, O beloved, my live-oaks, to hide In your gospeling glooms,[34]—to be As a lover in heaven, the marsh my marsh and the sea my sea. Tell me, sweet burly-barked, man-bodied Tree That mine arms in the dark are embracing, dost know From what fount are these tears at thy feet which flow? They rise not from reason, but deeper inconsequent deeps. Reason's not one that weeps. What logic of greeting lies Betwixt dear over-beautiful trees and the rain of the eyes?
O cunning green leaves, little masters! like as ye gloss All the dull-tissued dark with your luminous darks that emboss. The vague blackness of night into pattern and plan, So, (But would I could know, but would I could know,) With your question embroid'ring the dark of the question of man,— So, with your silences purfling this silence of man While his cry to the dead for some knowledge is under the ban, Under the ban,— So, ye have wrought me Designs on the night of our knowledge,—yea, ye have taught me, So, That haply we know somewhat more than we know.
Ye lispers, whisperers, singers in storms, Ye consciences murmuring faiths under forms, Ye ministers meet for each passion that grieves, Friendly, sisterly, sweetheart leaves,[35] Oh, rain me down from your darks that contain me Wisdoms ye winnow from winds that pain me,— Sift down tremors of sweet-within-sweet That advise me of more than they bring,—repeat Me the woods-smell that swiftly but now brought breath From the heaven-side bank of the river of death,— Teach me the terms of silence,—preach me The passion of patience,—sift me,—impeach me,— And there, oh there As ye hang with your myriad palms upturned in the air, Pray me a myriad prayer.[36]
My gossip, the owl,—is it thou That out of the leaves of the low-hanging bough, As I pass to the beach, art stirred? Dumb woods, have ye uttered a bird?
Reverend Marsh, low-couched along the sea, Old chemist, rapt in alchemy, Distilling silence,—lo, That which our father-age had died to know— The menstruum that dissolves all matter—thou Hast found it: for this silence, filling now The globed clarity of receiving space, This solves us all: man, matter, doubt, disgrace, Death, love, sin, sanity, Must in yon silence' clear solution lie. Too clear! That crystal nothing who'll peruse? The blackest night could bring us brighter news. Yet precious qualities of silence haunt Round these vast margins, ministrant. Oh, if thy soul's at latter gasp for space, With trying to breathe no bigger than thy race Just to be fellowed, when that thou hast found No man with room, or grace enough of bound To entertain that New thou tell'st, thou art,— 'Tis here, 'tis here, thou canst unhand thy heart And breathe it free, and breathe it free, By rangy marsh, in lone sea-liberty.
The tide's at full: the marsh with flooded streams Glimmers, a limpid labyrinth of dreams. Each winding creek in grave entrancement lies A rhapsody of morning-stars. The skies Shine scant with one forked galaxy,— The marsh brags ten: looped on his breast they lie.
Oh, what if a sound should be made! Oh, what if a bound should be laid To this bow-and-string tension of beauty and silence a-spring,— To the bend of beauty the bow, or the hold of silence the string! I fear me, I fear me yon dome of diaphanous gleam Will break as a bubble o'erblown in a dream,— Yon dome of too-tenuous tissues of space and of night, Overweighted with stars, overfreighted with light, Oversated with beauty and silence, will seem But a bubble that broke in a dream, If a bound of degree to this grace be laid, Or a sound or a motion made.
But no: it is made: list! somewhere,—mystery, where? In the leaves? in the air? In my heart? is a motion made: 'Tis a motion of dawn, like a nicker of shade on shade. In the leaves 'tis palpable: low multitudinous stirring Upwinds through the woods; the little ones, softly conferring, Have settled my lord's to be looked for; so; they are still; But the air and my heart and the earth are a-thrill,— And look where the wild duck sails round the bend of the river,— And look where a passionate shiver Expectant is bending the blades Of the marsh-grass in serial shimmers and shades,— And invisible wings, fast fleeting, fast fleeting, Are beating The dark overhead as my heart beats,—and steady and free Is the ebb-tide flowing from marsh to sea— (Run home, little streams, With your lapfuls of stars and dreams),— And a sailor unseen is hoisting a-peak, For list, down the inshore curve of the creek How merrily flutters the sail,— And lo, in the East! Will the East unveil? The East is unveiled, the East hath confessed A flush: 'tis dead; 'tis alive; 'tis dead, ere the West Was aware of it: nay, 'tis abiding, 'tis withdrawn: Have a care, sweet Heaven! 'Tis Dawn.
Now a dream of a flame through that dream of a flush is uprolled: To the zenith ascending, a dome of undazzling gold Is builded, in shape as a beehive, from out of the sea: The hive is of gold undazzling, but oh, the Bee, The star-fed Bee, the build-fire Bee, Of dazzling gold is the great Sun-Bee That shall flash from the hive-hole over the sea.[37] Yet now the dewdrop, now the morning gray, Shall live their little lucid sober day Ere with the sun their souls exhale away. Now in each pettiest personal sphere of dew The summ'd morn shines complete as in the blue Big dewdrop of all heaven: with these lit shrines O'er-silvered to the farthest sea-confines, The sacramental marsh one pious plain Of worship lies. Peace to the ante-reign Of Mary Morning, blissful mother mild, Minded of nought but peace, and of a child.
Not slower than Majesty moves, for a mean and a measure Of motion,—not faster than dateless Olympian leisure [38] Might pace with unblown ample garments from pleasure to pleasure,— The wave-serrate sea-rim sinks unjarring, unreeling, Forever revealing, revealing, revealing, Edgewise, bladewise, halfwise, wholewise,—'tis done! Good-morrow, lord Sun! With several voice, with ascription one, The woods and the marsh and the sea and my soul Unto thee, whence the glittering stream of all morrows doth roll, Cry good and past-good and most heavenly morrow, lord Sun.
O Artisan born in the purple,—Workman Heat,— Parter of passionate atoms that travail to meet And be mixed in the death-cold oneness,—innermost Guest At the marriage of elements,—fellow of publicans,—blest King in the blouse of flame, that loiterest o'er The idle skies, yet laborest fast evermore,— Thou in the fine forge-thunder, thou, in the beat Of the heart of a man, thou Motive,—Laborer Heat: Yea, Artist, thou, of whose art yon sea's all news, With his inshore greens and manifold mid-sea blues, Pearl-glint, shell-tint, ancientest perfectest hues, Ever shaming the maidens,—lily and rose Confess thee, and each mild flame that glows In the clarified virginal bosoms of stones that shine, It is thine, it is thine:
Thou chemist of storms, whether driving the winds a-swirl Or a-flicker the subtiler essences polar that whirl In the magnet earth,—yea, thou with a storm for a heart, Rent with debate, many-spotted with question, part From part oft sundered, yet ever a globed light, Yet ever the artist, ever more large and bright Than the eye of a man may avail of:—manifold One, I must pass from thy face, I must pass from the face of the Sun:
Old Want is awake and agog, every wrinkle a-frown; The worker must pass to his work in the terrible town: But I fear not, nay, and I fear not the thing to be done; I am strong with the strength of my lord the Sun: How dark, how dark soever the race that must needs be run, I am lit with the Sun.
Oh, never the mast-high run of the seas Of traffic shall hide thee, Never the hell-colored smoke of the factories Hide thee, Never the reek of the time's fen-politics Hide thee, And ever my heart through the night shall with knowledge abide thee, And ever by day shall my spirit, as one that hath tried thee, Labor, at leisure, in art,—till yonder beside thee My soul shall float, friend Sun, The day being done.
For a general introduction to Lanier's poetry, see Chapter V.
[Footnote 1: This poem was first published in Scott's Magazine, Atlanta, Georgia, from which it is here taken. It at once became popular, and was copied in many newspapers throughout the South. It was subsequently revised, and the changes, which are pointed out below, are interesting as showing the development of the poet's artistic sense.
The singularly rapid and musical lilt of this poem may be readily traced to its sources. It is due to the skillful use of short vowels, liquid consonants, internal rhyme, and constant alliteration. These are matters of technique which Lanier studiously employed throughout his poetry.
This poem abounds in seeming irregularities of meter. The fundamental measure is iambic tetrameter, as in the line—
"The rushes cried, Abide, abide";
but trochees, dactyls, or anapests are introduced in almost every line, yet without interfering with the time element of the verse. These irregularities were no doubt introduced in order to increase the musical effects.]
[Footnote 2: As may be seen by reference to a map, the Chattahoochee rises in Habersham County, in northeastern Georgia, and in its south- westerly course passes through the adjoining county of Hall. Its entire length is about five hundred miles.]
[Footnote 3: Changed in the revision to "I hurry amain," with the present tense of the following verbs. The pronoun "his" in line 6 becomes "my."]
[Footnote 4: This line was changed to—
"The laving laurel turned my tide."]
[Footnote 5: In this line the use of a needless antiquated form may be fairly questioned. In the revised form "win" is changed to "work."]
[Footnote 6: "Barred" is changed to "did bar" in the revision—a doubtful gain.]
[Footnote 7: The preceding four lines show a decided poetic gain in the revised form:—
"And many a luminous jewel lone— Crystals clear or a-cloud with mist, Ruby, garnet, and amethyst— Made lures with the lightnings of streaming stone."]
[Footnote 8: The revised form, with an awkward pause after the first foot, and also a useless antiquated phrase, reads—
"Avail! I am fain for to water the plain."]
[Footnote 9: Changed to "myriad of flowers."]
[Footnote 10: "Final" was changed to "lordly" with fine effect. This poem challenges comparison with other pieces of similar theme. It lacks the exquisite workmanship of Tennyson's The Brook, with its incomparable onomatopoeic effects:—
"I chatter over stony ways, In little sharps and trebles; I bubble into eddying bays, I babble on the pebbles."
It should be compared with Hayne's The River and also with his The Meadow Brook:—
"Tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, Hark! the tiny swell; Of wavelets softly, silverly Toned like a fairy bell, Whose every note, dropped sweetly In mellow glamour round, Echo hath caught and harvested In airy sheaves of sound!"
But The Song of the Chattahoochee has what the other poems lack, —a lofty moral purpose. The noble stream consciously resists the allurements of pleasure to heed "the voices of duty," and this spirit imparts to it a greater dignity and weight.]
[Footnote 11: This poem appeared in The Independent, July 15, 1880, from which it is taken. It illustrates the intellectual rather than the musical side of Lanier's genius. It is purely didactic, and thought rather than melody guides the poet's pen. The meter is quite regular,—an unusual thing in our author's most characteristic work.
It shows Lanier's use of pentameter blank verse,—a use that is somewhat lacking in ease and clearness. The first sentence is longer than that of Paradise Lost, without Milton's unity and force. Such ponderous sentences are all too frequent in Lanier, and as a result he is sometimes obscure. Repeated readings are necessary to take in the full meaning of his best work.
This poem, though not bearing the distinctive marks of his genius, is peculiarly interesting for two reasons,—it gives us an insight into his wide range of reading and study, and it exhibits his penetration and sanity as a critic. In the long list of great names he never fails to put his finger on the vulnerable spot. Frequently he is exceedingly felicitous, as when he speaks of "rapt Behmen, rapt too far," or of "Emerson, Most wise, that yet, in finding Wisdom, lost Thy Self sometimes."]
[Footnote 12: It will be remembered that Lanier was a careful student of Shakespeare, on whom he lectured to private classes in Baltimore.]
[Footnote 13: See second part of King Henry IV, iii. I. The passage which the poet had in mind begins:—
"How many thousand of my poorest subjects Are at this hour asleep!"]
[Footnote 14: See The Two Gentlemen of Verona.]
[Footnote 15: These characters are found as follows: Viola in Twelfth Night; Julia in The Two Gentlemen of Verona; Portia in The Merchant of Venice; and Rosalind in As You Like It.]
[Footnote 16: Referring to the well-known catalogue of ships in the Second Book of the Illiad:—
"My song to fame shall give The chieftains, and enumerate their ships."
It is in this passage in particular that Homer is supposed to nod.]
[Footnote 17: It will be recalled that Paris, son of Priam, king of Troy, persuaded Helen, the fairest of women and wife of King Menelaus of Greece, to elope with him to Troy. This incident gave rise to the famous Trojan War.]
[Footnote 18: Socrates (469-399 B.C.) was an Athenian philosopher, of whom Cicero said that he "brought down philosophy from the heavens to the earth." His teachings are preserved in Xenophon's Memorabilia and Plato's Dialogues.]
[Footnote 19: That is to say, his needless austerity was as much affected as the dandy's excessive and ostentatious refinement.]
[Footnote 20: Buddha, meaning the enlightened one, was Prince Siddhartha of Hindustan, who died about 477 B.C. He was the founder of the Buddhist religion, which teaches that the supreme attainment of mankind is Nirvana or extinction. This doctrine naturally follows from the Buddhist assumption that life is hopelessly evil. Many of the moral precepts of Buddhism are closely akin to those of Christianity.]
[Footnote 21: Dante Alighieri (1265-1321), a native of Florence, is the greatest poet of Italy and one of the greatest poets of the world. His immortal poem, The Divine Comedy, is divided into three parts —"Hell," "Purgatory," and "Paradise."]
[Footnote 22: This is a reference to the wars among the angels, which ended with the expulsion of Satan and his hosts from heaven, as related in the sixth book of Paradise Lost. This criticism of Milton is as just as it is felicitous.]
[Footnote 23: Aeschylus (525-456 B.C.) was the father of Greek tragedy. He presents destiny in its sternest aspects. His Prometheus Bound has been translated by Mrs. Browning, and his Agamemnon by Robert Browning—two dramas that exhibit his grandeur and power at their best.]
[Footnote 24: Lucretius (about 95-51 B.C.) was the author of a didactic poem in six books entitled De Rerum Natura. It is Epicurean in morals and atheistic in philosophy. At the same time, as a work of art, it is one of the most perfect poems that have descended to us from antiquity.]
[Footnote 25: Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121-180 A.D.), one of the best emperors of Rome, was a noble Stoic philosopher. His Meditations is regarded by John Stuart Mill as almost equal to the Sermon on the Mount in moral elevation.]
[Footnote 26: Thomas a Kempis (1379-1471) was the author of the famous Imitation of Christ in which, as Dean Milman says, "is gathered and concentered all that is elevating, passionate, profoundly pious in all the older mystics." No other book, except the Bible, has been so often translated and printed.]
[Footnote 27: Epictetus (born about 50 A.D.) was a Stoic philosopher, many of whose moral teachings resemble those of Christianity. But he unduly emphasized renunciation, and wished to restrict human aspiration to the narrow limits of the attainable.]
[Footnote 28: Jacob Behmen, or Boehme (1575-1624), was a devout mystic philosopher, whose speculations, containing much that was beautiful and profound, sometimes passed the bounds of intelligibility.]
[Footnote 29: Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772) was a Swedish philosopher and theologian. His principal work, Arcana Caelestia, is made up of profound speculations and spiritualistic extravagance. He often oversteps the bounds of sanity.]
[Footnote 30: William Langland, or Langley (about 1332-1400), a disciple of Wycliffe, was a poet, whose Vision of Piers Plowman, written in strong, alliterative verse, describes, in a series of nine visions, the manifold corruptions of society, church, and state in England.]
[Footnote 31: Caedmon (lived about 670) was a cowherd attached to the monastery of Whitby in England. Later he became a poet, and wrote on Scripture themes in his native Anglo-Saxon. His Paraphrase, is, next to Beowulf, the oldest Anglo-Saxon poem in existence.]
[Footnote 32: Lanier was deeply religious, but his beliefs were broader than any creed. In Remonstrance he exclaims,—
"Opinion, let me alone: I am not thine. Prim Creed, with categoric point, forbear To feature me my Lord by rule and line."
Yet, as shown in the conclusion of The Crystal he had an exalted sense of the unapproachable beauty of the life and teachings of Christ. His tenderest poem is A Ballad of Trees and the Master:—
"Into the woods my Master went, Clean forspent, forspent. Into the woods my Master came, Forspent with love and shame. But the olives they were not blind to Him, The little gray leaves were kind to Him; The thorn-tree had a mind to Him, When into the woods He came.
"Out of the woods my Master went, And He was well content. Out of the woods my Master came, Content with death and shame. When Death and Shame would woo Him last, From under the trees they drew Him last: 'Twas on a tree they slew Him—last When out of the woods He came."]
[Footnote 33: This poem was first published in The Independent, December 14, 1882, from which it is here taken. The editor said, "This poem, we do not hesitate to say, is one of the few great poems that have been written on this side of the ocean." With this judgment there will be general agreement on the part of appreciative readers. On the emotional side, it may be said to reach the high-water mark of poetic achievement in this country. Its emotion at times reaches the summits of poetic rapture; a little more, and it would have passed into the boundary of hysterical ecstasy.
The circumstances of its composition possess a melancholy interest. It was Lanier's last and greatest poem. He penciled it a few months before his death when he was too feeble to raise his food to his mouth and when a burning fever was consuming him. Had he not made this supreme effort, American literature would be the poorer. This poem exhibits, in a high degree, the poet's love for Nature. Indeed, most of his great pieces— The Marshes of Glynn, Clover, Corn, and others—are inspired by the sights and sounds of Nature. Sunrise, in general tone and style, closely resembles The Marshes of Glynn.
The musical theories of Lanier in relation to poetry find their highest exemplification in Sunrise. It is made up of all the poetic feet —iambics, trochees, dactyls, anapests—so that it almost defies any attempt at scansion. But the melody of the verse never fails; equality of time is observed, along with a rich use of alliteration and assonance.
The poem may be easily analyzed; and a distinct notation of its successive themes may be helpful to the young reader. Its divisions are marked by its irregular stanzas. It consists of fifteen parts as follows: 1. The call of the marshes to the poet in his slumbers, and his awaking. 2. He comes as a lover to the live-oaks and marshes. 3. His address to the "man-bodied tree," and the "cunning green leaves." 4. His petition for wisdom and for a prayer of intercession. 5. The stirring of the owl. 6. Address to the "reverend marsh, distilling silence." 7. Description of the full tide. 8. "The bow-and-string tension of beauty and silence." 9. The motion of dawn. 10. The golden flush of the eastern sky. 11. The sacramental marsh at worship. 12. The slow rising of the sun above the sea horizon. 13. Apostrophe to heat. 14. The worker must pass from the contemplation of this splendor to his toil. 15. The poet's inextinguishable adoration of the sun.]
[Footnote 34: "Gospeling glooms" means glooms that convey to the sensitive spirit sweet messages of good news.]
[Footnote 35: Lanier continually attributes personality to the objects of Nature, and places them in tender relations to man. Here the little leaves become—
"Friendly, sisterly, sweetheart leaves,"
as a few lines before they were "little masters." In Individuality we read,—
"Sail on, sail on, fair cousin Cloud."
And in Corn there is a passage of great tenderness:—
"The leaves that wave against my cheek caress Like women's hands; the embracing boughs express A subtlety of mighty tenderness; The copse-depths into little noises start, That sound anon like beatings of a heart, Anon like talk 'twixt lips not far apart."]
[Footnote 36: This passage is Wordsworthian in spirit. Nature is regarded as a teacher who suggests or reveals ineffable things. Lanier might have said, as did Wordsworth,—
"To me the meanest flower that blows can give Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears."]
[Footnote 37: Lanier had a lively and vigorous imagination, which is seen in his use of personification and metaphor. In this poem almost every object—trees, leaves, marsh, streams, sun, heat—is personified. This same fondness for personification may be observed in his other characteristic poems.
In the use of metaphor it may be doubted whether the poet is always so happy. There is sometimes inaptness or remoteness in his resemblances. To liken the naming heavens to a beehive, and the rising sun to a bee issuing from the "hive-hole," can hardly be said to add dignity to the description.
In Clover men are clover heads, which the Course-of-things, as an ox, browses upon:—
"This cool, unasking Ox Comes browsing o'er my hills and vales of Time, And thrusts me out his tongue, and curls it, sharp, And sicklewise, about my poets' heads, And twists them in.... and champs and chews, With slantly-churning jaws and swallows down."]
[Footnote 38: The deities of Olympus, being immortal, have no need of strenuous haste. They may well move from pleasure to pleasure with stately leisure.]
* * * * *
SELECTIONS FROM FATHER RYAN
SONG OF THE MYSTIC [1]
I walk down the Valley of Silence—[2] Down the dim, voiceless valley—alone! And I hear not the fall of a footstep Around me, save God's and my own; And the hush of my heart is as holy As hovers where angels have flown!
Long ago was I weary of voices Whose music my heart could not win; Long ago was I weary of noises That fretted my soul with their din; Long ago was I weary of places Where I met but the human—and sin.[3]
I walked in the world with the worldly; I craved what the world never gave; And I said: "In the world each Ideal, That shines like a star on life's wave, Is wrecked on the shores of the Real, And sleeps like a dream in a grave."
And still did I pine for the Perfect, And still found the False with the True; I sought 'mid the Human for Heaven, But caught a mere glimpse of its Blue; And I wept when the clouds of the Mortal Veiled even that glimpse from my view.
And I toiled on, heart-tired of the Human, And I moaned 'mid the mazes of men, Till I knelt, long ago, at an altar, And I heard a voice call me. Since then I walked down the Valley of Silence That lies far beyond mortal ken.
Do you ask what I found in the Valley? 'Tis my Trysting Place with the Divine. And I fell at the feet of the Holy, And above me a voice said: "Be Mine." And there arose from the depths of my spirit An echo—"My heart shall be thine."
Do you ask how I live in the Valley? I weep—and I dream—and I pray. But my tears are as sweet as the dewdrops That fall on the roses in May; And my prayer like a perfume from censers, Ascendeth to God night and day.
In the hush of the Valley of Silence I dream all the songs that I sing;[4] And the music floats down the dim Valley, Till each finds a word for a wing, That to hearts, like the dove of the deluge A message of peace they may bring.
But far on the deep there are billows That never shall break on the beach; And I have heard songs in the Silence That never shall float into speech; And I have had dreams in the Valley Too lofty for language to reach.
And I have seen thoughts in the Valley— Ah me! how my spirit was stirred! And they wear holy veils on their faces, Their footsteps can scarcely be heard: They pass through the Valley like virgins, Too pure for the touch of a word![5]
Do you ask me the place of the Valley, Ye hearts that are harrowed by care? It lieth afar between mountains, And God and His angels are there: And one is the dark mount of Sorrow, And one the bright mountain of Prayer.
THE CONQUERED BANNER [6]
Furl that Banner, for 'tis weary; Round its staff 'tis drooping dreary; Furl it, fold it, it is best; For there's not a man to wave it, And there's not a sword to save it, And there's not one left to lave it In the blood which heroes gave it; And its foes now scorn and brave it; Furl it, hide it—let it rest![7]
Take that Banner down! 'tis tattered; Broken is its staff and shattered; And the valiant hosts are scattered Over whom it floated high. Oh! 'tis hard for us to fold it; Hard to think there's none to hold it; Hard that those who once unrolled it Now must furl it with a sigh.
Furl that Banner! furl it sadly! Once ten thousands hailed it gladly, And ten thousands wildly, madly, Swore it should forever wave; Swore that foeman's sword should never Hearts like theirs entwined dissever, Till that flag should float forever O'er their freedom or their grave!
Furl it! for the hands that grasped it, And the hearts that fondly clasped it, Cold and dead are lying low; And that Banner—it is trailing! While around it sounds the wailing Of its people in their woe.
For, though conquered, they adore it! Love the cold, dead hands that bore it! Weep for those who fell before it! Pardon those who trailed and tore it![8] But, oh! wildly they deplore it, Now who furl and fold it so.
Furl that Banner! True, 'tis gory, Yet 'tis wreathed around with glory, And 'twill live in song and story, Though its folds are in the dust: For its fame on brightest pages, Penned by poets and by sages, Shall go sounding down the ages—
Furl its folds though now we must. Furl that Banner, softly, slowly! Treat it gently—it is holy— For it droops above the dead. Touch it not—unfold it never, Let it droop there, furled forever, For its people's hopes are dead![9]
THE SWORD OF ROBERT LEE [10]
Forth from its scabbard, pure and bright, Flashed the sword of Lee! Far in the front of the deadly fight, High o'er the brave in the cause of Right, Its stainless sheen, like a beacon light, Led us to victory.
Out of its scabbard, where full long It slumbered peacefully, Roused from its rest by the battle's song, Shielding the feeble, smiting the strong, Guarding the right, avenging the wrong, Gleamed the sword of Lee.
Forth from its scabbard, high in air Beneath Virginia's sky— And they who saw it gleaming there, And knew who bore it, knelt to swear That where that sword led they would dare To follow—and to die.
Out of its scabbard! Never hand Waved sword from stain as free; Nor purer sword led braver band, Nor braver bled for a brighter land, Nor brighter land had a cause so grand, Nor cause a chief like Lee![11]
Forth from its scabbard! How we prayed That sword might victor be; And when our triumph was delayed, And many a heart grew sore afraid, We still hoped on while gleamed the blade Of noble Robert Lee.
Forth from its scabbard all in vain Bright flashed the sword of Lee; 'Tis shrouded now in its sheath again, It sleeps the sleep of our noble slain, Defeated, yet without a stain, Proudly and peacefully.
DEATH [12]
Out of the shadows of sadness, Into the sunshine of gladness, Into the light of the blest; Out of a land very dreary, Out of the world very weary, Into the rapture of rest.
Out of to-day's sin and sorrow, Into a blissful to-morrow, Into a day without gloom; Out of a land filled with sighing, Land of the dead and the dying, Into a land without tomb.
Out of a life of commotion, Tempest-swept oft as the ocean, Dark with the wrecks drifting o'er, Into a land calm and quiet; Never a storm cometh nigh it, Never a wreck on its shore.
Out of a land in whose bowers Perish and fade all the flowers; Out of the land of decay, Into the Eden where fairest Of flowerets, and sweetest and rarest, Never shall wither away.
Out of the world of the wailing Thronged with the anguished and ailing; Out of the world of the sad, Into the world that rejoices— World of bright visions and voices— Into the world of the glad.
Out of a life ever mournful, Out of a land very lornful, Where in bleak exile we roam,[13] Into a joy-land above us, Where there's a Father to love us— Into our home—"Sweet Home."
PRESENTIMENT [14]
Cometh a voice from a far-land, Beautiful, sad, and low; Shineth a light from the star-land Down on the night of my woe; And a white hand, with a garland, Biddeth my spirit to go.
Away and afar from the night-land, Where sorrow o'ershadows my way, To the splendors and skies of the light-land, Where reigneth eternity's day,— To the cloudless and shadowless bright-land, Whose sun never passeth away.
And I knew the voice; not a sweeter On earth or in Heaven can be; And never did shadow pass fleeter Than it, and its strange melody; And I know I must hasten to meet her, "Yea, Sister! Thou callest to me!"
And I saw the light; 'twas not seeming, It flashed from the crown that she wore, And the brow, that with jewels was gleaming, My lips had kissed often of yore! And the eyes, that with rapture were beaming, Had smiled on me sweetly before.
And I saw the hand with the garland, Ethel's hand—holy and fair; Who went long ago to the far-land To weave me the wreath I shall wear; And to-night I look up to the star-land And pray that I soon may be there.[15]
NIGHT THOUGHTS [16]
Some reckon their age by years, Some measure their life by art,— But some tell their days by the flow of their tears, And their life, by the moans of their heart.
The dials of earth may show The length—not the depth of years; Few or many they come, few or many they go, But our time is best measured by tears.
Ah! not by the silver gray That creeps through the sunny hair, And not by the scenes that we pass on our way, And not by the furrows the fingers of care,
On forehead and face, have made: Not so do we count our years; Not by the sun of the earth, but the shade Of our souls, and the fall of our tears.
For the young are oft-times old, Though their brow be bright and fair; While their blood beats warm, their heart lies cold— O'er them the springtime, but winter is there.
And the old are oft-times young, When their hair is thin and white; And they sing in age, as in youth they sung, And they laugh, for their cross was light.
But bead by bead I tell The rosary of my years; From a cross to a cross they lead,—'tis well! And they're blest with a blessing of tears.
Better a day of strife Than a century of sleep; Give me instead of a long stream of life, The tempests and tears of the deep.
A thousand joys may foam On the billows of all the years; But never the foam brings the brave [17] heart home— It reaches the haven through tears.
For a general introduction to Father Ryan's poetry, see Chapter VI.
[Footnote 1: As stated in the sketch of Father Ryan, this poem strikes the keynote to his verse. It therefore properly opens his volume of poems. It became popular on its first publication, and was copied in various papers. It is here taken from the Religious Herald, Richmond, Virginia.]
[Footnote 2: The location of The Valley of Silence is given in the last stanza.]
[Footnote 3: This poem may be taken, in a measure, as autobiographic. In this stanza, and the two following ones, the poet refers to that period of his life before he resolved to consecrate himself to the priesthood.]
[Footnote 4: This indicates the general character of his poetry. Inspired in The Valley of Silence, it is sad, meditative, mystical, religious.]
[Footnote 5: Perhaps every poet has this experience. There come to him elusive glimpses of truth and beauty which are beyond the grasp of speech. As some one has sung:—
"Sometimes there rise, from deeps unknown, Before my inmost gaze, Far brighter scenes than earth has shown In morning's orient blaze; I try to paint the visions bright, But, oh, their glories turn to night!"]
[Footnote 6: This poem was first published in Father Ryan's paper, the Banner of the South, March 21, 1868, from which it is here taken. Coming so soon after the close of the Civil War, it touched the Southern heart.]
[Footnote 7: For a criticism of the versification of this stanza, see the chapter on Father Ryan.]
[Footnote 8: This note of pardon, in keeping with the poet's priestly character, is found in several of his lyrics referring to the war. In spite of his strong Southern feeling, there is no unrelenting bitterness. Thus, in The Prayer of the South, which appeared a week later, we read:—
"Father, I kneel 'mid ruin, wreck, and grave,— A desert waste, where all was erst so fair,— And for my children and my foes I crave Pity and pardon. Father, hear my prayer!"]
[Footnote 9: This was the poet's feeling in 1868. In a similar strain we read in The Prayer of the South:—
"My heart is filled with anguish deep and vast! My hopes are buried with my children's dust! My joys have fled, my tears are flowing fast! In whom, save Thee, our Father, shall I trust?"
Happily the poet lived to see a new order of things—an era in which vain regrets gave place to energetic courage, hope, and endeavor.]
[Footnote 10: This poem first appeared in the Banner of the South, April 4, 1868, and, like the preceding one, has been very popular in the South.]
[Footnote 11: Father Ryan felt great admiration for General Lee, who has remained in the South the popular hero of the war. In the last of his Sentinel Songs, the poet-priest pays a beautiful tribute to the stainless character of the Confederate leader:—
"Go, Glory, and forever guard Our chieftain's hallowed dust; And Honor, keep eternal ward, And Fame, be this thy trust! Go, with your bright emblazoned scroll And tell the years to be, The first of names to flash your roll Is ours—great Robert Lee."]
[Footnote 12: This poem was first published in the Banner of the South, April 25, 1868. It illustrates the profounder themes on which the poet loved to dwell, and likewise the Christian faith by which they were illumined.]
[Footnote 13: This mournful view of life appears frequently in Father Ryan's poems. In De Profundis, for example, we read:—
"All the hours are full of tears— O my God! woe are we! Grief keeps watch in brightest eyes— Every heart is strung with fears, Woe are we! woe are we! All the light hath left the skies, And the living, awe-struck crowds See above them only clouds, And around them only shrouds."]
[Footnote 14: This poem, as the two preceding ones, is taken from the Banner of the South, where it appeared June 13, 1868. It affords a glimpse of the tragical romance of the poet's life. The voice that he hears is that of "Ethel," the lost love of his youth. Her memory never left him. In the poem entitled What? it is again her spirit voice that conveys to his soul an ineffable word.]
[Footnote 15: This desire for death occurs in several poems, as When? and Rest. In the latter poem it is said:—
"'Twas always so; when but a child I laid On mother's breast My wearied little head—e'en then I prayed As now—for rest."]
[Footnote 16: This poem is taken from the Banner of the South, where it appeared June 29, 1870. In the volume of collected poems the title is changed to The Rosary of my Tears.]
[Footnote 17: "Brave" is changed to "lone" in the poet's revision.]
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